The Medici Prize (The Stolen Crown Trilogy Book 1)

by Sylvia Prince

Chapter Eighteen

  When Lancelot barreled around the side of the wagon, Caterina nearly stabbed him. Instead, when she recognized the guard, she dropped her stolen sword to the ground and almost collapsed.

  How long had the attack lasted? One minute, Caterina had been staring at the curtain, and the next, she’d heard the sounds of fighting all around the wagon. She had reached out and gripped Fiametta’s hand, her anger instantly forgotten in the wave of terror that swept through her body.

  Caterina felt like a sitting target, hidden away in the carriage.

  But there were no weapons at hand, and no way to protect themselves if bandits burst into the wagon to seize them.

  A new wave of panic had crested over Caterina as she imagined what raiders did to the young women they kidnapped. Fiametta must have had similar thoughts. She gripped Caterina’s hand in both of hers.

  But they couldn’t just sit there, waiting to see what might happen.

  Caterina had stood, hunched over because of the wagon’s low ceiling. She pulled her hand from Fiametta’s and tugged back the corner of the heavy fabric.

  Outside, she had seen a war zone. Mounted riders circled each other all around the wagon. The grunts and groans of men dying filled the air. Arrows stuck from the dirt, some only a handful of yards from the wagon. Still more fighters were running toward the melee, blades clutched in their hands.

  Caterina let the fabric fall, her hand shaking.

  The boy driving the wagon. Did he have a sword? With a sword, at least they wouldn’t be helpless.

  At the time, Caterina didn’t think to wonder why the driver was silent. She only thought of arming herself.

  A thin panel of wood separated the inside of the carriage from the driver’s seat. Caterina pounded it with her hands, ignoring Fiametta’s whimpers behind her. They weren’t going to die without putting up a fight. She pulled off a shoe and banged the panel with the hard sole.

  Finally, the wood splintered. With a groan, the entire panel popped out of place, giving Caterina a view in front of the wagon.

  She froze, wondering if the noise had drawn unwanted attention. But the fighting a dozen or more yards from the wagon continued without pause. So she kept her eyes on the narrow strip of light shining into the carriage.

  Next to her, Fiametta whispered prayers, her eyes screwed shut tightly.

  The driver’s slumped form didn’t move. Caterina peaked out the opening again, the sun momentarily blinding her, to see if the Medici guards had made progress in the fight.

  There were fewer men fighting. She couldn’t tell if that was good or bad.

  Caterina snaked through the narrow opening, keeping her head down, until she was next to the driver. He had been hit by at least four arrows, three in his chest. And his sword still hung, untouched, at his waist.

  Caterina reached out a quaking hand, fearing every second that an arrow might strike her. When she wrapped her hand around the hilt and pulled, the sword didn’t spring free. Men always made it look so easy to unsheathe a sword, but at least from this angle, her torso hanging through the carriage panel and her head low so she wouldn’t be hit by arrows or spotted by a horseman, the damn thing wouldn’t come free.

  A groan cut through the air. Was the driver still alive? Her body went rigid, alert to any movement from the man she reached across in a twisted embrace. Caterina shivered and put her weight into tugging at the hilt. It didn’t matter whether the man was alive or dead. She needed the sword more than him.

  A scream cut through the air.

  Fiametta.

  Caterina, halfway inside the carriage and halfway out, scrambled over the driver to leap from the carriage, still clutching the sword. In the split second she was in the air, Caterina wondered why she had leapt toward the men fighting in the grass on the south side of the road, toward the woods that shot arrows at their party.

  Then she heard a heavy creaking noise and the wagon started to tip behind her. Caterina scrambled away. With a crash, the carriage fell on one side, a pair of wheels spinning in the air.

  Caterina had glanced down at her body, expecting to find her leg crushed under the wagon or at least pierced by the sword she had no business wielding. But she was untouched.

  She crouched with her back pressed into the bottom of the wagon bench. The driver’s body rested a few feet away, his eyes glassy and blank. Caterina’s breath boomed in her ears as she listened for Fiametta.

  In the distance, she heard the sound of two swords meeting. It was a familiar, almost nostalgic noise. Back home, when the wind blew from the south, she used to hear the guards practicing in the courtyard. Then, the clash of swords mixed with loud boasts and laughs. By the time the sounds reached Caterina’s room, they blended together to make a kind of cheerful, violent music.

  This was a very different type of song. This was someone fighting for his life.

  From where she crouched, Caterina didn’t dare look up to see who she should root for.

  The carriage behind her back was too quiet. Where was Fiametta? Had she been knocked unconscious, tossed against the side of the carriage as it tipped?

  A slow, eerie sound broke the silence. Someone was walking, very quietly, toward the carriage.

  Caterina held her breath.

  The footsteps stopped, just around the corner from where Caterina hid.

  Her heart pounded in her ears—could he hear it? Caterina reasoned it had to be a man. Fiametta was the only other woman on the trip, and she certainly wouldn’t sneak up to the wagon.

  It had to be one of the attackers. A guard would have run to the wagon, checking for signs of life. This man was trying to conceal his presence. And thus, Caterina concluded, the man a few feet away was a murderer. The dead bodies cutting a wide ring through the field proved that the raiders were not shy about killing.

  She heard the sound of wood squeaking against wood. Had the man somehow opened the wagon door? No, it wasn’t possible. He would have to be seven feet tall to reach it from the ground.

  And then Caterina remembered the panel at the bottom of the carriage.

  As soon as the wood squeaked away, she heard Fiametta’s whispered prayers. The woman lived.

  But her maid yelped, breaking off in the middle of an Ave Maria. The rustle of fabric following Fiametta’s cry had to be the woman’s dress as she was pulled through the hole. Caterina tried to picture the scene—the man’s rough, hairy arm thrust into the carriage; Fiametta’s silent prayers; the maid’s terror.

  She had left Fiametta alone in the carriage.

  But Caterina didn’t have time for guilt, not yet. She wrapped her hands around the hilt of the sword. It was a sharp blade. She had no training, but she knew enough to stab a kidnapper. She pushed herself up onto the balls of her feet, her thighs burning in the crouched position, and was about to throw herself around the wagon when a voice stopped her.

  “Bind her wrists. We have to travel quickly.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Their voices were low, but urgent. Caterina fell back onto her heels, her palms sweating. She couldn’t take on two trained warriors by herself. It would be suicide.

  “And where’s the other one? The maid?”

  “Dunno.”

  Caterina’s stomach sank. They were looking for her. They’d fallen for the trap that Piero had set six days earlier when Caterina switched places with her maid.

  Fiametta was being kidnapped in her place.

  “It doesn’t matter. Let’s ride.”

  Another rustle of fabric. Fiametta was completely silent. They must have gagged her. Otherwise, surely the maid would be screaming that they had the wrong person.

  Caterina should stop them. She should run toward the men with her sword and free Fiametta, or at least beg for the men to take her instead of the innocent maid.

  She should.

  But she didn’t.

  A second later, Caterina heard the pounding of horses heading back toward the Via Romana.

 
The entire field had fallen silent. Caterina scurried around the edge of the wagon, three quick steps separating her from the place where Fiametta had been abducted. She rose onto wobbly legs and searched the grass for blood. Then, when she found none, she ducked her head into the carriage. The cushion and Fiametta’s knitting bag were turned upside down, but otherwise there were no signs of a struggle.

  Maybe Fiametta hadn’t been hurt.

  Caterina stood again, looking up the road where the kidnappers had fled. A hundred yards away, the road curved through the woods, a slight turn barely noticeable on the road but enough to provide cover for the men as they fled. To the west, as well, the road twisted. This was the perfect spot for an ambush.

  Caterina expected to see the sun low in the sky, but it still blared, not far past midday. How much time had passed? A half hour? Even less?

  Another noise came from the other side of the wagon, and Caterina raised her sword, ready to do battle with whatever monster was coming for her.

  But when the man stepped around the wagon, Caterina saw Lancelot. Exhausted, she let the sword slip from between her fingers and blinked at the person standing before her. She only recognized him by his gray-blue eyes. Blood coated his doublet, his own or someone else’s, she couldn’t tell. Dirt made dark patches on his face, mixing with the sweat of his brow. And his sandy hair, usually tied at the nap of his neck, hung loose at his shoulders.

  “Your arm,” she gasped.

  A fletched arrow stood quivering from his right bicep.

  “Oh,” Lancelot replied, looking down at the arrow as if he hadn’t noticed it before. But instead of fainting, or screaming—the two things Caterina would have done if she’d found an arrow poking out of her body—he looked back at her to make sure she was unharmed. “Did you see the men?”

  Caterina nodded. “They rode off that way. And they took Fiametta.”

  Lancelot gave her a blank look.

  “My maid. They took my maid.”

  His eyes widened and for a second they froze in place. And then he leapt for her.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The maid.

  She wasn’t the maid.

  Thoughts swirled in James’s mind. This woman wasn’t the maid. She was Caterina de’ Medici.

  And she was still in danger.

  He had to protect her.

  James moved quickly toward Caterina, using his left arm to pin her between him and the wagon. His right arm hurt every time he moved it. No wonder. The arrow. Luckily, the fallen wagon provided shelter from any archers who remained in the woods. And if any riders remained, James’s body provided a shield for Caterina.

  Caterina de’ Medici.

  Who was squirming under his body, pushing him away.

  “What are you doing?” she hissed.

  “Protecting you,” he growled.

  “By crushing me?”

  Maybe he had been too forceful. He moved back an inch, scanning the road and the woods to the north for signs of more attackers.

  “Get off,” she insisted, her elbow connecting with his right arm.

  A blinding wave of pain shot from his arm through his body. He grunted and stepped back as if punched in the gut. And he dropped his sword.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Caterina breathed, taking a step toward him. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I just—I get claustrophobic.” Her cheeks blushed red and she looked away from him.

  He bent over to pick up the sword, his eyes scanning the tree line. But he couldn’t grip the hilt in his right hand. He couldn’t even make a fist. James quickly swept up the sword with his left hand and sheathed it. The blade wouldn’t be much good against archers, anyway.

  A twig snapped in the forest. James spun around, his hand instantly on the hilt of his sword, anticipating another volley of arrows. But they didn’t come. Instead, he felt suddenly dizzy. The sun beat down on them unrelentingly. He had to get Caterina away from here. And, he admitted to himself, he needed to rest. And deal with the arrow sticking out of his arm.

  Caterina seemed to sense his unease. “We should follow them. They’re heading back to the Via Romana.”

  “No,” James said, rougher than he intended. “They have us outnumbered. It would be a fool’s mission. And those men were after you. I won’t carry you right to them.”

  Caterina narrowed her eyes at him. “Then what’s your plan? Wait here until someone comes back?”

  “On to Viterbo,” he grunted. Where he could find an empiric to take care of his arm. And a bed so he could lie down.

  “No,” Caterina said firmly. “If you’re right, they’d expect us to go to Viterbo. Once they realize that Fiametta isn’t a Medici, they’ll come back for us.”

  Sacré Dieu. She was right. They might come back at any moment, and Caterina was standing out in the open where anyone could see her. He should have realized sooner.

  “We can’t stay here,” he said firmly. But she didn’t move.

  So he wrapped his left arm around her waist and lifted her in the air. She squeaked in protest but didn’t fight against him. He carried her around the edge of the wagon, using the fallen carriage as a shield in case anyone came riding back up the road. It would at least buy them a few minutes.

  He set her down next to the sideways wagon bench. “Stay here. I’ll get my horse.”

  She watched him with silent eyes. He gave her one last look and stepped out from behind the wagon.

  His stallion stood a dozen yards away. James had expected to see other horses—the mounts of the men he’d killed, or the team that had been pulling the carriage—but the field was empty.

  Or, not quite empty. In a quick survey, James counted seven bodies in the grass. Maybe eight—he couldn’t be sure if the red that caught his eye at the tree line was a body or a discarded coat.

  Their party had been eight. Only James and Caterina remained. But the other six couldn’t be dead. No, James himself had slain at least three men in the melee, possibly four. And there certainly hadn’t been time for anyone to recover the fallen bodies.

  He took a step closer to the nearest body. It was the man on foot that he’d run through right before the end of the fight. His pockets were empty—he didn’t carry food, or even a coin.

  It had to be an organized attack.

  Which meant the men’s camp, and perhaps their goods, were somewhere nearby.

  It was past time to leave.

  But James took one last look at the man’s red and white shirt. The white made a cross over the man’s chest, a familiar emblem to those who knew their history.

  Eight bodies. At least a dozen attackers. Where were the missing men?

  James strode over to his horse, taking the reins in his left hand. The stallion, still lathered from the attack, stepped lightly behind James.

  They had to get away from the wagon.

  But when James looked at the spot where he had left Caterina, she was gone.

  No. No. He ran to the carriage, ignoring the pain that shot through his arm each time his foot struck the ground. There wasn’t time. They couldn’t have come back for her already. He would have heard something.

  But he did hear something. Someone was rustling through the bags tied to the back of the wagon.

  Blood pounded in his ears as James rounded the corner.

  And there stood Caterina, piling goods from the bags onto the ground. In full view of the road where the bandits might right back at any moment.

  “What are you doing.”

  “We’ll need supplies,” she said frankly, not stopping her work. So far she’d pulled out the tent, the folded cots, and a bag of food.

  It was a good idea, he admitted. “Don’t bring the cots. They’re too big.” He eyed the tent bag. It was small enough to tie on the back of his saddle.

  “Then at least the blankets,” Caterina said, unfolding the cots.

  “There isn’t time,” James hissed.

  She glanced up at him, her emerald eyes glittering in the sun.
Caterina de’ Medici. Looking at him as if they were lovers out for a picnic instead of a patrician’s daughter and a guard, fleeing for their lives.

  How did she not sense how dangerous their situation was?

  As if she’d read his mind, Caterina said quietly, “We’ll want these supplies by nightfall. And the next night. And the next.” Her eyes drilled into him for a moment before she turned to the chest, still roped to the back of the wagon. When she opened the lid, its contents spilled onto the road.

  James swallowed. Caterina’s words reminded him just where they were: over a day’s ride from Viterbo, where they couldn’t risk going. Only three hours from the Via Romana, but they couldn’t head in that direction, either. If they left the road, it would take at least three or four days to reach Rome.

  And, crossing the countryside with just one horse, they were more than ten days from Florence.

  That was without factoring in James’s injuries. Or the fact that they’d have to say hidden.

  She was right. Again.

  So James took the pile of clothes and food that Caterina stacked on the road and pushed as much as possible into his saddlebags. A sack of apples. Some dried meat.

  He stopped at the three dresses she’d placed in the pile.

  “You can’t take the dresses,” James said.

  “Why not?”

  “We’re in hiding. You can’t wear silk in the woods.”

  “I’m tired of servant’s clothes,” she said, her voice hitting a petulant note.

  “Well, get used to them,” James said, shoving the dresses through the sideways window of the carriage. “The best thing we can do right now is conceal your identity. No one can know you’re a Medici.”

  Caterina raised an eyebrow at him. “You didn’t realize who I was. None of the men in camp paid me any attention in servant’s gray.”

  James felt his face darken. That wasn’t completely true. He had kept an eye on her when he thought she was just a maid. But he hadn’t noticed her smooth, clean nails or the glossy sheen of her hair that marked her out as a patrician. He should have noticed, but he didn’t.

  He pushed off her comment. “You stay in gray. If I’m going to keep you safe, you have to listen to me.”