Her duty now was to plan an escape, but the task of getting loose from her bindings and making her way through an enemy camp bristling with knights and men-at-arms seemed insurmountable. Besides, she had no idea where she was, for all she knew she could be in the black heart of England itself.
She jerked at the sudden sound of laughter that came from right outside the tent. She caught snatches of words: king, battle, and something that sounded like accursed Welsh bastards. But then the voices dwindled. Far in the distance a trumpet sounded.
The wind came up, rippling the canvas. The flaps that covered the entrance were tied shut, but there was a gap that let in a welcome breath of fresh air. A lance had been stuck into the ground beside the entrance, its bright iron point buried deep into the soft earth. The pennon that hung from the shaft stirred in the sudden draft, and Arianna gasped.
It was a black dragon on a bloodred field.
4
I’m getting too old for this, Raine thought, wincing at the stiffness in his legs as he walked along the banks of the river Dee, searching for his tent.
Deep in his bones, he felt the hours of a night spent in the saddle. But it was more than that, he knew. He had wasted his youth in tournaments and war, hunting and carousing, drinking and wenching, and he was tired of it all.
Tired unto death.
Gaudily colored tents and pavilions were spread in a rainbow array over rolling meadows and among groves of sycamore. They had ridden through the night and most of that morning to arrive here at the main encampment of Henry’s army near Basingwerk Abbey.
The war-horses and pack animals corralled by the river had churned the ground into mud, and Raine had to sidestep around a particularly noisome puddle. The camp sprawled before him. Sergeants and squires bustled to and fro. Strolling minstrels sang love songs, followed by strolling strumpets ready to satisfy the itch inspired by those same songs. Mountebanks and peddlers relieved new recruits of their hard-earned coppers. Shouts of dismay and triumph mingled with the aroma of simmering soups and potages carried by the breeze from the cooking fires, where men had gathered to drink and gamble at nine-men’s morris and dice.
Yet for all the tumult of activity around him Raine felt alone.
Word of the Black Dragon’s feat had spread and men called out their praise, but few approached him. He’d always intimidated most men, and he had few close friends. He had stopped making friends long ago, when he started losing them to sword thrusts, crossbow bolts, and the bloody flux.
Contrary to yesterday’s storm, today the sun beat down with a vengeance. Rivulets of sweat soaked into the quilted bliaut Raine wore beneath his mail. A fellow knight hailed him as he passed, holding out a wineskin. Suddenly made aware of his thirst, Raine reached for the skin with a smile of gratitude.
He took a swallow, rinsed out his mouth, spat into the dirt, then drank deeply. They spoke of the Welsh ambush; the knight sounded disappointed to have missed the fight. Raine listened with half an ear, mumbling monosyllabic replies. A pair of whores strolled by, arms linked, laughing. One had striking cinnamon-colored hair.
She turned her head and her gaze locked with Raine’s. She had dark, velvety eyes. Raine gave her a slow smile. She pouted and tossed her head. But a second later her eyes, full of invitation, were back on Raine’s face. His sex thickened and hardened with a fierce and instant response. He felt a sudden need to bury himself in this woman and just forget, forget everything.
Raine jerked his head in the direction of the river. She mouthed the word later and passed by on a cloud of laughter and cinnamon hair. Raine thanked the knight for the wine and moved on.
He finally spotted his black dragon standard flying from the center pole of a red tent twenty yards beyond, where a group of squires and foot soldiers had gathered around a fire. He heard the lilting notes of a crwth, accompanying a clear, sweet, and very familiar voice.
“Taliesin!” he roared.
The song halted in midchord. The crowd around the fire dispersed like leaves before the wind. Taliesin emerged with his instrument—a Welsh version of a viol—its bow tucked beneath his arm. He walked toward Raine with his lazy, lanky stride, hair flashing coppery in the sun. He smiled; Raine did not smile back.
“I ought to beat you to a blood pudding. Where the hell have you been?”
Taliesin lowered his eyes meekly to his boots, an act that didn’t fool Raine for a minute. “I’ve been sort of busy.”
Raine felt a stirring of alarm. “Busy doing what?”
Taliesin lifted his head and fastened wide, coal-black eyes onto Raine’s face. He looked as innocent as a virgin in church. “Why, taking care of your interests, sire. Of course.”
“Oh, of course. And did it possibly occur to you that my interests might lie in the general area of riding into battle with my squire at my side, not with some wet-behind-the-ears page who probably still sucks his thumb at night!”
Taliesin shrugged. “He was the best I could do on short notice.” His mouth quirked into a grin. “Besides, I understand you managed just fine without me. You even saved the king’s life. I’ve already composed an ode about it. Would you like to hear it?”
“Christ.” Raine shuddered at the very idea.
He started for his tent and the youth fell into step beside him. For the hundredth time Raine wondered what possessed him to put up with Taliesin as his squire. The boy made a better poet than he ever would a belted knight, and the last thing Raine needed in his life was a cursed poet, for the love of Christ. He wasn’t even sure where Taliesin had come from. One day the boy who had been serving as Raine’s squire for five years had been killed by a stray crossbow bolt, and the next day Taliesin was there. And was still there two years later, though it seemed a week didn’t go by when Raine wasn’t threatening to have the boy flogged within an inch of his life.
A pot of bean potage simmered over the fire in front of his tent. Raine scooped up a ladleful and tipped it into his mouth. While he ate he worked one-handed to unbuckle the baldric that supported his scabbard and sword. Taliesin helped him off with his cumbersome, heavy coat of mail. It jingled softly as the squire laid it down on a nearby patch of grass. Later it would be cleaned by soaking it in a tub of vinegar and then polished to prevent rust.
Raine rubbed at the raw, red marks the mail had left on his neck and wrists. The bliaut he wore beneath his armor was smudged black, stained with sweat, and flecked with mud and dried blood. He thought about a hot bath and sighed because he would have to wash off in the cold river instead.
He had picked up his sword and scabbard and started toward the tent when he felt Taliesin’s eyes on him. “What?”
The boy cleared his throat and a guilty flush stained his pale cheeks. “Sire, there’s something you should—”
Raine held up his hand. “Whatever it is you’ve done this time, I don’t want to hear about it. All I want right now is wine to get drunk on and a wench in my bed.”
Raine missed seeing his squire’s eyes widen with alarm. He was imagining running his hands through that cinnamon hair, watching it flow over his thighs as she lowered her head, took him in her mouth…. He reached for the tent flap.
“Wait!” Taliesin lunged in front of him, spreading his arms across the entrance like a crucified martyr. “Wait. Don’t go in there … yet.”
Raine lifted one brow in a mild inquiry.
“It’s just … you could be in a better mood, sire. A different mood. If you don’t mind my saying it.”
Raine wondered if a knight could be hanged for justifiably murdering his squire. “There’s nothing wrong with my mood that wine, a woman, and some sleep won’t cure.” He waited for the boy to move; the boy did not.
Raine’s patience was formidable, cultivated after years of bitter experience. But his temper, when he lost it, was awesome. And he was about to lose it. His voice turned deceptively calm and his eyes took on a lazy, hooded look. “Now … you have precisely three seconds to get out of my way.”
Taliesin jumped aside as if he’d just been prodded with a hot iron. But when the tent flap had closed behind Raine’s broad back, the squire’s teeth bit down hard on his lower lip and worry lines furrowed his high, pale brow.
Raine blinked, letting his eyes adjust to the dim light. He grasped the hilt of his sword, thinking to take it out of the scabbard to oil it down. It was still stained with blood and would rust if …
His grip tightened suddenly at the rustling sound that came from his bed at the rear of the tent. He whipped the sword from the scabbard and lunged forward, to point the blade right between a pair of terrified green eyes.
“You!” he said on a hiss of breath as the tension left him. “What in Christ’s name—” He spun around and in three strides was at the entrance. He jerked the flap aside. “Taliesin!” he bellowed. The boy, naturally, was nowhere in sight.
He kept the sword in his hand as he walked back to the bed.
She lay there, staring wide-eyed up at him, tied hand and foot, a gag disfiguring her mouth. A throbbing pulse beat in her throat. Her hair spread across his pillow like a mantle of sable. He had heard tales of wild women who dwelled within forgotten forests, all flowing hair and rent robes. The Welsh called them Furies, and if their eyes were like hers, so filled with damning anger, then they were aptly named.
Her tunic wasn’t rent. But it was twisted and pulled tautly across her chest and stomach, outlining her breasts. They were small and uptilted, rising and falling with each labored breath. He caressed those breasts with his gaze and when a rosy flush spread across her high cheekbones, he bared his teeth in a wolfish smile. Her eyes widened further, her breasts rose and fell faster.
Her tunic had also worked its way up above her knees. Her legs were long and bare, and folded up behind her where they were tied to the thongs that fastened her wrists. Very deliberately, with the tip of his sword, he worked her tunic and underlying chainse up until they were as high as the parting between her thighs. There was an intriguing shadow, the hint of dark hair. The inner skin of her thighs was white, like frothed cream, and it rippled beneath his gaze like a lake suddenly stirred by a gust of wind.
He didn’t see any hidden daggers.
He raised the sword until it pointed at her throat. Her throat constricted as she swallowed. He pressed the blade closer until it just nicked the skin. And kept it there until her eyes began to glaze and he saw one bead of sweat and then another trickle down from her brow.
Only then did he lower the sword, tossing it behind him on top of his war chest. His eyes never left her face.
Her lids closed and he saw the muscles of her mouth, stretched wide around the gag, sag with relief. Her nostrils flared and her breasts heaved once more, then stilled.
“I’ll take that rag out your mouth if you promise not to shout curses at me,” he said in Welsh.
She jerked her head up, and the fury was back in her eyes.
“In that case …” Raine started to turn away. She made a strangled sound behind the gag. He looked back; she was nodding her head vigorously.
He eased down onto the folding wooden frame that supported his straw pallet. She’d cleaned herself up some since last he’d seen her—instead of reeking of the stables, she smelled of the sea. Though her disposition didn’t appear to have improved any. Using his dagger he sliced through the strip of linen that bound the gag in place.
He watched as she worked her jaws, dredging the saliva back into her mouth. It was a wide, expressive mouth with very full, almost puffy, lips. He counted off the seconds, and got as far as three.
“You filthy, murdering, bitch’s whelp—”
He stuffed the gag back in her mouth.
“You left off liar,” Raine said.
Color crept up her neck to flood her face. She turned her head aside and he caught the glint of tears. His lips curved into a cynical smile as he said, “Shall I give you a second chance?”
She nodded, very slowly, keeping her head averted, her face buried in the straw ticking. But when he didn’t remove the gag right away, she twisted her head back around to look at him.
He had been mistaken about the tears; her eyes were dry.
He took the gag out her mouth. He could practically see her thoughts churning behind her eyes. She wanted to curse him so badly, she was turning purple with the effort to hold it all in. “That’s better,” he said. “ ’Tis a most grievous sin, to break an oath like that.”
She had been rubbing her swollen lips against her shoulder bone, but at his words, her head snapped up. “We have a saying in Wales. ‘An oath sworn to an enemy is made to be broken.’”
She was quick, he had to grant her that, not that it mattered a whit. He didn’t care if his whores had straw between their ears, as long as they were fair and buxom and at least pretended willingness. This wench was none of those things. He wondered what misbegotten maggot had gotten into his squire’s brain, that the boy had thought to stow the wretched girl in his tent.
“If you’ve come to ply your trade for England now,” he said, “then I should warn you that we prefer our whores with more honey and less spice—”
She sucked in a sharp breath. “I’m not a whore!”
“Aye? Then you will explain to me how you came to be here.” He paused, then added, “In my bed.”
Her eyes opened wide and she blinked. “God’s death. Do I look like I arrived here willingly?”
He laughed, not about to be taken in by her air of outraged innocence. The wench was after something—doubtless a new protector, or a second chance to bury a knife in his back. But Raine had no intention of becoming either her next pimpreneau or her next victim.
He stood up to search through his coffer for a costrel of wine. He hooked a stool around with the toe of his boot and rested his foot on it, one arm draped over his bent knee. He pulled the flask’s leather stopper out with his teeth, and tilting back his head, drank deeply. Then he offered it to her with a lift of his brows.
“I can’t very well drink with my hands tied behind my back.”
“No, you can’t.” He wasn’t going to untie her until she asked him to do it. And all nice and humbly too. “Why did you have my squire truss you up like that in the first place? If you thought to gain my pity, it hasn’t worked. And I like my sex in the more conventional ways.”
“He’s your squire? That wretched, God-cursed, traitorous boy—the liar told me he was a bard! When next I get my hands on him I’m going to gut him with a sword and feed his innards to the dogs.” She thought a moment, then added, “He must have lied about his birth as well. No true Cymro could stomach serving the likes of you.”
“Isn’t that rather too fine a sentiment to be coming from a wench who serves any man for the price of a sop of ale?”
She had a strong jaw for a girl, and she was clenching it so hard he could see the muscle throb. “I am … not … a whore.”
Raine took another drink, regarding her in silence. He wasn’t surprised to feel his sex stir, lengthening, swelling. He had been a while without a woman and fighting always made him randy. He considered taking her after all, though he’d likely have to leave her bound, and stuff the gag back in her mouth.
While he studied her, she hadn’t moved, nor did her expression give anything away. Finally, she took a deep breath. “Would you … the ropes are tied so tightly …” Her mouth pressed into a long, tight line.
He waited, but that was the most he was going to get out of her. “I might consider untying you, if I weren’t convinced you’d come after my eyes again with your claws.”
“I won’t. I give you my word.”
Raine read the lie in her eyes. He knew well the Welsh. They would die before breaking their word if given to friend or kin, but they didn’t consider binding an oath given to an enemy. They reckoned that God, being on the side of Wales, would forgive such perfidy. In truth, in their perverted way, the Welsh considered it honorable to cheat and trick a foe.
�
� ’Twould be a waste of your breath,” he said. “We Normans have a saying as well … ‘A Welshman’s honor isn’t worth a leper’s piss.’”
She reacted as if stung by a wasp. Her whole body jerked and her head snapped back. “How dare you, of all people, impugn my honor. I’ll have you know that I am—”
“You are?” he prompted.
“Nobody.”
Suddenly weary of the game, Raine turned away.
“Wait! Please …” He turned back. “I swear to you on the blood of Christ I will not harm you.” Raine snorted, and her voice grew desperate. “I’ll even take an oath on the relic in your sword if you like.”
Every knight’s sword had a holy relic encased in the hilt. Raine’s happened to be the eyetooth of Saint Peter, or so he had been told. He thought it more likely, considering the size of the thing, that the tooth had belonged to a wolfhound with a penchant for gnawing on tough bones. But whether the relic was of saint or beast, he wasn’t letting her within a spitting distance of his sword.
Still, he restoppered the costrel and tossed it back into the coffer, then strolled over to the bed. He sat down beside her again and she struggled awkwardly over onto her side so that he could get at the bindings. Her tunic was now rucked up practically around her waist, revealing just the barest hint of firm, rounded buttocks. He ran his finger beneath the curved edge of one soft cheek.
She sucked in a sharp breath and her head whipped around. “You b—”
He held up the gag. “Don’t say it.”
She snapped her jaws together. But if looks could kill, he would have been dancing a carole with the devil in hell.
Her flesh had been softer than the down of a newborn chick. He wanted to run his hands along the length of her calves, up the inside of her thighs, between them….
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