Dropping his cloak and aversion spells, he snapped, “What happened?”
Her gaze clung to the dying man. Her eyes were dilated, and her lips looked bloodless. Droplets of Valentin’s blood stood out against her white skin. “He threatened to rape me. He’s been at the chambermaids. And I wasn’t going to be raped.”
“You should have come to me!” he hissed. Fury boiled over. If Valentin wasn’t already dying, Morgan would have gutted him.
Her gaze snapped to his face. She hissed back, “You shouldn’t be here! I told you to go back to the cottage!”
He barked out an angry laugh. “That was never going to happen, Sidonie!”
“I was trying to save you from getting involved!” she snapped. She was shaking visibly. “You’re too close to exposure as it is!”
She was the one who had been threatened, yet she had tried to protect him. The blood pounded in Morgan’s temples. He held so much rage in his body, he didn’t think his skin could contain it.
Grabbing Valentin’s head, he gave it a sharp, vicious twist, breaking his neck. Then he let the body fall. As Sidonie stared at him, he said, “I killed him, not you. Remember that. Now, give me your knife and get out of here.”
She stammered, “I-I have his blood on me. Morgan—whatever you’re trying to do, it’s not going to work.”
Then a new voice entered the tableau.
From behind Morgan, Warrick said, “What the fuck, Morgan. You and the musician know each other?”
Morgan grabbed the knife out of Sidonie’s hand and cast a death spell on it.
As he whirled, Warrick added, “The Queen wants to see you right away. Now that you’ve killed Valentin, that should be a hell of a reunion.”
Morgan had already flung the knife, but it was too late.
Even as the blade buried itself in Warrick’s throat, the geas flared to life and he was caught.
Chapter Twenty-One
When Morgan went to Isabeau, she wouldn’t see him at first.
Instead, she ordered him to wait in the great hall. He stood in stony silence, arms crossed, and watched as the castle guard ignited the witchlights and brought in first Valentin’s body, then Warrick’s.
The last to arrive was Modred, who escorted Sidonie. He held her with one hand gripping her biceps. Locked in the privacy of his mind, Morgan watched the two. He wanted nothing more in the entire world than the chance to gut Modred and cut off the hand that touched her.
Modred looked ironic, as he so often did when events turned unpredictable. Sidonie’s expression was set, jaw tight. Where Valentin had struck her, the side of her face had begun to turn purple with bruises.
When Modred paused on the other side of the bodies, Sidonie looked at his hand on her arm, then up at him. In a tone both weary and scathing at once, she asked, “Where do you think I could possibly go?”
Modred’s jaw flexed. With a curt tilt of his jaw, he acknowledged her point and lifted his hand away.
Then Isabeau stalked into the hall. She wore a black dress without any other adornment other than the knife on the gold chain at her waist. She had pulled her hair back into a plain knot, and her face was lined with grief. It looked so real, so poignant.
Her gaze fell onto the bodies and flared with fresh emotion. Flying to Morgan, she slapped him as she shrieked, “What did you do?!”
Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Sidonie shift suddenly, but he couldn’t look at her. Instead, he kept his expression stony as he answered, “I found Valentin attacking this woman, and I killed him. Warrick must have interrupted the scene.”
“He wouldn’t have done that!” she cried hoarsely. “He loved me!”
“You know I told just you the truth,” Morgan said, his voice hard. “You can hear it in my words. He attacked her. I killed him. End of story. You don’t tolerate rape in your kingdom.”
She whirled to face Sidonie. “You!” Her voice was filled with loathing. “You did something to provoke him, didn’t you? How could he possibly have wanted you?!”
Eyes widening in outrage, Sidonie exclaimed, “What could I have done to encourage that kind of crime? He wanted to rape me. He talked about it. He really liked the idea, and he looked forward to doing it.”
Modred spoke up unexpectedly. “Remember, Izzy. I did try to warn you, but you wouldn’t listen. He has hurt other women in the castle. All you have to do is ask Myrrah and the chambermaids.”
Pressing both clenched fists to her forehead, Isabeau screamed wordlessly.
Modred went to her and clasped her by the shoulders. When she looked up at him, he said gently, “Hard as it is for you to accept, my love, Valentin’s crimes and death are the least interesting thing about all this.”
That was when Morgan knew they weren’t going to get away with it. Isabeau was overwrought, and when she got in that state she grew sloppy and overlooked details. But Modred never did. Modred was always thinking things through.
Wiping her face with both hands, Isabeau asked, “What are you talking about?”
“Ask him.” Modred nodded to Morgan. “Ask him why he showed up just in time to kill Valentin, after having been gone all these weeks. Ask him where he has been, and what he has been doing. Ask him to describe exactly how Warrick died, and why. Ask him to show you his wound, if that was really what kept him away for so long, and if he still has it, ask him why he hasn’t healed. And then order him to tell you the complete truth with no innuendoes, misdirection, ambiguity, or statements of supposition.”
Morgan couldn’t keep from glancing at Sidonie. Horror hollowed out her eyes. She opened her mouth. The gods only knew what she meant to say.
He forestalled her by saying in a harsh voice, “I killed Valentin. There is no ambiguity to that.”
“I hear you speak the truth, no question, and yet there is ambiguity laid out on the floor in front of us.” Modred knelt by the body and tilted his head back and forth. “His neck is broken,” he said matter-of-factly. “Oh, but look—his jugular has also been cut. How doubly unfortunate for him, and how unusually inefficient of you, Morgan. Your killings tend to be much more straightforward.”
Isabeau angled out her jaw as she turned in a circle, looking at each piece of the scene.
“What is going on here?” she hissed. Her eyes were sharper, more clearly focused. Modred had brought her back on point.
Striding over to Morgan, she tore open his shirt and yanked off his bandages. The site of the wound, with the dark thick scab turning to scar and the black lines radiating outward, made her pause.
Behind her, Sidonie’s eyes widened with horrified compassion. He had never let her see what lay underneath the bandages.
And all the while Modred took everything in with a sharp gaze that missed nothing. His attention snagged on Sidonie’s expression and lingered.
Every muscle in Morgan’s body tightened, straining with the need to kill Modred, to switch off that bright, unrelenting mind forever. His Power built while the geas held him locked in place. His body heated, and sweat trickled down his spine.
“Start asking him, Izzy,” Modred urged, rubbing the edge of his mouth as his gaze remained on Sidonie. “Let’s see what he has to say. Be sure to make him tell the complete truth. I feel certain the tale must be fascinating.”
“Do as he said,” Isabeau snapped at Morgan. “Tell me what you’ve done since I last ordered you away. Don’t lie. Don’t prevaricate, and don’t try to misdirect me. Tell me everything.”
Everything.
Everything would reveal how he had healed Sidonie when she had been held in prison, and how Sidonie had worked with him and Robin to break him free of the geas so they could escape.
If he told Isabeau everything, Isabeau would kill her. Morgan’s life held some value for Isabeau, but as much as she liked Sidonie’s music, Sidonie wasn’t indispensable.
Finally he came to the end of a very long and lonely road. There was no further turn to take, and no way to go back.
The tale that told everything came down to just one thing.
I fell in love, he thought, and smiled. It was a miracle, and despite everything he had been through, he felt blessed with having been given such a fortune.