Page 9 of A Knight in Tarnished Armor

There was only half a moon out the following night, when William stood near the eastern side of the outer walls of Ardenwood Castle. Yet there was enough moonlight for him to see once he had entered the inner bailey. He moved swiftly and silently, uncertain if the guards had been warned by Arden.

She had insisted he meet her by the chapel. He counted buildings and found the second story arched window she had described.

He whistled once. Nothing. He waited. Still nothing. Women. He whistled again. Nothing. He counted to ten. To fifty. By the time—the long time—he'd reached one hundred he was not pleased. He looked around.

The bailey was quiet. Surely Arden would not be so foolish as to attack the king's man. He drew his dagger and flattened against the rough stones of the chapel wall. Slowly, silently, he eased along the stone wall. His instincts had never before failed him. He could always feel it when something was afoot. He sensed that nothing was amiss. Yet . . .

He rounded the corner.

A second later a screech rent the air.

William froze.

Like a demon from hell, a small shadow flew out of the darkness. Right at him. He raised his dagger and spun around. Sharp knife tip pricks dug into the back of his neck. The claws of some kind of crude weapon. He dropped to a squat, lashing out with his dagger. With his other arm he reached around and grabbed his attacker by the fur.

Fur? He held a handful of squirming and screeching fur. Cat fur.

"Yeooow!" The cat bit him.

"God's teeth!" he spat, holding the animal by the scruff of its neck, ready to fling the cat to Kingdom Come if the cursed thing bit him again.

Lady Linnet came scurrying around the corner. She stopped abruptly. "Oh! You caught him!"

"Where the devil have you been?" he gritted.

"Poor Swithun got loose and I had to find him. But now you've found him for me." She sounded remarkably cheery.

At that moment, poor Swithun had turned his head around and wedged his sharp feline teeth into William's wrist. He held the cat out to her. "Here. Do something with it. I don't intend to stand here until dawn."

She took the cat and hugged it to her as if it were some holy relic, then she spun around. "I'll be back down in a moment," she called over a shoulder. "All I must do is fetch my things.”

He grunted some response and stood there, his blood still racing from combat with a cat, something that didn't sit well with him or his warrior's pride.

But when she had turned a moment before, another image flooded his mind—Linnet spinning on one bare foot as she sang in the woods. And his pride didn't matter quite as much as it had just a moment before.

A few seconds later, around the corner of the chapel, there was a loud thud. If she were truly trying to covertly escape, the whole castle would have known it. He shook his head and walked around the corner.

Thud!

Several large satchels lay like lumps on the ground. He looked up at the window just as another even larger cloth sack flew out the window and hit the pile below. He stared at the bundles. There was a commotion before another sack hit the ground.

Arms crossed, he leaned against the wall and watched. Eight more sacks flew out the window.

"Pssst!"

He shoved off from the wall and looked up just as Lady Linnet poked her head through the opening.

"Pssst!"

"What?"

"I'm going to lower this down. 'Tis very fragile."

Fragile? He looked at the sacks and doubted there was anything left in the castle.

He was wrong.

She lowered a small willow cage by a rope until it dangled just above the ground. "Pssst!"