Florida Knight (17 page)

Cat gasped for air, squeezed her eyes shut. It was illusion, all illusion. Catriona MacDuff was sitting in a folding camp chair from Wal-Mart with the man called Raven at her feet. They were watching Royal Rounds at a Kingdom Archery Competition. It was unfortunate he had this effect on her, but she could—and would—handle it.

Sure, and how many Valkyries are going to come along to help you?
Cat’s jaw tightened. Even if an army of six-foot spear-carrying maidens descended on the Archery Field at that moment, they’d probably line up waiting for Raven’s favor rather than defend their sister warrior against a terminal attack of lust.

“Bows down!” At the Archery Marshal’s command, bows thudded to the ground. The female archery referee carefully checked the line of archers to make sure all bows were flat on the ground. “Retrieve your arrows,” she shouted. A motley collection of male and female archers headed toward the targets, a few pausing here and there to pick up arrows which hadn’t made it to the targets. Cat followed their movements, never acknowledging the six inches of flesh that burned against hers, despite two layers of cloth. When one arrow remained missing, there was a general scramble to find it so the next round could begin. Cat sneaked a peak at Raven. He seemed as intent on the field as she was. But somehow she doubted it. She could swear his shoulder had just burrowed a little harder against her leg.

Cat tried to inch her leg away. It wouldn’t budge. She glared at the reluctant limb. It was as if someone had painted those few inches with super glue. Okay, she’d live with it. While they were joined, her other problems seemed to melt away. Euphoria might be an uncomfortable emotion, but it was preferable to the screaming of muscles that were beginning to hurt even while she was sitting still. And yet . . . Cat suspected those muscles would heal long before her lust. Straining against temptation, she tightened the control developed over long years of living alone. Her heart began to deflate, the throbbing calmed to a manageable level. Smaller . . . slower. The errant organ gave up its chokehold on her throat. Smaller . . . smaller. The contracted heart slipped back into its appointed place. Yet its beat, Cat noted with almost clinical interest, was still erratic. If he’d just move away . . .

Cat focused on the field. The archers were at forty yards, shooting arrows as fast as they could nock them. “When they finish this round,” she said to the back of Raven’s head, “they’ll probably take a break. You could borrow a bow. For archery, there’s no armor or weapon authorization as there is for lyst fighters.  Why don’t you give it a try?”

Her only answer was a shrug. The slight movement against her leg set off another shock wave. “You might like it,” Cat urged through teeth clenched so tight the words were a hiss.

She thought he was going to ignore her suggestion. But when all the arrows had been retrieved and the archers were taking a short break, Raven unfolded himself and sauntered onto the field. Relief should have been instantaneous. Instead, Cat’s leg now burned with cold. Those six inches tingled, were mimicked by various other portions of her anatomy she preferred to ignore. Damn him! She couldn’t get away from the man.

Cat knew the Archery Marshal’s name, but that was about all. Fighters and archers seldom mixed except in occasional giant melees on the Lyst field. She had admired Lady Keilyn’s calm command, her personal expertise with the bow. At this moment, however, Cat was swept by intense annoyance with the red-haired Archery Marshal. Lady Keilyn was smiling at Raven as if he were the tastiest morsel she’d come across in a year of LALOC events. “Garth!” A wave of the Marshal’s hand, a bowmen ran forward. Broad shoulders, blond hair so short it was no more than a golden glow over his skull, topped a broad smiling face. Except for the length of his hair, Cat thought, he was the perfect picture of a yeoman sergeant of the guard. In the eyes of the current era, he looked as if he had strayed from basic training for the Marines. Garth handed his bow and quiver to Raven.

Smiles and bows all around, then Raven toed the line at thirty yards, a bow in his hand, a quiverful of arrows on his back. He did not ask for instruction. He checked his arm guard, adjusted his shooting glove, reached over his shoulder for an arrow, nocked it into the bow. Seemingly oblivious to the eyes watching his every movement, he looked down range, aimed, and let fly. A tiny shake of his head as the ar
row quivered in the red,
eight inches off dead center. A shout went up from the archers. They’d found a buddy.

“Very good, m’lord!” Lady Keilyn approved. “You’ve shot before?”

“In another lifetime,” Raven admitted. “Summer camp,” he added on a mumble as if embarrassed to admit he’d ever been that young.

“Didn’t think archery was like bike-riding,” said Garth, the rugged young man who had loaned Raven his bow. “Give it another try, m’lord.”

On his third attempt, Raven hit the yellow bull’s-eye dead center. With a grin, he relinquished the bow, looked to the Lady Keilyn for permission to retrieve his arrows. “At least you won’t have trouble finding them,” she simpered. At least, to Cat it sounded like a simper.

When Raven’s shoulder was back in place against her leg, once again sweeping Cat away on a flood of lust, the archers began a Novelty Shoot. “Clear down range!” the Marshal shouted. “Toe the line!” In spite of Raven, the action caught Cat’s attention.  The expertise of some of the archers was awesome as they attempted to hit a moving target being pulled along a clothesline, neon rings suspended from a line; and—most incredibly—a final round of attempting to hit a Lifesaver candy. Raven, when asked if m’lord would care to participate, just smiled and shook his head.

“Now the Mongol shoot,” the Lady Keilyn bellowed. Helpers ran onto the field, setting up the shoot. One of the targets was a poster-size drawing of a ferocious-looking wild boar, set into the ground at an angle part way down the field. A second poster depicted a cartoon-style rabbit, looking suitably frazzled over being a target. The Marshal walked the field, demonstrating the rules. A zigzag course must be run. The archer was required to stop at a designated position, shoot at the closest target, run to the next position. The entire course was timed. The shoulder against Cat’s leg shifted ever so slightly. Cat suspected Raven was sorry he’d opted out. She had to admit the Mongol shoot looked like fun.

“Clear down range! First up. Toe the line!” The first contestant stepped forward. “Go!” The Marshal’s assistant started the stop watch. Cat shook her head as the hapless archer dropped his arrow before he could nock it, never even making it to the second target before his sixty seconds were up. “Next!” Lady Keilyn called.

Others did a bit better, but only one—Garth, the burly Marine who had lent Raven his bow—hit both targets within the required sixty seconds. Raven looked almost as pleased as if he’d done it himself.

“Bows down. Retrieve your arrows.” The Marshal watched, eyes narrowed against the sun, as the archers jogged onto the field.

“I think that’s it,” Cat said. “I’m sure Garth would be glad to let yo
u practice a bit if you’d like.

Raven shook his head. “I’ll see if my old bow’s still in the garage somewhere. I’d rather practice a bit before making a fool of myself out there.”

“
Practice!
You were more accurate than ninety percent of the archers on the field.”

“Yeah, well . . . just call me picky.”

“You like to be best,” Cat stated flatly.

“Yeah.”

Men
. And what about herself? Didn’t she like to be best? Why else was she out there on the Lyst Field taking on the most macho men LALOC had to offer?

A sharp cry rang out. Surprise, pain. Cut off as suddenly as it began.

For a moment, everyone froze in place like characters in some nineteenth century tableau. Shock, disbelief, followed a mere second later by the certainty only disaster could have prompted that particular sound. Raven scanned the field.
What the hell?
He was off and running before anyone else began to move.

Chapter 11

Garth lay crumpled on the grass half way between the boar poster and the rabbit. When Raven dropped to the ground at his side, Garth was face down, his limbs at odd angles. Eight inches of arrow protru
ded from his left shoulder.

“My God, it’s a crossbow bolt.” Lady Keilyn knelt beside Raven. “We didn’t have a single crossbow on the field. Garth,” she urged, “can you hear me?”

“Yeah,” the archer mumbled into the dirt.

Raven reached for his cellphone, recalled it was lifeless in the tent, out of bars
, as well as
forbidden during LALOC events. “Somebody run to the Trading Post,” he barked. “They must have a
land line
or know where to find one.” One of the archers broke away from the group
h
uddled around Garth, sprinting toward the road through the woods.

Cat had scrambled to her feet and followed Raven onto the field. Now, standing at the back of the crowd around Garth, she nodded to herself. Raven had taken over. Authority was so natural to him, no one questioned a stranger’s right to give commands.

“Anyone know how far it is to the nearest town?” Raven asked.

“Thirty minutes, maybe more,” someone replied. There was a collective groan from the archers. This, then, was the price for being so far from civilization.

Gently, Raven ran his hands over Garth, looking for any further injuries. Had he broken an arm, hit his head on a rock when he fell? After a careful inspection and a few judicious questions, he eased Garth’s face to the side. The archer gulped air, s
pat out a mouthful of dirt.

The oldest archer, his lanky height topped by a head of hair that was more salt than pepper, knelt down beside Raven and Garth. He held a pewter mug of water. “Garth? Buddy?” he inquired. “Are you up to drinking some water?”

Garth opened the eye that wasn’t buried in the grass. “If I could figure out how,” he mumbled.

“Okay,” Raven declared. “I’ll be the prop. If you guys can get his good shoulder back against me, I’ll suppo
rt him while he takes a drink.”

As willing hands started to lift him from the ground, Garth howled. The archers nearly dropped him. “Hell,” he gasped, “the damned thing’s sticking in the ground.
I was picking up one of my arrows when it got me.
”

Raven slid his fingers beneath Garth’s shoulder, got a grip on the crossbow bolt. “Okay, easy now,” he instructed, “let’s try it again.”

Garth grimaced, then surprised them all with a sigh of relief. “Didn’t realize that’s what hurt so bad. The pressure. Sitting up’s a hell of a lot better.”

Gingerly, the archers maneuvered Garth until his good shoulder was leaning back against Raven, who was now sitting on the ground, supporting as much of the wounded archer’s weight as he could. Cat looked around, wondering if they dared risk moving Garth any farther in order to get him out of the hot
Florida
sun. “Lady Keilyn,” she called, “what if we moved the pavilion over here?”

The Archery Marshal responded immediately. A brief command, and four archers broke into a run for the small pavilion. In less than five minutes it was reassembled above Garth and Raven. As the last peg was driven home, Cleve Johnson came bumping across the archery field in his golf cart, followed by a string of LALOC members loping along behind. Among them, their royal majesties and the Kingdom’s
chirurgeon
, Lady Bronwen. After a few anxious and encouraging words to Garth, the campground ranger and LALOC royalty withdrew, leaving the wounded archer to the care of LALOC’s medical specialist. Cleve Johnson, King Corwyn, Queen Eilis, and the Archery Marshal huddled together at the edge of the field, talking quietly. Over Garth’s head, Raven and Cat exchanged silent glances as they watched the discussion from a distance. No one was
ever
supposed to get hurt at a LALOC event. Bug bites, bruises, a twisted ankle, but not this.

The look they exchanged said quite clearly:
Not an
accident.
All bows were down. No one on the field had a crossbow. The shot must have come from the woods, a typical tangled
Florida
jungle where the shooter could disappear in a matter of seconds.

The whole thing was surreal, Cat thought. All of them hunkered down in their medieval clothing, keeping vigil over an archer with an arrow in his back while waiting for the wail of a twenty-first century ambulance. In spite of low conversations here and there, the field was so quiet the buzz of insects could be heard. Raven continued to act as Garth’s prop, keeping pressure off both ends of the crossbow bolt protruding from his shoulder. Lady Bronwen, the
chirurgeon,
kept close watch, carefully wiping away the blood oozing from the front and back of Garth’s shoulder. Raven, Cat noticed, kept eyeing the woods, even though he had to know the shooter was long gone.

Or was it possible
t
he person they were looking for was
still there,
lurking in the woods
, enjoying
the excitement caused by his random act of violence?

Cat shivered. The violence was escalating. A few inches lower, and Garth would have been dead. Was that the shooter’s intention? Crossbow bolts were faster, more lethal than an arrow. Cat settled into cold, determined anger. Raven was right. This nut case had to be caught. As quickly as possible. And now that LALOC was waking up to the menace in their midst, she and Raven were no longer alone. LALOC would be going to War.