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Esme shrugged her slender shoulders. “Desperation will make a man do things he would not normally do,” she said. “My father has a large fortress and a big army, but that was not enough against the usurper. At least, that was what I was told. One of my father’s men took me from the convent where I had been living and brought me to Scotland. He told me many things I had not known since I had been away.”

Titus eyed her strangely. “Ye were in a convent?”

She nodded. “Since I was very young,” she said. “Iglesia de Santa Brigida. It was a school in the province that every noble family sent their young girls to. We learned to read, to write, to dance, to paint. My father’s man came and took me away from it when I was eleven years of age, escorting me across the sea to a place where I did not know the language. He was supposed to return with the army promised by the duke, but he did not.”

“How do ye know?”

She snorted ironically. “Mayhap I did not speak the language, but I did not need to in order to see that my father’s man, and the escort with him, was killed,” she said. “The next morning, their horses were still in the stable yard and I saw men taking away something in a cart, out into the fields. They were bodies covered with straw because I saw a foot sticking out. My father’s men were killed because the duke had no intention of honoring his part of the bargain.”

Titus was coming to feel the slightest bit guilty. Guilty because he thought he’d had it the worst of anyone at Culroy Castle but, clearly, there were others with a more tragic story to tell. He leaned back in the chair, pondering what he’d been told.

“Why did yer father never come for ye, then?” he asked. “If he had a large army, surely he could bring it tae Scotland and retrieve ye.”

Her eyes started to fill with tears again, but she blinked them back furiously. “I do not know,” she said honestly. “It has been nine years since I last saw my father, and I have received no word from him since that time. When his men were killed and did not return to Santacara, I thought he would come for me then, but he did not. It is my fear that he is dead, but even so, I must go home. I must discover for myself what has become of him, and I have waited these many years to escape Culroy. When I saw you, I knew the time was right. Please, my lord. Please… help me.”

Titus looked at her. In his world, Titus only helped Titus. That was the only thing of importance to him. He’d long bred the emotion out of himself, the ability to feel anything, the ability to show and to accept compassion. That process began as a young lad when he’d first been taken hostage at Culroy, and it continued to this day. It wasn’t selfishness.

It was self-preservation.

He stood up from the chair.

“Why me?” he asked. “Ye are presuming a great deal by coming here tae ask me such things. I’m not responsible for ye.”

Her expression fell and Titus resisted the urge to recant everything he’d just said. But something held him back, perhaps that young lad who had refused to make friends or grant favors. He wasn’t willing to risk himself for this woman. The only risks he ever took were for himself, for his greater gain. As he wrestled with his thoughts, Esme lowered her gaze.

“I know you are not responsible for me,” she said. “I understand that completely. And I do realize that I am asking a great deal of someone I do not know, but given that you were a hostage at Culroy, surely you can understand my desperation. Did you not wish to escape the entire time you were there?”

He had. Every day of those long years he’d spent at that horrible place. “I was released, eventually,” he said. “If ye go back, mayhap they’ll release ye eventually, too.”

Her features hardened. “After what I just told you?” she said. “Ridiculous. They want me for that barbarian of a son so he will inherit my lands. They will never release me because I am of great value to them.”

Titus knew that bunch enough to know that she spoke the truth. Greed flowed through their veins instead of blood. He saw that during his time spent there, something that had rubbed off on him because he was greedy, too. He was a professional fighter and he’d earned a great deal of money over the years because, according to the Dukes of Ayr, money was the most important thing in the world. He’d learned that lesson well. But as he looked at her, a thought occurred to him.

He had spent the past seven years forgetting what his captors had done to him. Seven years of pushing hate from his heart, seven years of struggling to find a place in a world where he didn’t fit in. There were many to blame for his issues, including his own father, but his worthlessness as a human being had never been so pressed upon him as it had during those captive years.

It began to occur to him that if he helped Esme, he would be obtaining some satisfaction against those who had persecuted him for so long. In helping her escape, he would be ruining their plans for Conan. Anything he could ruin for that wretch, he would. It would be a small victory against people who had treated him so poorly, a chance to seek some satisfaction.

With that in mind, why wouldn’t he help her?

Certainly, there would be risks involved. He would be bringing someone into the Ludus Caledonia who did not belong, someone viewed as a possession by the Duke of Ayr. It was, in essence, stealing.

But no one needed to know that.

“Very well, m’lady,” he said slowly. “What help did ye have in mind?”

Esme straightened in her chair, shocked that he would suddenly be receptive to her request. From the expression on her face, she had been positive he was about to turn her out.

Now, he was asking her how he could help her.

“I… I will need to earn passage to Navarre,” she said. “I had money at Culroy that I had earned, but it was stolen, so I need to find a way to earn money to pay for my passage. I was taught to read and write Spanish, Catalan, and French in the convent, and the duchess’ ladies taught me how to read and write English. I can teach others for a small price.”

“Do ye want tae teach me, then? I already know how tae read and write, lass.”

She looked over his shoulder to the complex of the Ludus Caledonia outside the door. “Then mayhap you can help me find others who will pay for my tutelage,” she said. “Though I’ve not really seen it, this looks like a big place. Surely there are people here who want to learn to read and write.”

He shrugged. “Mayhap there is, but if ye go about it that way, it will take ye a long time tae earn passage,” he said. “If I give ye the money, ye can go now.”

There was something in her surprised expression that suggested she very much wanted to take him up on his offer. But the excitement in her eyes quickly faded.