Agape
Disclaimer: Don't I just wish they were mine! But sadly, no. Forester and A&E have that privilege (lucky sods-bet they don't appreciate them as much as we would!). The Michaeline name and uniform/habit are borrowed from Katherine Kurtz, but she probably wouldn't recognize them otherwise. Everyone who doesn't belong to one of them is MINE!
Author's Notes: Agape (pronounced "ah-GAW-pay") is one of about five Greek words meaning love (agape, eros, storge, philia-ok that's only four, I know), agape roughly translates to "charity" or "love of your fellow man", this will make sense eventually! Immense thanks go to Rhiannon for beta reading this and being incredibly supportive!
Feedback: Yes, please fill out the nice little box provided—quite conveniently—at the bottom of the page!
Chapter One—An Unexpected Invitation
Jos watched the Englishmen come ashore from his niche in the cliff facing the beach. They were, no doubt, looking for fresh water. The Michaelines might even let them find some, depending on how clever they were. With a minute gesture he sent Yestin back to the Stronghold to inform their superior of these encroachers.
As the men pulled the launch ashore, Archie couldn't shake the feeling of eyes following him. A glance told him that Matthews was jumpy, but neither Horatio nor any of the rest of the men seemed to notice anything. Quietly, he called to his friend.
"Horatio?"
"What is it, Archie?" Looking around sharply, Horatio could sense his anxiety. Archie was scanning the surrounding forest cliffs.
"I'm not sure." he hesitated, then continued "I just feel that there is something or someone out there…. watching."
Horatio had learned to trust the accuracy of Archie's instincts on matters such as this. He supposed that living on the Justinian with Simpson had garnered Archie plenty of experience-that demon would be enough to make any man paranoid.
"Can you tell what or who?"
"No! It's just…" Frustration laced his voice. "Just that I know they're out there."
"All right."
Horatio raised his voice. "Look lively now. We need to find a source of freshwater, so stick together, men, and report anything odd to myself or Mr. Kennedy."
"What do ye mean odd, sir?" Oldroyd asked. The men had instinctively drawn closer together at the word.
"'E mean odd, ye twat! Not regular." Matthews seemed more acerbic than usual, confirming Archie's hunch that he, too, sensed something.
As the Englishmen plunged into the woods, Jos heard Yestin returning. He looked around, to find him accompanied by young Jamys Pearse and raised an eyebrow in question.
"Brecon was out in his coracle," volunteered Jamys, "and saw the English ship drop anchor. Lorcan wants them watched."
Lorcan wants them watched. Well, he would, smiled Jos to himself. Lorcan mistrusted the English, and with good reason, Jos admitted inwardly. If only… Yestin interrupted his reverie.
"Where should we go, Jos?"
"You're to go to the headland to keep a close eye on the ship, Jamys is to go back and fetch Ivo, then go on to the forest beach to follow their progress."
"And you?"
"I'll be along, don't worry."
"Come in." Lorcan turned from surveying the garden out side his window to greet Jos as he entered. "You're supposed to be watching those Englishmen on the beach."
"In the woods." Jos corrected, amused by Lorcan's scowl at this news. "I've set Yestin to watch the ship and Jamys and Ivo to follow the men from the beach."
Lorcan began to pace. His rooms in the Stronghold were spacious but spartan, as were most of the accommodations there. Jos knew what Lorcan's decision would be, but he waited patiently for it, standing stock still in front of the large cherry wood desk, knowing that this annoyed his superior to no end and taking a perverse pleasure in needling his friend.
"Oh, move, would you!" Lorcan snapped in affable exasperation, as he paused in his pacing on the other side of the desk. Jos just grinned at him. "Bring the English here. Take Brecon and the garrison to help."
Not far into the woods, the underbrush closed in on them from every side. Beating branches away from his face, Archie reflected that they at least kept them sheltered from the view of whatever was out there. The larger problem was finding the freshwater source. The small stream on the beach had disappeared once into the forest and they were merely searching in the direction it appeared to have originated from. For all they knew, it could veer suddenly to the left or right ten feet into the trees, he thought sardonically. Wouldn't that be lovely, to go tromping through this overgrown nightmare only to find out they went the wrong way.
An hour into the forest and Horatio was forced to this very conclusion. They couldn't find a trace of the stream and it would be fruitless to go on.
"Back to the beach, men," he ordered in a defeated tone. They'd just have to go back and try again, maybe have the men spread out single file along the edge of the wood and go in like that, then perhaps they would find where that stream turned.
"Archie, we'll need to try a different tack once we're back on the beach." But Archie wasn't listening; instead he was peering off into the surrounding shrubbery. To what purpose, Horatio couldn't tell, he couldn't see five feet to either side in here. "Archie? What are you looking at?"
"Over there, do you see it?"
"See what? All I can see is trees."
"No, I saw something move over there."
"Probably some local wildlife." But Horatio squinted in the direction Archie indicated.
"It was blue, dark blue."
"A bird?"
"Birds don't dash behind trees."
"I don't see anything, Archie. You're just keyed up from that incident on the beach, we haven't seen hide nor hair of anything or anyone since we got in this infernal forest. Come on, let's just get out of here."
Archie knew he hadn't imagined that swift bit of blue go behind that tree. It was not his imagination; they were not in fact the only ones out here. But he agreed with Horatio, they needed to get back to the beach-suddenly the beach was the safest place around. He didn't know how, but he knew that whoever was behind that tree was not friendly. All of a sudden, the column ahead of him stopped and he could hear Oldroyd yelp.
"Don't move," a quiet voice behind him warned. Out of the forest around them materialized silent men in dark blue robes, all of them with muskets trained on the young officers and their boat crew.
"I told you I saw blue." Archie whispered.
Who were these men? Archie glanced around as unobtrusively as possible. The boat crew had been tied together with ropes around their necks, and Styles looked ready to spit nails. Horatio had calmed him with a look, though, when it appeared he might object physically to being roped. Horatio's hands and his own were bound and each was attached to a man in blue robes. That was the truly strange thing about them, that and the silence. They seemed to communicate wholly by some sort of hand signals.
But it was the robes that intrigued him. They were the strangest sort of uniform, for that was what they appeared to be. Long blue robes over trousers and boots, seen in a glimpse when the tall fellow in the lead vaulted a fallen tree trunk. Robes like that ought to be more cumbersome, yet none of their captors seemed to be hindered in any way.
They held their muskets with the surety that spoke of long practice, and all carried a strange sheathed dagger stuck through the back of their belts. The device on its pommel seemed to echo the embroidered badge on the right breast of their robes, but he could not make out exactly what the design was.
Jos called a halt to their march about a half-mile from the Stronghold. The way here was steep as well as heavily wooded and the roped prisoners would not be able to manage the climb. Another way must be found—the other possibility that presented itself was the postern gate. Which was a problem.
"Jos, we can't take them up that way." Ivo broke the silence as he joined him. Jos signaled for Brecon and Jamys before replying.
"I know, but every other way presents its own… difficulties."
Such as how to keep these men from leading others to their door, when—or if—they were set loose. The trek through the forest had been roundabout in a subtle way; Jos was confident they could not find their way out or back. But the view from the postern gate… and these men were sailors, men who could navigate better on water than land. No, the postern gate was not a viable alternative. The gatehouse was accessible only through the town and he would not endanger the townsfolk they had sworn to protect. The "garden" gate, though, that had possibilities.
"You know, Lorcan's right, this talent of yours for imitating statuary is really very irritating."
Jos threw Ivo a quick grin, before gesturing to their left. "I think we can bring them in through the orchards. Our location should not be given away by any obvious landmarks and it has a much gentler slope."
"And a truly disturbing gateway," replied Brecon, with a grin of his own.