Enchanting the King (The Beauty's Beast Fantasy Series) (7 page)

Another swell reached the narrow section of the river. The cruel tide swamped rescuers and horses alike, tugging them into the river’s flow.

“
No
.” Aliénor watched with sick grief as the men’s and horses’ bobbing heads tumbled away downstream, almost too fast for her gaze to follow, let alone to attempt a rescue. Spell lights bobbed away down the river like drowned fireflies. The lights began flickering out one by one in the water and plunging all into darkness. Her eyes stung, and her gut twisted with nausea.

“
Help
.” One small voice seemed to rise above the clamor of the storm.

Aliénor’s nerves jumped, and she scanned the shore. Her heart squeezed to see one small glow-spell caught in a pocket of debris, and a scared, dark face lit by the blue light.
There
. “Praise be,” Aliénor whispered. A clump of debris was pinned against the shore for the moment by the curve of the bank and the current’s push. Young Violette clung to the mass, fighting the river’s murderous drag.

Violette’s glow-spell guttered out like a dying flame, and Aliénor’s breath caught.
It’s the water. Magic doesn’t work over running water
. “Hold on!” Aliénor called even though Violette probably could not hear her.

“
Aliénor
. My lady, wait.” Aliénor whirled at the sound of the king’s voice. He slid to a stop next to her and gripped her by the arm. Water dripped off his chin and into his eyes.

She dashed water from her own face so she could see him. “One of my ladies is down there.”

“I’m no swimmer, Princess, but let me find—”

“
I
am the best swimmer in this camp. I grew up on an island.
Let me go
.” She yanked her arm free, then staggered her way down the loose and muddy bank. At the water’s edge she hesitated. The river’s swollen banks crashed ahead of her, water lapping against her ankles and tugging on them.

“Aliénor
.
”

She whipped around as the king skip-hop-stumbled the last bit down the bank. He held a rope aloft in triumph and didn’t even wait for her permission before he slung it around her waist and tossed off a sailor’s knot. He tugged on the rope, pulling her waist toward him by the knot.

“That should hold.” His teeth flashed at her in the darkness. “Try to get to the other shore and get to her that way. Don’t try to swim straight across.”

“I know.”

He squeezed her arm. “You can do this.”

“I know.” Something surged in Aliénor then, a burst of feeling in her chest that left her nearly breathless.
No time
. She seized her skirts, dragging the hemline between her legs, then tucking her skirts into the knot the king had tied, creating rudimentary hose and leaving her legs free—and immodestly bared.
Some things are more important than propriety.
“Hold me tight.”

“I will.”

She scanned the debris pile. Poor Violette still determinedly, miserably clung to her pile of twigs and logs on the opposite shore. The glow-spell was dim and flickering still. Violette’s eyes were wide. The skin around her mouth showed nearly white with fear in the sickly blue spell-light.

Hold on, Violette.
Aliénor flung herself into the river, the icy water like a punch to the gut that left her trembling and gasping. She tipped her head up, spitting water out the side of her mouth. A wave crashed over her and she ducked, then inhaled as she bobbed to the surface again. Something smashed into her from behind, pushing her under and leaving a stinging bruise across her back. She squeezed her eyes tight, her chest hurting, and kicked back to the surface. She sucked in another breath before a wave crashed over her again. Her arms and legs burned. Her linen dress dragged in the water, slowing her down. Her body felt sluggish, almost frozen. These waters were very different from those of the warm summer beaches of her home.
I should have known that
.

The other shore beckoned.
So close
. Aliénor clawed for the muddy bank, digging her fingers in and scrambling like a landed fish. Once she felt secure on the shore, Aliénor tugged on the rope at her waist. A signal to King Thomas.

The pounding rain had slowed to a misting drizzle. Legs heavy, Aliénor followed the riverbank down, staggering toward Violette’s debris pile.

“Princess! My lady, I
—
” Violette’s voice broke and she let out a small, broken sob.

The spell-light was caught in the tangle of twigs, and poor Violette was also pinned among the sharp branches. The pile was too big for Aliénor to reach Violette from the shore. Aliénor’s stomach clenched, but she saw another way. Bracing herself for the cold shock, she eased into the water beside the debris pile. The current took her at once, pushing her with alarming speed toward that knotted mass of broken wood.

Aliénor gritted her teeth and gripped at branches in the debris pile, flapping her cold-clumsy hand back and forth, trying to catch hold of Violette. Something cracked beneath her, and water rushed over her head.

Violette was screaming when Aliénor surfaced again. Aliénor flung an arm out, and the girl caught hold of her wrist, gripping it painfully. Aliénor grasped Violette’s other wrist and tugged her forward, fighting against the river. When she was close enough, the girl wrapped both arms around Aliénor’s neck, sobbing into her shoulder.

The angle was awkward, water rushing over the both of them so they were coughing and gagging. Aliénor yanked hard on the rope around her waist and felt an answering pull. They were jerked free of the debris pile, and Violette shrieked again, startled by the sudden movement into open water.

Aliénor squeezed her friend’s waist. “No, it’s all right. We’re almost out.”

Something caught at the billowing skirts of Aliénor’s dress below the water, and she jerked downward. She managed, barely, to turn her scream into a gasp as her head disappeared beneath the water.

Aliénor held hard to Violette with one hand as the girl thrashed and tried to fight free. The roiling waves of the river trapped them, but the rope around Aliénor’s waist still drew them toward the bank
. If only I can get my skirt free of this blasted
— Aliénor kicked and kicked again, her eyes stinging, her chest on fire with the need for air. She tugged on her skirt and felt the fabric give. Suddenly their rate of motion increased, and she kicked toward the surface, gripping Violette desperately tight in her arms as King Thomas dragged them back.

When the other shore came into sight, Aliénor made a feeble kick toward safety, but her arms and legs were tired, her body chilled. She and Violette scraped against the other shore, mud sliding down the neck of Aliénor’s gown.

“
My lady.
” King Thomas splashed toward her, more men following behind, and they dragged her and poor crying Violette higher onto land. Aliénor found she could barely move. Her frozen limbs might as well have been stone for all that they obeyed her. Men brought blankets and threw them around her, even though the rain still beat down upon everyone. The king’s arms slid beneath her knees and shoulders, and she bounced a little as he lifted her high into his arms.

He was as cold as her, his skin clammy and wet, but she leaned against his chest. The sound of his heartbeat pounded fast and steady beneath her ear. “Brave girl,” he muttered as he ran with her up the hill from the riverbank. “Brave,
foolish
girl.”

“But I am a good swimmer, am I not?”

He sent an incredulous glance down at her face but then burst out laughing the next moment. “You are at that, my lady.” He ducked inside a tent and deposited her into one of the small camp chairs.

“Bed,” she protested, feeling light-headed, her joints aching with cold.

“Your women have to get you out of your wet things first, my lady.”

“
Hmm
.”

His hands traced her face, smoothing the water away from her cheek, and she was tired enough that she leaned into the touch with a hum of pleasure. His hand was calloused and rough against her skin but gentle for all that.

“Violette? Is she all right?” she murmured.

“She’s been taken to her husband’s tent. She’ll be tended well.”

“Noémi?”

“Here, my lady.” Her handmaiden’s round, kind face swam into focus over Aliénor’s, a heavy bandage wrapped around Noémi’s brow. “We must get you out of these wet things. Thank you, King Thomas.” It was a dismissal, and a rather curt one at that.

Aliénor forced her weary eyes open and caught his hand when he would have left. He turned toward her, but stiff formality had replaced the warmth on his face. Yet when she glanced down he was still barefoot. He had wiry black hairs on his toes. She bit her lip to restrain a giggle and met his gaze again. “Thank you for your help tonight, King Thomas.”

His expression softened, just a little, his eyes crinkling at the corners.

So handsome
. Her cheeks warmed, the only part of her body that felt so at that moment, and she dropped his hand.

Noémi stepped forward and blocked Aliénor’s vision so she did not see the king leave. With brisk efficiency, her handmaiden stripped Aliénor’s wet clothes off and bundled her into several warm and wonderfully dry blankets.

“I’ve sent for a healer. You’re scratched and bruised all over.” Noémi began smoothing the discarded garments and straightening the linens on the bed. Her mouth was pinched, her jaw working. “You should
not
have gone charging off like that, Your Highness.”

Aliénor felt her head drooping with sleep. She tried to nod, to pay attention, but she was so
tired
…

Noémi’s voice seemed distant and far away as she continued, “Your husband will be very angry when he hears of this.”

Aliénor could only manage a small, sleepy sound of inquiry before her head slumped to her chest with exhaustion, and she fell asleep in the awkward camp chair.

“Aliénor.” A male voice, impatient, angry.

She frowned in her sleep and rolled away.

“
Aliénor
.” Fingers dug into the flesh of her arm, yanking her onto her back.

She startled awake, gasping, heart racing. Philippe’s face swam into view above her. She swallowed, but her frantic heart slowed only a little. “Husband.” She sat up and knuckled sleep from her tired eyes. Someone must have moved her from the chair to the bed last night. The blankets slipped from her chest as she moved, revealing her shift to the chill morning air.

Philippe averted his eyes, a flush staining his cheeks. They’d been married nearly five years, and the sight of her half dressed still flustered him. Offended him. How she wished sometimes that his father had let Philippe become one of the chaste Oracles of Fate as he’d always wanted. Aliénor gathered her blankets around her shoulders as she tucked her feet beneath her to sit upright on the mattress.

“Good morning, Your Highness.” Mistress Helen chirruped from one of the camp chairs.

Aliénor’s hand twitched with fear, and she gathered the blankets more tightly around herself. “Good morning, Mistress Helen. Husband, what brings you here so early?” For he clearly had no wish to exercise his marital rights upon Aliénor’s person.

Philippe paced the tent, back and forth, but he whipped around now, and his eyes blazed with wrath. “How
dared
you, Aliénor? Throwing yourself in the river, flaunting your legs like a common whore.”

She recoiled, and inadvertently her glance caught on Mistress Helen, who sat smiling and twirling her little knife in the corner. Aliénor wet her lips and weighed her words carefully. “All was in chaos last night, my prince. One of my own ladies fell in. I knew I could help, so I did.”

Philippe gripped his hands into fists of frustration before his face. “That is not your place.” He dropped his hands and raked his gaze over her with disgust. “And to help in such a brazen, unwomanly manner. Better you had died than expose yourself so.”

The breath puffed out of Aliénor in a small, pained gasp. “If that is how you feel, then perhaps we should discuss an annulment again.”

“
Never
. You are my wife. You
belong
to me—”

“I do not please you. You tell me I bring shame upon you with every move I make. Why do you want to stay married to me if you believe these things about me?”

“I only want you to behave yourself. I want you to be a wife I can be proud of.”

A wild, tearing flurry of emotions battered away inside Aliénor’s breast—desperation, a frantic fear that tightened her throat with tears. “I will not break myself in half just so I can fit in your shadow, Philippe.”

“You do not even
try
.” Tears glittered in his eyes and his lips trembled, flecked with spit. His eyelids lowered, and his gaze flicked sideways toward Mistress Helen. “You
must
try, Aliénor.”

Against her will, Aliénor felt her own gaze drawn to Mistress Helen as if she had a leash around her neck already. The witch met her gaze unflinching and flashed her teeth at Aliénor in a predatory smile. Helen tightened her grip on her knife.

Aliénor scuttled sideways on the bed, ready to scream, to run. But what good would that do? This was Philippe’s army, his camp. She was his wife. Even if she got safely out of the tent, she would not get much farther.

She reached out with shaking hands to clasp Philippe’s sleeve. She kept all her focus on him, bent her will toward him. “Philippe, I will do better. I will. I promise. Send Mistress Helen away. You don’t need her.”

Mistress Helen quirked an eyebrow in patent disbelief.

Aliénor tamped down her own revulsion, swallowed her anger though her stomach clenched and roiled with the effort of it.
Meek. Mild. Docile
. She softened her voice, her features, leached the steel out of her spine until she felt exactly like the crawling worm Philippe wanted her to be. “I will do as you wish, husband. You don’t need her magic.
Philippe
,” her voice broke. “Please don’t do this.”

His features were still hard, his eyes cold. Cold enough that she shivered. “This is your last chance, wife. You will behave yourself or I
will
let Mistress Helen have the keeping of you.” He jerked his arm free of Aliénor’s grip and swept out of the tent, the flaps waving a little from the force of his passing.