Her heart was slowing, slowing…
And at its final, sluggish beat, as the pale hands laid hold of her, Caris realized that although there would indeed be blackness, it was far from over. There would be no sleep, no peace for her in the handsof her victims.
For the rest of eternity.
And the numbness, atlast, left her.
Epilogue
“Well, let’s just say he’s going to have a dreadful headache when he wakes,” James said with a grin for everyone seated around Lady Margaret’s grand table.
“One would think a professional hangman would be more aware of his surroundings,” Tavish mused.
James shrugged. “I left him a ha’penny in his shoe.”
“I couldn’t be at all certain that we’d arrive in time,” Lady Margaret interjected. “When Stephen recognized Mister Montrose attempting to breach my house, their quick thinking saved the day. How my steward laid hands to an appropriate costume—”
“What would you have done if you’d had to pull the lever?”
Padraig interrupted.
“Lucan was going to stop him,” Effie quipped and the warmth in her gaze was worth more than all theking’s fortune.
“Fat lot of good that would have done.” James snorted. “Delayed it, perhaps. But I’d already cut the noose.” James grinned, so obviously—and rightly—pleased with himself. “Tommy might have broken a leg, but I was hoping he’d be stunned enough by surviving being hung that he would lie still beneath the platform till I came for him. I daresay I couldn’t have done it without my newmate, though.”
Lucan raised his goblet as he sought out the blushing steward standing to the rear of Lady Margaret’s seat. “To Stephen,and to James!”
Stephen inclined his head graciously toward Lucan. “I do hope all is forgiven now, Sir Lucan.”
“If only we had trusted each other, eh?” Lucan suggested.
The steward’s only response was a mild grin.
“Pass the pitcher if you would, Sir Lucan,” Bob asked, seated toLucan’s left.
He reached across and accommodated the young man as the conversation about them rose and mingled. “I know everyone’s tale but yours, Bob. Chumley and James; Rose and Kit. Something at least of Dana. Gilboe, Winnie. But you’ve never told me how you came to be in the band. Why you’re known as Bob theButcher’s Boy.”
He shook his head and looked down, his pale, round face a mask of sorrow beneath his orange hair. “It’s a bad tale, I’m afraid.” He pinched off a piece and bread, popped it into his mouth and chewed before glancing up at Lucan. “I’m not proud of it. Don’t know that I should tell you, lest you thinkpoorly of me.”
“I can take it,” Lucan assured him kindly, and he could feel the gazes of everyone at the table on them now—especially Effie’s. Always Effie’s. “If it’s something you wish to share. You’re not obligated, of course.”
Bob nodded thoughtfully. “Most of ‘em know already, I suppose. Well, you see…it’s all because of me dad, of course.”
Lucan felt his brows draw together and he bracedhimself. “Yes?”
“He’s…a butcher.”
Lucan blinked. “You mean he’skilled people.”
“Naw, mate—I mean he cuts up venison and lamb and the like for folks. He and mum live just overin Newcastle.”
Lucan felt his head draw back. “But how did you end up…?”
“Ah,” Bob shook his head again with a grimace. “I didn’t want to be a butcher. We’d no money for a commission as one of the king’s men. I knew Gilboe from the abbey, and Effie agreed to let me stay. So I battle evil and eat stew. And I’vevery littleto do with entrails.” He leaned forward to half whisper conspiratorially. “A mite squeamish, you see. Keep that bit to yourself,if you would.”
Lucan took a moment to process his surprise and then gave a huff of laughter that grew into a sincere guffaw, his ears reddening with how he’d been bracingfor the worst.
To think, after all this, Bob the Butcher’s Boy was likely the most normal of them all.
