Townsend, Lindsay - The Snow Bride (BookStrand Publishing Romance) (40 page)

A man-built tower can have traps within it, but its walls are not riddled with malice. Yet does the same hold true for a necromancer’s house? Think of a church, a building yet also a house of God. You would not go lightly into a church, Magnus.

“Do you feel strongest as a witch in your house?”

“Yes, yes!” As she answered she lifted her head. Relief shone in her face, showing him that he was finally thinking right.

“And you think the same will be true for him?”

“I do. So if we take your plan and draw him out of his home, it will go well. And we are still before the solstice, within three days, as my magic promised.”

“My plan, eh? Yes, that may be safer for your sister and the others, too,” Magnus conceded, amused to catch her blushing. “What? Had you forgotten the rest of the missing brides?”

“Not a bit! Well, perhaps a little of late.” She blushed more fiercely, and he liked and loved her for that frailty and for admitting her all-too-human forgetfulness.

“
We shall get them all out,
”
he promised.

He disliked the plan but could tell her heart was set on it. And if he was to show Elfrida he loved her, he had to prove to her that he respected her.

She has always respected me
. As much as her love, he wanted to keep her respect, for one flowed into the other and back.
If she were a man I would not question it.

All said, she was the witch, not him. Anything that weakened Joseph Denzil was good, and they would have the element of surprise.

Remember those ambushes that you and Peter would spring out on the roads and tracks in Outremer, when one would play the wounded soldier and the other and our men would lie in wait? We won a few skirmishes by that ploy.

“I will be very close,” he vowed. “Very close, but I have one condition.”

She flashed him a look, as if she wanted to ask, “Only one?” but wisely said nothing. She gave a vast yawn and mumbled, “Forgive me, I am paying attention.”

“Then you will heed me when I say that I will choose the place where you pretend to swoon. I know the tactics of land fights and ambushes.”

She nodded quickly, her amber eyes brightening. “Yes, Magnus, I understand. I will do as you suggest.”

She gasped as Magnus swung her into his arms. “Elfling! Pretending to be good now you have your own way.”

“But I will obey you, sir.”

“I know.” He kissed her, feeling her excitement and also her overtaut weariness. Later, when they had Christina safe, he would also deal with Elfrida in his own way, he thought, feeling his backache and aching left leg eased by that pleasant prospect. He knew, though, that everyone was short of sleep and prone to make mistakes.

“You will do exactly as I say.” Still uneasy with the plan, still wishing Elfrida were not so blessedly independent, still hoping he could think of an alternative to get Joseph Denzil out of his lair, he began to outline how they would proceed.

It was midday when they reached the stone keep and Elfrida saw the great entrance door for herself, with its telling symbols and letters. There had been no more falling snow and no alarms, and when she closed her eyes and concentrated, she had no sense of any malevolence. For a heart-stopping instant she was afraid that their enemy and Christina were not here, but then two new voices sounded like small bells within her mind, young, scared voices, begging for help.

He has brought his other victims to this tower, his securest place, before he takes them on to the final wooden tower
.
Surely he lacks only the fourth maid, the redheaded maiden?

The idea swept the weariness from her spirits and limbs like an elixir, and as Magnus asked, rather tersely,
“
All quiet?
” she was smiling.

“
Yes, sir,
”
she replied, aware he was finding this whole plan difficult. She was not sure if she asked too much of him, but she was grateful he was willing to stand back, if only for a little.

“
Good. Quiet here as well.
”
Magnus nodded his handsome-but-scarred head at the clearing in which the tower was set.
“
The snow has helped us, for men and beasts linger indoors, and sounds do not travel in this weather.
”

He had ensured their approach was quiet, too, instructing each man to check his weapons and disguise or tie down anything loose or metal that might clash or reflect the pale sunlight. He had done the same with the ponies and horses, clumping moss or strips of cloth around stirrups, saddles and bridles. They had moved cautiously for the last half mile, keeping off the smooth, straight road and winding through the woodland.

And it had worked. Elfrida wanted to fling her arms around Magnus as far as they would go and tell him how proud she was of him, how resourceful and patient she found him. But the hours were edging away, and Joseph had to be tempted from his tower.

Magnus made a downward sign with his arm, and she dismounted, lying flat on the crisp snow. The other men had also dismounted and were hiding in the trees. Only she and Magnus worked their way closer. She followed his swift yet measured progress, dipping between trees and bushes and banks of snow, working to remain hidden from the tower. Crawling and worming sideways and forwards, they came within a spear’s cast distance of the entrance, and even she could faintly make out the symbols on the door.

Had her belly not been numb with cold and her mind burning with fear for Christina, Elfrida might have cheered.

Magnus rolled across a bare section of rock and flung himself beneath the cover of a blackberry bush. The bush rocked slightly, and snow drifted, then all was still. He turned and motioned ahead of them both, and she knew what he meant.

Their eyes met. His were dark with strain. “I will go gladly in your place,” he said softly.

She shook her head. “I must do this.” However strange her plan, however unnatural, she knew it was their best chance to trick Joseph Denzil, to catch him off-guard. “I must, for Christina.”

She must, too, not only for her sister. Danger hovered like a miasma in this seemingly peaceful clearing, and above all she wanted Magnus safe. In any battle using magic, he would have only the advantage of surprise and strength against their enemy, who might summon a demon on the spot to devour him. Again she understood how hard it must be for him to let her go. His steadfastness awed her.

She smiled for him alone, the moment theirs, inviolate, and then she rose off her knees and tottered out into the clear, clean snow.

She had chosen to walk and not ride these final steps because then she did not need to worry about the horse, and she could “faint” and fall exactly how and where she chose.

Unless Denzil is suspicious and shoots an arrow into me.

She dragged the rough woolen cap off her head, deliberately spilling her loosened hair. No youth she knew wore his hair so long— that is what she had confidentially assured Magnus. Now, easing her already cooling feet through the thick coverlets of snow before the stone tower, she felt very small and exposed.

She spun about, deliberately awkwardly and heavily, spotting Magnus
’
s grin and nod of encouragement and, above his hiding place, the overarching trees, their snow-white branches dotted with roosting, dark birds, too far distant for her to recognize. She turned around again, the fallen snow clinging to her legs.

I may perish of cold first, if Denzil lingers too long deciding
.

But she had done what she could to keep warm. Over her youth’s clothes she had
Baldwin
’s undertunic, shyly offered to her, and Magnus’s undertunic, dropped over her head with the rough words, “No dispute! Wear it!” She also wore other items, offered by Magnus’s men—shoes, extra leggings, mittens with the thumb missing—and looked sturdier than she had ever done, but still, she hoped, a woman wearing a boy’s costume for traveling.

And I am afraid. Where is the necromancer? Will he know me as the one he calls his Snow Bride? Should I have warned Magnus of that? No, that is secret, witch business.

She hoped Joseph Denzil had no wolf familiar, or any great beast. To counter devils, she had dried sprays of rosemary and an amulet that had been dipped in the holy tears of the Magdalene, given to her by her mother. She had wanted to pass the small copper trinket to Magnus, only her mother had told her only women could wear it. Now, with her crucifix and her moon sign, it would be part of her sacred shield.

And I know I am fussing because I am afraid
.

The snow yielded a little more under her shuffling feet. She took it as a good omen and sank to the frozen ground, falling sideways so she came to rest on Magnus
’
s leather cloak. She lay in a patch of sunlight, feeling a light breeze stroke against her face, and prepared to wait.

She closed her eyes but dared not sleep—those who fell asleep in snow rarely woke again. Instead, she strained her hearing to its utmost and clenched her hands within their mittens. She worked and twitched her toes within their alien shoes and tensed the muscles of her legs and arms, trying not to stiffen. Across the clearing, she wondered what Magnus could see and hear, if he was also keeping limber, and hoped it would not be long.

She became aware of a dampness under her cheek where the snow was melting due to the warmth of her face. Soon the damp turned to a chill, then an ache, then a dull throbbing, worse than a toothache. She tried to divert herself by imagining huge fires and listing all the cures for bad teeth.

Despite her movements, her limbs began to shiver. She felt a fierce itch in her nose and sneezed violently, setting a new ache flaring down her spine and ribs. The shadow of the stone tower loomed above her head, making her face and neck even colder.

He will not emerge until the shadow envelopes me
, she thought, in some despair. Her mind was growing as sluggish as her body. She could scarcely feel her feet, even with their brave borrowed shoes.

But Joseph Denzil has not set dogs or devils on me yet, and he does not control the weather as I feared, or else it would surely be snowing again.

She drummed her fingers against her thighs, rolling her head slightly so her face no longer rested on compacted snow. A cold point, wet as a dog’s nose, smeared onto her forehead. The shadow of the tower chilled her back, making her wish she had drunk more mead earlier. A sly breeze danced across her legs and made its home in her lap like an unwelcome pet. She began to crave noise and signs of life, true warmth like the hot deserts of Outremer that Magnus had spoken of so eloquently during their grim pilgrimage to this spot. Hoping to see him, she half opened her eyes, her eyelids feeling as if they were coated in dusty cobwebs.

It was snowing again, large, powdery flakes that burst on her gloved hands and face and slowly, inexorably, drifted across her body.

Will he wait until I am covered? Is he even here? Am I mistaken?

She thought of the small bag of salt and wormwood leaves tied around her neck and wondered if she should have placed a salt and wormwood circle of protection around herself and Magnus. But Denzil, if he were watching, would have spotted that at once and recognized her as a witch.

Magic lies in the will. Elfrida knew that, deep within her blood and bones, and that wisdom kept her still, pinned on the frozen ground like a trapped fly in resin on a pine tree, as she allowed her anger to build.

He is no good host, like the rest of his wretched kindred. He leaves me out in a snowstorm for his own safety and comfort, because he is no true knight. What is he, this Joseph Denzil? A master of no craft. He dabbles at knighthood but is of so small renown that Sir Magnus does not remember him in Outremer. He is or was a cleric but a cleric without the core of faith. He has a power of magic but too much pride. He assumes he is safe, that I am nothing but a bride of snow for him and that his dark workings within the wooden tower with the blue door cannot be touched. I have fire I can use against the tower...