Brides of Ireland

by Le Veque, Kathryn

  It was an odd situation, indeed. Leaving Pearce by the door, Bric headed out to the clusters of fighting to get a look of the situation for himself, hoping to make short work of the French that were still resisting. He’d done some serious damage in town against the enemy, but now that they were out in the open, he intended to do more damage.

  The High Warrior was on the prowl.

  Unsheathing his enormous broadsword, the one with the serrated edge, he began stalking the individual groups, coming up behind the unsuspecting French soldiers and lobbing off a head or two. God, he felt powerful when he did that. It was his favorite thing to do in battle. When word started getting around about the English knight who was beheading men, some of the French began to flee. Mylo, who had been fighting off a particularly vicious group, threw caution to the wind and began going for the neck like Bric was.

  Soon enough, the fighting began to break up as the French began to retreat. The River Nar ran just to the south of the priory, and Bric watched Mylo rush down to the river because there was some heavy fighting going on down there. He lost sight of Mylo because it was so dark, so he returned to his duties of cleaning up the field of battle by dispatching any remaining fighting.

  More often than not, men would simply scatter when they saw him coming, and sometimes they would scatter in the direction of the river. Bric wasn’t entirely sure how many men were down by the river now, so he thought to take a look. If there was more fighting going on, then he would hasten to disband it. It was so dark down there, however, that he took some of the soldiers away from the priory entrance and had them carry torches down towards the river so he could see what was happening.

  What he saw unfold was disturbing.

  The French had regrouped down by the river and were fighting the de Winter army furiously. When Bric saw this, he bellowed to the men near the priory, telling them to pass the word to send every available man down to the river. In a rush, the English were coming, all of them rushing down to the river to engage the French who were being stubborn.

  The River Nar was a wide body of water, but not very deep at all, and the foliage around it was quite heavy, making everything seem darker than it was. Bric charged into the foliage, swinging his sword when he was certain he was swinging it at an enemy. His horse, however, was snapping at anything that moved, French or English.

  Unfortunately, the near total darkness in the river made fighting chaotic and dangerous. Bric could only really see occasional movement, and the grunting of men, and the torches brought by the English soldiers didn’t illuminate much at all. At one point, Bric stopped swinging his sword, fearful he was going to kill one of his own men. He resorted to kicking and punching mostly, or knocking the heads he could see. It was as much as he could do considering he couldn’t see anything, nor could anyone else. It was fighting in total darkness, a deadly situation.

  Light came unexpectedly when soldiers with torches suddenly appeared in the area that Bric was fighting in and he saw that he was right in the middle of the stream, with mostly French soldiers around him. When the French saw the big English knight with the bloodied blade, they began to run, and Bric tried to catch them before they could get away. But just as he was turning to charge after them, he heard someone yell behind him.

  “Bric! Behind you!”

  Bric heard Mylo’s voice in a panic. An attack was imminent and Bric could feel something off to his right, like the breeze when something rushed by, and the water splashed heavily next to him. He heard a growl, saw the flash of a blade, and ducked low on his horse, hoping to miss the weapon that was flying out at him.

  His sense of survival kicked in; determined to defend himself, Bric brought up his sword to counter, or even kill, the man attacking him. He heard a grunt of pain a split second before he brought his sword around and plunged it into the neck and shoulder of the man who had suddenly appeared next to him. He could see the body in the darkness, but nothing more, and at this moment, anything in the darkness was his enemy.

  He wasn’t going to go down without a fight.

  But he noticed too late that man next to him was on a horse. There was also another man between them, on foot. The man on foot fell into the river, as did the man on the horse, but Bric couldn’t tell what had happened. He couldn’t see anything. He began screaming for light and a soldier with a torch rushed into the area and the foliage, the water, lit up with a golden glow. Bric looked down to see a dead Frenchman lying in the water and Mylo lying on top of him with his head half-cut off.

  Horror seized him.

  Bric leapt from his horse, into the freezing water, screaming for the soldier with the torch to come closer. Falling to his knees in the bloodied, cold water, he pulled Mylo up, seeing the wound in the man’s shoulder and neck and knowing he had put it there. God help him, he knew. He could see how easily the sword had cut the flesh, something his serrated blade did easily. It was made for lobbing off heads.

  “Oh, God,” he breathed. “Oh, God, no… Mylo? Can you hear me?”

  Mylo was ghostly pale, with blood pouring from his neck and shoulder. His eyes opened at the sound of Bric’s voice.

  “He… he was going to kill you,” he murmured. “I… had to… stop…”

  “Stop what?” Bric demanded, his voice cracking. “What happened?”

  “I… put myself between you and… you could not see him. I had to stop him.”

  I had to stop him. The confusion, the horror Bric experience was now transforming into something unspeakable as the situation became evident. The warrior who had never shown emotion in his life on the field of battle was feeling a rush of it as he realized what had happened.

  He’d killed his own man, who had been trying to save him.

  “Sweet God,” he gasped. “Mylo, you yelled a warning. I could not see in the dark and I thought you were the man coming to kill me. I did not know it was you!”

  Mylo tried to swallow, to breathe, but everything was cut. He was bleeding out all over Bric, his bright red blood seeping into the man’s tunic.

  “I… know…” he rasped. “Not… your fault, Bric. You did not know it was… me…”

  With that, he breathed his last. Bric stared at him, unable to comprehend what he had done. The fighting around him had died down, but he didn’t notice. At that moment, all he saw in the entire world was his knight in his arms.

  The man he had killed.

  The sound that came out of him next was something every man in the de Winter army would remember for the rest of their lives.

  “No!”

  It was a scream that reverberated off of the priory, startling the monks who were hanging out the windows, watching the battle dwindle. But down in that heavily-foliaged river, Bric held Mylo against him and wept as he’d never wept in his life. He cried for the life he took, for the man he loved who had sacrificed himself to protect him, and for a young son who would never know his father.

  He wept until he could weep no more.

  As he sat there in the river with Mylo’s cooling body against him, he noticed perhaps the only thing he would have noticed under the circumstances. Somehow in the fighting, in the twisting and the turning, his talisman had managed to escape from underneath his hauberk and he could see it outlined beneath his tunic. As he looked at it, the words inscribed on it suddenly came to mind.

  A maiorem caritatum nemo habet.

  Greater love hath no man than he lay down his life for his friends.

  That was what Mylo had done. He’d laid down his life so that Bric could live, and he felt painfully unworthy of those words. Without hesitation, Bric yanked off his helm, his hauberk, and pulled off the talisman. He put it over Mylo’s head, thinking that Mylo was much more deserving of the talisman than he was.

  He’d made the greatest sacrifice of all.

  Pearce, who had come upon the shocking scene of Bric and Mylo in the middle of the river, ran to the castle to tell Daveigh what had happened. Daveigh flew away from the castle in a panic
, determined to get to Bric and Mylo to see for himself what a devastated Pearce had told him. His heart was in his throat, tears in his eyes, as dozens of his soldiers ran with him, lighting the way through the darkness.

  When he finally reached the scene, the carnage was horrific. Daveigh entered the river only to see it running red with blood, and the dead and dying littering both the river and the river bank. It was so bloody that it was as if every man there had been through a meat grinder, and he plunged feet-first into the river, running to the spot where Bric held Mylo, both of them half-submerged in the freezing water.

  When Daveigh saw what had happened, he wept, too.

  Oh, God… it was hell.

  But it only grew worse as the night went on. Bric wouldn’t move and he wouldn’t let anyone take Mylo away from him. He simply sat in that freezing river and held the knight who had tried to save his life. That was all Bric could comprehend, and as morning began to dawn over the meadows and lands of Norfolk, Bric finally picked himself up out of that water and carried Mylo to the shore.

  But he didn’t stop there.

  With the dead knight in his arms, Bric began to walk. It was as if he couldn’t even function, his mind devoid of reason. All he knew was that he’d cut down his own knight, and his mind simply couldn’t accept it. He wouldn’t let the man go, and he wouldn’t mount his horse to ride back to Narborough.

  All he did was walk.

  All the way back to Narborough.

  The army, seeing that their High Warrior was devastated beyond words, simply walked with him. Not one man mounted his horse, and not one man spoke a single word. Bric was walking home, and so would they.

  They would escort him and Mylo home.

  It was a tragic and poignant sight.

  As Bric carried Mylo down the road, heading west as the sun rose, it was an agonizing reminder of the fragility of life. What the French couldn’t accomplish in a day and a night of vicious fighting, and what dozens of armies over the past twenty years couldn’t do, a single stroke from a serrated broadsword managed to achieve.

  The High Warrior was finally broken.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  The morning after Bric had left with the army, Eiselle had awoken with a belly ache. Given that her belly was usually quite sensitive, she didn’t give it much thought. She tried to eat bread and cheese to soothe it, but that didn’t seem to help too much. The cook had made porridge, so she had a little of that with honey, and that seemed to settle her belly right down.

  At least it did for a little while. When nightfall came around, she was nauseous again and ate a big bowl of porridge to ease it. She never mentioned her upset stomach to Keeva, or Zara for that matter, because she thought it was because she was worried for Bric. She didn’t want the women to think she was being foolish and not brave. If she was to be the wife of the High Warrior, then she was going to have to come to grips with the man going off to war.

  It was easier said than done.

  Two days after the army departed for Castle Acre, Eiselle awoke to more nausea. She wasn’t feeling well at all and began to think that she must have eaten something that made her ill. But she rose from bed, burping and uncomfortable, and proceeded to wash with warmed water and dress in a pretty blue garment that her mother had made for her. In the warmer weather, the fabric was light, so it was an excellent choice on this day. Even though there was some dew in the fields, she could tell that the day was to be a warm one simply because of the morning temperatures.

  She had much to do on this day, and that was intentional. She found that as long as she was busy, she had less time to worry. She had started a new dress for Keeva using a gorgeous silk fabric that Keeva had purchased in Cambridge, and she was hoping to get a good deal finished on the dress. In fact, Eiselle was earning something of a reputation as a master seamstress around Narborough and in addition to the several dresses she’d made for Keeva, she’d also made two for Zara. She’d even instructed some of the servants on the techniques she knew for sewing, so now she had an army of seamstresses to help her.

  In truth, Eiselle had never been happier. She was married to a man she loved dearly and life at Narborough was pleasant and lovely. She had a great friend in Keeva, and in Zara, and she would have been happy to include Angela in that group if the woman ever stopped being a hermit. Eiselle was hoping that someday the woman would realize that she wasn’t doing her son any favors by permitting him to be such a terror, and would understand that any criticism had been meant to help her. Not that Eiselle was an expert in children, but even she knew that children needed some discipline.

  As the day progressed, she began to feel better, a condition that was spurred on when the old cook gave her fresh currant bread with honey. The bread made her belly full and very happy. Retreating to the ladies’ solar, which still reminded her very much of Bric since it had been his former chamber, she settled down with the crimson silk and stitched careful, tiny stitches into the bodice. It was exacting work, because silk was difficult to work with, so she was patient with it. It was a perfect project to pass the time and pretend she wasn’t thinking about Bric every moment of the day.

  “Ah!” Manducor was suddenly standing in the solar door. “Here I find you, Lady MacRohan.”

  Eiselle looked up from her stitching. “And I am sure you are surprised.”

  Manducor grinned, his teeth yellowed with age. “Your movements are predictable,” he said. “If you are not in the hall or with Lady de Winter, then here you shall be.”

  Eiselle couldn’t talk and stitch carefully at the same time. She set the garment in her lap. “So you have found me,” she said. “What can I do for you today?”

  His old eyes twinkled at her. “Nothing,” he said innocently. “But I may be able to do something for you.”

  “What?”

  “It is possible I have seen a de Winter rider at the main gatehouse,” he said. “It is also possible that it is advance word that the army is returning.”

  Eiselle wouldn’t let herself become too excited. “And it is equally possible that it is not,” she said. “The army only left three days ago.”

  Manducor stepped into the chamber, eyeing the pitcher of wine on a table against the wall. He had a talent for finding the wine pitcher in any room he entered.

  “Aye, they did,” he agreed. “But Lady de Winter has been called to the gatehouse. The odds are in our favor that the army is returning and she is being told.”

  So much for Eiselle not becoming too excited. A smile flickered on her lips. “I suppose the battle wasn’t too far away, was it?”

  Manducor shook his head. “It was not. Castle Acre is only sixteen miles away, so whatever happened must have happened quickly.”

  Eiselle was encouraged by that. “Why did you not go with the army?” she asked. “Keeva said that Daveigh invited you to go. You are a former knight, after all. Why should you not go and fight?”

  Manducor shook his head. “It was a very long time ago,” he said. “I no longer possess any mail or weapons. Besides, I would probably cut someone’s head off if I tried. Nay, lass, that is a past life for me.”

  “Then mayhap you should ask Bric to practice with you. I am sure he would.”

  Manducor poured himself some of the wine he’d been eyeing. Lifting the cup to his lips, he drank deeply.

  “I am too old, Lady MacRohan,” he told her. “I would prefer to remain here, away from battle, and then help when I am needed. I am quite versatile, in fact – I can help Weetley with the sick or injured, and I can also perform a mass or a blessing. I think that makes me a rather indispensable figure here.”

  He sounded full of himself and Eiselle grinned, turning back to her sewing. “Tell that to Daveigh, not me,” she said. “He has let you remain this long, so I do not see why he would not permit you to be a permanent resident.”

  “That is my intention, madam.”

  “You like Narborough that much?”

  “Let’s just say that I
feel useful here. I feel as if I belong.”

  Eiselle chuckled, shaking her head at the priest who refused to leave a good thing when he saw it. But she didn’t mind; she liked Manducor and she’d come to appreciate his wisdom. She considered him a friend.

  “Then if you feel as if you belong, sit down and tell me some stories,” she said. “You can keep me company whilst I sew on Lady de Winter’s gown.”

  Manducor was more than happy to plant his fat backside onto the nearest chair, making sure to stay within arm’s length of the wine pitcher.

  “It will be my pleasure, Lady MacRohan,” he said. “What kind of stories would you like to hear?”

  “Something with humor. Or even adventure.”

  “How about bloody adventures?”

  She made a face. “Don’t you dare!”

  Manducor snorted. “No blood?”

  “No blood!”

  He grunted. “You have no sense of fun,” he said. He took another long drink of wine. “Humor and adventure, eh? Then let me tell you about my early days when I fostered. I come from a fine family, you know. One of the best in England.”

  “Who?”

  He cast her a quirky expression. “I will not tell you. You will have to wonder about that the rest of your life.”

  She cocked an eyebrow. “Well, you brought it up.”

  “So I did.

  Eiselle had to laugh at the man who was being both petulant and evasive on a subject he had introduced. She turned back to her sewing again.

  “Tell me,” she said. “Where did you foster?”

  “Okehampton Castle,” he said. “Seat of the de Courtenay family. Have you heard of them?”

  Eiselle shook her head. “I have not,” she confessed. “Are you sure you won’t tell me your family name?”

  “Mayhap someday. My family controls much of the northern Welsh Marches.”

  “Are you Welsh, then?”

  “I am English to the bone, lass.”