Fire and Steel

by Anita Mills

  “The Demoiselle is under my protection, my lord.”

  Belesme straightened in his saddle and turned to Guy. Appraising the younger man shrewdly, his green eyes assessing Guy’s resolve, he shook his head. “Nay, but Curthose sends a boy for a man’s task.”

  There was an open insult in both his manner and his words, but Guy would not be baited. Leaning forward to pat his horse’s neck, he merely nodded amiably. “Mayhap, but he gave me his writ, Robert, and I mean to discharge it as I am able.”

  “You have not assembled your levies, and already Henry has landed,” Belesme reminded him. “Nay, but I would leave you to do so now, and I will see the Demoiselle to Rouen for Curthose.”

  “I cannot allow it.”

  Robert of Belesme’s eyes narrowed dangerously, piercing like shards of deep green glass, but Guy refused to waver. “You deny me?” Robert asked harshly.

  Neither foolhardy nor unafraid, Guy knew he risked much in defying a man whose cruelty was legend in his lifetime, but he also knew he’d sworn an oath to Catherine de Brione’s safety. His mouth was almost too dry for speech, but he managed to answer simply, “Aye.”

  “Art a fool then, for I can take her with me whether you will it or no, Guy of Rivaux,” Belesme challenged.

  “My Lord, I have thirty men sworn to fight where I choose. You are alone and unhelmed among them, and you have scarce twenty to come to your aid. I’d not fight you in this, Robert—not when we both are sworn to serve the same overlord in a far greater cause—but I will if I must.” Resting his hand on the rounded pommel of his sword hilt, Guy faced the older count steadily and waited.

  Thinking herself about to be the center of a bloodbath, Catherine stared in disbelief, first at Belesme and then at Rivaux. “By the blessed saints,” she exploded finally, “but I think you are both mad! And I would not go with either of you!”

  Belesme’s usually inscrutable face betrayed him as anger gave way to surprise. “Nay, I will not fight you for now, boy—not when Normandy himself will deliver her to me ere this quarrel ends.” A slow smile played over a sensuous mouth and warmed the green eyes with an almost eerie light. “I give you one thing, Guy of Rivaux—art your father’s son.” Turning to Catherine, he sobered. “Until Rouen, Demoiselle.”

  “Sweet Mary,” Cat breathed in relief as he rode off. “So that is Belesme.”

  “Aye.”

  “He must have been very handsome once.”

  Guy stared in surprise at her. “So I have heard, but not since I can remember. ’Tis said ’twas your father’s blow that did that to his face, but I was not there. I was with the monks then,” he added bitterly.

  “You were destined for the Church?” she asked in disbelief.

  “Aye, I was to atone for my mother’s death. But I would speak no more of that, Demoiselle. Let it be said that my brothers died early, saving me from the life, and that is all there is to tell.” His gold-flecked eyes followed Belesme as the count rode back to his own men, and he shook his head in puzzlement. “Though I cannot think Count Robert would have admired my father, for they were enemies—unless ’twas that they both were cruel and bitter men.”

  “Art a fool, Count Guy,” Catherine murmured with unusual softness, “but I thank you for the service you gave me just now.”

  “Aye,” Guy sighed. “I pray it does not cost me my head. Robert neither forgives nor forgets those who thwart him in even the smallest matters.”

  6

  The abbey was still save for the deep rhythmic snores emanating from the pallet where Hawise slept. Catherine lay clothed and awake on the narrow cot, listening intently in the darkness, her ears straining for some sound beyond the tiny cell, her mind willing her body to remain alert. She judged that the last footstep had passed along the stone-flagged corridor an hour or more before, but she dared not move yet.

  They’d not made it to Lisieux—they were far from it yet, she noted with smug satisfaction. A slow smile curved her mouth in the darkness as she remembered Guy of Rivaux’s impatience with her. He would have liked to beat her, she knew, but his chivalry and courtesy to those weaker than himself forbade it. Instead, he grudgingly slowed their pace to accommodate a demoiselle unused to traveling in the heat. She could almost laugh at his exasperation with her as she remembered his irritation, his anger, and finally his resignation as she had demanded again and again to stop. Thus, when they’d reached the small abbey at Froilyn shortly before dark, he’d reined in and announced curtly that they’d ask for beds there. The older man, the one called William, had snorted and argued for pressing on through the night, but Rivaux had shaken his head, saying, “Nay, but she can go no further this day.”

  Her only regret was that he’d thought her too sick to eat and had sent her to the narrow cell with bread and cheese whilst he and his men had partaken of a more substantial meal with the abbot. She’d feigned illness too well, she decided with a sigh, and now she lay listening to Hawise’s snores and her own stomach’s growls. Briefly she wondered if she dared pass by the kitchen for food ere she left, and then reluctantly discarded the idea for being too risky. Well, on the morrow she’d be eating at the Condes, and that thought would have to sustain her.

  Finally, too afraid that she would succumb to sleep herself, she rose stealthily from the cot and edged to the small, high window to listen for sentries. Hearing nothing, she was emboldened to pick up her soft leather shoes and tiptoe past the slumbering Hawise to the door. Leaning her head against the grated opening, she waited several minutes to assure herself that the long, narrow corridor was empty before daring to ease the iron handle upward. The door opened with a squeaky groan as it swung on ancient hinges. Waiting again for the sound of movement within any of the sparse tiny chambers lining the passage, she finally slipped out and crept toward the open courtyard.

  Moonlight bathed the cobbled stones, showing them like hundreds of eggs lying in rows, shadowing them at the edges by the surrounding walls. Faint voices came from the depths of the shadows across the wide expanse of yard. Catherine held her breath and listened, determining that Rivaux’s sentries shared stories and a skin of wine, before she edged along the wall on the opposite side.

  The horses, tethered on a grassy strip behind the wall, moved nervously at her approach. Still barefoot and holding her shoes, she isolated her mare to lead it away. Rivaux’s ostlers had removed her saddle and piled it with the others in a row to form a barrier along one side. For a moment she contemplated trying to find it and then decided it too much of a risk. Suddenly Rivaux’s big black reared its head to shatter the stillness with a piercing whinny that made her heart rise in her throat. A knot formed in the pit of her stomach as she held her breath and waited for the sentries to respond. The big animal’s ears were laid back and his nostrils flared. Timidly she reached to lay a quieting hand on its long nose and whispered soothing words. She could hear the men across the courtyard pause and listen for what seemed a very long time. Finally they resumed a desultory conversation about full moons and skittish animals.

  Picking up a riding whip, Catherine stopped to slip on her shoes before grasping the mare’s mane and swinging up on its bare back. The big black whinnied again and moved restlessly within the small area, prompting others to shift about. With her knee, Cat nudged her horse away while lying close to its back.

  “Leaving, Demoiselle?”

  A half-dressed Guy of Rivaux stepped out of the shadows and grasped her reins. A tight smile of suppressed fury, coupled with eyes that glittered in the moonlight, gave him a frightening aspect. Catherine gasped at his sudden appearance. Raising her whip, she brought it down with full force. He closed his eyes by reflex and took the blow across his cheek, wincing as the thin leather ribbon cut into his flesh.

  “Unhand my horse!” she hissed furiously while kicking the mare.

  The animal tried to rear, but Guy maintained a firm grip on its reins. It half-stumbled and would have thrown Catherine had she not held tightly to its mane. Tears
of impotent rage stung her eyes and threatened to spill onto her cheeks as she choked helplessly above him.

  With the back of his free hand, Guy wiped away the blood that welled in the cut on his face before he reached for her. Then, releasing the mare’s head, he grasped Catherine roughly by an arm and dragged her down. She fell heavily against him and struggled for escape. Kicking and elbowing, she fought while he held her. Warm, wet drops of his blood dripped on her gown as both his arms imprisoned her flailing limbs. Finally he brought a knee around her, forcing her to lose her balance and fall in a heap at his feet. She lay for a moment to catch her breath and then scrambled up.

  “God’s blood, but you are a fiery little maid,” he muttered, his eyes on her heaving chest.

  “You’ve ruined my gown!” she spat out.

  His anger fading, he stared hard into her upturned face, thinking irrationally that he’d never seen any female, demoiselle or great lady, to compare with Catherine of the Condes. Her eyes, black in the moonlight, flashed defiance still. For the briefest moment he wondered if her mouth would taste like any other, and then blotted the dangerous thought from his mind. Instead, he reached for her wrist and pulled her into the open area.

  “And you have marked me, so we are even, Demoiselle,” he answered curtly. “Where did you think to go?”

  Twisting her hand to loosen his grip, she found his fingers cut into her wrist like unbreakable bands. “You bruise me, my lord.”

  “Answer me—where did you think to go?”

  “Mayhap I thought to meet someone!” she snapped insolently. “God’s bones! Does it matter? I am found out, anyway.”

  “The only person you’ll meet out there is Belesme.” He watched those black eyes widen and nodded. “Aye, he travels less than a league behind, and has since we met him.”

  “But why? He would not fight you surely…” Her voice trailed off uncertainly as she recalled tales of Count Robert’s treachery.

  “Who knows what is in his mind, Demoiselle? He is, I think, more than a little mad, and mayhap thinks to gather more men before he tries to take you from me.”

  “Sweet Mary!”

  “Aye. I had hoped to be to Lisieux by now—and would have been—and we would have been closer to mine own allies.” The hazel eyes were heavily flecked now, making them lighter as he stared soberly, his brow furrowed with some distant thought unrelated to her. The slash against his cheekbone still oozed dark blood. Abruptly he looked down and considered her anew. “You still have not said where you intended to go, Demoiselle.”

  “The Condes.”

  His scarred eyebrow lifted quizzically. “The Condes? ’Tis leagues, child, and despite the moon, I doubt you could find your way.”

  “I am not a child,” she muttered sullenly.

  “You are thirteen, Catherine, and scarce prepared for such a journey. You could have ridden into Belesme’s camp ere you even knew it, and I’d not have been able to aid you. Come on.” He tugged at her wrist and started back for the cloisters. “I would rise early on the morrow.”

  “Nay.” She pulled back, digging in the heels of her soft slippers against the cobblestones. “My lord, I would not go to Rouen—I would not,” she repeated desperately. “What if Curthose should receive word- however false—that my father was in King Henry’s train? He might blind me—or worse.”

  He stopped. “Nay. Too many of us fight for him because we must, Demoiselle, but we’d not stomach his harming Roger de Brione’s daughter. ’Twould be folly—Lord Roger would be sure to come then, and even Holy Church would stand against Normandy if you were harmed.”

  “Yet you let him take me hostage—aye, you come to do his bidding,” she accused.

  “Because you will not be harmed.”

  “How can you know that?”

  “Demoiselle, I swore you would not.”

  “You are but one boy. What if you cannot keep that which you promise? Will you grieve for me when I am blind or dead?”

  The muscles in his jaw tensed until they ached. “Demoiselle,” he answered finally, “I am but one man—or boy, if you will—but I will keep my oath or die. Now”—he grasped her roughly again and pushed her ahead of him—”I would sleep tonight that I may ride tomorrow.”

  It was useless to argue further and she knew it. She went without hurling the dozen or so barbs that sprang to mind, walking silently before him, knowing she was going to Rouen for a certainty. She’d been a fool to think it could be otherwise, she conceded to herself, but she’d had to try, else she’d not been Roger de Brione’s daughter.

  He shoved her unceremoniously through the cell door and woke Hawise. “Get up, woman, and watch your mistress until I return,” he ordered brusquely. “And do not think to let her leave again. Next time, I’ll beat her.”

  “Until you return…?” Catherine stared.

  “Aye.”

  Hawise blinked in the semidarkness and sat up. Catherine stood rooted where the moon made a wedge of pale light against the stone floor, her face as still as one of the carved stone statues in the chapel at the Condes. Then, before the plump woman’s eyes, the girl’s shoulders sagged and shook. “Oh, Hawise!” she wailed. “I go to Curthose! I shall die there!”

  “Nay, nay, little mistress,” Hawise soothed in alarm. “Come—’twill not be so. You’ll be cosseted and petted as you were at home—you’ll see. Nay, but none can look on you and not love you.”

  With an effort, Catherine collected herself and sniffed. It did no good to frighten one who could not aid her anyway. Dropping to sit on the cot, she nodded her head in dejection. “I thought to run away.”

  “Cat!”

  “Aye, but he caught me.”

  “I told you he was no fool.”

  Catherine sighed. “’Twas his horse that gave me away, Hawise, else I’d have done it. But he says Count Robert follows us, so I suppose it was for the best. Sweet Mary, but Curthose cannot be as bad as Belesme,” she reasoned finally.

  Hawise crossed herself at the mention of the hated name. A superstitious soul, she like many others felt certain that Robert of Belesme was the devil’s tool on earth, for how else could he have done what he had all these years without retribution? Aye, Satan’s spawn he was, and it was not healthy even to think of him.

  There was a faint scraping sound in the corridor and then Guy of Rivaux reappeared dragging a straw-filled mattress by a corner. Pulling it just inside the door, he arranged it so that it blocked the opening. His back to them, he explained, “You’ll not leave again tonight without waking me, Demoiselle, for I do not sleep deep.”

  “My lord, ’tis unseemly,” Hawise protested.

  “You can sleep between us, woman, and I will leave the door open for all to see she is unmolested.” Even as he spoke, he drew his tunic over his head and discarded it in a heap beside the pallet. Catherine strained curiously to see how he looked naked, but his pallet was in deep shadows. As if sensing her thoughts, he added, “And I sleep in my chausses, Demoiselle.” Easing his tired body down against the rough cloth that covered the straw, he rolled onto his side and cradled his head on his forearm. “Since you are recovered from your heat-sickness, Catherine of the Condes, I expect we will gain the leagues we lost today. We’ll stop but once in the morning and once in the afternoon this time.”

  She lay still on the cot, pretending not to hear him: That he’d discovered her before she could flee galled her still, but even that could have been borne if he were not so conceited about it. She waited until she could hear him breathing steadily and knew he was slipping into sleep, and then she brought him awake by announcing evenly, “I am glad I cut your face, Guy of Rivaux–I hope it marks you for the rest of your life.”

  7

  The city of Rouen bustled with the preparations for war. Everywhere Catherine looked there were men-at-arms on brightly caparisoned horses and common soldiers jostling for passage in the narrow streets. The whole place was crowded, teeming with the sounds and smells of armorers’ and
farriers’ bellows blowing smoke that mingled with the odor of bake ovens and spits. Great cauldrons sent pungent clouds of steam up as leather was boiled to toughen it for those unable to afford mail. Peasants drove herds of sheep and swine to slaughter within city walls, and the animals’ cries contributed to the din.

  Catherine wrinkled her nose at the commingling of garbage, animal offal, and urine that fouled the streets, keeping the ragged, bearded cleaners busy in a hopeless effort. A filthy beggar, his right arm ending in a blackened stump, clutched at the hem of her gown with his left and cried through broken teeth, “Alms for a poor soldier, gentle lady—alms for a poor soldier!”

  William de Comminges would have forced the fellow out of the way with his horse, but Guy reached into the purse that hung from his belt and threw a coin. As the beggar dropped to grope on the ground, William growled, “You give too much, my lord.”

  “Nay, he lost a hand to his trade.”

  “Humph!” the older man scoffed. “I’d say he lost it for poaching or debasing coins, more like. Sometimes art soft as a woman, Guy of Rivaux.”

  “I care not how he lost it, then—he cannot work.”

  “God’s blood, my lord, but you cannot feed every poor soul between here and Rivaux,” William expostulated before his face broke into a reluctant smile. “Not that you would not try. The monks had you over-long—’tis a wonder I could teach you that a hand’s for aught but writing.”

  Well aware of William’s pride in his ability to read and write and cipher, Guy grinned openly. “Aye, but at least I know when the clerks would cheat me, and you cannot say that is not an advantage.”

  Beside him, Catherine covered her mouth and nose with her hand and rode in stony silence. She was in Rouen—she was effectively Robert Curthose’s prisoner now. Before her loomed the ducal palace, ill-named thus for it was more fortress than anything, and this day it looked to be a prison.