She nodded, tilting her chin up proudly. “Of course, my father trained me.”
“Good, then go outside and take aim and fire if you see a man who looks like me but has a cut on his lip. Aim for his chest if you can. He is a traitor and a murderer.”
Without waiting for him to say anything else, Grace took off the way she had come, back down through the kitchen, with the clear intention of finding a target to aim at. A moment later, there was a blast of gunfire, and Silverton tore off towards the noise, the sound echoing from the left-hand side of the hallway, where his study was.
He arrived to see the door shattered, and Maeve and his brother facing off against each other.
To see his wife, cornered but bravely holding on to a flintlock, should have warmed his heart, but Silverton feared it had already splintered upon laying eyes on her again. When his brother’s earlier offer came to mind—his life in exchange for Maeve—Silverton jumped on it without a second thought. There was no question that he would give his life to ensure her safety—God, he’d probably do so to ensure she was just a fraction happier. Would Charles want the satisfaction of killing Silverton, or would he prefer to watch Silverton do himself in? Neither was an especially appealing notion, but there would be a solace in knowing it had been for Maeve’s sake.
“Go.” He gestured to her with a nod of his head towards the doorway. Once she was clear of the hallway, the tension, the guilt that had been inside him, growing and twisting through his body and mind at having her know this hideous world, would stop. It was his fault she was remotely connected to such a terror as his twin, and he would try his best to atone for such an occurrence. Atone and make amends as he always had for his brother’s sins.
Maeve looked away from Silverton. Fleetingly, he saw the hurt in her expressive eyes, deep pools of fear that edged forward, her dark lashes fluttering as she made step after tentative step towards the fragmented wooden door. Time itself seemed to drag as she moved forward, her chest tight and firm like a soldier, and her fear visible with the wobble that lingered around her chin.
In her right hand, Maeve held her own pistol, aimed at Charles, but she lowered as she walked towards the broken doorway.
As Maeve crossed in front of Silverton, there was a flash of movement as Charles lifted his pistol, clearly hoping to catch the pair of them in one direct hit, the agreement dashed away. Charles completely unaware that, if he had shot Maeve immediately, it would have been the same as firing on Silverton directly. With a familiar sneer, Charles pulled his trigger.
“No,” Silverton’s bellow seemed to consume him as he discarded his rapier and jumped forward to pull Maeve into the shelter of his body. His free arm wrapped protectively around her waist, and he bent himself forward, hiding her body from the onslaught. It was instinctual and rushed, and he wondered as he shielded her whether it would work at all.
Charles’s gunshot echoed over Silverton’s shoulder. It was loud and smashed into the fireplace just a few feet behind them.
Before Silverton could shoot back, there came a cry from outside the Hall itself, as a window smashed and a feminine voice shouted out, “Not my sister—she’s pregnant.”
A blast sounded after that, and in the chaos of smoke and the vibrating noise of the gunshot, Silverton pulled Maeve more closely to his side. His eyes ran over her in rapid assessment, the surprise of the announcement from his sister-in-law echoing through him. Maeve did not appear harmed, despite what seemed to be a bloodied and stained gown. When his trembling hand patted over her, she was whole.
“Thank God,” he muttered.
“I think he’s been hit,” her voice was faint. She wasn’t looking at Silverton but at the sight across from them, at the sprawled figure of Charles.
“Merely a scratch,” came the snippy reply, and when Silverton looked back his brother, Charles was righting himself to a standing position. Shifting his weight on the balls of his feet, Charles’s hand dropped away from the wound, and Silverton saw that Grace had done nothing more than graze Charles’s left arm. The shirt his brother wore was ripped, and there was some blood, but it would prove no hindrance for whatever his twin wanted to do next.
Without questioning it for a second, Silverton took aim at Charles with his gun and opened fire. He had hoped to hear the definite blast, and to see his twin thrown backwards from the impact. But the weapon did not fire, and his repeated pressing down on the trigger made no difference. It seemed that Silverton’s pistol had jammed, either from some malfunction or from not being loaded correctly. Leaning down to the carpet where he had dropped it, Silverton lifted the rapier. There was no other choice. Maeve’s pistol would have required mending, and thus could be not be used in haste. It was a touch old-fashioned to be duelling, he reasoned, but it would suffice to rid this world of his brother.
Charles grinned, seemingly liking the idea of it too. “Rather poetic. An allusion to when we were young, and we’d have to fence for hours.”
“You always tried to cheat at that too,” Silverton replied. If reaching for nostalgia on his brother’s part was supposed to induce affection or hesitation in Silverton, it would singularly fail. Of course, when they’d duelled previously, there had been competition and laughter from their fencing master. Now though, there was just the brutality of the last few years’ cat-and-mouse game between the two of them and the vital importance of keeping Maeve safe.
He tried to circle towards Charles so that Maeve had a clear avenue towards the door, but Charles wasn’t moving. Instead, he shook his head. “I can’t let her leave, not now I know about the baby.” His tone was almost regretful, although the gleam in his eye was an unpleasant one that hinted at nothing approaching sadness.
“Go to hell,” Maeve swore, a red flush colouring her cheeks as she looked up with all the appearance of being ready and willing to use Silverton’s rapier herself if needed.
“I’d always heard redheads were passionate, and I see that’s no lie,” Charles taunted. “But I’m in no rush to head down to meet the devil yet,” he continued. “I suspect my sins wouldn’t make it too pleasurable.”
“If you’d ever shown regret for anything you’ve done—” Silverton started to say, but he was cut off by an explosion of fury from his twin.
“You would like that. But I know the truth and that’s a lie. Don’t you lie to me.” Charles’s initial teasing humour died away as he looked at Silverton, his own passion heating his face as the mania flooded his skin. “All you do is lie. The special son. The favoured one. Don’t I make you regret that gift of your inheritance?”
Memories flooded in of their childhood, of how much their father had shown his preference in obvious and subtle ways for Silverton. After all, he had been the one to have a chance of going to London first. He had been allowed to pick out his pup from the litter first, and when their father’s breeding mare had a foal, that too had gone to Silverton. Numerous examples came to him. It hadn’t been fair, Silverton knew that now, but at the time, all he had seen was his unique bond with his father. That was something he had always valued, never seeing how much Charles might resent being sidelined and seen as nothing more than the spare. “That does not justify any of your actions, Charlie. Better people than either of us died, and for no good reason that I can see. Your choices led to suffering.”
“Sanctimonious bastard,” Charles yelled back. “I almost think I will spare the bitch and let her breed, just so I can raise the infant in a worse state than you can ever imagine.”
With his spare hand, Silverton kept Maeve close to him. It didn’t do him any good to dwell on that, on the babe whose existence Grace had revealed, or the blossoming lightness that had erupted close to Silverton’s heart at the news. He would not allow himself the pleasure of looking at Maeve to confirm it. That joy would need to be saved until afterwards.
“Enough,” he said to Charles, stepping forwards to block his brother from getting too close to her. “This ends now.”
Charles adjusted his weapon. He had been winged by Grace’s bullet, but he, at least, hadn’t been unconscious and tied up as Silverton had been until recently. Silverton judged it would be a fair fight—though not by the standards of thebeau monde.There was to be no firing wide or having a doctor check on them, but in terms of strength and fortitude at least, they would be a match for one another. The issue was the study, Silverton suddenly thought, the space being barely wide enough for a proper fight—their previous bouts having taken place outside.
“Does it bother you to think that Father died just a few rooms away from here?” Charles asked as he moved closer, his intention being to pin them both into the small corner of the study.
