by Grace Ingram
Lucifer was nearly half an hour ahead of him, time and to spare for the outrage he guessed at. Reason might reject it, protesting that even Lord Reynald and the mercenary would recoil from the vengeance that would follow, but surer certainty told him that reason was far from either. Guy followed the hoofprints in the track. They were stamped deeply in the mire that had spattered widely from their haste. Beyond the ford the roads diverged; the routiers had taken the woodland way towards Collingford.
He hesitated and then made his gamble, turning his own mount for Thorgastone. That way, though rougher, was shorter by the best part of a league. He touched his mount with the spurs, and the Slut stretched into a lope. He trotted through the village, mindful of pigs, poultry, brats and grandmothers, and once in the woods spurred to a gallop. Before he gained the crossroads he heard a triumphant yelp, a shout of alarm and a sudden trampling and squealing of horses.
He eased his horse to a canter, thankful for the sodden leaf-mould that muffled the noise of his approach. He was one against seven, and could afford no foolhardiness. He heard Conan’s voice, raised in mockery.
‘Well met, mistress!’
‘You’re out of bounds,’ Helvie said, steadily enough.
‘Why, mistress, our bounds reach as far as our lances—lance of iron or lance of flesh,’ he jeered. The groom yelled an oath, and Guy heard sounds of a scuffle. He rounded the last bend in time to see Helvie spur her palfrey at the line of men as her groom went down. Lucifer urged his stallion at her, seized her and wrenched her from the saddle in a flurry of skirts, flinging her to two of his men who tumbled from their mounts to receive her. As they dragged Helvie clear of the flailing hooves and wrenched her arms back to hold her, Conan slid from his rearing horse and lighted face to face. Guy halted, his heart thumping, while the other routiers dropped from their saddles to join in the sport, letting their horses scatter.
‘You’re brave with a woman, if your men hold her,’ Helvie said contemptuously.
‘A wasp under your tongue! But you’ve a deal to offer, mistress, and we’ll enjoy all you have.’
He plucked his sergeant’s dagger from its sheath, his own being inaccessible under his hauberk, and as Guy started his horse into motion he set it to her throat and ripped her gown and the smock beneath it to her navel, baring her pink-budded breasts.
Guy gasped, and fell upon the routiers like the wrath of God. He burst through the cluster from behind, bowling men over, and the Slut alongside slashed at the nearest, who rolled screeching, his arms up to protect his throat. Lucifer whirled, his hands still lifted, fury and surprise in his snarl. He dropped the knife and snatched for his sword.
‘Take!’
The Slut soared in a grey-brown lunge full against his chest, and he crashed backwards, the breath grunting out of him. Guy drove at the two still holding Helvie, mouths ajar and eyes bolting. They loosed her as he reached them, grabbing at weapons. He threw himself from the saddle upon them, a hand at either throat, and crashed their helmets together with a clang. Helvie fell and scrambled clear. He cast them down together and tore his sword from its sheath as he swung round to shield her.
Lucifer lay flat, arms outspread, a paw on either shoulder and the Slut’s weight on his belly. He stared past white fangs a couple of inches from his nose, down her steaming gullet, and his face turned grey. Anger and arrogance ran out of him like water from a sieve. He did not stir a muscle. The Slut’s ruff was flecked with crimson, and her growl rasped in her throat, changing tone as she breathed in and out. His men, picking up limbs and wits as surprise yielded to comprehension, froze as they were.
‘If you move,’ Guy warned, ‘she’ll rip your face off.’ Conan would derive spiritual benefit from contemplating her teeth a little longer; he fixed his gaze on the routiers. ‘Loose that groom and stand away from him,’ he ordered, and as they obeyed him sullen-faced he lifted his free hand to unfasten his cloak-clasp and pass the garment over his shoulder to Helvie. Cold fingers brushed his as she caught it from him, and he could hear her ragged breathing that might yet break to sobs.
Sweyn groaned, half-stunned, his hair matted and his face streaked with blood. He was not irreparably damaged; Guy cast one glance at him and then centred his attention on the routiers. He gestured to them with his sword-point to move back. They might have rushed the blade and overwhelmed him by numbers, but they hesitated, looking for initiative from their prostrate captain to his sergeant. Bertin was clutching his thigh, blood soaking down the leg of his chausses, and reluctantly endorsed Guy’s bidding by hobbling back, swearing.
‘You young fool,’ Conan said hoarsely, ‘your father himself commanded this!’
‘Prompted by Satan his master. D’you reckon obedience absolves you from guilt?’
‘You sanctimonious pup in the manger, you’d your chance to claim her for your own and refused, yet you interfere—’ Guy lifted his sword, and the Slut snarled, her lips curling back from her fangs. Lucifer froze, staring at those ranked points.
‘Decency’s beyond your comprehension. I’m here to defend this noble lady.’
‘Another bastard!’ Conan sneered.
‘An honest maid.’ He gestured again to the troopers. ‘Back to your horses, and ride for Warby.’
‘What d’you aim to do with our captain?’ demanded Bertin truculently.
‘As he deserves.’
Bertin, judging those deserts, stared in alarm. ‘Captain Conan—’
‘Do as he bids you,’ the mercenary conceded.
Still they hesitated. Sweyn groaned, heaved over, and hoisted himself painfully, hindquarters first, to all fours and then to his knees. He scrabbled after his dagger and scowled through congealing blood, but when he tried to lurch erect dizziness sent him to his knees again. Guy was able to ignore him and concentrate on the routiers.
‘Back to Warby,’ he repeated.
They looked glumly from him to Conan, nose to nose with the Slut, and at each other. No alternative offered. Bertin shrugged and limped cursing to the horses. He hoisted himself astride. ‘We’ll avenge our captain,’ he growled, more to assure Conan than in hope of being heeded, and led the withdrawal. Guy waited until the last sound of their going had died among the trees.
‘You’ve won,’ Lucifer spat. ‘Now call off this bitch of yours.’
Guy shook his head. ‘I am considering where my duty lies.’
‘Duty?’
‘It could only please Heaven to rid the earth of such vermin as you.’
‘God’s Blood!’ He jerked convulsively, and the Slut’s teeth clashed so close they grazed his nose. ‘You’ll answer to your father—’
Guy shook his head over the worthless threat. ‘D’you imagine he’ll avenge you?’ A monstrous temptation assailed him. ‘What’s to hinder me from killing you here and now for your mail and horse and gear, and riding to Bristol to join the Angevin?’ He lifted his sword, and looked along it to Lucifer’s frozen face, his lips twisting into a wolfish grin. ‘Justice, eh ? Isn’t that the way you reached knighthood?’
‘Near enough,’ Conan admitted, the mockery returning to his voice and face. ‘Have you guts for it?’
‘Give me one reason why I should spare you. You cannot pretend you are fit to live.’
‘No!’ said Helvie from behind him. ‘I’ll have no man killed for me.’
Guy had kept his back turned to her all the time, from some confused motives of delicacy and consideration, though he had all the time been conscious of her presence, aware of her every movement. He looked round almost unwillingly, afraid to see her diminished by Lucifer’s assault. She stood erect, gripping his cloak together under her chin with one hand, its folds covering her to her toes. Her face was white but resolute.
‘Your magnanimity is wasted, my lady.’
‘A gentleman doesn’t stain his sword in such trash.’
‘Gentleman!’ Conan flared. ‘A bastard that still stinks of the blacksmith’s forge!’
‘You must no
t stoop to his level, Master Guy.’ She did not even look at the routier.
Guy bent his head in formal acquiescence. ‘Since the injury was yours, retribution is yours to order. Up, lass! ’
The Slut snapped her teeth once more and bounded to his side, her tail waving gently in satisfaction at duty accomplished. Guy slapped her flank and fondled her ears as she pushed her head under his hand. ‘Good girl! There’s my brave lass!’ She grinned and lolled her tongue at Conan, who kept his wary gaze on her as he climbed to his feet. ‘Thank the lady for your life, and get out of our sight,’ Guy ordered, half-hoping for some gesture of attack that would justify his driving his sword through Lucifer’s face. His loathing pricked the mercenary, who turned red and then white, scowling from him to Helvie.
‘God’s Head, I see why you didn’t want the wench! What did you call her—a hulking shrew ? You may well prefer your whore Agnes! ’
He whirled before Guy could strike, flung himself astride his mount and spurred after his men. Guy started to follow, the sword trembling in his grip, and then checked, turning back to Helvie.
She stood rigid, staring at his face with eyes wide and dark in her pallor, and he reached a hand to her. ‘My lady—’ She struck it aside, and then crumpled inside his cloak, falling to her knees against the slender trunk of a young ash.
‘Don’t touch—another man—like him—’
Guy hesitated, and then dropped beside her. Her sobs tore at his own vitals. For a moment he flinched from fear of rejection, and then set his arm about her as he would have done to one of his sisters, drawing her against his shoulder to comfort her. This time she did not repulse him. As though recognizing that his hold was no more amorous than a brother’s she buried her face in his tunic and wept. Compassion and tenderness engulfed him. He murmured disjointed reassurances against her hair, and she fought to control herself, choking back sobs that died to gasps. Then the Slut growled warning, and his head jerked round.
Sweyn was on his feet, his dagger in his hand and his bloody face murderous. The Slut, between him and her master, was poised to lunge.
‘Put that knife up or she’ll rip your throat out,’ Guy recommended.
The lady lifted her face, caught her breath on a gulp, and gasped, ‘No! But for him—’
‘But for him you’d never ha’ been in no danger!’
‘He saved me—Master Guy, how do I thank you?’
‘Thank him, m’lady, when he’s laid his lewd tongue about you at his devil-father’s board, an’ brung them routiers on you?’
She pulled free, catching the cloak together, and huddled away from Guy, staring into his face. Her mouth quivered, and her eyes filled with tears. ‘Why did you say it? Why?’ she begged, her voice wavering with hurt and bewilderment.
He regarded her miserably, last night’s expediency showing more ugly than ever in her presence, but the truth was owed her. ‘Lord Reynald had learned of our encounters. He bade me seduce you and get you with child for vengeance on your father. I refused, and thought to turn aside his malice from us by—by—’ His tongue failed him.
‘By calling me a hulking shrew?’
‘Yes. I was drunk.’
‘And you do not desire me for your leman.’
He gazed into her face, tear-smudged but steadfast again, and paid the tribute due to her. ‘No man could dishonour you by such a thought, my lady. He who wins you to wife will be blessed by God.’
He stood up, bowed formally, and extended his hand to help her rise. Her fingers gripped fiercely; she was still shaking. Tears sparkled in her eyes, and she blinked them away; her lips trembled and then set tightly. Guy paid homage to her courage; most girls would have yielded to screeching hysterics before now. He signed to Sweyn to bring her horse. She adjusted the muffling folds of his cloak to free her hand for the reins, and Guy linked his hands and stooped to put her up. Settled in the saddle, she looked down into his face.
‘I owe you—I do thank you—’
‘Enough!’ He mounted and reined alongside. She glanced over her shoulder at the Collingford track and shivered, drawing closer.
‘I shall not leave you until I’ve delivered you into your mother’s care, my lady,’ he assured her.
‘I can guard me lady!’ Sweyn asserted.
‘I don’t doubt your loyalty, but you’re one man, and what’s a dagger against mail?’
Sweyn subsided, muttering maledictions. They rode in silence along the track until, almost within sight of Thorgastone, Helvie turned aside into a way so narrow that he had to fall back between her and Sweyn. He knew where he was, in that triangle of woodland that came down to the river on the village outskirts, land too rocky and broken for the plough. Axes had bitten a clearing in its midst, and set down on a level patch at its nearer end was a cottage more substantial than most. It sat on stone footings, its frame rose upright to golden thatch, its whitewash gleamed and its door was of planking, no flimsy hurdle. The garden beds, accommodating themselves to the ground, lay at a dozen levels, and a woman in a blue gown straightened herself from one and came to meet them, swinging a head of cabbage.
‘Tether the horses and wait, Sweyn,’ Helvie ordered in a strangled voice, slid from the saddle before either man could dismount to aid her and ran. Guy heard her sob. Hens scattered squawking. She reached her mother’s arms, and Guy dismounted and turned his back. He looped his reins over a branch and slipped the bit from his horse’s mouth to let him champ the dead grass still spiking up under the bushes. He foresaw a lengthy wait, and an unpleasant reckoning at its end; he could not depart until he had answered to Helvie’s mother for his dealings with her daughter.
The Slut growled. He swung round to face Sweyn’s glare. The groom jerked his hand from his dagger-haft, but the hatred in his gaze bristled the hairs on Guy’s nape.
‘Don’t try it.’
Sweyn spat at his feet and led Helvie’s mare a few yards away before tethering her. Guy scowled after him, deliberately unclenching his fists, that itched to pummel the head from the groom’s shoulders for the insult. Behind him he could hear Helvie’s voice, too low for words to reach him, and her mother’s murmured reassurances. After a brief silence came her comment.
‘Don’t take on so; you’ve kept your maidenhead. Go make yourself decent; men’re men, and the best of ’em easy tempted.’
Something between a sob and a laugh broke from Helvie, and her feet padded away. Guy caressed the Slut’s warm head, and as the door thudded braced his shoulders and turned to face her mother.
‘Master Guy!’
He walked up the path of flat stones. Helvie took her height and colouring from her father. Her mother was short and fair, with grey eyes and a rosy face faintly laughter-lined about eyes and mouth. She was comely still, but even in girlhood could never have been pretty, so that he wondered that Lord Henry, with his choice of all his wife’s serving-wenches, had picked this one to comfort his bed. She stood sturdily, still swinging the cabbage by its stalk, and surveyed him.
‘God save you, mistress.’
"Save you. We’re in your debt.’
‘I am here to give account of my fault—’
‘I reckons you was more fool than knave, and you’ve made amends. Come within.’
He made formal salutation as he ducked his head under the lintel. ‘God’s grace on this house.’
‘And on all who enter.’
Helvie, standing by the hearth, looked at him with the first shyness he had seen in her, and he smiled. She had changed her ruined gown for an old one of grey homespun, and memory of what he had seen of her reddened her cheeks. Guy unclasped his sword-belt, wrapped it round the sheathed blade and stood it inside the door, looking about him as his eyes accustomed themselves to the dimmer light within.
Lord Henry had made lavish provision for his discarded leman. A lidded iron pot hung over the central hearth, issuing wisps of steam, and about it ranged lesser pots, pans and skillets, a couple of trivets to set them on, a gridir
on and a frying-pan. A chest stood against one wall, with trestles and boards for a table. Above them ran a shelf loaded with cheeses, crocks, baskets and bags. In the peak of the rafters, thin smoke curling about them, hung three hams and two sides of bacon. The far end of the room had a loft of hurdles running across, and in the shadows beneath it loomed a fine bed, doubtless the one Lord Henry had shared with his paramour. Fresh rushes strewed the floor, and everything was scrupulously neat. His mother would have approved of this housekeeping.
She waved him to a stool. ‘We owe thanks to God and to you that you were in time. But if Helvie’s not safe riding her father’s roads—you reckon that routier’ll try again?’
Guy shook his head. ‘Leave him to me.’
‘You’ll not challenge him?’ Helvie cried in alarm.
Her mother rebuked her with a glance. ‘Men’s business. Don’t meddle.’
Guy repeated, ‘Leave him to me, Mistress—?’
‘Elswyth. Aye, he’s yours. But where’s my manners? Sit you down, Master Guy. You’ll take a bite and sup with us? Draw us all some ale, Helvie. And my baking’s just about done.’
Helvie moved to a barrel in the corner. Elswyth swept hot embers from a large earthenware bowl inverted on the hearthstone, and disclosed under it half a dozen small loaves that added their mouth-watering fragrance to those of onions, apples and ale. She picked them up in a cloth and juggled them to cool. The Slut sat up and watched her with interest, and she smiled, set down the loaves and fetched a pork shank-bone with a few tags of cooked flesh still adhering to it.
‘Here you are, my girl. It’ll taste better than that routier.’
The bitch turned to Guy and made no move to touch the bone. He reached for it, and tossed it to the Slut. She swept her tail in acknowledgement and settled to work.
‘Aye, you done well to train her so. Does your heart good to see her enjoy it,’ Elswyth observed. She had learned the graces in a noble household, and offered water to wash before she split a loaf, dribbled honey from a crock, and set it hot and oozing in Guy’s hands. Helvie brought a pitcher of ale and accepted her portion, and they sat opposite each other chewing on the hot crusts and licking up the sticky trickles that escaped over their fingers, while Elswyth shredded cabbage for the pot.