The Robber Knight's Love (The Robber Knight Saga #2)(95)

“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.