Through a Dark Mist

by Marsha Canham

  Lucien took her hand and led her out into the brisk night air. Was it only his imagination, or was the sky growing lighter overhead? To be sure, the wind was picking up speed and energy, gleefully plucking at the flimsy silk of Servanne’s tunic. Quickly he divested himself of the gray woolen robe and handed it to her.

  “Here, put this on. We have a way to go yet, and—”

  “Lucien! Come quickly!”

  The Wolf ran to where Alaric stood on the lip of the upper path. A grim line of bobbing orange dots could be seen spilling out the postern gate at the base of the castle wall; a dozen guards carrying a dozen torches were making their way down the side of the cliff, lighting the way for a dozen more armed with swords and crossbows.

  “Go,” Alaric shouted, ridding himself of the bulky robes. “I’ll loose a few arrows their way to discourage them long enough for you to get Lady Servanne below.”

  “There are too many of them!”

  Alaric fetched the crossbows and quivers of bolts from the dead guards. “You said yourself, a man with a ready supply of arrows could hold off an army until hell froze.”

  Lucien hesitated, the desire for blood and revenge warring with his need to see Servanne to safety.

  “In God’s name”—Alaric had to shout to be heard over the roaring of the waves and the rising winds—“we have not come this far to lose to them now! Go! I will join you in a trice. Have no fear—I have no more intention of perishing on this godforsaken eyrie than I have intentions of walking the way back to Lincoln!”

  Knowing there was no time to argue, Lucien grabbed Servanne’s hand again and picked up the path on the other side of the ledge. It was no less steep and treacherous than the upper half of the descent; if anything, the closer it came to the sea, the more the path degenerated to a mere lip of crumbling stone. They were forced to walk singly and to keep one arm and hip pressed painfully against the rough stone. Servanne’s boast of being able to run like the wind was mocked at every gap and broken toehold that reduced their pace to a snail’s crawl. Her one slipperless foot seemed to find every sharp needle of rock on the path. The monk’s robe weighed her down, snagging on brambles and crevices, twice jerking her back and needing to be torn from the grasp of the greedy talons of rock.

  The moon was well behind the mass of the cliffs, casting a dull glow over the surface of the water, but sparing nothing for the path. Lucien seemed to be guided by instinct and, on those occasions when the blackness erased all trace of solid footing, prayer.

  Back at the eagle’s eyrie, Alaric waited patiently for the lead guard to come within crossbow range before he leveled the bow and released the trigger, loosing a bolt with a resounding thwang. He struck his target dead centre of the De Gournay blazon, sending the wearer into an almost graceful arc out over the lip of the cliff and into the foaming wash of the sea below. He fired the second weapon, already armed and waiting by his side, killing the next man in line while he was gaping after his fallen comrade.

  Calmly, Friar braced the heavy bow nose down while he loaded another quarrel onto the firing shaft. He drew back the string to arm it, raised the ungainly weapon to chest level to fire … and saw that De Gournay’s men had already begun a hasty scramble back up the cliff. There was no return fire. Not even a testy challenge by a guard farther along in the rear.

  It had almost been too easy.

  Alaric rubbed the skin at the back of his neck and glanced upward at the silhouette of the castle, its shape growing more distinct as the false dawn gave way to the spreading stain of pale gray along the horizon. Even in this uncertain light and at this considerable distance, he could see the heads of the guards patrolling high up on the battlements. If he could see them …

  Alaric straightened and whirled around to stare at where the path resumed on the far side of the ledge. There was only the one way down, only one place to go, and, if the Dragon had been alerted to their presence on the cliff, what could be easier than to set a trap at the bottom and simply wait for the Wolf to walk into it? The Wolf, Servanne, Gil, Eduard … !

  “Christ!” he swore and ran for the path. Without the need to guide and steady a frightened woman behind him, he moved much faster than the Wolf and Servanne, arriving at breakneck speed at the base of the cliff just in time to catch a glimpse of their two shadowy figures rounding the last curve in the rocks.

  The fleeing pair was soaked in sea spray when they finally stumbled down onto the beach. There, to Servanne’s surprise and relief, she could see the glittering swath of a small bay. Though the air continued to vibrate with the thundering roar and crash of the sea, the inlet was nestled behind a breaker of huge boulders and the water was calm enough for a small boat to have maneuvered to within twenty feet of the shore.

  The last stretch of their flight was made over a bed of sharp, cutting shale. Lucien, hearing Servanne’s involuntary cry as the first steps drove a shard of glasslike stone into the pad of her bare foot, swept her into his arms and, without missing a step, plunged into the knee-deep water. A shout and the sound of a second pair of boots crunching across the shale brought the wolfish grin back to Lucien’s lips as he turned and saw Alaric swerving away from the shoreline to follow them into the surf. He was shouting something, both to Lucien and to the occupants of the small boat, and Lucien’s smile vanished. Dawn was in full bloom, the orange and red flare of the verging sun caught and reflected in the glint of conical steel helmets lined along the shore.

  They were trapped! The Dragon’s men had been waiting on the beach; they had allowed the boat to enter the bay unmolested and they had bided their time until their quarry had run straight into the ambush!

  Water began to plop and spout on all sides as a hail of crossbow bolts arced out over the beach. Lucien commanded every ounce of strength he possessed into his legs, but the water, now waist deep, hampered him, and even though the breaker of rocks helped to cut the force of the sea, there was still a wicked undercurrent that pulled and shifted the sand beneath every footstep.

  Less than ten yards from the longboat they went down under a slapping wall of silvery water. Coughing and sputtering oaths, Lucien struggled upright again, managing to maintain his grip on Servanne, sodden clothes and all.

  Eduard, ignoring Gil’s cry, vaulted over the gunwale and began plowing through the waves in an effort to reach the labouring couple. Gil, an arrow clenched between her teeth and another already nocked to her bow, began to return the fire of the guardsmen, who were now running in the open, in a parallel line along the shore. As they knelt to fire and rearm their heavy weapons, Gil was able to pick her targets carefully and with startling accuracy. Many of them heard the singsong hiss of arrows streaking out of the darkness toward them and did not rise from the shale again. Others ran back into the cover of the nearby rocks and dove behind them, assuming—and rightly so—the supply of steel-tipped arrows was not endless. But they were still well within the ideal range for firing their own weapons, and they did so continually, their rage fueling and improving their aim.

  Servanne heard a cry and glanced over Lucien’s shoulder in time to see Alaric careen sideways into the water, an iron quarrel embedded in his upper chest. Lucien shouted and released her, shoving her toward Eduard before he turned and started running back to where he had seen Alaric go under. Servanne’s scream of warning went unheeded. A mercenary running along the shore took aim with his bow and fired, the bolt flying straight and true, tearing a ribbon of flesh from Lucien’s temple.

  Stunned, the Wolf heeled to one side, the pain and blood blinding him even as his legs continued to churn toward Alaric. The knight armed his weapon a second time, but before he could sight along the shaft, he heard a graceful hiss and felt a punch of steel and ashwood pierce cleanly through his leather breastplate.

  The dead knight was no sooner swept into the foaming wash of the surf than another took his place, seeming to rise like a golden-haired Goliath out of the receding fingers of mist.

  Servanne screamed again,
this time to beat away the determined arm that had snaked around her waist and was dragging her toward the longboat.

  “No! No, let me go! Let me go to him! Lucien! Lucien!”

  Eduard’s arm remained like iron around her waist even though she kicked and writhed and fought to be set free. Salt water was in her eyes, blurring her vision, her hair was a drenched, tangled mass wrapped around her throat, choking her. Her hands, flailing wildly around, tried to strike away the force that was carrying her away from her love, her life, and smashed instead into something solid and wooden—the boat! A streak of white-hot pain lanced up her arm, causing her to temporarily cease her struggling and go limp in Eduard’s arms.

  He strained against the current and the violently rocking boat to try to lift her over the side. His leg was crushed against the keel by the undertow and he grunted in pain, feeling his wound reopen to the searing fire of salt water. Servanne felt his grip falter, saw him claw desperately for a hold on the gunwale … lose it, and begin to slide under the rolling waves. Instinctively she reached out to help him … and screamed again.

  It had not been the side of the boat her hand had struck. Rather, she was the one who had been struck, and not by a wooden plank but by a twelve-inch-long crossbow bolt. The iron head had split through the padding of flesh between her thumb and forefinger and buried itself in the wood planking, pinning her helplessly to the boat.

  A wave washed over her head, filling her eyes, nose, and mouth with salt water. Without the strength or ability to resist, she was carried along with the tiny vessel as it was pushed relentlessly toward the waiting danger on the shore. The sandy bottom fell out from beneath her feet and she was dragged down by the current, down into a void of muted sound and roiling darkness.

  Nicolaa de la Haye was a few short paces behind Etienne Wardieu when he stepped out from behind the shield of rocks, and she raised her voice with his in calling for the guards to put up their bows and swords. The trap had worked perfectly. The wolf was caught in the snare and it only remained for the Dragon to have the pleasure of dealing the killing stroke himself.

  Nicolaa’s excitement had been growing to a fever pitch from the moment the sentries had confirmed seeing two men on the cliff. She had insisted on accompanying Etienne and his guard to the beach and she had spurred her horse with equal vehemence, carving up the shale and sand, galloping through still tidal pools with the fury of vengeance shooting plumes of spray ten feet in their wake.

  Within a hundred yards of the sheltered cove, he had reined in his horse and positioned his men among the rocks and boulders lining the beach. They had not had long to test their patience before the low, black shape of a longboat had slid around the reef and sidled into the shallower water. Recognizing Eduard on the oars had only reinforced the Dragon’s rage and hatred; hearing the boy cry out and dive heedlessly into the surf to meet his father had altered the Dragon’s face into a mask of murderous malevolence.

  Nicolaa could have laughed out loud at the ludicrous attempt Lucien Wardieu had made to outwit her glorious Dragon knight. The girl was drowning, the other two would-be rescuers were going nowhere fast. The Wolf had struggled to his feet in the knee-deep water and now stood facing his brother, their two profiles etched in black against the blood-red sky. The fifth participant in this most enjoyable farce was floundering against the force of the waves, fighting the pain and nausea to reach one of the dead guards whose sword lay temptingly within his grasp.

  Striding toward him, Nicolaa drew her own short falchion and arched a raven brow in mild surprise.

  “Well, well, well. Bishop Gautier … we were wondering what had become of you.”

  Gil Golden knew she had no time to waste on subtlety. Servanne was helpless, pinned to the side of the boat, and Eduard was using all of his remaining strength just to keep his nose and mouth above water. With her lips moving around a silent apology, Gil reached over the gunwale and took hold of the end of the crossbow bolt. She snapped off the feather fletching and, praying the salt water had already numbed the wound beyond any additional agony, she jerked Servanne’s hand back, sliding it off the broken end of the shaft.

  The boat lurched onto a sandbar, stranding the three in shallow water as the wave receded. It was then, as Gil braced herself to keep from falling headlong into the surf herself, that she saw Nicolaa de la Haye stalking Alaric. He had managed to crawl to a dead guard and had retrieved the man’s sword, but as he started to haul himself upright, Nicolaa kicked his legs out from beneath him and he went down hard. He clutched his upper shoulder as he rolled with the pain, his fingers splayed on either side of the protruding arrow shaft.

  Gil stared long and hard at the woman she had loathed with every breath of her being for the past five years. Nicolaa and one of her lovers had been attending the Lincoln Fair, where Gil’s father—an expert bowyer and fletcher—had set up a booth to display his wares. Because Gil had looked pretty enough to earn a wink from the handsome soldier, Nicolaa had ordered her arrested and accused her of thievery. Gil’s father had come to her defense, and for his trouble, had been slain on the spot. Gil’s mother and two sisters—the latter barely in their tenth and eleventh years—had been taken to the guards’ barracks for the amusement of the sodomizing bastards until none had had the strength or will left to plead for mercy.

  Nicolaa had saved Gil to the end, teasing her just enough with the hot irons to know that when the screams of her mother and sisters stopped, hers would begin in earnest. By sheer luck, one of the dungeon guards had been a friend to Gil’s father. He bore the screams of the women as long as he could, then one night, after another poor red-haired lass was dragged dead from the barracks, the old man had put the body in Gil’s cell and had whisked her out in an empty ale barrel.

  Gil had survived, but she could hear her sisters screaming still, in her nightmares, just as she could hear Nicolaa de la Haye laughing and goading the guards to another round … and another …

  “No,” she gasped, seeing Nicolaa raise her sword above Alaric’s head. “No! By God, you will not take the life of anyone else I love!”

  She jumped out of the boat and screamed Nicolaa’s name. Too late, she realized she had set aside her longbow to pull Servanne’s hand free, and, for lack of any better weapon to use against the falchion that turned eagerly in her direction, Gil paused to scoop up a fallen crossbow. She released the trigger only to hear a wet snap as the string refused to respond. Nicolaa’s fleeting moment of panic gave way to grinning delight and as the slender, red-haired archer ran closer, she clasped her shortsword in both hands and drew it back for the killing stroke.

  Something black, salty, and gritty struck her stingingly across the face. The muck was in her eyes and in her mouth, and Nicolaa was repulsed into breaking her stance as well as her grip on the hilt of the sword. Alaric threw another handful of wet sand, but by then she had turned away, cursing and scraping the stuff from her face in time to see the blurred fury that was Gil Golden slam into her chest and send them both crashing into the surf.

  Alaric doubled over onto his elbows and knees, his head bowed forward with the pain. Gil and Nicolaa became a rolling, thrashing mass of arms and legs beside him; Lucien and Etienne stood a dozen paces away, their swords unsheathed, their footsteps bringing them together in an ever-decreasing circle of crouched wariness. Nicolaa’s falchion lay in an inch of water, a body length away, but before Alaric could drag himself over to it, a mail-clad boot kicked it a hopeless distance away. Almost too weary to expend the energy to do so, Alaric looked up, seeing his death in the eyes of the mercenary who braced himself to deliver a hacking blow across the back of Alaric’s neck.

  Fff-thunck!

  The mercenary stiffened, his back arched against the brutal force of a six-inch arrow fired from an odd, harp-shaped arblaster. Two longer, thinner ashwood arrows, tipped in steel, fired simultaneously from raised longbows, thudded into the guard’s back and shoulder, skewering through leather armour and Damascan chain mail as if
it was soft cheese. The knight toppled forward, his arms spread wide, his sword splashing harmlessly into the shallow water beside Alaric.

  Sparrow’s gleeful cry brought a wall of black and gold clad knights surging out from behind the tumble of boulders. Calmly, coolly, half of them dispatched a spray of arrows into the ranks of De Gournay’s surprised mercenaries; the rest, led by Sir Roger de Chesnai and Sir Richard of Rouen, poured out onto the beach, their throats roaring an unmistakable challenge.

  The Dragon saw his men falling back, retreating under the onslaught of flashing swords.

  The Wolf smiled and felt a resurgence of energy burn away the fatigue and despair that had nearly claimed him.

  “And so, it comes down to just you and me, Etienne,” he said in a low, controlled voice. “With honour as our judge and God our witness.”

  Etienne’s blue eyes glittered his response and, in ankle-deep water, the Wolf and the Dragon brought their blades slashing together. Lucien, his black shirt and leggings shading him like a dark wraith against the sparkle of the sea, lunged and spun away, his hair shedding bright droplets of salt water into the breaking sunlight. Etienne blocked the thrust and countered with a strength-shattering one of his own, the muscles across his back and arms bulging beneath the quilted blue silk of his surcoat. Steel bit into steel, the swords screaming as loudly as the gulls who spiraled down from the roosts on the cliffs, attracted by the fresh scent of blood.

  Each driving stroke of arms and legs was evenly matched. Both men had suffered bruising and earned wounds in their earlier meeting on the tournament grounds, but this was a new battle, the final battle, and neither spared a thought or grimace for the aches or fatigue. They attacked like rampant lions, blow upon mighty blow staggering first one, then the other. Their swords slashed and hacked without grace or deliberation, each cut searching for a hidden weakness, probing for an unguarded flaw—some imperfection in skill or speed that could reward a bloodthirsty blade.