“Greetings, Milady,” Hans the guard whispered, staring up at his mistress with dark, hollow eyes.
“You!”
“Aye. Me.”
A thunderstorm of twisted feelings was raging through Ayla. She had always liked Hans. He had been quiet and polite, even kind at times. Never particularly devoted to her, but steadfast enough. If asked a minute ago, before she saw his face here in the gloomy dungeon, she would have called him a good man. She would certainly not have called him a twisted snake of a traitor.
“Hans…”
She stared down at him, and he stared back unflinchingly. He had the gall to look into her eyes! He, who had betrayed them all! He’d had the gall to step up to her and tell her he was sorry Sir Isenbard died, when it was probably his fault all along! Ayla felt hot blood pound in her ears. If there were any justice in the world, this man’s eyeballs should shrivel and his hands drop off!
Enraged, she took a step forward, forgetting for the moment that she was a lady and violence was not what God had ordained for her. She raised her hand, wanting to slap the guard. No, not slap him—beat him until he hurt as much outside as she was hurting inside. But then she realized that was simply not possible, and her hand fell limply to her side.
“You betrayed us!” she said in a voice as cold as ice.
Hans nodded. “Yes.”
“You would have handed us all over to the Margrave!”
“Yes!”
“You are a despicable worm without a shred of honor!”
“Yes.”
What in the name of the Holy Virgin… It riled Ayla how he didn't bother to deny her charges, didn't even seem to feel guilty about them! Her cheeks heated, and she took another step towards him.
“I could have you executed for your treason!”
Hans nodded placidly. “I know.”
“Then why in God's name did you commit it?”
“Because,” Hans said, looking directly into her eyes without flinching, “I knew that if I didn't commit treason, me and my family were all going to be killed once the castle has fallen.”
There was a moment of heavy silence in the dungeon. The guards around Hans threw each other uneasy glances and shuffled around. Even Captain Linhart, Sir Waldar, and her other two vassals looked disturbed. Only Reuben remained completely unruffled, glaring at the traitorous guard on the floor with a force that, by all rights, should have incinerated him long ago.
“All of you,” Ayla said, feeling as though the floor beneath her had vanished and she was falling into a bottomless, dark abyss. “Out!”
It took a few moments for the meaning of her words to sink in.
“You mean…leave you alone? With that traitor?” Linhart's mouth dropped open. “Milady, you cannot be serious.”
“Do I sound as though I am joking?”
“Um…no, Milady, but…”
“Leave us! Now!” She didn't make her voice especially loud or commanding. But it was reinforced with the strength of the feelings that were fighting inside her—despair and determination, side by side.
All of the men turned and left the room without another word. Only one remained.
“I won't leave you alone with him,” Reuben declared.
Ayla felt her heart throb at the emotion in his words. Of course, most of it was bloodlust, no doubt, but maybe, just maybe, some of it was love, too.
Oh, what she felt for him…she could hardly comprehend it in her feelings, let alone give voice to it. It was a longing, deep and instinctual, that went beyond simple affection. It was a need as basic as that for air to breathe and light to see by. Everything in her ached to let him stay. But she couldn't let anyone else hear what would now surely follow.
“Yes, you will, Reuben,” she said, trying to keep her voice empty of emotion and failing in the end. “Please,” she added in a choked whisper. “For me.”
He hesitated a moment longer. Then he threw his arms up into the air with an exasperated growl.
“Satan's hairy ass, girl, I hope you know what you're doing.” He started to march towards the door, then suddenly stopped and turned around again.
“Reuben, please…” she began again, but he interrupted her.
“Oh, I'm going. I just have to tell our friend something first.” With a few quick steps, he was back beside the quivering heap that was Hans the guard. He picked him up by the scruff of his neck as if he weighed no more than a chicken and growled, “Listen very closely. You know the worst you have to expect from Lady Ayla?”
The guard nodded.
“Very well. And now let me tell you something: Lady Ayla is not the one you should be worried about right now. I am. If by any chance you should decide to make a dash for freedom and take her as a hostage, harm her in any way, or touch one hair on her head, I will…” He bent to the ear of the man and whispered a few words so low that Ayla couldn't understand. What little color there had been in Hans’ face drained away at once. His eyes grew big, and his hands began to tremble.
“You…you wouldn't,” he gasped.
“Look into my eyes,” Reuben commanded, his voice as hard as steel, and the guard did as he was bid.
“Well?” Reuben asked, staring into the guards eyes without blinking. “Would I?”
The guard nodded.
“And will you do anything stupid while I'm not here?”
The guard shook his head.
“Very well.”
Like a sack of turnips, Reuben let the man drop on the floor and marched out of the room, slamming the door behind him. All that remained was gloom and the sound of Hans' harsh breathing. The one torch in a torch-bracket on the wall did next to nothing to illuminate the large room. When Hans raised his head to look at Ayla again, all it did was throw eerie shadows over his face that made his expression harder to read than it already was.
“Hans. Get up.” Ayla waved a hand, and he got to his feet. He was about the same height as she. They ended up looking directly into each other's eyes.
What Ayla saw shook her to the very core. She would have expected him to be either sneering and villainous or filled with guilt and anguish. But he was neither of these things. He simply looked tired.
“Why did you do it?” she asked in a voice that didn't sound like her own. “Why did you betray me? Betray all of us?”
His look didn't change.
“Milady,” he said softly “there are about six-hundred men around the castle. We, the defenders, are only sixty. They have plenty of food. We are on rations and will soon begin to starve. You have been the most courageous, benevolent, and loving lady to us that a people could wish for. You have sheltered us, fought for us, risked your life for us. Yet this does not change one fact: the castle is going to be taken by the enemy.”
“No!” Ayla growled, gritting her teeth, ferociously trying to cling on to her hopes. But it was useless! Hans was only confirming what a dark part of her own mind had been telling her for weeks. And hearing it from the lips of this strange, sad traitor made it only worse, for he had no reason to lie, no motivation to encourage her in her struggle and paint the situation in any other light than the real one. “No, we have a chance. We can win. Somehow, we can! We just have to…”
Her voice dwindled as she looked into Hans’s face and saw nothing but pity there. Pity, and maybe self-loathing.
“The castle is going to be taken,” he repeated. “And when it is, our fates are going to go different ways. You, Milady, might be forced to marry the Margrave, but we—the common folk, those who dared to fight—we will be facing death, rape, and torture. I know enough of war to know that.”
Tears came to Ayla's eyes, tears of sadness and of rage. She knew it, too. But she couldn't let herself think about it, or she would go mad.
“So you betrayed us?” she hissed. “Just like that?”
Hans nodded.
“I have always been a loyal liegeman. But then, one night, as I was holding watch alone at a corner of the outer wall, a voice called up to me from the dark. It was one of the enemy, and he made me an offer I couldn't refuse.”
“Your life, I suppose?”
“No.” With a sad smile, he shook his head. “The lives of my wife and my two little girls.”
Ayla felt ice flood her veins. For a moment, for one terrifying, endless moment, she didn't know what to say to this man. He was the traitor, she was the judge, he had done wrong, she was doing right—yet, for that single moment, it was she that felt guilty.
“So you hung the rope from the wall?” Her lips were moving automatically now, spouting out some senseless words in the attempt to keep her mind from thinking about the inevitable.
“With the grappling hook, yes. I found the hook among some old gear down here in the dungeons and went to a particular spot on the wall which the Margrave's soldier had described to me. There, I hung the rope over the wall with the grappling hook to make it look like it had been thrown up from the foot of the wall.”
“And the next attack? The one that killed…”
Sir Isenbard. She couldn't bring herself to say his name. It was too much.
Hans shook his head.
“I didn't have anything to do with that. They became impatient and tried without me. Milady…I truly meant what I said. I am sorry about Sir Isenbard.”
And, for some strange reason, Ayla believed him.
She swallowed. “Your wife…your two little girls…what are their names?”
Sudden, fear flashed across the face of the guard who, just a moment ago, had seemed so composed. He threw himself at her feet in supplication.
“Please, Milady, I beg you, do not harm them! Punish me! Torture me! Do anything you want to me, only please do not harm them, please! Take me!”
“You have already been taken,” Ayla reminded him, her blue eyes flashing coldly. “Their names, Hans! I can find out easily enough from any of the villagers.”
Now it was his turn to swallow.
“M-my wife is called Madalena, and my two girls are Anna and Katherine. Please, Milady, I beg of you, you can do anything to me! Do you have a rack? I'll go on the rack if it will save them, I'll do anything, please, I…”
“Your family will not be harmed,” Ayla said. Inside, she wondered how she managed to keep her voice steady. Maybe because she felt so numb inside. Was this the price you paid for becoming a leader?
Well, at least she could be the right kind of leader.
“Your family will not be harmed,” she repeated, taking deep, steadying breaths. “Do not fear, Hans. I am not the Margrave von Falkenstein.”
He looked up at her, tears in his eyes.
“I know, Milady. You are the true daughter of your father.”
“Which soon enough will not matter anymore, when the castle is taken, will it?” She said, her voice brittle.
He bowed his head. “I'm sorry, Milady.”
Again, she believed him.
Slowly, as if in a dream, she wandered past him towards the door. As she opened it and was just about to step out, Hans asked, “Milady? What will happen now?”
She paused. “To the castle, or to you?”
“Both.”
“I do not know.”
Then she stepped out into the corridor.