Chapter 20

During the hours that followed, the small party rode steadily toward the northwest be­neath a brooding midnight sky. There was no moon or stars to light their way, nothing but the unerring, hound-like instincts of Joseph and the in­domitable Wears-A-Hat, who brought up the rear and fore of the small column, to guide them.

The going was difficult, the ground increasingly uneven and strewn with rocks and broken branches. For what seemed the hundredth time Lu­cien's hunter faltered, causing Fallon to waver on her precarious perch. Lucien, riding before her, in­stinctively reached out a helping hand, yet as his fingers brushed Fallon's sleeve, she righted herself and jerked away.

Lucien sighed in disgust. "You are being child­ish, clinging to your anger. What's done is done, and can't be rectified. It's time to let it go."

She cut him with a look, the same way he had cut her with his betrayal. "Pray, sir, what did you expect from me? Not approval, surely!"

"Fallon, you are young and naive. In time you will come to view things differently—"

"I am not so young that I can't discern right from wrong, good from—" She could not bring herself to finish the harsh assessment. Lucien, however, harbored no such qualms.

"—from evil," he said in silken tones.

"Yes." Emphatically.

Lucien looked at her, a long and measuring look. "So that's how you view me, as evil. A veritable monster, in your eyes. Tell me, won't you, for I am most interested to know: is this your opinion, or is it more of Youngblood's insidious poison?"

"My opinion has nothing to do with Draegan's influence, and everything to do with your callous disregard for everyone around you, your schemes and machinations. You played your devil's game, Uncle, and you won. But your ambition has blinded you to one painful truth: you cannot have your success as Sparrowhawk, do all the evil you have done, and still have my respect." She drew a deep breath and tried to still the trembling brought on by her anger. When she continued, her voice was deadly calm. "You can force me to accompany you to Niagara, but I vow, I will never set foot on English soil. I will find some way to escape you."

She did not say what she was thinking, that she would find a way to return to Draegan. It would only have prompted more scorn from Lucien, fur­ther assertions that Draegan was lost to her. Fallon could not abide to hear the words again, could not allow herself to believe for an instant that the only man she would ever love had fallen victim to her uncle's and to Randall's treachery, that she would never see his beloved face or gaze into his pale green eyes again.

Sensing that she had withdrawn again behind her icy shell, Lucien turned away. Fallon couldn't help noticing that he seemed to bend just a bit, and it was all that she could do to keep from trying to make amends.

He was her unde, her flesh and blood; and though she deplored what he'd become, hated the man who was Sparrowhawk, she somehow couldn't let go of the notion that somewhere deep down inside that twisted shell, something of the man he'd once been existed still.

She was destined to remain tom between love for Draegan and loyalty to her uncle.

Lucien did not try to speak with her again, for which Fallon was grateful. When they reached the narrow cleft between Hunter and Plateau moun­tains known as Stony Clove, the Englishman dis­mounted to confer with his men. Lucien made to do likewise, glancing at Fallon. "It seems this is going to be a lengthy discussion. If you'd like, I'll help you down, so that you can move about."

"That won't be necessary," Fallon said. "I can manage on my own." She alighted without diffi­culty, walking a little distance and back again, stretching her cramped muscles. All the while her interest remained keenly fixed upon Stone and the others.

They kept their voices low, barely above a mur­mur, but Fallon could see the Mohawks were up­set, and from Wears-A-Hat's sharp gestures, she gathered it had something to do with the vale. Moving closer, she seated herself on a fallen log and bent to examine a small flowering shrub nearby, pretending disinterest in the low-voiced discourse taking place.

"You can surely see," Stone said to the two guides, "that foul weather is imminent. We must stop somewhere and seek shelter."

"There is a stopping place two leagues hence," Wears-A-Hat said stolidly. "We stop there."

"Two leagues won't do," Stone argued. "We'll find shelter in the valley just ahead, and we'll carry on after daybreak, despite your misgivings. Is that clearly understood?"

Wears-A-Hat and Joseph exchanged black looks but said nothing, at which point Lucien entered the discussion. "What the devil's going on here? Why have we stopped in the open?"

"Bad spirits dwell in this place," Wears-A-Hat said solemnly. "Bad things happen to those who disturb them."

"Superstitious nonsense," Stone fairly spat. Turning to Lucien, he said, "They insist the valley just ahead of us is haunted, and flatly refuse to seek shelter there. Wears-A-Hat wishes to carry on two more leagues to the far side of the valley, but if we venture so far, we risk a drenching."

"I fear you are right," Lucien said, stroking his chin as he studied the lowering black sky. "There's rain in the air; besides, I am not sure Fallon can endure the additional miles. The emotional up­heaval of our abrupt departure has obviously taken its toll upon her; she needs to rest and recoup her spirits before we press on. You are the commander. Can't you simply convince them?"

"There is nothing simple about dealing with sav­ages," Stone informed Lucien. "They will not go against their beliefs. I'm afraid we have reached an impasse."

As Fallon watched, the first rain drops fell, driven by the wind to splatter on the ground near Lucien's booted foot. The uncertain weather seemed to fuel his impatience. He glanced at her, but Fallon kept her expression purposely impas­sive. "A compromise, then. Surely we can reach a compromise."

Stone frowned heavily. "What manner of com­promise?"

"A modest one. Let them make their camp right here, on this side of the valley walls. We can pro­ceed, find the shelter we seek within, and rendez­vous with them when we break camp later in the morning. In that way, they will provide us protec­tion as sentries without invoking the wrath of their imagined evils, and we maintain a semblance of comfort."

"It seems reasonable," Stone affirmed, but there was still a thread of skepticism lurking in his voice when he turned to Wears-A-Hat. "Are you agree­able to the terms Master Deane suggests?"

Wears-A-Hat nodded gravely; then, with a lin­gering look at the sheer rock walls looming blackly against the predawn sky, he turned away, toward Joseph.

Stone started forward, walking his mount to­ward the narrow defile; Lucien took up the reins, beckoning to Fallon. Knowing she had little choice, Fallon rose from her seat on the log and followed her captors into the cleft.

The valley was rumored to be the Devil's favorite haunt, and Fallon understood well the origins of the Catskill legends. Towering mountains rose straight and steep for over four thousand feet on either side of a track too narrow in places for the three to walk comfortably abreast. With its blasted trees grotesquely bent from the tearing winds, and the crumbling precipice upon which huge boulders precariously sat, Stony Clove did indeed appear a byway to Hell.

Fallon glanced at the sheer rock walls, and the fine hairs on her arms and the nape of her neck stood erect. The night air, which a moment before had been soft and balmy, now held an unearthly chill. She couldn't help but wonder if perhaps, just perhaps, Wears-A-Hat had been right—that bad spirits did inhabit the cleft between the twin moun­tains, and by disturbing the unearthly stillness of the valley, they were risking much more than they could possibly know.

They made camp near Stygian Lake, where Lu­cien and Stone cut boughs from the balsam fir and fashioned a rude shelter to protect themselves from the elements. Fallon kept her distance while they labored, wandering to the shore of the lake, where she stood, a brooding, silent windswept figure, gazing back across the rippling dark waters to the mouth of the valley, toward home.

She knew that Willie and Zepporah would be worried sick by now, and she wished for some way to let them know that she was well and thinking of them. And then there was Draegan. Was he out there somewhere, searching? How would he find her? When?

Tears stung her eyes, but she blinked them back, striving hard not to dwell on her current circum­stances. She chose instead to cling stubbornly to the small shred of hope left to her. Stony Clove was just twenty miles from Abundance, close enough for her to find her way home, she thought, if she could but manage to slip away.

Stone finished the shelter and stood, dusting off his hands. "Blasted wind," he said to Lucien. "We shall be lucky indeed if its infernal howling doesn't whisper to our sentries that they would be wise to take themselves off and leave us." At Lucien's questioning look, Stone chuckled, a dry, unpleasant sound. "They are very much like children, these Mohawks, in need of constant supervision and di­rection, which, regretfully, I must provide. And, to that tiresome end, I must beg your leave. Mistress." He bowed to Fallon, who stood stiffly watching. Then, with a nod to Lucien, he smartly turned and melted into the shadows.

A few more scattered droplets fell, striking FalIon's rigid shoulders. She turned her face up to the lowering sky. The black of night was turning grad­ually to deep gray gloom. Dawn was perhaps an­other hour away.

The scrape of a dragging step sounded behind her. Fallon started, half-turning to glare at Lucien.

Weariness showed in his every lineament. "You need not speak. I only ask that you come in out of the weather. It's deuced cold in this valley, and I fear you might take ill." He licked his lips, seeming to falter. "Please, Fallon. I—"

He would have gone on, except for an odd sound that issued from a little distance along the lake- shore. An odd, gurgling moan, half-human, it chilled Fallon far more than the preternatural cold of the defile.

"Stone?" Lucien called into the darkness. "My lord? Was that you?"

Stone did not answer. Indeed, the only sound above the soughing wind was the gentle lapping of the lake against the shore, waters that had been calm a moment before, except for the noiseless rip­ple of the wind across the black surface.

With a muttered imprecation, Lucien snatched up a burning brand from the fire and held it aloft. The golden light shone brightly, reflecting off the black surface of the water, illuminating the still form of Lord Lovewell Artemis Stone, floating face down in the stagnant lake.

Lucien moved closer to the water and grasped the Englishman's boot, pulling him into the shal­lows. As Fallon watched, one hand hovering at her bloodless lips, he turned the man over.

Fallon averted her gaze. She could not look at the Englishman; she could not look at Lucien for fear that he would read her thoughts.

Draegan had come.

He'd said he'd never let her go, and he’d been true to his word. He'd come for her, for Lucien. He was out there in the shadows, wait­ing.

The realization filled her with a wild elation, a trembling, soul-numbing fear.

"He's dead," Lucien said tonelessly, rising. "Strangled with a rawhide thong." He crossed to Fallon and took her arm.

Fallon tried to pry his fingers from her arm, but his hold was too desperate, too sure.

"This is no time for stubbornness. Whoever did this is still out there, lurking. We must go. Now!"

"There is no use running, Uncle. He won't let me go, and I won't leave him again."

As Fallon's words died away a somber figure, garbed in unrelieved black, emerged from the shadows. His shining sable locks were loose and tousled by the wind, and his green eyes burned in his pale face with an intense, unearthly light. In his right hand, he held his ever-present pistol, trained on Lucien's heart. Its mate was thrust through his belt.

"Youngblood!" Lucien hissed. "Damn your pes­tilent soul!"

"You were expecting Captain Quill, perhaps?" Draegan said with a humorless curve of his hard mouth. "I'm here to convey to you the captain's regrets. He's been detained, and won't be joining you after all."

"Therein lies my only folly," Lucien sneered. "I should have killed you myself, instead of entrust­ing the task to that incompetent young imbecile."

"Yes," Draegan agreed, "I suppose you would have made better work of it, even though it would have meant soiling your hands, a concept I have little doubt you find abhorrent."

Lucien uttered a rasping chuckle. "You know me that well, do you? Then you must also know I won't allow myself to be taken."

Draegan cocked the piece he held, but the double click of the hammer being drawn back was all but lost in the howling of the wind. "You don’t have a choice. Stone is dead, and the sentries you posted thought better of disturbing the spirits that inhabit this place and took themselves off nearly an hour ago. There's no one left to help you. No­where for you to turn. It's done, Lucien—finished. Let Fallon go and give yourself over to me. If you do, you have my word that I'll do all I can on your behalf when we reach Albany. For Fallon's sake, if not your own."

"And if I don't?"

The dark face above the pistol sights hardened almost imperceptibly. "Then, regrettably, I’ll have to kill you."

Fallon moistened her lips. "Listen to him, Uncle, please. What Draegan suggests is the right thing, the honorable thing, for you to do. You cannot hope to win against him, and I cannot bear the thought of your being hurt at his hands!"

"Stay out of this, my dear. This is between the major and me. It has nothing to do with you." Lucien tried to push Fallon behind him, but she broke free and ran into Draegan's arms.

His free arm encircled her shoulders, and for a moment he held her tightly to him. Pressing her cheek against his shirtfront, she closed her eyes and heaved a ragged sigh. "He said you were—that Randall—" Her voice broke on the last syllable. "I was so afraid that I would never see you again."

"I'm here now to make things right," he said. "But you must trust me, Fallon. Can you do that?"

She nodded, beyond words, while Lucien scoffed. "My, how very touching. If I didn't know better, I might think that caring facade of yours is genuine. But I do know better, Youngblood. I am not as naive as my niece, or as easily convinced, and I can see straight through to your black heart. Not unlike me, you are passing good at erecting false facades, at making others believe you are something you are not. And you have employed your talents at chicanery relentlessly where Fallon is concerned, worming your ruthless way into her affections with the sole purpose of undermining her loyalty toward me. It would seem that you have succeeded admirably, and it will take a good deal longer for her to get over your demise than I had at first imagined."

On the last word, Lucien swiftly flung the burn­ing brand he still held. At the same instant, Drae­gan pushed Fallon aside and squeezed off a shot.

The brand bounced and rolled, flinging live sparks onto the hem of Fal­lon's skirts. Fallon gasped as the embers burst into tiny flames, and frantically slapped at her skirts with her hands, but she could not extinguish all of them, and the flames spread swiftly, filling her with mindless panic.

Desperate now, she bolted, heading toward the dark waters of the lake, toward her sole salvation. Her breath was sobbing in her throat, her chest was on fire, and then hard hands seized her, flung her to earth, and Draegan smothered the flames with his coat.

Pulling her up, he gathered her in against him, holding her tightly, stroking her hair to soothe her. "It's all right. You're safe now."

Fallon fought to control the quaking of her limbs. "Where is Uncle?"

"He slipped away," Draegan said. "And I think it best we do the same."

"But Uncle—"

"I'll see to him the moment you’re safe."

Draegan turned away, but Fallon was slower. She had seen something, a blur of movement from the corner of her eye. Pausing, she turned her head toward the blue and saw Lucien coming swiftly out of the darkness, a stout cudgel raised high above his head. Fallon opened her mouth to cry out a warning, but it was already too late, too late to do more than to watch in horror as the staff came arc­ing down toward Draegan's head. "Uncle... no!"

At her cry, Draegan half-turned, and the cudgel caught him a wicked blow on the temple. He fell to his knees, stunned, and shook his head.

Lucien swung the staff down again, hard, and Fallon screamed, lunging for Draegan as he fell for­ward from the blow, cradling his head in her lap. His face was ashen. Blood trickled from a gash at his temple, wetting her hands, staining her pale skirts.

Lucien moved in for the killing stroke. "Come away from him, Fallon. Come away, now, and let me finish it."

Fallon was wild with grief and anger. Tears streamed down her cheeks, scalding her chilled skin, blinding her. "No! No! I won't let you hurt him again! I love him, Uncle! I need him! And I won't let you take him from me!"

She touched the still white face of her lover with fingers that shook uncontrollably, feeling for the pulse at his throat. It was there, steady and strong, as strong as her love for him. "Go away," she said, with desperation in her voice. "Go to Niagara, or London, and start anew. I am giving you a second chance, and all I ask in return is that you leave us!"

Lucien shook his head, and the gesture seemed almost sad. "I can't do that, child, don't you see?

If I let Youngblood live, he will dog me the rest of my days. It must end here. I must kill him. It is the only way. Now, be a good and dutiful girl and move away from him."

As Lucien raised the cudgel high, Fallon's fingers closed around the worn walnut grip of the pistol in Draegan's belt, and she dragged it out and thumbed back the hammer.

"You won’t kill me, Fallon. You’re a gentle soul, so very much like Sabina. You haven't the heart to harm any living creature."

With shaking hands, Fallon raised the piece and leveled it at her uncle's chest. "Uncle Lucien, please!" she cried. "If you ever cared for me at all, if you ever loved me, you will not make me choose!"

Over the barrel she saw the man who had raised her, the gentle, caring man who had indulged her whims and satisfied her childish curiosity, swing the heavy staff with all his might, and Fallon squeezed the trigger.

The weapon bucked and roared, belching fire and acrid smoke. The loud report mingled with Fallon's full-hearted wail to echo eerily down the narrow cleft as she saw her uncle fall.

The sound of her soul-wrenching anguish dragged at Draegan, drawing him slowly from the soft, all-encompassing darkness into which he had retreated, toward the breaking dawn and Fallon.

The sight of her, when he opened his eyes, tore at his heart.  Her sweet face was ravaged by her tears, and in her beloved amber eyes, there was a wretchedness and pain unlike any he had ever seen.

At a little distance lay Lucien Deane, a cudgel held loosely in his grasp, a spreading crimson bloom on the breast of his shirt. His eyes were closed as if in sleep, and Draegan had no doubt about what had happened here, no doubt about the depth of Fallon's sacrifice.

She had risked her own heart to save his life, and there was no way to thank her, no way to ease her pain. He could only love her and pray to a merciful God that time would indeed heal this most griev­ous of wounds.

"Fallon," he whispered around the painful lump in his throat. "My sweet Fallon. I love you so." His own eyes were moist as he took her hand and urged her gently down, holding her while she wept out her broken heart.

After what seemed an eternity, her tears ceased to flow, and she grew quiet in his arms. "Madness took my uncle from me," she said miserably. "I could not allow it to claim you as well. I love you too much to let you go."

With reverent fingers, Draegan raised her chin and gazed into her tear-reddened eyes. "My love," he whispered. "My one and only love. My life.  It’s over now.”