Dawn had not yet crept over the battlements when William de Valery arrived at Rardove Keep.

He was led into the hall, asked to see Senna, and when she wasn’t brought immediately, demanded in a loud voice to see Lord Rardove. Servants scurried in all directions as if to do his bidding, but no one entered the hall for three quarters of an hour. By then the de Valery knights’ heads were bent in a tight, murmuring circle, their hands by their sword hilts.

A servant poked his nose in the baron’s bedchamber, his brow already scrunched up to ward off any objects that might be sent flying from his lord’s ill humor. “My lord?”

“What the hell is it?” he snapped.

“Sir William de Valery, my lord.”

Rardove’s eyes snapped open. He looked up into the gray light. “What are you talking about?”

“Sir William de Valery is in the hall, my lord. A bit angry at being kept waiting.”

Rardove sat up straight. “De Valery? Waiting? What is he waiting for? What is he here for?”

The servant cleared his throat. “He wants to see his sister, sir.”

Rardove entered the great hall five minutes later and found a circle of six or seven knights standing in the center of it. His gaze swiftly scanned the group and settled on the one who looked most like Senna.

Gauntlets stripped off and held in one hand, the knight had also removed his helm, holding it under one crooked arm, and pushed the mail covering back from his head, revealing damp, matted blond hair. Leather boots, rising to his knees, were coated with mud. His surcoat was barely visible beneath an equally impressive layer of muck. The rest of the group looked in the same state, as if they’d ridden hard and long without stopping.

Rested or no, though, the blond-haired knight turned at the first sound of boots scuffing the rushes. His eyes were alert and infinitely wary as he crossed the hall in long strides.

“My lord?”

“Sir William?” inquired Rardove, nodding. He smiled, but the young cub did not seem inclined toward social proprieties, for he pointedly did not return the smile.

“My sister.”

“Ahh.” Rardove turned to wave a servant into bringing refreshments. “Senna.”

“No one has brought her to me.”

Rardove clasped his hands together like a monk and sighed. “There’s been a slight problem.”

“Problem?”

“She’s…gone.”

The hazel eyes shaded darker in confusion. “What?”

“She’s been abducted by an Irishman.”

“Abducted?” His voice was incredulous.

“Aye. This is a brutal land, and—”

“What the hell are you talking about?” William demanded, his hand flexing over his sword hilt, brushing against the simple clasp at his left hip. Rardove dropped his gaze to the sight, then lifted it deliberately.

“Nigh on a week ago, while I was sickened in bed, an Irish prisoner I was holding in the cellars escaped. He took Senna with him.”

“Took Senna with him?” de Valery echoed, his face a study in confusion and anger.

“Snatched her up and took her away.”

“Why?”

Rardove spread out his hands in a gesture of helplessness. “’Tis unfathomable.”

“To where?”

“Finian O’Melaghlin is councilor to the O’Fáil tribe. We assume they went there. We’ve men out searching, but the castle…it’s unassailable.”

“Finian O’Melaghlin?” de Valery asked, his gaze sharp. “I’ve heard of the man.”

“Ah, yes.” Rardove exhaled in a disappointed sigh. “He’s gaining quite a reputation. But the Irish are a twisted race and do not abide trust well. Upon a time, I tried to make an alliance with them, which they spurned. One cannot rely too much on alliances in these dark days.”

William paused through the length of a breath. “No, my lord. One cannot.”

They held one another’s gaze, then Rardove broke contact and reached for a tray of mugs the servant had just set on the table.

“You know little of this land, Sir William,” he said over his shoulder. “You might find it burdensome to scorn what friends you have.”

“I will recall that to mind.”

“Be sure you do.” Wine gurgled from the flagon into his cup, the sound of splashing loud in the quiet hall. “As for your sister, let me assure you, I am doing everything I can to secure her return.”

De Valery’s reply was pitched low and harsh, carrying no farther than the two men. “Let me assure you, Rardove, I will see someone pay in blood if anything happens to Senna.”

Lowering the cup, Rardove placed it on the table with deliberate slowness. “Alas, your dear, docile sister is not in my keeping at present, so I’ve little to say on the matter.”

Rardove elongated the word docile to a number of extra syllables. De Valery’s jaw tightened. He swiveled and looked to the circle of knights, who stood watching him with hooded eyes.

De Valery turned back. “I cannot see for what reason the Irish would take her,” he said with a mistrustful glance down at the cup of wine on the table.

“They are fiends,” Rardove explained in a magnanimous gesture, then followed de Valery’s gaze to the goblet. “Care for some?” He raised the flagon. De Valery said nothing. “Your men, perhaps?”

Rardove held the vessel higher so the knights in the background could see. Ten pairs of eyes stared back, five armored knights and five muscular squires, none a day under seventeen. Not a muscle moved. Rardove cleared his throat and set the pitcher down.

“Explain to me why O’Melaghlin would take my sister,” de Valery said grimly.

“Because they are savage barbarians,” Rardove snapped. “All of them, with as little honor or sense of right as a sheep. I had a few of their men in my prisons and I expect when O’Melaghlin saw a chance to escape, he saw taking her, too, as a matter of pride.”

De Valery’s gaze slid slowly up Rardove’s robes, to his face. “Aye. I expect he did.”

Rardove’s face grew hot at the insolence, but the cadre of sword-bearing knights kept his tone quiet as he leaned forward and spoke near William’s ear.

“Woe to you, young cub, if you become the object of their enmity as have I. You know nothing of this land, and happens your arrogance will bedevil you as much as the Irishry.”

“Happens it may bedevil you the more if Senna is not returned in pristine condition.”

Rardove set the pitcher down. “And there we come to the heart of the matter. The Irish are a changeable race, untrustworthy and as likely to turn an alliance as to spit.”

De Valery’s jaw flexed. “What is your plan, then?”

“There is no way around it. I’ve summoned my vassals to the muster. The justiciar Wogan is coming. Edward, too.”

De Valery stared. “The king of England is riding here to rescue Senna?”

“The king of England is riding here to prevent a rebellion on his Irish borders while he tries to quell the one in Scotland.”

“A rebellion? Senna is out there.”

“I know. We march for the Irish come three days.”

De Valery paused long enough for several thoughts to have flickered through his young mind. Rardove waited, wondering which he would choose. If he was anything like his sister, William de Valery was probably not going to make a wise choice, a political choice—

The cub leaned forward until the tip of his nose was practically touching the baron’s. “Be assured of this, Rardove: I’ll march straight over your bones if anything happens to my sister.”

No. Not politic at all. Rardove ground his teeth.

He could cut this one to the ground with a few deft words if he wished, fling out a few memories of his mother, here in Rardove Keep, bending for Rardove, but for now such things needed silence. De Valery would not be pleased to learn his mother had been here, died trying to escape. And he preferred de Valery’s alliance to his enmity. For now.

De Valery gestured to his knights and the troop moved out of the hall. The sound of booted feet on stone thundered through the room as the herd of armored men ascended the stairs.

“I can count on your presence at the muster?” Rardove called after.

De Valery paused with one foot on the top step. He half turned to glance over his shoulder, mail basinet clumped around his neck. “I think you know what you can count on from me, my lord.”

Rardove smiled thinly. “Twenty-four knights and their retinues.”

De Valery swung away. “I’ll be there,” he said without looking back. The mud-soaked knights disappeared in a swath of golden sunlight as the door swung open, then slammed closed again, leaving the great hall in blue-black shadows and moldy intrigue.

The de Valery horses were assembled outside the covered stairwell leading to the keep. As the men dropped down the stairs, puffs of dirt billowed in small clouds. Low-angled dawn light mingled with the hazy grit floating in the air, making amber swirls of grime that rose around their steel-encased legs.

Will dragged his mail hood over his head and stuffed a padded layer of cloth between his hair and the protective iron links, then swung up into his saddle. He shoved the helm onto his head and latched the slotted visor upright with a twist of his fingers, exposing his face.

His men watched him in silence. With a curt nod, the cavalcade moved off, riding slowly across the bailey.

Will held himelf straight and silent as they passed under the rusted fangs of the raised portcullis. The gate was slung so low he would have lobbed off an ear if he’d risen in the stirrups. The squeal of grinding winches lifted the draw after they’d passed.

His hands held the reins as lightly as ever; his words, the few he used, were as impassive as a monk’s upon hearing the tally of the rectory’s in-kind offerings at Michealmas. Indeed, nothing about him betrayed anger. He could have been a wooden wagon-wheel, rolling across the land. But he was far past anger. Nigh onto a noxious rage that needed to be tempered to prove useful.

Christ’s mercy. Senna kidnapped by an Irishman. Only Senna. She’d come to conduct a business deal, and was caught up in an intrigue so large it would rock this war-torn land for a generation to come.

And now, the land Will had earned with a great deal of blood was at risk. He said frequently that he cared naught for land, but that was only because he had no land to care for. The manor would have come to him, of course, but he would never have taken it away from Senna.

Not that he could now in any event. The business was hers, ever since she bought out her father’s debt with her very own dowry, after her husband died. With a blade through his heart.

Robbers, she’d said, and had called out the hue and cry. The culprit had never been found.

Will would gladly have done the deed himself if Senna hadn’t. The way her face looked after a single night wedded was enough to bring murder to anyone’s mind. It was more than sufficient to spur Will into teaching Senna every skill of blade and bow he had in his considerable repertoire.

But now, Will had land. Land. And despite his nonchalant claims to the contrary, he wanted it badly.

He was quite conscious of the fact that he did not know much about Ireland, certainly not enough to know if Rardove was telling the truth about the Irish and their lack of honor. It mattered little. They had Senna, and he would run his sword through them, every one, to get her back.

With a gentle prick of his spurs, he lifted his horse into a canter. His men followed suit and the land fell away under the smooth, rocking motion as they made for the de Valery keep.