She continued after she swallowed. “Well, not entirely on his own; there’s Eseld. She’s the one who was responsible for poisoning me for months. And Felsteppe’s devil’s-spawn priest. Simon.”
“Your father—he’s dead now, I suppose.”
Dori stilled, licked the last taste of salt from her lips. “More than a year.” She glanced at his now deflated satchel and then back into his face. “Have you anything else?”
He shook his head. “I’ll go fishing in the river on the morrow.”
“You’ll help me rescue my son, now you’re here,” she said, not daring to pose the phrase as a question.
Constantine Gerard stared at her for a moment, and his green eyes were glittering, cold, nearly as cold as his tone when he spoke. “You must forgive me for my lack of enthusiasm for rescuing a child belonging to the man who killed my wife and my own son in the very rubble we now occupy. Frankly, Lady Theodora, I couldn’t care less what happens to your ill-gotten offspring.”
“You’d better,” she said, looking him up and down, “if you ever hope to have your lands restored to you.”
“What are you talking about?” Lord Gerard demanded.
“Glayer Felsteppe is petitioning Henry to purchase Benningsgate Castle. He’s been at it for months now. You’re quite behind in your taxes, Lord Gerard.” The man’s jaw flinched as he stared at her but said nothing, so Dori continued, her heart pounding as if it would leap from her chest. “If you should be successful in your mission to see him dead, you’ll have murdered a peer. If Felsteppe has purchased your lands, without proof of his treachery to justify your actions, Benningsgate will never revert to you. It will instead fall to . . .” She let the thought trail away.
“Felsteppe’s heir,” he finished, seemingly through clenched teeth. “I don’t care, though. My whole purpose in returning to England was to kill Glayer Felsteppe. I don’t care what happens to Benningsgate afterward. I don’t care what happens to me.”
She was nodding, her thoughts turning quickly in her head as she thought of something to say. “I understand. And there is no one else on earth who also wants to see Glayer Felsteppe dead as badly as I. But is that the legacy you wish to leave?” She affected a common accent. “ ‘Oh, aye—that poor boy what burned up in Benningsgate—a mercy, really. You know his father died a murderer and a traitor.’ ”
“I’m not a traitor,” Lord Gerard growled.
Dori rose from the cot and walked toward the table to stand across from him. She trembled in furious panic and it made her words low, breathy. “If you kill Felsteppe before I can reach my son, I’ll never get him back. He’ll be taken away as a ward and Thurston Hold—and Benningsgate—will be held by the Crown. Glayer Felsteppe will have succeeded in taking everything. Fromboth of us.”
He continued to stare at her so that Dori felt prickly chills race up her spine; she could see the hatred in his eyes.
“I know things about Felsteppe. Things he did in Jerusalem, people he killed, tried to have killed. My testimony could be the proof you need to ruin him forever. If you help me—”
“I don’t want him ruined—I want him dead.”
“The proof to justify your actions, then.”
His eyes narrowed. “Tell me now.”
Dori felt her eyebrows raise, and for the first time in months and months a genuine laugh bubbled at her lips. The sustenance must have made her giddy. “Oh, certainly. I’ll tell you everything I know so that you can kill him right off and be on your way.”
They stared at each other for a pair of moments before Lord Gerard spoke again. “What’s his name?”
Dori’s frown faltered. “I beg your pardon?”
“Your son; what is he called?”
Her throat constricted for just a moment. “Felsteppe had him christened Glander, I’m certain—he was set on it from the moment he learned I had conceived.”
“What would you have called him?”
“It doesn’t matter now, does it?” she said, folding up the cloth and the strings from the food. Who would her son be, if she ever got him back? Who would she be? She raised her face suddenly.
“William.” When Constantine looked at her she lifted her chin. “I would have called him William.”
He took the folded squares of cloth bundled with the string from her and returned them to his satchel. He cinched the bag and then looked back at her. “At the very least, you must tell me how it is that you came to be married to Glayer Felsteppe; I cannot fathom your father allowing you to wed such a monster.”
Dori felt her back stiffen and she turned from him, moving to the cot to straighten her coverlet. “I think I’ve allowed you enough liberties for the evening. Especially considering you’ve beaten me. I don’toweyou anything.”
“I believe you’ve more of my blood on your hands than the other way ’round. I have fed you. And in principle, you’re living in my house. Call it a tax.”
Dori spun around to fix him with a glare. “Yes? Well, arrest me or shut up.”
