Snow in July (14 page)

Is she worth it?

Alain was beginning to revise his initial opinion.

He glanced past his shoulder but saw nothing more than the chalky downs rising to either side of the narrow valley, sporting a thatch of grass too sparse even for sheep. A rabbit venturing from its warren couldn’t find cover on the ridgeline.

Still, he couldn’t dispel the sense of being watched.

Their captors were watching them, of course, after a fashion. In their present situation, the knights had no means of escape, so the outlaws didn’t deem it necessary to keep them under constant scrutiny.

No, this feeling ran deeper, more dangerous. The air crackled with deadly expectation.

He raised his hands to wipe his brow as best he could, chiding himself. While his instincts had served him well on many a scouting mission, in this instance he was most likely sensing the presence of sentries guarding the outlaw band’s perimeter.

To the young man leading him, whom the others called Wart, he gave voice to his curiosity. Of the three, the strapping but spotty-faced Wart seemed the most approachable, perhaps owing to his apparent newness to their band. Or perhaps because, in some remote way, this youth reminded Alain of Étienne.

He ground his teeth against the familiar tide of guilt and tried to banish the uncomfortable association.

“Naw, we’ll be lucky to make it by sundown.” Wart eyed him suspiciously. “Why would you be thinking that?”

Pit guffawed. “Why, indeed? Saint Pretty Boy is eager to try the rest of the lads. Seems we’re not good enough for the likes of him.” He winked at Alain.

The suggestion leapt beyond ludicrous to genuinely amusing. Alain thinned his lips and averted his gaze to kill his smile.

And abruptly wished he wasn’t bound. He stared at an inverted salve pot. As the distance lessened, he spied a golden lock of hair lying pinned beneath it.

His pulse quickened.

That they were following Kendra’s trail comforted him only to a degree.

He feigned a stumble and fell, causing Wart’s horse to rear and whinny and its rider to loose a barrage of epithets. Ruaud tried to rush to Alain’s aid but was yanked back by an irritated Raven. Alain rolled toward the salve pot, snatched the hair, and stuffed it in his pouch.

Spouting a string of vulgar remarks, Pit stopped and dismounted. He stalked to Alain, hauled him to his feet, kicked the salve pot under the nearby hawthorn bush, cocked a fist, and gave him an uppercut to the jaw. Alain’s head snapped back, exploding in needles of pain. He tried to focus on his attacker to steel himself for another blow but couldn’t concentrate.

Is she worth it?

Numbness enveloped him as his vision went black.

Chapter 7

S
AXONS DID not share the Welsh belief in a fey-peopled Otherworld, but Kendra could see how the fantasy could come to pass when lulled by the rhythmic rasp of fronds and splash of water on the barge’s hull. Nothing else broke the journey’s silence. Even the outlaws, after exchanging watchwords with the bargeman, seemed to prefer the company of their private thoughts.

She huddled against Hilde’s comforting, horsy warmth, closed her eyes, and pictured herself drifting into the Otherworld, beyond the outlaws’ reach.

The drawback, if such a wish could be granted, was that it would leave her trapped beyond Alain’s reach as well.

She shook her head to dispel the traitorous notion. Of course it didn’t work.

Sighing, she opened her eyes to watch the Tor slowly rise before her. Although the air didn’t feel cold, she couldn’t suppress a shiver. She drew her cloak more tightly about her chest, as if it could shield her from her uncertain future.

At the base of the hill, the bargeman poled the craft to the dock while sentries emerged from their posts behind a ruined rock wall. More of these chest-high walls encircled the terraced slopes all the way up to the summit: the remains of the ancient maze her mother had spoken of, she surmised. Huts clustered near the dock, displaying evidence that the builders had pilfered blocks from the maze. The stone tower seemed to survey the swamp and valley like an implacable lord.

“Dragon be awaiting you up there.” Snake’s tone sounded awed.

A plaintive howl drifted down from the summit, causing the horses to snort and stamp.

Rat led the horses into a nearby pen, and Snake escorted Kendra into the maze.

The journey had been a garden stroll compared with the arduous task of navigating the switchbacks and overgrown cut-throughs of the Tor’s maze. As they ascended, the wind turned cold and tangled with the frequent howls to make them seem by turns dreamily distant and dangerously close.

By the time they reached the top, she felt so disoriented, chilled, weary, and out of breath that she doubted she could find her way down even if her soul’s salvation depended upon it. She spent several minutes bent double, turned away from the biting wind, hands to knees, panting and trying to coax her heart back to its normal pace.

The prospect of having to meet this Dragon, whom even the dauntless Snake seemed to fear, didn’t help.

“Come, my lady,” he said as another outlaw opened the tower’s door from the inside and ordered them to enter. “We’ve one more climb afore us.”

Kendra straightened and groaned at the tower’s spiral staircase, visible behind the guard’s bulk. Steeling her resolve, and praying the eerie howling wouldn’t start again, she marched onward, trying her best to ignore the guard’s lewd stare as she was forced to brush past him.

The tower’s lower chamber appeared to be a storeroom of sorts, with a straw pallet tossed against one wall. The chamber reeked of must, offal, urine, and sweat. Oddly, wooden planks comprised the floor, rather than dirt or flagstones. She thought she heard a faint growl as she crossed the room, but she had no time to wonder about any of these things, for Snake hurried her toward the staircase. This ascent, coming so close upon the heels of the other, left her legs wobbly and burning. She clung to the cool stone wall for support.

After a few moments, Snake took her elbow and ushered her to the door. He pounded thrice and gave the countersign in response to a muffled query from within.

The door swung open to reveal opulence beyond anything Kendra had ever imagined.

Jewel-hued tapestries and plush carpets hid almost every hint of stone. Plump pillows embroidered with gold thread lay scattered among ornate chests, tables, chairs, and benches. A hearth along one wall contained a fire that cast shifting shadows throughout the room. Thin slotted windows, their wooden shutters no match for the wind, punctuated the stone at regular intervals. Reedy music reverberated off the walls, accompanied by the shutters’ rattling.

She pressed a hand to her throbbing temple and averted her gaze.

In spite of the ample hearth and the overabundance of fabric, she got the distinct impression that the cold outside was awaiting the best time to strike.

She tried to dispel the sensation with a toss of her head.

The piping stopped, and a rustling drew her attention. A man appeared, as if he’d stepped out of one of the tapestry scenes, and he approached her with haughty grace. His robes looked elegant enough to adorn any courtier’s frame, although Kendra imagined that few courtiers could boast of having a frame as well muscled and proportioned as his. He wore his long, dark blond hair in a thick braid. His face she might have called handsome if not for his twisted lower lip, perhaps the legacy of an old battle wound, which gave his expression a perpetual snarl.

“I’ve brought the Lady Kendra, as ordered, my lord Dragon.”

Dragon’s eyes never left her as he accepted the statement with a curt nod, reached out, and began running his hands over her body. When he pinched her nipples, panic flared in her gut. She flinched.

Dragon yanked her closer, baring his teeth in an unpleasant grin. “Just making sure the merchandise is not damaged, my lady. For my king.” His hands slid downward across her hips. “A sound business practice, would you not agree?”

“Your king? William?” she gasped.

His grin widened. “Not every man bows to the Bastard of Normandy.”

She had no chance to retort as he encountered the bandages swathing her legs and straightened. Glaring, he rounded on Snake. The older man stood his ground, but Kendra saw sweat bead upon his brow.

“What did you do to her, you filthy excuse for a whore’s son?”

“Nothing.” Gratitude for Snake’s kindness strengthened her tongue. “Snake did not cause this. My clothing chafed me, so I bound my legs to ease the pain.”

Although Snake looked relieved, Dragon regarded her suspiciously. “Show me.”

Guessing that any attempt to preserve her modesty would prove futile, she hitched her skirts over her knees and unwound the bandages. Dragon lost no time in stroking her thighs, probing farther than he had any decent right to do. She gritted her teeth against his assault.

After what seemed like an eternity, he withdrew his hand and let her skirts down. She nearly collapsed with relief.

“She tells the truth,” Dragon growled to Snake. “Fortunately for you.” He turned to a gilt chest sitting atop a nearby table, opened it to withdraw a small linen sack, and tossed it at Snake. It jingled as he plucked it from the air. “Now leave us.”

She gazed beseechingly at Snake, who answered with a one-shouldered shrug and made for the door. As he reached for the handle, the timbers shuddered under the force of someone else’s knock. Snake opened the door to reveal the man who had admitted them into the tower, grasping a sealed piece of parchment in his fist. Eyebrows knotted, Dragon strode forward and snatched it from the guard.

His reaction, after breaking the seal and studying the contents, was immediate and vehement. He flung the parchment into the fireplace.

“A summons, my lord?” Snake ventured.

Dragon did not answer but stripped off his robe to reveal a fine ebony leather jerkin and breeches. He stalked up to the guard. “Bring her food and wine. She does not leave this chamber until I return, and no one but me is to enter it. Understood?”

The guard nodded. Dragon ordered Snake to attend him and crossed the threshold without a backward glance. Snake gave her a short bow and followed his master. The door thumped shut with deadly finality.

Kendra hurried to the hearth, found a poker, and rescued the smoldering parchment. She moistened her fingers to quench the heat, but the embers had already obliterated much of the message. The only phrases she could make out with any certainty were “at once,” “explain,” and in a bold flourish at the bottom, “URTH.” In the retreating sunlight, she squinted at the message and turned it at different angles, trying to discern more clues, to no avail.

In dejected misery, she sank onto the nearest mound of pillows. Even if she could divine the outlaws’ plans, she had no prayer of escaping their lair, and no one who might help her knew where she was being held. She wadded the parchment and threw it into the fire. As it blackened, her hopes of rescue crumbled to ash within her heart.

Face in hands, she succumbed to sobs.

TOLERATING THE insults and the occasional yanks on his bonds, Alain trudged behind his captors, wrapped in a fog of fatigue and pain.

She
is
worth it!

Every stride he reminded himself: She
is
. Worth it.

When doubts threatened to overcome his resolve, he had only to recall the maidservant’s battered form and terrified face. The idea that Kendra might be suffering thus sent a jolt of anger through him.

Although he despised its source, he welcomed the anger as the one thing keeping him alive.

Since late afternoon, the group had been traversing a causeway across a swamp. Gnats and biting flies provided merciless escort, and the creatures seemed to take perverse delight in inflicting their torture upon the captives, whose bonds made it impossible to brush them off.

Evening brought cooling temperatures and relief from the insects, but a quickening fog complicated efforts to find a suitable camp site.

“I say we press on,” said Raven.

“Are ye daft, man? In this gloom, the lads’ll be at our throats afore they ken it’s us.” Pit crossed his woad-painted arms and glared at his companions. “Or mayhap they’ll recognize us and slit our throats anyway, for the gold.” He leered at Alain. “Or for a go at Saint Pretty Boy here.”