“Christ, no.” he chuckled. “I’m a history professor and a weapons instructor. I’m a menace around anything with wires.”
“Do you think I can make it?” Isabella shifted so she was leaning closer to him. She had no idea what to do at the moment, and he was her only source of information.
“Honestly, no.” He coughed as he stood to his full height once more. “It’s a long way on foot over very rough terrain. Any people you encounter will be loyal to Shaftesbury and will gladly tell which way you went to anyone who comes asking. And given what that piss head of yours did to Annis, believe they will come asking.”
Isabella blinked, then stood up to face him. “No one did anything to Annis. What are you talking about?”
“When he came in to steal the crucifix, he ripped off her clothes and whipped her. The woman had just given birth and was already short on blood. Then he comes in and does that to her? I tell you girl, I hate that munter just like everyone else but I damn sure don’t like her being beaten nearly to death.” There was a vein protruding from his neck as he spat his accusations at her.
“Selwy— Daniel… I didn’t know Emilio before he got here, so I can’t make any judgments on his morality. But I can tell you he absolutely did not look like someone who just engaged in a lengthy beating. There was no blood on his clothes or his hands. How much time did he really have to whip her?”
“Then who else?”
On that question, Isabella had no answer. He was right, everyone hated Annis. But no one, not even Redwald, would have the balls to go out and flog the Lady of Shaftesbury. And no one was sadistic enough to do it right after she had just given birth. Emilio really was the only possibility. But why would he do that? Is that why you let him die, Lord?
“I didn’t know. I’m sorry,” she mumbled out. Her prospects were even worse than she imagined. “So I can expect to be executed when they find me, I suppose.”
“Look,” Selwyn stepped out of the fairy circle and started a slow trek away from her, “If you go back to Shaftesbury of your own accord and beg forgiveness, I’m eighty percent sure Cædda won’t kill you. They know for a fact you weren’t the one to hurt Annis and they know for a fact that you didn’t know the bishop before he summoned you. Plus, I planted a rumor that he was holding you against your will. I can’t say for sure if it’ll catch on, but at least you won’t be universally painted as a traitor.
“Likewise I’m seventy percent sure you won’t make it to East Anglia. The search party will get you; or if they don’t, the Danes will, and that’s a whole other set of problems. So, I suggest you stash that retrieval assembly somewhere safe before you come back to town. If nothing else, my GA, Shannan, will be coming here at some point. She actually is an engineer and will know how to assemble that beacon. If you have even the slightest intention of living long enough to meet her, you’ll follow my advice and come home.”
“Selwyn, wait! When is Shannan coming here?” she yelled at his retreating form.
“Not soon enough to do you any good, I’m afraid.” He did not turn around to face her, and Isabella could only watch as Selwyn quickened his pace and strode purposefully off into the woods, giving a half-hearted flick of his wrist as he nimbly avoided the trees. The last glimmer of his outline disappeared into the mist, leaving Isabella to stand alone in her fairy circle.
“Eighty percent sure they won’t kill me,” she whispered pensively to herself. Almost unbidden, her eyes closed and she stilled her body; drawing in a deep breath, she thought about what to do. Warmth crept onto her face and neck, and a telling red glow behind her eyelids announced the sun had managed to emerge from the clouds.
Ah—she noted the heat was on her left side—I’m facing north. So now she knew which way was up, so to speak, but was still conflicted as she slowly opened her eyes. North to Thetford or South to Shaftesbury?
She cast her eyes downward in contemplation, looking at the beautiful ring of mushrooms, the ring of protection God had surely sent her. This miracle was no doubt meant for her, but which direction was it telling her to go?
A splash of color snagged her eye. The weak beam of sunlight cutting through the mist had settled on two of the mushrooms near her right foot. Their tops were stained with thick layers of red scales that stood in stark contrast to the taut ring of white caps surrounding her.
She had never seen mushrooms like that before. Stepping back a little, she got a better look at the ring and its odd red spot. It looks like a model of a hydrogen atom. The simple observation gave way immediately to a dizzying intake of breath as a memory forced its way to the forefront of her mind.
“Where were you?” Alfredo’s ragged voice wheezed out of his shaking form. “You should have been here hours ago. Why weren’t you home with her?”
The red and blue lights strobed over her father’s ashen face and his stooped, blood-splattered shoulders as he kneeled over the soaking wet body of her mother.
There were so many people—the policemen, Padre Lopez-Castaneda, Stefania, and Elizabeth crying together in a far-off corner—and they were all looking at her. She could not say anything. She could only look at Mama lying on the black mosaic tile next to the pool—the pool filled with dark red water. She could only watch as the circle of water surrounding her body flashed like lightning against the police lights—how the blood dripping from her father’s hands pooled into one spot of the ring of water.
“Isa?”
“Yes, Padre?” she hollowly responded.
“Your mother slipped and fell,” he said solemnly. “She has had a terrible accident. Do you understand?”
Without averting her eyes from the long gashes on her mother’s wrists and thighs, Isabella felt herself nodding.
“You should have come home.” The last of Alfredo’s willpower dissolved and the violent sobs shook his body. “Why in God’s name didn’t you come home?”
The buried memory, shaken loose by her fear, twisted her stomach into knots and choked her with long-suppressed sobs. Her father’s question had gnawed on Isabella like a scavenging jackal, and she had no answer for him. She had never, not once, stayed after school. But she had that day, and not for any good reason she could articulate. She just hadn’t wanted to be around Mama, who had been so miserable, so angry all the time. So she had stayed at school, helping Bianca Sequeira build her hydrogen atom out of plaster, grateful for the feeling of freedom, the joy of rebelling. She had felt righteous as she ignored her ringing phone.
She could never tell that to her father; she could never admit it to herself—never say aloud the ugly truth. If she had come home when she should have, her mother would not have died. She had never fully appreciated the trouble her little rebellions caused. But now she understood what the dream had been telling her, what the fairy circle was directing her to do. “Run home, Isa! Run home and stay there!” It was time for her to heed her mother’s words, to accept her punishment, and to trust—really trust—that God would take care of her. It was time to go home.
As if chased away by her memory, the weak winter sun reclaimed its place behind the blanket of clouds. The lovely warmth on her cheek evaporated, but it didn’t matter—she had her bearings now and knew which way to go.
Her nerves bit into her as she turned an about-face and walked out of her fairy circle, into the trees, and south towards Shaftesbury.
Déjà vu slapped her cruelly as she shoved through the thick tree branches. It had seemed the woods went on forever in the dark, but with only a few minutes of walking, she could already see the forest’s edge. How lucky Selwyn had been the one to find her; she was so shallowly placed in the trees, any fool could have stumbled upon her.
As she stepped over the last bit of forest, she emerged onto the infinite green pasture. Isolation and exposure overtook her, and shivers seized her body. She was alone. The beautiful land sloped gently; though the hills were not steep, they restricted her ability to see people coming. The lost protection of the forest brought new
fears into the pit of her stomach, worsening the quaking in her body.
If she just walked up to the gates of Shaftesbury, would the guards even let her in? For all her good intentions, she could very well end up with an arrow in her heart before she could even ask for forgiveness. It would have been better if Emilio had not found her at all.
A horse screamed in the distance, interrupting Isabella’s frustrated train of thought and freezing her legs midstride.
Still as stone, she listened. There was no wind today to howl in her ears, so she heard only silence. She was about to continue on her way when there was another scream, this one human. It sounded like a woman, but could easily have been a child, and it was calling out for help.
The lingering panic at her situation drained away, and she hiked up her skirt on her way up the hill. She had wanted to arrive before dark. But Isabella knew better than anyone the fear of being alone and helpless, and she could not leave the woman beyond the hill to fend for herself. There was a dull ache in her ankle, letting her know she had sprained it last night, probably when jumping out of the tree. But it was mild, and nothing to get excited over. She would just have to be careful with it.
The crest of the hill came under her feet, and at last she was able to see the source of the pitiful cries, which were weaker now and choked with sobs. A grey horse lay on its side, struggling to get up. But the boy it was laying on top of held the reins tight, keeping the animal on the ground.
“Please someone help me,” he cried softly, clearly not believing that anyone could actually hear him. As Isabella came down the hill toward him, she could see far and wide, and there truly was no one else to help the poor boy.
Not wanting to startle him, Isabella came up behind him quietly. He was facing away from her, but she could see he looked like most other young boys. He was on the taller side, belying his unchanged voice, but still had the wiry frame of barely-begun puberty.
She was close enough now to see the predicament he was in. The horse had obviously stumbled and, instead of jumping clear of the falling animal, the boy had hung on for dear life, wrapping his legs into the overly long reins, and fallen to the ground. The boy’s left leg, hidden underneath the struggling animal, had to be broken; there was no way around that. And if he let that horse up, he would likely be trampled or dragged.
“Boy?” she said softly.
At the sound of her voice, his head twisted slowly and painfully around. Sweat had matted the unruly brown hair to his forehead, and tears still flowed freely from his beautiful honey-colored eyes…. Cædda’s eyes. The boy was Wyrtgeorn.
Her recognition of Cædda’s son came a split second after he saw her face, rage smearing over his brief relieved expression.
“You! You whore! I’ll kill you.” His voice was so choked with tears and anger, Isabella was overcome with pity, despite the ejaculation of name-calling. Pinned as he was, he could only really move his eyes, which flicked wildly to the sword lying awkwardly underneath his own body. His face displayed in full color his desperate desire to reach for the sword, but it just as clearly showed he understood that he could not do so while maintaining his grip on the horse’s reins. One slip, and the muscular colt would be able to free himself, leaving Wyrtgeorn to perish under his hooves.
“Young master,” she tried to keep her voice from quavering as she maintained her distance from him, “I wish to help you. I did not harm your mother, and I will not harm you.” She paused for his expected retort, but it did not come.
She cursed her simple Saxon vocabulary. How cold she must sound to him.
Wyrtgeorn simply continued staring fiercely at her, a noticeable tremor rippling through his whole body. He could be going into shock.
Isabella knew what she had to do next, but was oddly hesitant to put her hands on the boy. She had never even spoken to him. Were it not for his resemblance to Cædda, she might never have noticed him at all. She had always been far too focused on the women of the house to pay any mind to Cædda’s sons. But he most assuredly knew her and (rightly) hated her. For Isabella to reach out and touch him seemed an unforgiveable violation. But there was no choice.
Shoving her discomfort away, she took the final two steps to his side and squatted down, leaning over him so she could reach the mangled reins that snaked around his leg. The dagger she had taken from Garrick was still in her waistband; ignoring a hiss from Wyrtgeorn as she pulled it out, Isabella gently severed the stirrup straps that wrapped around his leg.
Now the only thing holding the horse to the ground was the boy’s very tenuous grip on the reins. Gliding quickly and smoothly behind him, Isabella hooked her arms underneath his armpits, ignoring her flush of embarrassment at having him pressed against her.
“When I say go,” she whispered, “I want you to let go of the reins. This is going to hurt very badly, but it must be done. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” was his shaky reply.
She waited two beats, then quietly said the magic word.
Wyrtgeorn flung the reins out of his hand, freeing the horse from its mouth-chafing binding. Holding tightly onto Wyrtgeorn’s chest, Isabella watched the animal raise its head and roll over to get its legs underneath him and, just when she could see all of Wyrtgeorn’s left leg, she heaved with all her might, sliding the injured boy away from the horse and its newly regained footing.
Delighted to be standing again, the animal took several steps and did a half turn, trodding over the ground where Wyrtgeorn’s torso had only recently been laying. Luckily for Isabella, the wiry youth was not heavy, and he had slid easily to safety on the damp grass. But as easy as it had been for Isabella, the move had not been so kind to Wyrtgeorn.
Lying still at her feet, Isabella saw how white his face was, how his eyes had become unfocused and even his look of venomous hatred had faded. He had not cried out, but his breathing was shallow, and the shaking had worsened. One look at that god-awful leg told her why.
He had a compound tib-fib fracture, with the white of the bone protruding boldly against the sticky blood on his trousers. She couldn’t see if blood was still flowing, nor could she tell if there were multiple fractures. The poor kid.
“I am going to die.” The whisper gasped out of his mouth through his clenched jaw. Looking past the horrible agony he was in, Isabella saw for the first time that he was afraid. Of dying. Of her. Wyrtgeorn had been out to hunt Isabella, and now he found himself completely at her mercy.
Perhaps it was her lack of previous contact with Wyrtgeorn that made her feel so sorry for him. Maybe it was his resemblance to Cædda. Whatever it was, Isabella saw nothing of Annis in him; all she saw was a little boy who needed help, and she was painfully aware that even though she could offer some assistance, his fear of dying could very well come true if an infection set in. The invention of antibiotics was a long way off.
“You are not going to die, Young Master,” she said in her most comforting voice. She kneeled down in front of him, trying to look at him with the same tenderness she saw so many times on her own mother’s face. “I am going to dress your wound as well as I can, and then I will take you to Shaftesbury where you can heal.” She paused to make sure he was listening to her. “I am going to take your sword now. I need it to brace your leg. I promise I will not harm you.”
“My father is going to kill you.”
He may have meant the words to come out angrily, but given the level of pain he was suffering, it only came out as a flat statement of fact, and Isabella had to swallow a sudden impulse to swear at him.
“That may be,” she said evenly. “But your father is my lord and master. I will not leave his son to die, no matter what happens to me.” She gingerly reached out and undid the buckle around Wyrtgeorn’s waist, freeing the sword and scabbard.
She didn’t have everything she needed to make a tourniquet, not even close. But at least she could use the sword to keep his leg straight and steady, and the pressure from the belt would hopefully staunch the bleedi
ng. Cursing her own laziness, she thought back on the many times she had stood back while her co-agent took care of first aid needs on her prior missions. Perfect opportunities to practice gone to waste! Now she had to rely on luck and her insufficient medical knowledge to help the boy. If Cædda’s son succumbed to his injuries, then that would be the final nail in her coffin—and it would not be long afterward that Isabella would be joining Wyrtgeorn in oblivion.
15
The ankle injury that seemed so insignificant a few hours ago throbbed with a wrathful intensity. Between scooting around Wyrtgeorn while dressing his leg fracture, lifting him onto the horse (none too gracefully), and the subsequent three-hour walk, Isabella was starting to grow desperate for the sight of Shaftesbury’s walls.
It did not help her situation that Wyrtgeorn had nodded off twice, each time prompting Isabella to dart to the horse’s side to catch the falling boy. The most recent time, she had rolled her ankle, sending a stab of agony up her leg. So to keep him awake, thus preventing further injury to the afflicted ankle, she had decided to keep him talking, whether he wanted conversation or not.
“Why were you out by yourself?” She had resumed her post next to the horse’s head. Initially she kept her hands on the reins with the intention of leading the colt back to Shaftesbury. But after only a short while, it was very clear that the animal knew exactly where it was going and needed absolutely no guidance from her. He was apparently as anxious to get back as she was, and had not attempted to stop and graze even once.
“Young master?” The boy had a habit of taking several minutes to respond, and Isabella couldn’t be sure if it was due to his reluctance to speak with her or if he was having trouble staying conscious.
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