through it.
And the only room that would begin to hold the contents of Faulkhurst was the great hall.
"A treasure hunt!" Lisabet's shouts and Pippa's squealing followed the pair of them into the undercrofts, and soon they were racing up and down the tower stairs, their arms filled with a mix of cups, shoes, and brooms.
Eleanor sectioned off the hall for kitchen goods, for linens, for furniture and chests, setting aside the odd hammer or harness for the stables. It would be a weeklong endeavor at the least to find everything, even if she could spare everyone in the castle for this single task.
"Please let me know immediately, Lisabet, if you find any books." Eleanor rescued the pail of candle bits out of the girl's arms and set it with the two jugs of lamp oil. "They'll be very large. Heavy, too."
"Books to read?"
"Only the estate records, sweet. Inventories and accountings, the harvest schedules."
Lisabet wrinkled up her dust-smudged nose. "What kind of reading is that?"
The most valuable kind of all: information. "Faulkhurst's best kept secrets, Lisabet."
"A real treasure! Pippa! There's a book somewhere with a secret inside!" Lisabet dashed up the tower stairs.
"Where did you hide your black heart, husband?" The records had to be in the castle somewhere, and with any luck she'd find the estate office at the same time, behind one of Bayard's hundreds of locked doors.
She hurried down the stairs to the undercroft beneath the great hall, armed with her lamp, her faithful picklock, and a sledgehammer for good measure.
She hung the lamp on a peg and fit the pick into a rusted lock, certain that God completely understood why she'd learned to pick locks with such ease: to open the herbalist's cabinet at the deserted Priory of St. Oswald, to free Dickon and Lisabet from that horrid jail at Bristol. The skill was an uproarious source of humor for Dickon.
She did her level best with the small picklock, but still the rusted hasp just hung there.
Like so many of her husband's locks, it was impregnable. An overlarge hunk of rusted iron, corroded by the salted air of the sea, encrusted with his villainy. But hopefully, no match for a simple sledgehammer and a chisel.
She hoisted the long-handled thing over her shoulder, fit the chisel blade against the hasp, raised the hammer above her head, inhaled a breath of suddenly familiar, altogether intoxicating coolness, then put every ounce of her weight into a downward swing.
But the hammer went nowhere. At all. It hung with a magical weightlessness in the air just above her head.
"What—"
"Are you trying to take your fingers off at the wrist, madam?"
"Nicholas!" Furious that he could so easily thwart her—that he could sneak up on her like a shadow, as though he owned every passage, she kept a firm grip on the handle and turned beneath his arm, only to come face to chest with his frozen-frowned fury. "Let go this instant. I order you."
Nicholas decided then and there that the only way to save the woman from herself was to lock her up and toss away the key. "And I refuse, madam." He plucked the sledgehammer out of her hand and tossed it aside, well out of her reach.
"On what grounds, sir?"
"On the grounds that you are being careless with your well-being."
"I'm perfectly capable of breaking a few locks. I've been doing it this way all morning." She rapped on the panel with the heel of her hand, then leaned back against the door.
"This way?" Holy hell. "Wild swings with a sledgehammer and a chisel?" He took the chisel out of her hand.
"Lacking a set of keys to my husband's castle, I have no choice. You haven't seen any, have you, Nicholas? Keys to any of the doors?"
He nearly laughed. There was a whole ring of them rusting beneath the waves where he'd tossed them over a year ago. But she didn't need to know that. He would open the damned locks himself.
He'd never in his life had to lie about anything. He'd never needed to—he'd always taken what he wanted by force or
And the only room that would begin to hold the contents of Faulkhurst was the great hall.
"A treasure hunt!" Lisabet's shouts and Pippa's squealing followed the pair of them into the undercrofts, and soon they were racing up and down the tower stairs, their arms filled with a mix of cups, shoes, and brooms.
Eleanor sectioned off the hall for kitchen goods, for linens, for furniture and chests, setting aside the odd hammer or harness for the stables. It would be a weeklong endeavor at the least to find everything, even if she could spare everyone in the castle for this single task.
"Please let me know immediately, Lisabet, if you find any books." Eleanor rescued the pail of candle bits out of the girl's arms and set it with the two jugs of lamp oil. "They'll be very large. Heavy, too."
"Books to read?"
"Only the estate records, sweet. Inventories and accountings, the harvest schedules."
Lisabet wrinkled up her dust-smudged nose. "What kind of reading is that?"
The most valuable kind of all: information. "Faulkhurst's best kept secrets, Lisabet."
"A real treasure! Pippa! There's a book somewhere with a secret inside!" Lisabet dashed up the tower stairs.
"Where did you hide your black heart, husband?" The records had to be in the castle somewhere, and with any luck she'd find the estate office at the same time, behind one of Bayard's hundreds of locked doors.
She hurried down the stairs to the undercroft beneath the great hall, armed with her lamp, her faithful picklock, and a sledgehammer for good measure.
She hung the lamp on a peg and fit the pick into a rusted lock, certain that God completely understood why she'd learned to pick locks with such ease: to open the herbalist's cabinet at the deserted Priory of St. Oswald, to free Dickon and Lisabet from that horrid jail at Bristol. The skill was an uproarious source of humor for Dickon.
She did her level best with the small picklock, but still the rusted hasp just hung there.
Like so many of her husband's locks, it was impregnable. An overlarge hunk of rusted iron, corroded by the salted air of the sea, encrusted with his villainy. But hopefully, no match for a simple sledgehammer and a chisel.
She hoisted the long-handled thing over her shoulder, fit the chisel blade against the hasp, raised the hammer above her head, inhaled a breath of suddenly familiar, altogether intoxicating coolness, then put every ounce of her weight into a downward swing.
But the hammer went nowhere. At all. It hung with a magical weightlessness in the air just above her head.
"What—"
"Are you trying to take your fingers off at the wrist, madam?"
"Nicholas!" Furious that he could so easily thwart her—that he could sneak up on her like a shadow, as though he owned every passage, she kept a firm grip on the handle and turned beneath his arm, only to come face to chest with his frozen-frowned fury. "Let go this instant. I order you."
Nicholas decided then and there that the only way to save the woman from herself was to lock her up and toss away the key. "And I refuse, madam." He plucked the sledgehammer out of her hand and tossed it aside, well out of her reach.
"On what grounds, sir?"
"On the grounds that you are being careless with your well-being."
"I'm perfectly capable of breaking a few locks. I've been doing it this way all morning." She rapped on the panel with the heel of her hand, then leaned back against the door.
"This way?" Holy hell. "Wild swings with a sledgehammer and a chisel?" He took the chisel out of her hand.
"Lacking a set of keys to my husband's castle, I have no choice. You haven't seen any, have you, Nicholas? Keys to any of the doors?"
He nearly laughed. There was a whole ring of them rusting beneath the waves where he'd tossed them over a year ago. But she didn't need to know that. He would open the damned locks himself.
He'd never in his life had to lie about anything. He'd never needed to—he'd always taken what he wanted by force or
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