Gervaise thundered by them, perilously close to their horses, his big chestnut stallion tossing his head at the bruising pace his rider set. Le Comte d'Argenlac was a reckless rider, and only his great skill kept him from killing himself in the saddle. He yelled something incoherent to de la Sept- Nuit, waved hugely, and spurred past them.
Far ahead, beyond the trees, the young stag leaped a fence and bounded over the stream beyond, onto the holdings of le Duc de Ruisseau-Royal, headed for the dense forest that stretched away into the north.
"That will teach us a lesson." De la Sept-Nuit laughed, raising his voice enough to carry to Madelaine. "Is your mount up to it? Take care, or you'll come to grief."
"I trust he is sound," Madelaine said through clenched teeth, not so loudly that her unwanted companion could hear her. She was glad now that she had not insisted on riding her Spanish mare, for this grueling pace would have sapped her strength dangerously.
They were out of the trees now, crossing the open meadow to the fence that marked the limits of Gervaise's land. Already the owner himself was across it, and was wisely fording the stream beyond, holding his sweating horse on a direct point to the opposite bank.
Now Madelaine felt her English hunter gather under her, and she tightened her leg on the hom of her sidesaddle. The horse surged upward, and Madelaine leaned forward against the neck of her hunter; then, as he crested his jump, she stretched backward in her saddle, her head almost brushing the horse's rump. Immediately the horse had touched all four feet to the ground, she came up straight, shortened her rein, and urged her mount toward the stream.
De la Sept-Nuit's Hanoverian was right behind her, and le Chevalier shouted to Madelaine, his enthusiasm getting enough ahead of his judgment that his horse almost stumbled, and de la Sept-Nuit had to collect his mount to keep him from going down on his knees.
Gervaise was quite out of sight in the wood now, and the rest of the hunt had fallen behind. A crisp breeze had come up, rustling the leaves around them and sending the heavy clouds scudding across the sky.
Madelaine glanced around swiftly, and felt a twinge of fear, worried that she might be caught alone with de la Sept- Nuit. Her horse was into the stream now, and she held him on course to the far bank. She found herself wanting to spur the hunter hard into the forest, to get a great deal of distance between her and the young nobleman who was still less than two arm lengths away. There was a resounding crash from the fence, and two more riders parted company with their horses. Madelaine felt her fright congeal in a solid lump at the base of her throat.
Over the stream at last, she pushed on toward the forest, but knew that Donatien de la Sept-Nuit was enjoying the chase now, playing with her as a cat plays with a mouse. For a moment she considered challenging him, demanding to know what he wanted of her, but then dismissed the thought almost as quickly as she had formed it. She had no desire to put herself at such a great disadvantage, for it would be a simple thing for de la Sept-Nuit to compromise her, and then there would be no choice but to marry him.
The trees were quite near, and she sank her spurred heel into her hunter's flank, and felt satisfaction as she drew away from de la Sept-Nuit's Hanoverian. Once in the woods, she would have a chance to put more distance between them. She ducked her head in anticipation of the many low limbs that waited in the waning light
It was cold under the trees, and she was forced to rein in to a canter. The ground here grew rougher, more uneven, and her hunter was beginning to labor under the furious pace. Madelaine set her hands on the reins, grimly determined to ride the hunt out. She knew that Gervaise was ahead of her, and she told herself that her aunt's husband would not refuse her the protection she so ardently sought.
A swift glance back over her shoulder told her that she was indeed pulling ahead of de la Sept-Nuit. She could hear the steady pound of his horse's hooves, but he was far enough behind her that she began to hope that the track would offer her a chance to be free of him. She looked about her, ready to take full advantage of any opportunity the woods presented.
The track wound deeper into the forest, and began to lose its clear markings. Huge pines and ancient oaks commanded the view, dominating the dusk they themselves created. Here the track became more tortuous, winding among the formidable old trees.
Ahead, the track forked, one branch leading up a slope and away from the marked pathway. The other branch kept to the lower way, a little broader than the other, clearly marked, and free from rocks. The disturbance on the second path showed that several horsemen had come that way no very long time before.
Madelaine did not hesitate. She dragged heavily on the rein, tugging the hunter toward the upward path. The big English horse faltered, then raced up the narrow way, flecks of sweat foaming on his neck as he bounded over the tumbled rocks.
At the top of the rise, with a screen of trees between her and the main track, Madelaine reined in, holding her restless, panting mount still while she listened for de la Sept-Nuit to pass. She had almost convinced herself that she wanted to follow him when she recalled the many hoofprints on the track below.
In vain she told herself that it was another hunting party, that she was letting her apprehension overwhelm her, that her aunt's husband would be waiting for her, solicitous of her well-being.
Tired, worried, far from Sans Désespoir, Madelaine took stock of herself. She knew she could return to the main track and follow it to where Gervaise and de la Sept-Nuit were, but something told her she must not do that. After a moment, she slipped out of the saddle, twitched the reins over her horse's head, and began to lead him along the lesser track, wondering where it might go. She knew that she would have to walk the hunter a way, for the big horse was too hot; his mottled gray coat was dark with sweat, and his breath came in great heaving gusts. She tugged on the rein, and began to walk.
It was awkward going, for the long train of her habit was forever catching on things, and the hunter was restive. She began to wonder if she would find her way to safety that night, or if she was fated to spend the time wandering the forest. The wind, too, was stronger, and the trees moaned to one another, lashing the limbs like flagellants doing penance. Where the sky was visible through the branches, there were threatening clouds, growing darker now that the afternoon was so far advanced.
She had gone perhaps a quarter of a mile when she heard the sound of hoofbeats not far behind her. She paused, and put her hand to the hunter's nostrils to keep him from whinnying. It seemed a ridiculous precaution for her, since the moment before, she had been anxious to be found, but now there was a grue down her spine, and her heart beat more quickly.
Listening carefully, Madelaine was sure she heard four or five horses. With the three casualties, that was the number of riders who had set out on the hunt. It could not be those horsemen who came after her.
On impulse, she tugged her hunter off the trail and into a thicket some way back from the track. She stood there in the dim light, not daring to move. She was grateful for the fallen leaves now, because the hunter had left no telltale prints leading to her hiding place.
The sounds of the chase grew louder, and then six horsemen burst into sight, their faces hard and their horses steaming. Madelaine felt herself grow cold, for the rider at the lead of the group was le Baron Clotaire de Saint Sebastien, and beside de la Sept-Nuit was Baron Beauvrai.
Madelaine's eyes grew wide, and her face paled. She put a hand to her throat and wished that she was not trembling. Saint Sebastien! Dread weakened her knees, and she felt herself slump against the shoulder of her hunter. She knew she must get away. She must not be caught by those desperate men.
They were gone now, and only the sound of their plunging horses kept her aware of the great danger that confronted her. She told herself to think clearly, to put her fright aside so that her wits would save her. She heard the hoofbeats growing fainter, and as they receded, she felt her courage return.
She secured the reins to a tree branch so that her horse
could not wander, and then she raised her voluminous velvet skirt and began to untie her four petticoats. One by one she dragged them to her ankles and stepped out of them until there was a large heap of crumpled linen at her feet. She was colder now, but her movements were freer. Bending down once more, she pulled the little knife strapped to the top of her boot from its sheath. Her father had given her that knife so that she could cut herself free from the stirrup should she ever fall. Now she put it to another use, cutting long strips from her petticoats and spreading them around her like diapers.
It was hard work, and she felt herself grow tired long before the task was done. But at last there were enough of the linen rags for her to wrap each of her hunter's feet in muffling cloth, and she set to work on that task. She was certain that Saint Sebastien would still be searching for her, and she did not want chance noise to bring him to her side.
It was almost dark when she finished swathing and tying the horse's hooves, and she was much colder now. It was going to be a hard night. And she would have to ride through it if she were to escape her enemies.
She was about to pull herself up into the saddle once again when it struck her that the men hunting for her would be looking for a figure riding sidesaddle. She nodded to herself and unbuckled the girths of the saddle and pulled it from her hunter's back. She put it down with some little regret. It was a fine saddle, and had been made for her. If there was rain that night—and a covert look toward the tiny patch of sky overhead confirmed there would be—the saddle would be ruined. She thrust it under the thickest branches of a low- growing pine and told herself that it might not be too badly damaged.
With hardly more than a sigh, she cut the heavy velvet skirt up the front and up the back, then bent over one last time to secure the flapping hem around each ankle, making herself surprisingly serviceable breeches.
At last she was ready. She unfastened the reins from the branch, and taking a handful of mane in her left hand, vaulted clumsily onto the hunter's back. It took her a few moments to accustom herself to riding astride and bareback, but she had been excellently trained, and it did not take her long to get her balance and adjust her seat for the ride ahead.
The hunter was fairly rested, and did not object to moving off into the deep woods. She tried to glance back toward the track, but the dusk was thick, and the track was lost in the gloom.
It was more than twenty minutes later that she heard the sounds of pursuit once more. She pulled in the hunter and listened carefully, trying to discover where the hoofbeats were coming from. She thought for a moment that she had been mistaken and that it was only the sound of branches knocking together, but it was not so. The next gust of wind brought the sound to her, louder. She realized, as she listened, that the hunters had fanned out and were moving through the forest in a wide swath. She threw her head back to stifle a sob, and felt despair grow in her like some exotic disease. Her escape seemed so useless, so meaningless. But the memory of the cruel smile on Saint Sebastien's face forced her to action. Cautiously she urged the big horse forward, hardly daring to go faster than a walk.
Night had settled in in earnest, and the dark slowed her progress even more. The third time she found herself almost swept from her mount's back, she was ready to weep with vexation. Only the continuing sound of the search near her kept her silent.
There were scratches on her face and arms, and her hair was disheveled now that her hat was gone. Even one of her pigskin gloves was torn, and she felt her hand growing cold as the wind touched her skin and lashed out at the trees, bending them before its invisible might.
Suddenly Madelaine saw a glimmer of movement off to her left, and her horse shied, snorting.
There was a soft moaning in the forest as the trees braced themselves against the onslaught of the gale.
Madelaine reached for her boot to grip the knife there, thinking that if she were to be ravished by Saint Sebastien's men, she would at least fight them until she was overpowered. She might even be able to kill one or two of them before they could rape her.
A shape in the brush moved nearer, and her horse almost bolted.
She sat up straighter, holding the sliding, frightened hunter firmly in check. She looked through the woods, and in the dark discerned a low, gray shape crouching in the underbrush. Her eyes narrowed as she stared; then, trembling violently, she saw it plainly and knew it was a wolf.
Involuntarily she looked about swiftly for more of the sinister gray forms, but she could see no others. Her pulse was as loud as the wind in her ears, but she held her fear as firmly as she held her horse.
The hoofbeats behind her were nearer, and she could hear an occasional shout as Saint Sebastien and his men called to one another in the darkness. Carried on the wind, their words had the eerie sound of madness in them, as if the air itself was touched with their malevolence.
Now the wolf circled in front of her, keeping well back from the terrified horse. It whined, then yelped, starting away into the dark, then once again circling back toward Madelaine, never coming close enough to panic her mount into bolting.
Madelaine hesitated, studying the strange behavior of the wolf. She had almost satisfied herself that it was alone, that no pack ran with it, when it began to bark. It was a strange sound, not like the friendly tumult of dogs. This was lorn, ageless, as desolate as the mountain crags, as primeval as the close-crowded trees around her. Something about that wild, lonely cry tugged at her heart, and she longed for one insane moment to be able to run on four paws away from the horror behind her.
The hunting party grew nearer, and Madelaine fought down her rising panic. She forced herself to watch the wolf, looking for that one moment when the strange gray animal would be far enough away that she could push past it without terrifying her horse still further. Thinking of the monstrous men who chased her, and comparing them to the gaping mouth of the wolf, Madelaine knew that she would much prefer to take her chances with the wolf. That, at least, would be a clean death. Or she might be able to kill it. As her horse reared, she wondered if she could force him close enough to the wolf to trample it into the ground with flashing hooves.
With a kind of desperate bravado, she reached up with one hand and tugged the comb out of her hair, so that her dark tresses streamed out behind her on the wind. She held on to her plunging horse with her knees, waiting.
Now the wolf had circled back again and was whining more loudly, starting off into the darkness of the forest, then moving back where she could see it once again.
Quite suddenly Madelaine remembered something that Saint-Germain had said to her in that elegant little room at Hôtel Transylvania. The words sounded in her mind as clearly as if he had spoken them in her ear. "Your soul is like a sword, bright, shining, and will always pierce through deception to the truth. Do not doubt what it tells you, ever, Madelaine. "
She shot one swift look over her shoulder, then kicked at her horse's sides, moving away from the hunters into the dark, following the liquid gray shape of the wolf.
It seemed to her that she had been following the wolf for half the night, even farther into the forest, when she saw ahead of her the looming shape of a building. She slowed her horse and carefully approached the structure, saying nothing, making no noise that might alert the inhabitants that she was near.
The first few drops of rain had fallen, and Madelaine was achingly exhausted. She circled the building once and was startled to realize that it was an ancient church, abandoned, yet intact, its heavy arches and squat pillars indicating its great age.
Gratefully she slid off the horse, and after looking over her shoulder nervously, pushed on the thick oaken door of the church.
Old metal screamed as the doors were opened, but the ancient hinges grudgingly admitted her. She stared into the darkness of the narthex, denser than the dark of the rainy night On impulse she turned and tugged at the bridle, pulling the English hunter into the church. His muffled hooves made little sound on the stone floor, and he whick
ered once, before coming to stand in the little space of the narthex.
Madelaine secured one rein to the door bolt, then turned into the church itself, noticing that in spite of its obvious disuse, the altar was still in place, and there was a slight smell of incense on the musty air. She walked up the aisle, and genuflected automatically before the crucifix, murmuring a brief, incoherent prayer of thanks.
When she turned again, she saw him.
"Madelaine," he said in his deepest tone, and held out his small hands to her. He was dressed in a military-like uniform, with somewhat loose breeches and a heavily frogged tunic of bottle green on black. He wore high cavalry boots and a fur hat, and the smile in his dark eyes filled her heart.
"Saint-Germain," she cried, and ran into his arms, pressing her face into the curve of his neck.
"Hush, hush," he whispered, holding her tightly against him. "You must not be afraid, Madelaine, my heart. You are safe here. Saint Sebastien will not come onto consecrated ground."
The words caught her, and she said rather wildly, "If you are here, this cannot be consecrated ground. The Sisters have said—"
Saint-Germain gave a bitter laugh. "The Sisters do not know everything. All of my kind can walk on consecrated ground. Most of us are buried in it." He felt her stiffen in his embrace. "There, I have said it, and you are horrified." He freed himself from her arms and went toward the altar. "It is not safe to have much light in here, for though the windows are small and high, it is possible we may be discovered." He pulled flint from his sleeve, and steel. "There are a few oil lamps in the choir," he said by explanation as he struck the spark.
In a moment a faint, soft glow suffused the choir, and Madelaine could see him more clearly. She noticed he was rather leaner in the face than she had seen him last, and he moved as one who had run a long way.
Hotel Transylvania Page 14