The Promise

by TJ Bennett

  Inés grasped her hand, pulling her back down. “Have a care, Señora. You will make yourself a target. Günter would be very upset to survive this battle only to discover you had perished in it instead.”

  “Sí,” Alonsa nodded and crouched down lower, still straining to see. “You, as well. Fritz will surely return soon, and I would not like to tell him you became a spoil of today’s battle.”

  Inés flashed a quick smile. “Let them try. The Devil himself could not keep me from my Fritz.”

  Alonsa smiled at her fortitude, yet understood it well. Nothing but death would separate her from Günter again.

  However, the fog made it impossible to tell the course of the battle from their vantage point. Occasional reports came in with a wounded soldier indicating the French and Swiss troops appeared to be losing the battle. Indeed, many of the Swiss mercenaries had already fled on foot, giving up their positions to the attacking Imperialist troops.

  Alonsa could hear the boom of artillery and smell the acrid gunpowder as it drifted their way. They had been at a safe distance from the battle before dawn, but it was difficult to tell anymore. The screams of dying men, the clang of blades striking armor, and the thunder of hooves pounding across the open park seemed to be growing louder. Alonsa prayed continually, her hands clasped before her, that her husband would be among the men to survive this horrible day.

  The ordnance master had informed her of Günter’s decision to lead the forlorn hope, and her own hope had arisen with the sun that he might live and come back to her. He was strong—stronger than his enemy; stronger than despair; stronger, yes, than even the curse.

  He must come back to her.

  Suddenly, cannon shot blasted into the side of one of the carts. Its occupants shouted and fled, and pandemonium ensued.

  “They are attacking the train! Run!” yelled a cobbler, and he abandoned his cart.

  Alonsa and Inés exchanged horrified glances, picked up their skirts, and started running. They had gone only a few paces when another explosion blew apart the very cart they had stood behind, knocking them to the ground.

  Alonsa landed hard and lay stunned, unable to move, the wind thrust from her lungs. Her ears rang from the blow. She saw Inés struggling to rise beside her, her forehead cut and bleeding. She reached for Alonsa, her face filled with concern. Behind her, Alonsa saw two men, mercenaries dressed in black, their wild eyes rimmed in red, burst through the breach. The mercenaries swung their blades, stabbing indiscriminately into the fleeing bystanders, smashing the wares of the carts in their way. Incongruously, one stopped to steal items from an abandoned cart and then turned, breathing hard, his eyes locking onto Inés.

  Alonsa tried to cry out, to warn her to run, but her throat would not work. All at once, the world seemed to spin out of control, too fast, and Alonsa raised a shaking hand, trying to pull Inés toward her. The mercenary, a Swiss, locked one arm around Inés’ waist and dragged her away with him. Inés’ mouth worked in a silent scream, and she kicked and clawed as the brute pulled her from Alonsa’s grasp.

  Sound rushed in again, and Alonsa heard women screaming and saw them grab their children while Hell took shape before them. Enemy mercenaries poured through the breach in the train, most fleeing for their lives without a backward glance, but some stopped, filled with frustrated fury at having to retreat. They hacked and swung at anything in their path, racing through the camp ahead of the pursuing Imperialist troops.

  Alonsa felt a surge of power flow through her, and she pushed to her knees, sighting her blade glinting on the ground only feet away. She crawled to it, grasping it just as another mercenary came towards her. When he leaned over to grab her, she swung her blade and stabbed him in the leg, hearing him scream in pain. Behind him, a market woman raised a cast iron pan and smashed it over his head. He dropped like a stone, and Alonsa withdrew her blade from his flesh.

  “Inés!” Alonsa shouted to the other woman, motioning frantically over the sound of culverin fire and the women’s terrified screams. “They have Inés!”

  The woman—Greta, she remembered—nodded her understanding. “I saw. That way!”

  They raced toward where they had last seen Inés’ terrified face as she fought for her freedom then disappeared with her captor into the mist.

  “Inés!” Alonsa cupped her hand to her mouth as she shouted, then to her ear, trying to distinguish the sounds of fright and pain around her, trying to determine if any belonged to her friend. “Inés!”

  No answering shout came.

  Other market women around them fought in clutches of two’s and three’s, swinging pans and axes and anything they could lay hold of at the fleeing mercenaries, while old merchants drew out their rusty blades and finished the job. Only minutes behind them, the Imperialist troops pushed through the breach in hot pursuit of the fleeing Swiss.

  Before she knew it, the fierce battle for the baggage train was over. The men raced from the camp, leaving the groans of the injured and dying, and the cries of the women and children, behind them.

  Smoke rose from the burning carts, choking and gagging Alonsa, who ran helpless and aimless, searching in frantic circles for her friend, her blade clutched useless in her hands. “Inés, for the love of God, answer!”

  Nothing. Alonsa flung her blade to the ground and covered her face. “No …” she sobbed in desperation and in fear, and Greta’s arms went around her.

  Her friend was gone, kidnapped by a man who had nothing to lose. Alonsa could only pray he killed her quickly, because she could not bear to think what Inés might endure at his hands if he chose to keep her alive.

  “Señora!”

  Alonsa heard the familiar male voice call to her, and she turned in search of its source. “Fritz! Oh, Dios mío.” How could she explain to him that his beloved had been taken?

  Fritz leaped over a smoking plank of wood and raced up to her, his eyes full of concern. “Señora, are you well?” He touched her forehead, which throbbed with an ache only newly realized. “You are injured.” His blue gaze swept the baggage train, taking in the destruction all around him.

  “What has happened here?” Then, more urgently, “Where is Inés?”

  She grabbed his jerkin in her fists. “He took her—a man, one of the fleeing mercenaries. He took her! I don’t know where.”

  Fritz blanched. “No! When? How—”

  “There is no time, Fritz. We must gather a party of men to search for her. Every moment she is missing—” Alonsa bit her lower lip. She could not say it.

  Fritz’s jaw firmed, and his gaze became like cold steel. “Which way did they go?”

  Alonsa shook her head in denial. Fritz would be no match for an enraged mercenary fleeing for his life. “You must get help. Men, weapons. You cannot do this alone.”

  “There is no one to help. There is a battle raging! No one will have time to search for her now. We cannot wait. Tell me which way she went, and I will find her and bring her back. I swear it on my father’s grave.”

  Alonsa saw the determination in his gaze and wondered if he could do it. Nevertheless, there was no time to argue. Thinking quickly, she searched the ground nearby where the man she had felled still lay. She found his blade and, pulling it from his cold grasp, thrust it at Fritz. “Here. You will need a sword. I last saw them heading that way. Hurry!”

  With a quick nod, he turned and raced in the direction she pointed, the willow pack around his waist bouncing on his hip, his blond hair flying in the wind. He disappeared into the mist like a ghost.

  Alonsa uttered a prayer of Godspeed and hoped she would not lose all of those who mattered to her this day.

  Inés groaned in agony when the beast who had captured her flung her to the ground like a rag doll. He had dragged her by her hair through the bushes and trees in a desperate flight from the pursuing Imperialist army. When she had tried to scream for help, he’d shoved her against a tree and put his thick fingers around her neck. “Scream again,” he threatened, spit
flying from his lips onto her face, “and I will snap your neck in two.”

  Terrorized, she nodded her acquiescence, and he picked her up, threw her over his shoulder, and started running again. She bounced atop him, his shoulder jabbing her stomach repeatedly, the ground her only view as she tried to keep from falling, for what seemed like hours. Others such as he had run past them every so often, but he paid them no heed, eventually swerving into a copse of trees and away from the swarming horde of the Imperialist army pursuing them.

  They stopped, her captor panting heavily, his breath creating white fog as he dropped her and grabbed his side. A wicked dagger hung from his belt, and he still clutched the goods he’d stolen from the cart in one hand. He looked behind them for a long time, until the forest grew silent of footfalls and fleeing mercenaries. She started to reach for his dagger but he turned to her, a look of purpose on his pug-nosed face.

  “It seems I won’t get paid this month after all,” he snarled, an ugly sneer on his mouth. “You will be my payment instead.”

  She scrambled backwards, too weak to run away, yet too frightened to lie still and await her fate. Her vision swam, and when she lifted her hand to her face, it came away covered in blood.

  “Never.” She spat at him and turned to crawl away as fast as she could.

  He grabbed her leg, easily pulling her back. She kicked him, connecting with something solid, and he grunted and released her. She scrabbled away again, pulling herself to her knees. For one moment, she thought she might be free, but then he flew at her, hitting her broadside and knocking her down.

  She gasped with the pain radiating out from her ribs. He rolled on top of her, clasping her wrists and pulling them up. His heavy body pushed down over hers, and she could smell his putrid breath and ripe sweat, feel his sickening hardness as he ground his hips against her flailing body.

  She spit in his face again, and he drew his hand back, slapping her hard.

  She cried out and began to sob.

  “I’d use my fist on you, but I like a little fight in my women,” he grunted, grinding down hard. “And I like your face. Don’t want to ruin it. Not too many pretty ones out here.” He shoved his nose into her neck, smelled her while she cowered in fear. “But if you fight me too hard, I’ll not be so good to you.” His eyes traveled over her body. “You’ll be handy to have around. Haven’t had a woman in months. In the meanwhile,” he said, grunting as he released one of her wrists, “might as well have a sample of what’s to come.”

  She felt his hand between their bodies, working his cock out of his codpiece. She renewed her struggle against him, clawing at him with her free hand while they jerked and rolled upon the ground, and he pulled up her skirts. He was too big, too strong to stop, and she knew she could not defeat him. Still she fought, until she had no more fight left, until she felt the beginning of his searing penetration and she choked back a scream of rage.

  Suddenly he was gone. No, his head was gone. She blinked, uncomprehending, as his body fell against hers and streams of blood poured from the gaping wound in his neck onto her face. She gagged in horror, squirming frantically to be rid of him, when she saw Fritz’s rigid face just above hers. He grabbed the man’s still jerking body and pulled him off her, rolling him away, the bloody blade in his hand a testament to what he had done.

  Still she did not comprehend, and she gasped and choked and could not breathe. The blood, the pain—what in Christ’s name was happening to her?

  Fritz leaned over her, a look of quiet horror on his face. “Inés?”

  He reached for her, but she could not bear to be touched. She rolled away, not recognizing the desperate animal sounds coming from her throat, mewling and choking until her stomach contents heaved and she was retching on the ground before her.

  She buried her face in her hands, shamed and covered with someone else’s blood, and wept in great racking sobs that shook her entire body. “Ay, Dios mío, Dios mío!”

  The forest was silent except for her cries. Then, she felt a soft hand on her shoulder, and a wet cloth touched the side of her face.

  It was Fritz. Fritz, wiping the blood off her face and hands. Fritz, who had come into this place, pursued her, and rescued her. Fritz, who had seen her nearly violated for the second time, and who this time had killed for her—and he a man who had never killed before.

  Her head jerked up, and she caught the sick look in his eyes. “Oh, my love, I am so sorry,” she whispered.

  He looked at her, astonished. “What do you mean? Why are you sorry?”

  “You—you killed him.”

  He nodded his head and clenched his jaw. “My first kill in battle.” He looked at the sword in his hand and lifted it up. “It is a good blade. I think I will keep it.”

  She held out her trembling hands to him and let them drop. “You are not sorry you had to do it on my account?”

  He arched a brow. The boy was gone completely, and in his place was a man. “Anyone who thinks to harm the woman I love will die by my hand. No one touches what is mine.”

  She sobbed again and he gathered her in his arms, blood and all. “Fritz.” She gazed up at him, her voice hushed with awe. “You saved me.”

  A great shudder went through his wiry frame. “This time.”

  She leaned back, touched his face. “And forever,” she whispered, letting her head fall onto his shoulder once more.

  “More bandages!” Alonsa called to one of the women helping to tend the wounded while she dunked her own bloody hands into a basin of water to cleanse them.

  The woman, occupied in cutting the strips of rough linen used for bandages, nodded. “They are nearly ready.”

  She stacked several swatches together and handed them over. The crash of gunfire had long ago been silenced. Now only the moans of wounded men penetrated the persistent fog.

  Alonsa, pressing a hand against the dull ache in her back, surveyed the ground where she stood. All around her, injured men lay groaning out their last moments. The stench of bodily fluids, the acrid scent of burnt powder and shot, invaded her nose. She pressed a scented cloth to her face to lessen the impact. The cold ground soaked up the blood in dark patterns, and she wondered what stark flower might grow there next year.

  So much blood. So much loss.

  She tried not to think about where Günter was and why he had not returned from the battlefield. At first, she told herself he merely indulged in the spoils of victory and that was why he had not yet returned. However, as the day turned into night and then another day passed by, her hope thinned and stretched, too brittle to survive.

  Yesterday, after Fritz returned with Inés, he had gone into the battlefield to search for any indication of Günter’s remains, though he did not say as much. Today, Fritz and Inés went out together.

  No sign of Günter existed. They found nothing. A few of his men remembered seeing him at the capture of Francis I on the battlefield, but no one seemed to know what had happened to him after that. No body had been recovered, and for that, she was grateful. She would not believe he was dead. Her heart would tell her the truth if it were so, and it remained stubbornly convinced he lived.

  So many bodies, so much blood.

  Alonsa needed to stay busy, needed to do something other than wonder if her husband lived, so she had volunteered to tend to the wounded alongside the market women.

  Then, out of the mist, Fritz appeared, Inés trailing slowly beside him, her face wet with tears. In his hands, he held a battered great sword, flecked with dried blood the color of rust.

  Black stones glittered on the cross guard.

  Fritz, his face in anguish, held the sword out to her in a wordless apology.

  Alonsa backed away from it. Her world narrowed to the blade, the stones, to one moment in time. Everything else became gray, meaningless … the air she breathed, the coolness of the fog upon her face, the death cries of the soldiers around her. Everything.

  “Señora.” Fritz, his tearful face streaked wit
h dirt as he wiped his glove across his cheeks, continued to hold the blade out for her to take. “I am … so sorry.”

  Alonsa shook her head. “No.”

  “We found it nearly hidden on the field. He would never have given it up if—if he was alive.”

  She took another step back. “No. “

  Sorrow marred his handsome young features. “My lady…”

  Alonsa shook with the violence of her denial. “He is not dead. You did not find his body.”

  Inés stepped toward her now, took her hand. “There were many men who … could not be identified. We looked among the dead, but we may never find him. The destruction was too great. I am sorry, Señora. There is no one else left to find.” She glanced at Fritz, the look they exchanged one of resolve, and then back at Alonsa. “If he could have come to you, he would have. All the whole men have returned to camp, and the injured and dead have been retrieved. There is no one else on the battlefield.”

  “Günter is dead, my lady. You must accept it.” Fritz’s blue eyes grew cloudy once more. “If I could have been with him, if I could have done something …” He cradled the sword in his arms, and the tears slipped down his face. Inés rested her head on his shoulder, murmuring soothing sounds.

  Every part of Alonsa’s body, of her soul, denied this news. He was not dead. He could not be dead.

  “You are wrong. He is alive.” She snatched the sword from Fritz, felt its weight. It still seemed warm, as though Günter’s hand had only moments before left it.

  “I will find him myself.” Gripping the sword’s hilt, she turned and rushed toward the line of horses tethered nearby.

  “Señora, no!” Inés called out to her, but Alonsa would not be denied.

  “I will find him myself!” Alonsa located the horse Robert had acquired for her before their swift ride back to Pavia. She pulled the reins from its tether, found a block to stand upon, and mounted the horse. She rode past the shocked faces of Inés and Fritz, past the weary faces of those who tended the wounded, and out toward the battlefield to find the man she loved.