Claire Delacroix (27 page)

Had she not known better than to put her faith in him?

No matter that she had done precisely that. No matter that Thierry had not treated her in the manner she might have expected from a Mongol. No matter that he had been kind and considerate of her beyond anything or anyone she had ever known. Mayhap that just made the inevitable more bitter to swallow.

‘Twas the cruelty she had originally expected from him, rendered all the more cruel by the kindness he had shown her first.

Curse him.

She was an abandoned whore who was with child. Kira jabbed her chin into the air determinedly. She owed her child more than wallowing in self-pity would earn him. Was his sire not a proud and tall man?

But she would not raise her child here in this place that brought a gleam to Thierry’s eye. To this fortress she knew he would return. Mayhap he fetched his bride to bring her back here. At the very thought, Kira hauled the heavy kirtle over her head and began to hastily lace the sides.

Whatever the price, Kira and her child would not be here to greet him.

* * *

Thierry and Nogai were leaving the village perched on the side of the hill below Montsalvat when Thierry realized another party rode along the serpentine road toward them. He and Nogai exchanged a look and Nogai frowned.

“Think you that they follow from that king’s court?” he demanded suspiciously. Thierry did not like that he had no ready answer, nor did he like that the party was too far away to be readily identified. His first thought was for Kira sleeping far above and he knew he could not simply ride away without knowing more.

“I would know their intent,” he said, relieved when Nogai nodded agreement. They ducked into the shadows alongside the only tavern in the ramshackle village and waited impatiently for the others to approach.

As they sat, Thierry watched his horse’s ear twitch complacently and reviewed what he had seen. The party was extensive, which did not bode well to his mind. But there seemed to be no haste to their progress, a fact both annoying and puzzling.

Surely invaders would approach quickly and attack before any guessed their intent? To that end, surely attackers would arrive in the night. But this road led to no other destination than the fortress. Well it seemed that Montsalvat would soon have guests, of one manner or another.

And Kira he had left alone within the fortress walls. Thierry stifled a foreboding sense that these riders came on a mission he would not like. Nogai settled himself back into the shadows with his usual calm and spared Thierry a telling glance.

Aye. Thierry gritted his teeth. They would simply have to wait, even though these riders seemed to be taking far too long to reach the town.

Well it seemed that he had lost his patience for waiting, among other things, these past few weeks.

* * *

“Töde!” called an imperious voice when Thierry thought he could surely remain quiet no longer. ‘Twas a voice that Thierry remembered well and he stiffened instinctively at the sound, despite all the years that had passed since he had last heard it raised.

It simply could not be.

“Do pick up the pace, Töde. I would cross the threshold of Montsalvat yet again before I expire.” The rumbling growl was so achingly familiar to Thierry that he closed his eyes for a long moment to regain his self-control. He felt Nogai’s inquiring gaze upon him, but could not summon the words to explain through the midst of his surprise and confusion.

“Never is time wasted on caution, milord,” a younger voice replied.

“Time aplenty have we already wasted on this trip and I would sit at a warm hearth with a cup of brew in short order.”

“Our homeland ‘tis, Töde, and safer than you might think,” an equally familiar but feminine voice added persuasively.

It seemed that Thierry could not summon the air into his lungs.

Here. Now. Naught had he decided of what he would say, what he would do, what he would ask, having fully expected to have the width of a continent to summon his thoughts. But the moment was upon him already and naught was there he could do but face its demands as well as he was able.

Thierry straightened slowly and turned, the knowledge of what he would see not lessening the shock a whit. He took a deep breath and urged his horse out of the shadows into the road as the arriving party drew alongside.

The closest horse whinnied in surprise and took a double step. This drew the attention of the Mongol who rode alongside, his hand dropping to his blade with predictable speed.

Thierry moved naught as he met the steady gaze of his sire.

“You!” Dagobert inhaled sharply and hauled his destrier to an abrupt halt.

The others jostled to a halt and all fell silent. An expectant silence filled the crooked road, but Thierry could neither speak nor look away from the recollection in his sire’s eyes. Dagobert squared his shoulders suddenly and his expression turned forbidding. In that moment Thierry knew he would have to be the first to speak and hoped he could do so. He cleared his throat, the clamor of his heart making it difficult to find fitting words.

“Hello, Father,” he said simply.

The quiet words hung in the silence and it seemed the very earth held its breath. His sire’s expression melted not a whit and Thierry feared that his greeting would garner no response at all.

A movement caught his eye and he noted his mother’s presence for the first time. In the same instant he saw his father’s restraining hand on Alienor’s forearm and well understood the meaning.

This battle was betwixt the two of them alone.

Thierry noted the signs of his father’s aging in the morning sunlight and endeavored to calculate how long it had been since they had exchanged heated words. Five years? Six? Thierry could not be sure, but well did he know that his sire’s memory of that day had not faded, either.

He had been young indeed when he had ridden out of Khanbaliq in anger. And had sworn he would never return.

The hostility sat between them as surely as if the argument had only just been voiced.

“What are you doing here?” Dagobert demanded tightly.

“I might ask the same of you,” Thierry retorted, his tone colder than he might have intended it to be. His father’s nostrils flared slightly, the only outward sign of his anger, and he glanced up at the brooding fortress with almost a casual air.

“This is my home,” he asserted stonily. “I would ask again, what brings
you
here?” The challenge in his eyes was unmistakable. This was not Thierry’s home.

“I had thought I might find something of home here myself,” Thierry maintained proudly. His father lifted one fair brow.

“No legacy have you here,” he said flatly.

The memory of what Eustache had said filled Thierry’s mind. The realization that his sire had deliberately chosen to deny him his heritage cut like a well-honed knife.

“So I have been told. No idea had I that you were so ashamed to have me as your son,” Thierry commented bitterly. His mother gasped, but both men paid her no heed.

“Not half as ashamed as evidently you are of having me as your sire,” Dagobert snorted.

“No shame have I in my lineage, even if my own sire would deny me,” Thierry argued.

“Ha!” Dagobert charged. He urged his horse forward as the color rose in his neck. “‘Twas not as I recall your last words to me,” he spat venomously. “Or mayhap you find no shame in having a `coward’ as your father?”

Thierry felt his own color rise at the reminder. “I was young and spoke in haste,” he said defensively.

“Oho! In haste indeed did you speak, not to mention that in haste did you leave,” his father countered. “And nary a word in the years between. Have you not a shred of compassion for your mother’s worries, at least?”

“Well I understood that you were relieved to see the back of me,” Thierry snapped, his anger finally beyond constraint.

“Me? And what had my concerns to do with any of this? Headstrong you were from the first and determined that you alone knew what was for the best!”

“Headstrong?” Thierry repeated angrily. “‘Twas not I who deliberately denied my only son his rightful legacy! Tell me, Father, am I a bastard born? Is that what lies at the root of this?”

“Thierry!” Alienor breathed in shock. Dagobert’s eyes blazed and he spurred his mount yet closer to his son.

“Were you not my own spawn, I would take a lash to you for speaking thus of your mother,” he spat.

“So you claim me, then?” Thierry demanded proudly.

Dagobert’s head jerked up and his silver eyes blazed. “Always have I claimed you as my own,” he retorted.

“Indeed?” ‘Twas Thierry’s turn to arch an inquiring brow. “‘Twas not what old Eustache told me.”

Dagobert’s features paled despite his tan and when he spoke, his voice was strained. “Eustache could not have told you that I denied you, for he knows better.”

“To deny me my legacy is not to deny me?” Thierry snorted in disgust. “Indeed, it seems you play a game of words with me, milord.”

Dagobert’s eyes flashed. “I denied you
naught!
” he fairly shouted. “Claimed you as my son and heir I did all those years past.” He jabbed one finger through the air to the fortress high above. “There in that bailey under the spring moon did I claim you as my own son!”

“Then what of this legacy that all speak of in whispers?”

“‘Tis naught for you to concern yourself,” Dagobert insisted stonily. He turned slightly away. Rage rippled through Thierry as he realized that his father still had no intention of confiding in him the tale.

“Has it to do with this?” he demanded, tearing his
kalat
open to bare his mark with a vicious gesture.

Dagobert looked up with evident reluctance. The tension crackled between the two men until Dagobert glanced away from Thierry’s mark and swallowed carefully. “What do you know about that?” he asked quietly.

“Well enough do I know that you sport one much the same.”

Dagobert shrugged with feigned nonchalance. “‘Tis a birthmark, no more, no less,” he maintained calmly. Even with the years between them, Thierry knew his sire lied.

“‘Tis a birthmark that nearly saw me slaughtered!” he cried. His father’s eyes widened in shock. Thierry felt a surge of satisfaction that his point had been made.

“Where?” Dagobert demanded tightly.

“At the court of the king in Paris,” Thierry supplied proudly, savoring his father’s astonishment.

“You bared your mark there?” his sire asked incredulously. Older he looked, though his new appearance of vulnerability did naught to cool Thierry’s anger. “Well does it seem that
you
cannot be called a coward,” Dagobert charged. “Although mayhap a
fool
would be closer to the mark! Know you what you have done in this? Know you what you risked?”

“How could I? ‘Tis a
birthmark,
no more, no less,” he taunted. His father’s jaw tightened.

“Fool!” he spat. “Know you what you have risked by such foolishness?”

“Evidently not!” Thierry shouted in exasperation. “How could I know when all refuse to confide in me the tale?”

Dagobert glared at him and his lips thinned. “Always did I mean to tell you the tale. When you were older.”

“I
am
older,” Thierry retorted. “And your reticence has nearly seen me dead.”

“‘Twas you who called me a coward,” his sire accused. Thierry glared back at him, having naught with which to explain away those angry words. “Well did I understand that I was simply some coward with the good fortune to have fallen upon your mother at an opportune moment,” Dagobert continued when Thierry did not speak. “And now you would ask of me a tale of your heritage.”

“Dagobert,” Alienor chided under her breath, but Dagobert’s expression did not soften.

“‘Twas precisely that the boy charged, as I well recall.” His eyes narrowed as he looked to Thierry once more. Thierry winced at the familiarity of the words, wondering how he could ever have been so cruel.

“I erred,” he said simply. Dagobert’s eyes flashed angrily.

“Quickly indeed does that confession come for all the years spent awaiting it,” he said tersely. “Should I not know better, I might conclude that you were solely concerned about your status as heir. Have you seen Montsalvat and decided you fancy it better than roaming ceaselessly over the hills?”

Thierry impaled his sire with a glance. “I seek no more than to know the truth of something that might see me dead,” he maintained tightly. “Indeed, it seems little enough to ask of a father.”

“I would tell you the fullness of the tale, were you not clearly leaving Montsalvat,” Dagobert answered stiffly. Thierry met his father’s gaze slowly.

“I ride only to seek you out,” he said quietly and saw the surprise register on his father’s features.

“Why?” Dagobert demanded.

“Eustache did I ask for the import of my mark. He declined to tell me the tale out of deference to you.” Something eased in his father’s expression, encouraging Thierry to plunge on and ask the question to which he most feared to hear the answer. “He bade me seek you out,” he confided hoarsely. “I would ask you myself whether you had disclaimed me by not granting me the fullness of this legacy.”

“Never.”

Dagobert’s flat denial hung in the silence between the two men so long that Thierry wondered if he had imagined the sound.

So long had it been. And for what? Heartless words exchanged in anger. Surely his sire knew that Thierry did not truly believe him a coward.

Was it possible his father had not swept Thierry from his heart?

“And well it seemed that I owed my sire an apology,” Thierry added quietly.

Then Dagobert shook his head and dismounted hastily, closing the space between them with hasty steps. Thierry knew not his intent, but echoed the older man’s move lest his father think even less of him. Their gazes met again when they were but a pace apart and Thierry did not dare to hope when his father laid one hand heavily upon his shoulder.

“Never would I deny you, no matter what charge was made in anger,” Dagobert asserted with quiet resolve. “My son are you, blood of my blood and fruit of the vine. One night long past, I claimed you as my son and heir in the bailey at Montsalvat. I but left the decision to you whether you would assume the burden of the family legacy.”