The Strength of Baffin Read online

  “You nearly beat one of my guards to death over a week ago--What? You think I didn’t know?--and had the audacity to return to do it again? You must not know how brutal I can really be.”

  Tethran grunted on a sardonic chuckle, though he hadn’t a clue from where he mustered the strength, all of a sudden, to be amused. “What angers you more, milord? That I brutalized your guards or that you know I’d never agree to be one?”

  The alderman snarled, and shoved upwards, connecting him in the face with a sharp swing of his booted foot. Tethran felt a million sparks of pain explode through him and his body sagged, his knees grinding painfully against the coarse floor. Gasping for air, he felt his eye water and a bitter taste rise in his throat, grazing his tongue.

  Viktor de Gesch’s feet shifted beneath his wavering gaze and then moved away, his receding footsteps echoing in his ears.

  “Know this, you wretch!” the alderman barked. “You’ll die beneath the floors of this castle.”

  TWENTY-NINE

  Jolin chewed on her bottom lip as she gazed out the window, the beginnings of dawn stretching its red and orange streaks across the sky. The villagers were now streaming, one-by-one and some two-by-two, into the streets to begin the day anew. She could hear the tavern maids walking slowly through the hall, their footsteps light as if not to cause much disturbance. Across the street, the locksmith had just shoved open the iron door of his shop and bony mongrel darted beneath a stall in pursuit of a fat gray cat. Jolin sighed and released the thin curtain, moving towards the waning flames within the hearth.

  Tethran was yet to return. And she was worried sick. Her stomach felt as if it was bundled into painful knots, her throat dry but she did not feel thirsty. No beverage could ever quench the feeling; no, not until she saw him safe and well again. Jolin added a strip of wood to the fire and stoke it back to life, glancing at Sinclair’s restful frame on the bed. The physician’s medicinal had done much for the pain over the past few hours but Jolin only wished she had secured herself some form of antidote to cure the agony currently spreading through her veins. She wished--hoped--that Tethran would just return to her and with Josephine in tow, of course. But she still could not help but feel perturbed over the entire situation. She’d sat up awake throughout the night, desperately trying to maintain her grip on an optimistic ending but she had to be rational. His presence at the alderman’s castle could be going very, very wrong. And there wouldn’t be a thing she could do about it. Sinclair was injured, these attempts at Josephine’s rescue would be all for nothing, she still hadn’t located her father or knew if he was alright…and Tethran--the man she had grown to love--would be gone. She would lose him too.

  Swiping a tear from her cheek, Jolin wrapped her arms about her body and tried not to weep. No, she must not cry. Tethran would come back. He had to! A commotion out in the hall instantly drove her from her own sad reveries and she moved towards the door, pressing her hair against the cool wood to listen.

  “Miss, you must wait!” came Mrs. Smythe’s hushed voice. “Good heavens, you look a fright.”

  “Please.” Another woman’s voice. “I must speak with Jolin. You told me you’d take me to her. It’s most urgent.”

  Jolin’s eyes widened a fraction, her heart rate kicking up. Who was this woman? And why did she need to speak with her? Did something--

  “Hush, will you? There are people still abed, you know. Come, I will take you to her.”

  Jolin gasped and jumped away from the door. A groan sounded from behind her and she glanced quickly around to see Sinclair stir in his slumber, but then thankfully relaxed again. Smoothing her palms over her skirts, she took a deep breath, slid away the bolt and dragged the door open. When she stepped out into the hall, Mrs. Smythe drew up short directly before her, a young red-haired woman standing just behind her.

  Mrs. Smythe shook her head. “Sorry. She was rather quite adamant about seeing you immediately.”

  Jolin peered around Mrs. Smythe’s shoulder at the woman. She was wearing a long robe that was muddy at the hem and her mop of hair was sticking out at all angles, framing a pale oval face. Jolin figured the redhead was probably a year or two older than she was, her pale hazel eyes glossy with that seemed to be unshed tears.

  “You’re Jolin?” she asked.

  “Yes, I am.” There was something oddly familiar about the other woman.

  “Oh, thank God!”

  The fierce hug that came directly afterwards was both shocking and puzzling. Over the woman’s shoulder, Jolin saw Mrs. Smythe raise an eyebrow questioningly.

  “Um…what’s going on? I don’t--Who are you?” Jolin blinked, staring at the woman’s distraught face. “Wait a second. Are you--”

  “J-Josephine. I was told to come to this very tavern and a-ask for you.”

  “Oh Jesus! I can’t believe it. He found you.” Jolin laughed. “You’re safe. Oh god!” She glanced at a confused Mrs. Smythe and almost immediately sobered. “Where is he? Tethran. Didn’t he return with you?”

  Josephine grasped her by the shoulders. “There were guards. I-I don’t think they saw me but they spotted him while we were trying to s-sneak out but--” She shook her head. “He told me to run. T-to not look back. Dear God, I think they captured him!”

  Jolin felt as if her heart had just fallen into the pit of her stomach. Tethran…captured? No. No! It couldn’t be! Her knees buckled and she shot a hand behind her to brace against the door. “W-what? C-captured?”

  “I am so sorry. I didn’t know what to do. There was nothing I could do!”

  “But…” Jolin’s mind whirled, bile rose high in her throat, tears burned her eyelids like vinegar on a fresh wound. “He can’t be…”

  “Let’s move out of the hall, shall we?” came Mrs. Smythe’s controlled voice. “This seems like a grave matter indeed.”

  * * *

  Mrs. Smythe pressed a cup of water into her hand but Jolin could barely feel it. Her entire body felt as if was about to fail her. Her belly felt weak, her heart ached with a pain she had never felt before. And the hope…the hope she’d been clinging to throughout the night had deserted her. How was she to go on past this moment?

  “I can see the resemblance,” Josephine said softly from where she was propped next to Sinclair’s still sleeping form. The medicinal seemed to have left him in quite a slumber. She wiped away the stream of tears flooding down her cheeks and sniffled. “I always saw this face of a boy in my head but I never thought they were real memories. After all that’s happened, I’d started to think I was starting to lose my mind.”

  Mrs. Smythe gave her a warm smile and then turned to look at Jolin, who was stiff in the chair. “Drink it, Jolin. You need it.”

  She gave a bitter chuckle, the cup loose in her grip. “What’s the use? The alderman will have him…killed.” She choked on the last word, a fat tear rolling down her face.

  “You don’t know that!” Mrs. Smythe took her hand and squeezed. “I wish you had told me everything sooner?”

  Jolin shook her head. “There’s nothing you could have done.”

  The older woman sighed. “Of course, I couldn’t have done anything. But at least we could have helped in some way.”

  “I just… I’ll never see him again, will I?”

  Josephine rose from the bed and knelt beside her. “I’d never seen anyone fight like him, your Tethran. We can hope that--”

  “No!” Jolin dropped the cup, spilling the contents and tugged her legs up on the edge of the chair, hugging herself. He didn’t know if she could hold back the tears any longer. “There’s no use in hoping!”

  “You cannot give up just yet.” Mrs. Smythe looked very near to crying as well. “Where’s the stubborn girl that walked into my husband’s tavern near a fortnight week? Where is she?”

  Jolin struggled to keep herself from falling apart, her throat working with grief. “I can’t…I can’t do this. I’m not…”

  “Listen to me! You cannot give up hope. Th
ings can still turn around.”

  “How?” Jolin threw her arms up and out, her face red with an array of emotions. “How?! How can things turn around, huh? My father is missing and my…” She gasped and shot off the chair, chest heaving fast. “I love him, alright? I love Tethran LeMark. And I know I can’t just give up hope…but don’t you bloody expect me not to be irate and fretful and miserable! I am going to cry my eyes out right now--” She paused on a sob and swallowed tightly. “--and then I’m going to go back to hoping. Can you at least give me that?” The tears came flooding out now. “P-please?”

  Mrs. Crymble’s lips trembled and Josephine clutched at the front of her robe, her eyes watery. “We’ll cry with you then,” Josephine gasped. “After all, it was me he’d rescuing when it…when it happened.”

  Jolin nodded and the two women each took her by the arm and slid to the floor with her, while they all lamented over the difficult and broken-hearted situation. It was truly a miracle that prevented Sinclair from rousing.

  About half hour later, Jolin leaned into Mrs. Smythe’s comforting embrace while Josephine gently smoothed her hair from her face. Her mind had gone numb but her heart was nowhere near to accepting Tethran’s fate. He would return to her. Somehow…

  “Thank you.”

  “There’s no need to thank us, dear.” Mrs. Smythe hugged her a little tighter. “You did need a good cry after all.”

  “Do you think…do you believe things could really turn around?”

  Josephine sighed. “I believe it. All my life, I’ve been the bedslave of men. I’d be here one day and wake up somewhere else not even knowing how I got there in the first place. I’ve been sold like a whore to the highest bidder. That wretch, McCall, is--was my sixth master. He would…beat me but never where it could be seen. Said he never wanted to ruin my pretty face as he couldn’t…fuck an ugly whore.” Her voice was wobbly but Jolin suspected anger drove her on. “When he left the castle on a mission, I was sent twice to…t-tend to the…the alderman. He’s a terrible, terrible man who beats his wife and forces the maids to…to give him fellatio.”

  Jolin gasped. “The bastard.”

  Mrs. Smythe gave a grunt of disgust. “I hope he dies a slow, painful death. All these wretched laws and for what? The wealthy gets away with everything and we are left to watch it all happen.”

  “There’s a rumour whispered in the castle that he killed his first wife,” Josephine said. “That he left her starve to death in his dungeon when a midwife had snitched about the newborn heir everyone believed had died. But the lady had actually sent away the child to be hidden. I heard he stopped searching for the boy many years ago, and some say he might still be.”

  Jolin swallowed. “Can you blame the woman? If that bastard was as cruel as he is now, then his wife must not have wanted her child to grow up under such terrible influence.” She sighed. “If anything, all this revelation only makes me more worried over Tethran.”

  “Remember,” Mrs. Smythe coaxed softly. “We must have hope. It’s all we can rely on--”

  The door crashed in suddenly, banging against the adjacent wall and almost smashing off its hinges. Sinclair shot up, releasing a colourful string of curses and then, “J-Josephine? Is that…is that you?”

  All three women jumped up but all eyes shifted to the man who had just came stumbling through the door. All three gasped--including Sinclair--and Jolin’s eyes widened to saucers, her mind desperately seeking to figure out the possibility of this. Surely, she must not be seeing well.

  She stumbled a step forward. Then two. “F-father?”

  THIRTY

  A foul, rancid scent flooded his nostrils the very second he regained consciousness. His back felt raw as if he had been trampled by a horse, his limbs weary and weak. The pungent smell of rotted cheese wafted its way through the surrounding air, mingled with the acridness of days-or probably, weeks old piss. Groaning, he tried to turn on his side but a searing pain exploded through his right arm and up to his shoulder. Gasping, he squinted but only welcomed an ocean of blackness. His shirt had been stripped from his body; so had his trousers. A bitter taste slid over his tongue and he gritted his teeth above the pain in anger. The alderman had been true to his word. The bastard had meant for him to die in this dungeon; he’d just made sure that the death would be a slow one. A slow, cold and painful one.

  Tethran grunted, trying once again to move, his skin scraping harshly against the rough stone floor. He felt around quickly with his hand, locating a wall, and exhaled heavily. It took him five more excruciating drags of his body before he managed to prop himself against the solid surface, almost bellowing from the anguished effort it had caused him. His throat was parched, he could taste a metallic savour on the inside of his split lip.

  Jolin… He wondered if she thought he’d abandoned her. That he’d wilfully left her broken-hearted and alone. He couldn’t have--would have never. Not after he’d found the one woman he’d ever loved. The only woman he would ever love. He only prayed that Josephine had managed to make it to the tavern. Raising a hand to his face, he brushed a finger over his tender jaw and to his swollen eye. Rage was broiling fresh in his veins but he hadn’t the strength to entertain it. Viktor de Gesch would die; even if not by his own hands. But one day, Tethran would escape this hell hole. And the alderman had better be praying the arms of death would welcome him before then. I’ll come back for you, Jolin. Just wait for me. Please…

  Stretching his legs out before him, though damnable painful it was, he twisted his stinging arm in an attempt to work out some of the stiffness. He’d managed to flex the fingers on same hand without pissing himself when a scraping sound came directly from his left. The gaol was pitch black; too dark for him to make out a thing but… The sound came again.

  “Who’s there?” The moment he spat the question, he instantly regretted it, feeling like a fool. Who could possibly be here in this godforsaken dungeon with him? Rats, maybe. Cursing, he shook his head and huffed a breath. He was already going damned balmy in this pit.

  The sound came again, this time a little further away and he felt his fists tightening. Whatever the hell was making that sound didn’t sound like a blasted rat. An overgrown one, perhaps but even that wouldn’t have convinced him. Tethran sat as still as he could, preparing for a fight even if it ended up killing him. Five dreadful seconds passed. Then five more. His heart rate kicked up with each moment, his ears perked to pick up even the slightest of movements. Whoever or whatever was there in the darkness with him would not live the rest of the night…or day? Hell, he hadn’t a clue if it was still night and it didn’t really matter either because--

  “Do not lunge, if that’s what you are thinking. You are not alone.”

  Tethran’s jaws slackened, his good eye desperately searching the darkness. A woman? In this stinking hole? Couldn’t be. “Who are you?”

  The voice chuckled wryly. It was a strong, feminine voice that didn’t at all match with the gloom of the alderman’s dungeon. A chuckling female who seemed far from being afraid… Who was she? And why was she here? Another scraping sound came, followed by a rattle. Something sharp was struck against the wall and soon the gaol was flooded with blinding bright light. Tethran groaned, squeezed his eye shut and blinked a few times before his vision adjusted.

  “Sorry,” she was saying. “I should’ve given you warning.”

  Yes, she should have. But he feared no amount of warning would have prepared him for what he was seeing now. The woman was sitting upright, braced against the opposite wall, mimicking his own position. But what really surprised him was the impeccable dress she wore. It was not extravagant but far better than servant’s garb; and it looked…new. She had dark raven-coloured hair, that seemed to have long lost its natural sheen, and striking blue eyes. He supposed when she was younger, she’d been quite a belle for she was quite beautiful. Tethran guessed the woman was somewhere near fifty, deepish wrinkles framing the corners of her mouth, eyes and forehead. Slight
ly sunken jaws proved that she was not at all as well as she could be, and though she hadn’t a very bony structure, she did appear to be far too thin. He found himself asking himself the same question again: Who is she?

  His gaze then shifted to the lamp next to her. “Where’d you get that?”

  One corner of her mouth turned up. “A friend brought it to me.”

  Perhaps, she was mad. “Here?”

  A nod. “Almost fifteen years ago, to be exact. Captain Carlisle secretly keeps me supplied with wick and oil. Sustenance too.”

  Tethran eyed her dubiously. “The alderman’s captain?”

  Another nod. “I forgave him ages ago for his involvement in a terrible incident but it seems he’s quite determined to earn my forgiveness instead.”

  Captain Carlisle…aiding a prisoner? Was she his lover then? “The alderman would have him guillotined if he were to find out about this.”