by Tamara Leigh
If only I had taken the road. If only I had not wasted precious time burying—
No, that she had done right.
Deciding firmer footing would serve her better, even if only to delay the inevitable, she veered toward the road and spared a moment of wonder for how quickly she was yet able to move despite labored breathing and fear bordering on terror.
When her feet met the hard, packed dirt of the road, she released her hold on the hood, reached her legs longer, and wished her mantle flying out behind her would stay as near as her skirts that slapped her ankles and the Wulfrith—
The dagger. Could she use it? If she was to have a chance of getting back to her boy who needed his mother, she might have to.
Dear Lord, save me. For John, above all. For whatever good I can yet do and be.
There came more shouts and she glanced around. The men of Parsings had regained the road and drew near, Irwyn in the lead with his long-reaching legs. Indeed, if she abandoned her flight and all hope with it, he would be upon her before she could finish reciting the Paternoster.
She strained forward, wishing she had been born with longer limbs the same as Lady Gaenor—and greater strength, for the road ascended and she felt the strain in every muscle.
Promising her failing body there would be no rise over this one, she was slow to assign meaning to the vibrations beneath her feet and the pound of hooves, but as she crested the road and began the descent, she saw approaching riders round a far bend in the road.
Lord, I am bound ahead and behind!
Longing for night, no matter how cold or wet if it but afforded her the smallest chance of escape, she lunged to the left. The uneven, obstacle-strewn floor of the wood welcomed her back by once more testing her footing, but she managed to remain upright and moving forward. Still, terror was tight on her heels and she saw little more than what lay directly ahead, barely heard the breath that tore in and out of her chest, vaguely felt the cool air that swirled around her and the heat of her exertions rippling over her skin.
“Helene!”
She gasped. Faint though the voice was, she had heard it. Had she not? Perhaps she merely hoped to hear the familiarity and concern in each sound from which her name was formed. It nearly stopped her, but from within and much louder she heard: Do not stop! Not until you reach John! Thus, when her ears again captured her shouted name, she did not turn aside.
But something else stopped her, catching her by the throat, snapping her head back, and slinging her to the ground. The force knocked the breath from her, but more than the need to breathe, she knew the need to bring the dagger to hand, even if there was not enough time or space, even if it would be turned on her.
Desperate sounds struggling to break from her throat, she fumbled at her skirts and closed her hand around the hilt. However, no sooner did she sweep the blade upward than her assailant fell upon her and reached for it.
It was Petronilla’s husband, his long legs that had outdistanced the others, he who had caught hold of her mantle and brought her to ground.
“Give over!” Irwyn barked, nearly making her gag when she finally filled her lungs with air tainted by the odors of his breath and body.
Though she did not believe she had any real hope of escape with the rest of her pursuers soon upon her, she hearkened back to Abel’s instruction on how to defend herself in close quarters—to use whatever means were available to her. As it was her right hand that held Irwyn’s attention where he stretched over her to seize hold of it, her left arm remained free and unguarded.
Helene bent it, put the greater part of her strength behind it, and arced her elbow upward. She did not know if she first heard or felt the crack of the man’s nose, but she saw the spray of crimson, his gaping mouth as he shouted with pain, and the topple of his body that freed her.
Holding tight to the dagger, she rolled to the side. And felt the pound and heard the sound of hooves. Then the voices. Everywhere. Shouts. Grunts. Curses. Cries.
“Helene!”
That voice again, but it could not be. Telling herself time was better spent fleeing than wasted on wishes, she rose to her knees. And there, heading for her, were the others who came on foot. Just beyond them, sword edges catching what dull light remained of the day, were those who came on horseback—three, four, and more…
There would be no more running, but she forced herself upright and slid her gaze down the unsullied blade to her bloodless fingers that had become one with the jeweled hilt. It would be taken from her as Abel had warned, but not easily.
Drawing a deep breath, she raised her eyes and startled when she saw the scene before her had taken a turn, one so peculiar she could almost believe she had quenched her terrible thirst with an excess of wine.
Those on foot had changed course, veering to the right as if to flee those who were mounted. And, as she blinked in an attempt to set the scene right, three of those on horseback broke from the others and headed straight for her.
Again, she heard her name shouted, this time a moment ahead of movement to her left. She jerked her chin around and saw Irwyn had regained his feet. The lower half of his face and the neck of his tunic wet with blood that ran from his nostrils, he started toward her.
She thrust the dagger in his direction. “Go home to Petronilla, Irwyn!”
He hesitated, and she knew he longed to return to Parsings as much as she wished him to, but still he came, pulling an arm from beneath his worn mantle and, elbow to wrist, dragging it beneath his bloodied nose.
Helene shook her head. “I would do you no more harm, Irwyn. Pray—”
“Aye, best you pray, for ‘twas you who put my family in danger, and now I—”
“Aside, Helene!”
She snapped her chin around and beheld the face of one whose voice she had heard, who should not be here, whose teeth were bared as he urged his destrier forward, whose sword was drawn back to deal a blow from which his prey would not rise.
“Nay!” she cried and, a moment ahead of acknowledging the risk of being trampled by the beast’s hooves, lunged at Irwyn and fell hard against him.
Chapter Thirty
Merciful Lord!
As the destrier’s hooves cleared Helene by a sliver’s width—the blade a hand’s width—Abel experienced a moment of wonder at having first acknowledged the Lord in delivering this woman who might otherwise have been lost.
Her attempt to protect the miscreant best left for pondering when the danger was past, he yanked the reins. His mount whinnied and reared, but before its hooves landed, he was out of the saddle, as were Durand and Christian Lavonne.
Abel reached Helene first, but as he bent to pull her from atop the man, she rolled onto her back and threw her arms out to the sides to shield the one who lay wide-eyed and stunned alongside her.
“Do him no harm!” she commanded in the language of the commoner, hair wild about her smudged face, eyes large, fingers yet gripping that with which she had fended off the man she now shielded—the Wulfrith dagger he had given her and feared she would have long ago denied herself for the memory of him.
“Do not!” she said again.
Understanding well the treachery of men—that the one beside her could easily turn the situation to his advantage and end her life—Abel swept his right hand around her wrist against which the dagger’s pommel pressed, wrenched her upright and to the side, and swung his sword toward the man’s neck.
Helene dropped to her knees alongside Abel and dragged on her arm to try to break his hold which, months earlier, would have been possible. “’Tis of my doing,” she cried, “not his.”
He knew better than to hesitate, yet he stayed his hand despite the familiar—near comforting—rush of bloodlust that warned him to think death as he stared at the one who ought to be bleeding and spasming upon the ground rather than panting and trembling.
“She…” The man gulped. “…speaks true. I would not have given chase had she not put my Petronilla in danger.”
/> “Petronilla,” Durand said from over Abel’s left shoulder. “’Twas this man’s wife who stole John to the wood that I might take him from Parsings.”
“John!” Helene gasped. “He is safe?”
“He is,” Durand said as Abel looked to him and Christian Lavonne, both of whom stood with swords at the ready. And well beyond them were the baron’s knights who had surrounded Helene’s other pursuers—men who, believing their actions were justified, would have put her to blade, to fire, to frigid water.
Returning to the one whose life could be easily severed, Abel gripped the hilt tighter and set the point of his blade to the man’s flesh.
“Nay!” Helene strained against his hold. “Irwyn is a good man.”
Abel jerked his chin around. “He would have killed you!”
“He would not have. He but needed to protect his family from sharing my fate.”
Even if this man would not have killed her by his own hand, his capture of her would have aided those who meant to strike her down.
“Pray, Abel,” she entreated, “do not let the shedding of blood be the answer to all the ills of the world.”
Moved by the pleading in her eyes, pained at causing her more distress when comfort was what she needed, he struggled to push back against all that would have him push forward to assure one less threat, one less knife at her back, one less cause for him to rage at God, one less reason to turn his back on the Almighty.
Think life, Everard urged from afar.
Believe in something above and beyond the swing of your sword, Helene beseeched from half a year past when he had rejected her. Believe in Him.
With a growl that, even to his own ears, sounded as if expelled from the throat of an animal of prey, Abel swept his sword aside and sent a prayer heavenward. Lord, let me not regret this. Let the voices I heed this day be in accord with Your will. Above all, let Your will be to keep Helene and John safe.
When Christian Lavonne stepped forward and ordered the man, Irwyn, to his feet, Abel turned to where Helene knelt with skirts and mantle askew. Realizing she no longer strained against his hold, he released her and she sank back onto her heels and dropped her dagger-wielding hand into her lap.
He returned his sword to its scabbard, then lowered to his haunches and considered her rigid fingers that were as near to being one with the hilt as flesh and bone could come. Had her terrifying flight addled her?
“I thought—” She gasped. “When I saw the riders, I feared they also came for me.” She shuddered. “The water…‘tis so cold even this time of year.”
Anger against those who had sought to harm her once more pushed surface-ward. However, the tears that filled her eyes and glistened on her lashes held him to her side.
Sliding his left hand over hers upon the hilt, he said, “You are safe. Pray, give over to me.”
She lowered her chin and stared at their met hands upon the dagger. “I am not Rosamund.”
That she felt the need to say it cut nearly as deep as his wife’s blade had done. “This I know, Helene.”
He heard her swallow—a dry, labored sound—then she looked up. “I am not my father.” This time, there was anger in her tone. “I am not my brother.”
Though the dagger upon which she had yet to ease her hold was nowhere near his innards, he again felt its cruel edge. “Indeed, you are not.”
Her eyebrows drew near. “You are certain of that?”
“I am.”
She stared at him a long moment, then pressed her parched lips inward and closed her eyes. “Thus, you came,” she whispered in a rush that seemed borne upon relief.
“I did. But regardless of who you are not, still I would have come—unworthy though I am.”
Her mouth quivered as if toward a smile and, slowly, her fingers relaxed beneath his. However, as he began to ease the dagger free, she tightened her grip and opened her eyes wide. “’Tis true my John is safe?”
“He is with my sister at Broehne Castle.”
Once again, she delved his face.
“Helene,” Abel said in as soothing a voice as he could summon, “your son is safe, just as you are—and whether you want me or nay, ever shall you be. I give you my word.”
Her shoulders slumped and she sank more deeply into her heels. “I thank you.”
Abel loosed the dagger and slid what had once been exceedingly familiar to him—and would now be again—beneath his belt. Then he reached inside his mantle and retrieved his wine skin. However, before he could offer it, Helene leaned forward and laid a palm to his shaved jaw that made no secret of the scar there.
Unsettled by her touch, he removed the stopper from the skin and said tightly, “You must needs drink.”
“You look near the same as the last time you came for me,” she murmured.
The scar disagreed that the face of the one who had carried her beaten body from the cave was so unchanged, but he would not gainsay her. Instead, he repeated, “Drink.”
She removed her hand from his jaw, took the skin, and put the spout to her lips.
While she quenched her thirst, Abel searched out the darkening wood and saw Durand stride toward his destrier while, to the far right, Christian Lavonne and his mounted knights held watch over the villagers.
Feeling every day of every month in which he had longed for Helene’s forgiveness and the chance to begin anew, he looked back at her.
“The baron, too?” she said, having followed his gaze to the man who surely waited on her to confirm their kinship.
“Aye. He accompanied Sir Durand to Wulfen Castle to collect me that we might all bring you home to Abingdale.”
She gasped. “Durand is here?”
Her question momentarily stunned him. However, after what she had endured, it was understandable that though the knight had been the first to assure her of John’s safety, his had been but a voice that gifted her with an answer.
“He is here as well.” Abel jutted his chin at where Durand gathered his horse’s reins.
Helene peered over her shoulder. “Durand!” The name sounded from her with such joy it stopped the words Abel had been gathering behind his teeth.
As the knight turned, Helene rose to her knees. “I must go to him.”
To him.
Something inside Abel began to crack, and out of those cracks seeped regret, sorrow, jealousy, and anger. But somehow he pushed them back before they could widen the cracks and undo him—and others.
Gripping Helene’s elbow, he raised her with him to standing and felt her tremble. Certain her ordeal had left her much weakened, he determined he would deliver her to Durand no matter how it cut him to do so. Thus, he braced her arm with his and led her toward the knight to whom he had likely lost her, the same who, despite his trespasses against the Wulfriths, had not failed her.
But though tempted to hate his old friend, Abel could not. It was he who had asked Durand to watch over her, and if she had transferred her affections to one who had remained within reach—who might have done so even had Abel not asked it of him—he was hardly to blame.
Let her go, Abel—
“Nay,” he breathed. One could not let go of what one did not have hold of, especially after so cruelly rejecting it. Thus, he passed Helene to Durand whose eyes widened when she flung her arms around his neck and began to spill words of gratitude against his chest.
Teeth so tight they throbbed, Abel pivoted and crossed to his destrier. Once more gaining the saddle, he avoided Christian Lavonne’s searching gaze as he guided his mount toward the herded villagers who, despite the farm implements carried by several and the knives and fists of others, would quickly drop beneath battle-tested men.
As Abel neared, a broad man who had only his fists with which to defend himself shouted, “The witch is ours!”
“She is not,” Christian Lavonne said loud, albeit with deadly calm.
The big man turned his wrathful countenance upon the baron. “She did kill a man!”
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�And witched herself out of Jacob’s cottage!” called another who, despite the brave declaration, presented a hunted, fearful face brightened by the chill air.
An aged man raised a bony fist. “’Tis the Lord of Firth who ought to determine her fate!”
“Death to the witch!”
“Cease!” Christian Lavonne shed his calm.
The drawn bowstring of Abel’s emotions threatening to draw further back—to shatter the bow if he did not soon loose the arrow of retribution—he halted his destrier alongside one of the baron’s knights and moved his gaze over the villagers who stirred restlessly but held their tongues.
With few exceptions, their faces reflected the realization that the hunters had become the hunted. They feared as Helene had surely feared, felt death’s shadow as she had felt it. And he longed to meet their expectations, for though she was not lost body and soul, her heart was lost to him, and that acknowledgment made him want to strike out at those deserving of anger.
Thus, he took up the silent argument that underestimating the reach of evil was what King Henry had done when, following the attempt on Beatrix’s life, Sir Robert’s punishment had been mere imprisonment from which he had escaped to loose death and destruction upon the barony of Abingdale. Had the king instead embraced death with which he was certainly no stranger, Helene would never have been stolen from her son, beaten, and left to die. Never would Castle Soaring have been attacked and Beatrix’s life once more placed within reach of death. And…
Abel curled the fingers of his right hand inward as far as they would go.
…never would he have sustained injuries that, despite merciless months of training, still made him feel less than whole.
But never would you have known Helene or John. Never would she have reconciled with her father as she rejoices in having done. And now she has a chance at true affection that she might not have had, for Durand would have had no cause to watch over her and prove his devotion and constancy—as you failed to do. Now a husband she may have and a father for John.