They seemed to know who they were looking for. They’d caught her like a cat in a trap and dashed off with her before anyone really realized what had happened. But someone sent word to de Leia over at Falstone and his men went on the hunt, only to find Lady Gavriella in a livery in the far corner of the village, bruised and beaten and raped.
Therefore, the physic had lied to the pair. He’d seen Gavriella de Leia after she’d been assaulted and raped, presumably by Nicholas from what he could now gather. The young woman had been badly beaten and her innocence taken in a most hideous manner. Nicholas also knew the rape had resulted in a pregnancy, but Harman had been truthful when he said he hadn’t attended the birth and neither had his wife.
But what he couldn’t figure out was why John and Nicholas wanted information on that child.
Perhaps it was time to stick his neck out a little.
“Then allow me to go to Falstone and see what I can discover,” he said after a moment. “They know me and they trust me. I will do this for you, but for my service, I wish to be paid.”
Nicholas started to berate him, but John held out a hand and stopped him. “What do you wish?” he asked.
“How valuable is this information to you?”
John eyed the shrewd old man. “Go to Falstone and find out what you can about Lady Gavriella and her child,” he said. “Return to me with the information and I shall pay you a full pound. Tell anyone what you are doing, or breathe a word of this, and I shall return and kill your wife before your very eyes. Do you understand me?”
The old physic nodded. With a deal reached, he figured the worst of the storm was over, at least for now, so he stood up and shuffled over to his wife, pulling her off the floor. As he stood with her next to the hearth, the father and son ducked out of the cottage to where their men were waiting outside in the mud, unaware that the brand on the hip of one of the horses had been recognized, as it had been before.
“What good is it going to do to simply find out the wellness of de Leia’s daughter and the child?” Nicholas asked his father once they were outside. “We want the child.”
John nodded. “I know,” he said. “But you must have patience, lad. We discover what we can about the child and Lady Gavriella, and then if the old physic is trustworthy enough, with enough coin we can probably pay him to smuggle the child out of Falstone. But first things first – we have to determine how the child and its mother, fare. It is possible that neither have survived to this point.”
Nicholas was impatient. He swung himself onto the back of his steed. “Why are we even bothering with this?” he hissed. “Why not simply go to Falstone and take what we want?”
John nodded slowly, fussing with his stirrup. “Because Falstone has big walls, a good army, and the backing of de Wolfe,” he said. “Need I remind you of that? Nay, lad, we must be careful about this. Let us take the child by stealth, not with a big show of force. That would gain us nothing. Let the physic do his work.”
“And when he does?”
“When he does, we shall reward him,” John said. “A very special reward.”
Nicholas knew what his father was alluding to – death and destruction. That was always what he meant. He looked over the village of Deadwater, a surprisingly prosperous village with a gloomy name.
“When we have fulfilled the prophesy and begin our advance against de Wolfe, this village will make a nice spoil of war,” he said. “I have fond memories here already.”
He flashed his yellow teeth rather lewdly. John simply shook his head at is crass son, though he did not dispute him. They had the beginnings of what they’d come for – information on the infant delivered by de Leia’s daughter. There was nothing more they could do but return in a few days to ensure that the task had been completed.
All they could do now was wait.
As they mounted their fat horses and headed out of town, Harman the Wise stood in his open doorway, watching them go. He’d heard their conversation because they hadn’t shut the door when they’d quit the cottage.
He’d heard every word.
It was quite possible that Merek de Leia was going to hear every word, too.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Andreas saw her walk into the river.
In utter disbelief, he watched her walk right into that swirling, dark water. He was standing at the end of the avenue on the river’s edge, watching her red dress through the fog. There was some illumination on the river walk because of some public torches lighting up the narrow walk that had several taverns still open for business.
If not for those torches, he wouldn’t have been able to see her at all.
He’d heard her walking and weeping. That was how he’d been able to follow her so easily. Her tears weren’t just of a woman who couldn’t find her way home, or of a woman who had spent the evening in a guild filled with debauchery. She’d wept painfully, tears of something much deeper than what had happened that evening. He’d thought her suspicion of him was driven by something else, something deeper, and now he was suspecting it was perhaps deeper than he’d thought.
This wasn’t a woman who was frightened or angry.
This was a woman who was filled with despondency.
Whatever she was feeling was something beyond the obvious and he was drawn to her. It was true that she was beautiful and it was also true that he was a man of compassion and understanding. He still wasn’t sure what drew him to her because he’d known his share of women. He’d been pursued by some truly beautiful and accomplished ones.
So what made this woman different?
He wasn’t sure, but something did.
And now she was trying to kill herself.
He was just setting foot on the rocky shore of the river when he saw her abruptly go under water. He was in mail, with his broadsword around his waist, and he knew jumping into the river with all of that weight would sink him right to the bottom, so he began yanking off his sword and anything else that might weigh him down, including his mail. By the time he ripped the coat over his head, several long seconds had passed and he raced to the river’s side and dove in.
It was like ice.
Murky, dirty water greeted him. He was a good swimmer and went right to the spot where he’d seen her head go under and dove down, grabbing around, trying to catch hold of her somehow. He was trying not to panic, but he swam in circles, flailing about, trying to find some scrap of her. She couldn’t have gone too far, but maybe she’d gone just far enough that he wouldn’t be able to find her in time.
The seconds ticked away.
His lungs were screaming for air.
And then, he touched something.
It was hair.
Andreas grabbed a handful and pulled, surfacing on the water and pulling the woman up with him. She was unconscious and he swam desperately until he could find his footing. Hauling her into his arms, he carried her to the bank and lay her onto the rocky shore.
She wasn’t breathing so he turned her on her side, slapping her on the back, trying to evacuate the water from her lungs. He ended up rolling her onto her stomach, pressing her back firmly, trying to get her to breath. After several pumping tries, she suddenly vomited up brackish river water, coughing violently as water sprayed from her lungs.
Andreas thumped on her back, helping her expel it, as her body shook with cough. Once she’d managed to evacuate what water there was, she just lay there, eyes closed, breathing painfully and sounding as if she were dying.
He bent over her.
“My lady?” he said, dripping water on her. “Can you hear me?”
She grunted softly but she didn’t say anything. He rubbed her back, trying to stimulate her. “My lady?” he said again. “Can you speak?”
She drew in a long, agonizing breath before coughing fitfully again. But the coughing eventually faded and he heard her grunt again.
“It’s you,” she muttered. Then, she burst into tears. “Why can you not leave me alone?”
; He wasn’t going to argue with her. He was freezing, she was freezing, and they were both going to catch their deaths if they didn’t get out of the wet clothing. Without another word, he went over to collect the things he had tossed off before diving into the water. Once he had them back on, over his wet clothing, he returned to the lady who was still laying there on the shore.
Bending over, he swept her into his arms, carrying her back up to the street level and heading back the way they had come.
But she didn’t put up a fight.
Maybe the fight had finally gone out of her.
They were back at the tavern.
This time, Gavriella was too exhausted to run from him. She was soaking wet and nearly catatonic by the time he carried her into the small bedchamber that he had rented for what remained of the night. She could hear the tavernkeeper as he rushed to awaken his wife, who helped him lug in a large copper pot used for bathing. Hearths were stoked and hot water began to fill the tub as she lay against the man called Wolf, as limp as a wet rag. Literally.
She could feel him shivering as he held her.
But she didn’t care.
She’d given up.
A fire and hot water and food was brought in. She could smell it, but she was so tired that she drifted off to sleep even as the bustle went on around her. When next she realized, he was setting her on the bed and the tavernkeeper’s wife was pulling the wet red silk off her. The water had made it run, so there were puddles of red water on the floor. Gavriella noted that it was just her and the tavernkeeper’s wife in the chamber. The door was shut and the man called Wolf was nowhere to be found.
They were alone.
The tavernkeeper’s wife managed to get the dress off of her, the shift, her hose and shoes. She’d lost the hat somewhere along the way. Once she was stripped down, the old woman plopped her into the copper pot that was big enough for two people.
The heat from the water was searing. Gavriella closed her eyes, relishing the heat. But her brief moment of peace and comfort was brutally interrupted when the old woman grabbed a horsehair brush, and a bar of lumpy white soap, and began to scrub her from head to toe.
Gavriella had to hold on to the sides of the pot as she was buffeted back and forth by the force of the old woman’s scrubbing. The woman didn’t have a light touch, unfortunately, and she scrubbed so hard that Gavriella was certain she had scrubbed some skin off. She even scrubbed under her toenails and her fingernails, thorough as she was. When she was finished, she poured buckets of water over Gavriella’s head and when she was certain her young charge was completely waterlogged, she used that slimy white soap to lather up her hair.
Gavriella was too tired and too weak to resist at that point, so she simply let the woman have her way. Her hair was scrubbed cleaner than it had probably been in her entire life and the woman finished her washing by pouring several more buckets of water over her head to rinse out the slimy white froth.
In truth, it was a little strange to have the woman bathe her, as Gavriella had been bathing alone since she had been a girl. She had a maid who served her at her father’s castle, but the woman never really helped her bathe. That was always something Gavriella did on her own. Even now, she wasn’t entirely comfortable with a strange woman bathing her, but it was too late to do anything about that, so she simply went along with it. When she had been scrubbed and scraped and rinsed from the top of her blonde head to the soles of her small feet, the old woman pulled her out of the pot and wrapped her up in a big coverlet.
Gavriella took no active role in anything that the old woman was imposing upon her. If the woman wanted her dry, then Gavriella sat there while the woman dried her. When it came to combing out her wet hair, she made no effort to take the comb from the old woman and do it herself. She simply let the woman do it for her, combing the tangles out of her hair as the heat of the chamber began to dry it.
With her hair partially dry and her body completely dry underneath the coverlet, the old woman loaned her some of her own clothing because the red dress was completely ruined. The red dye had been affected by the water, leaving big patches of white where it had washed out of the fabric. Gavriella knew that Aurelia was going to be extremely upset at the ruined dress, but there wasn’t anything she could do about it now.
In truth, she didn’t care.
At the moment, she didn’t care about anything.
The tavernkeeper’s wife pulled a shift over her head, made from wool and surprisingly clean. Over that went a heavy broadcloth surcoat that was tied at the waistline. It was too long, and a little too loose, but it was clean and comfortable. As Gavriella sat on the bed, quiet and exhausted, the old woman continued to comb through her hair before finally braiding it into a long, thick braid.
But all of the grooming had taken time and the food that had been brought into the room was cooling now. Still, Gavriella could smell it and, cool or not, she was going to eat it. The lure of bread and butter was enough to get her up off the bed. As she took a seat at the small table in front of the hearth, the old woman gathered up the damp linens and opened the door, hissing at her husband. He rushed in to help her remove the copper pot that was now heavy with lukewarm water. They lugged it out together, sloshing it on to the floor. As they departed, an enormous figure took their place.
Gavriella looked up to see the knight standing there.
“Are you feeling better?” he asked quietly.
She had a big piece of bread and butter in her hand, having just taken an enormous bite. In truth, she wasn’t sure how to answer that question. Did she feel better? Maybe physically. She was warm and clean. She had food.
Mentally was a different matter altogether.
After a moment, she lowered the bread and fixed on him. “You… I simply do not understand you.”
“What don’t you understand?”
“Why you will not leave me alone.”
His response was to shut the door, but he didn’t bolt it. He shut it just enough to give them privacy with their conversation. “I told you why,” he said. “You became my responsibility when I helped you find your way out of Gomorrah.”
“And that includes pulling me out of the river?”
He nodded faintly. “I could not let you kill yourself,” he said quietly. “At least, not in my presence. It is a sin, my lady. Surely you understand that.”
She pushed the bread aside completely, her appetite waning at the subject of conversation. “Mayhap it is, but it is my sin,” she said. “You had no right to stop me.”
He regarded her a moment and as he did, something in him snapped. He was tired of being noble when it wasn’t appreciated… or wanted.
“My lady, I have gone out of my way this evening to present you with a courteous man of honor and you have done your very best to insult me every step of the way,” he said, a flash of temper rising. “I can tell you, plainly, that I have no motive in all of this. I saw a lady in distress tonight and I felt compelled to help her, but that will end in a couple of hours when the sun rises and I help you find your way home. After that, I will trouble you no further. Run back to the river and drown yourself if you wish because I will not be there to pull you out. If you succeed, then God have mercy on your soul. But I will wash my hands of you and your foolish behavior. I am finished showing any measure of concern for your safety because, clearly, you do not care.”
It was a scolding, probably far less than she deserved, but in those stern words, she began to see something in him that she hadn’t seen before. A hardness that he hadn’t shown her, a darkness flashing in those pale eyes. She sat there, looking at him, feeling indignation. Anger.
Pain.
“I never asked you to save me,” she said. “All I did was agree to permit you to help me find the way out of that horrible guild. That was it. You took it upon yourself to become my protector and I never asked you to do that, either.”
He just looked at her, slowly shaking his head. “God, you’re an ungrateful c
reature,” he muttered. “You may look like an angel, but you have the manners of a lout. Since you feel that way, I’ll pay for you to use this chamber for the rest of the night, but you can find your way home on your own in the morning. I am sorry to have wasted my time with you. You make a good act of being fearful and weak, but when someone tries to help you, you have no idea how to graciously accept such help or even be polite about it. What do you get out of this abusive game, my lady? Some kind of sick satisfaction?”
She was taken aback by his words. “What are you talking about? How I behave is not a game, my lord.”
He snorted rudely. “How you behave is as poorly as I have ever seen,” he said. “God help the next man who tries to give you any measure of assistance. You’re not worth any of it.”
She frowned. “How dare you say such things,” she said. “You know nothing about me.”
“And I do not want to,” he snapped back. “I honestly thought I was doing something good. You see, I have sisters and a mother and many female relatives, and in my family, we treat our women with great esteem and respect. It is natural to us. I was raised to be a chivalrous man and I thought you needed someone to be kind to you, but I was wrong. So very wrong. Therefore, I will not trouble you further, my lady. Good luck to you. You are going to need it.”
With that, he turned for the door and yanked it open. Stepping through, he shut it behind him, pausing a moment because he’d just yelled at a woman who had tried to kill herself. He tried not to feel like a monster. But her ingratitude had inflamed him. He didn’t expect praise, but simple thanks would have been nice.
But he’d been wasting his time.
He’d been an idiot.
With a sigh of frustration, he was about to step away from the door when he heard something.
It sounded like weeping.
Keep walking, he told himself. She didn’t want his help. She’d told him to go away multiple times. She didn’t want anything to do with him and she’d made that abundantly clear. Ungrateful, rude, bitter wench.
WolfeBlade: de Wolfe Pack Generations Page 11