Page 71 of Dancing On Air

She whirled around and groaned inwardly when she saw Lord Sampson approaching with his entourage of guards all around him.

“Lord Sampson,” she said with a curtsy. To think she grew up here and had looked up to the man at one time made her want to retch.

“I’ve invited everyone to the grand festival. And in case you haven’t heard, the main event is the hanging of that young thief,” he said with a chuckle, as if the thought of killing a boy amused him. “I’ve scheduled it for this afternoon. I figured the bigger the crowd, the better. The gallows are always a big draw. What fun.”

“Fun? I don’t understand how you can think killing anyone, let alone a young boy, is fun!”

“He’s not a boy. He’s a young man. It’s a shame he won’t live long enough to even grow a beard.”

That made his guards laugh, and caused Eleanor’s stomach to tighten.

“If you’ll excuse me,” she said, trying to walk away, but Sampson grabbed her arm and pulled her along with him.

“You’ll stay by me. I want to see your expression when your past betrothed is the one to hang that pitiful orphan boy.”

Her head jerked upward. “Why would you think Connor would be the one doing the execution? After all, his father always does it.”

“Well, how the hell is the man going to pull the lever when he’s dead?” He laughed again.

“How do you know he’s dead? Who told you?”

He stopped laughing and looked over to one of his guards.

“I told him,” said the guard.

“And how did you know?” asked Eleanor.

“I was at the hangman’s house earlier and his son told me.”

“That’s a lie. I was there when the guards arrived and remember the guards clearly. You were not one of them.”

“My guards report everything to me. They all know what is going on,” said Sampson, making Eleanor realize it probably was true. “Besides, what does it matter?” asked Sampson. “Let’s go closer to the gallows while we wait. The anticipation is making me anxious.”

Eleanor saw Connor and Finnian sneaking through the crowd and Sampson was headed right toward them.

“Lord Sampson,” she called out, stopping him is his tracks.

“What is it?” He turned back to look at her, thankfully not seeing Finnian getting into the back of the wagon.

“I was… wondering. I mean, what other things will be happening today? At the festival?”

Raven drove the wagon right past them, directly behind Sampson. He didn’t even look. She kept the man’s attention until from the corners of her eyes she saw the wagon passing through the main gate.

“You’ll just have to wait and find out.”

A serving wench walked by holding a tray of wooden goblets filled with wine.

“Wait,” said Sampson, taking two goblets and handing one of them to Eleanor, keeping the other for himself. “Lady Eleanor, I see you haven’t yet taken a husband. Why is that?”

“I’m not interested in getting married.”

“Well, you have been living at the abbey for years now, yet you have not taken any vows. Why is this?”

“I-I’m not planning on becoming a nun. I just take care of the orphans,” she told him, lifting the cup to her mouth and then stopping, remembering that this man liked to poison people. She didn’t want to take a chance. “One of those orphans is the boy I’ve place with a family. The same one you have condemned to death.”

“I see.” He took a sip of wine, watching her over the rim of his goblet. That told her the wine wasn’t poisoned, but still she didn’t want to chance it.

When he turned to talk to his guard, she dumped the wine behind her when she pretended to cough. Then when he turned back around, she pretended to have drunk it all, plopping the cup down on the tray of a passing servant.