The falcon turned over in the air and dropped onto the dead grouse, but her attention was soon stolen by Thorne’s shrill whistle and the lure—something heavy on the end of a cord—that he swung in circles over his head. He let the lure drop, and the peregrine flew to it and began enthusiastically pecking at it. Then he knelt close by, whistled again, and held something toward her, which Martine assumed to be a bit of meat. She flew to his fist and ate the meat, then he slipped the little hood back over her head, leaning over and tightening the braces with his teeth.
The rumbling of wooden planks on the bridge made Martine turn with a gasp. It was the horseman, the one she had seen on the road—a young man on a dun stallion that had been ridden to the point of exhaustion, judging by the foam trailing from its mouth. Reining in his sorry mount, he called to Martine, who happened to be closest, “I’ve a message for my lord Olivier!” Martine pointed to the meadow, and the young man took off toward the hawking party.
Sudden movement from the direction of the canopy caught her eye, and she saw Lord Neville and his wife hurrying toward their horses, which they mounted hastily and kicked into a gallop. Several of the guests stood to watch their abrupt departure, although Bernard and his men, including Edmond, were too preoccupied with drinking and storytelling to notice much else. Rainulf, standing alone just outside the canopy, stared grimly at the baron and baroness as they rode away, then turned toward the meadow, as did Martine.
The messenger dismounted and bowed to Olivier, then stood at attention while he communicated his message. Although they were far away, Martine heard the earl exclaim, “Dear God!” After a brief and impassioned exchange, all the men began striding purposefully toward the canopy, Olivier bellowing, “Detain Neville! Don’t let him get away!”
Martine ran to her brother, who was standing quietly with his arms crossed, his expression sad and detached. Looking down at her, he said, “We can’t hope to overtake Neville at this point. All our horses are in the stables. I can’t imagine the earl will be pleased about that.”
“I don’t understand,” said Martine, grabbing his arm. “What is it? What’s happened?”
Gazing calmly at the distant, retreating figures of the baron and baroness, he said, “Neville had Anseau and Aiglentine killed.”
Martine gasped. “What? How do you know?”
“They bolted like rabbits as soon as that messenger arrived looking for Olivier. My guess—and Neville’s, I’d wager—is that the bandits have confessed and named him as the man who paid them for their crimes.”
Martine began to understand. “Neville wanted that barony.”
Rainulf nodded. “Aiglentine was about to bear a child. If she had done so, and the child had lived, Neville could never have hoped to inherit that holding. But with Anseau and Aiglentine gone, and no heir—”
Ailith’s voice, shrill and insistent, piped up from the direction of the river. “Mama! Mama! Look at me!”
As Martine turned to look, she caught sight of Geneva sitting on a bench nearby. The older woman glanced toward the river, her expression of weary disinterest giving way to shock and fear as she sprang to her feet. “Ailith!” she screamed.
Martine wheeled around. Ailith stood on one of the boulders at the top of the waterfall, her arms out to the side to balance herself. After a second of stunned disbelief, Martine dropped the chaplet and ran, along with Rainulf and Geneva, toward the river, screaming the child’s name.
“I’m going to jump across like Uncle Edmond did!” Ailith called out. “Watch me, Mama!”
Ignoring the screams of warning, she turned, lifted her ivory kirtle, and leaped.
Chapter 9
The boulder at which the child aimed was fairly close, but her short little legs were barely adequate for the job. Her bare feet slid and she landed on her hands and knees.
“Ailith!” Geneva screamed. “Stop that! Come back!”
Rising unsteadily, Ailith yelled, “I’ll do better next time!” The next boulder was much too far away for her to reach.
Martine, at the apex of the waterfall, tossed aside her mantle and kicked off her slippers. Gingerly she stepped onto the first boulder and then the next, her eyes on the child about two yards away. The stone beneath her stockinged feet felt cold and wet, and her heart hammered in her throat.
Rainulf grabbed one long sleeve of her silver tunic and tried to pull her back. “Martine! Let me—”
“Nay! I can swim, and you can’t. Let go, or I’ll lose my balance.”
He did, and she reached a hand out to Ailith. “Ailith, please. Take my—”
“Nay! Go away! Mama’s watching! I want Mama to see!” Ailith swatted angrily at Martine, nearly throwing herself off balance.
“Ailith! You can’t make it!” Martine looked down at the jagged boulders over which the water fell, and the bottomless pool below, nearly opaque beneath rapidly graying skies. Memories, fierce and unbidden, rushed up at her from the water’s smoky depths: the apple-green gown, the horrible thing hidden beneath the surface.
In a panic, she turned to Rainulf and Geneva, standing at the water’s edge, the mother clutching for support from the priest, who murmured something and crossed himself. “Say something to her, Rainulf! You always know what to say! Say something to her!”
Beyond them, in the meadow, someone broke away from the group and raced toward them—Thorne.
Suddenly Rainulf and Geneva both stretched their arms out, screaming Ailith’s name. She turned and saw the child suspended, arms outstretched, like an angel in her ivory kirtle, between the two boulders.
Time moved slowly. Martine heard the dull flap of the kirtle, the rumbling of the angry waters, the musical splash as first one little foot, then another, missing the boulder, disappeared into the churning water. A sound filled Martine’s ears, and she realized it was her own scream as she watched the little girl, the angel, fly into the air, rotating slowly, flung up with eerie grace by the relentless force of the river.
For a split second, as Ailith hung above the waterfall, hair flying, kirtle billowing, Martine saw her face clearly, and thought she looked directly at her, beseechingly. Then she became, not an angel, but a rag doll, bouncing once, twice, against the waterfall’s jagged boulders before the frothing waters consumed her, swallowing her whole.
“Ailith!” Martine didn’t know whether it was her voice, or that of Rainulf or Geneva, or all of them, that screamed the child’s name. With numb hands, she flung her circlet and veil aside, then grabbed her heavy tunic and tried to pull it up and off, but it had been too tightly laced. Poised at the edge of the boulder, looking down, she thought, in terror and panic, I can’t do this. Then she closed her eyes and saw Ailith’s eyes as she fell, pleading for help.
Blindly she sprang from the boulder, half expecting to hit the rocks beneath the waterfall on her way down, as Ailith had. But her spring had been powerful, and the first thing she hit was icy water, which bubbled around her, closing over her head and pummeling her, its force squeezing the breath out of her. Consumed with terror, she struggled to the surface. She heard her name, and Ailith’s, yelled by people on the shore. I must be calm, she thought. Ailith needs me. She took a deep breath and dove, swimming underwater with all her strength away from the waterfall and toward the calmer waters downstream, where Ailith would have been carried.
Martine peered through the green-tinged, shadowy water, deep and wide as a lake. The layers of wool, silk, and fur in which she was laced felt leaden, weighing her down as she swam. She tried to ignore the wild drumming of her heart and the growing pressure within her lungs.
The sides and bottom of the pool were encrusted with boulders, rotten tree limbs, and bits of debris—wine jugs, crockery, a rusty scythe—all festooned with green algae. Up ahead, through the obscure waters, loomed the tangle of hawthorns bushes and fallen trees that formed the river’s natural dam.
A shimmer of white caught her eye, and she made for it, her overtaxed arms and legs struggling agains
t their confining garments to propel her, so slowly, forward. Please, God, she prayed, let it be Ailith.
It was. But at the sight of her, Martine’s heart lurched.
Her little body—senseless at best, and possibly lifeless as well—hung suspended in the cold gloom, her arms posed gracefully above her head, as if stilled in the act of dancing. Her eyes were closed; her mouth hung slackly open. She had a raw scrape on her chin and an open cut on her forehead, from which blood seeped, forming a pink cloud in the greenish water.
The dam had stopped her progress downstream, which was fortunate, but in the process, the bottom half of her kirtle had become entangled in the hawthornes’ spiky branches. With her lungs close to bursting, Martine grabbed the child under her arms and pulled, again and again, but she didn’t budge. Looking more closely, she saw the hundreds of needle-sharp thorns embedded in the thin ivory wool.
Quickly she swam toward the sunlight above, gasping for air as she broke the surface. People were gathered on the riverbank, including Thorne, close by, whipping his brown undertunic over his head. Beneath it, he wore a white linen shirt and brown chausses.
“Sir Thorne!” she called hoarsely.
“My lady! Thank God you’re all right! Did you find—”
She nodded impatiently. “Your sword! Bring it!”
As he slid the weapon from its scabbard, she filled her lungs with air and dove toward Ailith. The child was as she had left her, and with dismay, Marine saw how deathly pale she was, how still, how like a shell without a soul. Dear God, please don’t let her be dead, she begged, wrapping her arms around the little body and holding her tight.
The hand on her shoulder made her start, and she turned to find the Saxon, holding his sword. Martine pointed out the snagged kirtle and Thorne, with careful aim, swiftly cut the wool loose from the hawthornes’ grip. Dropping the sword, which floated to the river bottom, he took the child in his arms and swam with her to the surface. Martine set out to follow him, but her ascent was stopped short before it even began.
She couldn’t move! She pumped her arms and legs furiously, not comprehending, in her sudden alarm, what was wrong. When she looked down and saw her own garments held fast by the hawthornes’ tiny claws, her alarm turned to terror. Up above, Thorne swam away from her with swift, sure strokes.
She tugged at her tunic, then reached down to try to pry the thorns loose, but they pierced her fingers, drawing blood, and for every one she loosened, two more took its place. Below, on the river bottom, Thorne’s unreachable sword glowed dimly, tauntingly. Her lungs burned and her heart slammed painfully in her chest.
She knew. She had always known, always, that she would die by drowning—struggling in terror, waiting for the moment when her lungs would fill with water.
Trying to ignore the pain and pressure in her chest, she reached behind, groping for the knot that Estrude had tied. Useless. With both hands, she yanked at the neck of the tunic, but the heavy silver braid could not be torn. Mindlessly she thrashed, wrestling with her prison of silk and wool, as bubbles of air escaped from her nose and mouth. Her chest spasmed and her throat contracted as she resisted the instinct to inhale.
She closed her eyes. Don’t breathe don’t breathe don’t breathe don’t breathe. She let her body go limp... don’t breathe... let the water embrace her, suspend her... don’t breathe...
White light filled her vision. She lost all track of time, all sense of space, all fear... until a pair of large hands gripped her shoulders, breaking the spell, and she opened her eyes.
Thorne. His expression of dread gave way to relief as he took her face in his hands and, closing his eyes, pressed his forehead to hers. Then he released her, retrieved his sword, and swiftly set about cutting away the fur and braid-trimmed hems of her tunic and kirtle. The urge to breathe was all but irresistible, and Martine shook as she struggled for control.
Thorne freed her from the hawthornes’ clutches, and with an arm around her waist, swam with her to the surface. Gulping great lungfuls of air, they struggled to the shore. There, Rainulf and Albin waited, the rest of the guests having regrouped near the canopy. From their direction came a dreadful wail, like that of an animal in pain.
“Martine!” Rainulf exclaimed, running toward her. “Thank God!”
Her legs were quaking so badly that they could barely support her, and she knew that she would collapse without Thorne to hold her up. “Ailith! Where is she?”
The knight and the priest exchanged a grim look. With a hand on Martine’s arm, Rainulf said, “She’s gone.”
At first Martine’s overwrought mind refused to accept her brother’s meaning. “Gone where? Back to the castle?”
For a moment, neither man spoke. Then Thorne took her by the shoulders. “My lady...” he began, but seemed unable to finish. He didn’t have to. Martine could read the grief in his transparent eyes, and when he looked toward the group near the canopy, her gaze followed his.
They stood in a circle, gentlefolk and servants together, silent and still, their heads bowed. From within their midst came the wailing, as well as a man’s steady, low murmuring. Someone moved, creating a gap in the circle. Through it, Martine saw one of the white linen tablecloths spread out on the grass, and atop that, the ivory skirt of Ailith’s kirtle, sliced off raggedly at the hem, and, emerging from the kirtle, the two little bare feet, pale and still.
“No,” she choked, half running on her quivering legs, shaking off Thorne’s attempt to hold her back. He released her, but followed close behind.
“Martine,” Rainulf called, following as well, “you did everything you could. You risked your life for her. ‘Twas God’s will that she be taken—”
“To hell with God’s will!” she spat out, as the circle parted to admit her, some of the servants crossing themselves at her heretical words.
Ailith lay on her back with her arms crossed over her chest as Father Simon administered last rites. At the sight of her—her blue-gray skin and violet lips, the ugly wounds on her face—a moan of disbelief arose within Martine. She can’t be dead.
The wailing came from Geneva. She crouched over her daughter’s inert form, her face buried in her hands, rocking back and forth as she sobbed and shrieked her grief. “My baby, my baby! Please, God, give me back my baby! I’m sorry, I’m so sorry! Just give me back my baby!” Martine had never witnessed such uncurbed despair. Rainulf, kneeling next to the distracted woman, put his arms around her and spoke soft, insistent words into her ear, but she seemed unaware of his presence.
Martine’s legs gave out. Sinking to her knees next to the child, she laid a hand on her cold cheek. “Oh, God,” she whispered. “This can’t be.” She uncrossed the limp little arms and rested the other hand on her chest to check for breathing, but felt no movement of any kind.
Father Simon scowled at her as he mumbled his prayers, and she heard whispered comments about her hands from the onlookers. They were both covered, front and back, with myriad tiny lacerations, the result of her struggles with the hawthornes. They bled badly, but oddly enough, Martine felt no pain.
Ailith’s coloring clearly indicated that she had been starved for air. Her skin and lips looked like that of a baby boy Martine had helped deliver in Paris. He couldn’t breathe, but the physician, having found a heartbeat, saved him by breathing into his mouth.
Martine leaned over and put an ear to Ailith’s chest, but could hear nothing but her own ragged breathing and Geneva’s lamentations. Pressing two fingers against the side of Ailith’s throat, she closed her eyes and held her breath. Presently she felt a faint pressure beneath her fingertips, and then another. A pulse! Contrary to appearances, she wasn’t dead yet.
What now? The physician in Paris had covered both the baby’s mouth and nose with his own mouth and blown into them. But Ailith’s mouth and nose were too far apart for that, so she pinched the child’s nose closed, covered the little open mouth with her own, and blew. Ailith’s chest rose, and Martine felt encouraged. Her
optimism waned, however, when she heard a faint gurgling sound, which suggested the presence of water in her lungs.
Father Simon ceased his praying. The whispered comments became a buzz of collective shock and bewilderment. Geneva began raining frenzied punches on Martine’s shoulders and back, screaming “Leave my baby alone! What are you doing to my baby?”
As Martine raised her head to take a breath, she saw Rainulf seize Geneva’s fists and draw her into his arms. “It’s all right,” he assured her. “She just needs to feel she’s done all she can.” Geneva collapsed in his embrace, sobbing, and he held her tightly, stroking her and whispering comforting words.
Martine forced breath after breath into the child’s lungs, commanding herself to think of nothing but the mechanics of what she did—not of what people might think of her for doing it, and not even whether she would succeed in making Ailith breathe again. Especially not that, because she couldn’t bear to think that she would fail.
“My lady!” Father Simon exclaimed. “What are you doing? This is outrageous! Someone stop her!”
“Leave her alone,” Thorne commanded, standing between Martine and the horrified priest.
“Nay!” Simon cried, reaching toward Martine. He probably meant to push her away, but before he could, Thorne yanked him abruptly to his feet.
“Get away from here,” he ordered, roughly shoving the priest, who stumbled and fell. Raising her head to take a breath, Martine saw that Peter and Guy had emerged from the crowd, their swords drawn in automatic and unquestioning allegiance to Thorne.
“The child is dead!” Simon exclaimed, gaining his feet. He glanced toward Bernard as if for support, but the other man just looked on passively, smiling his humorless smile. “To attempt to bring her back is unholy. The devil’s work.”
Thorne said, “If the devil is here today, ‘tis you who act as his instrument, not the lady Martine.” His right hand contracted into a fist. “Now, leave.”
Lords of Conquest Boxed Set Page 149