Enchantress

by Lisa Jackson

  “Tarren will be good to him.”

  Springan didn’t comment, pretending interest in her food and not looking up from her meal.

  The time passed slowly, and when Springan took the remainder of food to the guard, Morgana walked to the door of the tent.

  “Orders are that you are to stay inside, m’lady,” the guard, Marsh, insisted. He offered her a wide toothless grin that turned Morgana’s insides cold. A scar ran down the length of his cheek and was testament to the battles he’d fought.

  Morgana clamped her teeth together — to tamp down her fear and try to still her tongue. During all her seventeen years she’d been allowed to run free and do as she wished, but ever since the horrid vision and meeting Garrick of Abergwynn, she’d been held captive, first by her own father and now by the bloody lord himself. “Tell Lord Garrick I wish to stretch my legs,” she commanded coolly.

  The big man frowned, and his beard-roughened face took on a stern expression. “You are to stay in the tent, m’lady.”

  Morgana took a step closer to the huge man and thought of the dagger in her belt. “And if I don’t?”

  “The baron will not be happy.”

  “I care not whether he is happy or sad. I need to stretch my legs, and if you don’t let me pass, I’ll be forced to change your mind,” she said sweetly.

  Marsh smothered a smile, but clucked his tongue. “I know of your dagger, but I’m not afeared of it.”

  Morgana gave him a long look. “It’s not a blade I’ll be needing,” she said in a low voice, hoping this large man would prove as superstitious as his fellow knights. “By the skin of the toad and the wing of the bat—”

  “Enough!” Garrick, seeing the crafty smile playing upon Morgana’s lips, strode to his tent. “’Tis time we slept. You,” he ordered the sorceress, “shall sleep here” —he pointed to a pallet thick with furs near the center of the tent— “and you, servant woman, will sleep near the flap.”

  Morgana eyed the largest bundle of furs tossed on a pallet bare inches from the one he had named as her bed.

  “I shall sleep next to you, to make sure you don’t chant and disappear before you have fulfilled your promise.”

  “I’ll not sleep next to you!”

  “You’ve no choice,” Garrick commanded. “You rest on your own pallet or I’ll see that you share mine.” His eyes were as dark as night, his lips thin with anger at being contradicted in front of his men. Several of the knights were close enough to the flap of the tent to hear the exchange, and Marsh, still planted firmly at the entrance, could not help but overhear the argument. Morgana guessed few defied Garrick of Abergwynn, yet she refused to back down.

  “Have it your way,” he said before Morgana could respond. He threw an angry glance at the guard. “Sir Marsh, take Springan outside to wash herself. Do not return until I say.”

  Morgana’s throat froze as her plight became clear. Obviously the baron intended to punish her. “Nay…” she whispered.

  “Do as I say!” Garrick snapped, and the guard grabbed Springan’s arm, drawing her outside the tent and letting the flap close behind him. Inside, the air was close, the darkness permeated only by the red glow of the fire.

  Morgana shivered, feeling his presence, watching as he moved slowly around her, circling her as a wolf might stalk its prey.

  “Dare you defy me in front of my men?” he growled, his voice as low as the sound of surf rumbling to the shore.

  The hair on the back of Morgana’s neck lifted. “I did not—”

  “Dare you argue with me?”

  She stood, braced, waiting, sure that he might strike her at any moment. “But I—”

  “Dare you chant silly, meaningless words to frighten my men and mock them?”

  He quit moving. His bootsteps were hushed, and he was standing behind her, so close that she could smell him, could feel his breath, hot as dragon’s fire, against her neck.

  “You try my patience, witch, and I’ll not allow this farce to continue. My men have pledged their fealty to me! They are loyal and—”

  “You do not own me, Lord Garrick!”

  “Do I not?” he returned, and she trembled at the taunting sound of his words. “Edward has given me these lands and all that which is upon them. Aye, in truth, they are partly his, but he would not argue that all that is Wenlock, including the people therein, belongs to me.”

  “Nay, you do not—”

  “Unless I have harmed you, I can do what I will.”

  Merciful God. She reached instinctively for her dagger, but a hand, large and callused, folded quickly over her wrist, clamping hard over her skin and drawing her back against him so swiftly that her breath caught in her lungs. Her spine pressed against his abdomen, and though she tried to move, her buttocks were slammed against his rigid thighs. Steel muscles bound her to him, as his other arm surrounded her, holding her fast, his fingers splayed beneath her breasts.

  She dared not move. Never had she been held so close by a man and certainly not with the savage power she felt in the coil of his muscles.

  “I did not give you back your dagger so that you could use it against me,” he snarled against the nape of her neck, and she quivered in fear.

  She swallowed back a hot retort, though a thousand sharp words spun through her mind. Lord, please let me get through this, she prayed in terror-riddled silence. The vision had been right. The danger was from this determined knight.

  “What? No incantations?” he mocked. When he let his one hand slip lower, beneath her hip-slung belt, she tensed. Did the beast mean to take her? But his fingers, hot through her tunic, did not probe her legs. Instead they found their way to her dagger and unsheathed the silvery blade. He held the knife in front of her nose. “This is yours, m’lady, but since you must now sleep with me, I think it best kept in my hand.” Turning his head toward the door, he barked, “Bring in the servant girl and prepare the camp for the night.”

  Springan, eyes round with fear, crawled back inside, and Morgana wished she could indeed chant a spell and disappear. A tiny smile tugged at the corners of Springan’s mouth when the servant girl discovered her lady in the arms of Garrick of Abergwynn.

  “Turn your back to us and sleep,” Garrick ordered sharply. Springan spun quickly and slid beneath the furs on her pallet, her face to the wall of the tent. Garrick folded his knees, and together he and Morgana tumbled onto his pallet. “Now,” he said in a voice as low as death, “push me no further, woman, and taunt me no more in front of my men, or I will be forced to find other means of making you bend to my will.”

  Chapter Nine

  “Let me go,” she commanded in a whisper that was rough and frantic.

  “You’ll stay here. With me.” Garrick seldom doubted the wisdom of his decisions, but this time he knew he’d made a vast mistake. Lying with Morgana tucked against him had been a horrible error in judgment. The woman was betrothed to Strahan, by Garrick’s own word, and yet here he was, one arm tucked around her waist, another gripping her right hand. She was rigid in his arms, her breathing shallow, showing her fear. She smelled of lilacs and spring, and his fingertips felt the beat of her pulse on the inside of her wrist.

  “I’ll not lie with you.”

  “You’ll rest, little one. That is all.”

  “I cannot rest with you holding me prisoner. Release me!” She struggled, but her arms, though strong, were no match for his.

  Who was this tiny woman who snarled orders like a king? Did she really think she could best him? He smiled in the darkness at the challenge. “Release you? And have you slit my throat? I think not.”

  “You have no right!” He felt her tense, then straighten. Her heel connected painfully with his shin.

  His breath whistled through his teeth. “Do not test me, witch.”

  “I’ll not lie here on your bed and — oooh!”

  He swung one leg over hers, pinning her to the pallet. Still holding fast to h
er arms, he leaned over her. In the tent’s dark interior he could barely make out the features of her small face, but he saw her eyes — round, reflecting the golden illumination from the filtered firelight, sizzling like lightning. When his gaze shifted lower, he noticed that her tiny mouth was pursed, her full lips drawn together, and he wondered if she had the nerve to spit at him.

  “Unhand me,” she warned.

  He didn’t respond, just shifted his weight slightly. He felt every point where their bodies touched. His leg, though covered with a coarse legging, fit perfectly inside hers, and even as she tried to squirm away, he held her fast. Her hair streamed out over the furs. Night-black curls gleamed as they framed a face so small and enchanting he could think of nothing save kissing her.

  Nervously she licked her lips, and as he watched the silken path of her tongue, he felt his manhood rise, stiff and full, pressing hard against his clothes, betraying him.

  “What?” he finally asked when she stopped moving beneath him. Aside from the rise and fall of her breasts, she was still. “No chants? No spells? No talking to the wind?”

  She swallowed hard but did not reply. Her gaze locked with his, and deep inside, he suppressed a groan. The ache between his legs tormented him. Not since his beloved wife, Astrid, had he wanted a woman more … and perhaps this passion he felt for Morgana, this forbidden desire, was even more intense than his faded memories of Astrid. Caught between anger and awe, he became the same kind of beast as many of his men, wanting to feel her supple body yield to his, wanting to feel her hips rise to greet his manhood and hear that soft whoosh of her breath as he entered her. He wanted her to pulse around him, to writhe anxiously beneath him, to buck upward in silent invitation, to —

  “Do not mock me, m’lord,” she whispered on a ragged breath.

  His wild, humiliating fantasies were brought up short. “Why not?” he demanded in a voice that was rougher than usual. “I brought you on this journey for your skill with magic. Prove to me that you’re not a fraud.”

  “And what would you wish? That I turn your hands into hooves? That I cause the fire to rise up and devour your tents? That I turn a beetle into a war horse? What?”

  Gazing down at her, seeing the glimmer of humor in her eyes as she openly ridiculed him, Garrick felt foolish. He flung his knee from between her legs, and still holding onto her wrists, he cursed the fates that had brought him to this. “On Logan’s soul, woman, all I want from you is help in finding my son,” he said, unwilling to admit how his body cried out for hers.

  Morgana shivered, but not from the cold. “I will try,” she said, grateful that he was no longer poised above her, that his gray gaze was no longer searching hers. Her heart had begun to beat rapidly, as if she’d been running and was out of breath, and the feel of his legs pressing against the inside of her thigh had caused a heat to race like wildfire through her blood.

  Aye, she’d felt fear of this man, but there had been a new emotion swirling through her heart, and she’d been spellbound by his face, so close to hers, his hands surrounding her fingers, the pressure of his hips against her thigh. Her throat dry, she didn’t move, but the scent of him, male and leather, forest and sweat, was everywhere and the touch of his hands, warm and firm, made sleep impossible.

  She closed her eyes, wishing for the oblivion of slumber, wishing for morning, wishing she’d never met the man who held her prisoner.

  For the rest of the journey to Abergwynn, Morgana held her tongue. Garrick insisted she ride next to him, and amid the hidden smiles of the men and their knowing gazes, she sat in the hated saddle, her back stiff with as much pride as she could muster. Obviously the men thought she had lain with their lord. Though her cheeks turned crimson when she caught the shrewd glances of Garrick’s most trusted warriors, she let the men think what they would. Professing her virtue would do no good. Besides, her soiled name might prove helpful, for certainly Sir Strahan would not want a woman who was no longer a virgin.

  Only three people knew the truth — Morgana, Lord Garrick, and Springan, all of whom had shared the tent. Springan, however, could have slept part of the time, thinking that while she dozed Garrick had taken Morgana, when, in truth, he’d shown no interest in her whatsoever.

  Morgana had not slept a wink as she lay rigid next to the man who held her dagger in one hand and her wrist in the other while snoring softly — as if he didn’t have a care in the world! She was jealous of the rest he could so easily attain.

  When she’d dared move her hand away from his as they stretched out upon the pallet, he’d half awakened and dragged her nearer to his warm body, so she’d forced herself to lie without moving a muscle, her sleepless body aching, her eyes burning for lack of rest.

  In the morning, of course, the soldiers had attributed the dark circles under her eyes and her weary posture to the belief that their lord and master had spent hours pleasuring her, teaching her the art of lovemaking. That scandalous thought brought fresh color to her face.

  She’d thought about what it would be like to lie with him. Aye, trying to rest with her body so close to his, hearing the soft sounds of his breathing, and feeling his leg brush against hers had caused her silly heart to beat much too rapidly. She’d imagined his callused hands against her bare skin more than once and had been ashamed at the stirrings deep within her at the turn of her thoughts.

  The knights’ belief that she was Garrick’s lover served another purpose, however. None of the men dared send her lust-filled glances any longer. The soldiers kept their distance from her, for which she was thankful, though she had trouble lifting her head proudly, knowing that they thought she was no better than a common wench.

  Let them think what they would, she decided as she rode and tried to keep her eyelids from drifting downward. Her muscles throbbed from lack of rest, her fingers were nearly useless on the reins. Above the odor of horses, dirt, and sweaty men, she smelled the sea-scent in the air, for though the road between Abergwynn and Wenlock wound through forest and valley, the rutted lane was never far from the ocean.

  They rode through the forest and rolling meadows and on the third day passed through a small village, where shopkeepers and almsmen alike smiled and cheered as Garrick’s men guided their mounts along the narrow streets. The horses’ hooves rang on the cobblestones, and the smell of smoke and refuse drifted over the pervasive scent of horseflesh. Morgana lifted her chin, but caught more than one interested stare cast in her direction. It was not often a woman rode beside the baron, she realized, and she wondered how many of the townspeople thought she spent her hours dabbling in the black arts.

  She noticed a cat slink down an alley, and a group of children who had been stalking the animal pulled up short to stand at the corner and gape, their attention now riveted to the procession. Several of the older boys laughed and pointed at Morgana, and one little girl drew back in horror at the sight of her.

  So that was how it was going to be, Morgana thought sadly.

  On the upper floors of the shops, shutters were thrown open, letting out the smell of roasting meat and the cries of babies as women and small children stared at Baron Garrick and his soldiers.

  On the street, men laughed and clapped each other on the back. So Garrick, the beast of Abergwynn, was loved by those whom he guarded. The dirt-smudged faces of small boys and the toothless grins of stooped and crippled ancients attested to his popularity.

  A scrawny boy, prodded by his peers at the corner near the bakery, broke apart from the group while his friends stood by and watched his thin body move through the crowd toward the soldiers. Several of the boys glanced up at Morgana, and their eyes shone with malevolence. No good would come of this, Morgana thought as the boy wove his way among the onlookers and ran into the street. Freckles were sprayed across his nose, his hair was lank and in need of washing, and his eyes were as blue as a summer lake.

  “It’s the witch! She’s here!” he cried, pointing a grubby little finger at Morgana
.

  Garrick pulled hard on his mount’s reins, and his horse stopped, forcing each soldier to rein in his horse until the entire company drew up short. Morgana wished she could sink beneath the cobblestones, but instead lifted her chin slightly. Phantom sidestepped, and a few other horses snorted, breaking the silence that the small boy’s proclamation had caused “I’m not a—”

  “Witch! Witch! Drinks the blood of babes! Witch! Witch! Eats the eyes of knaves! Witch! Witch! Burns the skin of—”

  “Tommy!” A thin woman wearing a dusty red kerchief over her hair raced through the shuffling throng. Her gaunt face was twisted in horror as she stretched her thin arms out toward her child. Scooping the boy up, she held him to her chest and stared up at Garrick with cold fear in her eyes. “I’m sorry, m’lord,” she whispered. Her lower lip trembled until she clamped it between her front teeth.

  The town, boisterous only moments before, had become hushed. In the distance a chicken squawked, but the merry villagers were now sober, all eyes trained on Morgana. Tommy’s comrades quickly dispersed, breaking apart and running down separate paths lest they incur the baron’s wrath.

  “Bring me the boy,” Garrick said, and the woman, shivering visibly, did as she was told.

  “Do not punish him,” Morgana whispered, though her insides were twisted, her heart stone cold from the wretched chant he’d aimed at her. Nonetheless, he was just a boy, believing the terrible stories that no doubt had been grist for the gossip mill ever since Garrick had announced he would be riding to Wenlock. Gossip was known to breed within castle walls before racing along its cruel path to the villages and towns of the countryside. The boy, spurred on by his friends, was but repeating what he’d heard.

  Behind Garrick, several soldiers coughed, as if to disguise the urge to laugh aloud, though Morgana found the situation far from humorous.

  Garrick bent low on his horse and hauled the boy into the saddle with him. His features harsh, he studied the white-faced lad.

  Tommy’s mother lifted her arms in quiet supplication. “M’lord, please. Show mercy.”