Templar's Destiny (9780545415095) (6 page)

We waited in the cold — damp, tired, and far away from any place safe enough to lay our heads. The docks on the water's edge smelled of dead fish and old leaves. Aine's cloak was pulled up and pressed tight to her face. “I'm sorry about before,” she mumbled, her voice thick behind the wool.

I tilted my head, questioning.

“I shouldn't have gone into the room a' the inn alone. 'Twas only for a moment,” she insisted. “But I
was
almost caught. One o' the Templars came up before the others.”

I grimaced, but made a bid for peace. “'Tis over. Ye're safe.” I stared out over the lightly rippling water to the shore. “I am no one to speak badly o' taking chances,” I said. “I
was
found out, an' it was all for naught. I didn't even learn anything from going out the window. It could have been far worse. It still might.” Thoughts of Torquil in danger taunted me. Aine moved close and for a moment leaned against my side. The quiet comfort only she could give was welcome.

Gaylen knew that I had been on the roof and that the captive de Nogaret and the King assumed to be me was my brother. He could have given me up and earned extra favors from the King, but he hadn't. It was not out of goodwill; that was a surety. If Bertrand was right and Gaylen hadn't wanted to face me directly for fear of losing the carving, there was still the strong possibility that he was at this moment arranging for our arrest.

In the distance, I could see the dark shape of the ferryboat that would take us across the river. The night was quiet, and the regular soft dip of the oars marked its passage. The power of the land was a low ebb that shifted with the lap of water. I drew a strand to myself and reached to survey the boat. Only one man was aboard, and his thoughts were barely on us. We were his last fare. Drink and company awaited his return.

My neck was stiff with the persistent shiver that trembled along my back. Winter was growing closer by the day. I did not allow myself to linger on the thought of what would happen if we did not find Torquil soon. Aine pressed the back of her hand against mine, her silent support a blessing.

A few moments later, the boat beached with the soft stir of muddy silt. Aine boarded first, then Bertrand. I did a quick scan of the town behind us and the water ahead, then stepped carefully into the shell. My scan would not reach the opposite shore or any that might await us there, but for the moment I thought us to be safe. If Gaylen were watching or intent on following, though I would not be able to sense his presence, I would feel the carving. Since I didn't believe he would ever leave it behind and I felt no trace of it, I allowed myself a moment's peace.

The ferryman dug in his oars and pushed off. The wash of the river's current moved us along. It was black as pitch on the water, and the sound of the oars as they dipped was mesmerizing. Somewhere off to our left lay the Île de la Cité and the castle of the King, a threat that was now far closer and more real than ever before. Our hunters were near.

The Templars, Gaylen, and de Nogaret. It appeared to me that the only link between them was the Holy Vessel and myself, but there had to be more, something that lay right there before my eyes. De Nogaret demanded proof. Proof of what? That the Holy Vessel existed? No — the Templars, the Church, Gaylen, and the soldiers who were in the cave where I found the Holy Vessel's bowl, all knew that it was real. So that was not it.

Across the water, birds of the night fluttered and called. I let my body relax and my eyes haze. A voice came to me then, as unexpected as it was unknown.

“But I don't want to go to England and marry a man I have not met. He can't make me do it!”

“There now, milady, if it happens you'll have no choice in the matter. You've known this all your life.”

“It's barbaric. Is this not the year 1307? Have we not come further than this? When I marry, it will be for
l'amour.”

A chuckle sounded in my mind.
“You will be lucky if the man your father chooses is kind and wise. Love is for the peasants, milady.”

“If I were a peasant, then freedom would be mine.”
The flash of a bright amber gaze filled the dark of my mind's eye, and as it faded I found myself staring into a different set of eyes. Eyes that held a spark of annoyance.

Aine said nothing, just turned away and closed her eyes. Suddenly, her shielding was stronger than moments before, and she was closed off to me.

I tucked my arms around myself and wondered what in the world had brought on this vision? The lass was lovely. I found myself lingering over the color of her eyes and the shape of her face. Though the conversation was forgettable, the lass was not.

Aine's eyes opened, and I felt her stare. I shook my head and turned my thoughts to the carving, the base of the Vessel. The mysterious wooden talisman had been fashioned by one of the gifted in the likeness of his mother. He had been a Protector, but I knew no more of their tale, save that the woman was somehow linked to the carving, and that her spirit came to me in times of need and enhanced the gifts I was born with.

I called her face to mind and silently asked what it was she wanted of me? What were these riddles I was meant to find the answer to? A glow of warmth came to me then, pressing away the chill. It was not an answer, but it gave me hope.

Aine was seated close by, huddled against the cold. I drew some of the heat that I had been granted and whispered it in her direction. Her eyes drowsily held mine, and she nodded a silent thanks as we drifted across the river.

No one waited on the opposite shore. Though I knew it long before we beached, I was still surprised that Gaylen hadn't arranged an armed welcome. Aine's hum filled the back of my mind, and I automatically reached for the one who had rowed us here.
No passengers traveled this crossing.
I drew on a strand of power that glistened on the air and gently set to blurring the edges of his memories.

We moved away into the darkness of the trees, and I opened my mind to the area around us. Beech and elm grew thickly, and as I walked, the ancient feel of the forest swirled about my senses. It was different here. I understood now what Aine had detected; there was a sluggishness to the beat of life.

Aine was wrapped tight in her woolen cloak. Misery, cold, and exhaustion had grown within her since leaving the boat, and I noticed that she stumbled over the gnarled roots at our feet more than she would have normally. The night sky was a somber gray, as if the promise of the coming day's light was not assured.

“We part ways here,” said Bertrand. “I'll be in touch as soon as I know something. Be careful ye both.” An odd chill skittered along my spine, and my skin tingled.

I nodded, and Aine and I turned away, following a path that was no more than a small break in the foliage as Bertrand continued west.

Aine had reached the top of the hill, and she looked down toward the direction Bertrand had disappeared. I could see the vague outline of the Templar preceptory off in the distance. Aine murmured something softly.

“Aye?” I prompted.

“Ye didn't do what ye usually do. That ‘stay true to the light' bit ye Templars always say whenever ye part ways,” she said before she turned away and started down the backside of the hill.

It was in me suddenly to run after Bertrand, to send him off with the Templar blessing. I felt badly for not thinking to do it. I was not a Templar as yet, but had witnessed Alexander share the well wish and had adopted it since we'd parted. I hadn't been at all diligent about my devotions on this journey. My prayers were done in moments of haste and need. I was a poor apprentice, I thought, and silently said the words toward the direction he had gone.

I started down the hill then, eager for the solace that sleep would bring. Aine and I were alone. Again. The sudden realization struck me, and I looked at her sidelong. She was just a black shape in the darkness. Without a word, she slowed and moved closer, tangling her fingers with my own. The breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding released on a sigh.

She shivered, and the ripple of it passed through her hand where it met mine. “Are ye cold?” I made to undo my cloak.

“No. 'Tis this land. I don't know what is wrong with it, but the power is strange. Twisted and weaving in a way that I have never come across before,” she murmured. “Though, granted I've no' been far.” I hadn't noticed that she was scanning the area around us. Her mind's touch was subtle. “Ye've been to this place before, aye?” she asked.

“No' here specifically, but in this land, aye,” I said, opening my senses more widely to try and understand what she was sensing.

“There are so many echoes o' the lives that have passed here. Their stories jump into my head,” she said. “But 'tis more than that — I've known that feeling the whole o' my life. Here there is a twisted kind o' squambly feeling that grips my inners whenever I let the echo roll over me. 'Tis like the power is off. Wrong somehow an' 'tis warping my read.” It was more words from her than I had heard in several days.

“Is it a worry, d'ye think?”

“I don't know. Maybe 'tis just a different kind o' power here than a' home,” she said.

Home.
The word gave me a sudden jolt of longing for the way it used to be, under the roof of my parents, surrounded by my brothers and sisters and not haring off across a strange land on a quest that I still had no great understanding of.

“It makes me want to fix it somehow,” Aine said, drawing me back. She hummed softly as we walked, and I listened with all of my senses, normal and gifted. “But I don't know how to do it, an' I'm fair frightened to try,” she said.

The power all around us
was
different from home. The air was cool, and yet the strands that drifted along its edges were thick and somehow sticky and hot. I could not direct them to shift as I could at home. They clung to my mind's touch, leaving something behind when I dropped the link.

“I sense what ye mean, but I don't have any thought as to how we could change it or even if we should,” I said. Even with the strengthened bond between the Holy Vessel and myself, this seemed beyond me.

Aine said nothing, just wandered the road with her head cocked and her song playing softly in the night.

The inn that we found was in a small village whose name I did not mark. The dwelling was one of many such dark, wooden hovels scattered among the hills. Though it stood on its own, it projected the air that if one board should crack, the whole would tumble down in a heap of tinder. A small, wooden plaque hung from a rusted-iron spike over the door. It's marking was nearly as dark as the weathered plank it was made from, but I could vaguely make out a crudely carved crown. This was the place Bertrand had suggested.

It was dim and quiet, shut up for the night. Aine stood behind me, tightly tucked up in her cloak. The drift of her hum played softly in my mind. I rapped on the door.

A woman opened it several long moments later. She was as thin as a stripling. Her gray hair hung in strands down her face and was caught up in the back with some sort of rough twine. “What do you want?” Her voice was as haggard as the rest of her.

“We need a room,” I said. Beneath the words I wove a suggestion.
Open the door an' show us in. Ask no questions. Remember only a tinker man.

Without a word she turned, leaving the door ajar. Aine and I slipped inside. The main room was sparse, and smelled of fires long banked with ale.
A meal,
I whispered.

She handed us two wooden bowls and silently ladled a thick, pasty soup into them from an iron pot that hung over a low fire, then she fetched us wine in heavy, clay mugs. I whispered to her once more, and we were shown to a room off the main before she disappeared back to her own with no memory of having served or seen us.

Aine dropped to the pallet and slowly began to eat, her exhaustion so strong that her arm fell to her lap after each bite, as if it weighed two stone.

I took a small, heavy stool by the door. The soup had been long cooking. The taste of the burned bottom of the pot ran through the thickness so strongly, I could not recognize what had been used for meat or vegetable. I ate it nonetheless. We had traveled hard and eaten little.

Aine finished and was swaying where she sat. “Sleep,” I said. “I will take the watch.”

“Do we need a watch?” she murmured, dropping flat and drawing the coverlet close. “No' a soul knows that we are here.”

I didn't bother to answer. Gaylen knew that we were somewhere in this land, and I would not be taken by him unaware. Aine's even breathing told me she had slipped off.

I moved the stool against the wall, and in the clear space I drew my dagger from its sheath. I was amazed, as always, at the feel of it in my hand and the knowledge that it was precious and mine. It had been the Templar's, an Islamic work of art he had gifted me with. Quietly, I murmured the prayer of Our Lady and deftly moved through the exercises the Templar had taught me. The rhythm of the prayer helped me keep time, but it did nothing to settle my unease. I could not dispel the feeling that Gaylen was about to make my life even more difficult than it had been of late.

Exercises done, I pulled a scrap of worn linen from my bag and wiped the sweat from my neck and face. Though Aine would most likely not appreciate it if she woke, I approached the room's small window, pushed aside the shutter, and stuck my head out into the night. Beyond the walls, the air was filled with wetness. I leaned into it, grateful for the cool that pushed aside my fatigue.

The wind had risen. The cold held the sharp scent of snow and winter. A storm was coming, a maelstrom not unlike the one already raging within me, and it had everything to do with Gaylen, de Nogaret, and the Templars. I was beyond my abilities. I needed the help of Templar Alexander in this. Although I knew it was dangerous to use the power in a way that would ripple the web, I called to him.

Alexander. Please. If ye can hear me, speak.
I put all of my desperation into the call, drawing the power and fueling the reach. The currents stirred beneath my feet, as if waking from a long slumber, and tingled along my shielding. The wind blew cold through my hair and pressed against my neck like a blade freshly sharpened. The Templar was out there somewhere, if only I could find him. I drew to mind all that was his essence, his peace, his strength. It was more than I had ever attempted before, and I felt as if my mind were spreading thin.

And then as if he had never been away, I felt the link that we had once shared flare to life. Joy burst within me. I had thought it forever broken.

Where are ye?
I asked.

Close,
came the reply.
Stay. Wait.
Mindspeech was less trackable, when you used the least amount of words fueled by small bursts of power. I had forgotten.

Torquil?
I asked. Instantly, a series of images flit before my mind's eye. Black walls. Manacles. Rusted chain. In a panic I tried to move closer, to follow the path of his thoughts, but I was cut off abruptly.

Safe.
The Templar's reassurance was strong, and his peace flowed through me.
Only a possible future.

What d'ye mean?
I nearly shouted, breaking the rule, lengthening my words. But my thought seemed to echo uselessly in my mind. Our contact had begun to fade. In moments, it dropped away altogether.

My body swayed, and I clutched the wall. The thought of my brother in chains made me feel ill … but what had I expected? I must take heart. Torquil was alive and the Templar was coming.

I secured the shutter, finding it difficult to raise my arm to do it. The contact was taking its toll, but I didn't care in the least.

I crossed to the pallet and looked down on Aine. I wanted to wake her and tell her what happened, but she slept so peacefully that I found I could not. Her red ringlets were short and bright on the coverlet. Without thinking, I reached down and rubbed a lock between my fingers. It was as soft as I remembered. Aine shifted and the bit of hair slipped away.

I moved the stool close to the bed and sat down. It was not a surprise when her eyes opened and she slid back, making room, and beckoned with an outstretched hand.

So tired. I moved as if in a dream, taking my place beside her. Her eyes were luminous in the candlelight. Gently, her arm lifted and I felt the trace of her fingers on my face. I closed my eyes to rest, yet it was as if a trail of fire sparked along my jaw. With it, a wash of memory slid through me. Moments we had spent alone, just like this. Aine was remembering and I, in my exhaustion, was reading her. I felt her breath fan softly across my lips, and all but the need to kiss her emptied from my mind. Gently, I pressed my lips to hers. I had forgotten how soft they were, how incredible the sensation of her closeness was.

Aine reached out and cupped my face, holding me still while her mouth explored the edges of my own. There was no fear in her now, no nervousness. She rolled to her back, and I moved with her, our bodies pressed close. It felt good, right, as if we were two halves to a whole.

“Tormod?” Hesitation colored her tone.

“Aye?” I said.

“Have ye seen that vision before?”

It took a moment for me to understand which vision she was talking about. It was the girl I had seen when we crossed the river. Something large seemed to weigh on the answer I would give.

“No. 'Twas fair odd, eh? No' something I should think would be part o' anything coming to me.”

“Aye,” she said softly, fumbling with the coverlet. “Comely, she was, don't ye think?”

I was so tired I barely attended her words. “Aye. Beautiful,” I replied absently.

“I wouldn't say that exactly,” she said, “but no' plain.”

“Aye.”

Her arms circled my back, and I buried my face in her neck, feeling the pulse of her blood roar beneath my face.
I love ye, Tormod.
Aine's words brushed my mind. And everything within me stilled. She hadn't meant for me to hear. I was linked to her. Suddenly, I thought of the Templars and the life I had always wanted to lead, a life that did not include women, a life without Aine.

I felt the shock run through her, the hurt and disbelief. Immediately, I drew up the shielding around me, severing my thoughts from hers, but the damage had already been done. She had pulled away from me, backed as far away on the pallet as she could manage, like a frightened animal.

I wanted to draw her back into my arms, to explain that Templar life had been all I had ever thought of, it had always been my only desire. I didn't know what I wanted anymore.

I drew myself from the pallet and turned away into the cold of the room. Her shields were still low, and I could feel her hurt and confusion. “Close yer eyes,” I whispered. “Get some sleep.”

I heard the rustle as she turned onto her side, and in moments I was no longer privy to her thoughts or feelings. Aine had shut me out. A ripple of pain squeezed my heart. I forced myself to move away — to take the stool once more. I drew my dagger and held it loosely, facing the door. What good I might have been if Gaylen or some other threat had burst through, we were lucky enough not to know.