by Lisa Shea
“Here is your ring,” she growled. “Have it back, with pleasure.”
A low grin spread across his face as his eyes went between the golden circle and the cleft of her bosom. “Ah, a much better place for it to have rested,” he murmured, his face flushing with desire. “I heartily approve.”
“I only carried it because I wanted to give it back to you personally,” she snapped. “Not because it held any meaning to me.”
“Ah, but clearly it did have meaning,” he countered. “You have carried it on your body all this time.” His eyes grew wolfish. “And in such an intimate manner, too.”
“I simply did not want it seen by others,” corrected Elizabeth sharply.
His eyes moved possessively to hers. “Our private connection.”
Richard’s voice came quietly into the mix, and Elizabeth started at it, almost having forgotten he was watching the exchange, was witnessing her reunion with her ex-fiancé.
“Can I see that for a moment?” he asked evenly, holding out his hand.
Corwin’s eyes narrowed, but Elizabeth handed over the ring without hesitation, plunking it into Richard’s outstretched hand. Richard turned it over in his fingers for a long moment, then his eyes swept up to meet Corwin’s with a hard gaze.
“This is our father’s signet ring. The one that went missing after his death.”
There was the smallest glimmer of hesitation in Corwin’s face before his arrogance flooded back, his voice rising. “And well it should be,” he retorted. “We deserved far more than one ring. It belonged with his firstborn sons.”
“I vouched for you,” continued Richard, his eyes holding his brother’s. “When the others claimed you had been the thief, I backed you up and swore that you had not been involved.”
“Yes, finally, you did something to defend your own flesh and blood,” agreed Corwin, his lips thinning in anger. “And then you promptly went to support those whelps at their keep!”
“You were invited as well,” reminded Richard.
Corwin spat on the ground. “That keep should have been ours,” he growled. “To watch those puppies play lord in it, to see them lying in our beds, eating our food, was unsupportable. I had grander ambitions for my life. I was going to live my own life under my own terms.”
Richard’s voice was cool with challenge. “And so you courted a woman under a false name, and proposed to her with a stolen ring?”
The situation suddenly became too much for Elizabeth to handle. She needed to get away, to think. She turned from both men, striding toward the stables, grabbing her saddle off the bench and tossing it onto her roan’s back. In a moment the men were beside her, staring at her.
Corwin’s voice was sharp. “And just where do you think you are going?”
“I am returning to the nunnery,” snapped Elizabeth.
Richard took her bridle from the peg, handed it to her. “I will ride with you.”
Corwin scoffed, turning to Elizabeth. “Have you become so weak,” he prodded her, “that you need a wet nurse to travel a mere few miles?”
Elizabeth’s anger flared, and she tugged the bit into place before rounding on both men. “I will return home alone,” she snapped, “I think I have had just about enough of this whole situation.” She swung up onto her horse, gave a pull at the reins, and in a moment she was streaming across the countryside, her hair flying behind her, the wind whipping across her face.
The tears began to flow, a wetness covered her cheeks, and she struggled to pull the blanket of anger over her shoulders, to bury herself in its comforting embrace. Despite her most urgent efforts, the emotions slipped away from her at every tug, resisted her every attempt to draw them around in their familiar smothering.
She had no idea why the only sensations which drifted around her hollow core were tendrils of desolation.
Chapter 12
Elizabeth blinked in frustration as the faint glow of dawn gilded the windowsill. She had tossed and turned all night, and she doubted sleep had made even a hesitant visit to her exhausted mind. Her back ached in throbbing shards, and stress pulled tightly along her shoulder blades. Simmering fury lingered just beneath the surface of every thread of thought that pummeled her.
She let out a long sigh, then pushed herself to stand. She had dealt with sleepless nights for long enough to know how to fight through them. Her bruised arms throbbed. She groaned as every seam of her dress fought with her attempts to put it on. The belt buckle proved an equal challenge, and finally she convinced her sword and dagger to fit into their proper locations.
She ran a hand absently through her hair. There had to be a solution; she could not go on for long like this. She would talk with Richard. Somehow in the past he had been able to find the narrow path through the brambles, to find a quiet pool of calm seas amidst a tempest-tossed ocean. He would help her make sense of her current maelstrom.
She padded her way down the hall and around the narrow staircase, pressing open the keep’s door with a weary shove. Her eyes swung down to the ring -
Her feet ground to a halt. Two men stood there. One was steady, gazing at her with quiet support. The other paced, prowled, his eyes swinging up to hold hers with a grin of dark triumph.
God’s Teeth.
She blew out her breath, then strode down the steps, coming over to stand before the two men. “I want to talk with Richard, alone,” she stated, her shoulders tensing.
Corwin laughed shortly. “No you do not,” he countered in a sharp voice.
Elizabeth swung her head to look at him with rising fury. “What?”
Corwin’s eyes swept her with a knowing look. “I know exactly what you want to do,” he countered.
“And just what is it that I want to do?”
“As I recall,” he mused, the corners of his mouth turning up in pleasure, “the last time I saw you, you were being slammed face down into the mud by your father in front of hundreds of people. You were blooded, bruised, and degraded.” He chuckled. “And then I walked away from you.”
“Yes, you did,” snapped Elizabeth, hurt and anger roiling within her. His cold marble eyes were before her now, just as they had been that day. Hot fury filled every ounce of her being with a tense power.
He drew his sword easily, then, and held it out to one side. His eyes glistened with amusement. “Well, come teach me a lesson.”
Richard’s voice came low from behind her, rich with warning.
“Elizabeth, I do not think that -”
She barely turned, holding up a hand to him, waving him off. “This is between him and me,” she snarled, maintaining a tenuous hold on the waves of hatred which threatened to swamp her. “You stay out of this.”
There was no response, and her head snapped around. She saw the concern, tension, and protectiveness in his eyes. It needled her that he thought she was not up to this.
“He was my fiancé,” she snapped. “This is personal, and I will handle it. You need to stay out.”
When he again did not reply, her emotion spiked, and her eyes held his with fierce anger.
“Swear it!”
He hesitated, then nodded reluctantly, stepping back over the ring of hay bales. Elizabeth saw a quick movement at his side, and Michelle was there beside him, her face tight and scared.
She would show them both.
She spun back to face Corwin, drawing her own sword, the world narrowing down to just the two of them. She had sparred with him countless times, knew his moves, and she had the advantage now. She was filled with fury, imbued with righteous anger, and she would make him pay for what he had done.
With a cry she swept her sword high over her head, cleaving it down toward his bicep. She would mark him, scar him, carve into his skin a memento to remind him daily of the many wrongs he had inflicted on her.
He dodged to the left, whipped his sword around at her waist, and his block sent her arms ringing. She snarled, twisting the blade around toward his ankle, and he danced back, then
forward quickly, laughing as he swung, and she barely evaded the whistling tip.
He flashed a sharp smile, delight dancing in his eyes. “That is my Elizabeth!”
She was not his.
She lunged into an opening, but then it was not there, and his blade was circling to her left, the flat of it coming hard against her bicep. The force of the blow shook her, nearly knocking the wind out of her. The length of her arm throbbed and she knew that another painful bruise was soon to follow.
Damn the man.
She lifted the hilt high, whipping the tip around, aiming for his shoulder blade, but he blocked, rotated, and she barely escaped the spinning edge. She lunged, lunged again, twisted against him, and his laughter spurred the anger within her, made her press that much harder to land the blow -
WHAM. The flat of his blade came down hard on the exact same spot on her arm. This time it sent a ringing, searing pain shooting along the length, and she staggered. She shook her head, fighting off the urgent signals from her arm, willing herself to continue.
He leered at her, his eyes bright with satisfaction. “You missed me, admit it.”
She growled, reseating the hilt in her hand, and then she was driving hard, aiming for his waist, looking to hurt him, to drive a scar across his midsection. She needed to wipe that grin off his face, to make him pay. She thrust, dodged, ducked under the spinning swing, came up low, twisted around -
His blade whistled along the length of her thigh, and the tip carved along the flesh, leaving a sharp, stinging line which merged into wetness.
He gave a bark of disapproval. “You are slowing,” he taunted her. “Was that brother of mine not pushing you hard enough? It is a good thing I am back in your life.”
Elizabeth was exhausted, and her body throbbed with pain, but through sheer force of will she brought her sword high, diving at him with every ounce of anger she could muster. She swept down and across, pouring everything she had into the blow, seeking to hurt him … to hurt him …
SLAM. His boot lashed out at the edge of her kneecap, and her leg crumpled beneath her. She slammed hard onto the ground, crying out as her injured thigh struck the earth, feeling nothing but pain and frustration and exhaustion. She struggled to catch her breath.
Corwin smiled down at her. “And there, my dear brother, is how a woman should look when you are done with her for the day,” he mused with pleasure. “Exhausted, out of breath, and on her knees.” He gave her one last glance, then rolled his shoulders. “A delightful morning, I must say. Well, then, I will leave you to heal up. I know you will be looking forward to tomorrow.”
He sheathed his sword and turned to stride over to the stables. Richard instantly moved to place himself between Elizabeth and Corwin. He remained there, tense, until Corwin emerged on his horse and, with an ironic salute, turned to ride out through the gates.
In an instant Richard and Michelle were on either side of Elizabeth, taking her arms. She groaned with pain as they helped her to her feet, walking her over to one of the hay bales.
Michelle’s voice was shaky and tinged with fear. “Are you all right?”
There was a movement, and Richard’s hand dropped to his hilt, his eyes hard. Claire stood there with mugs of mead in one hand, a basket of bread in the other. Her eyes went down the bruises on Elizabeth’s body and she spun toward Richard, her eyes blazing with fury.
Elizabeth drove herself to speak, wading through the waves of pain. “It was not him,” she defended in a groan. “It was Corwin.”
Claire’s stance did not gentle. “So you stood by while another man did this to her?” she challenged him.
Richard’s face went tight, and again Elizabeth drew a breath, fought down the spinning of nausea that began to whirl around her. “I made him swear to let me handle it,” she ground out. “It was between me and my fiancé.”
“Your ex-fiancé,” corrected Claire with a snap, “and apparently for good reason.”
“He needed to be taught a lesson,” snarled Elizabeth, taking one of the mugs from Claire, downing half of it in one long draw. Her leg throbbed with pain, and she kneaded it, trying to lessen the ache. Her hand came up red.
Richard was kneeling at her side in an instant. “Claire, please fetch some medical supplies,” he requested in a low voice.
Claire nodded, making a motion to Michelle, and in a moment the two were trotting back toward the keep.
Richard wiped away the blood with the fabric of her dress, examining the wound. His voice was hoarse. “Why did you do it?”
“I was furious with him,” she responded wearily. “I wanted to hurt him.”
His eyes moved up to meet hers. “And because you were acting from anger, your blows were wild. Your blocks were only half set. You left yourself wide open to his attacks.”
“I wanted to hurt him,” she insisted. “I knew it would make me feel better to attack him.”
He drew a hand up to her cheek, smoothing his fingers against her in a tender motion. “And do you feel better?”
She dropped her head. “No,” she admitted. “I feel exhausted, and drained, but the fury is still in there, but just too worn out to take action.”
He paused for a long moment, and when he spoke again, his voice was gentle. “Could it be that you also felt like you should be punished, for causing him to leave you?”
Her first reaction was to flare with anger, but he was so steady at her side, his voice was so tender, that she took in a deep breath, rolling the idea around in her head. She found, to her surprise, that a part of her resonated with the thought, latched onto it.
“Maybe,” she conceded after a moment. “If I had not lost the tournament, my father would not have been furious with me. Corwin would not have been driven away from me. If I had just won -”
Richard went still at her side. “So you feel you had a part in the suffering you went through?”
She found herself nodding. “I failed, and I brought it on myself.”
He tenderly raised her head so her eyes met his. His gaze was gentle and warm.
“If Michelle fought in a sparring match, and she did not win, would you cover her body with bruises and scars?”
Elizabeth’s protective nature flared into heat. “Never,” she ground out. “I would not hurt a hair on that girl’s head.”
Richard’s eyes held hers, and a long moment passed. She found herself immersed in confusion. “But I …” she began, then stopped.
His voice was a whisper. “Do you not deserve the same care that Michelle does?”
She looked down at her hands. It seemed an eternity before she put the thoughts to words. “I do not know.”
He groaned softly, then drew her into an embrace. She sighed at the sturdiness of his chest against her, the strength in the arms that wrapped around her. At long last she was safe, tended to, protected.
His voice was a murmur in her ear. “I think you do.”
A wave of warmth swept through her, pushing away the pain and exhaustion. She let herself relax against him, melt into him, give herself over to his watchful eye.
There was a movement, and Claire and Michelle were beside them. Claire glanced at Richard, then over to Elizabeth. “Perhaps we should do this down in the infirmary, where you will have more privacy.”
Elizabeth looked at her, baffled. “For sparring injuries? I just patch those up in the ring when the match is over, and go on with life.”
“But your leg …” continued Claire, pointing at Elizabeth’s tunic.
Elizabeth scoffed, hauling the fabric up to mid-thigh, laying it around the long gash. Claire and Michelle drew in breath at the full length of the wound, but Richard was kneeling at her side, holding a hand out for a clean rag, and began methodically working his way down its length, cleaning out any dirt or grime.
“I know this hurts, but we have to keep this safe from infection,” he commented in a low voice.
Elizabeth was gripping the hay bale with both hands, focusing on he
r breath, fighting through the waves of pain. “Yes, yes,” she ground back. “As if I have not been through this a hundred times.”
“That is quite clear,” returned Richard, his voice rough. “Your leg is criss-crossed with scars. I cannot believe even Forwin … I mean Corwin … could be responsible for this many.” He paused for a moment to look at a twisting wound which ran just over her kneecap. “This one, for example, looks to be quite old.”
Elizabeth glanced down, wincing slightly at the memory. “That was soon after Jeffrey was slain,” she agreed. “My father did that to me, when I failed to retreat from a swing quickly enough. It had me in bed for three days, which made him even more furious.”
Richard shook his head, his lips tight with emotion, and then he took the bandage from Claire and began gently wrapping it around her thigh, laying the fabric evenly over the wound. Soon he had the ends tucked in place. He gave a long look down her leg, at the myriad of wounds and injuries, then gently pulled the fabric back down over it.
His eyes came back to hold hers. “Any other cuts that we should know about?”
She shook her head, wincing at the pain which throbbed in her arm. “The rest are bruises, and they just have to go through their cycle of colors. I will be a living work of art for a few days, and then I will be as good as new again.”
Richard handed over the mug of mead, and she drew down a fresh, long draw of it. “Ah, that helps too,” she murmured with a half-smile.
Richard held her gaze for a long moment, then drew up to his feet. “These two women can care for you,” he stated, his voice steeling. “I need to be heading out.”
Anger flared through Elizabeth, and she shot to her feet. She winced as her leg nearly buckled beneath her. His arm was holding her in an instant, helping her to lower back to a seated position.
“This is my fight,” she insisted once she had regained her breath. “I will not have you interfering.”
“He is my brother,” responded Richard tensely, “And I care for you.”
Warmth surged through her again, but she held it off. “This situation is mine to deal with,” she reiterated, her voice holding absolute certainty. “He was my fiancé. This was my relationship.”
