Page 42 of Wolfehound (De Wolfe Pack Generations #11)

T here was a gentle rapping, rapping on the solar door.

Startled, Cambria came off her chair.

The rapping came again, more loudly this time, and she timidly made her way over to the door.

“Who is it?” she whispered.

“Me, my lady! Alwyn!”

Cambria knew the servant. He was from the kitchen yard and helped her watch out for her puppies.

“What is it, Alwyn?” she asked.

“It’s one of the puppies, my lady,” he said. “A hawk injured him. You must come!”

If anything could make Cambria forget Liam’s orders to remain in the solar, it was any mention of her puppies in danger. Quickly, she unbolted the door only to see Alwyn standing there, looking quite upset. Her gaze darted around the keep entry to see if anyone else was present.

“How did you get in here?” she asked.

He turned and pointed to the entry door. “It wasn’t locked, my lady,” he said. “I thought you might be in here. Hoped you would, anyway, so I knocked on the door. You must come!”

Cambria wasn’t sure why the entry door wasn’t locked, but she looked around again and didn’t see anyone in the entry or on the stairs.

She knew that a young de Wolfe knight had been inside, making sure the door was locked, but he was gone and the door hadn’t been locked by anyone else.

Alwyn had managed to get in with news of an injured puppy, and although she knew she wasn’t supposed to leave, she couldn’t ignore the distress of one of her dogs.

“How badly is he wounded?” she asked. “What happened?”

Alwyn held up a hand, like a hawk hovering.

“He went after the littlest pup,” he said.

“The others were feeding in the den, but the littlest one hadn’t managed to make it in to feed.

I was standing just a few feet away and the hawk still swooped.

It must have been watching and waiting. Usually, it tries to take a chicken, but this time it went for the pup.

The little thing has punctures and is bleeding. Will you not come to him?”

After hearing that, Cambria couldn’t stay away.

She hoped Liam would forgive her.

“I am coming,” she said, emerging from the solar and shutting the door behind her. “Quickly, now. Show me where the pup is.”

Since there was only one way in and out of the keep, they could only go through the keep entry that faced the bailey, and Cambria was close on the heels of the servant as they raced down the stairs.

The kitchens were to the south of the keep, with a covered passageway that went from the kitchens to the hall, but in order to get to the yard, they had to go outside of the keep’s perimeter.

Cambria was practically running by the time she hit the dirt of the bailey, picking up speed as she headed for the kitchen yard.

She rushed past the stables and into the yard, which was behind a stone wall and a gate.

Once she was inside, she was able to breathe a little.

She knew she shouldn’t be out. Liam had told her to stay in the solar, but she simply couldn’t stay there while one of her puppies suffered.

She had to keep telling herself that, telling herself that no harm was done.

There were so many soldiers in the bailey that surely she was safe for the quick dash into the yard.

She ran straight to the series of pens and dens she had for the puppies only to see another young servant boy there, holding the wounded puppy.

Cambria climbed right inside the pen.

“Let me have him,” she said.

Reaching out, she scooped the pup off the lap of the servant.

The boy laid out a piece of cloth he had, one a kitchen servant had given him to stem the blood, and Cambria put the puppy down on the cloth to inspect him.

He was yelping in pain and she could see two distinct puncture marks and a big scrape.

The mother dog, lured by the sounds of her injured puppy, came out of her den and began to lick the injured pup as Cambria critically assessed the situation.

“I am going to need wine and honey,” she told the servant hovering over her, the one who had fetched her. “I will also need my sewing kit, something to sew up the cut. Hurry!”

The servant fled. Meanwhile, the mother dog was very concerned with the puppy, so Cambria coaxed the dog back into her den and then put the injured puppy against the mother.

The puppy began to nurse, and the mother dog licked the wounds, and that was the best they could do until Cambria received the things she’d asked for.

At that point, all she could do was wait.

*

Tyrus thought he was seeing things.

He was in the stable yard, which was next to the kitchen yard, tightening up his saddle when a woman with coal-black hair and a finely featured face ran past him into the kitchen yard.

She had been with a servant, focused on what was ahead of her, so he only saw her in profile.

He thought he might have caught more of a broad view of her face, just a flash of it, and it seemed to him that her eyes were light.

Blue eyes.

Black hair.

Suddenly, the cold light of suspicion dawned.

So did a rising anger. He was starting to think that, somehow, there was a woman with black hair and blue eyes at Folkingham and he’d been convinced otherwise by those who lived here.

Therefore, he was going to do more investigation on the subject that didn’t involve the lord or his complicit friends.

He looked around for the nearest stable servant and found an old man bent over one of the horses inside, picking stones out of a hoof.

Tyrus was, if nothing else, cunning. He was going to have to be discreet about what he wanted because that usually achieved the desired results. Demands and going straight to the point would only cause fear and, perhaps, even reserve and suspicion. And he didn’t want that.

Therefore, he was going to have to be subtler about it.

“I was wondering,” he said to the servant, “where’s the nearest tavern around here?”

The man paused what he was doing, pointing with the metal pick he had in his hand. “There’s a small one in the village,” he said. “They don’t have rooms, but they’ll let you a bed if you pay. You’ll just have to sleep in the common room or in the barn.”

“Are there better inns within a few hours’ ride?”

The man nodded. “Go on the road to the east and you’ll run into the village of Billingborough,” he said. “They have an inn called The Fish House. You can find a room there and the food isn’t bad, so I’ve heard.”

“Thank you,” Tyrus said. Then he paused a moment, looking to the bailey beyond the stable. “Everyone seems very excited for the wedding.”

The old man grinned and went back to the hoof. “It’s been a long time in coming,” he said. “I’ve watched that little lass grow up. It’s time she was married. No pretty lass should be left unmarried at her age.”

Tyrus smiled weakly. “Pretty, you say?”

The old man snorted. “Don’t get any ideas about her,” he said. “Liam Herringthorpe will run you through.”

“Is that so?”

“’Tis,” the old man said. “He’s been waiting for this longer than anyone.”

Tyrus was still smiling, though it was an act. “I’ve got a woman of my own,” he said, though it was a lie. He was making a calculated statement to get the answer he wanted. “I do not need another one, though I suspect mine is the prettiest. Blonde like an angel.”

The old man shook his head. “Then de Royans’ daughter is the devil to your angel,” he said, chuckling.

“Hair as black as night and eyes the color of a summer sky. I hear that people in Wales are dark, you know. She was brought by the master from Wales a long time ago. A foundling, they say. But she’s a beauty. ”

Tyrus had his answer. It had been so easy that it had almost been child’s play. Whoever Liam had presented in the hall as Bria de Royans, if that was even the name of Carlton’s daughter, wasn’t who Liam said she was.

He’d been lied to.

Damn.

“I think I just saw her walk by,” he said, his attention now turning toward the kitchen yard. “What is her name?”

“Lady Cambria.”

Cambria. That was why Liam had called the other woman “Bria.” Now, things were starting to make a little sense. Tyrus pointed toward the kitchen.

“She went into the yard over there,” he said.

The old man snorted again. “It’s the dogs.”

“The what?”

The old man stood up and began pointing off toward the kitchen yard. “Dogs,” he said again. “She raises dogs. Sells the puppies for a tidy sum, so I’ve heard. That’s where she keeps the dogs. Are you looking to buy one?”

Tyrus shrugged. “I hadn’t thought about it,” he said. “I suppose I could take a look.”

The old man came away from the horse, gesturing to the gate in the stone wall. “In through there,” he said. “She’ll be in there with the dogs if you want to look for one. All men should have a dog. They’re fine companions.”

Tyrus had his answer. In fact, he had everything he needed. Liam Herringthorpe and the rest of them weren’t going to make a fool out of him. He had what he wanted now and he was going to finish it.

“Thank you,” he said, gaze on the gate. “I’ll see for myself. Mayhap I do need a dog.”

He started to head toward the gate as the old man called after him. “Tell her you’ll take good care of it,” he said. “She’ll only sell you a dog if you tell her you’ll be kind to it!”

Tyrus waved at him in acknowledgment, but his focus was on that gate.

He was in no rush as he made his way to it, peering through the small iron grate in the middle of the panel that gave him a view to the yard beyond.

It was a normal kitchen yard, with chickens and goats and a sheep that was gnawing on a fencepost over in the corner.

There was a lone female servant over by what looked to be a well, and then closer to him there was a series of small pens, each one with a shelter in it.

And then he saw her.