by Lori Dillon
But he knew all too well where they would go. They would return to the Dark Witch and tell of what happened. They would tell her they had not succeeded in killing the maid, for without seeing Lady Jill's death with their own eyes, they couldn't be certain. And to fail the Dark Witch meant a fate worse than death. He knew, for he'd faced her displeasure himself.
Nay, they would be back. And the next time they would make certain the deed was done.
He had to find Lady Jill, for as long as the Dark Witch knew she lived, she would not be safe.
He sheathed his bloody sword and charged through the forest.
Kendale and Lady Jill were on horseback. They would make good time. If he flew, Baelin would be faster, but it would do him no good. The forest offered concealment from the air, so he was forced to follow them on foot, looking for the horse's tracks in the soft ground of the forest floor and broken twigs on the brush as they passed by. It wasn't fast, but it turned out to be deceptively easy. Kendale had left a trail even a child could follow, as if the knight knew Baelin would come after them and he welcomed it.
But even without the obvious signs of their flight through the forest, he would be able to find them. He could still detect the sweet, familiar scent of Lady Jill, faint on the damp forest air where they'd passed. She was so familiar to him now, he would know her scent anywhere, and on that alone he could follow her to the ends of the earth.
As he sped through the forest, questions began to plague him. The Dark Witch had sent her warriors this time. He'd killed several, but more would come. But in what form? More warrior knights? Another dragon? Or something else entirely? And on the edge of those thoughts, other doubts chased Baelin as he slipped through the trees.
Was Kendale truly who he seemed to be? Was he a dragonslayer in truth, or was he one of the Dark Witch's minions, too? Had she first sent a man with a handsome face to turn Lady Jill's head and steal her away? The possibility terrified him.
But nay. He'd been a sennight in Kendale's company. Irritating though the man could be, Baelin would have sensed if the knight was something other than what he appeared to be. Wouldn't he? He prayed for Lady Jill's sake he'd not been wrong.
Then as he leapt over a fallen tree, another thought chilled him even more.
What if she'd gone with Kendale willingly? He recalled with painful clarity how she'd left him the first time after witnessing the dark side of the dragon. Had she left him again? Had she seen in the other knight a means of escape from the beast she felt held her captive?
Baelin didn't want to think it, but he couldn't help but wonder if Lady Jill had chosen to go with the dragonslayer.
And that was the worst possibility of all.
CHAPTER 25
Baelin found them just before the sun reached its zenith.
Though plenty of light remained in the day, a large fire blazed out in the open field a stone's throw from the edge of the forest. The smoke billowed up in a thick, black column, entwining with the clouds above, high enough for all the countryside to see.
Or one very angry dragon.
Not that Baelin intended to descend on them from the skies in his dragon form. But from the look of things, Kendale was expecting him to.
He had to credit the dragonslayer's tactics—he'd chosen the site well. Kendale took his stand on high, open ground, able to see for several furlongs, yet he was close enough to the forest edge should the protection of the trees be needed. The knight sat fully armed upon Flaume Stelan, the flickering light from the nearby fire glinting off the shiny plates of his armor, waiting.
Just as Baelin knew he would be.
What he didn't know was if he was rescuing Lady Jill or about to take her from the man she'd chosen as her salvation from the beast.
He had no choice. Without her, the curse could not be broken. His life, and very likely any hope Lady Jill had of returning to her time, depended on getting her back.
Baelin left the cover of the trees, walking on human legs as would any other man. He did not draw his sword, but kept his hands at his sides. Though he'd once called Kendale friend, if only briefly, at the moment he wanted nothing more than to run the knight through where he stood. But he had no desire to spill the man's blood in front of Lady Jill if he did not have to. He'd made that mistake once before.
Kendale was not so inclined. Noticing Baelin's approach, he drew his sword, the sudden motion bringing Lady Jill to her feet. She turned wide, frightened eyes his way.
What she was thinking, he could not tell. She made no move either in his direction or toward Kendale, but stood still between them, her face pale beneath smeared soot and ash. Then, as his blood threatened to deafen him with its pounding in his head, she took one small, tentative step toward him.
The knight spurred his mount in front of her and grabbed her by the hair with his free hand, halting her next step, holding her back. The possessive nature of the dragon within bristled at the sight of the man's hand on her.
"I believe you have something that belongs to me."
"Do I?" Kendale asked. "Methinks the lady belongs to herself."
"Then release her and allow her to choose who she wishes to stand with."
"It matters not what she says. You have bewitched her with your serpent's spell. Once you are dead, she will return to her right mind and like as not thank me for freeing her from the dragon's clutches."
"Like as not is right." Lady Jill tried to pry her hair out of Kendale's firm grip, then hissed at him through clenched teeth when she couldn't break free. "And it's none of your damn business if I want to be in the dragon's clutches or not."
Baelin's tension eased a fraction at her words, but not completely. The fact she called him dragon revealed while she may not want to be with him, she knew as well as he that she needed to be with him.
Perhaps the knight was right after all. Lady Jill had no choice. Not truly.
"This is between you and I, Kendale. Leave the maid out of it."
"Ah, but 'tis just the thing. She is in the thick of it." The knight shoved her away, toward where Owen stood silent, his young eyes darting back and forth between the two men. "If you want her back, you will have to kill me to get her."
"It does not have to be this way."
"Oh, but it does. I have spent my life protecting others from creatures such as you. Before this day is through, only one of us will remain."
"If that is the way it must be, so be it." Baelin drew his sword, the hiss of steel leaving scabbard an answer to Kendale's challenge. "But I will fight you as a knight and no other way."
Kendale laughed, the sound humorless, skeptical. "What, no dragon tricks?"
"On my word."
"What good is the word of a dragon?" he scoffed.
"'Tis the only word you will have from me this day. And be thankful you have it, for if I came before you as a dragon, 'tis a battle you would quickly lose."
"That remains to be seen. I have sent more dragons than you can imagine back to the hell that spawned them. It will be my pleasure to add one more to their number this day."
"We shall see about that."
"Then let us be done with this." Kendale lowered the helm over his face and spurred his horse.
Baelin spared one last glance in Lady Jill's direction to assure himself she was safely out of harm's way. Would that he could blind her to what was about to happen, for surely she would never forgive him for what he must do now. He knew all too well it would be so, for in the end he did not think he would not be able to forgive himself.
He hardened his resolve as Kendale charged, his sword raised high. Baelin consigned the friend the man once was to some small, dark place deep in the pit of his heart. Friendship and regrets had no place in battle. The enemy approached him now. He'd not suffered two hundred years as a dragon to die now when the end of his torment was so near.
They came together in a bone-jarring clash of steel on steel, the resounding peal ringing out across the open field. Kendale had the a
dvantage of height astride the horse, but Baelin was quick, darting out of range of animal's powerful hooves.
"To think I shared meals with you." The knight swung his sword in a powerful arc, barely missing Baelin's shoulder. "And hunted with you." He swung again, the steel blade whistling through the air by his head. "And all this time you were what I should have been hunting." He growled as Baelin blocked a hard blow with his sword.
"It appears you are not as good a dragonslayer as you claim to be."
Baelin thrust back, then dove under the horse to come up on the other side.
"Oh, you are good, I will give you that, to have kept your dark nature a secret from me so long." Kendale pulled his mount around and circled, waving his heavy sword before him. "Did you laugh at how easily you deceived me?"
The battle dance trampled the tall grass beneath foot and hoof as their swords came together again and again. The sight of knight and mount fighting as one was a sight to behold. But Baelin was tiring from the effort of keeping up with a mounted warrior. He needed to bring Kendale down or this might very well be a battle he would lose.
At the thought, the fighting instincts of the dragon roared to the forefront, demanding release. He beat the beast down. He'd vowed to fight the knight as a man and would die before he broke it.
But, whispered the creature within, you never said anything about the horse.
Before he could stop it, the fire of the beast shot out, barely missing the charger's muzzle. The horse's eyes rolled white and it reared, sending the dragonslayer to the ground.
"You bastard!" The knight shot to his feet. "What of your vow of no dragon tricks?"
"Merely leveling the battlefield. Now we fight man to man. Or do you fear you will lose to me without your steed between us?"
Kendale growled with righteous rage. "The people were right. You, with your dragon's fire, started the blaze at the inn, did you not? What evil lives within your devil's heart that you would burn women and children alive?"
Their swords locked and Baelin shoved him away.
"The fire 'twas not my doing."
"Mayhap you did not strike the flame yourself, but as surely as I live and breathe, 'twas you who brought death to those people." The truth of those words struck deep, for Baelin had wondered the same thing himself.
This close, he could see the dragonslayer's hate-filled eyes burning through the narrow slits of his helm. "You are the embodiment of evil, and its like follows you wherever you go. I have sworn before God and my king to wipe your kind from the face of the Earth. Only then will the innocent be safe. Only then will the dead be avenged."
It was in that moment Baelin knew he hadn't misjudged the knight. Kendale wasn't one of the Dark Witch's warriors. His convictions were too strong, his righteous mission too sacred to carry out such a deception for so long. He was a dragonslayer in truth, and just as deadly, if not more so, because of it.
Blow after blow they inflicted on each other, their movements in synch from hours of practice together. But this was no friendly sparring. Today, they fought to kill.
Breathing heavy, Kendale held him off with his sword, circling as Baelin turned in concert with him. He hammered away at the knight, until their swords came together overhead. Then Baelin swung down and under, catching Kendale behind the knees. The knight went down and Baelin stepped on the dragonslayer's sword, preventing any defense. He held the point of his own sword under Kendale's helm, at his throat.
"Finish it, dragon spawn."
Baelin tensed, ready to inflict the final, killing blow.
Lady Jill rushed up and grabbed his arm. "No, Baelin. Don't!"
He froze, every muscle in him straining to do what instinct and training demanded. It would take no effort to break Lady Jill's hold.
But he didn't.
"If I do not end this now, he will never stop hunting us." Was he speaking to her or trying to convince himself?
"No, he won't," Lady Jill said.
"The dragon is right," Kendale hissed through bloodied lips. "As long as I draw breath, I shall hunt you and your kind to the ends of the earth."
"No," she said. "You will give us your word not to come after us, won't you?"
"I will not give my word to a dragon."
"He gave you his word, to fight you as a man, and he did." She paused. "Sort of. Now he has won, as a man. You both live and die by your precious code of honor. Well, let's see some of it now."
The two men remained frozen, Kendale on the ground and Baelin standing over him, his sword poised to strike.
"Roderick, swear on your honor you will not pursue us and Baelin will let you live." She turned her head to look at him, but he refused to take his eyes off the dragonslayer. "Won't you, Baelin?"
He gritted his teeth. The dragon in him wanted nothing more than to kill the hunter, while the knight in him demanded he give quarter to a fallen knight.
But in the end it was the man in him who decided. The man who did not want to kill his only friend, even if that friend now looked on him with hate and loathing.
"Aye, if he gives his word, I will accept it."
"Good." She turned her attention to Kendale. "So, what will it be, Roderick? To die with honor by the sword or to give your word and live to fight another day?"
A battle raged behind Kendale's blue eyes. His voice, when he finally spoke, sounded distant, tinged with anger and betrayal.
"I give you my word I will not pursue you."
Baelin stood back, but he did not sheathe his sword. He knew he would stand by his word, but would Kendale? After all, he'd thought nothing of leaving him behind to face death at the hands of the angry mob.
He backed away, with Lady Jill by his side, never taking his eyes off the knight.
Kendale slowly pulled himself to his feet. Owen rushed to his side, offering the long sword with shaky hands, but the knight waved the weapon away.
"On my oath, I will not hunt you, dragon. But by chance if our paths should ever cross again, I will not hesitate to kill you."
"Then I consider myself forewarned." Baelin bowed his head. "Until we meet again."
Then he and Lady Jill slipped silently into the forest.
"Did you choose to go with him?"
Baelin's voice was so soft, it startled her in the silence of the forest.
Jill glanced at the somber man walking beside her. The first words he'd uttered to her since he'd found her with dragonslayer were not gently spoken. An undercurrent of repressed anger and rage continued to radiate from him, crackling in the air around them as it had ever since leaving Roderick and Owen far behind at the edge of the forest.
"Of course not. He practically kidnapped me."
He grunted in response, and the tension between them rose a notch higher. She grabbed his arm and pulled him to a stop.
"Who are you mad at here, me or Roderick?"
"You. Him. Myself. I know not anymore." He swallowed hard, the thick muscles in his neck constricting with the effort. Then he looked at her, and she'd never seen his eyes so full of pain and doubt. "I cannot help but wonder, did you choose to come with me because you wanted to or because you felt you must?"
"What are you talking about?"
He shook off her grip and started walking again. "You have said yourself you believe breaking my curse will send you back to your time. If that 'tis so, then you had no choice. You had to come with me."
Jill rushed to catch up with him. "Oh, no. You couldn't be more wrong. Maybe that was a big part of it in the beginning, but it's not the only reason. Not anymore."
"Even though I may have started the fire?"
"You didn't start it."
He slanted his gaze to meet hers, his look skeptical. "How can you be certain?"
"Because I know you. You would never do something like that."
The tension on his face eased a fraction before he turned his attention back to the trees ahead of them. "Kendale did not think so."
She heard the underlying
regret in his words. The fight with Roderick had been hard on him, more emotionally than physically. She knew what it was like to lose a friend. But witnessing Baelin lose the only man he could claim as one had been almost too hard to watch.
"Roderick is an idiot."
Baelin chuckled, but there was little humor in the sound. "Perhaps, but he was not completely wrong."
"What do you mean?"
"The fire was deliberately set."
"By whom?"
His jaw tensed as his eyes continued to scan the shadows of the forest ahead. "The Dark Witch. She sent her underlings to do her dirty work."
"What?" That news flash caused Jill to fall a step or two behind, but she quickly caught up. "How do you know?"
"Because I encountered them. After the fire. After you were gone."
A million questions ran through Jill's mind. Why would anyone do such a thing? Had it been because of them? She strained to see behind every tree and bush nearby. Were they even now being followed by these 'underlings'? So many questions and none of the answers that came to mind were good.
She noted the tension in his shoulders. "Baelin, what aren't you telling me?"
He didn't answer her right away, and that worried her even more.
"The Dark Witch has learned of you. She knows we have succeeded in passing the first test. Now, she will stop at nothing to prevent us from meeting the next two challenges, even at the cost of innocent lives."
The breath rushed from her lungs. "What are we going to do?"
He looked at her, concern etching deep lines around his eyes.
"Keep you alive until the curse is broken or our time runs out, for now that the Dark Witch knows you live, she will do all that is within her power to make it otherwise."
CHAPTER 26
After making their way deeper in the forest, Baelin stopped suddenly.
His gaze sliced toward a high slope ahead of them. She stopped too, instantly in tune to the stiffness in his shoulders, the way his eyes scanned the area around them. Alert. Wary. On guard.
"What is it?" she whispered, instinctively moving her body closer to his. "Is Roderick following us? Oh God, it's not the Dark Witch's thugs, is it?"