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Terran’s gaze snapped up from the blade to lock with the Midnight Shadow’s. Mary? Oh, yes. Wasn’t she Bria’s friend? The girl Kenric said had murdered the herbalist. “I don’t know where the sheriff keeps my prisoners.”

He saw fury flash in those blue eyes, the bluest eyes he had ever seen. “Who rules this castle, you or Kenric?” The whisper was full of disgust.

Suddenly, the sound of footsteps echoed down the hall. The Midnight Shadow’s eyes shifted slightly in the direction of the sound.

Blue eyes. The bluest eyes he had ever seen. Why couldn’t he escape that thought?

“You’ve much luck this day, Knowles,” the Midnight Shadow said. “But we’ll meet again. This I vow.” With a flurry of his black cape, he lurched toward Terran with the tip of his blade. Terran stumbled back, away from the sharp blade. Was this madman going to kill him? He put up his arm to ward off the attack. But no pain pierced his arm, his shoulder, his torso. Terran lowered his arm and quickly scanned the hallway around him. The Midnight Shadow was gone.

Terran sprang into action, shouting for his guards. He barely took a step when his bedroom door swung open. Kathryn stepped into the hallway, clutching a blanket to her chest to cover her nakedness.

Terran halted immediately, his gaze sweeping Kathryn. Betrayer. Suddenly, his enemy’s accusation made sense. What the hell was Kathryn doing in his room?

“What’s happened?” Kathryn cried, clinging to his arm.

As Terran disengaged his arm from Kathryn’s hold, two guards ran down the hall toward him. He had no time for her. His enemy was in the castle! He turned to the guards. “Search the castle. The Midnight Shadow was just here.”

“The Midnight Shadow?” Kathryn gasped.

“Close the portcullis. Raise the drawbridge,” Terran ordered. “We’ll trap him.”

The guards moved to carry out their lord’s orders.

Terran took a step away from his room, down the hallway. He had to get to the gatehouse. Hadn’t the guards seen anything?

“Wait!”

He stopped to look back at Kathryn. She let the blanket drop another inch.

“What about me?” she asked with a sultry, if practiced, pout. “I’m so frightened.”

“I suggest you dress and return to your own room,” Terran replied.

“But...”

Terran turned his back on her protests, moving down the hall with long strides. How had it been so easy for his enemy to get into his home? Was he that clever? Was he that good? Was he really a he? He shrugged off that last question; he had no time to try to figure it out now. He could only concentrate on making sure the Midnight Shadow did not escape. He couldn’t allow his enemy to return to his wife with the news of Kathryn in his bed. How could he explain that everything he’d said to her was a lie if the Midnight Shadow told her otherwise? How could he hope to fix things then?

Bria had donned the brown monk’s cloak and was making her way toward the drawbridge and her escape when the cry went out. Bria froze, thinking she’d been discovered.

“Raise the drawbridge!”

The drawbridge.

She could still make it. It would take several minutes before the guards could turn the cranks and fully wind the drawbridge chains. She crept closer and breathed a silent sigh of relief as she reached the outer gate. The drawbridge was still down, her passage to freedom unhindered.

Bria chanced a glance back over her shoulder. No garrison of guards stormed toward her from the inner ward, no one cried out to stop her. Most of the guards would still be waking up, scrambling for their weapons in the darkness. A smile stretched across her lips. Success! She’d done it. But she immediately knew that wasn’t true. Mary was still trapped inside somewhere.

She took a step forward to move quickly beneath the gatehouse toward the drawbridge. A sigh of relief welled up inside her. She’d been foolish to seek Terran out. It had been too great a risk, but she’d made it.

The sound of rushing metal reached her ears. The portcullis crashed down a mere few feet before her, its sharp metal teeth biting hard into the earth, slamming closed with a resounding boom, sealing her inside Castle Knowles.

Chapter thirty-eight

“Get back from there!” a voice called from the battlements.

Startled, Bria obeyed the voice, trying not to give herself away, trying not to be scared, but already terrified.

If she was discovered as the Midnight Shadow, she would be executed.