Page 53 of Honor Requires

“Yes, what about them?”

“On the night we are to leave, we can trim each other’s beards and hair. We will look less…vagabond-like.” Darcy’s mouth curved faintly, though there was little true amusement in it. “As we follow the coast, perhaps we might find somewhere to wash.” Lucien gestured to the dirt and grime on his hands.

“Yes, it will be no easy thing to wash away years of filth.” Darcy could scarcely remember what it was like to be clean. The memory seemed almost unreal, like something belonging to another life. “When shall we go for the treasure?”

“If fortune favors us, we might secure some of it soon after we leave Yarmouth. The treasure is secreted just past the Needles in Alum Bay.”

The Needles were chalky stacks of rock that formed a small, nearly unreachable area to the west of the Isle of Wight. They would be required to pass through to reach the place on Alum Bay where the treasure was hidden. The location was treacherous enough that smugglers would not use it and most disregarded it completely. “And you managed to anchor a boat there? Incredible.”

“It was difficult. The waters are rough, and one must be careful not to capsize. However, I know a path through the stacks to where the treasure was hidden. We might secure enough coins to begin.”

Darcy nodded slowly, considering. “Is that how you were caught as a spy?”

“Yes. I was leaving the stacks when a boat filled with soldiers being ferried to Yarmouth came upon me. They did not believe I was merely fishing. The few coins I had taken with me were confiscated.” Lucien shook his head, frustration flickering briefly across his features. “We will need to be more cautious than I was that first time. Perhaps we might hire someone to help us retrieve everything.”

“There seems to be less activity here at Yarmouth in the last year. Perhaps the area is less populated now.” Darcy wondered if England was still at war with Napoleon. My cousin may very well be dead. He did not wish to consider it. The thought came unbidden and unwelcome, pressing against the fragile control he maintained over his mind.

For a moment, neither spoke. The silence between them was not uncomfortable, but heavy, filled with all that remained uncertain, all that could still go wrong.

They dug a bit more that night, Lucien reciting his lessons and Darcy telling stories of his childhood. The rhythm of it had become familiar, almost necessary. Lucien’s voice, steady and instructive, offered a structure to their labor, while Darcy’s recollections—Pemberley’s grounds in the spring, Georgiana at the pianoforte, Elizabeth’s laughter carried on a sea breeze—gave it purpose.

He spoke of home as though describing a place he might reach again, though some part of him feared it had already slipped beyond his grasp.

They returned to their cells in the early hours of the morning, both sinking onto their beds, exhausted.

Darcy knew the moment they broke through.

The final stone shifted beneath his hands with a resistance that had become familiar over weeks of labor, and then, at last, it yielded.

Not fully, not enough to free them, but enough.

A breath of air, cold and sharp, slipped through the narrow gap, carrying with it a scent so distinct, so achingly familiar, that it struck him motionless.

Salt. The ocean lay beyond.

He did not move at once. For a few seconds, he remained crouched within the cramped tunnel, his hand pressed against the loosened stone, his breath held, fearing any sudden motion might undo what they had accomplished. The air against his face was different—alive in a way the prison’s stagnant atmosphere had never been—and it stirred something deep within him, something he had long since buried beneath necessity and endurance.

“Darcy?” Lucien’s whisper came from behind, edged with impatience and anticipation alike.

“We are through,” he replied.

Carefully, deliberately, he eased the stone outward just enough to widen the opening. He leaned forward, angling his body so he might see beyond without dislodging the carefully balanced stones that concealed their work. The view was narrow, constrained by the thickness of the wall, but it was enough.

The sea stretched before him, dark and restless beneath the night sky, its surface broken by the faint glimmer of reflected starlight. The ground below the opening dropped away sharply—no more than a meter, but enough to require care. To one side, rising stark against the darkness, stood a guard tower, its outline unmistakable. A lantern burned faintly within, casting a dim circle of light that swept slowly across the ground as the sentry within moved.

Darcy withdrew at once, his mind already turning over what he had seen.

“There is a drop,” he said in a low voice. “Not far, but enough to warrant caution. And a guard tower to the east. We must avoid it entirely.”

Lucien exhaled, the sound almost a laugh. “But we have done it.”

“Not now,” Darcy said, though there was no true reproach in his tone. “We will not risk everything by haste.”

They worked then with renewed care, loosening the surrounding stones just enough that they might be removed swiftly when the time came while leaving them in place so that nothing would appear amiss from within or without. Each stone was tested, shifted, then carefully reset until the opening was prepared but hidden, ready to yield at a moment’s notice.

When there was nothing more to be done, Darcy replaced the final stone and leaned back, his body aching from the strain, his hands raw and unsteady.

“We return,” he said. “Tomorrow night, we leave.”