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I sabella’s heart was in her throat as Martin squared off with Lord James. The two looked so unevenly matched. She couldn’t imagine how Martin had defeated Lord James in tournament, but she prayed he could do it again. His life depended on it, as did her and her sister’s futures.

Men from around the bailey were starting to gather to watch the fight.

She couldn’t blame them. It was riveting.

No matter how much she wished she could turn away from the awful scene before her, she couldn’t do it.

They had all come to watch her husband die.

A low murmur arose as they began placing bets, not around who would win but around how long Martin would last before Lord James demolished him.

There was no way Martin could win trying to match Lord James in terms of brute force.

Fortunately, her husband seemed to have heeded her warning.

Something in his stance changed after she cried out, and he took a few steps back, no longer hacking at the earl in a blind fury.

For a moment, she could almost swear she saw a twinkle in his eye like the one he wore when he traded barbs with her on the day they first met.

Yes, you can do this, Martin. You’ve done it before. Just keep your wits about you.

Lord James advanced on Martin and swung with all his might, aiming to separate Martin’s head from his body.

Isabella closed her eyes, unable to watch.

The crowd gasped. Then, she heard the clang of metal and dared to open them again.

Martin was still alive, still fighting. Hope and pride surged through her each second that her husband fought back.

Martin was quicker than the earl, and he was using it to his advantage, making Lord James lumber about like a bear on its hind legs. And then Lord James roared like one as he swept down in a strike that aimed to cleave Martin in two.

Isabella shrank away, wanting to hide but unable to tear her gaze away from the awful scene before her.

“Missed again,” Martin quipped as he stepped aside, just out of reach. “Your aim is truly disgraceful.”

Oh, thank God he’s still in one piece! Isabella clutched at her chest as if she could slow the terrible pounding of her heart.

But what was Martin doing, goading the man? The last thing he needed was to make the earl angrier. But her husband just smiled as he circled.

“Shut up and fight, you miserable little gadfly.” Lord James attacked again with all his might.

“I like to talk while I fight,” Martin said lightly as he dodged and deflected a blow that should have sliced through his belly. “You don’t mind a bit of civilized conversation while we try to disembowel each other, do you?”

Isabella’s mouth dropped open. The man she had married had lost his mind.

Lord James’s only response was a low grumble and another forceful strike that missed at the last second, thank God!

“Is that all you have to say?” Her husband parried the earl’s heavy blows one after another. “I see. Well, I suppose I’ll just have to carry the conversation myself.”

Martin ducked beneath the earl’s next blow and slashed out with his blade, missing flesh but slashing a hole in the earl’s sleeve.

Isabella clenched her fists and gasped. A hit! Did she dare hope? Did Martin stand a chance against Lord James after all?

“I’m sorry to ruin such a fine garment. It looks like it was quite costly. Is that real gold embroidery on the sleeve or just straw?” Martin buzzed around the big man like a wasp looking for an opening to sting.

The earl roared as he struck back with a low, sweeping slash aimed at Martin’s knees. Her husband had to jump to avoid losing half his leg. Isabella stopped breathing. For a moment, he was unsteady as he landed, but he recovered quickly and stepped back. Relief flooded her at his narrow escape.

“Straw embroidery is nothing to be ashamed of, you know. I’ve seen some truly stunning garments embroidered with straw to look like gold. It glints in the sunlight so beautifully.”

“God’s wounds, do you never shut up?” Lord James yelled as he slashed again, this time slicing at Martin’s arm.

Isabella covered her mouth as a line of blood bloomed in the fine linen of her husband’s shirt sleeve. Too close! And the earl had drawn first blood. That didn’t bode well. Isabella felt the sting as if the sword had cut her own flesh.

Martin hissed through his teeth as he dodged another blow aimed at his neck. “Nice try, my lord, but I’ve had worse pinpricks from my tailor.”

A few of the men watching chuckled, and Isabella put her hand over her mouth to hold back a horrified guffaw.

“I’m going to carve out your tongue, you imbecile.” Lord James was not amused, and he glared at his subjects, defying them to laugh again.

“Ah, but to do that, you’d have to catch me.”

Isabella’s heart was ready to pound out of her chest as Lord James feinted and slashed down Martin’s chest, leaving a long, shallow wound.

“No,” she cried out as blood darkened the green of her husband’s cotte to black.

This couldn’t happen. There had to be some way to stop this madness before Lord James chopped Martin into pieces. She’d only just found the joy of love, and she had no intention of losing it so soon.

“You see? It’s me she cries out for,” Martin said, chancing a moment’s glance at her before returning to his adversary.

In that moment of connection, she tried to convey all the feeling she’d failed to express—all the tenderness and affection that she’d hardly dared to speak of. “She’s chosen me. I’ve won her heart.”

At his words, Isabella’s heart swelled. He had won her heart indeed. Now, if only he could survive!

Martin suddenly began to attack with such swift blows, Lord James could hardly keep up and was forced to stagger back.

“Enough,” Lord James bellowed as he countered and advanced on Martin with renewed fury. “I don’t care about her heart. I only care whether she delivers on her bargain. And I intend to hold her to it.”

As if she needed further confirmation of the man’s callous, selfish nature.

“Over my dead body.” Martin struck out and nearly caught the earl in the side.

“That is the general idea.” Lord James snarled as he lashed out again, cutting into Martin’s left shoulder before he could get away.

Guilt assailed her at the thought that she had brought him into this mortal peril.

If only she hadn’t tried to make a bargain with Lord James, none of this would be happening.

Her own fear and selfishness had brought them to this pass.

And now the husband she loved—who loved her in a way that no one had ever loved her—would pay the price for her folly.

“I won’t lie. That smarts.” Martin gritted his teeth as he dodged another killing blow.

Oh no. He couldn’t even come up with a witty quip. He must have been hurt badly.

It wasn’t right that she had only just found love and now she was in danger of losing it. But how could she help? The earl wanted Martin dead, and there was nothing she could do about it.

Or was there? Think, Isabella. Think! What would Lady Eleanor do?

No, that was no help. Lady Eleanor would let them fight it out and celebrate whoever survived as the stronger man.

The weak deserved what they got, according to her.

Trying to think like the deposed queen had gotten her into this mess.

She had to find her own way out of this, leading with her heart instead of hiding it behind high walls built by her own ambition.

A clang of metal brought her back from her thoughts.

Martin danced around the earl like a court jester, wearing him down bit by bit.

If she wasn’t mistaken, the earl was starting to slow, the lag between Martin’s jabs and his ripostes growing by the minute.

Still, Lord James struck with a force that made her quiver each time metal hit metal.

Martin circled. “There once was a man from Calais,” he sang in a teasing voice. “Who thought all his enemies to slay.”

Lord in heaven, what was her husband doing?

Lord James snarled and swung his blade at Martin’s head.

In just the nick of time, Martin ducked beneath the blade, his full lips curving in a teasing smile and his eyes twinkling. She couldn’t help but admire his brashness in the face of danger.

“He fought a court fool, who cut off his tool. Now he sings falsetto all day.”

Ducking low, Martin stabbed Lord James in the upper thigh, quick as a flash. The earl bellowed in wordless rage. Isabella threw up her arms and cheered. There was hope! Her husband was a mad man, but his ridiculous swagger was undeniably effective at throwing his enemy off balance.

Martin ducked just out of the earl’s reach as his blade came crashing down on where he’d been a split second earlier. “Missed me,” he chided.

“I. Will. End. You,” Lord James said, punctuating each word with a murderous slash of his sword.

And he very nearly did. Isabella could hardly breathe as she watched. She tasted iron as she bit the inside of her cheek. Every muscle in her body tensed as she gripped the rough timber of the fence enclosing the yard.

A hairsbreadth away from those deadly blows, Martin danced out of the way and spun around the earl’s flank as if this was all a game. He was behind the earl now.

Get him, Martin! End this. Don’t let him get away!

“Can’t find me?” Martin taunted as the earl spun in circles trying to catch him. “But I’m right here.” On the final word, Martin jabbed his sword into the earl’s buttock, making him howl and nearly drop his sword.

Huzzah!

Isabella’s heart swelled at the sight. Surely, he had won now. How could the earl recover when Martin had dealt him such an injury? And what a fitting revenge for Lord James’s threats and browbeating!

“Take him down, Martin! Finish this,” she called out. “You can do it!”

Taking advantage of Lord James’s momentary lapse, Martin jabbed again, this time at the back of the earl’s knee. The giant man stumbled as his knee gave way, and he fell on all fours.

“Yes! Huzzah!” Isabella cheered and waved her fists in the air. He’d done it! Her husband had bested the earl! She never had to fear Lord James again!

Martin stepped on the earl’s sword and levelled his blade at his opponent’s throat.

“Yield.” All teasing was gone from her husband’s voice. It was cold and deadly as the North Sea. In that moment, he seemed to be as tall as the mast of The Wind Song . “Let us go, and I will spare your life. We’ll buy passage on a ship and be gone within the hour.”

A gruff laugh escaped Lord James’s lips. “You little prick. You think you’re leaving Yarmouth alive?”

The earl moved too quickly to see, and Martin let out a bloodcurdling scream, falling over. For a moment, Isabella couldn’t tell what had happened, and then she saw it. The hilt of a dagger protruded from her husband’s foot.

Lord James threw himself on top of Martin, tearing his sword from his hand and throwing it away. The earl’s sword was still pinned under her husband, and he didn’t bother trying to retrieve it. With a wicked laugh, Lord James wrapped his hands around Martin’s throat and squeezed.

No. Please no. Don’t let this be how it ends.

No matter how her husband thrashed and twisted beneath the other man’s grip, he could not escape.

Martin’s face turned purple and then began to take on a blue tinge.

Before her very eyes, Lord James was squeezing the life out of the man she loved.

The crowd around them went silent, and several turned away with looks of disgust. But no one dared intervene and challenge their liege lord.

She had to act. She couldn’t lose Martin now, not when they were so close to escaping this place to live a happy life she had hardly dared imagine. There had to be something she could do to save her husband. As long as Martin lived, there was hope.

And then it came to her. She knew what she had to do, even if the thought sickened her.

“Stop,” Isabella cried out. “I’ll give you what you want. Just spare him.”

The earl squeezed harder. “Once I end him, there’s nothing to stop me from taking what I want.”

No. This can’t be happening. I won’t let it. “If you kill him, I’ll never tell you what you want to know. I’ll take my secrets to the grave.”

Lord James laughed. “I have ways of making you talk.”

She was sure he did, but nothing he could threaten her with compared to the abject terror of watching the breath squeezed out of the man who had won her heart.

“Maybe so,” she said. “But you’d never know if I was lying. What if I feed you a secret that makes The Duke of Normandy kill you on the spot?”

A long moment passed as she and the earl stared each other down, a collision of steel wills. Martin’s movement was slowing. He was going to lose consciousness if this didn’t end. This had to work. She could not face a world without Martin in it, even if it meant sacrificing herself.

At last, the earl loosened his grip, and Martin gasped in deep, ragged breaths.

“You had better keep your word, my lady. You will both remain here until the annulment goes through. I’m not taking any chances. Guards,” he said to his men, “Take Lord Martin away and lock him in the dungeon.”

“Isabella, no,” Martin wheezed. “Don’t do this.”

Tears filled her eyes as she watched Lord James’s men take her husband away, red marks clearly visible on his neck.

The look of betrayal and horror on Martin’s face nearly undid her, but she had to be strong for his sake.

If he died, she would never recover, especially not if she was forced to marry his murderer.

She stood frozen until Martin was out of sight. Then she turned to the loathsome man to whom she had just promised her life.

A slow grin spread across Lord James’s face. “Now, you’re mine,” he said, grasping her arm with fearsome strength.

That, I will never be , she thought to herself as he hauled her inside. She would find a way out of Yarmouth with Martin and Adelaide if it was the last thing she did.