by Anna Elliott
And then his accustomed slow, broad smile spread over his face. Hereric stay. Isolde and Trystan go.
Trystan was silent a moment, and then he said, gaze steady on Hereric’s, “You’re sure?”
Hereric’s look was utterly confident, utterly calm as he formed another quick series of signs. Isolde and Trystan find Hereric again. When safe to return.
There was another long moment’s silence while Trystan’s eyes met those of the other man. Then Trystan held out his hand, and Hereric extended his arm. They clasped wrists, briefly but firmly. Then Trystan rose.
“We’d better be gone.”
Chapter Fourteen
TRYSTAN LEANED BACK AGAINST A tree trunk and briefly closed his eyes. Son of a flaming she-devil, his ribs hurt. Ignore it. Open your eyes and try to guess where the cursed hell you are by now.
They’d left the crannog and the marshes behind hours ago. And Trystan would have said they’d been lucky—save that he mistrusted all luck like this. No one had followed, at any rate. From time to time Cabal came bounding up at them out of the darkness, then bounded off again. If the dog met with any search parties or guard patrols, he’d give them some sign of alarm.
Now they’d entered a dense patch of forest, black as pitch save for the faint, feeble light of the moon through the leaves that just enabled them to see the shapes of the trees. Good for shielding them from any pursuers. Worse for calculating positively the direction and distance they’d come.
“Trys?” He opened his eyes to find Isolde beside him, her face a pale oval in the dark. “Is something wrong?”
“No—nothing.” He wasn’t even sure why he hadn’t told her about the broken ribs, save that denial was automatic by now. That and he didn’t want her coming within ten paces of him when he was as tired as this, or he’d lose complete control of himself. As it was, he kept seeing her sitting across from him in the tiny round hut. Impossibly beautiful, with her skin glowing like pale starlight, her bare feet curled under her, and her loose hair falling to her waist in a shining curtain of raven black.
He kept reliving the moment when she’d thrown her arms around his neck—as she had in half a hundred impossible fantasies from the time since he’d first laid eyes on her again five months before. Not that it meant anything but that they’d been friends for years and that she was thankful to see him again. He knew that. Hell, if he’d been stuck in Fidach’s mud pit of an encampment for the better part of a week, he’d have welcomed with open arms anyone who came to get him out as well.
Still, maybe at that he should be thankful for the broken ribs. If not for their aching stab, he would have forgotten all the reasons he didn’t deserve to clean her boots, forgotten even Fidach’s watching eyes. Another moment and he would have lowered his head and covered her mouth with his and—
And probably she’d now be back at the crannog, having decided to take her chances with Fidach’s men rather than be alone with him this way.
Trystan swore at himself silently, closed his eyes again in anticipation of the pain, and was about to order himself to move when Isolde said a word that made his eyes snap open. She was at his shoulder, leaning to look up into his face, eyes wide in the moonlight.
“Don’t lie to me, Trys. Not now. How badly are you hurt?”
It sounded as though she spoke through clenched teeth, and her voice wavered slightly. Please God, let her not start to cry—not even angry tears. Not that he’d blame her, but he’d be completely lost if she did.
Trystan slowly let out his breath. “A couple of broken ribs, I think.”
She had moved into a brighter patch of moonlight so that he could see her face more clearly now. “A couple of broken ribs,” she repeated. For a moment, she looked at him, blank-faced, and then she said, “Trys, I know I asked for it, but that is one goddamned bad answer if ever I heard one.”
He should have known she wouldn’t respond with tears. When had she ever cried at what couldn’t be helped?
All the same, Trystan’s mouth twitched, and then he started to laugh. It felt like iron spikes being pounded into his side, but he leaned against the tree trunk and shook helplessly. Then when he’d finally managed to stop, he opened his eyes again. “You never swear.”
He could see an unwilling smile pulling at the corners of Isolde’s mouth. “Yes, well. I do when I’m in the middle of a forest with Fidach and his men on one side of us and Octa’s army on the other, and you have two broken ribs.” Then she sobered and said, “Broken ribs—you realize there’s almost nothing I can do for that? I could bind them up for you, maybe. But—”
Merciful God. Trystan shook his head. “Better not. It won’t do that much good. And it would only slow me down if we have to fight or run.” He tensed all his muscles, ordered himself again to ignore the pain, and finally managed to push off from the tree. “Let’s move on and see if we can find somewhere to wait out the rest of the night. I don’t want to take the chance on walking straight into some wandering war band in this dark.”
“All right. Which way?”
Trystan scanned the forest around them. “There.” He pointed. “You see that rise in the land just ahead? Head towards that.”
The rise in the land turned out to be a rock-strewn hill, the slope ground for dozens of straight-limbed pine trees. The light from the full moon above was stronger here, and they were climbing quickly, Isolde ahead, Trystan behind. He had turned his head to listen again for any sounds that might show someone was tracking them, when a rock or loose branch must have rolled under Isolde’s foot, because she lost her footing and fell backwards against him.
It caught him completely off guard, and sent them both crashing to the ground. The wave of pain that shot through him as he struck the forest floor felt like a giant hand snapping him in two. When the pounding blackness that had darkened his vision cleared, he was on his back, the scent of broken pine needles sharp in the back of his throat, and Isolde was bending over him.
“Holy goddess mother.” Her gray eyes were huge and liquid bright in her pale face, and her voice wavered slightly. “Oh, Trys, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
She was smoothing his hair back, brushing the dirt and dust away from his face, his chest. This time she did look close to tears. Trystan caught hold of her hand, and when he could draw breath enough to speak forced his voice to sound as close to steady as he could make it. “It’s all right. I’m fine. No harm done—and don’t say I’m lying again.”
Isolde laughed shakily, scrubbed a hand across her cheeks, and shook her head. “I don’t have to say it. I’d have to be blind, deaf, and feeble-witted to believe you. How bad is it? Do you think you can stand?”
“I think so.” Trystan drew another breath. “Just—give me a hand.”
It took three tries for him to drag himself upright with Isolde’s help. By the second try he was sweating and shivering by turns and swearing under his breath.
“I’m so sorry,” Isolde said again. She was crouched beside him on the ground, supporting as much of his weight as she could with a shoulder under his arm. “Yell if you want to.”
“Yes, well.” It took him several harshly drawn breaths to get the words out. “I would, but from all I hear, it doesn’t do much good. Besides, I’d rather not get captured just now. Save at least one disaster for tomorrow.”
She laughed unsteadily again, then when at last he was on his feet and standing, she looked up at him. “Trys, where do we go from here?”
WHEN SHE’D LET HERSELF BE led to the great carved oaken bed, they left her, though she knew they would wait outside the door.
She dug her nails hard into the palms of her hands. It’s only my body, she thought. I won’t let him touch the rest of me.
She thought for a moment she was going to vomit, but she fought the sickness down, whispering the words through clenched teeth.
“You can face this. You have to.”
In the darkness beyond the bed, she heard a door open—
; STRONG ARMS CLOSED AROUND HER, PULLING her up out of the dream. Still gasping and shaking and feeling as though she’d been dragged free of the quagmire around Fidach’s crannog, Isolde opened her eyes. Trystan had dropped to one knee on the ground before her and had one arm still around her shoulders, steadying her.
“All right. I’ve got you. You’re all right.”
For a moment, she couldn’t remember where she was or what had happened. Then memory came flooding back: Piye and Daka’s warning—the escape from Fidach—Trystan’s broken ribs—
Belatedly, she pulled away from him, pushing a loosened curl of hair back from her sweat-damp brow. “I’m sorry—did I hurt you again?” Her voice sounded shaky, and she swallowed. “It was just …just a nightmare. I’m all right, now.”
She drew further away, smoothed her hair again, and tried to steady her ragged breathing. They had found a clearing among the pine trees to shelter for the night. A small, hollowed-out patch of ground at the base of an outcropping of rock, where the dried pine needles made a soft, sweet-smelling carpet. Trystan’s mouth had been tight with pain by the time he’d lowered himself to the ground, and Isolde had told him she would keep watch if he wanted to sleep. He’d shaken his head, though, giving her a brief flash of a smile.
“You’d have to drug me unconscious for me to sleep through the way my ribs are feeling just now. I’ll stay awake. You rest, though, if you can.”
So Isolde had lain down on the bed of pine needles, pillowing her head on her arm and drawing her cloak tight about her against the night’s chill. Cabal still hadn’t returned from his latest venture into the night-dark forest, and she’d tried not to be worried for him. He was a war dog, trained at hunting and tracking both. He’d pick up their scent and make his way back to them. She’d not expected to sleep. But she had. Obviously.
Now she could feel Trystan watching her and she willed him silently not to ask her anything more. Don’t ask. Don’t ask. Don’t—
It must not have worked this time, though, because after a moment’s silence, he said, “It’s Marche you dream about, isn’t it?”
Isolde understood in that moment how a rabbit caught in a the yellow-eyed stare of a wolf’s eyes might feel. Beyond fear. Too hopeless to even try to run. She lifted her head. “How did you know?”
The moonlight was bright enough that she saw the small, mirthless smile tighten Trystan’s mouth though his face was as grim and hard as she’d ever seen. “You’re forgetting who my mother was. When you woke, you had the same look in your eyes that she used to, years ago.”
Isolde’s chest tightened as though a giant fist had clenched bruisingly about her heart, and a sudden stinging rush of tears burned in her eyes. Don’t cry, she ordered herself. Don’tcrydon’tcrydon’tcry—
The silent order didn’t work any better than it had with Trystan. Scalding tears spilled down over her cheeks, as though a dam had broken inside her, and she dropped her head, hiding her face against her upraised knees, trying without success to choke back the sobs that tore her throat. After a moment, she felt Trystan get up, come to sit down beside her, and put his arms around her. He held her very lightly—so lightly that even with the lingering remnants of the dream clinging to her, she didn’t panic. He didn’t speak, either, just held her while she cried and shuddered against him.
Finally, her sobs died away to wet, hiccupping gulps, and Trystan said, “Why wouldn’t you tell me before?”
Isolde tried to sit up, drew a shuddering breath, and dragged both hands across her wet cheeks. Her head was stuffy with crying, and she felt utterly exhausted, drained and emptied and strangely numb. The threatening kind of numbness. When you know pain is coming, though it hasn’t started to hurt yet. She locked her arms about herself.
“Tell you?” she repeated. “Trys, how could I? He’s your own. …” She stopped. Swallowed hard against the rock-hard lump lodged in her throat, willing herself not to start crying all over again. “He’s your own father. The man who beat your mother—and you—over and over again when we were young. And I—I married him.”
She stopped, gulped air again, pressed her hands tight against her eyes. “I—” She clenched her hands tightly together in her lap, looking down at her own interlocked fingers because even by moonlight she couldn’t stand the thought of seeing Trystan’s face. Not with Marche—Trystan’s father—a living, breathing presence between them. Just as he’d been at the Roman villa, as though he’d crawled out of her dream.
Isolde heard the words spill out of her in a dull, exhausted rush like blood from a wound.
“The council had just chosen him High King. And men like Marche think, take a woman by force and you’ve mastered her—won. So I thought, give him that. Let him think he’s beaten me, and—” Isolde stopped, squeezing her eyes tight shut against the tears that kept spilling down her cheeks. “But I’ve asked myself, over and over and over again, if I couldn’t have thought of some other way—some other way of getting free from him. I—”
“Wait a moment.” Trystan’s voice was quiet, but something in his tone still made her break off, and against her will, look up, meeting his gaze. “Did you think—” He stopped. Shook his head. “You thought—you thought I’d blame you?”
Isolde couldn’t make herself answer, but the truth must have been plain on her face, because he stared at her as though he’d never seen her before. “You honestly believed I’d blame you? Holy God, Isa, is that what you think of me?”
He sounded almost angry, but then he seemed to check himself. He rubbed a hand over his face, drew a deliberate breath, and seemed to force himself to speak calmly, his eyes on hers. “First of all, Marche of Cornwall is not my father. I stopped thinking of him that way a long time ago, before I was nine. I realized he was no father of mine. Not really. Whatever blood we share, he’s no more to me than any other man. Except—” Trystan laughed shortly. “Except that he taught me most of what I know about dealing with pain.”
Isolde flinched involuntarily, and Trystan said quickly, “I’m sorry. What I meant to say was yes, I hate that he hurt you. And if I thought it would do any good, I’d track him down and kill him for it. But blame you?” He shook his head, passing a hand across his face again. “Christ’s blood, Isa, I’ve been facing battles since I was—what? Fourteen? You think I’ve never done anything terrible—anything I hated—because it was that or die?”
He let his hand fall back to his side, and leaned back on his elbows, looking past her into the night. When he went on, his voice was quieter. “You train for it—day in, day out, snow or sleet or pouring rain. How to fight with a sword. Handle a shield. Throw a knife. Ride a horse into battle. You practice every day until you can barely stand up you’re so tired at the end of it all. But you keep going. You get better. Better able to aim a spear, wield a sword. And then you actually fight a battle one day. And you realize that all of it—your whole life—has been directed at just one thing: teaching you how to kill. And that that’s all you know. How to fight to the death and win. Some days—” He shook his head. “Some days I can still see the faces of all the men I’ve ever killed. Every last one. And then—” He stopped. In the moonlight, his eyes were very blue. He spread his right hand, so that the mutilated fingers, the crooked scars were plain. “I was a slave in a tin mine, Isa. And you learn—and learn fast—that there’s no law, no honor, no code that applies to you. There’s only what you can live through and what you can’t. Whether you’re going to die or see one more day.”
He stopped, folded his fingers, and let his hand fall back to his side. Isolde wiped her eyes with the heels of her hands and drew another shuddering breath. “How long were you there for?”
Trystan didn’t answer at once, and she added, “I’m sorry. You don’t have to speak of it if it troubles you.”
Even in the darkness, she saw Trystan’s mouth lift in a wry half smile. “Speaking of it doesn’t trouble me half as much as it did to actually be there. It’s just that I honestly don�
�t know how long my time there lasted.” A shadow crossed his face, and he looked past her again, out into the shadowed forest beyond. “First, I counted the days, the weeks. But after a while—” He broke off, one shoulder lifting. “After a time it was all the same. Nothing changing, day after day. By the time I finally got free, I couldn’t even have told you how old I was.”
For a moment, all was silent save for the sigh of the wind in the pine branches above and the soft night sounds of the forest all around. Then Isolde rubbed her eyes again and said, “Twenty-two. I’m twenty, so you’d be twenty-two.”
Trystan’s smile flashed out again, the tension leaving his face. “Thanks.”
There was another moment’s quiet, and then Isolde drew in her breath. “Trys—”
She stopped a moment, trying to make herself speak. “There’s something I have to tell you. Something you should know.” She stopped again, though, trying to think how to say what she had to.
Trystan’s brows lifted. “Go on.”
Whatever words she tried out silently in her mind seemed to lodge in her throat. Isolde shook her head. “I’m sorry. It’s just I don’t quite know how to tell you this.”
Trystan let out a breath, half amused, she thought, half exasperated. “Isa, after the way we’ve spent the last few weeks, I don’t think there’s a hell of a lot you could say that would come as a shock. Just tell me—what is it? What’s wrong?”
So she told him—told him everything. About Kian’s capture and Marche’s supposed plan for alliance with Cerdic of Wessex, and the price Marche had set on Trystan’s capture. Through it all, Trystan listened in silence, his face unreadable. When she’d finally stopped speaking, he was silent a long moment, and then he said, “All right. I take it back.” His voice was utterly, deadly calm, and Isolde couldn’t tell whether he was angry or not. “So you didn’t tell me before this because you were afraid I’d feel responsible for what happened to Hereric and—” Isolde could feel him working to keep his tone so tight with control. “Kian?”