Her words died in a little choking sound. She stared at her father, thunderstruck. “By my faith, you didn’t just happen across that poor wretch in Falmouth, did you? You planned this, all of it!”
“Hear me out, Rowena.” Sir Christopher could be as strong-willed as his daughter. “What I did, I did for my own good reasons.”
“How long did it take you to arrange it?” she demanded, trembling as she rose to her feet. “Six months? A year? What did you have to do to get him?”
“I put up printed notices in the taverns around the docks,” he answered with the cold stubbornness of a rock in the Narrow Seas. “The notices declared that I would pay one hundred fifty pounds for a healthy savage from North America. A messenger brought me word yesterday that a captain, newly arrived, had such a specimen—”
“A captain, indeed! A privateer, you mean! No better than a pirate!”
“In truth, I did not think to ask.” Sir Christopher had marshaled his defenses now. The set of his shoulders and the jut of his jaw declared that he had taken his position and would not be moved.
“And not a word to your own daughter!” Rowena fumed. “Indeed, why did you neglect to make me privy to your plans?”
Sir Christopher speared a morsel of beef with the point of his knife and used it to jab the air emphatically as he spoke. “Because you would have behaved exactly as you’re behaving now. And you would not have succeeded in changing my mind, Rowena. Not by a whit. The discoveries I make about this creature and his world will restore my favor with the queen. Yours, too. Perhaps you might even be offered a position at court—”
“I have no wish to wait upon the queen, Father. My life is here in this house with you.”
Sir Christopher sagged in his chair, an expression of profound sadness stealing over his once-vigorous features. “And what kind of life have I given you, child? When I pass on, you’ll be alone here. No husband, no children—”
“Let the savage go,” Rowena demanded gently. “Take him back to Falmouth and put him on a ship for the New World. I’ll pay his passage myself out of the dowry of jewels my mother left me.”
Rowena’s father shook his head. “You know as well as I do he would never survive the journey. Likely as not, the captain would take your money and throw your savage overboard at the first sign of trouble.”
“My savage?” A bitter smile tugged at the corners of Rowena’s mouth. “So now he’s my savage, is he?”
“Why not, since you seem to have taken up his cause?” Sir Christopher scowled at the tidbit of meat on the end of his knife, then brought it to his mouth and began the tedious chewing that his meager teeth allowed.
“Well, then, as long as I have claim to him, I want him out of the cellar,” Rowena said. “There are empty chambers aplenty in this house. The least we can do is lock him in a warm, dry place with ample food and bedding.”
Sir Christopher downed the remains of the meat with a swig of ale. “What? And have him leap out of a window or attack the first poor soul who comes in to feed him? No, Rowena, as long as the creature is a danger to himself and to others he will remain behind bars. As for you, you are not to go near him, nor is any other woman in this house. Leave the tending of him to Thomas and Dickon.” He pushed back from the table, his chair scraping on the stones. “And leave the breaking of him to me. I mean it.”
“Breaking?” Rowena paused in clearing away the platters, something she often did if the evening meal lingered past the time for the servants to retire. “You talk about him as if he were a wild animal!”
“That is precisely what he is.” Sir Christopher rose wearily to his feet. “I wasn’t always the doddering old fool you see before you, my dear. Just give me a little time. Believe me, I know how to break a beast—and a man.”
Black Otter gripped the iron bars, his eyes straining to see into the murky darkness that lay beyond his cell. The effort was useless. For all he could make out, he might as well have been blind.
How long would they keep him here? Time lost all meaning when the sun was gone. At least, in the belly of the great boat, he had caught occasional glimpses of light from above. He had been able to hear men moving and shouting on the decks overhead and, in time, had learned to tell day from night by the sounds they made.
Here there was nothing but darkness and bone-chilling cold. Nothing but the scurry of rats and the faint, distant drip of water. Nothing but his own burning rage to keep him from giving in to madness.
He thought of the two husky men who had dragged him through the great lodge and down the dark stairs. He pictured the pale, plump man with the torch and the old one, the chief of all the white men. He remembered the woman, tall, like a man, but with a disturbing grace about her, the skirt of her odd costume flaring around her legs like the inverted cup of a huge, dark flower. One by one he focused his anger on them, letting it burn hot in the cold darkness. Even her. Even the woman. He hated them all.
But anger would not get him out of this place, Black Otter reminded himself. For that he would need a cool head and the cunning of a fox.
He had explored his small prison from top to bottom, fingers probing the straw, the walls, the fastenings that anchored the heavy barred door. The enclosure was solid stone, with not so much as a niche that could be widened into an opening. The bars, as well, were too strong to bend and too closely spaced for even a child to squeeze through. His only chance of escape lay in seizing the instant when one of his captors opened the door. For that he would need to be on constant watch.
The iron manacles ground into his scab-encrusted wrists and ankles, raising an ooze of fresh blood as he moved into a shadowed corner and eased himself into a low crouch against the wall. He had found the water jar earlier and taken a cautious sip. It was fresh and cool, and after the foul stuff he’d been given on the boat, it had taken all his willpower to keep from gulping it to the last drop. Even now, his parched throat cried out for more. But he could not surrender to thirst. There was no way of knowing how long the water might have to last.
With a broken exhalation, he leaned back against the wall, closed his eyes and tried to rest. To take his mind off the pain of his battered body, he thought about Lenapehoken, his homeland, with its deep forests and clear-running streams; and he thought about his children. He pictured Swift Arrow bounding toward him along a mossy forest trail, his small brown face split by a reckless grin. He imagined Singing Bird kneeling beside the fire, her gaze lowered, her young features—awkwardly balanced but holding the promise of beauty—soft in the golden light. He would return to them, he vowed. Whatever the cost, if they lived he would find them. He would gather them into his arms and the three of them would be a family once more.
Whatever the cost….
Rowena lay on her bed, her hair spread in a wild tangle on the pillow. Above her the midnight moon glimmered through the leaded windowpanes. She had been tossing for hours, it seemed, turning this way and that, willing herself to sleep. But it was no use. Her body was tired but her churning mind would not grant her release.
Frustrated, she sat up, swung her legs over the edge of the bed and brushed her sweat-dampened hair back from her face. Her chamber, closed as always against the night vapors, was warm and stuffy. Rowena hesitated, then rose and strode to the window. Vapors be damned! She needed fresh air!
Flinging open the sash, she
