Part VIII

© Copyright 2003 by Elizabeth Delayne

Lila woke to darkness. Her body ached with piercing pain. She immediately shut her eyes and sought the comfort of sleep again. In dreams she found the beautiful stone walls of Castle Billingdor, Alex, and with those wistful moments the vague shadow of memory that she carried with her of her parents.

Lord Fowler.

The memories of her capture flooded back. Spun around her like the soldiers who'd marched around her, masses of men, faceless tempers. The bright sun, the dark nights, the swirling of trees and long knotted branches that held tired leaves.

She'd been on the road. She'd fallen.

Her knees were scraped. She could feel the prickling pain.

"Give me vision," she prayed and opened her eyes to the darkness again. This time she saw the soft cascade of moonlight. She was in a room, the door not far away. The walls were bare, simple construction. Straw from temporary bedding was scattered across the dirt floor. No water basin, no pot, no amenities beyond the spot where she lay. She reached out and ran her hand over the coverlets where she lay, to the dirt floor at her side.

Lila shifted carefully until she was sure she was alone, then slowly pushed herself up. Her hair cascaded around her shoulders.

She stared at the door, willing herself the strength to stand—to press against it—to take on what was on the other side.

Then she heard the seemingly odd purr of a female voice.



Percy stood out on the front terrace and watched London sleep. Torches burned in the streets around his parents' town estate, flickering in the air as rain came in from the west. How many times had he ridden through those gates on horse back or in his father's carriage, without thought to danger that could be lurking on the streets? How many times had he stood on this terrace and enjoyed a peaceful night, without understanding the peace that surrounded him?

He looked down at the patch of grass below and remembered what a lark he'd thought it been to train with one of Alex's comrades. He'd laughed, thinking of it as an adventure, and then turned his newly honed skill on Alex. He'd thought nothing more of it than winning a bet, seeing that his friend attended a ball.

Where Alex met Lila.

Where Percy was drawn into the escalating fury of Lord Fowler's forces around London.

I was prepared for this moment, he thought, not for the first time. And yet, he was not truly prepared. He was not ready.

The training had come in useful—and would, he was afraid, continue to.

The townhouse at his back was empty save Sara, Ashton, and two elderly servants. His parents had left days ago, taking the servants to safety on the continent, presumably for trade.

Mainly for information. His father knew how to find out information, so he confided now. Instead of the bright light of laughter in his eyes, Percy had witnessed a different side of him—a serious, dangerous side.

It caused Percy to ponder ... just ponder what his father's service for the kind had actually been.

Percy stayed on in the estate. They were waiting for William's next move, uncertain where he lay in waiting.

Trapped in the city, he was grateful for his father's eccentricities once again. There was a path, underground, narrow and dark, that dropped down from one of the outer store buildings. Long ago,, the passage had been used constantly to route messages through the wood. Percy had only learned of it within moments of his father's leaving. Percy wasn't sure where it roamed to—or why it was beneath the estate.

However, if the time came to run, there was a way. So he waited. For Fowler, for Alex, for word from Bilingdor himself.

He worried for Sara. In such an escape, she would be under his protection. She still shied from him, from anyone, instantly, without thought. She ate only because Ashton challenged her to do so. She seemed to sleep long hours. She walked the halls alone.

Percy stood in the dark of night as the wind began to swirl around him and he felt the fire as bright and as deadly as the flames that leaped from torches lining the outer gates. Dry leaves lifted in the gust of wind.

Rain was coming.

The sky flashed with lightening, with fire. The thunder rolled.

And Percy felt the anger pinpointed in his soul.

He looked up as light flashed again, and saw Sara standing at the small balcony above him, alone in the night. She'd awoke from a nightmare, he thought. He could see it in her eyes.

Then he heard it, the sounds galloping down the lonely streets. He turned and watched the rider arrive at the gate, pause. The gates opened.

He had given the password.

When Percy glanced back up toward the balcony, Sara was gone from sight.



Moving quickly, Ashton wrung a rag from the basin of water as Brock struggled to talk with Percy. His face was deathly pale, beaded with sweat from the struggle against what had to be excruciating pain. When she approached, he broke off, his eyes seeking hers.

She simply knelt by his side and pressed the cloth against the newly opened wound. Percy paced to the mantle, where he placed both hands and leaned forward.

As Ashton settled at Brock's side, carefully lifting her skirts, she studied both men. Percy was a nobel. In the days since she'd arrived within his home, in the days since she met him, she'd never seen him in anything but the finest clothes. He had a broad sense of humor and play. That much she remembered from the man who had accompanied Alex to castle Bilingdor.

But he was not used to the world as he was seeing it now. He rarely, if ever, had seen warfare. He had probably never seen women used as Sara had been.

He was not used to danger, darkness, evil.

All of those circulated openly in the world of peasants—and was ignored by most nobels.

She turned and studied Brock as she worked on wounds she had nurtured before.

"You weren't yet healed," she murmured, not meeting Brock's eyes as she cared for the old wounds. "You shouldn't have come."

She moved the cloth. He hissed and bucked up against the pain. His ragged breathing took a moment to level out. "Someone had to."

"Of the great knights of Billingdor, surely someone was able to make the trip."

"You were here."

She looked up in surprise and met his gaze, before dropping it again. You blamed me, she wanted to remind him—and thinking of that horrible day in the woods, thought of Lila. Her heart ached. You blamed me, and you will again. She found his hand and moved it to hold the rag against the wound as she rose to get another.

He watched her cross the room. In the silence she could feel his eyes following her. She refused to look, to lean on his presence in the least.

"Fowler has placed his men—" Brock said at last as Ashton turned toward him with a fresh cloth. He looked toward Percy as he struggled with his words. "Around the—around the city. I was followed by two—for a short time."

Percy turned back. "Then they know we are here."

"Not from their mouths." Brock muttered and Ashton saw in him the weariness of battle. "But nothing will stay hidden for long."

"William—and Fowler both know my family allies with the king. My father was an advisor our late king. He and Fowler are arch enemies."

Ashton frowned and knelt again at Brock's side. It was hard to think of the cheerfully blithe man at odds with anyone.

But then, Fowler's escape from the London guard had been long ago. The King's son stepped in at his father's untimely death. The regime changed, the world turned upside down. Lord Wentworth had retreated into his blissfully interesting—as he saw it—world of trade.

Ashton could still remember the day Lord Bilingdor first came to her door. He'd come in peasants clothes, not the armor of a child's nightmare. She'd thought him a jolly old giant—with an odd sadness in his eyes. A sadness that matched Lila's.

From that moment on her heart had been bound to both Lila, her friend, and the jolly giant known as the Black Knight.



The iron latch on the door rattled and the door pushed open. Footsteps were slight, soft. Lila carefully controlled her breathing, willed her eyelashes still.

The figure stopped at her side, then lowered to the ground.

Lila lay in the stillness, waiting. She picked up the faint fragrance of Asian perfume.

The silence was torture.

Finally, Lila opened her eyes, blinking twice. She saw the skirts, the colors rich with reds ad blues, the fabric silk, tucked under thin legs. Slowly, Lila looked up.

The face was shadowed, unfamiliar. For a moment Lila thought she was looking at Sara, then blinked it away. No, not Sara. Even the hair color was different, picking up hues of red in the soft moonlight.

Slender, pampered, definitely nobility—Lila thought. Her golden hair fell in curls around her shoulders. The bodice of her dress was adorned with touches of beads.

"You're awake at last," she said, her lips turned upward in a small smile. "I have been waiting for you."

Where am I? Lila wanted to ask, unable to find her voice. She stayed quiet.

"It seems we have been long separated." She tilted her head and still, her face remained in the shadows. "Do you not remember me, Lila of Arlington? We were quite close once. Long ago."

When Lila only stared at her, the woman who sat on the dirt floor in her rich gown. She raised a slender hand, snapped her fingers. A big man, a giant of a man, Lila thought as he came in, was instantly at her side.

"Bring us some water and food from the sup."

"My lady."

"Quickly, Thomas." She turned slightly, looked up at the big man. "It has been a long time since our guest has had a fine meal."

Thomas moved fast, letting the door close behind him. Taking a chance, Lila sat up, wincing at the bruises. "Where am I?"

The woman considered her. "Safe, for now." She smiled a little. "Safer than you were, I imagine."

"How—"

"The men brought you here. My Lord's getting impatient. You were slowing him down."

Lila frowned. So she wasn't safe—not still under Fowler's guard.

"Who are you?"

"Hmm. I had hopes ... but you don't recall. We have both grown and time has weakened our memories. You may know me as Catherine, for now." She sat across from Lila and studied her, with interest, with curiosity. The air was suddenly moist with coming rain and the sky lit with lightening. It flashed across Catherine's face. "I have waited half my life to see you again."

Half her life? Lila thought back to her days in the court and her brow furrowed. She did not remember a Catherine—did she? It was a common enough name. Her grandmother's name.

"The food will come," she said and stood, somehow gracefully managing her skirts. "And you shall eat. Then we will talk, and I will tell you all. It seems we have much catching up to do."



Percy paced the halls, alone in the corridors. The sun was high and beamed in from windows reminding him it was day. He had slept little.

Brock had passed out, and slept deep. He needed his rest. Percy depended on him to gain his energy and skill back.

Fowler's forces were drawing in. They needed to leave. They needed Brock with them.

He pondered his father's role again and headed around the corridors to what his father called a tradesman's playroom. Percy stopped when he spotted the shadow ahead of him, and noting it's size and shape, smiled a little. He walked forward, making sure his steps declared his presence.

Sara ran her hands lightly over the iron plaque by the door then turned shyly to look at him, her hand dropping to join it's mate.

He ran a finger over the words and read them. "Deus autem pacis qui eduxit de mortuis pastorem magnum ovium in sanguine testamenti aeterni Dominum nostrum Iesum aptet vos in omni bono ut faciatis voluntatem eius faciens in vobis quod placeat coram se per Iesum Christum cui gloria in saecula saeculorum amen."

"What does it mean?"

"It's from the Bible. Hebrews. It says, ‘May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.'"

"Amen," she repeated, clearly familiar with the practices of the church. "Why is it on the wall?"

"My father," Percy said with a smile. "They are all over the house."

"I noticed—I didn't know what they were for."

"To remind him of his calling, " he walked passed her, into the darkened room, and pushed open the heavy shutters. For a moment he would forget the outside world. He would help her forget. "This is where he keeps his favorite things—toys you might say. Things he says he will sell, one day, should he choose to part with any of it."

Light poured into the room and highlighted the masks painted in bright colors, mostly ridiculous, smiling creatures. A large wooden boat took up the long wall of one side. Its sails were wrapped tight around its mast, secured with a thick rope.

Sara walked forward, looked inside—and jumped back.

Percy would have laughed had he not seen the terror on her face. Instead, he chastised himself for forgetting about the old set of bones. "It's all right. Father called him Terrible. Terrible Truce."

He stepped forward himself and studied the skeleton that belonged to his father's made up persona. Obviously, Terrible had seen better days—days when his father's contraption that held him up worked better, Percy though wryly. But he wasn't about to put his own hands on the old skeleton.

Percy shook his own head and stepped back. "One day you can ask him to tell you the story. He tells it so much better than I. Basically they found Terrible, or the remains of him, while visiting an African market. A seller stood in the street and shook the bones at him. When my father did not move back, the native dropped the bones and ran. He didn't tell my mother of its presence, just sat him up in the boat as if he were sailing the seas. A ghost pirate, he said."

"In here?"

"No—my mother never comes in here. He did it in the great hall downstairs. My mother discovered him one day while entertaining members of the court and gave my father a verbal bashing for frightening her so. But she was not embarrassed and she never told him to send it away. She knew him—my father—too well. He simply stored his treasure up here and plans, one day, to give Terrible Truce his own burial."

He shrugged when Sara stared at him, seemingly lost, then diverted his gaze to take in the rest of the room. There were hats with large feathers, capes, musical interments, and books. Long shelves with pots and vases, ceramic, clay, painted in ornate, bright colors. Herbs hung in bunches from pegs in the walls. Medicines, his father explained once.

Crates were stacked against the walls. Long ago he and his brother had used it as a stage, had dressed in the hats, in the capes.

His father had been away at the time, Percy remembered.

He opened a small box and ran his hands through the coins inside. Gold, silver, some worth much, some worth nothing. He had a larger supply, one he'd taken with him for trade and information purposes.

Percy drew Sara over by turning the box so she could see inside. "What do you think?"

"What is it?" she reached inside and pulled out a crafted gold coin. Percy wished he could tell her its origin.

"Coins. My father has visited many lands. He kept a record by bringing back his coins. He made my mother a set of jewelry out of the coins."

"Tis beautiful," she said, turning the ornate coin over. Percy closed his eyes and willed himself not to touch her, to trace the skin that looked so beautiful and soft at the corners of her lips.

"Yes," he said, looking only at her.

She set the coin back in the small chest and he lifted up contraption from a small velvet pillow. His father was fond of contraptions. It twinkled as metal rods drifted against each other.

Sara's smile beamed with delight as she took the object when he passed it to her.

"You father was a merchant."

"One of the best."

She frowned a little, watching the thin bars move, gently making music. "But he was of the court."

"He has always been a tradesman. Under the late king, he was an advisor, very respected."

"Then the dark dragon came." Sara murmured and set down the object. The room became quiet and very still. She worried over it, worried over Lila, he knew. He could see it in the furrow of her brow, in the way her eyes closed in agony.

"Wait out in the hall for a minute," he bade and waited for her to move before he closed the heavy shutters. He didn't want her to feel the fear of darkness.

Not yet.

That time would come.

As he left, he picked up the crate his father had indicated would be waiting by the door. Sara was waiting in the hall, her eyes downcast once again.

"Come on," he said and resisted the urge to pull her along. "I'll show you some of the better plaques."

An hour later, Percy was thankful for the moments with Sara. He was afraid it would be a long time before he would see the smile on her lips or the fear gone from her eyes.



Ashton stood by Sara's side and watched the elderly servants work together to push the large cabinet back into place. It was an ingenious system Percy's father had devised. Unless one knew to push back on the cabinet, one would not see that it was attached to the floor, and when shifted, opened the secret passage.

The servants moved it back, opening the passage again, proving they had the strength to remove the evidence once the four of them were sealed in.

"There are handles on the bottom, sir, should you be forced to return. To grab a hold and push up."

"Tis like a tomb," Brock murmured, studying the hole in the ground. He handed Percy his sack and lowered himself into the floor. One of the servants passed him a torch.

"A long stone walkway, dark." He moved further down, out of sight, so that even the light of the torch disappeared.

"What is this place?" Ashton asked Percy.

It was one of the servants who answered. **"A place only a select few know about. Years ago, the Romans built a series of tunnels leading out of the city walls. For trade, for communication. This was a foreign land to them, then. Their first attempt to build a city along the Thames failed. They needed something that would hold London and their kingdom together. First a great fortress, a wall, that spanned 300 acres. Then the sight you behold now."

"My father never said anything."

"He was vowed to secrecy, about many things." The elderly servant reached a hand up to scratch his nearly bald head. "We were all vowed to secrecy. Only those who were loyal to our late king were given information. I do not believe even his son knows to what extent these passages roam."

Brock appeared then and looked up from Percy. "The passages are strong, sturdy. The are flows ripe."

"Aye," said the servant.

Percy looked back at Ashton, reached for her hand. "We'll send Brock first. I'll take the rear. You have our light?"

She held up the knapsack. He took it, helped her, with Brock's help, lower into the hole. Brock's hands were strong at her waist. As her hand released Percy's, it fell to his shoulder.

His eyes darkened. "I have so much to say to you," he murmured as he set her on her feet.

She stepped back, drew in a deep breath. "I'm sure you do."

She held up her hand, accepted the pack Sara carried and was surprised at it's weight. Inside was their food supply. She should have thought, but Sara had not complained.

She looked around as Brock helped Sara down. The walls were made of stone with short strips of wood. In the air she felt a bit of a breeze, not the musty feel of still air. There was nearly enough room for them to move side by side.

It did not take long for Sara and Percy to lower into the cavern. They watched as the cabinet was lowered into place above them.

Ashton reached for Sara's hand, and without a word they followed Brock into the dark corridor.

**Think I'm off my rocker? Well, remember this was a writing excersize of 'what could have been if...' and if ... well, we know the Romans had the Catacombs. What if they sought to protect England and connect the trade as London grew across the Thames ... then maybe. And maybe the tunnels are there and you just don't know. Maybe they are hidden from mind, from memory, from history ... for a reason... maybe.


HEY! and don't forget to e-mail me if you have a comment!





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