Carroll, Laurie - War Of Hearts.txt
Page 40
Jeremy acquired the dagger, but the legends say the pieces
are destined to be together. That’s how he came to be at
Landeyda.
Alicen shook her head in wonder, barely able to
comprehend the import of her mother’s words. She
struggled with her rampant emotions, paced and prayed,
pressed cold fingers to her temples and rubbed chilled
arms with icy hands. Naught alleviated her torment.
***
Jeremy stared down at the man sprawled at his feet.
Sword tip pressed against the throat exposed beneath
the knight’s helmet, he asked again, “Do you yield?”
“Aye,” came the faintly muffled voice behind the visor.
Jeremy stooped and retrieved his opponent’s sword
before stepping back to allow him to sit upright. “Then
show yourself.”
When the plumed helm was removed, the surprised
gasp from William’s camp carried far in the still air.
“Harold,” Jeremy stated quietly, quirking a brow.
“Aye, Blaine,” Harold of Stanhope sneered, black eyes
glittering hatred. “Who else to fight you? Those dolts I
hired are as worthless as tits on a boar.”
“A man fights best when he defends his own,” Jeremy
said on a shrug. “Hirelings have little to lose but their
lives. That oft makes living more dear than their lord’s ill-
gotten lands.”
“A warrior philosopher.” Harold’s contempt revealed
itself in his curled lip. “What an accomplished man you
are.”
“Not nearly as skilled in butchery as you, it seems.”
The vanquished knight spewed bloody spittle onto
the ground at his conqueror’s feet. “You’ve bested me,
Blaine, now finish what you undertook to do.”
Jeremy took another step back. “Nay. I’ve enough
blood on my hands without adding yours. You’ll find your
reckoning in London.” He nodded toward the usurper’s
horse. “But I’ll take your steed, and this fine sword.” Then
he smiled as he added, “And the lands you stole from
William that are now rightfully mine.”
“If you’d stayed in France another year, I’d have owned
all of Tynan.” Harold yanked his gauntlets from his hands
and threw them to the ground.
“Do you truly believe you’d have kept it?” Having
sheathed his own sword, Jeremy gestured with Harold’s.
“Rise, knave. The dukes of Tynan and York crave a word
with you.”
Harold rose unsteadily, stood swaying a moment, then
straightened. A haughty stare filled his eyes when he
spoke. “I’ll rot in hell before I let you haul me to London
in irons.”
Before anyone could move, the conquered knight
unsheathed his dagger and drew it across his own throat.
A gout of blood issued forth as he collapsed face first on
the ground.
“Sweet Jesus,” Jeremy cried, dropping Harold’s sword
and kneeling beside the stricken man. In pure reflex, he
shouted, “Fetch Alicen, quickly! Bid her bring her
instruments.”
A rider was already thundering off toward camp when
Jeremy saw that Harold of Stanhope was dead.
***
The sound of hoofbeats reached Alicen’s ears, the
rumble ending in a scrabbling flurry outside the tent.
She was nearly to the opening when she heard a
breathless voice cry, “Mistress Kent, come quickly! And
bring your medicaments.”
She rushed outside, only to find her legs had turned
to water. She stumbled toward a rider whose face had
become too blurred to recognize, and started to fall.
Vaguely, she felt herself being lifted onto a destrier, her
medicament satchel slung over her shoulder. She clung
blindly to the rider, able to think only that Jeremy was
dying. Or dead.
And that her life would end with his.
Her mind was blessedly numb by the time her escort
reined in beside the bloody form of a prostrate knight.
She slid from the destrier’s back, felt herself beginning to
swoon, and started to pitch headlong to the ground.
Strong arms caught her and pulled her up against a
chest encased in steel. Although she knew she could not
stand on her own, she was nonetheless still upright in
this man’s arms.
“My apologies, kind sir,” she muttered, not lifting her
head. “I seem to have lost my balance.”
Jeremy’s embrace tightened and his smile widened,
though Alicen could not see it with her face pressed to
his shoulder.
“I told you to stay in the tent,” he grumbled. He kissed
her temple, then with a slight gesture, indicated to a pair
of soldiers to remove Harold’s body. In the meantime, he
blocked Alicen’s view of the corpse.
Jeremy’s pleasure at holding her was lost on Alicen,
but the sound of his voice registered. That alone rent the
dam that had held her emotions in check. He was alive!
And he had frightened her half to death. She wept
uncontrollably, heart-wrenching sobs of agonized relief
that unnerved every man on the field.
Jeremy, at a loss to comfort her, responded in the
only way certain to gain her reaction. Leaning down, he
said in her ear, “Are you so despondent I yet live, Mistress,
that you cry thus?”
His words struck with such force that she gasped,
choked back her tears, and glared up at him. Then she
pushed back from him as far as his embrace would allow.
“I thought you were dying, you lout! Why else would I be
so hastily summoned?”
“And you wept that your talents were not needed?”
He cocked a brow, venturing a wry smile. The sparks in
her eyes encouraged him. Lips twitching, he fought a grin.
“I should have known such a willful, stubborn woman
would disobey my orders.”
“Better willful and stubborn than foolishly heroic,”
Alicen countered acidly, too weak with relief at her love’s
good health to actually break from his arms. Abrupt
concern darkened her eyes, and she looked anxiously at
him. “Are you injured?”
“Nay, not in the slightest.”
That did it. With a snort of disgust, she pushed free
and stepped back, scowling. “Why did your man not tell
me you were safe?” she shouted. “I nearly swooned with
fear!”
“Fear for my life?” Jeremy asked drolly. Widened eyes
added to his amazed expression. “Do you admit to caring
for me?”
Alicen clenched her jaw. “Certainly not. Do I appear
so foolish?”
Jeremy could not contain his smile. It threatened to
crack his face with its breadth. He removed his helmet,
tucked it beneath one arm, and pulled his coif off his
head. Then he swept her an elegant bow. In his richest
tone he declared, “Mistress Kent, I wish to wed you. As
well you know, I’m oft in need of a skilled physician, and
I am brainsick enough to bind myself to one as headstrong
as you.�
��
Alicen was momentarily silent, then she sniffed
haughtily. “I care not for the ravings of a lunatic, sir
knight. Mayhap a stronger blow from your enemy would
have cleared your thinking. Though ’tis doubtful.”
He chuckled, but quickly donned his sternest mien.
Before she could react, he’d encircled her with an arm
and drawn her close. “If I rave, lady, then all the world is
mad. For I do want you as my wife.”
“And what if I am not of like distemper to wish you as
my husband?”
“Then, I’ll marry you against your will.” The pained
look his comment brought made him laugh aloud. “You
see, you’ve little choice in the matter.”
“I can highly recommend Lord Jeremy Blaine,
Mistress,” William called from where he sat his palfry at
his champion’s back. “He brings to this union the largest
holding in my duchy—Sherford. And Whitecomb to the
north. Though that estate is in need of repair, rest assured
the young lord has ample funds to see it done properly.”
Jeremy shot William a startled glance. Whitecomb was
indeed the gem of Tynan’s properties. Abandoned for
several years, if run efficiently, it would provide the
protection Sherford currently lacked. The thought of such
a great estate being his made his heart leap.
William paused only a moment before adding, “He’ll
truly need a worthy wife to help manage such a holding.”
The woman Jeremy held more than deserved the
comforts of being lady to such a manor. If he could only
convince her of such.
“Best you consent to marry me, Alicen,” he growled,
squeezing her gently. “No other man among these
assembled would take you to wife.”
At this, Jason Warrick grunted. “’Tis well known you’d
kill any one of us who dared attempt to wed her.”
Alicen laughed along with the troops at Warrick’s
remark, yet refrained from comment on Jeremy’s
proposal. He offered her his hand, his look that of a boy
who sought a gift too wonderful to ever obtain. In that
blue gaze she saw the depths of his heart, and hers soared
to join it.
But pride demanded reprisal in kind to his barbed
offer. Assuming an expression of strained patience, she
sighed in mock despair as she laid her palm against his.
“I suppose I must needs take you, for, in truth, ’tis no
more than my duty to womankind.”
Jeremy’s black brows drew together. “How so,
Mistress?”
“’Tis my burden to save them from your cunning
ways,” she replied tartly. “Therefore, I’ll make sacrifice of
myself on the marriage altar, thus ridding the world of
one of its plagues.”
While the men cheered, Jeremy drew Alicen closer
for a deep kiss. Her arms wound around his neck, then
her hand crept to his hair to ruffle it with trembling fingers.
Unmindful of their audience, she kissed him soundly.
As the cheering escalated, he broke off the kiss, still
clasping Alicen close, and bent his head. “No elixir you
could devise would ever cure me of my love for you, lass,”
he whispered for her ears only.
Alicen felt her eyes fill with tears at his statement.
She gently ran her fingers down his cheek and across his
lips. “No battle you could fight would ever quell my love
for you, sir,” she murmured in reply.
Jeremy caught his breath when the meaning of her
declaration became clear, saw in her expression her deep
regard, and lifted her off her feet to twirl around and
around in a giddy dance of adoration.
“Stop,” she cried finally, laughter bubbling from her
throat. “Put me down, churl.”
When he set her again on her feet, to the raucous
huzzahs of every soldier, she clung to him to remain
upright. Taking advantage of her disorientation, he
brushed her lips with a kiss.
“Lord help us,” Taft exclaimed. “If we don’t separate
those two, they’ll never pause for breath long enough to
endure the nuptials.”
Laughing as loudly as anyone else, Jeremy firmly set
Alicen away from him and turned to the assemblage.
“Let it not be said that I bore my duty with ill grace,”
he proclaimed, voice dripping irony. “I’ll save this woman
from her ill-tempered ways and myself from a life of
untended wounds.”
“I’ll cause many of those wounds, if you don’t temper
your loutish manner,” Alicen pronounced, cuffing him
on the arm.
“What? Mend my ways and lose my favorite jousting
partner?” He rubbed the spot where she’d struck his
armor. “Nay, I look forward to your sharp tongue and
your tender care of my hurts.”
Abruptly solemn, she whispered, “May my sharp
tongue be all that cuts you for ever more.”
“I intend it to be,” Jeremy replied, kissing her yet
again.
When he broke the embrace, Alicen’s eyes held only
concern. “You’re certain you’ve not been injured.”
“Aye, but you could ascertain for yourself.” He winked.
“In my tent. After all, even a physician of your skills cannot
detect wounds hidden beneath armor.”
His heated look sent ripples through Alicen’s belly.
“Then best we see to your needs anon,” she murmured,
breathless.
***
Escomb’s walls were silhouetted by blazing sunset
as Alicen and Jeremy sat atop a rise overlooking William’s
camp. Cook fires held back the encroaching dusk, and
the laughter and songs of the victorious troops carried
on a breeze to the lovers’ lookout.
Jeremy leaned back against the oak on the crest and
beckoned Alicen into his arms. “It grows cold, lass. Let
me warm you.”
She needed no second invitation, but moved onto his
lap to wrap her arms about his waist as he enveloped her
with his cloak.
Reaching beneath his doublet, he pulled out the
amulet, removed it from his neck and put it around hers.
“I thank you for the lending of this, but it belongs to you,”
he said quietly as he kissed her forehead.
“It kept you safe in battle.”
He nodded. “And now I wish it to once again protect
you.” After a short pause, he asked, “When did you
discover its likeness to my dagger?”
“After you were injured at Escomb.” She related the
history of the two tokens.
“Remarkable.”
“Indeed. But there’s more.” When he quirked a brow
in question, she continued. “I had a premonition that a
man would change my life. The moment I saw you, I knew
you were that man.”
“Your mother brought us together, you know.” At
Alicen’s startled look, Jeremy stated, “After the first battle.
We were in Sherford to seek a physician, and I heard a
voice say the area’s finest healer lived at Landeyda. Later,
when I questioned my
men about who had directed us to
you, no one knew what I spoke of. They’d heard nothing.”
He smiled. “She’s remarkably persistent.”
“That she is,” Alicen said with a laugh. Looking into
his deep blue eyes, she saw his heart. “I love you, Jeremy,”
she whispered, just before laying her head on his
shoulder.
“How came you to such a conclusion?” he asked, voice
as quiet as hers.
Lifting her head, she leaned back to see his features.
“I listened to my heart. My mind refused to accept your
goodness, but my heart carried the day.” Pausing briefly,
she added, “Much as my body carries your child.”
Jeremy went rigid, his arms tightening around her.
“When?”
“The night before the attack on Escomb.” At his sharp
intake of breath, she captured his face in her hands. “I
know what you believe, Sir Jeremy Blaine, yet you are
mistaken. I came to you because I wished to. No other
reason.” She chuckled ruefully. “I even tried to prevent
conception, but ’tis evident I failed.” Her statement met
with no response, and at Jeremy’s continued silence,
apprehension seized her. “Don’t you desire this babe?”
she finally managed to ask.
Jeremy’s heart lurched at her vulnerable tone. “Don’t
you?” he countered softly.
“So much so it frightens me.”
Gently, he drew her closer and kissed her forehead.
“How long have you known?”
“I was certain a few days before you returned to
Durham from the field.”
“Yet you kept this secret.”
Now Alicen grew tense. “I feared the news would
distract you.” She swallowed hard before adding, “And I
wished you to love me for myself, not for a child I carried.”
“I love you more than aught else,” Jeremy vowed,
burying his face in her hair. “Our babe will have a place
in my heart, but the greater portion belongs to you alone.”
Alicen felt her throat tighten as she stated, “If my
love for you dies, I’ll die with it. I will never stop loving
you.”
“Kiss me, minx.”
A sudden breeze whirled around them.
‘Twas destiny. Kaitlyn O’Rourke’s voice filled both
their minds. You’ve each other now, and no need to fear
the ghosts of the past. And you’ve love enough to defeat
any foe.