The Warrior's Maiden (The Warriors Series Book 2)

by Denise Domning

  “Since you’ve already helped me once to straighten my thoughts this day, help me again if you will.” The pleasure his request sparked in her gaze made Josce flinch.

  “If I can,” she replied with a tiny smile.

  He paused to marshal his thoughts. Of one thing he was certain: what he told Elianne here would most surely reach her sire’s ears. Therefore, she must carry only the messages he wanted the sheriff to hear. When he was ready, he tossed his words like a knife, his statement coming to a quivering halt between them.

  “My lady stepmother believes Lord Haydon knew the thieves who attacked him.”

  Elianne’s brows lifted in surprise over her eyes. “Why ever would she think such a thing?”

  “Because the thieves didn’t retreat when Haydon’s party joined the set-upon spice merchant. She and I reckon the only reason for doing so could be to conceal their identities. Why else fight on, only to lose twelve of their own?”

  “Twelve?” Elianne’s brows remained high upon her forehead. “How do you know how many the thieves lost?”

  Josce’s hopes of learning anything new from her faltered. He countered her question with his own. “Has your father told you nothing about the bandits he chases?”

  “Not a word,” Elianne said with a shake of her head. “He says the activities of degraded men are an indecent subject for a woman. I must admit to wondering, though. I saw your sire’s armor in the ice house, left in its entirety. What sort of thieves leave behind something so valuable as that?”

  “My question exactly,” Josce replied, then eyed her for another quiet moment.

  Innocence and ignorance glowed from her face. Aye, but if Reiner thought keeping his daughter unaware protected her he was a fool. Nothing would shield Elianne if a connection between du Hommet and the bandits was revealed. Nay, for what remained of her days she’d be reviled as the spawn of a base and dishonorable man.

  That her father might leave his daughter so completely bereft, without either coin or name to protect her, stirred a need to shield Elianne the way her sire hadn’t. If Josce had no harbor to offer her, there was another one.

  “Tell me, for I cannot help but wonder,” he said to her. “That’s a fine bed your sire owns. Since there’s no acreage to give you for an inheritance why doesn’t he make that bed your inheritance? It’s fine enough that the prioress might accept it as your dowry and give you a position among the nuns. Not that I think you should take your vows,” he added. The idea of Elianne locked in a barren cell and beyond his touch made something within Josce twist in the strangest way. “It’s only that yesterday you seemed at one with the sisters, and they were content with your presence.”

  What could have been a quiet cough broke from Elianne. “That assumes my father values me above a bed given to him by some distant relative whose face he cannot recall.”

  Josce blinked at confirmation that du Hommet had inherited the bed. If he hadn’t purchased it, then where had all the profit gone?

  “As for the priory,” Elianne was saying, “until yesterday I was indeed comfortable in its embrace. A number of sisters had promised to petition Prioress Gertha to offer me a place upon my sire’s death, even though I have no dowry. Yesterday, my father’s invitation to you resulted in your lady stepmother leaving the priory when the prioress wanted her to stay. In doing this, he alienated Mother Gertha beyond hope of any such offer.”

  Catching a broken breath, she stared at her fisted hands upon her knees. “He gave away my only chance for a decent future and he won’t tell me why he did it.”

  Josce eyed her in astonishment and triumph. That du Hommet had ruined his own daughter’s future to invite his enemy to stay in his house nigh on screamed that the sheriff was connected to the thieves. Josce strained to weave his fragmented bits of insight into a whole, only to give up in frustration. Too many pieces were yet missing.

  What followed was the strangest desire to tell Elianne all he knew. Startled, Josce swallowed the urge, only to be flummoxed all over again. It wasn’t just to warn Elianne against her sire that he wanted to confide what he knew. Nay, he longed to convince her that his own vow to kill her father was right and just, when no daughter could accept such a thing.

  “Well, against that I can see why you weren’t overjoyed to have Haydon a-visiting in your home,” he managed.

  Elianne shot him a sidelong look, one corner of her mouth lifting. “Aye, and then all went even more awry when you came to bathe at the pool.”

  Josce drew a quick breath as his poorly-controlled desire for her once more took flight. God help him, but he wanted to hold her in his arms one more time. As if she felt what stirred in him, new heat came to life in Elianne’s gaze. Her face softened. She bit at her lower lip.

  “Mistress! Mistress, come you now, and swiftly so!”

  The shout from one of Aggie’s girls jerked Josce out of lust’s grip. Across the bench from him, Elianne fair sprang to her feet to face the gate. Pretty Mabil appeared in the opening, doing her best to peer past the wreckage blocking the gateway.

  “Oh mistress, what happened here? Ach, look at your lovely arbor!” she cried, failing at her attempt to pick her way through the mess into the garden. “A shame, after all the work you did on it. Sir Adelm is arrived and would speak with you. He also brings with him a messenger for Sir Josce.”

  Only then did Mabil see Josce sitting on the bench. “Oh, but here you are, sir. We’ve been looking all over for you.”

  She smiled at him and blinked, or was it a wink? A touch of revulsion shot through Josce at this, only to be followed by another raft of surprise. Why would one woman’s bold ways disgust him, while another’s only left him wanting more of her?

  “I think your messenger comes from companions of yours who’ve taken up lodging in town,” Mabil called out with enough force to make her words ring against the garden walls. “I think they expect you to come to them on the morrow.”

  Josce’s disgust gave way to dismay. In polite society, a messenger delivered his news only in the presence of the one to whom his words were addressed. Apparently, every man and his brother received any and all news here at Coneytrop. Forewarned was forearmed. Unless there was no way to avoid it, he’d send no messages to Lady Beatrice, should his quest for vengeance take him from these walls.

  Only then did the full meaning of what Mabil said register. His friends had left their holiday at Glevering to join him? Gratitude lifted from the morass of emotions that bound him these days. The need to know who of the friends he so valued had come brought him to his feet.

  “Well, that’s the end of it, then,” Elianne said, her voice low and flat as she turned to look at him.

  That stopped Josce. “The end of what?”

  “Your visit,” she replied, regret and longing filling her pretty eyes. “Once you leave us to join your comrades, your lady stepmother will return to the priory. She wants to go, now that she’s a little improved.”

  “Nay.” The word fair leapt from Josce’s mouth, startling him. He told himself it was his need for vengeance that prompted his denial. The truth was that he wasn’t ready to bid Elianne farewell.

  “Nay,” he repeated, this time burying his passion. “My lady stepmother and I concur. We prefer to remain at Coneytrop throughout Lady Beatrice’s recovery. If she returns to the priory the sisters will separate us and neither of us wants that. I know it’s a burden for you, but might we stay a little longer?”

  The joy that blossomed on her face both took Josce’s breath and worried him. Would that she weren’t so honest. Her affection for him filled every inch of her expression.

  “But, of course,” she agreed.

  “Mistress, what are you doing in there with Sir Josce, anyway?” Mabil called to them, her voice alive with curiosity. “I thought you went to the garden to avoid him.”

  Yet smiling, Elianne whirled and strode toward the gate. Josce watched her walk, once more enjoying her straightforward and capable pace, even as he
felt the beginnings of responsibility for her settle onto his shoulders. He had an inheritance and the promise of new wealth at his fingertips. How expensive could it be to see her pensioned to the convent should his vengeance leave her orphaned and without resources?

  “So I intended,” Elianne called to Aggie’s daughter. “Unfortunately, he was here before me. Mabil, from your side, do what you can to untangle the roses from the wreckage and make a path. I think Sir Josce would like to hear the proper version of his message sometime before nightfall.”

  Adelm took his ease at the hall’s high table, a cup of Elianne’s fine ale before him. As he waited for his half- sister to join him he watched Haydon’s men game. Richard, Coneytrop’s bailiff, diced along with them. If the bailiff’s whoops were any indication, Richard was fully enjoying this visit from his master’s enemies.

  The corner of Adelm’s mouth tightened. It was a good thing he’d insisted Reiner keep their illicit activities from Coneytrop’s bailiff. Richard was a worse gossip than any of Knabwell’s midwives. It hadn’t been easy to do. Where Elianne respected a man’s privacy, never asking about what she had no right to know, Richard poked and pried with niggling questions.

  Behind the hall screen the exterior door opened, then Elianne rounded the wooden panel. She smiled at him as she strode toward his table. Adelm stared. Something was different. It wasn’t her hair or her clothing, but she looked softer, more feminine, somehow.

  An instant later, Sir Josce followed her around the screen’s edge and into the hall. Haydon’s bastard wore hunting attire this day. Oddly enough, the knight looked more powerful dressed in the rough woolen garments than he had in his mail.

  As Adelm studied the tall man, he gave thanks his fellow bastard hadn’t traveled with Lord Haydon that day. One more sword plied with the nobleman’s skill and the battle might well have gone to the thieves’ detriment. As it was, Lord Baldwin and his men had come close to decimating his hand-picked band of soldiers.

  Grief stirred in the pit of Adelm’s stomach. Until that day he’d lost only four men over the full seven years of thieving. To lose so many all at once cut him to the core. Those men had been his to care for, and he failed them, just as he’d betrayed the trust those little ladies put in him. It galled him that, were he to die now, the sum of his life would be murder, failure and betrayal.

  “Sir Josce!” cried the servant called Perrin whom Adelm had led here from Knabwell. The man rose from the crouching dicers where he’d been welcomed as one of their own. “God be praised, we’ve finally caught you.”

  The knight stopped beside his man. “And glad I am you’ve come, Perrin. I’d dearly like something other than this to wear,” he said, touching the breast of his rough tunic.

  Another start of surprise shot through Adelm. Yesterday Haydon’s bastard had worn his thirst for vengeance on his face the way some knights painted their successes on their shields, for all the world to see. This day no sign of that blood lust showed. Since Adelm doubted the knight had given up his dark ambition, that meant the man hid his emotions. To what purpose?

  Elianne reached Adelm’s table. Not a trace of yesterday’s unease showed in her face. Instead, his half- sister looked beautiful in a way she never before had. Her eyes fair sparkled, while there seemed to be a new lushness to the bend of her mouth.

  Only then did he recognize the signs. Adelm drew a quick breath. She was virgin no longer. Yon bastard had had his way with Elianne!

  Even as the thought formed, Adelm discarded it. That Sir Josce yet lived said he hadn’t laid an inappropriate hand on Elianne. Reiner was right to think she might slaughter a man for even for attempting rape. As for a seduction, although deflowering Reiner’s daughter might serve Sir Josce’s vengeful ambitions, a year wouldn’t be long enough for a determined stranger to tease Elianne into sin.

  His sister was oblivious. More than a few men had cast their nets in Elianne’s direction over the past years, only to gnash their teeth in frustration when she failed to notice their advances. Nay, Elianne couldn’t be anything but the maiden she’d always been. Then, what was different?

  “Mabil says you wish to speak with me,” Elianne said, naught but welcome for him in her voice.

  “Aye, so I do, but not so much for conversation’s sake, but yours,” he replied, yet gnawing over her change. “Is all well? Do you yet fear Haydon’s stay at Coneytrop?”

  With his words, Elianne shot a glance across the hall toward Sir Josce. As her gaze lit upon the knight her face softened even further. Adelm caught another startled breath. Jesus God, it wasn’t Sir Josce pursuing Elianne, but she him!

  Far beneath Adelm’s astonishment and his own base need for self-preservation, a strange mingling of gratitude and pride woke. Such was the purity of his sweet sister’s heart. Elianne fixed her affections on yon knight, not caring a whit for the fact that the man was bastard born.

  When she returned her gaze to Adelm, her expression was a touch sheepish. She gave a tiny shrug. “Perhaps I overreacted a mite. Haydon’s men are well-behaved and good-natured.” She laughed a little. “Mayhap a little too good-natured. Our Mabil has her eye upon one of the soldiers.”

  Adelm’s astonishment grew. By his sword, but his ofttimes dour sister was fair giddy with her newfound affections. He shot another look at Sir Josce.

  The knight had retreated a bit from the dicers. With his back toward the room, he and his servant were opening a pack between them. There was no message for Adelm to read in the span of the noble bastard’s broad shoulders. Then again, he didn’t need a message from this man to know Elianne’s fate. Once the knight’s business was done, Sir Josce would leave, and his sister’s heart would be broken.

  Adelm’s jaw tensed. If there was a hell, then Reiner should rot there for how he used his children. Fretting for his sister, he looked back at Elianne. She might be wise enough to recognize that Sir Josce could offer her nothing; not only was the man Reiner’s enemy, but in this world, property married property, no matter what a man's or woman’s heart might desire. Ah, but was her heart strong enough to recognize this truth?

  “And the knight?” he asked gently. “He also behaves himself toward you?” Here it was, her opportunity to confess, if there was aught to tell.

  The girlish softness drained from Elianne’s face, to be replaced by shades of sorrow. Adelm sighed for her. Aye, his sister knew very well the pain she faced by fixing her heart upon her sire’s enemy.

  She shrugged a second time, as if the loss of a lass’s customary dream of home and family were nothing to her. “He’s calmer today than yesterday.” There was a odd flatness to her voice, then she offered a puzzled frown. “Do you know, he has the strangest ideas. He believes his lord father knew someone among the thieves, if you can fathom it.”

  The hairs on the back of Adelm’s neck stood upright. Like the crying of some awful haunt, Adelaide’s sweet voice echoed out from his memory as she called out his name to her sire upon the battlefield. Sir Josce was wrong. It wasn’t Lord Haydon who’d known one among the thieves, but his daughters.

  With that thought, Death came to breathe behind Adelm, hot, hungry, and horrible. He, a common woman’s unacknowledged bastard, had slain nobles. If he were exposed, it was drawing and quartering that would send him into eternal blackness. Adelm mentally recoiled from the prospect of such pain. Sir Josce must be kept from truth, even if that meant using his sister as the spy. as Reiner intended.

  Hating himself anew, Adelm set himself to the task of winnowing information from Elianne. “Why would he think such a thing?”

  His sister’s brow remained creased. “Sir Josce says the thieves fought on and lost many after Haydon’s troop joined the spice merchant. I didn’t think bandits owned that sort of courage. Shouldn’t they have run when they found themselves out-manned? Why battle on and lose so many, unless they had something to protect, such as their identities?”

  “Who would a nobleman from outside this shire know among such riffraf
f?” Adelm countered, his fear abating a little. What Elianne related was nothing more than the conclusion any battle-trained and intelligent man might make when dissecting what little was known of that day.

  “I think it more likely that Lord Haydon somehow trapped the troop, leaving them no choice but to fight their way out of his net,” Adelm went on. “Don’t forget that this is the first time those thieves faced a knight with well-schooled soldiers instead of a merchant’s simple men. It’s logical that the bandits might lose more than a few in that case.”

  “Aye,” Elianne replied slowly, her brow smoothing, “so it is.”

  Then she shuddered. “Ach, those poor lasses. It chills my blood to think on what they endured before our Lord finally took custody of their souls.”

  Adelm flinched. If only he’d known Lord Haydon and his party were in the vicinity when he attacked the spice merchant. If only the nobleman hadn’t tried to rescue the beleaguered merchant. If only Haydon’s womenfolk had stayed far from the battle scene.

  The need to beg Elianne’s forgiveness filled him. Adelm longed to tell her how he’d made the lasses’ passings as swift and painless as possible. Hadn’t he covered their eyes so they wouldn’t see their death blows approaching? Aye, and as their life blood flowed, he’d rocked each of them in his arms, trying to soothe their fears as they entered whatever afterlife was set aside for the innocent. He let the urge for Elianne’s absolution die. How could he expect her to forgive him when he couldn’t forgive himself?

  “Why does Sir Josce make you his confidante after he’s told the world your sire is his enemy?” he asked instead.

  New color burst to life in Elianne’s cheeks. She lowered her gaze to the table, using her fingernail to scrape at remains of the midday meal on its surface. “I doubt I’m his confidante. I think his grief over his sire’s death made him hungry for a sympathetic ear. As for his threats toward my father”—again, she shrugged—“I wonder now if they, too, were nothing but a reflection of his grief. It seems he and his sire cared deeply for each other.”