Over the last five days, Vivienne had done her best to slow de Soules and his men down. She begged and pleaded nearly every hour for them to stop so that she could relieve her bladder.

After the first day, the men were grumbling about foolish women and their problems, but fearing de Soules’s wrath if he believed they were mistreating her, they stopped more often than not, and left her alone as well.

The problem was, slowing them down wasn’t enough. Oui, she was buying herself more time, but she held no hope that anyone was looking for her. Who—besides Kieran—would even know she’d been taken? And Kieran lay in the Highlands, cold and still, exposed to the elements, his life drained away.

She could not let herself dwell on that, though, else she break down once more. Nay, she needed to be strong for him. But she also needed to do more than simply bide her time.

So when the briny scent of the sea reached her as they rode southwest on the fifth day, she knew she had to act.

As dusk began to fall, de Soules drew them to a halt in a dense patch of woods. They stood on a rise overlooking a small village set along the sea.

“Ye, and ye,” he said, pointing to two of his men. “Move closer to the village. When it grows dark, see about liberating a birlinn for us.”

Even as she pretended to ignore his orders, Vivienne’s mind churned. They were traveling by water now? Her stomach lurched at the thought, but she managed to hold on to the meager contents of her stomach. This would be her best—and possibly last, depending on where they were headed—chance to escape.

She forced herself to remain docile and submissive as Bevin undid the bindings on her hands, as he always did, and led her away to relieve herself. With her hands free, she pulled away the gag, but let him guide her to a nearby shrub.

After de Soules had lashed out at him for touching her, Bevin was now in the habit of turning partially away and standing several paces back while she saw to her needs.

She pretended to lower herself, but the moment he shifted his gaze away, she straightened and bolted. Lifting her skirts to avoid getting them tangled in her legs, she ran down the slope toward the village, hoping that someone would come to her aid.

“Help!” she screamed. “Help me, plea—”

Suddenly it felt as though a boulder had crashed into her back, driving her into the muddy and leaf-strewn forest floor. All the wind rushed from her lungs at the contact, making stars dance before her eyes as she wheezed for breath.

Rough hands rolled her over, and she found herself staring up at Bevin’s coarse face.

He jammed the gag back into her mouth and tightened the strip of cloth around her head roughly. Then he hoisted her up and tossed her over his shoulder like little more than a sack of barley.

“Foolish bitch,” she heard de Soules hiss as Bevin strode back to the others.

To the chuckles of the other men, Bevin dumped her unceremoniously on the ground once more and began binding her again, but this time he tied her hands behind her back, then bound her feet and secured her wrists to her ankles.

She lay there helplessly as she was trussed up like a lamb to the slaughter, silent tears streaming down her face.

She had failed. But as dusk deepened to night and the men continued to wait in the woods, she forced herself to hold on to hope. She was still alive, she reminded herself. Her heart still beat, powered by the memory of Kieran’s love and his faith in her.

And because of that, she could never give up.

 

*    *    *    *

 

By the time Bevin lifted her from the birlinn and onto the dark, rocky shore of some unknown island, Vivienne felt wrung out and limper than a rag doll.

When the two lackeys de Soules had sent to the village had returned with confirmation that they’d secured a boat, Bevin had thrown her over his shoulder once more. They’d abandoned the horses, stalking toward the water under cover of night. She’d been tossed into the bottom of the birlinn, the soft rocking of the harbor instantly making her sick.

And when they’d hoisted the sail and reached open water, she’d retched until there was naught left in her stomach but bile, and then retched some more. Luckily, at her first heave, de Soules had removed her gag, else she would have choked on her own vomit. But non, he still wanted her to suffer more than that.

Blessedly, the journey had only lasted a few hours, and the ground felt solid under her feet once Bevin lifted her from the birlinn and cut the bindings on her ankles. He allowed her to walk but held her tightly by the elbow as the others dragged the small wooden birlinn onto the beach and into a small alcove in the island’s steep, rocky cliff sides.

“Give her to me,” de Soules snapped, grabbing Vivienne’s arm.

As he pulled her away from the beach, she tried to get her bearings. She hadn’t seen their approach to the island, for her head had been lowered over the side of the birlinn the entire voyage, but now she squinted through the dark to get a sense of their surroundings.

The rocky beach onto which they’d landed seemed to be the only entry point onto the island, for the rest of the island’s sides were sheer, tall cliffs rising up from the water. She could make out the faint tinge of greenery well above them on the dome-like top of the island, but she saw no way—other than to climb straight up the rocky cliff-faces—to reach it.

De Soules continued striding across the pebbly beach straight for one of those rock faces. It wasn’t until they had nearly run into it that Vivienne realized the stone opened up into a cave.

He dragged her through the cave’s mouth and deep into its dripping, dark recesses. At last, he released her, shoving her to the ground, and she heard him fumbling with two flint stones.

A spark caught and struggled to light an already-laid fire. De Soules must have been here before, for he seemed to be familiar with the island and knew the cave well enough to navigate it even in the dark.

“Is this where you plotted your rebellion?” she ventured, watching his face in the weak, flickering light.

He glanced at her. “Clever whore. Aye, it was one of many locations,” he commented. “But no’ a soul who came here with me before is still alive, so dinnae imagine that anyone is coming for ye.”

Despite her determination to remain brave, she couldn’t suppress a shudder. There was still hope, she reminded herself. There was always hope as long as she remained alive.

But as de Soules slowly rose to his feet and stalked toward her, panic seared through the last of her courage.

He was no longer the quiet, obsequious man she’d first met all those months ago at the French court. Of course, his outward sycophancy and courtly manners had all been a lie, meant to lull those around him into thinking he posed no threat, but even after he’d been found out for a traitor, he hadn’t borne the wild, feral look in his eyes that he had now.

In the five days she’d spent with him, he’d possessed knife-sharp focus at times, but at others it seemed his mind was hazy. She’d heard him mumbling to himself more than once, his words running in circles and his thoughts seemingly scattered.

Perhaps his time in Scone’s dungeon had not only stripped him of his fine clothing, titles, and polished mannerisms, but had also chewed away at his sanity. Non, it likely wasn’t just imprisonment that had warped him, but also his obsession with revenge.

Whatever the case, she was alone with him now, at his mercy—and he’d already made it clear that he planned to show her none.

“There is no one to hear ye scream anymore, bitch,” he said, sinking on his haunches before her. “Except me, and I’ve been looking forward to the sound for a long while.”

She sucked in a breath, trying to scoot back from him. “You are mad.”

“Nay,” he replied, “Just giving ye a taste of what ye did to me.”

“All I did was dose you with a draught to lay you low, to force you to remain close to the garderobe,” she said. “I never tortured you.”

“Ye humiliated me!” he hissed, his control slipping. He drew a breath to calm himself. “And for that, ye’ll pay.”

He reached for her, but to her surprise, he merely caressed her cheek with his grimy fingers. She flinched back, but there was nowhere to go with the cold, wet cave wall behind her. Abruptly, he drew his hand back and slapped her hard across the face.

She gasped and sputtered, stunned.

“Och, I think ye can do better than that,” he said with a grin. “I said I want to hear ye scream.”

He drew back his hand again, this time balling it into a fist. Her mind scrambled wildly for some way to stop him, delay him—anything.

“You know that Bevin touched me again, don’t you?” she blurted.

His fist halted halfway to her face. “What?”

She’d seen the way de Soules interacted with the others. He hardly spoke to the other men and didn’t even seem to know their names, except for Bevin. It had made her surmise that the remaining men meant nothing to de Soules. They were likely only hired mercenaries.

But Bevin was different. Though the brute did de Soules’s bidding, and he seemed to be the man’s only true ally, de Soules didn’t fully trust him. Based on how de Soules had reacted to Bevin hitting her before, there was a chance that the wedge between them could be exploited. Words began pouring from her.

“Before, when I tried to escape,” she continued hurriedly. “When he tackled me, he grabbed my breast. Then he bent one of my fingers back so hard that I feared he’d break it and made me promise not to tell you.”

In the low light of the fire, de Soules’s dark eyes flared with rage. “I told him no’ to touch what is mine,” he breathed.

Oui, he was unhinged, but Vivienne just might be able to use that to save herself from his torment—for a time, anyway.

“That is why he told me not to tell you,” she repeated.

De Soules suddenly jerked to his feet and stormed out of the cave. From Bevin’s confused shout and then his grunts of pain, she knew de Soules had set upon him.

A long while later, de Soules stumbled into the light of the fire. His knuckles were rubbed raw and he was so exhausted that he staggered like a drunkard. He slumped down before the fire, breathing hard.

Slowly, the other men began filtering cautiously into the cave. They kept their distance from de Soules, eyeing him warily and muttering about needing more coin if they were expected to stay here indefinitely. Bevin slunk in after them, his face a swollen, bloody mess.

De Soules seemed oblivious to them all. He sat hunched over the fire, staring into the flames. After a while, he lay down on the cave floor, pulling his cloak around him, and fell asleep.

It seemed she had earned herself a few hours of peace. Vivienne leaned back against the cave wall, succumbing to exhaustion with a prayer of thanks on her lips.