by Tamara Leigh
Baron Wulfrith was wrong. She would do well to fear him. And, perhaps more, Sir Abel.
Even more, you would do well to pray, the nearly beloved Sister Clare whispered across her thoughts.
Helene smiled in remembrance of the strict nun who had been so tall and thin that there had been very little difference between her forward-facing figure and her profile. Despite words that could be sharp and her determination that no girl at the convent should grow so fond of her as to look upon her as a replacement for her mother, Sister Clare had been as beloved as one could become who did not wish to be so loved. And now she was gone, news of her passing having been delivered a fortnight past.
Helene swallowed against the painful tightness in her throat. It was years since the nun’s words had come so clearly and often—words of admonishment, encouragement, counsel.
Pray, wee Helene, she urged now. Life is too hard to not avail one’s self of the greatest love.
Pulling her hands from between her knees where she had pressed them for warmth, Helene put her palms together. First she prayed for John whom she had not wanted to leave behind though he had been enthusiastic about the offer made by Baron Lavonne and his wife for him to remain at Broehne Castle. Then she prayed for those of the household whom her son would surely test. Next, she asked that Abel Wulfrith respond well to her ministrations. And as sleep pulled her under, she prayed that when she left Castle Soaring she would be no worse in heart and soul than when she had come to it.
“I am dreaming,” she whispered, but the words had no effect on the scene before her.
Just as forcefully, she felt hands upon her. Just as fearfully, she sought the gaze of her son who huddled where she had secreted him before the door had burst inward. Just as desperately, she shook her head to remind him that he must not move or let the smallest sound escape. Just as cruelly, she was dragged outside, kicking and clawing and near choking on the cloth shoved into her mouth. Just as shockingly, she found herself face to face with Sir Robert, Baron Lavonne’s misbegotten brother. Just as carelessly, she was tossed over the fore of his saddle and carried away from the little boy who might forever be marked by the night’s violence.
Awaken, Helene. Open your eyes and see ’tis no more.
With a gasp, she sat up, forced her lids to rise, and found before her a different day, a different place, and far different circumstances.
“Thank you, Lord,” she breathed. Feeling small but safe in the midst of the many beginning to rouse in the great hall, she embraced her knees, pressed her forehead to them, and gently rocked herself.
Chapter Two
Embrace death.
It was as Abel Wulfrith had aspired to do, but they had refused to let him go, plying him with medicinals and drink and words they believed would raise him from a body so broken it would never again serve as it had once done.
He clenched one hand into a fist and raised the other that no longer did his bidding. And never again would, according to the physician. As he stared at the flushed, newly formed scar that divided the upper half of his palm from the lower, he again heard the words he longed to put a blade through, most loudly those spoken by his brother, the least welcome of all who had denied him the respite of abandoning this life.
Garr Wulfrith’s words had not reeked of pleading or encouragement or prayer like those of others who had come around his bed, sat hours beside him, gripped his hand, and touched his brow. Rather, the head of the Wulfrith family had been resolute and demanding and might even be said to be cruel if Abel did not know him as he did.
Unfortunately, it did little good to be so well acquainted with him, for some instinct—some unanswered part of Abel—had listened. But for what? That a once-esteemed warrior might face the thousands upon thousands of days before him as a pitiful excuse for a man?
“Embrace death,” he muttered the creed he had often extolled, though never in regard to his own life or the lives of the young men he trained into knights. Always it had been directed outward—a reminder that if one did not seek an opponent’s death in battle, if one wavered and cast mercy where it was not due, such a fool would yield up his own life.
But on days like this, like every day since Garr had dragged Abel from the bed that should have been the last place he drew breath, resentment welled that he had not turned his creed inward. That he did want the next breath and the next and the one after that, even if they added up to endless days and nights, even if every step in and through and out of them was not without hitch or burn.
Thinking it would not take much more force to break the teeth he ground so hard his jaws ached, he stared at the dawn-drenched wood beyond the window and pushed his one functioning hand down his tunic-covered thigh. Its journey was soon arrested, not only by the transition from smooth muscle to thickly ridged scar, but the pain his probing fingers sent deep to the bone.
“God Almighty,” he groaned and dropped his chin to his chest and squeezed his eyes closed. It required several deep breaths before he was finally able to continue his exploration of the length and width and weakness of his pieced together flesh that ran mid-thigh to just below the knee.
“Look at it,” he growled. “Know it well, for ‘tis your lifelong companion.” And this one, unlike Rosamund, the wife he had buried, would never set him free.
He released his breath in a rush, but it did not blow away memories that played against the backs of his lids as they had done often since his life had nearly been sundered beyond the walls of Castle Soaring.
Opening his eyes, he dragged up the hem of his tunic and, still loath to gaze upon his leg, sought the old scar that curved up from his hip to his lower rib, and which had proved nearly as dire as those that now ridged his body as if his flesh were a newly furrowed field.
When it required no shift of the eyes to move from the pale scar that had formed years ago to fix on the more recent injury dealt not by the wife who had wielded a meat dagger against him but a brigand with a sword, he thought he might laugh. And were he a bit angrier, a bit more bitter, quite a bit full of wine, he would have.
Unbeknownst to him until this day when finally he had determined he would witness the work of the three brigands who had taken him to ground, the line of stitched flesh cut through the lowermost portion of the old scar, forming the crossbar of what appeared to be an upended crucifix.
Did not the priests tell of one of Jesus’ disciples who, facing crucifixion, asked that he be suspended upside down, believing he was unworthy to die as his Lord had done?
Abel grunted. In his own case, it was the crucifix that was set wrong side up. And he lived, though how it was possible, even with the strongest of wills to give death one’s back, he did not know. Michael D’Arci, his brother-in-law and keeper of Castle Soaring, was said to be a fine physician, but surely his patient had lost too much blood and the blades had cut too near vital organs for him to be on this side of life, let alone able to rise from bed without aid as he had done this day.
For which you have much to be grateful, he heard his mother’s voice, she whose prayers at his bedside had not consoled but, rather, made him wish her away.
He lowered his tunic and once more reached to his thigh, only to arrest his hand and turn his gaze out the window to the wood where sunlight now streamed through branches and glided over tree tops. It had happened out there, though then the moon had been full up, its light running the blade he had swung time and again.
Remembering the black and gray night that had known only the color of blood, he curled his fingers around an imagined hilt. Or tried to, for his sword hand trembled as the fingers strained to meet the thumb.
Lifting his hand before his face, he strained harder despite the tearing pain that warned he would likely cause further damage, but the fingers would draw no nearer. Though that night he had cut down men far less versed in sword skill and delivered them over death’s threshold, that battle—that life—was in his past. This was his present.
“Curse all!” h
e spat.
“I would myself be tempted.”
Abel stilled and, in the silence, heard panting—his own, coming so hard and loud that it had masked the sound of the door opening and the tread of the man whose boots ground the dry rushes that would have been freshened on the day past had Abel allowed it.
Recalling the frightened maids who had fled in response to the shouts of the one who, heretofore, had ignored their comings and goings, he felt a pang of remorse. And wondered why he should feel anything other than anger.
“As you can see,” he said, keeping his back to his brother, “‘tis not a good time for me to grant you an audience.”
“Then it is good I do not wish an audience.”
What, then? For what did he—?
“Worry not,” Garr said. “I vow I will not allow my brother to bite you.”
Only then did Abel become aware of other footfalls. Forgetting the injury to his leg, he turned so quickly he lurched and had to grab the sill to avoid further humiliation.
“What is this?” he demanded, causing the maid who approached the brazier with burdened arms to falter and the other to nearly lose her grip on the broom poised to sweep away the aged rushes.
“’Tis chill in here,” Garr said where he had positioned himself to the right of the threshold, arms crossed over his chest.
“Is it?” Abel snapped, though now he did feel the cold where he stood before the window from which he had thrown back the shutters.
“Worse, it stinks.” Garr hitched an eyebrow. “I was not told your sense of smell was also afflicted.”
Abel narrowed his eyes. When his displeasure but caused his brother to raise the other eyebrow, he gritted his teeth and glanced at the maid who attempted to kindle the fire in the brazier that had burned so hot on the night past; next, the woman whose efficiency with the broom was no match for Abel’s impatience.
“This can be done later, Garr.” He knew it was disrespectful to address his brother by his Christian name rather than “Wulfrith” in the presence of non-family members, but he did not care.
“Nay, it cannot.” Garr lowered his gaze over Abel and paused on his bare legs. “’Tis good to see you willingly out of bed, but it would be better to see you fully clothed.”
Though Abel knew the lower portion of the injury to his leg was visible beneath the tunic’s hem, he did not turn away.
Garr jerked his chin toward the chest against the wall. “If ‘tis too much for you, I could ask one of these young women to raise the lid and search out clean braies and hose. And tunic, of course, for that one might best be burned.”
Feeling his upper lip peel back, Abel rejoined it with the lower. He knew he was being baited, that Garr believed anger was better than brooding.
When finally he could speak again without presenting as outraged or, worse, petulant, he said, “I thank you, Brother, but I can attend to my own needs.” Unfortunately, he could make no move to do so without casting more light upon his infirmity and arousing pity, the scent of which might ignite the smoldering within and far surpass the speed with which the maid coaxed the brazier to life.
Thus, Abel stared at Garr and Garr stared back, and all the while Abel tried not to envy or resent his brother whose own battle wounds, once healed, had no ill effect upon his ability to take up sword and defend family and home. Beneath his garments, Garr might be abundantly scarred, but he was as able as ever and worthy of the coveted Wulfrith dagger he wore upon his belt. Abel Wulfrith was not, and the self pity that ran through him burned like bile full up in his throat.
He swallowed hard. With much consideration of the leg that would betray him again given the chance, he turned back to the window and tried not to think on his own jeweled dagger that he distantly remembered having knocked to the floor during those first days when he had risen to consciousness long enough to take notice of his losses. Was it his sister, Beatrix, who had laid the sheathed dagger upon his chest, who had sought to assure him he would be back at arms before long?
Abel closed his eyes and, when he opened them again, determinedly set them on the inner bailey below. The rousing of day had stirred it to life, and he found this unremarkable scene that he had not witnessed in far too many weeks strangely fascinating. Unlike his life, the lives of those whose legs quickly traversed the beaten dirt ground had not come to a halt, and he wondered how many times others had looked upon him as he now looked upon the castle folk, oblivious to the suffering of the unseen observer. Oblivious to a life lost.
Abel did not know how much time passed in the space between his brother’s entrance and the hand that gripped his shoulder, but some part of him had been aware of the broom’s shush and scrape, the brazier’s warmth that radiated upon his back even as the risen sun breathed upon his face, the scent of fresh rushes and the herbs scattered over them, the slosh of water, the creak of the bed, and the rustle of sheets. More, he was aware of his legs, the uninjured one that cramped from long supporting most of his weight, the lame one that throbbed and ached at being forced to remain upright.
“’Tis done,” Garr said. “Now you must only decide whether to bathe yourself or allow the healer to assist you.”
Abel snorted. “As already told, I can attend—”
A chill spread across his every pore. Garr could not possibly mean her. He would not have brought her here—unless their sister, Gaenor, who had recently wed Baron Christian Lavonne and believed she saw more than there was to see, had told their older brother of the healer and her son.
Holding his feet tight to the floor lest his leg further shamed him, Abel looked around. “Of what do you speak?”
Garr squeezed Abel’s shoulder and stepped to the side. “Helene from the village of Tippet has come.”
Chapter Three
She stood inside the chamber to the right of the open doorway, hands clasped at her waist, chin up, dark red hair woven into a fat plait draped over one shoulder.
The chill left Abel, and though he knew the color that rose up his neck was mostly born of anger at having his wishes ignored, he knew it also bore shades of shame.
The last time he had seen—and held—this woman, he had been a man in full. One whose hands knew well the ridges and furrows of a sword hilt. One with two legs solid beneath him. One who had thought it a worthy challenge to face not one but two opponents at once. One whose countenance many a woman had found pleasing.
He was no longer any of those, and yet the one who stood a half dozen strides from him did not wince or look away, as if accustomed to what her eyes beheld—so accustomed that no pity shone from her. And it was the lack of that detestable emotion that permitted him to contain the anger that might otherwise have burst from him.
“I shall leave you to decide,” Garr said and strode from the chamber.
Helene, all five feet and few of her, was the first to speak, though she did so only after his brother’s footsteps receded. “How shall I best assist you, Sir Abel?”
Her effortless Norman-French surprised him, though not as much as it had that first time when she had eschewed the language of the commoner in favor of his own. More, he was unsettled by how familiar her voice sounded though it was some time since last he had heard it.
Keenly—painfully—aware of his every move, he turned to fully face her. “You are not needed.”
She glanced at his injured hand that, until that moment, he had not realized was attempting to form a fist. “Would it not be better said that I am not wanted?”
Though tempted to shout down the implication that he was incapable of caring for himself, he controlled his emotions and, feeling the strain upon his hand, eased his fingers. “Regardless, you may go.”
“That I may, for it was my decision to grant your brother’s request.”
“Why did you?” He did not mean to ask, and yet the question rose so swiftly he could not check it.
“I am in your debt.”
She surely referred to her son, John, whom she had been forced to
leave behind weeks—or was it months?—past, although Abel had initially believed she had abandoned him. “Your boy but followed me around like a puppy,” he said, “and I did little more than toss him scraps. For that, you owe me naught.”
Her breath caught. Though he knew it was cruel to equate her child with a dog, he determined that if it offended her sufficiently that she was all the sooner gone, it would serve.
She stared at him and, when no response was forthcoming, he gave what he hoped was the final push. “However, if you insist upon being in my debt, I vow your absence will be payment enough, for I am most eager to see your back.”
She straightened her shoulders and stepped forward. “Ah, but then Lord D’Arci would have to continue tending you when it is the business of Castle Soaring to which he ought to turn his attention.”
Abel narrowed his gaze on her. “Just as I do not require your services, I no longer require his. Now leave.”
Still she came, the coarse, heavy material of her homespun gown rustling almost obscenely upon one so slight and comely. As she neared, she slowly raised her chin to hold her gaze to his, and he noted the shadows beneath her dark blue eyes that told she had either not slept well or been ill. Regardless, she was more lovely than he remembered and looked younger than the twenty and few years he had guessed her to be when first they had met. Of course, as Sir Robert’s captive, her days had surely been hard.
She halted before him and, when she reached forward and lifted his crippled hand, he was so stunned by her boldness that, before he could wrench free, she turned his palm up and bent her head to it. Worse, his traitorous fingers curled toward hers as if they remembered them though never had he held her hand. For that, he was almost glad his range of motion was so limited.
She probed the flesh on either side of the scar and looked up. “It heals well.”