Celtic Fire(74)

“Aye,” Gwenda was saying. “I’ll help ye leave the fort.” She quickly divided her laundry and held one of the bundles out to Rhiannon.

Rhiannon dropped the chain over Gwenda’s head and took the laundry in exchange. The woman shoved the amber pendant into the neckline of her tunic.

“We’d best be going,” the laundress said in a whisper, “afore the women return from the baths.”

Rhiannon nodded, not without a pang of regret. She’d not seen the inside of the bathing rooms, as Vetus was nearly always within, but the kitchen women spoke of the pool’s heated waters in the most reverent of whispers.

She wished she could delay long enough to experience the bath’s pleasures for herself, but there would be no better time to make her escape. Lucius had left the house several hours earlier. Even Cormac was gone. Claudia had sent him to one of the outlying farms in search of an herb he’d been unable to procure in the village. He’d been none too happy to receive the order, as the task took him far from the fort.

She had to act now or not at all.

“How will ye distract Dermot?” she asked Gwenda.

The woman chuckled. “ ’Tis no problem I’ll be having on that score. Just slip out and don’ be stopping until ye turn the corner past the stables. I’ll follow as soon as I’m able. Here,” she said, unpinning her checkered cloak. “Take this.”

Rhiannon drew the garment’s hood over her head. “Will the gate sentries remark upon two laundresses leaving the fort when only one entered?”

“Nay. The guard changed at midday. The new ones will not be knowing I came alone.” She stepped to the door. “Wait here a spell until ye see it’s safe to pass.”

Gwenda went into the kitchen, hips swaying, as Rhiannon peeked around the doorframe. Dermot sat near the alley door, back propped against the wall, his weight balanced on two legs of a stool. His eyes were closed.

“Good day to ye, Dermot.” Gwenda’s voice was a husky whisper.

Dermot’s stool crashed to the floor as he leapt to his feet. “Gwenda.” Heat flared in his blue eyes.

Gwenda smiled up at him. Dermot took the bundle of laundry from her arms and set it aside, then bent low for a kiss. Gwenda responded, wrapping her arms about the man’s broad shoulders. He backed her up against the worktable and tugged the neck of her tunic down over one shoulder. His head dipped and Rhiannon heard the sound of suckling mingled with Gwenda’s sigh of satisfaction. The laundress’s fingers tangled in the stout man’s blond hair, holding him close.

Rhiannon stood rooted to the spot. Gwenda opened her eyes. She sent Rhiannon a grin and a pointed glance at the alley door over the top of Dermot’s head. Rhiannon drew a sharp breath, then went still. Dear Briga! Had Dermot heard her? No. He was oblivious to anything but Gwenda, at least for the moment.

Rhiannon crept toward the door, scarcely daring to breathe. How in the name of the Great Mother would she be able to open it unnoticed? Surely Dermot would hear the creaking hinges and feel the rush of moist air, no matter how intent he was on Gwenda’s ample breasts.

She sent the laundress a questioning look. Gwenda’s eyes unglazed long enough for her to respond with a brief nod. She wriggled in Dermot’s arms, coaxing him toward the storeroom where Rhiannon had stood but a moment before. Rhiannon eased open the latch as silently as she could and stepped into the alley.

The morning’s downpour had eased to a sullen drizzle. Thank Briga, the narrow path was deserted. With luck, the garrison soldiers would be within their barracks until the rain stopped completely. She glanced to her left and caught sight of the wide road fronting the residence, then turned to the right and made her way along the wall of the stables.

Soft whinnies and snorts drifted from a bank of high windows. She crept to the corner and peeked around it. No one. She slipped into the intersecting alley, flattened her spine against the wall, and waited.

Gwenda arrived a few moments later, breathless and glowing, one breast all but spilling from her tunic. Rhiannon cast about for words to cover her embarrassment, but the laundress just gave her a cheeky grin. “The others rave about Cormac, but I’ve no complaint with Dermot,” she said. “My last babe was his.”

Rhiannon followed Gwenda past the rear of Lucius’s house and into another alley between the granaries. Only one barrier remained—the south gate. Once through, it would be an easy task to slip through the fort village and into the forest.

Gwenda traded bawdy jests with the sentries, introducing Rhiannon as her cousin visiting from a village to the south. Rhiannon forced a smile and a few suggestive comments to her lips. One soldier patted her behind as she passed, but Rhiannon barely noticed the liberty in her haste to clear the gate. She drew a deep breath and murmured a prayer of thanks as the stout timber doors closed behind her.