The twilight seemed to meld the forest now into a wall, but Collum, far more accustomed to riding by twilight, knew the landscape, and seemed able to see in the dark. He continued riding into what appeared a great void, but it was not—a trail broke through the trees.
"Oh, 'tis dark," Bridie murmured.
"Aye, but the copse is just ahead," Margot assured her. "And there, we'll find a shelter, and build a fire."
"A small ride to go," Hagar, riding at the rear, informed them cheerfully.
The trees here were very close; the trail such that it seemed the horses would be too great to pass through it. But in moments more, the growth gave way; they entered a copse.
Collum dismounted. "A moment, my lady."
He dismounted. She saw that there was a structure in the woods, wattle and daub, and covered with thatch. Soon after Collum ducked his way beneath the small, open doorway, dim light appeared from within. Collum reappeared, coming to Eleanor's horse, ready to help her dismount. " 'Tis not much, but a shelter. We'll be out of the weather."
The crude little house had an opening in the front, a low arch Collum had to duck through, and another like it in the rear. The place had long been open to the elements, but there was a pit of stone in the center for a fire, and the walls seemed sturdy enough. Its very closeness made it warm enough, with the front and rear opening allowing for clean air to pass through. A small opening in the roof overhead would help clear the smoke once a fire was built.
"Ah, well, here we are," Collum said, somewhat helplessly, as if he were not accustomed to being the one to make a lady comfortable on a rough journey.
Eleanor set a hand on his shoulder. "It's a fine shelter," she assured him. "A good place to rest for the night."
"Aye, and we'll make it comfortable enough," Hagar said. "We'll get the blankets and the food.
"And I'll be seeing that you don't make a mess of my packing," Bridie said, giving a firm nod to Eleanor, who wondered how Bridie could still have so much energy, when she suddenly felt so exhausted herself.
She stood alone in the shelter with Margot. Margot walked over to her, taking both her hands. "Thank you," she said fervency. "Thank you ... you made something happen that... might have taken a lifetime. No, it would never have happened—"
"He loves you very much," Eleanor told her.
"Well, I've always believed that," Margot said with a small smile. "If not ... well, I love him, loved him enough just to be with him. But what you managed... and taking the occasion of your own wedding ..."
"I was rather an extreme circumstance as it was," Eleanor murmured.
Margot laughed.
"We're all fighting for what is right, aren't we?" Eleanor asked her.
"Aye, but still ... thank you. I will never be able to thank you enough."
"Don't forget, you showed me kindness when I was in terror."
Margot laughed. "You? You were never in terror. You were already planning your leap into the sea."
Eleanor smiled, and what answer she would have given remained with her as the others came into the little house in the woods.
"Blankets, my lady," Hagar said to Eleanor, "the floor is not comfortable, I'm afraid—"
"It will be fine," she assured him.
She took her blanket, and noted that what they had given her was a woolen swath of Brendan's tartan. "I will be quite fine," she assured him, and looked across the room to where Margot was taking a place. She smiled at Margot. "I can learn to sleep easily in the woods," she added softy. "Like Margot."
The blonde woman returned her smile. Bridie had been into their packs, producing the loaves of bread and cheese they had brought, along with a basket of wild berries. There was ale to drink, and famished as she was, the food, eaten on the floor in the smoky hut, seemed to be the finest she had ever tasted. The place was warm, the blanket seemed to cradle her. She smoothed out the tartan, and asked aloud, "I wonder how they are faring at the castle."
"They'll be fine, my lady, don't fret," Hagar told her. "We'll hear word from the south soon enough," he told her.
She agreed. Aware that Collum, Hagar, and Lars were dividing the watch, she curled in her comer and lay to sleep. She realized that she was really Brendan's wife, and no matter what her circumstances, that fact suddenly thrilled her, though she lay without him on their wedding night. Whatever the future held ...
He would always come to her.
Corbin was the one to stop Brendan from the madness of fleeing from the front gates of the fortress alone, and risking the movement of the remaining English forces against them when the enemy still retained powerful numbers.
"If you die, and we're all destroyed, you'll be of no possible use to Eleanor," he reminded him, when he vehemently let out the plan that he could ride on his own, racing through the opposition with such speed and surprise that they would not expect him. But Griffin's words warned them that the frontal attack on the fortress had become a ruse only to keep them from knowing that Fitzgerald had ridden northward, aware of the very roads they would take, and probably what safe houses they intended to use along the way.
"There is a way out," Brendan said, looking at Eric. "The rear, by the water, where the wall is still freshly repaired. We can break a section down, and escape up the hill, and they will never know we are gone."
He didn't wait for agreement, but started calling out to men, seeking the masons drawn to service on the walls, and the brawniest of his soldiers. He picked and clawed at the newly set stone himself. The time to create a portal was minimal, but it seemed as if the minutes sped, passing like wildfire.
Yet while he worked at the stone, Eric ordered horses and chose the men to ride.
This time, Corbin insisted he be among their number.
"Eleanor is my cousin; her enemy is my enemy," he told Brendan.
"As you wish," Brendan told him, mounting, "but be prepared to take your sword against your countrymen."
"That I am, I swear."
Both Liam and Eric would ride as well; six others were chosen. Griffin, Bruce's messenger would stay, commanding the castle defense with Rune Mac Duff, a veteran of many of Wallace's skirmishes. Jem Maclver, a man long accustomed to hard riding as well, would accompany Eric, along with Tam of Perth, Morgan Anderson, Paul Miller, Jason Douglas, and Axel de Burg. All were expert at quick movement—and hand to hand combat Liam, as always, was armed with the weapon at which he so excelled, his bow.
The moon was rising high when they rode out through the cavity they had created in the wall. As soon as they were through it the masons began repairing. They sped across shallow water and fields, rising on the hill in a silhouette they could not avoid.
Behind them, the English camp remained still; an eerie black shadow in the menace of the night. Their horses' hooves thundered as they rode. Each staccato beat seemed to echo in Brendan's heart. He had never known such fear.
Eleanor awoke feeling very stiff.
It was one thing to claim that she was quite comfortable on the floor, and that she cared nothing for luxuries.
Quite frankly, she realized, she preferred luxuries.
But rising, stretching, she knew in her heart that she'd rather a floor with Brendan, than the softest bed without him. That morning, she had neither, and hugging her knees to her chest, she suddenly realized that that wasn't quite so easy a thing to do as it had been; she felt the growth in her abdomen, rounder now, yet that discomfort gave her a strange sense of happiness until she realized that it might be a long time before she saw Brendan again, or even knew if he had survived the fight with Fitzgerald's men.
She rose carefully. Collum, sleeping nearest the door like a great bear guarding a cave, woke immediately. "Sorry!" she said softy. "It's very early; not full light." He started to rise. "No!" she protested. "There's no danger. I only need ... to slip outside."
"Hagar guards outside," Collum murmured. "Don't go too far."
"I won't"
She stepped carefully over Lars
and Bridie. The pair were sweetly curled together beneath a plaid near die peat fire which had now died to embers.
Outside the arched entrance, she found Hagar awake and watchful. He had been sitting on an upturned log, whittling, but his hands were still as she went out. He looked up, offering her a nod. His brow was knit in a frown.
"What is it?" she asked.
"Listen."
She did so. "I don't hear a thing," she said softy. Not even the horses, tethered at the front of the house, shifted or moved.
"Not a thing ..." Hagar whispered, "that's what's wrong. No birds ... no rustling of leaves as the night creatures move ..."
He rose slowly.
Feeling no sense of danger or alarm, Eleanor looked around the copse. Hagar had dropped his wood; his hand was tense on his knife.
His warhorse suddenly shuffled its hooves, and let out a whinny of distress.
"There!"
At a sudden whisper of movement in the trees, Hagar let his knife fly. There was a scream to shatter the quiet of the coming dawn, and then a thud as the man fell to his death. Then, instantly, there was a sudden burst of commotion from the trees. The danger awakening in Eleanor like a bolt of lightning striking, she tore for the horses, seeing that one of Hagar's battle swords remained sheathed at his saddle. She caught the sword and spun in time to parry the sudden violent strike of the man who had rushed behind her.
He had meant to kill. There would be no pretense of taking prisoners here.
By then, Collum and Lars had emerged; they were busily engaged with the men who had streamed into the copse after Hagar had killed the first of their number.
The man she faced was pock-marked and lean; his features were hard, cold, and ugly; he was certainly no young lord of English youth, out for a lark, nor was he a fool with his weapon.
She had been taught that she was no match for the real power of a well-muscled warrior, honed to battle; her defense was in movement, and in forcing an opponent to use his own strength against himself. She was afraid that she would fall, and fully aware that neither Collum nor Lars could reach her, when her last sleight of foot brought her opponent swinging his sword and bearing it down to the earth. Desperate for her life, she swung her own sword. She caught the man's back as his great weight and impetus brought him crashing forward. He fell at her feet with a woof of air expelling from him. She danced back quickly, raising her sword.
She heard the whirr of an arrow; then a grunted cry of pain, emerging from between clenched teeth.
Collum leaned hard against the wall of the dwelling, pinned there by an arrow piercing through him, just below the shoulder.
A sudden, slow, clapping of hands brought her anguished gaze across the copse. Collum bore a bleeding wound across his cheek; the sleeves on Lars' shirt was torn, and an angry stain seeped from it as well. Only Hagar was still standing, and he warily now, his eyes upon the enemy.
There were five fallen Englishmen before them, but there, swaggering across the copse, clapping, was Fitzgerald.
"Ah, my lady, so you really can use that sword! You could have skewered your old husband, my lady, rather than reverting to poison."
"I didn't poison him."
"Alas, but so it appears," Fitzgerald said. She thought he was a fool, walking so into the copse, clapping, his hands not even on his weapon. But then she saw that men were aligned behind him, armed with swords and wearing coats of mail beneath their colors. Six of diem, including Fitzgerald. And Lars was upon the ground, possibly bleeding to death, and Collum was pinned to the wall.
"You've come for me because you accuse me of murder," she said quickly. "Leave them be; I will go with you."
"Leave them be?" Fitzgerald said incredulously. "Madam—they are rebel Scots, the bastards, among the number who thought to make a fool of me, I do believe. Let them be? You must be quite mad, my lady. Pity you didn't lose your senses before! Locked away in tower, you might have lived out your days."
"He'll not touch you while there's breath in my body!" Hagar shouted in warning.
Fitzgerald looked him up and down. "Well, good man, that may not be long," he said softly.
At that inopportune moment, Bridie came flying out of the house, crying as she rushed to kneel by Lars's side.
"The servant woman again, eh?" Fitzgerald said almost pleasantly. "Ah, well, perhaps that's good."
He means to kill them all, Eleanor realized. And again, she clenched her teeth, because Margot had followed Bridie; she was not about to hide. She walked to where Collum stood in agony, pinned to the wall.
"Leave him be!" Fitzgerald barked out.
Margot stared at him contemptuously, then turned to Collum, telling him he must keep consciousness, he had to help her break the shaft.
"My God, you fools—" Fitzgerald began.
"Sir Miles!" Eleanor interrupted, knowing that Collum was defenseless, as was Margot, who would take any risk to help him. "I've a challenge for you."
"A challenge?" He inquired, amazed, but giving pause.
"I'm not intended to reach London for a trial. I never was. You wish me dead. Make me so yourself. I'm but a woman, and you ... you're the king's servant, a brave upholder of justice. Prove your own worth. Have your men back away. Take me on."
"You wish to challenge me—with a sword?" He inclined his head, studying her, and the fallen man at her feet. "You think you are so capable? My dear, I am very, very good."
"So you think."
"You risk a great deal here. Your future is decided. But I can give you a painless death. Indeed, my lady, may I say that it is a true sorrow to destroy such beauty?" It sounded as if he really meant the words; there was a note of regret in his tone.
"If that is the truth, sir, it would be a far greater compliment if you would simply refrain from doing so!"
"Alas ..." Fitzgerald murmured.
"No!" Hagar shouted out furiously. "I will not stand here and watch this dog come after ye, my lady. Back away, Eleanor." He started forward.
She hurried to him, halting him, pushing him back, whispering furiously.
"Hagar! Give me a chance; let me buy some time for Collum to be freed. If you must, if I start to falter ... then you may come to my aid!"
"My lady—"
"I have a plan," she lied quickly.
She had no plan, but she had to make Hagar believe that she did. She shoved him all the way to the house.
"Please!" she whispered fervency. "Please ... help may be coming."
She knew that wasn't true. Hagar's eyes told her that he knew the futility of such a plea as well.
"Trust me!" she whispered again.
He stood still, jaw locked.
She left him there, smoothing back her hair with the back of her hand as she approached Fitzgerald, already feeling a tremendous ache in her arm from the weight of the sword she had taken from the sheath strapped to his horse. Great Hagar. Dedicated to the last.
At that moment, she wished that he were not such a powerful man, for his sword seemed to weigh as much as he did.
She halted between Fitzgerald and the others.
"Are you afraid of such a challenge, Fitzgerald? Are you afraid that the helpless woman you've intended to murder— though God alone knows why!—will take you down."
"Not a chance, my lady," he said politely. He paused, and she saw that he was looking around die copse. How had he known that Brendan was at the castle—and that he had sent her north for safety?
She feared the answer. But still, she was curious that he should be looking elsewhere.
She did not have to worry about the question long, for he looked at her politely. "Your cousin Corbin is not lurking yonder in the house, is he, my lady? Cowering there, until the dead lay strewn and he can slip away?"
He wanted Corbin as well, she thought. To what end?
"Corbin? Cowering, sir? I think you seriously underestimate my cousin."
She rued her defensive words the instant they left her lips; it would have
been best to make him believe that there were others with him.
She looked back to the house. Empty. They had rushed to the sound of danger. If only ...
Ah, if only there were a dozen Scotsmen in there, men who had learned to fight from the shadows, with their wits as well as their prowess! She realized suddenly that she was staring at the house with such longing, imagining the scene of men streaming from the entrance, that she must have given Fitzgerald the belief that her dreams could be true.
Fitzgerald cleared his throat. "There is no one there, is there, Lady Eleanor?"
"Can you be so sure? You've been tricked before by a wily enemy."
"This time, my lady, it's the Scots who have been tricked."
Despite the way he spoke, she thought that he hesitated. She forced a smile. "You don't know, do you? You can't be sure. Perhaps they are waiting, watching you now, and when your defenses are lowered ..."
"Any man worthy to carry a sword would have appeared when the fighting began," he said harshly.
"Worthy to carry a sword, or capable of a great strategy?"
"Madam, the hovel wouldn't hold more than a few men."
"If you're certain ..." she said, forcing her words to be a subtle taunt he could not ignore. His movements would have to entertain such a possibility.
Seize The Dawn Page 34
