The Hostage Bride by Jane Feather

leaving a trail of broken hearts and bastard children in his wake. But then, judging by the dagger-throwing episode, Jack’s daughter was a most unusual creature.
    He turned again to the door. “Olivia, you should visit your stepmother without further delay. She may have need of you.” He drew on his gloves again and banged out of the kitchen in another icy blast.
    Outside, he strode to the parade ground, where the men were falling out after the morning’s drill. Cato paused to look back up at the castle battlements where the pennants snapped, flying the colors of Parliament. They made a brave show against the ice blue sky. The air was so cold it hurt to breathe deeply, and the sun was a pale yellow round hanging low over the hulking Lammermuir Hills without a thread of warmth to it.
    Where was Rufus Decatur at this moment? Holed up in his private fold of the Cheviot wasteland? The earl of Rothbury had known since the previous afternoon that Cato Granville was declaring for Parliament. The information had been pricked out of one of Giles’s less stoic companions during their ordeal at the hands of Decatur moss-troopers while the robber baron himself had entertained Granville’s niece by a cottager’s fireside. Cato was in little doubt that the attack on his men had been primarily designed to produce the information.
    Not that it made any difference, since the information was now as public as it could be, flying for all to see for miles around from the battlements of Castle Granville. But Cato would have dearly liked to know which way his enemy was going to jump. Was Rufus still sitting on the fence, watching the turmoil unfolding across the land with an ironical observer’s eye, planning his own entrance into the anarchy where it would bring him and his band the most benefit?
    Cato could not believe that Rufus would make his decision based on anything other than self-interest. If Decatur allied himself with the winning side, then he could expect rewards. He could expect that the house of Rothbury would be returned to its former position of wealth, influence, and prestige.
    If indeed that was what he wanted. Rufus Decatur was a born outlaw, and a born leader. He attracted men like bees to pollen. Good men and bad. Men in search of excitement. Men unwilling or unable to live within the ordinary laws of society. Would such a man ever be able to return to the civilized world?
    But there was a war to be fought before such questions could be answered. And for all the excitement among the men leaving the parade ground, for all Cato’s own jubilation, the marquis of Granville saw the shadow of a bloody death across all their futures.

5

    “W ell, well, will you look at that, now.” Rufus smiled
within his red beard, but his bright blue eyes were hard as diamonds. He sat his horse and looked across the roll of low hills spread out before him to where Castle Granville stood on its own hill, higher than the rest, Parliament’s flags flying from keep and buttress.
    “Cock of the dunghill,” he said scornfully. “Crowing defiance and boastful pride.”
    “Seems like they’re having some kind of feast,” Will observed, shading his eyes with his hand. “You can smell the roasting meat from here.” There was a wistful note in his voice; they’d left Decatur village just after sunup and it was now nearly noon.
    “Aye, an’ there’s ’alf the countryside goin’ in to join ’em, looks like,” their companion muttered.
    In silence the three men watched the scene below them. Folk in holiday dress were pouring across the drawbridge into the castle, children pranced and darted, and the sound of drums and pipes drifted upward, the music both martial and merry.
    “I reckon they’re celebratin’ Granville comin’ out for Parliament.”
    “So it would seem, George,” Rufus agreed absently. He tapped his whip against his boot in the stirrup, his gaze fixed on the activity below, the snapping banners, a pair of skaters