Protected by the Knight's Proposal

by Meriel Fuller

  Standing up, Cecily smoothed down her skirts, checking that the leather side-lacings on her gown were secure. She secured her plaits at the nape of her neck with the hairpins supplied by her mother, settled the veil and silver circlet over her hair. She picked up her cloak, shaking out the heavy folds, brushing off the loose fronds of straw.

  ‘Will we reach Exancaester today?’ she asked.

  The knight, John, crouched by the fire, attempting to coax the dead ashes into life. ‘Aye, if we ride fast and the roads are in good shape.’ His narrow face held a sly expression. ‘And if you pull no more of your tricks.’ He jerked his head sideways.

  Cecily followed his glance. The soldier thought Lachlan had been duped by her. Through the wide archway, he was saddling up the horses with the older knight, his cheeks red, raw with cold. The sun had scarce broken over the horizon; the sky was translucent, a limpid blue. A single star hung low on the horizon, peeking out through the fretted silhouette of dark branches. The temperature had dropped even further during the night. The ground held a light dusting of snow; beneath the trees, a spangled frost coated the dead leaves.

  From the shadowed interior of the barn, Cecily traced the hard, lean angles of Lachlan’s face, and wondered at his words of grief from the night before, at the sadness, the guilt that he had carried for such a long time. She clamped her lips in solidarity—she knew what guilt felt like. What it did to you. For hadn’t she carried the guilt of Raymond’s death around, for years and years, like a hard, lumpy parcel against her heart?

  Now she knew what tormented Lachlan, what drove him. His need to avenge his family, to right the wrong that had been done to them. If she cared about escaping her own situation at all, then she should persuade Lachlan to seek revenge now, this very day. And yet the thought soured her tongue. She had grown used to his company, his strong, protective presence beside her, which strangely she had no wish to lose. But, however much she liked having him around, it didn’t change the fact that he was determined to take her to the King. If she wanted to save her own skin, she would have to do it.

  Cecily walked out into the light, skirts swishing across the rock-hard, icy earth, brushing a path through the frosted leaves. Lachlan was bent down against his horse’s glossy flank, adjusting a girth strap. Cecily moved around the back of the animal, the pelt glossy in the sunshine. ‘May I speak with you, my lord? Alone?’

  Lachlan lifted his eyes at her approach, yanking the girth strap tight, securing the buckle. He straightened up, pushing sinewy fingers through his brilliant hair. ‘Go inside,’ he ordered Walter, the older knight. ‘What is it?’ He rested his hand on his horse’s saddle. The edge of his cloak flipped back with the movement, revealing the tight sleeves of his under-tunic. The fabric clung to his arm, revealing taut, rope-like muscles beneath.

  ‘Last night...’ Blood flowed into her cheeks, reddening the soft skin.

  His blue eyes traced her delicate features, the fine curved bow of her mouth. ‘We are both to blame for what is happening between us, Cecily.’ His voice curled around her.

  ‘Not that!’ she whispered, urgently. ‘I mean the things you told me about your family.’

  ‘What of it?’ he murmured. ‘You know my history now and what I intend to do.’

  ‘Yes, and you taking me to the King is holding you up. You could be on your way north, right now.’

  ‘I thought you didn’t approve of me seeking revenge.’

  ‘Since when did you care what I thought?’ Cecily bit back. ‘You told me that I had “forgotten my place”, if I remember rightly.’

  ‘And I apologised.’ Lachlan ran his thumb slowly around the leather stitching of the saddle.

  Yes, he had. She lifted her fingers to her cheek, to touch the spot where his mouth had been.

  Lachlan smiled, his bright glance tracking her movement. In the clear morning light, her skin adopted a dewy plushness. His fingers twitched, ached to touch, to test that velvet softness once again. He curled his palms ruthlessly by his sides, fingernails digging deep into his palms. Concentrate, he told himself sternly, focus on what the maid was saying and not what she looked like.

  ‘So, are you going to go?’ Her voice was bright, quick with hope. ‘Surely you can see that I am a burden to you.’

  ‘What are you trying to do?’ His eyes raised in mocking question. Christ, her eyes shone like emeralds, green flames, devastating, that seared into his soul. Branded him. His breath seized.

  ‘Do?’ Cecily asked innocently, folding her arms across her chest. Her cloak rumpled beneath the tight clasp of her arms.

  ‘Give up,’ Lachlan ground out. ‘I am not going to leave you until I have delivered you to Exancaester, so you can rid yourself of any thoughts to the contrary.’ Her long, delicate fingers were white, her fingertips blue. She needed some gloves, he thought.

  ‘But I thought... I thought you wanted revenge for your family.’ She ducked her gaze, stared at the ground.

  ‘I do,’ he said. But even as the words emerged from his mouth, he realised he did not. His words rang out with a dull clang of uncertainty: a lack of conviction. What was happening here? Where had his rage gone?

  ‘Then seize this moment, Lachlan, and go.’

  He shook his head, his mouth set in a firm, resolute line. ‘I have waited long enough to take the journey north. A few days more will not matter. Sorry to disappoint you, but you’ll not rid yourself of me that easily.’ Rummaging around in his leather saddle bag, he extracted a pair of gloves, woven from coarse grey wool. ‘Here,’ he said, ‘these will be too big, but they will keep your hands from freezing solid.’

  Cecily took the gloves, throwing him a half-smile to thank him for his concern. But her shoulders slumped in despair. There was nothing more she could do.

  * * *

  They dropped down from the moorland as the sun reached its highest point in the sky, the horses travelling in single file along a series of earth-packed tracks through the ice-topped scrubby grass and gorse. Far, far in the distance, across the vast marshy floodplain of the river, the square turrets of the great Norman cathedral in Exancaester rose up from the wreaths of mist floating in the valley, the reddish-purple stone shimmering in the hazy sunshine, as if floating on air.

  Before they reached the city though, they had to cross the Forest of Haldon, a great mass of trees clustered on the lower slopes of the moor, stretching down to the river. The rounded tops of the trees spread out in a huge horseshoe shape before them, dominating the lower slopes of moorland.

  Cecily jagged back on the reins, slowing her small grey mare.

  ‘Go on, Cecily!’ Lachlan shouted at her from behind. ‘Why are you stopping?’

  She hitched around in the saddle, the collar of her cloak brushing her cheek. ‘We must go around the forest, Lachlan. Outlaws live in these woods. It is not safe to go through.’

  The older knight turned his horse around and came back up the hill towards them. ‘What’s amiss?’ He stared dispassionately at Cecily.

  ‘These woods are not safe,’ she said again.

  ‘I have travelled through here before,’ the knight named Walter scoffed openly. ‘And nothing happened to me. The chit is only trying to buy herself some time. It will take at least one more day to go around these woods.’

  ‘We are trained fighters, my lord.’ The younger knight steered his horse back towards them. ‘There’s not much that we’re afeard of.’

  ‘We go through,’ announced Lachlan. His tone rang out dismissively.

  Her heart sank. Of course he wouldn’t listen to her now, not after her fumbled attempts to persuade him to leave early, to head north. But she told the truth. She had heard many bad things about this forest. About people who had entered and had never come out again. And if they did emerge unscathed, there were the stories of strange noises and lights in the darkness; of bad spirits filling the air.
>
  She shivered, squeezing her knees into her horse’s belly to urge the animal onwards.

  The bare trees closed in over their heads as they entered into the woods in single file, the two knights at the front, Cecily in the middle with Lachlan behind. Spindly twigs scratched against her cloak, caught in her veil; low overhanging branches forced her to duck her head. Brambles snagged, dragging at the hemline of her cloak.

  The path was faint, difficult to see, snaking in a vague circuitous route through the trees. The horses up front switched to left, then to the right. As long as they kept heading in a northerly direction they would eventually reach the city, thought Cecily. But it was hard to focus on where north was; the thick mass of branches above prevented the weak sun from reaching the forest floor.

  They plodded steadily, silently, around the dark, serried trunks, moving forward through gaps big enough for the horses. The woods were quiet, no birdsong permeated the air. Cecily shuddered, a sense of anxious premonition gripping her heart. The borrowed gloves, too large, had slipped down over her wrists; she pushed the cloth back up to her cuffs, grateful for the warmth. Maybe they would be all right, she thought. Both the knights wore chainmail and carried swords, and although Lachlan wore civilian clothes, he carried a sword at his belt. She allowed herself to relax, just a tiny bit.

  The attack, when it came, was swift. Savage.

  In the hiss of an arrow, the older soldier up front toppled from his horse and thudded to the ground. In a trice, the other knight was down, an arrow quivering in his neck.

  A howl of fright tore from Cecily’s throat. Her little mare reared up, front hooves pawing the air.

  ‘Get down!’ Lachlan yelled at Cecily, jumping from his horse and drawing his sword. Bunching her cloak in a fierce grip at her waist, he yanked her from her horse, shoving her into the undergrowth. Legs braced, he pivoted lightly on nimble feet, his keen eyes searching the dark woodland, so that he covered a full circle in the space of a breath.

  Lachlan had thrown her in front of a massive clump of brambles, behind a thick tree trunk. Cecily hesitated, crouching low, blood thumping in her chest.

  Sword outstretched, Lachlan jerked his gaze towards her. ‘Hide!’ he growled. ‘Crawl, make yourself invisible!’ Breathing heavily, he swung his lithe body round in another neat circle, his big feet moving with a surprising lightness for a man so tall. ‘Do it now!’

  His order was terse. She scrabbled forward on her hands and knees. Nettles stung her skin. The woven gloves snagged on the bramble thorns, caught, slowing her progress. She yanked them off and left them. The earth was damp, cold beneath her fingers as she crawled deeper and deeper into the undergrowth, the rotting fungal smell stinging her nostrils. This felt so wrong, this running away. She wanted to be out there, alongside Lachlan, but that was stupid. She had no weapon and no idea how to fight. She was of no help whatsoever. She was useless.

  The brambles arched high above her head, but she found a space, in the middle of that dense nest, a space where she could turn and sit, clasping her knees with tightly knotted fingers. Her blood thumped in her ears and she tried to slow it, to still her breathing, in the hope of hearing what was happening to Lachlan.

  She heard a shout, then a clash of swords. A volley of cursing. More shouts. Sweat beaded her palms. Cecily had no idea whether it was Lachlan, or someone else. The invisible enemy. The swiftness of the soldiers’ deaths had caught her by surprise; the accuracy of the arrow shots meant that, whoever they were, their adversaries were skilled. They had the upper hand. Deep in her hiding place, thorns catching at her hair, her veil, her clothes, she bent her head to her clasped knees and prayed. Prayed that Lachlan’s life would be spared.

  Please God.

  The image of the two knights, falling swiftly, tortured her inner vision. Dead before they reached the ground. Would Lachlan suffer the same fate?

  She hunched forward, resting her chin on her knees. If only she had her wits about her, if only her brain was not befuddled by Lachlan, by his strong, dynamic presence, then she would use this chance to flee and head north. She would go to her friend of old. She would find William. She should keep crawling, crawling away, then straighten up and walk away. Run.

  She should.

  And yet—she could not.

  She had scarce known this man above a handful of days and yet she could not leave him. Her brain screamed at her to go, to flee, but her heart made her stay. Sit still. Wait until the moment when it was safe to go to him.

  Her thoughts made no sense, settled on rickety planks that had no support. Emotion tangled with reason. Lachlan was her captor, taking her to a place that she had no wish to go, yet she wanted to be with him. The memory of his voice hummed into her, that low accented burr drilling down to the very core of her. She could not wrench herself away. She had to make sure that Lachlan was safe.

  Cecily had no idea of how long she waited, waited until the forest was quiet again. And even then, she hesitated. What would she find, when she crawled out of this hiding space? Would Lachlan be dead? Her heart howled with the thought, a great cavernous hollow opening up in her chest. A chasm of loss. How was it that she couldn’t bear to lose him? This man who had turned her whole life upside down.

  Working her way back through the brambles, the dead wood and leaves, Cecily eventually emerged into the open space where they had been attacked. She squinted, her eyes watering in the low sunlight. The horses had vanished: either they had been taken by their attackers or had run away. She hoped that her little grey mare had been quick enough to escape capture. The bodies of the two knights lay where they had fallen, crumpled on the muddy, leaf-strewn track. She grimaced, averting her eyes; despite being Lord Simon’s men, she had not wished them ill. Her heart tripped and rolled, her eyes searching frantically through the trees for Lachlan—had he been taken?

  Then, through the whispering of the trees, a faint groan, so faint she wasn’t sure if she even heard it. Tilting her head, Cecily tried to locate the source of the sound, her eye roaming the dense vegetation, peering through the narrow gaps in the trees, searching for the tell-tale flash of fiery hair, or any scraps of blue: the colour of Lachlan’s tunic, his cloak.

  In the scuffle of breeze, Cecily heard the sound again. She darted through the trunks, her shoulder banging painfully on the solid bark as she barged through. A dust of lichen, pale green, smeared her dark cloak as she tore through.

  Lachlan lay in a puddle of brindled leaves, so still. Felled, like a giant oak. His legs stretched out before him, sprawling across the dead leaves; his arms were flung out either side. His beautiful eyes were shuttered, long dark lashes sweeping the top of his high cheekbones.

  Her heart plummeted, screwed tight with wretchedness. Flying towards him, she plunged to her knees, sinking into the damp mossy undergrowth. The wet leaves soaked upwards through her gown. ‘Lachlan,’ she whispered, fearful that the outlaws might still be about, might hear her. ‘Lachlan!’ She bent her head down to his mouth and his warm breath sifted across her cheeks. Her heart swelled with joy. Thank God!

  Cecily patted his cheek, his skin rough and cold. The short bristles on his jawline scratched the soft skin of her palms. Running her hands over his shoulders, his chest, then over his torso and legs, she checked for entry wounds, but found nothing. ‘My God, Lachlan,’ she blurted out, half-sobbing into the silence of the forest, resting her palms flat on his chest. ‘What have those bastards done to you?’

  ‘They hit me on the head.’

  She jumped at the sound of his voice. Dry, laconic. Her eyes sprung to his face. Lachlan’s eyes were clear, brilliant. Studying her closely.

  ‘Oh, my God, Lachlan! How do you feel?’ Instinctively, she touched his cheek, cupping his chin. Relief flooded through her; relief that he was alive.

  ‘Terrible,’ he grunted, turning his face into the warmth of her hand. ‘At least they did not find y
ou. You are unhurt?’

  ‘Yes. I found a safe place.’

  His eyes sought and held hers: a questioning look. ‘I must sit up, yet I fear it may be difficult.’ She had come back to find him, he thought.

  ‘Let me help you.’ Dropping her hand, Cecily leaned forward to hook her arm into his, hoisting his muscular body into a seated position. He swayed against her, his face a deathly white, bracing his straight arms on to his outstretched legs. His massive shoulder locked against her slim frame and she breathed in the heady, masculine scent of him. So close.

  ‘Can I look at your wound?’ Cecily asked, tentatively.

  He nodded, then groaned, wincing at the movement, narrowing his eyes in pain.

  ‘I’ll have to let go of your shoulder,’ she explained, ‘so I can move around to the back of you.’

  ‘I’ll be all right,’ he said, through gritted teeth. Christ, how his head ached.

  Cecily hitched around behind him, raising herself on her knees. Blood matted his hair, dark red and oozing. With careful fingers, she parted the blood-soaked strands. A gash cut through the white skin of his scalp.

  ‘It doesn’t look too deep,’ she breathed, deliberately keeping her voice calm, steady. ‘I don’t think you will need stitches.’

  ‘Someone clunked me with a stone,’ Lachlan growled, dropping his head slightly. ‘They must have thought they had killed me.’

  Thank God they did not. Sitting back suddenly on her heels, she traced the strong column of his neck, the tanned flesh striped with drying rivulets of blood and thought, I cannot do without you. He made her feel safe, protected, for the first time in her life. And she clung to that feeling, like a lifeline. It was ridiculous, stupid. She wanted to laugh out loud. Or cry. Her situation was impossible, untenable.