CHAPTER 796: SAMIRA’S SECRET (PART ONE)

"So she wasn’t really Lady Ashlynn?"

"Did you hear? Lady Ashlynn was murdered the night of her wedding..."

"Lord Owain forced himself on her?"

"I saw Lady Ashlynn at the wedding, I did. I were carrying dishes ta tha’ lower tables. She looks like Lady Ashlynn did, I swear it!"

"Looks like her? Enough to pass her child off as Lord Owain’s heir you think? Is that why he..."

"Shush now! This sort of thing, it gets a man killed for knowing. You don’t know nothing and I don’t know nothing either!"

The whispers that swept through the crowded kitchen were like a wildfire, spreading rapidly on the heels of Samira’s shocking confession that not only wasn’t she Lady Ashlynn, the real Ashlynn had been murdered the night of her wedding. And most shocking of all, Samira was carrying Lord Owain’s child!

Suddenly it made sense why things had been so strange at the summer villa. If the imposter received visitors the way the real Lady Ashlynn would have, people would have found out she was a fake. But if Owain returned from the Summer Villa with a bouncing baby, maybe one with Lady Ashlynn’s signature blond hair and Lord Owain’s charming features... Everyone would believe the child was his proper heir!

But the secret they’d just heard was far, far too dangerous to know. Perhaps it was more dangerous than the demons outside the walls! After all, Sir Ollie seemed to have a plan for dealing with the demons, but how would he deal with the heir to the Lothian March if he disrupted Owain’s plans?

Even a powerful knight like Sir Ollie appeared to have become would have to fear the consequences of knowing this secret, to say nothing of what would happen to common servants who knew!

"Everyone, quit yer yappin!" Otis yelled over the noise of the crowd. "Didn’a ye hear Sir Ollie? He said ta go an’ fetch yer things! So go, git an’ hurry back before the demons swallow us whole! Save tha’ lords gossip for tha’ lords and mind yer tongues."

"Otis is right," Ollie said as he shook off the shock. "We need to move quickly. The further we’re able to go today, the safer we’ll be," he explained. After all, he had no way of knowing if someone had sent a carrier pigeon or other messenger bird when the attack began.

Reinforcements could be on their way by the end of the day if the Church got word of things and he’d learned enough in the visions of his trial of witchcraft to have a healthy amount of fear for the things their priests and Inquisitors could do if they were truly determined to hunt down the demons who destroyed the villa. The sooner he could get these people behind the walls of the Vale, the better.

"Samira," Ollie said gently as he turned back to the pregnant woman as the servants began to file out of the kitchens, rushing to the common quarters they all shared to retrieve the few precious items they’d brought with them when they came to the Summer Villa.

"I promise, I won’t hurt you," Ollie said gently. "But I still need to retrieve things from your chambers. I’d hoped you could show me where they were, but I think you should sit here in the kitchens with Otis and let me go fetch them."

"Ollie, what’s so important tha’ ye haf ta trouble her like this?" Otis asked, frowning at the youth who had, until recently, been one of his best kitchen helpers. "Lady Ash, er, Lady Samira, why don’t’cha come ’ere and let me serve ye up a bit o’ warm bread an’ butter. Ye look pale an’ sweaty from runnin’ about..." he said gently.

"I, I’m not a lady," Samira said awkwardly, uncertain whether she should move to accept the cook’s invitation or not "You don’t have to be nice to me. You don’t even have to take me with you when you escape," she added as she clutched at her heavy, long skirts. "Just help me pack up a bag of food. Some bread and cheese, a bit of meat, and I’ll be on my way. You can pretend you never even saw me," she said.

Whatever Sir Ollie was planning, she clearly couldn’t be part of it. She had to get back to Noomi to make their escape... And maybe run to the demons for help if she had to get away from Sir Ollie as well. But she couldn’t stay here any longer.

Every minute she wasted was a minute that Noomi was alone in the dungeon, waiting for Samira to come back with supplies so they could make their escape. But if she was gone too long and Noomi came looking for her then... then things would be beyond bad in ways that she couldn’t bring herself to contemplate.

"No, you can’t go out there by yourself," Ollie said, shaking his head. "It’s cold and there’s nothing for leagues but fields and forest. With a child in your belly, even if you had food and water, you couldn’t go far enough before you froze in the night. I won’t let that happen to you," he insisted.

"No, really," Samira said, backing away from him once again. "I, I just need to... that is, I can’t. I can’t go with you. Because," she stammered, trying to find some kind of excuse she could give them. "Because Lord Owain will come hunting for me," she said, realizing that Ollie had likely misunderstood that Owain wanted her to have this child. It wasn’t true, but if she could make him believe it, then maybe there was a chance.

"You heard what they all said," Samira continued, as she rubbed her belly. "I, I’m carrying Lord Owain’s heir. He, he won’t let me go, and if he finds out that you have me, he’ll come for you. I’m sure he still hates you and Lynnda for what happened, so you don’t want that and..."

"I’m not worried about Lord Owain," Ollie said, shaking his head. "Honestly, if he came for us, it would make someone very, very happy," he said before he paused. He’d been about to tell her that he would keep her safe and that she didn’t need to worry about Owain hunting her but... could he really keep her safe? Not from Owain, but from Ashlynn.

Lady Ashlynn said that she didn’t hold a grudge against Samira because she knew the other woman had simply been a pawn in Bors and Owain’s schemes. Even Jocelynn had played along and helped to prop Samira up in her role as an impostor.

But it was one thing to bring along the woman who had been impersonating Ashlynn... it was another thing entirely to bring along the mother of Owian’s child. As much as Ollie wanted to say that Ashlynn wouldn’t hurt her, he’d felt the storm she caused when she lost control of herself. If this provoked her, she might hurt Samira before she even realized it, and once she did, it would be too late to think they should have done something different.

Given that, could he really risk bringing her along with them? But if he didn’t, it was as good as sentencing her to die...