by Susan King
Chavant cantered ahead of her, his russet cloak and the gray rump of his horse fading and vanishing. Trusting her horse’s instincts and relying on her keen hearing to guide her, Emlyn followed. The lead horsemen carried lighted torches, but from her position in the line, she could not see the glow.
As the escort continued its creeping progress, the slightest sounds—the creek of leather horse trappings, the jingle of chain mail, the rhythmic squeak of wooden wheels—took on a round, hollow echo, straining Emlyn’s taut nerves.
Stretching the stiff muscles of her neck and shoulders, she looked around at the bright spectral wall of mist. A drizzle began again, dampening her cheeks and hands, coloring a few clinging, exposed curls at her cheeks and brow to honey gold.
Ahead, she heard the low drift of excited conversation. Straining to listen, she was unable to determine the words. Moments later, she heard another exclamation.
“What is it?” she called out. “Chavant! What is wrong?”
“Hush!” Chavant replied, emerging from the mist ahead. He held up a hand for silence, and swept an arc with his head as he listened, squinting into the fog.
“What is it?” she whispered loudly.
“ ’Tis naught. Ride on,” he hissed.
“Perhaps we should stop after all, my lord,” she said. “The fog is so thick—”
“Never would I stop here! We must be out of this forest by dark. If we follow the path carefully, we will come to the edge of the wood soon enough. The moors will be in heavy fog as well, but the way will be far easier.”
Another excited murmur drifted back to them. “My lord Chavant,” Emlyn persisted. “What is happening?”
Chavant sighed, a deep blast of frustration. “The men say that we are being watched, perhaps followed.”
Emlyn’s slender brows shot up in surprise. Who would dare to accost the escort of Lord Whitehawke’s betrothed? If she had any personal enemies, she certainly was with them now. No brigands would be about in such foul weather. Anyone with a scrap of sense was in front of a cozy fire.
“But who would follow us?” she asked Chavant. He rode close enough to fix her with his uneven, fierce glance.
“None of this earth.” His eye drifted to one side and stayed there. “We ride on. My lady, you would be more comfortable and safer in the wagon.”
Emlyn regarded him steadily. She had refused the same suggestion twice already today. “Nay, my lord,” she said, a trace of stubborn pride making her words brittle.
“As you will, then. Follow the path, and look for the lights. I will send Gerard back to carry a torch in front of you. My lady.” He bowed, a brief snap of his head, and was soon enveloped in the smothering mist.
Emlyn kicked at her horse and moved ahead, bending down to search the ground beneath her horse’s hooves for the flat, grassy surface of the path. Satisfied that she was still on it, she straightened and rode toward the creaking sounds up ahead.
“There!” A voice cracked through the moist air. Emlyn jumped as if she had been struck.
As she turned her head, a swirl of mist between some ghostly trees moved and thinned to reveal, a short distance away, a horseman. He sat quite still, a large, vague shape.
The mist seemed to withdraw and form an amorphous halo around the man and horse. Emlyn saw him clearly for an instant before the fog rolled and spilled over him once more. He was not one of the guards, for he wore no russet cloak or mailed hood. Emlyn was unsure for a moment what manner of clothing he wore. Tall and very broad on the pale horse, his massive body was draped in textured green. His hair flew in wild shapes around the huge oval of his head, and his eyes were deep pits.
She gasped. This was no man, but a huge and fearsome creature, a giant formed of intertwined branches and leaves, as if he were a tree come to life. The huge body sat on an equally massive mount, its coat a pale green color.
One thick arm, more like a sturdy branch sprouting leaves, lifted. Something glittered, an axe or sword, in its leafy fingers. The creature turned and seemed to point directly at her with its long arm.
Someone shouted again, behind her, and a horse neighed.
“Ride on!” bellowed one of the guards. “Ride on!” Three or four soldiers tore past her, jostling her horse and spinning it around. One guard reached out to grab her reins and bring her ahead with them, but he dove too late and missed. “Follow, lady!” he called, galloping past.
Panicked, she kicked at her horse, but the animal spun crazily around, twisting against the jerk of the reins. A wall of deep, white mist quickly surrounded her. Cold wet air sat heavily on her hands and cheeks, entering her lungs with each rapid breath. She was disoriented, dizzy from the spins of the horse and the bright, damp cloud that obscured all steadying landmarks. Finally the horse stopped circling in response to her tugs on the reins, and stood still, its sides bellowing heavily, sensing her hesitation and unsure itself where to proceed.
Muffled shouts came from somewhere to her left. Pressing her feet in the stirrups, she urged her mount in that direction.
Her heart thumped uncomfortably. She wanted to spur and ride ahead, but she was afraid to go any faster, worried that the horse would stumble or fall, frightened that each uncertain step took her closer to the forest beast.
She had seen the creature. The apparition had been no trick of the mist. Wiping the back of her hand across her eyes as if to clear her vision, she halted the horse. She could see nothing now, either before or behind her, but swirling, pale, thick fog.
“Chavant!” she cried out. “Gerard! I am here!” Her voice picked up a shrill, eerie echo.
“Lady Emlyn!” someone called. “Lady! Stay where you are!” He sounded very far away.
“Here! I am here!” she cried.
Ahead of her a tiny light glowed suddenly, like a golden star in a white sky. Here, then, must be the guard sent to bring her a torch. Sighing with relief, she urged her horse forward, riding slowly toward the light.
From out of the mist, a large dark shape appeared in front of her horse, off to one side. “Thanks be to God,” she murmured.
Her horse’s bit was lifted and pulled slightly. She let the reins go slack, willing to be led to safety, and leaned back in her saddle with relief. Then she jerked forward suddenly.
A huge green claw closed around the bridle. Emlyn screamed. The lead horse had pale green hindquarters and a yellowish tail.
She screamed again, heard the shouts of the guards, and tried to turn her horse. Confused, her mount reared back on its hind legs. Emlyn slid out of the saddle, and one hip hit the hard ground with a painful whack.
She tried to sit up. Her horse kicked out and an iron shoe grazed the side of her head. Knocked sideways, she shook her head groggily and rose up on her knees, scuttling away to avoid another kick. As she went, she stumbled over her satchel, grabbed blindly at it, and crawled into the bracken.
She could hear the creature coming behind her, riding as if the mist were no deterrent to his unearthly vision. He forged through the forest, hard and rapid, plunging toward her. Emlyn ran, breathless and disoriented, blinded by swirling fog, her head spinning and aching from the horse’s blow. Her only thought was purely instinctive, without reason: an urge to get away, and fast, from the creature. She ran, noisy and directionless.
After a while, she realized that the only sounds were her own heavy breathing, and the crash of her own feet through the undergrowth. She stopped and listened. Silence filled the heavy air. She heard no sounds of pursuit. No creature. No guards.
She ran shaking fingers through the tangled curls that fell into her eyes, pushing them back. No one was near. Then a new thought, the first logic that she had allowed herself for several minutes, emerged.
She was free of the escort.
Moving quickly, she had been running through the forest, in spite of the mists, for several minutes. Soon she heard a faint drumming sound, deeper than the beat of the fine, constant rain: the thunder of horses.
Frantically she plunged into the dripping gorse, sliding on wet leaves and flattening her body along the roots of a wild hedge. She had hardly pulled in a few heaving lungfuls of air before a group of horsemen careened past. Peering through a gap in the thicket, she glimpsed, through wisps of fog, four of Chavant’s guards halted close by.
“Ho!” called one guard loudly. “Lady Emlyn!”
She pressed her brow against cold leaf muck, inhaling the moldy odor with shallow breaths, staying still as a rock.
“Where the devil did she get to?” one of them muttered. The horses pranced and snorted. Her heart a soft riot in her chest, Emlyn curled into a quivering ball beneath the dripping thicket.
Search and call as they might, she had made up her mind to hide. She would go to her uncle’s monastery. Godwin would help her. He could send a formal protest to the Pope, and she hoped he would take her to Hawksmoor Castle to fetch the children.
When the little ones were settled with relatives in Scotland, Emlyn would commit her life to God, and enter a convent in grateful thanks for her family’s safety.
But she could go no further until the fog cleared. Her greatest concern was meeting that horrible creature again. Though she feared getting lost, questioning Chavant earlier in the day about the countryside had yielded useful information. An eastern path through the woods, he had said, would lead down to the dale. Across the dale lay the river, where she could hire a boat to take her south to Wistonbury Abbey.
“We must search further,” she heard one of the men say. “If the demon took her, she’s in the wood. And if he let her go, we’ll find her.”
Another guard muttered a low curse. Emlyn heard a leathery creak and the chime of chain mail, and saw iron-trimmed boots touch the ground as two men dismounted. They walked a stone’s throw from where she lay, slashing with their sword blades through tangled, wet branches.
Shivering equally with chill and fear, grateful that her green cloak blended with the leaves, she lay still. Moisture seeped through her saturated garments. She had a tickling urge to cough, and covered her mouth and nose.
After a while she heard footsteps, murmurings, and the sound of horses cantering away. Sliding backward to inch out from beneath the dripping thicket, she grabbed up her fallen satchel. As she launched forward to run, shouts exploded behind her.
She burst ahead, dodging grizzled brambles and shrubbery, leaping fallen tree limbs, plunging into the deep misty greenwood. Faint shouts sounded behind her. She crashed onward.
Exhausted finally, she stopped behind a wide oak, slumping to her knees among wet ferns. Whooping breaths burned her throat. Her soaked hood slid down, baring her bright hair to the mist, as she listened for her pursuers.
Distantly, then louder, came the heavy noises of armored men crashing through the undergrowth. Emlyn muffled a fearful sob in the base of her throat and climbed as quickly as she could into the sheltering oak. From somewhere came the high cutting whoosh of an arrow, followed by the breathy grunt of its victim. She peered cautiously through the branches.
In a stand of slender birches, the bright rusty splash of a guard’s cloak swirled in the fog as he fell. An arrow protruded from his neck. The second guard bent to his companion, then stood slowly. With a horrified expression, he backed away, and spun to make a noisy exit, calling for the other guards.
Alarmed, Emlyn looked about for the hidden marksman.
Had the mist not swirled slightly away from him, she would not have seen him among the shrouded, blurred trees, for his green clothing and greenish skin were barely distinguishable from the surrounding foliage. He was taller than any man she had ever seen. The Green Man paused for a moment, and then moved away, shouldering a longbow and shaking his shaggy, leafy head.
If Emlyn had never believed in the reality of demons before, she had just changed her mind.
How long she huddled in the oak tree, shivering with cold and shock, she did not know for certain. She must have slept a little, though she felt drained rather than rested. The dismal afternoon light had been replaced by a dense, spongy blackness.
Dimly she recalled an icy drizzle that had set a wet sparkle to the wool of her cloak. Hours must have passed while she crouched in the tree, at first too frightened to come down, later deadened by exhaustion and bone-chilling cold.
In the oppressive darkness, sleety rain pattered the leaves that sloped tentlike overhead. Leaning back, stretching her stiff arms and legs, she noticed that her head, where the horse’s hoof had grazed her, ached painfully, and felt bruised and blood-crusted. Her stomach was queasy.
Wetness permeated her clothing, hair, and skin. She needed shelter desperately, but knew that if she left the tree now, she would only trudge deeper into the forest and lose any sense of direction.
Sighing, she reached into the satchel for the spare cloak, managing to pull its dry folds around her. What little warmth she gained was agonizingly slow in gathering, and she thought yearningly of soup, and furs piled high, and a blazing fire.
Coughing, she wiped her face with a corner of the cloak, feeling a little more comfortable curled in the thick wool. Sleep began to surround and fill her like a dark mist.
A sudden foggy awareness slammed into her like a fist in the belly, and she sat upright. Her head knocked against a lower bough, sending it softly swinging. Groggy, she listened for whatever had awoken her.
Some animal, pray God not a wolf, prowled around the base of the oak. Hearing the faint stealthy rhythm of careful steps, she drew her stiffened legs slowly up.
When the walking ceased, Emlyn ceased breathing, wondering frantically if she could scramble farther up into the tree.
Then the deep velvety darkness of her aerie was pierced by a blast of cold air and a shaft of moonlight. The mist had cleared. She saw a tall forest creature on two long legs reaching out toward her. Emlyn gasped and pressed against the trunk, her heart slamming against her ribs.
“Dear God. There you are.” The voice was as soft and deep as the night shadows. “Come here.” Emlyn whimpered, too weak and frightened to scream. She beat clumsy, meaningless blows at the solid, strong arms that surrounded her.
“Nay,” she rasped, her voice hoarse. “Who are you?”
“ ’Tis Thorne,” he said gently. She pushed at him. “Dearling, ’tis Black Thorne.” She stopped in amazement. He spoke again. “You are safe now. Come with me.” He gathered her, suddenly unresisting, to him and lifted her in his arms.
Thorne. This must be a dream. But she felt the warm, solid play of bone and muscle as he carried her away from the tree. Warm breath blew over her cheek as she tucked her head against his shoulder, and prickly wool and slick leather pressed beneath her cheek. She smelled wet leather and a spicy, earthy odor. No dream this, she thought groggily.
Without the strength to question the strangeness of it, she burrowed into the warmth of his arms and gave in to an irresistible lethargy. His bearded cheek brushed softly against her brow as he carried her into the forest.
Chapter Seven
“My lady. My lady.” The voice droned on, and had been droning for a while, like a small fly buzzing persistently at her ear. She swatted at it.
“Lady Emlyn. Are you awake?” She turned her back as a barrier to the voice, and the fur coverlet slipped. Cool dry air caressed her bare shoulder. Through eyes blurred with fatigue, she saw a dark stone wall mere inches from her face, its rough surface glazed with firelight. Turning her head, she saw the sloped walls and low ceiling of a small, oddly shaped chamber, dark but for a small central fire.
“Lady Emlyn.” This time she let the voice lead her to a face and a form. “My lady. Yer awake.” A woman stepped forward.
Sturdy and round, she seemed tall, even given Emlyn’s point of view from a pallet of furs on the floor. The woman crossed the small space to kneel beside her. Broad shoulders and an ample bosom were clothed in a thick homespun wool of warm onion yellow. The face above the simple neckline was round and pleasant, with pink cheeks an
d blue eyes, and brown tendrils escaping from a plain linen headwrapping. She seemed young, only a few years older than Emlyn.
“I am Maisry, Lady Emlyn. These are my sons.” She gestured to two little boys who stood on the other side of the low central hearth. The taller of the two had smooth shining hair, bright as carrots in the firelight. The smaller one sucked his thumb solemnly, golden-red curls rioting around his head.
“The eldest is Dirk, and the little ’un is Elvi,” Maisry said. The boys came near, and Maisry reached out an arm to draw them close. They snuggled beside their mother and gawked at Emlyn with huge eyes. She smiled, and the little one blinked, sucking faster, his plump cheeks flushed. Both boys wore tunics of brown wool with dark leggings and soft leather boots. The older one was no more than four or five, the younger one a little older than Harry, probably only just out of breechcloths.
Emlyn glanced back at their mother. Remembering who had brought her here, she felt a flutter of disappointment. Thorne had rescued her last night—he was not dead, but her befuddled mind could not question that as yet—and so these must be his wife and sons.
She felt a little lost to think him settled, a married villein. But then, several years had passed. He would not have waited for a little girl, no matter how often she had thought of him.
She began to sit up, and the fur slipped with the movement. Gasping at her emerging nakedness, she snatched at the wayward fur covering. “Where are my clothes?” she squeaked.
“There. They should be dry by now.” Emlyn noticed her two cloaks, blue and green, draped over a bench with her blue silk gown and white chemise, her woolen hose and shoes arranged on a low stool beside the fire. “Ye must have taken an awful chill in those wet garments. Soaked and near frozen, I hear ye were.”
