Candle in the Window (9 page)

The leader rode close to their side and warned,
“Listen well. We are a troop of mercenaries—”

“Troop? A powerful name for one mercenary
commanding a flock of untrained serfs.”

“—of eight able-bodied
men—”

“Eight?” William mocked.

“At least six,” the leader said sourly.
“You didn’t kill anyone back there, but only broke a
couple of bones. You are a wet, blind man, but once you were a
warrior, so I caution
you now. His lordship
wants you alive, but my patience is at an end. Unless you want to
ride tied hand and foot and dropped over a horse like a portion of
game, don’t try to escape.”

“Wisdom I will endeavor to follow,”
William answered ironically.

The leader left to ride to the front of the column.
The troop of men thinned to a single file, brushing past branches
and bushes in their haste to put ground between themselves and the
avenging Lord Peter of Burke. They grumbled and spit, compared
bruises and argued.

William and Saura adjusted to the jarring pace, and
William wiggled his hands.

“Can you free them?” Saura asked
quietly.

“I can loose them from your waist. The knots
are so tight my fingers tingle.” He worked with silent
contortions until he sighed with pleasure. “There.” He
rubbed his fingers across her flat stomach. “Much
better.”

Saura jumped and quavered, “What if they see
your hands are free?”

“They’ll not care. He’s right,
only a fool would try to escape now, and I’m not that. Nay,
the battle was never in doubt, but our miniature squires must have
heard the shouting and be on their way to the castle. Let us enjoy
the ride until we reach our destination, wherever that might
be.” His fingers flexed again and hugged her waist.
“You’re tiny.” His breath sighed across her neck
and she jumped again. “And high-strung. I never would have
suspected a woman of your
elderly
years
would be so responsive to the touch of a hand. Have you never
married?”

“Nay.” Her voice began steadily and
rose to a squeak. “William!”

His lips caressed her neck and shoulders,
roughening the
skin with his bearded chin.
“I love the scent of carnations. Such smooth skin.” He
smiled. “For a woman of your
elderly
years.”

“William….”

“And such high, tight breasts.” His
hands moved across her bosom, exploring and pressing. “For a
woman of your—”

“
Elderly
years.” Her hands caught his and positioned them on the
saddle. “How long have you known?”

“I told you before I’m not a fool.
Clare is seven. A mighty difference in age between an
elderly
woman of forty and her brother.”

“It’s not impossible!” Saura
protested.

“But unlikely. Once I made that connection,
it wasn’t hard to equate my mystery maid of the bath with the
untouchable nun of gentle birth. The unknown relation of my mother,
our housekeeper. I gave you every chance to tell me.”

Reduced to silence, she could only nod. The
movement of her head jogged him and he guessed, “Lady Saura
of Roget?”

“Aye,” she whispered.

He settled her against his chest to cushion her
ride. He tenderly wrapped his mighty arms around her waist, but his
mind bubbled with revolt. Had he discovered this woman, his woman,
only to be murdered by some anonymous evil that feared to show its
face? It would never have been so in the old days, before his sight
was stripped from him by ruse or deceit. In the old days, he would
have fought for this lady, protected her with sword and shield. Now
he was constrained to ride with the enemy to some unforeseen fate.
He cursed the inaction that dragged at his spirit and longed for
another skull to crush.

They rode until evening and the horse beneath them
sagged with their weight. As the birds chirped a weary good
night and the breeze cooled and thickened, they
stopped to let the animals drink. Saura dismounted gingerly, for
her shoes had been abandoned on the banks of Fyngre Brook. Her legs
buckled beneath her, protesting the hours in the saddle. William
reached for her, but Mort stuck out his leg and William staggered
over it.

“Ha! I’ll take care of th’ pretty
lady,” Mort chortled, catching her waist.

The others laughed, their grudge against the blind
knight fresh. Encouraged, Mort pressed Saura close and made kissing
sounds by her ear. “Come with me, m’lady. You’ll
need help to find your way. Let me show ye th’ huge tree
trunks that grow in these woods.”

“Stumps, more likely,” she hissed,
dragging her nails across his eyes. Blood sprang up where her nails
dug and Mort howled with fury. Jerking free, she stumbled across
the clearing. The merriment of the troop rang in her ears;
Mort’s snarling pursuit propelled her.

She feared, oh God, she feared.

But another joined the hunt: William followed them,
trailing the threats that rang in the forest. Saura heard as he
snared the unwary Mort and flung him around. She heard Mort gurgle
as William wrapped one hand around the man’s neck and lifted
him into the air. She heard the crunch of bulbous flesh as one
mighty fist knocked Mort’s curses down his throat; she heard
William fling the serf into the group of scrambling
mercenaries.

What she couldn’t see was Bronnie, stalwart
Bronnie, as he swung the shaft of his bow and smashed William in
the back of the head.

Saura heard the thwack as it connected, heard the
rumble as William keeled over in the dirt.

Then it was silent, only Bronnie’s whimpering
broke the shocked hush.

The leader walked to William and turned him with a
heave of his foot. “Have you killed him, Bronnie?”

“Is there a bed?” The stone beneath her
fingertips felt dry and cold, but the winding stairs she had
climbed had warmed her, as did the anger surging through her veins.
The group of men who had captured them had dispersed when they
arrived in this strange household, but Bronnie had been retained to
guide them, and his new shoes squeaked from their dunking. One
giant of a man carried William, draped over his shoulder.

Who were they? Who was this mysterious lord? How
dared he take the master of Burke and his housekeeper from their
lands? The distinctive combination of smells that identified each
castle assured her she had never visited here before. So where were
they? The stair leveled into a landing and they halted as Bronnie
swung the creaking door wide and ushered them in. “Where are
we? Is there a bed for William?” she insisted, her voice
sharp as a slap.

“Aye, m’lady.”

His French grated with harsh consonants, but Saura
could hear the obsequious whimper in Bronnie’s voice.
She’d taught him respect with the whiplash of her tongue.

“That’s to say, nay,
m’lady.” He groaned under the sharp jab of her elbow.
“There’s a palliasse on th’ floor. In this room
we prepared just for ye.”

“You call this prison a room?” She
placed one hand on one wall and without moving her feet, simply by
leaning, she placed her other hand on the other wall. “But a
palliasse is
better than nothing. Lay my Lord
William on it.
Gently
, you
fools!” As she knelt beside the unconscious man, her ear
caught the squeak of shoes sneaking out the door. “You cannot
leave until you bring me water and bandage material,” she
enunciated clearly, and the feet stopped.

“Eh, well, I’ll have to ask th’
lord.”

She rose to her feet in a magnificent fury.
“Ask him! Aye, and ask him if he wanted Lord William killed
by your stupidity, too. Ask him how he feels about a churl who
disobeys the commands of a baron’s daughter. Ask
him—”

“I’ll bring th’ water,”
Bronnie answered hastily.

“And the bandaging. And something for us to
eat, I’m hungry. And extra blankets.”

The large man shuffled out, escaping her authority,
while Bronnie bowed and said, “Aye, m’lady. As ye wish,
m’lady.”

Then he left, too, shutting the door with a solid
thunk and leaving Saura standing alone. As quickly as he
disappeared, so did her supporting anger. Her chin dropped, her
knees folded. She crouched beside William, her fingers frantically
combing his head, seeking the cause of his long unconsciousness. A
lump rose there on the back of his neck, and it felt angry and
hard, full of blood. A goose egg, her mother had called them,
painful but not serious. Surely there was some other injury, but
her hands could discover nothing else. As far down as she could run
her hands beneath his clothes, there was nothing. The top of his
head, his face, nothing.

With a groan, she thumped her head beside
William’s. Her hands clutched her middle, her knees tucked
close to her chest, and she lay there, unmoving, in the depths of
despair, beyond tears. No thoughts crossed her mind, no ideas
lightened her darkness.

She was blind. As useless and repulsive as her
stepfather had told her. She couldn’t see the attackers for
William. She
couldn’t scout out their
surroundings, couldn’t seek useful weapons, couldn’t do
anything of any use to anybody. She couldn’t even force
respect from that lowborn churl, couldn’t even get him to
bring water and bandaging and food and blankets, all things they
would need to survive the night with comfort. She was nothing more
than a worm.

Life seemed brightest just before it was snatched
away. Those nebulous dreams of hers had led them to the stream, had
distracted her when she should have been listening for the whisper
of feet in the woods. When she lived in her stepfather’s
house, she had always listened. She never slept unless Maud guarded
her, she never worked alone, she never walked in the garden or
bailey without listening, listening for the scuttling sound of
Theobald’s shoes. He wanted to lay his hands on her body,
breathe his fetid breath on her face, poke himself at her. She
shuddered and rubbed the serpent that twisted her insides. How
could a man despise someone as much as Theobald despised her and
still want to fornicate with her?

Did she dare think she loved William? She squirmed
as Theobald’s jeering echoed through her head. He’d
tormented her ceaselessly, and with no effort she could recall
every word. She wasn’t worthy of love, he’d said. She
couldn’t work on a tapestry, she couldn’t ride a horse
by herself: she was worthless. Her face could turn a man into salt,
he’d sneered. Her figure reminded him of a couple of fat
dumplings on a short stick. What man, he’d asked, would want
a stupid woman in his bed, one who couldn’t even see the piss
pot if she stepped in it?

She couldn’t even help William. His goose egg
rated as nothing more than minor, but she knew the truth, although
she didn’t want to admit it to herself. He might never wake
up. Head injuries were tricky, her mother had told her. Espe
cially the kind of head injuries that dealt with a
previous wound. Whatever brain lurked inside your head conformed to
its own rules. A bruise on the body hurt and could be deadly, but a
bruise on the head could reduce the brightest toddler to a drooling
idiot. A blow in the right area could replace a grown man with a
silent block who lived and breathed but slept like the dead until
starvation claimed him.

Sometimes, it seemed to her, God must hate her
above all creatures. He’d given her enough to live on the
fringes of life, but never become a participant. She was capable,
never beautiful. She was a sister, never a wife. She was an aunt,
never a mother.

One of her hands crept out from beneath her and
stroked William’s rough arm. She was a friend, a teacher, a
woman: never a lover.

What would she do without William?

Tightly, she clasped his fingers in hers. Each
individual muscle and bone and sinew bespoke his strength, yet he
lay still in the chilly room, his skin unnaturally cool.

Like a slap in the face, Saura’s mother arose
before her. “Lying there wallowing in your pity, Saura, when
you have enough to eat, and shelter, and the sun to warm you in
summer, and a fire in winter. Pay attention to what goes on around
you. If there’s famine, who starves? Not you. If
there’s war, who burns? Not you. If there’s sickness,
it’s not you who lies in the mud at the side of the road and
dies. So what if your eyes don’t work? You have a brain. Get
up and use it.”

With unseen power, the echo of her mother’s
voice jerked her erect. “Whining about your fate will not
cover him with a blanket,” she said aloud, and laughed a
little. The voice she heard from her own mouth sounded like her
mother’s, or
dering the young Saura to deal
with the sick because it was the job of the chatelaine to do
so.

Her clumsy fingers searched the hard pallet beneath
William until she found a rough woolen blanket folded at the foot.
She covered him, then changed her mind and slid it off. Putting her
hands beneath him, she heaved, trying to get him onto his back, and
then heaved again.

He didn’t budge. He was one large, inert
block of meat, and she was only a mosquito worrying his flesh.
“It’ll be easier…for you…to
breathe…my lord,” she punctuated her words with her
struggles, “if you’ll roll…onto your
back.”

“Nay, m’lady!”

Saura jumped and turned.

“Let me do that. Ye’re too slight a
lady t’ do such heavy labor.” Bronnie hurried into the
room, dropping things as he came. “I can move t’
lord.”

“Well, be careful with him. That’s a
vicious blow you gave him,” she scolded.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I am. But
see, he was beatin’ Mort.”

“He’s a blind man. How much damage did
you think he could do?”

“Well,” Bronnie drawled the word with
the profound doubt of the slow-witted. “He looked like he was
doin’ a good job of killin’ him t’ me. Here, you
want him on his back?”

She nodded and wrung her hands as she listened to
the man move William. God knows what the ham-handed fool did, but
she had no choice. William needed to be turned, and she
couldn’t do it.