Heart of the Dove

by Tina St. John

  She did not want this burden. She did not think she could bear it, and knew not how Rand himself was able to cope. His fury was his anchor, of course. She felt that, too, in the rippling cold of the Knowing's wake. Rand's need for retribution was likely all that held him steady when the anguish of what he had endured threatened to sweep him away.

  Serena shivered despite the warmth of the day. She willed herself toward more peaceful waters, her heart feeling wrung out and weary. The sun that had been blazing directly above when she arrived at the chapel had since drifted past the open-air ceiling of the nave, heading toward afternoon. She had lingered there too long. If she delayed any longer, her mother would worry.

  She dashed at her moist eyes with gloved fingertips and scooted off her altar perch. Fine motes of forest silt eddied about her feet as she stepped across the floor of the nave to the peaked stone portal that had long ago given up its wooden door.

  Outside the sanctuary ruin, the woods hummed with sudden activity. Leaves rustled as birds took flight, and above the soft sough of the wind, Serena heard the sure strides of long legs and the heavy crush of a man's feet approaching through the woods.

  She pushed her hair from her face and blew out a calming breath, just as Rand's tall shadow reached the chapel threshold. He held a dagger in his hand, close near his body, but poised to strike.

  Serena drew back with a gasp.

  "What are you doing out here?" he demanded of her, turning the blade away. "What is this place?"

  He scowled at her, his gaze narrowing on hers as she took a subtle step away from him. Her sorrow of a moment ago was replaced by sudden awareness of him. He stood too close, overmuch so, when a simple brush of contact would wake the Knowing and send her back into the bleakness of his heart.

  "This was our family's chapel, a long time ago," she answered, feeling too crowded in the small space with him now. "I came here because I wanted to be alone."

  "You've been crying." His voice held the flat tone of disapproval.

  Serena lifted her shoulder in a mild shrug. "I came here to be alone," she said again, all the excuse she would give him when he was towering over her like a thundercloud. "And I was just about to take my leave. My mother will be waiting for me at the cottage."

  He took a step inside, not bothering to wait for invitation.

  "You didn't tell me about this place when we walked the forest yesterday."

  Serena glanced around at the dusty, ancient nave. "I didn't think it important to you. There is naught of interest here. This chapel can serve you in no way."

  "But it can serve to hide a curious dove hunter--as I first thought it might when I approached." Rand's mouth turned down at the corners, a sober line within his dark beard. "I should think you'd be more careful, lady. It may not be wise to venture about alone."

  "I suppose I am not accustomed to cowering in the bracken."

  "No?" There was an irony in his tone that made her bristle a bit.

  "No," she insisted. "And I have no wish to start now."

  "Suit yourself," he said as he moved farther into the nave, his bare feet soundless on the earthen floor. Serena watched his fingers skate over the stone altar as he slowly walked the confines of the small chamber, then came around to face her once more. "You should know that I've found more snares today. I counted four of them, but I'm certain there are more."

  Serena breathed a dismayed sigh. "Where?"

  "Scattered hither and yon, farther out near the grove line." If it was possible, it seemed that a note of true concern edged his deep voice. "They will only come closer, Serena. It is merely a matter of time."

  Dread settled heavily on her shoulders, for although she was loath to think it, she knew Rand was right.

  "You think we should leave," Serena said, grasping his unspoken advice. "We should simply abandon our home in fear?"

  "Mayhap," he replied. "Before you have true cause to fear."

  A small burst of wry laughter slipped past her lips. "My mother would have us leave in fear of you, and you would have us leave in fear of what might never come to pass."

  She caught the note of surprise in his expression at her blurted admission, but he said nothing of it. "What of you, Serena?"

  "What about me?"

  "Your mother cannot live forever. When she is gone, and it is only you in that cottage, will you be content, living out your days alone in these woods? Have you never wondered what else is out there?"

  "I thought you said there was naught but bleakness and sorrow to be found in the world you know."

  "Not at all." He grunted, lifting one chestnut brow. "I may have painted an unfair picture."

  "As when you told me your family was alive and awaiting your return to them?"

  A stiffness crept into his mien, as if to warn that she was treading on hallowed, forbidden ground. "I never said they lived. They do await me...in the hereafter, so you now know, after laying all my secrets bare with your touch this morning."

  "You still have secrets. Many, I would guess."

  "Is that so?"

  Serena nodded, carefully watching his gaze. "You can talk to me, Rand. Tell me what happened the night your family was attacked. I would like to know," she gently urged him. "I think I need to know."

  He laughed, a harsh sound that cracked in the silence of the gloomy nave. "I admit, I am somewhat disappointed to hear this. I presumed your Knowing to be a stronger magic, Serena. Did I not bleed enough details to satisfy your questing mind?"

  "You held something back," she said, trying not to be pricked by his caustic tone. "And there is no weakness in the Knowing. Your thoughts--all your feelings--were centered on your family in the moment I touched you. 'Tis all you gave me, the anguish of what you endured. That, and...traces of what you witnessed that night. I know what I've seen, but I cannot make sense of it."

  "My apologies if I left you to wonder." His voice was dark and even, more foreboding than any shouted outburst. "Shall I confess every grisly moment of that hellish night? You may wish to sit, gentle lady, for the bloodletting and fire went on for long hours, and it may take me some time to relay it all to your satisfaction."

  "Or I could touch you now, and know the truth of it in an instant," Serena replied, a statement of fact more than provocation. "I wager your thoughts on that night are naught but clear now."

  His bearded chin went up, gaze narrowed to flinty seriousness. "There are some secrets, Serena, that can kill. This is one them. Do not make a game of it, for it is deadly real. If you do not trust me, think on what my wife and son suffered in those hours of their murder. That brand of evil is something you'll not want visited on you, or your mother."

  She thought his harsh words a threat at first, and worried that she had goaded this dangerous man past his slender leash of civility. But as she looked at him, pinned by the steely coolness of his hard hazel eyes, she realized it was no mere attempt at intimidation.

  It was a grim prediction.

  The worry she had felt chilled to something even colder under the weight of his penetrating stare.

  "What are you involved in, Rand? Who is this man you seek? Why did his raiders attack your keep? What were they looking for? Was it the cup you lost at sea?"

  "Enough questions," he said, brusquely dismissing her. "I won't bring you into this any more than I already have."

  Rand tucked the dagger beneath the rolled waistband of his tattered hose and gestured for her to follow him.

  "If you are recovered, lady, I would have you show me the rest of the area here. I would know every corner of it--down to the last inch. And you will tell me at once if anything appears unusual to you."

  "What for?"

  "I think it prudent that I know precisely what I will be guarding." At her questioning frown, he went on. "So long as I'm inhabiting this patch of woods, like you, I would prefer no surprises from Egremont's hunting lords, or from anyone else. I need to know every perimeter and potential hiding place in this forest. I doubt
I'll find a better guide. We can start at the grove line."

  As it seemed he would not be refused, Serena acquiesced.

  She led him through the copse of tall trees and grasping bramble, to the nearest place where the old stones began their march through the woods, marking the line she had never breached in all her years.

  For a long while, they walked in uneasy silence, following the trail of placed rocks that went on a fair distance into the heart of the woods. More than a century old at the least, the grove line more resembled a row of crooked teeth, some of the stones obvious, others overgrown with age, all but obscured by moss, or displaced by stripling trees that thrust up between their careful settings.

  "These old stones are the labor of my kin, the first ones to come here and make the woods their home," Serena said, feeling a bit awkward to be making conversation with a man who, not a few hours ago, had been intent on sacking her home in his rage, and had now declared himself a guardian of these woods.

  But the day had been nothing short of extraordinary, and deep within her, the Knowing stirred just to be near him, reminding her that whether she willed it or nay, part of this fearsome warrior now lived in her.

  "Come this way," she said once they reached the outer curve of the grove line. "I will show you where I found the first traps."

  Quiet fell upon them once more, the only sounds those of chirping, flitting birds, and the occasional scuttle of a fleeing rabbit or field mouse, eager to be out of the range of tramping human feet. It was music Serena dearly loved, the happy chatter of animals, the soft soughing of the wind rustling the canopy of leaves overhead, the distant, rumbling crash of waves echoing from the shore to the east.

  The concert of soothing forest sounds almost made it easy to ignore the pang of alarm that was ringing in her head, warning of the danger of encroaching hunters, and the other, less blatant danger that now strode beside her, commanding her time as he had all else that once was hers and her mother's alone.

  Their guardian, indeed.

  Serena did not want to credit that she and her mother needed his kind of protection, but she could not deny that the life they had enjoyed for so long was slowly eroding. Randwulf of Greycliff was only the latest harbinger of the change to come. The hunters' snares were another. The outside world was closing in. Soon there would be more strangers in these woods, more threats to the peace that had been hers all her life.

  She accepted Rand's presence with not a little resignation, but subjugation was one thing she could not abide. Serena slowed her pace beside him, then stopped.

  "What is it?" he asked. "Why do you pause?"

  "There is something that needs to be said between us, here and now. You should understand that there will be terms if you are to stay here."

  "Go on," he said, a measured timbre to his voice.

  Serena squared her shoulders, facing him on the path. "You need to know that I will not be made a prisoner in my own home."

  His shoulders lifted in a vague shrug. "I am not your keeper."

  As a reassurance, his statement gave only the smallest comfort. "I won't be made to serve you--me or my mother," she added, needing him to know where she stood. "We will give you the food and shelter you require, but we do so of our own will, not because you demand it. You cannot bully us or seek to cow us into doing your bidding."

  "Ah." He inclined his head in mild acknowledgment. "I regret my outburst in the cottage today. I was in the wrong, it seems, and I have no desire to abuse your hospitality, Serena."

  He looked at her as her name slid off his tongue, warm as a caress, and in an instant Serena saw herself reflected back in his gaze. She saw her own eyes, wide and wary, filled with something that looked alarmingly like...hope.

  She could not deny that a strange bond had linked her to this tormented man, formed by the power of her Knowing. She knew what he was about. She knew his pain. She knew he lived to stain his hands with the blood of another man. She knew all of this, yet here she was, standing not an arm's length from him in the middle of an empty forest, demanding his consideration.

  She was pressing him for compromise, asking him for acceptance, and it terrified her.

  "Anything more, Serena?"

  "Yes," she said, breaking his gaze when the intensity of it proved too much. "I would have your word that you will leave as soon as you are able. As soon as you have whatever it is you need to continue with your...quest, will you then go, and leave us in peace?"

  "I will not linger a moment longer than is needed." He put two fingers over the center of his chest, where she knew his heart beat with the burdensome pain of loss and unmet fury. "I give you my oath, lady. My business is elsewhere. I will not stay."

  "Good," she said, with a sense of comfortable finality. "Then we are settled."

  "We are," he said, his voice quiet, but firm with an equal resolve.

  Serena nodded once, unable to meet the eyes that watched her so unwaveringly.

  "Very well, then."

  Something quirked at the edge of his mouth, the corner of his lip edging up ever so slightly, into what she was tempted to call a smile. He vexed her, this dark stranger with the wounded heart and penetrating eyes. He unsettled her like nothing she had known before.

  But she had won a victory here today. She had presented new terms of his stay, and he had agreed. Looking up at him, his face halved in sunlight and shadow from the trees around them, Serena felt a moment of triumph.

  She would not fear him anymore. In truth, she did not fear him.

  Nay, far worse was the budding feeling that was growing in her since the moment her touch had laid bare his secret pain. What she felt now was compassion. A tender seed of empathy, of a need to understand and comfort, had begun to take root and unfurl within her heart.

  Something deeper than Knowing told her this was what she should fear the most: caring, even a little bit, for a man like Randwulf of Greycliff.

  "This way," she said, knotting her hands in her skirts, all of a sudden uncertain what to do with them. Striding briskly past him, Serena set off on the path once more and continued with the unnerving tour of her woodland domain.

  Chapter 9

  Rand's requested tour of the outlying forest had taken the better part of the afternoon. To his amazement, he found the time had passed quickly in Serena's presence, almost pleasantly. He had followed her through the endless maze of dense greenery, pausing to observe and listen as she pointed out their water and food sources, and the locations where she had discovered more hunters' snares in the past few weeks. She had shown him the grove line perimeter of the woods, a meandering collection of rocks and brick that separated her domain from that of the outside.

  The delineation between her world and the other was clear, despite the fact that time and forest vegetation had obscured some areas of the ankle-high wall of stone. Rand could not help notice that even in casual movement, Serena had dared not so much as place her foot beyond that ancient demarcation.

  But her gaze had not been so easily contained.

  She had looked out past the edge of her neatly secluded world, eyes wide open, lit with a longing she hardly bothered to hide. Rand had caught himself musing over what her reaction might be to a bustling town, or the hearty ruckus of a castle hall at feast time.

  He had pictured her laughing, amazed and excited by all she had been missing, and for one stunning moment, he had wanted to be the one to bring that world to her.

  Ridiculous, of course. Reckless and selfish as well, for he was a poor choice as an escort when the path before and behind him was riddled with enemies. Keeping company with him, whether it be within the solitude of the forest grove or anywhere else, could prove deadly. In helping him, sheltering him in their home, Serena and her mother could be yet more unwitting victims of the war that waged over the Dragon Chalice, and that was a price Rand would not allow them to pay.

  It was a thought that troubled him even now, after they had returned to the cottage and Serena h
ad left him to go inside and help her mother prepare the evening's sup.

  Rand occupied himself with a further search of the beach, agitated by impatience and the nagging ache of his injuries. He was healing, but not fast enough for his liking. Each moment he spent with her brought added temptation. Each aqua glance pulled him toward a gentle drowning, a sensual demise he was all too willing to embrace.

  Irritated by his own weakness, Rand picked up a staff of pale, knotted driftwood and began an angry stalking of the shoreline. He stabbed at washed-up debris, and dragged the long stick through the muck of the receding waves in but another futile attempt to recover his errant treasure.

  When he turned back and reached the place he had started, he found Serena standing at the edge of the beach, the shade of the forest bathing her in cool shadow. She stepped out into the late afternoon sunlight when he saw her, her gloved hands clasped loosely before her.

  "I didn't mean to disturb you."

  "You have not."

  "You've been out here for a long while. Have you found anything?"

  "No." Rand rubbed his palm over the dark beard at his jaw, then pivoted to glance out to sea. "I've recovered nothing more than the scrap of cloth I found in the bracken this morn."

  "I'm sorry," Serena said with sincerity. "I could help you look for the cup you lost...that is, if you'd like."

  Rand said nothing as he turned back to regard her, feeling himself grow very still in Serena's presence. Simply by being there, she drew his senses to alert, commanded every fragment of his attention. He attempted to dismiss her with a shrug.

  "There is no need to assist me, Serena. The problem is mine. I can manage it on my own."

  "Of course," she replied softly. "I just thought I would offer--"

  "Well, don't."

  He thought she would take his gruff reply for the dismissal it was and leave, but she did not. She remained where she was, tilting her head to regard him in frank curiosity.

  "Rand, I realize that we did not begin on the best of terms, but after today I thought...I hoped...that we might start over--on peaceful ground."