It was the kind of night when anything could happen.
Magic. Moonlight. The sea roaring like a dragon, breathing
a soft mist that was slowly enveloping the land. The
stalwart figure who drifted along the rocky shoreline
materialized like an apparition in his glinting chain mail
and dark tunic. A ghostly knight from King Arthur's court
who had wandered into the nineteenth century by mistake
and couldn't quite find his way back to Camelot.
But Lance St. Leger was merely a man attired in the
costume he had worn to the Midsummer's Eve fest and had
not yet troubled to remove. He had far weightier matters
on his mind.
He scanned the dark and silent beach ahead of him, his
face anxious and tense. He was possessed of strong
handsome features: a square jaw, a hawklike nose, and a
deeply tanned complexion framed beneath a sweep of raven-
black hair. But a certain cynicism already marred the
velvet darkness of his eyes, despite the fact that he was
a relatively young man, only twenty-seven. The
disillusionment that tugged at the full curve of his lips
made him seem older, giving his mouth a hard cast except
when he smiled.
He wasn't smiling now as he studied the overturned hull of
an abandoned fishing boat, the sea raking cold fingers of
foam across the sand, obliterating all traces of any
footsteps. But Lance was certain this was the place where
he had been attacked only an hour before, surprised by
some hooded brigand and rendered unconscious.
When Lance had awoken, he had found his watch and signet
ring missing. But that had not been the worst of it. The
thief had also taken his sword, the one that had been in
his family for generations, a weapon as steepedin mystery
and magic as the St. Leger name itself.
When the sword had first been handed down to Lance on his
eighteenth birthday, he had sensed the power in it. Merely
touching the hilt had somehow made him feel stronger,
better, more noble.
He had earnestly recited the pledge that all St. Leger
heirs were required to give:
I vow that I will only employ this blade in just cause.
That I will never use it to shed the blood of another St.
Leger. And on the day that I marry, I will offer this
sword up to my bride as a symbol of my undying love along
with my heart and soul forever.
But that had been a long time ago. Back when Lance still
believed in
such things as just causes, magic, and true love. Back
when he still believed
in himself . . .
Lance desperately circled the area around the boat, but he
didn't know why he had bothered to come back here, what he
was hoping to find.
That the thief had experienced a change of heart? That he
would suddenly reappear to return the stolen treasure to
Lance, scraping and bowing while he babbled, "Oh, here you
are, Master Lance, here's your ancestral sword. Please
forgive the impertinence."
Lance's lip curled in contempt at his own folly. He swore
beneath his breath, cursing both the unknown brigand and
himself. He had certainly made mistakes in the past,
brought enough disgrace to his family's name, but allowing
that sword to be stolen was by far the worst thing he'd
ever done.
Not true, a sad voice whispered in his ear. The worst
thing was what you did to your brother, Val.
But Lance refused to think about Val. He was already
racked with enough guilt over the disappearance of that
infernal sword.
Despairing of finding any clue to his attacker on the
beach, Lance turned and headed up the path toward the
village instead. Despite the fact that he had recently
cashiered out of the service, Lance still moved with the
military bearing of a man who spent nearly nine years as
an officer in Wellington's army.
Slipping quietly alongside the forge next to the
blacksmith's shop, he peered toward the line of
whitewashed cottages. Earlier Torrecombe had been a riot
of noise and laughter, alive with all the excitement of
the Midsummer's Eve festival. But the village slumbered
now, not a soul stirring across the green in the center of
town.
Lance thought briefly of conducting a house-to-house
search, only to discard the notion. He doubted that anyone
from the village would have dared to attack him. The local
folk were too much in awe of the St. Legers and their
legends. Legends of a family descended from a notorious
sorcerer. The mighty Lord Prospero might have come to a
disastrous end, burned at the stake, but he had passed on
a legacy of strange talents and powers to his descendants,
of which Lance had inherited his share.
No. Lance was convinced. No one from the village would
have trifled with a St. Leger. The thief had to have been
an outsider, a stranger, and there had been plenty of
those wandering through Torrecombe tonight because of the
fair. Many of them were stopping over at the inn, and that
seemed the most likely place for Lance to begin his search.
He stole across the village square until the Dragon's Fire
Inn loomed over him. A quaint building, it still bore
traces of its original Tudor construction, with mullioned
windows and overhanging eaves.
An ostler bustled about the stable yard, attending to the
horse of some late arrival. Lance watched, keeping to the
shadows. Long ago, he had promised his father that he
would never reveal the secret of his own peculiar and
frightening power to anyone outside of the family. And one
did not lightly break promises given to Anatole St. Leger,
the dread lord of the Castle Leger.
Lance was deeply grateful that at this moment his father
was far from Cornwall, traveling abroad on an extensive
holiday with Lance's mother and three younger sisters.
He'd already proved enough of a disappointment to Anatole
St. Leger, Lance reflected grimly. With any luck at all he
would be able to recover the sword before word of this
latest escapade reached his father's ears. He had to.
Huddling behind a tree, Lance wished that he was merely a
clairvoyant like his second cousin Maeve. It would
certainly make his search for the sword easier . . . and
safer. The ostler was taking a damned long time about
disappearing into the stables. The blasted fool was doing
more stroking and talking to that horse than he was
attending to it.
Lance cast an uneasy glance toward the sky, trying to
calculate how much time he had left until dawn. It would
not do for him to be caught abroad exercising his strange
gift when the sun came up. That could prove dangerous. In
fact, deadly.
He was filled with relief when the ostler moved on at
last, leading the horse into the stables. Stealing from
his hiding place, Lance drifted toward the inn. After a
moment more of hesitation, he braced himself.
And shimmered straight through the wall.