38
Shaun stepped into the room and Saoirse was behind him. For someone who wasn’t supposed to be allowed near weapons, she looked quite comfortable with the rifle in her hand.
“Shaun,” Sarah said. “What is the meaning of this?”
“Good try, Sarah,” Shaun said. “But I don’t have a good excuse for what you just saw and I’m pretty sure you can’t unsee it.”
Sarah felt the trembling begin in her legs and she tightened her hold on Siobhan. Both Shaun and Saoirse were pointing their weapons at the three of them. Her mind raced to understand what was happening. But her shaking body already knew.
“I figured you’d find out eventually,” Shaun said sadly. “I was actually trying to get rid of the evidence. The last thing I wanted was for things to end like this.”
“It doesn’t have to end,” Sarah said.
“Really? Well, can you tell me what you think the explanation is for the pile of bones behind you?”
Sarah licked her lips. “You…you’ve been waylaying people who come to the castle?”
“And eating them. Yes, Sarah.”
Catriona gasped at Shaun’s words and Saoirse snorted in derision.
“It started out an accident,” Shaun said. “Ava’s husband died that first winter and we were starving. I’m not a hunter. So I did what I had to do to keep my people alive.”
Okay, so they ate one of their own who died. They were starving. That’s still a far cry from the pile of bones here.
“After that, well, we’d already done it once. It wasn’t that hard after that.”
“So that’s… that’s how you survived?” Frank asked. Sarah saw that he’d pulled Catriona into his arms in a protective hold.
“Keep your hands where I can see them,” Shaun said to Frank.
“We need to move ‘em into the main cages,” Saoirse said.
“Will ye force me to take the bairn from ye, Sarah?” Shaun said. “Or will ye come along without trouble?”
“I’ll come,” she said, her heart pounding in her throat. His gun was pointed at Sarah’s heart, which meant it was pointed at Siobhan’s back.
“Catriona?” Shaun said. “Come to me, lass.”
Catriona hesitated.
“Come to me or I shoot him,” Shaun said waving the gun at Frank. Catriona walked to Shaun and he grabbed her by the hair and twisted her around so she was facing away from him. He held the gun to her head.
“Now behave yourself, lad,” Shaun said. “Or she dies sooner rather than later. Everyone outside if you please.”
Frank and Sarah stepped into the hall. Saoirse quickly patted down Frank and then pressed a hidden lever in a nearby stone wall and a small door cracked open on the wall.
“After you, arsehole,” Saoirse said to Frank. He bent over and stepped through the door with Saoirse right behind him, then Sarah, and lastly Shaun and Catriona. Through the door was a steep and ancient staircase that led two levels downward.
At the bottom of the stairs was another door. Inside was a large cavernous room with three old-fashioned jail cells fixed to the western wall that faced the ocean.
“Inside, genius,” Saoirse said as she nudged Frank with her rifle barrel into the first cell. He stepped in, followed by Sarah. Finally Shaun pushed Catriona inside. Saoirse closed and locked the cell door behind them
Sarah tried to think, tried to stall. Tried to appeal to the man she’d lived with every day for the last two weeks.
“And your mother?” she said. “I can’t believe she would be a part of this.”
“She didn’t know about it,” Shaun said, frowning. “My mother lived in another world. It wasn’t hard to fool her. I’m sorry, Sarah. I genuinely liked you and Mike. But now that you’ve found evidence of…our history, what choice do I have?”
“We can talk about it together.”
“Do you really think after your husband knows what we’ve done, he’d allow us to stay?”
You’ll be lucky not to be branded with the letter C and turned out to starve.
“I can see by your face that my assessment of Himself is correct,” Shaun said.
“What about our children?”
“I’m sorry, so I am. You must think us monsters.”
Sarah clutched Siobhan so tightly the child began to cry and squirm to free herself.
“And now what?” Frank said. “Someone will notice we’re missing.”
“Of course they will. Which is why it’s time for all of you to become enlightened.”
“Mike will never let you get away with this,” Sarah said, her chest vibrating with fear.
“Mike and Gavin are both outside the castle at the moment,” Shaun said. “Providential for me. The drawbridge will stay up until everyone is secured down here.”
He was going to herd the whole castle population into these three jail cells? Sarah’s mind was whirling. The window in her cell was small but she might fit through it. But to what end? She could hear the roar of the ocean as it pounded the rocks eighty feet below.
“And then?” she asked, hoping for time, hoping for something. Catriona was in Frank’s arms again and was crying.
“Blimey, Sarah. Do you really want to know the details?” Shaun said in frustration. “Once your people are locked up, we’ll lower the drawbridge for Mike and Gavin.”
“And then you’ll kill them as they enter,” Frank said with disgust.
“I know you don’t believe me,” Shaun said, addressing Sarah, “but it kills me to break a trust, so it does. But I have no choice.”
“Shaun, listen to me. You don’t need to do this to survive now.”
“Nay, but Mike wouldn’t let us stay and that’s a death warrant, so it is. Or do you think he’d still be delivering muffins and rabbit stew to us this time around?”
Saoirse backed out of the opening and disappeared into the hallway. Shaun turned to join her.
“I’m sorry, Sarah. I truly am,” he said sadly from the doorway. “No one was more excited about the idea of joining up with you lot but it just won’t work now and—what was it your husband said when he tricked us into opening the gate?—the sooner we all come to grips with that the better it’ll be for everyone.”
Fiona folded the cotton diaper and laid it on top of the stack. The squeals of the children in the nursery soothed the wound in her heart. Seeing Ciara laughing and running around—unmindful of the fact that she’d lost her father—helped at the same time it hurt.
“Are ye all right then, Fiona?” Nuala asked from across the room. She held two babies in her arms, both of them squalling but Nuala looked unperturbed.
Everyone is so worried about me, Fiona thought as she forced a smile for Nuala’s sake. And none of their worry can help me. What a useless thing it was, worry. Has it helped Sarah all these months now? Did it once keep anyone alive? Little Maeve? Or Declan?
She felt her eyes brimming with tears and turned away to focus on the older children. Both Nuala’s boys were too big for the nursery but Mary and Kevin O’Malley’s lass, Mary Ann, was old enough to be a bit of a help. As Fiona watched her—no more than six years old—she thought she saw a strong maternal streak in the girl.
For all the good it will do you. Take care of them. Love them. And lose them away.
“Penny for them, Fiona?” Liddy said from where she sat by the window with her four-month-old baby in her lap.
Fiona sat down next to Liddy and held her arms out for the child. Liddy handed her over.
“Sure they’re a full time job,” Fiona said trying to keep her mood light.
“Mary says it’s no easier even with Kev helping,” Liddy said. “But sure that’s a lie.”
Fiona looked sadly at Liddy. “You missing Davey?” she asked.
“Missing him? How can I miss someone who loved me so little he’d walk away rather than be the father to our child?”
Fiona knew Liddy’s husband Davey didn’t exactly walk away voluntarily. When he refused to consider raising the baby Roisin—the result of a rape—as his own, Mike threw him out of the community.
Liddy eyes brimmed with angry tears.
“Sure, he’d have me choose him—my dearest sweetheart and husband of eight years—over my rapist’s baby?” She wiped her tears away and reached out to take Roisin back. “It wasn’t even a contest. So good riddance to bad rubbish.”
“I know you don’t mean that,” Fiona said. “Davey was a good man.”
“Aye, he was,” Liddy said. “Right up to the moment when he wasn’t. And Roisin and I are just fine without him.”
So much sadness in the world, Fiona thought as she saw the hurt in Liddy’s face. She’d loved Davey and until last summer, Fiona would have bet everything that he’d loved her too.
The door to the nursery swung open and Ava stuck her head inside.
“Ladies?” she said breathlessly. “Sarah’s asking for you downstairs. She seems to have found some kind of ancient bathing room.”
Nuala turned to look at the other women in the room.
“A bathing room?” Nuala said, but her eyes brightened with interest.
“Aye,” Ava said. “She says you’re to bring all the bairns.”
Well, that was a wasted afternoon, Mike thought as he and Gavin trotted down the main road to the castle. Gavin had wanted to lay traps in another patch of woods out on the northern ridge of the deserted village. They’d hoped to find something there a little more exotic than rabbit or squirrel.
No such luck.
“Does it really have to be turkey?” Gavin asked as they rode back. He had four rabbits draped across his saddle. It wouldn’t feed the whole castle and it definitely wouldn’t rank as the star of a Thanksgiving day feast—at least as far as Sarah was concerned—but it was all they’d scared up.
“She doesn’t expect turkey,” Mike said. “No more than she expects cranberries.”
“But something better than rabbit?”
“I’m not giving up. We have a few days yet. Besides the day is more about coming together and being thankful than it is the food.”
“If you say so.”
They stopped in front of the castle. The air was cold and while it was still early afternoon, it would be dark in another hour or two.
“I don’t see Kev,” Gavin said. “He’s usually on watch this time of day.”
“Halloo, the castle!” Mike called. It would be good to get in out of the wind and have a nice hot cup of tea.
Shaun appeared at the parapet and shouted down to them.
“Having trouble with the trunnion on the door again,” he said.
The trunnion was one of the two axles on the door that allowed it to raise. Mike remembered Kev mentioned a couple of days ago that it was sticking.
“How long to fix it?” Mike called up.
“Should be jake within the hour.”
Mike looked at Gavin and grinned. “Gives us an excuse to hunt a little longer.”
“I’ve been wanting to try the area on the other side of the parking lot,” Gavin said, shrugging.
“Might as well.” Mike waved to Shaun and banished the image of the waiting cup of tea as he pointed his horse’s nose away from the castle.