Lord of Vengeance

by Lara Adrian

  * * *

  Baron d'Bussy and Nigel set out for Wynbrooke early that following morning. It had taken only a couple flagons of wine and a healthy dose of guilt to convince the old man to allow his bastard son this one honor. Nigel now rode at his father's side, watching a vein tick in the side of his ruddy neck and anticipating the moment it would cease...for good.

  He smiled, nearly giddy with the idea that he would be the one to do the deed.

  Beside him, slouching in his saddle, the baron let out a lengthy sigh. “My bones are growing weary of riding,” he murmured, his speech slowed from too much wine with his morning meal. “How much farther do you reckon we have yet to go, my son?”

  Nigel ignored the endearment, shutting out the stab of guilt he felt at hearing the acknowledgment voiced at last. The old man said it only because he was drunk and had forgotten himself for a moment. It was too late, anyway, Nigel reasoned. It meant nothing. Norworth needed a new lord, someone stronger than this feeble-minded, slovenly drunkard. Norworth needed him; it was his birthright. Time he set about claiming it.

  “Not much farther,” Nigel replied evenly, scanning the thicket of woods ahead of them and deciding it looked secluded enough for his task. “It won't be long now.”

  * * *

  Gunnar approached Wynbrooke soon after dawn, conflicting emotions buffeting him with every step his destrier took nearer the keep. During the ride south to his familial lands, he had nearly come to terms with the idea of letting d'Bussy live.

  He doubted he would ever forgive, and certainly never would he understand, but he no longer needed to stain his hands with the baron's blood to move on, to live his life in peace. Something inside him had gentled, had softened the old feelings of hatred and hurt, had made him take joy in living and gave him hope for tomorrow.

  That something was Raina.

  She was inside him. Inside him and around him, in everything he did and felt and thought. She was his life. Loving her as he so fully did, he could never bring her pain, could never make her suffer the loss of family that he had. And if he could have her in his life, he knew he would feel that loss no more.

  Letting the warmth of that notion embrace him, Gunnar urged his mount forward and up the hill to the castle to await the baron's arrival. He was halfway there when something whisked past his head and landed on the ground behind him with a solid thwack. Stunned, he pulled the reins and cast a quick glance over his shoulder. “What the devil--”

  He spurred his destrier, scarcely having time to register the meaning of the attack before a second arrow flew, this time closer to its mark. The bolt whizzed down from the tower and grazed his right arm with searing pain.

  “D'Bussy,” Gunnar cursed, charging up the rest of the incline, sword drawn, prepared to kill or be killed.

  A clatter from above him on the roof echoed in the bailey as he leapt from his horse. Damning himself for being fool enough to trust a proven deceiver like the baron, Gunnar dashed up the stairwell that spiraled through the heart of the keep, toward the portal opening of the tower roof. He smashed the wooden plank open with his forearm, nearly daring the assailant to fire on him as he hoisted himself up.

  All that greeted him was quiet: a momentary, eerie pall that belied an attack waiting to happen.

  Gunnar pivoted, weapon raised as he made a quick assessment of the rooftop, noting the abandoned, open wine flask and the quiver of arrows spilled in the corner near the wall. Bow and archer were nowhere in sight. A breeze kicked up, nearly masking the soft click that came from behind a large barrel, likely once filled with oil and left there from the day of siege.

  Gunnar took one step forward and his attacker sprang from his hiding place, armed with a loaded crossbow and a murderous gleam in his eyes. Gunnar experienced but an instant of surprise and then anger burned to the fore.

  “I should have killed you when I had the chance, Burc.”

  The mercenary chuckled, lowering his head and squinting over the bow. “Doubtless ye wish ye 'ad now. Drop yer blade.”

  Gunnar took a step forward, his eyes trained on Burc's. “So, my old enemy has taken to paying other men to do his misdeeds, has he? What did he promise you in return for my head? A nice plot of land? A handful of coins? I do hope you got your payment in advance, because you won't be collecting any time soon.”

  Burc shifted, readjusting his aim. Sweat beaded on his brow. “I said, lay down yer arms.”

  “Nay,” Gunnar replied coolly, “I don't think I will. Your striking me on the motte had little to do with skill or aim; more likely beginner's luck. 'Tis obvious from your handling of that weapon that you've never so much as held one before.”

  Burc scowled. “Another step and I'll skewer yer carcass where ye stand.”

  “You're drunk and you have one bolt. Take your best shot. For I promise you, you'll be dead before you make it to the rest of your supply.”

  Burc's gaze slid to the side as if to gauge his chances of reaching the cache of spilled arrows. The instant his attention flicked away, Gunnar surged forward, knocking the crossbow up with the flat of his blade. Burc discharged his weapon. The arrow soared up past their heads to arc, then disappear, over the battlement wall.

  With a growl, Gunnar hooked his foot around Burc's ankle and shoved him. Burc took two stumbling steps backward and dropped the crossbow. Armed with his sword, Gunnar charged, striking with a heavy downward swing. Burc rolled to his side, narrowly avoiding the cleaving blow. In the next instant, he rolled back. Gunnar's weapon snapped out of his grasp.

  Burc's hand reached out, clutching and groping, nearly seizing Gunnar's ankle. Gunnar kicked him away, stretching to reach the crossbow. His hand closed around the shaft just as Burc's hand closed around his leg. Burc gave a hard tug.

  Irate and cursing, Gunnar rose up, twisted around and punched Burc square in the face. He cried out; his grip relaxed immediately. Gunnar scrambled to pick up an arrow from the dozen scattered on the floor, threw it into the weapon, set the bowstring and leapt on top of Burc.

  He straddled him, pinning the knight's arms at his sides, the crossbow loaded and poised at his forehead. Burc didn't move, scarcely breathed, though his eyes blazed with animosity. “Bastard should have asked for a demonstration of your skills before he enlisted you to kill me,” Gunnar taunted.

  “Aye, well, 'e didn't much care 'ow I did it,” Burc sneered, “only that ye were good and dead by day's end.”

  Gunnar's innards coiled with rage. He had been betrayed. A fool. Ten times a fool, he had trusted a scoundrel and walked right into a trap. But the thing that burned worst of all, was that he had hoped for a peaceful meeting. Curse his pitiful hide, but he hoped for it even now.

  He wanted answers. Damnation, he would demand an explanation. He would drag Burc with him to testify to Raina of her father's continued deceit, and depending on her reaction, Gunnar would either take her with him, or say good-bye to her forever. One way or another, his conflict with d'Bussy was at an end.

  “Get up,” he said and began to ease off Burc, gripping the crossbow in his left hand as he made to rise. All at once he felt Burc's body tense beneath him, felt his legs draw up. In the next instant, Burc's feet were in Gunnar's gut, and with a heaving grunt, he shoved him off.

  Gunnar flew backward, crashing against the wall. The crossbow went skittering across the rough stone of the rooftop, beyond his grasp. Cold, steel arrow tips bit into his back and jabbed his arms where he landed and his vision spun from the impact.

  “Now ye die,” Burc seethed as he scrambled to his feet and drew his sword. Arms spread wide, he barreled forward, teeth bared, snarling savagely.

  Instinctively, Gunnar's hand went to his scabbard...and clutched naught but air. The realization sobered him instantly, his vision clearing as he reached behind him and grasped the slim shaft of an arrow.

  Burc lunged at him, sword raised over his head.

  With a sharp flick of his wrist, Gunnar let the bolt fly.

  Burc froze
. His jaw went slack. A look of sheer surprise washed over him and his arms fell limp at his sides. His wince turned to a befuddled frown. The sword dropped from his hand, clattering at his feet. With trembling fingers, he touched the slick bolt protruding from a growing, scarlet stain at his chest. “Jesu,” he gasped, a look of stunned disbelief on his face, “I am dead!”

  “Aye,” Gunnar observed blandly, rising up and scrutinizing the wound with a casual glance, “in a few hours. But first, you will make the trip back to Norworth with me.”

  Chapter 24

  Raina kept herself busy in the kitchens most of the day in an attempt to keep her mind off the meeting between Gunnar and her father. She had found it hard to concentrate on even the most mundane task, her fingers trembling with anticipation and her heart nearly leaping out of her chest at the slightest noise. When one of the castle hounds barked, she spilled an entire bowl of trimmed green beans and was still on the floor picking them up when the trumpeter's blast sounded, announcing the arrival of her father's riding party.

  She vaulted to her feet and threw her handful of beans into the bowl. “They've returned,” she cried, nearly breathless with excitement as she dashed over and embraced Eda, the cook, who had patiently endured her assistance all day. “Oh, Eda, they have returned!”

  “Thank the saints,” the woman replied with a smile. “Mayhap now I can get some work done.”

  Raina laughed, spinning on her heel, then lifted her skirts and dashed out of the kitchens and through the great hall. “They've returned at last,” she announced gleefully to the group of knights conversing around one of the trestle tables.

  The chains supporting the drawbridge ground noisily in the bailey, echoing down the winding corridor as the great wooden gate was lowered over the moat surrounding Norworth Castle. A hopeful image of Gunnar and her father riding side by side eagerly leapt into Raina's mind. The urgent clatter of horses' hooves sounded atop the drawbridge, quickening her pace--too quick, for she nearly lost her footing on the narrow stairs leading from the keep to the bailey.

  She was laughing as she ran across the grassy courtyard, giddy with joy at the prospect of being united with Gunnar once again. Castlefolk, drawn from their work at the announcement of their lord's arrival, watched Raina with open curiosity, but she didn't care what they thought. A crowd had gathered near the gate and she waded through them, trying to move toward the front.

  Nigel was the first to thunder through the arched gate of the barbican. He was shouting something, reining in his mount, but Raina was only vaguely aware of him or his voice. She listened instead for two more horses on the drawbridge.

  The crowd behind her began to disperse, as did a few to her sides, but it was the people in front of her that Raina wished would move. Standing on her toes, she bobbed to look between their heads and over them, straining to catch a glimpse of her father and Gunnar. Surely they would not be far behind. Moments passed. Where were they? Commotion grew to a din behind her.

  Then the drawbridge began to creak back up into a secured position.

  “Nay!”

  Raina's voice rose above the crowd. The men turning the drawbridge winch ceased and looked down at her from their posts, their faces solemn...damning.

  Suddenly, Nigel's shouts became horrifically clear: Ambush. Rutledge betrayed us. Our lord is dead.

  “Nay,” Raina whispered, shaking her head. It could not be true. “There must be some mistake.”

  But the drawbridge chains groaned again and the great wooden barrier closed with a heavy boom. The bailey came alive with activity as the castle was secured. Peasants scurried around her driving chickens and sheep into their pens and clearing the courtyard.

  Raina stood dazed and numb before the iron-banded panels that now separated her forever from Gunnar.

  He could not have betrayed her.

  Grief and anger collided within her and she railed at the drawbridge, throwing her fists against the solid wood as if the physical pain would somehow crush the deeper anguish. A tortured cry keened on the wind, ringing in her ears, before she realized it was her own pitiful voice. Feeling a hand come to rest on her shoulder, she turned to find Nigel, his cropped hair sweat-soaked, his jaw tense and smeared with blood.

  “Oh, Nigel. Pray, tell me this is not true,” she pleaded. “What happened? Where is my father?”

  “Dead,” Nigel said simply. “Killed by Rutledge's traitorous hand.”

  “Nay.” Raina mouthed the denial, taking in the visible signs of struggle on Nigel's person: The cut on his lip from the night before had been split open anew; a bruise shadowed his jaw. Stains from grass and dirt marred his russet-colored tunic; a swatch of fabric had been torn from the hem.

  “By the grace of God alone,” Nigel continued, “I was fortunate enough to get away.”

  “I do not believe it.” Nigel glanced up and met her gaze, his own chilling as winter itself. “I cannot believe it,” she asserted with quiet resolve. “Gunnar would never do something like this. I trust him--”

  A haunted look swept past Nigel's eyes, then he frowned. “Your naive trust in a rogue has proven the death of your father, Raina. For the sake of us all, perhaps now I should be the one to decide whom we should or should not trust.”

  Too stricken to respond, Raina numbly allowed Nigel to wrap his arm about her shoulders and escort her through the crowd of morose onlookers, toward the keep. All the while, she weathered the sting of his accusation, fighting desperately to hold back her tears. Dear heaven above, had her trust in Gunnar been misplaced? She clutched the leather cord at her neck, drawing strength from the fact that he'd given her his rings and assuring herself that he would not have so cruelly betrayed her.

  When they reached her chamber and Nigel closed the door behind them, Raina asked, “What really happened this morn?”

  His attention snapped to her, narrowed on her. “My lady?”

  “Gunnar would not have simply attacked without provocation. You must tell me precisely what transpired at the meeting.”

  “We never made it as far as the meeting. Gunnar,” he sneered, “laid in wait for us along the road. Gunnar ambushed us and murdered your father in cold blood. Now you tell me, what more do you need to know?”

  “Why?” she whispered, refusing to cower under Nigel's rising anger. “It doesn't make sense...”

  Instead of raging at her, Nigel chuckled. “'Twas just as I suspected. He used you. All he ever wanted was your father's lands and your father's power--”

  “That's not true. He never wanted any of those things.”

  “Aye, he did, and evidently, badly enough to kill for them. It seems the only thing he did not want was you.”

  Though she had succeeded in holding back her doubt thus far, Nigel's assertion struck her to the quick. A sob tore from her breast and a flood of tears spilled down her cheeks. She could not summon strength enough to deny what he'd said, could scarcely keep her legs from crumbling beneath her.

  Nigel looked at her with feigned pity then pulled her into his embrace, shushing her and stroking her hair. His voice was a pained whisper beside her ear. “It sickens me to recall the besmirching remarks the bastard made on your honor. 'Twas bad enough my suspicions proved correct, but for your father to have heard the details of your shame voiced by the blackguard himself...” He let out a woeful sigh. “Would that they had not been the last words he heard before he took his final breath.”

  Raina could take no more. “Enough,” she cried, “Please, enough.” She thrust him away from her, her ears ringing with the awful notion, her heart feeling as if it were being rent from her bosom.

  Her body racked with sorrow, she threw herself onto her bed and buried her face in a bolster. She heard Nigel step to the window and draw the shutters closed, blotting out the sounds of activity in the bailey and plunging the room into darkness.

  “Beleaguer yourself no more with thoughts of him. I rather doubt he will ever darken our threshold again.” With that, his footste
ps retreated and he left the chamber, closing the door behind him and sealing Raina inside with her grief.

  * * *

  Sweat-soaked, bloodied, and fatigued, Gunnar arrived at Norworth's massive gate as the sun began to dip below the horizon. Burc rode tethered behind him, draped over his mount and very near death. At their approach to the gate, a guard on the barbican called for them to halt and state their business.

  “My name is Rutledge. I've come to speak with the baron.”

  The guard stared down at him for a long moment before beckoning another to his side with a wave of his hand. The two conversed urgently before the second disappeared from the ledge and the gatekeeper addressed him once more. “State your business,” he repeated, leveling his crossbow at Gunnar.

  “I would speak to your lord as to why he hired this man to murder me.”

  Nigel appeared on the parapet, peering over the edge. “What the devil--” he gasped, his face blanching. Regaining his composure, he barked, “What do you want, Rutledge?”

  “I want an explanation as to why this assassin was sent in the baron's place to a meeting meant to be peaceful. I demand an audience with d'Bussy--”

  “An audience with the baron?” Nigel chuckled, shooting amused looks at the men gathered around him. “Come now, Rutledge, that would be difficult, considering the baron's current physical state.”

  Gunnar frowned, wondering if d'Bussy were ill or if some other ailment had detained him from the meeting. It did not matter. He would stand before the man and demand answers even if he was on his deathbed. “Admit me enter, damn you. Surely one man is little threat against the baron and all of his guards.”