The Rogue’s Stolen Bride

Chapter Thirteen: Too Late

Riley

I had rehearsed the speech the entire ride.

It was a good speech. Dramatic, but not overwrought. Firm but compassionate. The kind of speech that would make Kaida’s eyes fill with grateful tears and make her say something like “I knew you’d come, Riley” in a small trembling voice while I helped her onto my horse and we rode away into the sunset.

I had really outdone myself with this speech.

“Pick up the pace,” Donal said, from beside me.

I picked up the pace.

We had set out the moment the dust from Kaida’s carriage had settled on the road, the four of us — myself, Donal, Finn and Corbin — slipping out of the pack manor with the casual ease of men going for a morning ride. Nobody stopped us. Nobody asked questions. My father was busy congratulating himself on a difficult political problem neatly resolved, and Ben was busy being Ben, and neither of them had any reason to watch their second son too closely.

Their mistake.

We pushed the horses hard and made good time, the road unrolling beneath us through the grey morning. Finn rode steady and silent at my back, as he always did. Corbin, who was seventeen and had been vibrating with excitement since I’d recruited him the previous evening, kept trying to ride up alongside me and ask questions.

“Stay back,” Donal told him, for the third time.

Corbin stayed back. For about five minutes.

We were perhaps an hour’s ride from Greymore Forest when I first noticed something was wrong. The road ahead was too quiet. There should have been the sound of the carriage, the creak of wheels, the steady clop of the escort’s horses. Instead there was nothing but birdsong and wind.

I pushed my horse faster.

We came around the bend and I pulled up so sharply that Corbin nearly rode into the back of me.

The carriage was there. Right there in the middle of the road, the horses still hitched and calm, their breath making small clouds in the cool air. The carriage door hung open. One of the horses had its head down, cropping at the grass at the road’s edge as though nothing of any significance had occurred.

There were no guards on horseback. No escort. No Kaida.

“Well,” Donal said quietly, from beside me.

I didn’t answer. I was already off my horse.

The guards were to the side of the road, four of them, sitting in a row with their hands bound behind their backs and their swords in a neat pile several feet away. I noticed the ropes binding them were laced with silver thread — none of them would be shifting anytime soon. The driver sat among them, his hands bound like the rest, the reins abandoned on the box above him. He had the expression of a man who had made every sensible decision available to him and still ended up sitting in the dirt.

They looked up as I approached with the expressions of men who had been having a very bad morning and were not done having it yet.

I recognized the senior guard — a solid, experienced wolf named Harwick who had served my father for fifteen years and who I had never once seen rattled.

He looked rattled.

“Where is she?” I said.

Harwick’s jaw tightened. “My lord Riley. We were—”

“Where. Is. She.”

He blew out a slow breath. “Taken, my lord. About two hours past. We were ambushed in the forest.”

The word ambushed hit me like a fist. “How many?”

“Four. All rogues — we could smell it. Came out of the trees fast, disarmed us before we could—” he stopped, the muscle in his jaw working. “It happened very quickly, my lord.”

“Four rogues,” I repeated. Something cold was spreading through my chest. “And Kaida?”

Harwick hesitated.

“Tell me.”

“She fought, my lord. Screaming and fighting the whole time. The big one — the leader — he threw her over his shoulder and carried her into the forest.” He paused. “She put up a good fight.”

I thought about my small fierce sister being thrown over some rogue’s shoulder and carried off into Greymore Forest and felt something white hot move through me that was not entirely unlike the feeling before a shift.

“And Maggie?” Donal said, from behind me. Calm and steady, asking the question I hadn’t thought to ask.

Another pause from Harwick. A different quality to this one. “The maid, my lord. She climbed down from the carriage of her own accord, picked up her bag, and walked into the forest after them.” He paused. “Didn’t hesitate.”

“She went willingly,” I said.

“It appeared so, my lord.”

I moved along the row to the driver, who was regarding me with the patient resignation of a man who had accepted his morning. “And you?” I said. “What did you see?”

He swallowed. “Same as Harwick said, my lord. Four rogues. Fast and quiet. The big one went straight for the carriage door.” He paused. “I put my hands up straight away.”

He said this last part with the dignity of a man who had made a sensible decision and was prepared to stand behind it.

“You coward,” I said, because there was nothing else to say to that. I turned away from the carriage and walked back to where Donal was standing, his arms folded, looking at the treeline with his steady dark eyes.

“Silver laced ropes,” Donal said quietly, almost to himself. “Whoever did this came prepared.”

“Four rogues,” I said, so the guards wouldn’t hear. “They’ve taken her into Greymore Forest.”

“I heard,” Donal said. He was quiet for a moment, still looking at the trees. “Riley.”

“We go after them,” I said. “Right now. All four of us, into the forest—”

“Riley.” His voice was measured. Careful. The voice he used when he wanted me to slow down and think. “Four rogues who ambushed a guard escort, disarmed them without killing anyone, tied them up comfortably enough to work themselves loose, and walked calmly into the forest.” He paused. “That’s not a random attack.”

I stared at him. “What are you saying?”

He looked at me for a long moment with those dark eyes that missed very little. Then he shook his head slightly, as though dismissing a thought that had no evidence yet to support it.

“I’m saying we go after them,” he said. “Which way did they go?”

We both looked at Harwick.

Harwick nodded toward the forest. “Into the trees, my lord. Foot prints go north.”

North. Away from Vance’s keep. Away from Cedar Ridge.

Away from everything.

I swung back up onto my horse and looked at Donal and Finn and Corbin lined up behind me, waiting.

“North,” I said.