Authors: The Knight of Rosecliffe
Rexanne Becnel (26 page)
Against her back Rhonwen felt every breath Rhys took. She
felt also his tension and his seething anger. Would he make her watch Jasper die? Had she provoked him that far?
felt also his tension and his seething anger. Would he make her watch Jasper die? Had she provoked him that far?
To her utter shock, he held her closer.
“She is not a part of this. Two of my men will escort her to Afon Bryn.”
“She stays,” LaMonthe countered. He smiled as if to soften the curt order, but his pale eyes were dangerously cold.
Rhonwen did not understand. Rhys hated her for betraying him and his cause. But still he would protect her from LaMonthe?
“She stays,” LaMonthe continued, “until we have dealt with FitzHugh. I find it more satisfying to deal with one little problem at a time.”
It was not going to end well between Rhys and LaMonthe. Rhonwen recognized that at once, as, she sensed, did Rhys. His hands tightened on her shoulders and he whispered, “I want you to be safe, Rhonwen. Trust me and do exactly as I tell you.”
She gave a brief nod. When Rhys shoved her to one side, toward Fenton, she went. “Let us be done with this,” Rhys said. “Randulf FitzHugh has not yet returned to Rosecliffe Castle, and his brother is in our hands. I will kill this one and then take the castle as planned. You have only to intercept Rand when he returns to Rosecliffe. He will be caught between us.” He spat on the ground between them. “Then our pact will be done.”
“So it will,” LaMonthe answered.
It was plain, however, that the end of their unholy pact would make them the bitterest of enemies. The death of Jasper or Rand or any number of people, English or Welsh, would not change anything, Rhonwen saw. War and its attendant miseries would remain like a plague forever upon the land. Today’s darkness and the prediction it fulfilled had changed nothing. The world was the same as ever—as unhappy as ever.
Without thinking she edged nearer Jasper, gazing at him with a breaking heart. He was watching LaMonthe intently. Did he think the man a more dangerous enemy than Rhys? Then again, traitors usually were.
And Rhys thought
she
was a traitor.
she
was a traitor.
Then Jasper looked up at her, his eyes dark and turbulent, and she wondered if he too thought she was a traitor.
“Let us begin,” LaMonthe said, jerking Rhonwen’s attention back to him. He drew out his sword. The cold slither of steel on hide sent a frisson of renewed fear up her spine.
“He is mine to kill,” Rhys snapped, glaring at LaMonthe. “You can have his brother, but this one is mine.”
“Do you seek revenge for your father,” Jasper asked in a calm, clear voice, “or is it for Rhonwen?”
A muscle jumped in Rhys’s jaw. “It should make no difference to you. Dead is dead.”
“Think of it as my final request. If you think to claim Rhonwen, the answer to my question must eventually be made. She will want to know.”
Rhys hesitated. His face creased into a furious frown, but when he looked at Rhonwen she saw doubt in his eyes. His youth was against him, she realized. Two older, seasoned warriors, both LaMonthe and Jasper knew how to play on his volatile emotions.
But what did Jasper think to accomplish?
She glanced wildly about, searching for someone to intercede, some way to stop this. Some way to help Jasper escape.
“You get no final request,” Rhys snarled.
“Be careful,” Jasper said, smiling at him confidently. “If you want her, you will not gain her by slitting the throat of an unarmed man.”
Again Rhys hesitated, and Rhonwen felt a glimmer of hope.
But LaMonthe interrupted. “Enough of this. If you have not the stomach to slay an unarmed man, I do.”
It happened so fast Rhonwen had no time to think. In three strides LaMonthe crossed to where Jasper was held still on his knees between two burly Englishman. LaMonthe lifted his blade and she threw herself at him, grabbing his arm.
“Rhonwen! No!” Jasper cried.
“Damn you!” LaMonthe screamed, trying to shake her off. He twisted his wrist and she fell forward. But she scrambled to her feet just as he thrust at the struggling Jasper.
She felt a searing pain in her side.
She heard someone call her name.
Then the sky grew gray, as it had before. Gray, and then black.
Jasper jerked against one captor, then the other, then backward as they both tightened their hold. They stumbled into one another as he jumped to his feet. But his hands were bound and he could not stop LaMonthe’s thrust.
“No. No! Rhonwen!” he screamed. But it was too late. Rhonwen jerked, then went horribly limp, more like one of Gwen’s cloth babies than a living woman.
“Rhonwen!” This time it was Rhys who cried her name. The anguished youth somehow caught her before LaMonthe had fully withdrawn his weapon from her side. But as Rhys bent over her, cradling her in his arms, LaMonthe raised his weapon once more.
Blood was smeared on the blade—Rhonwen’s blood—and Jasper let out a bellow of pure rage. Before LaMonthe could fell the unsuspecting Rhys, Jasper plowed into the black-hearted Englishman. They went down in a screaming, cursing heap.
Jasper had no hope of surviving. But he could save Rhonwen. If he saved Rhys, he would save Rhonwen, and maybe give Rhys the time to fight back and kill LaMonthe. Rhys was at least justified in his venom toward Jasper. But LaMonthe was a traitor to his country and to all his countrymen.
“Behind you!” he screamed when the other Englishmen
jumped into the fray. Rhys heard and ducked, then elbowed his attacker and split his face open with the butt end of his sword.
jumped into the fray. Rhys heard and ducked, then elbowed his attacker and split his face open with the butt end of his sword.
The battle erupted into a full-scale war. Slashing and cursing. Screams of pain. Grunts of deadly effort.
LaMonthe scrabbled backward, trying to untangle himself. But Jasper tripped him with one foot, then kicked at the man’s sword hand. If LaMonthe recovered, Jasper was a dead man.
“Free me!” he screamed at Rhys, even as he stomped LaMonthe’s fist. “Free me!”
He risked a fast look at Rhys, and for a second their eyes locked. For less than a second. But in the fraction of a moment, their eyes conveyed a wealth of emotions. Jasper had just saved Rhys’s life, and the boy knew it. Hesitating only to lay Rhonwen down, Rhys flicked the tip of his sword and sliced through Jasper’s bindings.
Though Jasper had no weapon, in close quarters it was not as great a disadvantage. Before LaMonthe could scramble upright, Jasper tackled him, clutching his wrist with one hand and his throat with the other.
Around him the battle raged. His nostrils flared at the sharp stink of blood and the potent stench of fear. But for himself he felt no fear, only the overwhelming need to kill the man beneath him.
LaMonthe tried to throw him off. He tried to roll him over. But Jasper was consumed by bloodlust. Rand had spoken of the red haze of fury that overtook a man in the midst of battle. But though Jasper had felt its pull when he’d attacked Rhys’s camp to save Isolde, this time was different. This time it consumed him. This time it turned him into a madman. LaMonthe fought like a demon, but Jasper foiled his every move.
When the man fumbled for his dagger, Jasper wrenched it from his hands. But LaMonthe was stronger than he looked, and fought for his very life. He brought one knee up hard. Jasper turned aside barely in time. Taking advantage, LaMonthe sliced wildly at him with his sword.
The razor-sharp blade whizzed past Jasper’s ear. But LaMonthe was off balance and trying to rise to his feet. Jasper
slashed once with the dagger and sliced open the man’s thigh. Then another thrust, forward and up, and he felt LaMonthe sag.
slashed once with the dagger and sliced open the man’s thigh. Then another thrust, forward and up, and he felt LaMonthe sag.
LaMonthe gasped something unintelligible that ended in a gurgle of blood and vomit. But Jasper had no time for revulsion or triumph. He shoved the man backward, then swung around, taking a quick survey of the battle. Several bodies littered the ground Three battles were ongoing, though the Englishmen began to retreat when they saw their leader fall.
Then he spied Rhonwen with Rhys hovering over her, and he couldn’t move at all. He stared, still on his knees, with LaMonthe’s blood dripping from the raised dagger onto his hand.
She could not be dead. God have mercy, Rhonwen could not be dead!
But she was so pale. Her outstretched hand was milk-white. Her face, always so animated, now held the pallor of death.
Somehow he scrambled through the mud and gore to her side. But when he tried to press his fingers to the place where her pulse beat, Rhys snarled, “Don’t touch her! Don’t you come anywhere near her!”
The Welshman spread his arms over her, as if to protect her, and Jasper saw the anguish in his face. He put the dagger down and caught Rhys by the wrist. “She saved me. I have to try to save her.”
“No—”
“Yes, damn you! Do you
want
her to die? If you can’t have her, would you rather see her dead?”
want
her to die? If you can’t have her, would you rather see her dead?”
Rhys’s youth had never been so evident as now. Stricken, he stared at Jasper, the man he’d hated more than half his life and had vowed to kill when he was but a lad of seven. He looked up at Jasper now, desperate for some reason to hope. “Can you save her? Can you?”
“I don’t know,” Jasper answered honestly. He felt along her throat, holding his breath, praying as he’d never prayed before. Then he felt her life’s pulse, weak and slow, but beating with some semblance of regularity.
“She’s alive,” he muttered. But how long would she remain that way?
Around them the battle had ground to a halt. Two men lay dead. Six others lay strewn about, groaning and suffering from various wounds. But Jasper focused solely on Rhonwen, as did Rhys.
Jasper found the wound, a hideous gash just below her ribs. It was deep, but clean, and he pressed the ends of the gaping wound together. “I need something to bind her side.”
In short order Rhys handed him the crossbanding of one of the fallen Englishmen. Together they managed, Rhys carefully lifting her as Jasper wrapped the cloth around her waist and chest.
Once she moaned, and Jasper’s hands stilled.
“Rhonwen?” Rhys’s voice cracked with emotion. “Rhonwen, do you hear me? We’ve got you now, safe from harm. And we’ll take care of you. You’re going to be all right.” He looked up at Jasper, pale beneath his tan. “She will be, won’t she?”
Jasper set his lips in a tense line and finished his task. “If we can get her into a warm bed, then clean this wound and pack it properly—and nurse her carefully—then yes. I think she will recover.” He could not bear to imagine any other outcome. Most especially he could not imagine her dying because she’d bravely tried to save him.
He stood up. There was no time to spare. They were less than a league from the road, and from there Rosecliffe was not even an hour. When he looked around for Helios, however, he was met by suspicious stares and black frowns. The Welshmen had bandaged their wounded as best they could. Someone had gathered the horses. But they were all waiting for orders from Rhys. If Jasper had not been so worried about Rhonwen, he would have been impressed that a youth could so easily command men years his elder.
He looked back at Rhys. “Tell them we have to take her to Rosecliffe Castle,” he demanded in a low, urgent voice.
“To Rosecliffe Castle?” Rhys glanced up at him, then stood. Where he’d looked to Jasper for help just moment before,
he stared at him now accusingly. “This foul day’s work is all your doing and yet you think I will give Rhonwen back into your keeping, especially now, when she is weak and barely alive?” His hand moved to the hilt of his sword, a threatening gesture that Jasper did not underestimate.
he stared at him now accusingly. “This foul day’s work is all your doing and yet you think I will give Rhonwen back into your keeping, especially now, when she is weak and barely alive?” His hand moved to the hilt of his sword, a threatening gesture that Jasper did not underestimate.
Jasper spread his arms wide. He had no weapon. The dagger lay in the mud beside Rhonwen. “We have defeated a common enemy.” He gestured to LaMonthe, who lay as he’d fallen. “We have a common goal to save Rhonwen’s life. Can we not put our differences aside, at least until she is safe?”
“She goes to Afon Bryn.”
“That’s twice as far as Rosecliffe.”
Rhonwen moaned and Rhys’s gaze went to her. Jasper knelt beside her again. Her heartbeat had not worsened, but had not improved. He pressed a hand to her brow. Her skin was unnaturally cold. At the moment he would almost welcome a fever.
He looked up at Rhys. “She needs to be bathed and changed into clean, dry clothing. She needs a medicinal bath for her wound, and a healing tea to give her strength. Every minute we delay works against her.”
“She will heal better among her own people.”
“If she lives to get to them. Use your head, man! Do you hate me more than you love her? Is it more important to thwart me than it is to save her life?”
Rhys swallowed hard and in the boy’s face Jasper saw lifelong hatred war with loyalty for one of his own.
“I want her to live,” Jasper continued urgently. He knelt beside her and began carefully to pick her up.
“Don’t touch her!” Rhys slid his sword out and waved it threateningly at Jasper. “Leave her there. Leave her!”
But Jasper could not comply with the boy’s demand. As he cradled Rhonwen in his arms, her very lifelessness urged him on. She seemed so light. She was a small woman, but as he rose to his feet, her weight seemed inconsequential. He breathed deep, seeking the fragrance of her, the essence, and without thinking, he pressed a kiss to her brow.
“
Lofrudd!”
Rhys roared. “Murderer! I will kill you for
every insult you have done her!” He advanced until the point of his sword was a scant inch from Jasper’s throat. “Take her from him,” he ordered his men. “Take her so I can kill him now.”
Lofrudd!”
Rhys roared. “Murderer! I will kill you for
every insult you have done her!” He advanced until the point of his sword was a scant inch from Jasper’s throat. “Take her from him,” he ordered his men. “Take her so I can kill him now.”
When none of his men moved forward, his rage increased. “Fenton. Take her! Then one of you, give him your sword.”
A horse whinnied in the terrible silence. Helios. Another answered. One of the Welsh ponies. Jasper’s hold on Rhonwen tightened. She was dying in his arms!
Then two of Rhys’s men stumbled aside and Newlin appeared. His pace was unhurried, dipping and swaying with every crippled step. But his wayward eyes were focused together—focused on Rhonwen.
“She lives,” he murmured.
“You see?” Rhys said. “Newlin says she will live.”
At his words the odd bard’s gaze turned slowly to him. “She lives—now. I cannot foretell the future, not of people who possess a free will. She lives. But for how long I cannot say. That depends on you.”
“Let the man take her,” Fenton pleaded with Rhys. “The English castle is closer and Lady Josselyn will mind her better than—”
“Enough!” Rhys cried. But Jasper saw the sword waver in the boy’s hand. Was it doubt, or merely exhaustion?
Then Rhys abruptly shook his head and slid the sword back into its sheath. “We will accompany you. You will give us assurances of safe passage.” His eyes flashed with hatred, but his words were those of a wise leader. “Newlin will accompany us to bear witness to your honesty—or its lack.”
“Agreed.” Jasper started for Helios but Rhys blocked his path. He held out his arms.
“I will carry her.”
“There is no need. I have her,” Jasper said.
A muscle ticked in the youth’s jaw. “She is Welsh, and she has been struck down by English treachery. ’Tis Welsh comfort she needs. Welsh strength.”
“But it was my life she saved!” Jasper countered. To let her go was something he could not do.
“You quibble like children,” Newlin snapped. “Mount your animal, Rhys. Now give her into his keeping,” he ordered Jasper.
Rhonwen sighed, a soft flutter of shallow breath. Was it her last? Jasper’s heart quickened in panic. But her breathing resumed and at last he lifted her reluctantly to Rhys. She needed help that they could not give her in this godforsaken place.
Once she was settled in Rhys’s arms, Jasper stepped back, bereft as he’d never been. Let her live, he prayed. I can endure anything else if You will just let her live.
Newlin moved up beside him, an oddly comforting presence in the unforgiving Welsh forest. “Go now, all of you. I will prepare the way.”
Jasper complied, without questioning him. Any doubts he had about the ancient bard vanished beneath his need to believe in Newlin’s powers. To get Rhonwen to Rosecliffe alive was the task that consumed him.
As Rhys cantered away, Jasper ran for Helios and threw himself astride. Then, with Jasper fixed on the same goal as his enemy, they all rode for Rosecliffe.
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