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We shared an amused smile before she took my hand, urging me to follow. Then she yanked us from the room in a full sprint. “They were this way.”
I followed her from the Red Chambers and into a side hall.
“Why aren’t you on the battlefield,” she managed to ask over her shoulder.
“They were doing fine; didn’t need me.”
She glanced around again. “You felt me in distres
s and abandoned them, did you?”
I shrugged. “We were winning. Frankly, it was getting boring out there.”
With a roll of her eyes, she faced forward again and tightened her grip on my hand. “In here,” she said, steering me toward the open door of the Blue Chambers where a man’s scream flowed out to greet us.
Worried, we rushed inside together, only to skid to a halt side by side, shocked to see what we found.
In one corner of the room, Yasmin, Nicolette, who was holding a swaddled bundle to her chest, and a maid huddled together as they watched Allera in the center of the room where she stood, placing her foot in the middle of a Far Shore soldier’s chest, so she could gain enough leverage to pull the sword free of his throat that she’d just impaled him with. Two more Far Shore soldiers lay slain around her while three dead Donnelly guards were slumped lifeless near each entrance.
Pushing the dead Far Shore soldier to the floor with her foot as she freed her weapon, Allera huffed out a breath and swept a sweat-clogged piece of dark hair out of her eyes, only succeeding in smearing blood across her cheek. Then she turned to us.
“I’ve got these three,” she panted, half out of breath. “And I assume you pair took out the other one. So, then, where are the rest of our boys? Is Brentley—”
But before she could even finish the question, her husband’s voice carried down the hall and into the room.
“Here,” he ordered. “Carry him in here. And have a care. Gently now.”
I exchanged a questioning frown with Vienne before we hurried to the door together and out of the room, to find the hall packed full with soldiers and servants. The crowd was so thick it was impossible to tell who the group of men was carrying into the dining hall. Brentley urged them to go quickly, declining the offer of a healer as he went.
“What the hell?” I said, striding forward.
Why was everyone back inside the castle, not out on the battlefield?
“Brentley?”
He swung around, unfiltered rage filling his expression. “You!” he roared, swinging out a fist. “You damn bastard.” I ducked even as he demanded, “Where the hell did you go?”
“I felt Vienne in distress,” I said simply, lifting my hands in peace when he looked as if he may swing again. “So I had to check on the ladies. And it’s a good thing I did. More Far Shore men than we originally thought had stolen inside the keep when they kidnapped Anniston. But they’re all dead now. What happened here? Why is no one out on the field, still fighting?”
“Because the battle’s over,” Brentley boomed. “It ended almost as soon as you ran off. Most of them fled, but the few who stayed were rounded up and chained to be dealt with later, just as you instructed.”
I nodded, beyond impressed by what had been done without me.
Brentley didn’t seem so pleased with his own accomplishments, though. He continued to glare as if I’d betrayed him.
“What the hell is your problem then?” I demanded, growing annoyed when he stalked toward me to push me in the chest.
“My problem is that you left,” he roared. “If you’d just fucking stayed, Caulder might not have been wounded.”
My mouth fell open. “Wounded? How bad?”
His anger drained away as sorrow filled him. “Fatally,” he finished in a choked voice.
“Caulder?” Nicolette said in a small voice as she came up behind us and heard the report.
“What! Where?” Yasmin shrieked, hurrying past me and Brentley to streak into the dining hall.
When a scream followed from within, Vienne took Anniston from Nicolette’s arms so the young princess could hurry in to see her brother as well.
