He opened his eyes and looked at her. “Because,” he said evenly, “if I am within reach of him when he touches you, I will kill him.”
She said nothing, but all the defiance drained out of her and she sank to the floor at his feet.
Tristan glanced quickly at the window to see how high the stars stood. He had hours yet. She was trembling like a leaf in a tempest; he could not leave her. But he could find nothing to say. All his concentration was bent on ignoring her nearness. The cream-colored ribbon that bound her hair had slipped its knot. The end of the silk lay against his leg—so slight a touch, so insignificant an encounter—yet the storm within him swelled into a rage, driving him toward the edges of control. He felt sweat break on his brow and drew a long breath to calm himself.
Essylte’s voice, low and curious, broke in upon his thoughts. “Lady Esmerée knows a lot about you.”
“We are old friends.”
“Friends?”
“We met through my uncle Pernam when I was recovering from the wounds that Marhalt gave me.”
“She is a friend of Prince Pernam’s, then?”
“Yes. And of mine.” Part of him was amused at her jealousy. How quickly she had smoked that out! He knew Esme had told her nothing, that Essylte must have read it in the tone of her voice or the tilt of her head, or a silence held a beat too long, or a laugh a shade too forced. Women seemed to share a language mysterious to men. Some secrets could not be kept from them.
“Esmerée knows the truth about us,” she said softly. “She knew at once, there in the hall. She knows you very well, Tristan.”
“Is that what she told you?”
“No. But it was obvious. She knows you even better than I do. Her distress at our—predicament was clear. And it was not on my behalf.”
Tristan managed a smile. “Some of it was. She has a heart that can hold the world’s grief.”
“She is the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”
“She is very lovely. But there is one who is lovelier.”
Essylte did not smile. “Why did she ever accept a man like Segward?”
“She had nothing to say in the matter.”
Essylte trembled. “She called you ‘Orpheus.’ What hell did you rescue her from?”
Tristan looked down at her upturned face. Her heart spoke in her eyes, willing his love from the depths of her uncertainty and fear. He clenched his fists to keep his hands still. How he longed just to run his finger along the fine, curving line of her cheek! His will was fast dissolving. He had to get free of her soon. “What is it you want to know, Essylte? Ask me. I will tell you the truth.”
“Did—did you love her when you lay with her?”
He drew breath sharply. He found himself on his feet, and Essylte beside him, a hand on his arm. Her sweet scent filled his head until he could think of nothing else. His arms found their own way around her waist, his hands slid of their own accord along her back. The pain of wanting her began to beat at his temples, hot and insistent. “Did I love her? I thought so, then. But . . . it was nothing like this.”
“Are you certain? Think. Did you not once love her as much as me? Tell me, Tristan. I need to know if this is a thing that will someday fade and desert me, or if I will feel like this forevermore.”
He nearly laughed, to hear his own thoughts echoed so precisely, but the laughter caught in his throat. “Never. God, it was never like this.”
Holding her in his arms was like holding a living flame. She quivered, alight with desire, her bright hair dancing free from its ribbons, her glowing eyes burning into his will. “Never like this,” he whispered, finding her lips, drinking her in. She responded to his touch, firing like kindling in a blaze, breathing with him, moving with him, already one with his unspoken need.
Beside them the candle guttered for a moment in the night wind, then blew out.
He awoke to darkness. For a moment he did not know where he was. Then he felt the girl’s silken skin against his body, felt the tickle of her hair against his arm, smelled the sweet warmth of her flesh, rich with the scent of love. He pulled her closer. A deep peace took hold of him, a glorious contentment, a sense of things being at last where they belonged.
“Essylte,” he murmured sleepily. But the sound of his own voice awakened him, and in midbreath it all came flooding back. He froze. In his arms the girl’s warm body stirred.
“Tristan.”
Twice will you swear before your God an oath you cannot keep—lies you will be called to answer for! Twice he had sworn—sworn!—not to touch her. In God’s name, what was left for them now?
“God help me,” he breathed, holding tightly to her, “God forgive us both.”
She grew still. Around them the silence was complete. The only sound was the half-heard sigh of the sea against the fortress stone.
Her voice, when it came, was hard. “I don’t care. I’d welcome even Hell so long as we could be together.”
“Essylte—”
“Hell for me is life without you, Tristan.” Her lips moved against his throat. “We are one. Now and forever. If God condemns us for it, then—then I am willing to be condemned.”
“Essylte, my bright angel—”
“You are my husband, Tristan. Not Markion.”
He drew her closer and buried his face in her hair. “Dear Christ, I would that I were!”
“You are. The words I spoke before Markion did not make him my husband. Words are nothing. It is by our deeds that we are judged. And by our deeds, he is Branwen’s husband. You are mine.”
“I am yours forever, sweet Essylte.” He kissed her softly. “But you are still Mark’s wife. We have not the power to undo that, however strong our love.”
“Listen to me. There is no marriage without consummation. It has always been thus. Listen, Tristan.” The hard note still rang in her voice, and he listened to it fearfully. She fought with all her strength and wit against damnation, but something in her had already changed, and it was his doing. “As long as you and I are faithful to each other, we are more closely wedded than Mark and I will ever be, no matter what words the bishop pronounces over our heads. If we are true to one another, it is all that matters. Oh, Tristan, pledge to me, and I will pledge to you, that we shall never, ever lie with anyone else. That we shall be faithful to our love all our lives.”
His heart ached at her mighty struggle. He could not bear to tell her it was a dream built on dust and ashes, that he had doomed her to perdition, in all her innocent splendor, for a passing ecstasy. “My magnificent woman,” he whispered, hugging her close. “Think on this a moment. Is it possible? What about Mark?”
Essylte began to tremble. “To lie with Markion would be adultery.”
“But is it possible to avoid him?”
“If Branny is as ambitious as you think, if she continues to take my place. . . . Somehow we will manage it—it must be possible to avoid him.”
“Sweet Essylte—”
“And you, Tristan? Why do you hesitate to pledge to me?”
“I would not have you make a promise you cannot keep.”
She moved against him, her lips warm and demanding, drawing him out of his despair into the unruly heat of her desire. “Either I am damned now or damned later. Let it not be now. Come, Tristan, make me your promise if you love me—why do you shy away?”
He gripped her hard and kissed her. “I swear by everything I hold holy that I shall never lie with any woman but you. You have my heart, Essylte, and no one else. And if it comes to damnation, we shall walk through the gates of Hell together, arm in arm.”
He pulled the blue enamel ring from his finger and pushed it onto hers. “This is a token of our promise. Remember, when you see the eagle carved upon the crest, that you are Queen of Lyonesse, and my wife.” He kissed her again, pushing the shadows away, enchanted by her warmth and her reborn desire. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe it is possible after all. God in His wisdom has given Branwen ambition. Let’s hope
He has given her enough.”
The stars outside the window had dimmed to pale, glimmering ghosts of their midnight glory before Tristan slid out of Branwen’s bed and crept stealthily down the stairs to Dinadan and the waiting horses. The guard Kellis, half asleep in his corner, opened an eye as he passed and watched him go.
16 THE HEIR
Old Talorc, King of Elmet, sat on horseback on the crest of a low hill. Below him in the valley a battle raged, hotly fought and impossible to predict, between Briton troops still in ragged formation and a wild, cutthroat, desperate barbarian horde. The river plain was soaked in blood, churned to mud, thick with bodies. The din of battle—the thud of hooves, the smash of spears on shields, swords against axes, screams of pain, of warning and command, victory paeans—floated up to the king and his escort, but softly, no louder than the cries of hopeful ravens circling overhead.
The old king, white-bearded and frail, his long nose red with cold, although it was April, lifted a hand and beckoned his captain closer. “Pylas, my eyes are failing. What in the name of Mithra is going on?”
“Your noble son Prince Drustan leads the center, my lord, which is holding. Uwaine of Rheged’s on the right flank—it’s still intact but wavering. They’ve been hit hard.”
“And the damned Cornishmen? Markion’s idea of reinforcement?”
“Bruenor of Dorria leads the left flank, my lord. It’s holding well, despite their numbers. I’ve never seen so many Anglii, my lord—they must be in federation—ten tribes at least.”
“Humpf,” Talorc snorted, pulling his thick cloak tighter about his thin frame. “They unite when it suits them. I know the chieftains in their federation. Do you think I don’t have spies? But they never dared test us until they treated with that filthy Saecsen, Badulf.” He hawked, turned his head, and spat. His gaze ran down the river to the score of high-prowed, shallow-bottomed sailing craft that lay along the shore, each one bearing Badulf’s emblem, the white sea dragon. “Sea power,” the old king muttered. “Once the wretched Anglii have that kind of sea power . . .”
The captain cleared his throat tentatively. “My lord, some among the men said that Tristan of Lyonesse thought the Saecsens might—”
“Hah! Tristan!” Talorc laughed rudely. “Oh yes, by all means, tell us what young Tristan thinks. By the Bull, Pylas, how did Markion have the nerve to send him here? He belongs in a holy house, chanting prayers, not on a battlefield.”
“My lord, his reputation as a warrior is unsurpassed—”
“In Cornwall, perhaps. I spit on Cornishmen. If he were any good, he’d have led the troops Markion sent. He’s his nephew, after all, and heir to the High Kingdom, such as it is. It is his right. But no, Markion sends one of his sycophants who isn’t even kin. By the blood of the Bull, I was ashamed to receive him—and wouldn’t have, but I needed the men he brought.” The king’s thin body trembled. The captain signaled his attendant, who approached with a skin of warmed wine.
While Talorc refreshed himself, Pylas scanned the battlefield. “Look, my lord! Smoke!”
Talorc strained forward. “Where?”
“On the river. The Saecsen keels are burning! Set adrift and burning!”
“Burning! How? Who fired them?”
The captain grinned. “That was Sir Tristan’s plan, my lord, if I understood the gossip. To come up behind the Saecsens and burn their means of escape. Watch the field. As soon as their rear guard spots the smoke, the Saecsens will desert the Anglii like a false friend in bad weather. They’ll risk anything but their boats.”
No sooner had he spoken than a cry went through the troops. Men broke and ran toward the river. The charge wavered, confused. Immediately the Briton left flank pushed forward, trapping the barbarians between the center of the Briton line and the water.
“So,” Talorc said softly, “Bruenor knew the plan.”
“Aye, my lord. It would seem so.”
“How many keels are burning? Are they all destroyed?”
“All but one, my lord, and that one seems to be drifting back downstream.”
The sound of the Elmet victory paean floated up to them as the flanks of Britons closed around the Anglii like the inexorable jaws of a great fish. Talorc smiled.
“Here, Din! Quickly!” Tristan shoved his dagger between his teeth and jumped out of his makeshift coracle into waist-deep water. He threw his shoulder against the bow of the Saxon keel.
“Tris! What are you doing?” Dinadan paddled closer, a torch ready in his hand.
Tristan beckoned sharply. “No, don’t fire this one—let’s take her! Help me get her off the beach before they see us.”
Dinadan doused the torch and slipped into the water. Between them, they pushed her prow out of the mud. Once free, she slid sweetly back into the river, light and silent. Tristan hoisted himself up, swung a leg over the gunwale, and clambered aboard. “Call the men—six of us could handle her, maybe fewer. Come on! Any minute now they’ll see the smoke and be on to us! Get Brach and Harran and Borsic—”
“Whatever for?”
“We’ll take her! We’ll sail her. She’s our prize!”
“You’re out of your mind.” But it was too late to argue. Tristan was already unshipping the oars. Muttering under his breath, Dinadan retrieved his coracle and paddled to the nearest burning boat to drum up a crew.
A wild yell jerked Tristan’s attention to the shore. A young Saxon lookout had seen the smoke. He stared, unbelieving, at the burning fleet, and then at the last keel drifting slowly from the reeds into the current, Tristan in the prow. He threw down his ax and began to run. Tristan watched him come. He was young and fast. He dove into the water and swam with swift, clean strokes for the slowly moving keel. Tristan glanced wistfully at the oars, but until he had another rower he could do nothing to speed the keel’s progress. Dinadan was summoning the men, but they would be minutes getting to him, and the blond Saxon boy was an oar’s length away. Tristan drew his sword and backed up to the widest part of the deck. This was a needless death; he did not want it laid to his account. But he knew Saxons. They fought from passion, not from sense. Nothing would prevent that boy from boarding.
He heard the gasping breaths, saw the strong young hands on the gunwale, a leg kicked over, two. The boy landed heavily, rolled, sprang to his feet. Tristan stepped forward and touched his sword point to the boy’s naked breast. For one long moment they looked at each other. The Saxon was no more than a beardless youth, fifteen at most. Rage and fear swept across his features. He clutched at his dagger, then let it drop as he stared at Tristan, tears misting his light blue eyes.
It was cruel to make him wait. Such bravery as his deserved a merciful death. “Go to your gods, Saxon,” Tristan grunted, and thrust the blade between his ribs. He caught the body as it crumpled and for a moment held it close against him. His voice fell to a whisper. “May they keep your spirit from harm.”
A chorus of shouts and curses lifted his head. Sixty Saxons came racing toward him, brandishing short swords and two-headed axes. Beneath him the keel began to gain speed as it felt the current’s pull. He withdrew his sword from the youth and dumped the body overboard, crossing himself quickly. A brief glance ashore assured him that most of his men had already joined the Cornish forces under Bruenor. Dinadan and four others were paddling madly for him. The Saxons threw themselves into the water. Three of them made it to the craft before the Britons. The first Tristan slew as the man pulled himself from the water. The second hauled himself aboard and had raised his arm to hurl his ax when Tristan’s sword slashed across his waist, spilling his innards in a great, glistening pool upon the deck. The man made a croaking sound, staring down in horror, and died before his body fell. The last Saxon threw himself at Tristan, flinging him down and knocking the sword from his hand. He was a big man, heavy with muscle but blue with cold. Tristan slipped the dagger from his belt and plunged it upward into the Saxon’s belly. The man grunted, trying to lift himself away. Tristan twisted the d
agger hilt and pushed, kneeing his attacker hard in the groin. Pain and cold made the Saxon slow. He bellowed and grabbed for Tristan’s throat, but Tristan, soaked in his attacker’s blood, slithered from his grasp, crawled to his sword, whirled, and brought the blade down hard across the Saxon’s neck. He stood above the body for a moment, gasping for breath. “God damn you to Hell, you heathen bastard!” Lifting the head by its hank of yellow hair, he flung it far out into the river.
“Tristan! Behind you!” Dinadan shouted, swinging a leg over the gunwale, pointing to the bows. Ten more Saxons fought to climb aboard. Tristan attacked, joined by his companions, and gradually, as the boat responded to the current and picked up speed, they fought off their pursuers. Four of them manned the oars and sent the shallow-bottomed craft flying downstream.
Tristan loosed the rope that bound the sail, and tossed the lines to Dinadan. “Here, raise the sail. I’ll have a go at steering her.”
The keel proved an easy boat to sail, responsive to every breath of wind, quick to Tristan’s hand upon the tiller. He was amazed at her speed and stability. In all the years he had spent on the waters around the coast of Lyonesse, he had never handled a craft so swift, so sweet to steer, so alive beneath his hand. The shore seemed to fly past, thick with hardwoods just leafing out in the late, cold spring. The sounds of battle dwindled into silence.
“Where are we going?” Dinadan asked anxiously.
Tristan grinned and pointed to the Saxon bodies piled in the bows. “Strip those men and let’s have their clothing. Leave them their jewelry—it’s primitive stuff. Then send them overboard to their water god. But one or two have tunics I’d kill for just now. I’m half frozen.”
Dinadan tied down the sail and bent over the bodies, wrinkling his nose. “They’re soaked, Tris.”
“I don’t care. It’s only water. My tunic reeks of blood.” As he spoke he stripped off his tunic and leggings, preferring to stand naked and feel the cold bite of the wind on his flesh than bear another moment with that filthy barbarian’s blood sticking to his skin. He shuddered. For a moment, with those hands at his throat and the wind knocked from him, he had panicked—it was Marhalt all over again, the nightmare returned in daylight. He still felt sick from it.
Prince of Dreams Page 22
