Defiant

by Kennedy, Kris

  “This will make the horses happy. They like me. Yours especially. I am fairly certain he likes me more than you.”

  His gaze stayed on her a moment more, then the men went back to finalizing their plans, which seemed to consist of “I hit... then you slash... and we run...”

  Suddenly Angus poked his head in from where he’d been keeping watch out front. “Sun’s rising,” was all he said.

  Jamie turned and, without any explanation to Ry or Roger, although surely they did not need one, took her by the waist, lifted her up on her toes, and delivered a single swift, hard kiss, which made her heart hammer. He set her down and turned away without a word.

  The three of them strode off into the misty predawn to see the slave trader Mouldin and ransom back the priest.

  THEY strode through the wakening world. The gates were open, and early fairgoers and traveling merchants and the entertainment—tumblers, tricksters, the men who ran the dogfights—flowed into the town and spread out through the streets inside.

  The old vintners’ guild hall occupied a corner lot and was abutted on either side by shops. Across the way was a tavern. But inside, it would be deserted.

  Smart choice. Enough people passing by just outside to keep people in line, but still deserted, with sufficient shadowy corners and upper balconies to make the others worry on where Mouldin had placed all his men.

  Jamie, of course, knew precisely where they were: where he and Ry had left them after dragging them into the woods five days ago.

  Some people were around, early shoppers. Roger and Ry and Angus went up the back alley and Jamie strode boldly up to the door. As anticipated, no one even approached.

  He paused, closed his eyes to help quicken their adjustment to the darkness he knew he would find inside, and flexed his hand around his sword hilt. How many times had he stood thusly, about to go in and report to fitzWalter, his old mentor and trainer in assassination? To the king? Always to men he had no respect for but was nonetheless bound to?

  No longer, though.

  He was done with it. He’d told Eva true. He wanted very much to see her cottage, to repair her roof, revel in her body, make her feel safe. He would take Eva, and everything else could go to hell.

  He unslung his sword. Keeping his eyes shut, he kicked the door open and leapt to the side, out of the doorway, out of the light. A sigh of coldness extruded from the cavernous interior as if it had substance. It smelled of old wood and cobwebs.

  He opened his eyes.

  A moment passed in silence, then a voice said quietly, “Enter.”

  Two torches were burning, illuminating a few other figures in shadowy blotches. Sunlight leaked weakly in through the line of shuttered windows on the upper floors.

  He heard someone shift.

  “God’s teeth,” the person hissed. FitzWalter. Good, he was here. “You always were one for sneaking up, Lost.”

  “Aye. You trained us well.”

  Silence for a moment. Jamie’s eyes searched the interior. There was fitzWalter, standing in a wash of pale light. He was smiling faintly.

  “Ah, yes. I heard you saw Chance.”

  “It was fleeting.”

  Another small grin lifted Baynard’s glossy beard. “She was hog-tied and had a rag stuffed in her mouth, her hands this close to being broken.”

  “What I meant was, it did not take long.”

  Baynard gave a bark of coarse laughter.

  “Jamie Lost.”

  Mouldin’s gravelly voice was recognizable anywhere, even to Jamie, who’d only heard it once, on the streets of London. Jamie turned toward it.

  “I am honored,” Mouldin said. “In a hundred years, I never expected you to show up here. But I am pleased to have two such esteemed emissaries from King John.” Mouldin turned and indicated the other shadowy figure in the room, standing against the far wall. Cig. Damn. “How sad for you all that you cannot kill me.”

  Jamie met Cig’s eyes.

  “You bastard,” Cig said in a low voice.

  From the corner of his eye, Jamie saw fitzWalter grin.

  Mouldin spoke, amusement in his voice. “Tell me, Jamie, are there two parties bargaining, or are you making a separate offer? In other words, where do your loyalties lie?”

  Jamie held Mouldin’s gaze for a long, silent moment. “Have you hurt the priest in any way?”

  Mouldin grinned. “Lessened his value? Not whatsoever. He can speak and think and excite you with his wit. Has a bit of a rheumy cough, but naught a physic could not remedy, one hopes, as so many hopes are pinned on him. Particularly yours, Lost.”

  Cig’s gaze burned through the flickering shadows. “You’re a dead man, Jamie.”

  Mouldin gave a short bark of laughter. “And the deterioration continues before mine eyes. I admit, I cannot fathom a better ally to have in one’s camp than Lost, but then, maybe we do not know who claims his allegiance?”

  Cig and Mouldin looked at fitzWalter.

  “I am not his,” Jamie said simply.

  Mouldin might have clapped his hands, he appeared so pleased by this. “So you are an independent agent, Lost. This is tremendously gratifying.” The mocking amusement vanished as he turned to fitzWalter and ordered curtly, “Your men, outside.” He turned to Cig. “Yours as well. Four blocks down the hill or the negotiations are canceled.”

  Neither man moved.

  Mouldin’s voice hardened. “Should you think to trifle with me on this, I have my own guards already placed. More importantly, there are other parties equally eager to have a go at placing a bid for Peter of London. ’Twas professional courtesy to offer him to the rebels and the king firstly. But the King of France showed marked interest when the possibility was put to him, so I say again: your men down the hill. And your swords here.” He pointed to his side.

  FitzWalter’s soldiers tromped out sullenly. Surely no one believed they were going to position themselves a full four blocks off, but then, no one believed Mouldin could be here alone, without his own men scattered all about, in the tavern next door, in the streets outside.

  But for the moment, Jamie was strangely allied with Mouldin. Telling Fitz that Mouldin had no men would only mean he’d attack, hard and fast, and Jamie would lose his chance of ever regaining Peter of London.

  Mouldin seemed to realize the irony as well. Or perhaps it was pure malevolent enjoyment at the proceedings. In any event, while everyone was ordering his men out and away, Mouldin turned and smiled at Jamie.

  FitzWalter and Cig laid their blades down, making a steely pile. Mouldin gestured to Jamie. “All of them, Lost.”

  When the bidders were as disarmed as they were ever going to be, the negotiations began.

  “Shall we commence?” Mouldin stood by the back wall, nearest to the other door. He toed the underside of a short bench and dragged it out. He rested his boot on it, leaning forward to rest an elbow.

  Silence.

  “Come, I brought you all together for a purpose. To outbid one another. You do know what you are bargaining for? The king has offered a thousand livres. And the rebels?” He looked at fitzWalter.

  “Two. And transport across the Channel to Normandy, for you will surely need it after this.”

  Mouldin laughed. “How kind, seeing as you all are planning to murder me once the transfer is done. And for this reason, I do not know why you don’t offer me the crown jewels, Cigogné. And why the rebels do not offer me more yet.”

  “Then I ought kill you now,” snapped fitzWalter.

  Mouldin smiled. “Father Peter is not here. If I die, so does he. What a loss. Come, you cannot think these offers meet the mark of Peter of London’s merit.“

  “He’s old and sick,” snapped Cig.

  “You are not in pursuit of a hale warrior. You want his mind. And his pen, and the incriminating things he draws with them.”

  FitzWalter took a step forward. “Have you brought no proof of your claims? Not even the finger of the priest or one of his sketches?”
/>
  Mouldin smiled. “How interested would you be in a full-color scene of King John murdering the earl of Everoot?”

  In the quiet room, with only the echoes of boots and laughter from outside, the sound of Cig sucking in a breath was harsh. Jamie flexed his fingers around an empty sheath.

  “’Tis quite an impressive sketch,” Mouldin said. “I was there that day with the king. I know how accurate Peter of London’s depiction is.” He looked over and pinned his hard gaze on Jamie. “Knowing this, have you an offer?”

  Jamie appraised the distance to the stairs behind him. Four running steps.

  Fitz shifted impatiently. “Did Peter give you no news of the heirs?”

  “Oh, ’tis more than news of the heirs. The heirs are here in England, are they not, Jamie? All of them. Father Peter is the magnet. ‘Whither goest the priest, so goeth the heirs.’ All of them.”

  Fitz stepped forward. “She?”

  The hair on the back of Jamie’s neck started rising. “Who?”

  FitzWalter made an impatient gesture. “Father Peter is not the crucible. It is she. The one who took the heir d’Endshire. His ‘nurse.’ She is no nurse.”

  A cascade of coldness moved through Jamie, from his chest to his arms to his hands and down to his legs. “What is she?”

  FitzWalter gave a bark of laughter, so it was Mouldin who replied in a low, cunning voice.

  “A princess.”

  Fifty-four

  Eva stood in the stables and looked at the horses. It was warm and quiet and comforting in the stables, with the crunchy hay and the furry, softly snuffling beasts.

  She was not reckless or stupid. She was well aware that since this matter involved men, it would almost certainly also involve fighting. She was further aware that she could do little in a fight but get killed. She was not interested in this whatsoever.

  But she was most interested in getting everyone she loved out of England alive. And not tortured on her behalf.

  Jamie seemed confident that people did and said things when they had blades held at their throats, and this was often true. But other times, when they wanted something dearly, they resisted revealing things even to their last breath.

  If Jamie did not yet know who she was, he would soon figure it out. And right now, it did not matter if he knew who she was; he knew where she was. Roger knew. Father Peter knew.

  Even if she ran, right now, started running and never stopped, people would question Jamie and Roger and Father Peter about her and her whereabouts. And Jamie, like Father Peter and Roger, would reveal nothing.

  Then they would be hurt. Perhaps terribly. Protecting her.

  Eva had no qualms about hiding. She’d done so with great success and vigor her entire life. But now everything was unraveling, and it was wrong to allow others to be stuck with swords on her account.

  This could not be.

  She patted the horse on the nose and, in a dim, faraway way, saw her hand was trembling. She turned and walked out the door.

  She told herself she had no intention of being taken. She was no martyr. She had infinite faith in Jamie’s ability to rescue her from a castle tower if need be; this was not in question. But he needed not to be hanging upside down from a rack in order to do so.

  So, she told herself, this was a matter of self-preservation. The thought made her feel better.

  She looked down. Her other hand was shaking now too. Her knees were made of broth. Her lips felt cold and tingly.

  She stayed to the shadows and kept walking.

  THE shock of Mouldin’s words moved through Jamie in waves.

  “She is the daughter from John’s first marriage. The king hid her the moment she was born, and few know of her existence. But John always had his eye on the throne, and his first wife, Isabella of Gloucester, was neither so richly endowed nor so noble nor so nubile as Isabella of Angoulême.”

  Jamie shook his head. “That marriage was annulled,” he said, fighting off the stubborn wet heaviness that was entering his limbs, making him want to sit down. “She has no significance in this; the king has many bastards.”

  Eva, of royal blood. Eva, on the run, hunted by the great and powerful, a threat to the crown. Eva in danger.

  “Lowborn, wenches, mistresses,” fitzWalter said dismissively. “He has children by such women as these. This one, she is born of a countess.”

  “She is not legal,” Jamie said dully.

  FitzWalter gave one of his gravelly barks of laughter. “What matters that? The king of France just had his illegitimate children legitimatized. How hard would it be for us to do?”

  This ephemeral cloud of aggressive hope fitzWalter was spewing had substance. For hundreds of years, the lines of inheritance and rule had been more about a powerful sword than legitimacy. It was not so far back in time that England had been conquered and ruled by a bastard. Sooth, King John had murdered his own nephew Prince Arthur to silence the opposition to his own ascendancy, for even twenty years ago the question of rightful inheritance ran hot and sticky. The answers were hardening, but not yet solid.

  In these dark days, people were looking for any good cause, anything binding upon which they could hang their homage. An illegitimate daughter was not such a peg. But a royal-born daughter married to a powerful, ambitious baron?

  It could bring down a kingship.

  “So, is she here?” Fitz demanded.

  Mouldin answered, but he was looking directly at Jamie as he did. “Aye, she is here.”

  Things had just rounded the bend. The only way to come out of this was to push it further, faster, than anyone expected. It was all going to hell. Swords would be drawn, people would die, and the only way to come out the victor was to be the instigator. Set the terms.

  Everyone was readying himself, but “readying” was not “ready” and Jamie made his move. He reached down and yanked the small blade out of his boot.

  “Enough!” he roared, throwing up his hands, stepping forward. Mouldin immediately stepped back and swept up his blade. His one remaining soldier stepped up to flank him. “You fools,” Jamie shouted, circling. “A priest? We stand here fighting over the entrails of a priest? Keep him.” He was shouting. “I want the heirs.”

  “Nay,” Cig shouted, leaping forward, scrambling for the pile of swords. “He does not represent the king anymore. Jésu, Jamie—”

  “Not on my life will you have even one of the heirs,” roared fitzWalter, knocking Cig aside.

  The door burst open and men came pouring in, and amid them Jamie saw Chance’s blond head. Jamie lunged forward, crashing into Mouldin’s henchman, knocking him out of the way. Then he rolled to his feet and grabbed Mouldin before he could run, wrenched his arm up and behind his back, almost to breaking, and put his blade at his throat. The room froze.

  “Now, Hunter,” Jamie said, his voice low, his gaze on the frozen figures of fitzWalter and Cig, “you will tell me where Peter of London is, and you will live to see another day.”

  Mouldin was breathing heavily, his eyes angry but calm. “The priest spoke of you, Jamie. I know who you are.”

  Jamie jerked him. “He did not tell you that.”

  “He did not have to.”

  “Where is he?”

  Mouldin shook his head. “You will never find him. And she will never tell.”

  Heat flowed into Jamie’s limbs. Confidence. “Do you mean Magda?”

  Mouldin froze, then roared in anger and threw up his arms, a powerful move from a powerful man. It released the frozen room, and fighting exploded. Jamie let the move throw him backward, twisting to dive for his sword.

  “Get the priest,” shouted fitzWalter.

  “Bring me Lost!” Cig roared.

  Jamie’s hand closed around the hilt of his blade and a measure of calm suffused his body. He bounded to his feet, and the room turned into a vine garden of slashing steel. Jamie held his own, allowing himself to be backed up to a wall. When he was close enough, he leaned to the side and shouted out
the window, “Now would be a ripe time!”

  He needn’t have bothered because Roger and Ry and Angus had just burst through the door.

  And at the edge of his vision, Jamie saw Chance disappear out the back.

  Fifty-five

  Eva crept up the back alley. She was skilled with alleys after her time in England. She hurried up, soft as a mouse, a minute behind Ry and Roger.

  But there was also no need to be stealthy like a mouse, she realized as she drew near. It sounded like a shipwreck inside, with waves and wood cracking and men being tossed overboard. She withdrew her blade and took a deep breath, just outside the door.

  She froze when she caught sight of someone coming out. Pressing herself to the wall, she watched the willowy figure. Was that not the woman she had seen with Jamie?

  The woman saw her and stilled, paused as if in indecision, then turned the other way. The woman glanced back over her shoulder and whispered, “You can have him. I will take the rest. But the king is coming for him. He is doomed.”

  Long, glossy hair swished around the corner of the doorway.

  Another loud crash came from inside, and Eva turned for the door.

  Right now she had to take care of Jamie. She could not worry on Jamie’s women.

  THE battle was fierce. Men were scattered about, groaning or bleeding or dying or all three, but a few men fought on.

  Unfortunately, fitzWalter was one of them, and he was facing Jamie, standing near an overturned table, sword in hand. From the edge of his vision, Jamie saw Roger engaged with one of the soldiers, holding his own but clearly outmatched by the powerful, seasoned fighter. Ry was fighting Cigogné, while Angus appeared to be holding back two men.

  “Jamie,” fitzWalter said, holding out his hand, up slightly. “This will not go well for you.” He took a breath. “But it need not end this way.”