The two converged on the centre of the field, halting close enough for conversation, far enough to emphasize their mutual wariness.
The Wolf’s gaze had remained steady on the face of his adversary through most of the short trek, but as the chiseled features became clearer, more defined, he could not resist the impulse to assess his enemy down to the toes of the pointed, iron-ribbed boots he wore.
The same reflex caused the piercing azure eyes to stray from their intent focus and the Dragon gauged the remarkable breadth of the chest beneath the gleaming black wolf pelts, the impressive power in the bold, fluid stride, and the total absence of any sign of injury or aftereffects from wounds that should have left the man dead and turned to dust on the sands of Palestine.
Eyes glowering with a quiet look of speculation rose once again to a gaze as frigid and emotionless as Arctic ice.
“It has been a long time,” the Wolf said. “The years have served you well.”
There was no reaction in the brittle hardness of Wardieu’s countenance, no tremor of response in the stern ridge of his jaw.
“What?” The Wolf smiled faintly. “Is there not even charity enough in you to offer similar praise for my own humble appearance? Admittedly, it is not as grand as it might have been under different circumstances, but—”
“What is it you want?” Wardieu interrupted bluntly. “Why have you come back to Lincoln after all these years?”
“I do grow weary of answering that question,” the Wolf sighed. “Why should I not come back? Lincoln is my home.”
A fine, chalk-white rim of tension compressed the taut lips. “Bloodmoor belongs to me. You will not find a man in all of England willing to challenge my possession.”
“One stands before you now,” said the Wolf.
The blue eyes flicked past the broad shoulders and returned almost immediately, laden with scorn. “A wolf’s head and his band of thieves and cutthroats? Is it your intention to walk up to the gates of Bloodmoor and announce yourself, or shall you and your men place the castle under siege?”
“It is my intention to reclaim what is mine.”
“And I say again, there are none who would believe your claim. I am Lucien Wardieu. I have played host to Richard, King of England. I have fought by his side and won the acclaim of my peers.”
“And the brother? The coward bred of a Wardieu whore and weaned on greed and corruption? Dare I ask what became of him?”
The Dragon’s smile was slower to form, appearing in deference to the rage throbbing at his temples. “Etienne Wardieu died some fourteen years ago, mourned by few, remembered fondly by none. It seems there was some taint of treachery associated with his name—to do with an attempt to implicate his father on charges of treason. Part of my unflagging efforts over the years has been to exonerate the name of Robert Wardieu, and to restore the De Gournay name to its former prominence. In that respect, the name of Lucien Wardieu ranks high in royal esteem and you would have greater success declaring yourself to be Richard the Lionheart.”
“I come to claim only what is mine to claim.”
“Attempt to do so and there is not a man in Lincoln who would waste a second thought before striking you dead on my command.”
“Assuming you were alive to give the command,” the Wolf pointed out.
Wardieu glanced away, letting the silence drag for a long moment, and when he looked back, there was a wry, sardonic smile on his lips. “Why am I not surprised to learn your word still means nothing? Nothing then … nothing now.”
The Wolf crooked an eyebrow. “I gave my word you would leave the abbey alive. I said nothing about the meadow, or the forest, or the Lincoln road.”
The Dragon’s smile lingered, the smug satisfaction in it rankling the Wolf more than if he had drawn his sword and challenged the affront. It struck him then that his brother had expected the archers on the wall. He had come onto this field fully accepting that death might come from one source or another—further, that he would be judged to have met it boldly and bravely, with his honour as a knight unimpeached.
The Wolf relaxed his grip on his bow. “Did you really think I would make it this easy for you? An arrow through the heart, an honourable exchange of swordplay? Quick … painless …”
The blue eyes narrowed, but the Dragon said nothing.
“No. No, you seem too eager to see an end to it. Methinks I should let you live a while longer. Live … knowing I am here—” The Wolf spread his hands congenially to encompass the trees, the sky, the meadow. “Knowing I am watching you, biding the perfect moment to strike—a week from now, perhaps. Or a month. Perhaps in a year, when you have grown short of temper and twitch with sweat each time a shadow creaks at your back.”
“We will end it now, damn you,” the Dragon vowed, his hand reaching for the hilt of his sword.
Before he could draw it from its sheath, the Wolf had raised his bow and nocked a slender arrow to the string.
“I have determined not to kill you this day,” he warned. “But I would gladly give my arrow a taste of maiming you in any limb you choose. An elbow … or a knee? You were sorely disappointed not to see a cripple walk onto this field— perhaps we can arrange to have a cripple leave it?”
The Dragon slowly, furiously lowered his sword back into its leather seat.
“A wise decision. A comforting one as well for your bride, who seems not to have the stomach for violence.”
“The Lady Servanne.” The words were grated through the Dragon’s bloodless lips. “Where is she?”
“Awaiting your pleasure. And since she has already provided me mine, you may take her away with my fondest wishes for wedded bliss.”
If it was possible, the Dragon blanched whiter. “If you have dared to touch her—”
“Be assured,” the Wolf broke in bluntly. “I have indeed touched her; would you have expected less? Frankly, I expected a good deal more. Oh, she is a pretty enough piece to look at, but between her weepings and swoonings she would sooner shrivel a man’s best intentions as slake them. I found her hardly worth the trouble. Then again, I assume it is not a zealous craving for her body that hastens you to the altar. As I understand it, the lady comes to you dowered heavily enough to more than compensate for any shortcomings between the sheets.”
The Dragon’s steed bolted an agitated step sideways in response to the sudden tension communicated through his master’s body. He was brought quickly and savagely under control again, but his flanks quivered and his nostrils flared with the scent of possible violence.
“You will release her to me at once,” Wardieu seethed.
“Gladly. We will even waive the ransom—consider it my wedding gift for you and your lovely bride.”
He turned and passed a signal to Gil, who nodded down to someone behind the closed gates of the abbey. The oaken doors creaked open on their wooden hinges and Mutter appeared first, leaning forward to urge a reluctant white palfrey through the narrow archway.
Servanne de Briscourt, cloaked against the chill and mist of the evening vapours, sat astride Undine, her small hands gripped to the leather pommel, her face a pale, wan oval beneath the draped folds of the scarf she wore around her head and shoulders. A second horse, led by Stutter, clopped out of the courtyard and through the gates with Biddy sitting as straight as Fury, her expression bleaker than an ax blade.
Soft yellow whispers of hair were dragged forward across Servanne’s cheeks by the breeze. She had not been permitted an opportunity to comb or plait it, nor to remove the dulling tarnish of moss and dried sand. Waiting by the heat of a fire had scorched the dampness out of the green velvet gown, but it was crushed and wrinkled beyond any hope of repair, the cloth scuffed and stiffened, the seams so weakened in places her bare flesh gaped through. She looked and felt bedraggled. Her hands trembled and her heart beat like a wild, caged thing within her breast, and she knew if she looked up, if she dared search out the Wolf’s face, she would die then and there of shattered pride.
/> As it was, when she heard his voice and realized he was addressing his remarks to her, she grew so faint, she needed Biddy’s quick hands to steady her upright in the saddle.
“I have been telling your betrothed what a pleasure it has been to have your company these past few days. I explained I was only trying to give you a truer idea of what might be expected of you by way of marital obligations. Hopefully your husband will not find you so difficult to thaw.”
Servanne was shocked, horrified. How could he say such things? How could he humiliate and shame her so heartlessly?
With her eyes flooding with resentment and her heart still pounding to burst, she lashed out with the only weapon available. The wide leather strap of Undine’s reins cut him sharply across the face and neck, hard enough to break the skin and raise a bright, stinging red weal on his flesh. She would have struck again, but for Undine’s confused response to a misread command. The mare caracoled sideways a step, then leaped forward in a startled attempt to avoid tangling legs with Biddy’s horse.
Wardieu reached out in a reflexive action as the mare danced close to his own snorting warhorse. For a moment their eyes met; Wardieu’s incensed and burning beneath the steel nasal of his helm, Servanne’s as bright as glass behind a thick film of outrage and defiance. They each looked away again, focusing their pain and hatred on the man who watched the exchange with grim indifference.
“A deserving bride and groom,” he murmured wryly, lowering his hand from his cheek, frowning at the spidery threads of blood on his fingers. “I bid you both a pleasant hereafter … for as long as you may live to enjoy it.”
The heat of Servanne’s anger, as well as a scalding sense of betrayal, kept her well warmed on the winding journey back through the forest. Her last sighting of the Wolf—his face turned away as he strode back to the abbey—was seared on her brain like a smouldering brand. He had not looked over his shoulder. He had not shown a trace of remorse or guilt over the cruel, callous way he had used and dismissed her.
Her eyes ached with the fullness of tears but she refused to give way, fearing if she once started to weep, she would not be able to stop again. It was her own fault; she had brought this travesty upon herself by succumbing to the very curiosity Biddy had tried to warn her against. She had wanted to know the feel of his arms around her, the press of his hot flesh against hers. She had not once tried to stop him, or stay his hands or lips from whatever wicked, depraved pleasures he sought to bestow. Her body had been his body to do with what he would, and she had shamelessly, shamefully begged him not to stop. Even now, when she should have been using all her strength to concentrate her hatred on the man, she burned with the memory of his hands, his mouth, his flesh moving over her, in her …
Servanne bowed her head to muffle the sound of her sobbed breaths in the folds of her cloak. If Wardieu heard them, or questioned their cause, he made no attempt to offer solace by word or gesture. He rode in the lead of the small, miserable procession—a sullen, brooding figure whose flowing blue mantle belled from his shoulders to his horse’s rump, giving him neither shape nor substance below the conical steel helmet.
Biddy rode in the rear, berating her own inadequacies as matron and guardian, intoning prayer upon prayer until Servanne’s nerves were stretched almost to the breaking point.
They rode through the dark mist, and, as if there was not enough grief to contend with, the skies cracked open on a jagged fork of blue-white lightning and after a few moments of thundrous sound without fury, the deluge soaked its way through the overhead branches and began pelting the earth with icy lancets of rain.
The Black Wolf of Lincoln tilted his chin upward and let the rain beat down on his face. The welt from Servanne’s slashing reins stung vividly where the flesh was torn, and where the blood had not yet congealed it was washed down his neck in a reddish smear.
He leaned his weight briefly on the top of his longbow and pressed his brow against the comforting tension of the resined string.
“It had to be done,” Friar said quietly. “You could not have kept her with us. Nor could you have sent her away with stars in her eyes and a keening lament for lost love in her heart; the Dragon would have seen it in a minute and either killed her outright for the insult, or kept her alive long enough to use her against you. God knows, if a man’s heart is his weakness, a woman’s anger is her strength.”
“I know,” the Wolf said wearily. “I know. But will she be strong enough?”
Friar pursed his lips thoughtfully. “How angry did you make her?”
“Angry.”
“Enough to make her want to strike out with more than just a leather strap? Enough to spill everything to the Dragon in a rampage against you, including your recommendation of La Seyne’s trustworthiness?”
The Wolf glanced over, his questioning frown confirming Friar’s supposition.
“I did not think you would just throw her to the lions without giving her some avenue of escape,” he remarked dryly. “I only hope she does nothing foolish with the confidence.”
“For that, I will rely on my brother’s own arrogance. Instinct tells me by tomorrow he will have convinced himself he has come away from here the victor. Since he is incapable of feeling compassion, he will not show any to Lady Servanne, and it is my hope she will then see enough of the real Etienne Wardieu to be on her guard.”
“You are risking a great deal on instinct.”
“It has kept me alive longer than my enemies care to believe.”
With the gloom and the rain there was not much he could see of the Wolf’s expression, but what he could see gave Friar an uncomfortable feeling of walking too near the edge of a cliff.
“You … did not tell her about the Princess Eleanor, did you?” he asked slowly.
The Wolf straightened and glared at his companion. “I may have been behaving like a fool these past few days, but I have not completely forsaken my senses.” He saw the look in Friar’s eye and sighed. “Perhaps I did mention the attempt to steal Prince Arthur from Mirebeau, but”—he held up a hand to forstall Friar’s aghast interruption—“like everyone else, she assumes both children were returned to the queen’s protection unharmed. She has no reason to suspect the Princess Eleanor is anywhere but in Brittany with her grandmother.”
Friar continued to stare, prompting the Wolf to vent his temper on a hiss of air. “You act as if this was all my doing! As if I had a hand in kidnapping the children; as if I knew beforehand of Lackland’s plans to use a threat of death against Arthur in order to force the queen to throw her support behind John being declared Richard’s successor.” He paused and wiped angrily at the rain coursing down his brow. “Moreover, when John realized his plans were foiled and the best he could hope to gain was a ransom for the return of the Princess of Brittany, you would think I personally volunteered the services of La Seyne Sur Mer to oversee the exchange!”
“No. You only volunteered to come to England beforehand under the guise of having once been familiar with Lincoln and its surrounds.”
“The queen approved the idea.”
“Only because she thought you might be able to find some way to rescue the princess without her having to pay a ransom she can ill afford. She was not aware nor advised that her captain of the guard boasted intimate knowledge of Lucien Wardieu and Bloodmoor Keep.”
“Prince John chose Bloodmoor to make the exchange because he thought a wedding of such prominence would afford the perfect camouflage for his political intrigues. La Seyne was chosen by Queen Eleanor to deliver the ransom and collect the princess because she knows Lackland would not dare any of his tricks or double crosses against the Scourge of Mirebeau. All of this was decided long before I was even told the identity of the master of Bloodmoor Keep!”
“Aye, and when you found out, you could not resist planting a thorn in the Dragon’s side.”
“I have done nothing to jeopardize La Seyne’s mission in England.”
“You call it nothing to steal th
e Dragon’s bride and have him empty his castle of mercenaries to overturn the country side in search of you? You call it nothing to fall in love with the girl yourself and thereby give us all two reasons to risk our lives instead of just the one?”
“I have asked no one else to risk their life for Servanne de Briscourt,” the Wolf retorted. “And who the devil says I am in love with her?”
“Well if you are not in love, you are giving a good imitation of a boiled fowl. And what is wrong with being in love? What is wrong with admitting you are human?”
The Wolf glared for a long moment. “I do not have time to be human.”
“Aye. That much has been obvious for the past ten years. It is a malady that appears to be contagious.”
Friar walked away, brushing past the approaching Gil Golden, making her the innocent recipient of a meaningful scowl.
The Wolf watched him go, his expression grim, his nerves drawn so taut, Gil had only to look at the whiteness of his knuckles to know she was better off seeking conversation elsewhere.
16
Servanne was thoroughly soaked and iced to the bone by the time they arrived at the encampment at Alford. Wardieu had not stopped when he met up with his men again in the forest. Despite the rain and the condition of the two women, he had wordlessly ridden through the huddle of dripping, frowning mercenaries and left them scrambling for their mounts in his wake.
Aching, exhausted, numbed in body and spirit, Servanne was scarcely aware of being deposited at the gates of the abbey, or of the helpful, concerned hands of the monks who fussed about her like vexed peahens. Two of her waiting-women, Giselle and Helvise, had been sequestered at the abbey since the ambush, and greeted their returning mistress with weeping and prayers of thanksgiving. Servanne’s clothes were quickly removed and a fire stoked beneath the huge oaken barrel that served as a laundry tub for the monks.
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