by Sarah Hegger
“I will be there.” Calder’s voice floated down to them.
Of course he would. It filled Faye with an unshakeable dread. She kept her feet where they were as Gregory strode beside Roger to prepare.
An arm settled about her shoulders and William stood beside her. “You are a woman of remarkable courage.”
Nay, she was a terrified and stupid woman. She should call Gregory back, refuse her blessing, insist he not do this. Perhaps plunge the sword into Gregory herself before Calder did. Anything would be better than watching him do this awful thing. She merely shook her head in denial.
“Aye.” William clasped her to his side. “You are. We are strange creatures, we men.”
Faye glared at him. Did he want to debate with her now?
William chuckled and shook his head. “We are so many parts, but pride forms the greatest piece of the whole. It is a wise and brave woman who understands this.”
“But I do not understand.”
Gregory disappeared into the tent behind Roger. There he would don hauberk and helmet, pick up a shield and sharpen his sword. She hated fighting and all that came with it.
“Every blow you have suffered and every hurt is carved on his soul like a seeping wound.” William touched his finger to the bruise beneath her eye. “Every time he looks at this, he sees only his failure to prevent it. Now, you gift him with absolution.”
William spoke true, she knew it in her heart, but still it rankled. “You do not know this.”
“I do know this.” William glanced back to where Ruth huddled, a solitary heap, beside the fire. “When I look at her, I feel it.” He thumped his chest. “In here. How much worse would it be if she was the woman I loved?”
“I will see to Ruth.” What else could she do?
Chapter 24
Gregory tested the haft of his sword. His hand curled around the grip like a second skin. He belonged here. The sword his old friend.
Calder entered the field.
By mutual agreement, they dispensed with shields. Blade against blade, short and brutal, to the point of surrender. Around them, a ring of men watched, silent and grim. Calder had brought a party of ten and they stood to one side of the circle. On the walls of the castle, archers waited, bows at the ready. Braziers cast flickering orange light across the field. Daylight would have been better, but Gregory was done waiting. This ended tonight.
Calder stood a few inches shorter, but built compact and powerful. The cur was fast and light on his feet. Blade gleaming with reflected light from the brazier, Calder took up a fighting stance, weight balanced between his feet, sword raised, testing the air before him like a serpent’s tongue.
Calder favored his right foot, his balance off. Gregory assumed fighting stance and fixed his stare on Calder’s shoulders. The blade was a mere extension. The blow would start there before the blade moved.
Calder circled, shifting his blade through the air.
Gregory watched his shoulders. He couldn’t afford to let the flickering blade distract him. He shut out the sounds of the men, the torchlight, the smell of wood smoke.
Calder danced forward, feinting to his shield side.
Gregory blocked the blow, held the bind long enough to gauge its strength and twisted his wrist.
Calder danced back out of range.
The next blow came at his head. Gregory parried and thrust, testing Calder’s reflexes. Calder’s sword blurred and blocked.
They danced free.
They were matched in speed. Gregory had the advantage of reach. He cut to the left.
Calder twisted and hit him on the weak, pushing his sword away.
Not as quick to the side. Gregory tucked the information away.
Calder leapt free and came at him in second ward, sword raised for the head blow.
Gregory blocked, twisted to weak and released.
Calder lunged, a sweep to his right.
Calder would need to be faster than that. Gregory parried to the left, ducked low and swept in from below. Calder stumbled out of the way, slightly weaker on his left leg. Gregory pressed the small advantage in a rapid succession, left, right, overhand left and bind.
Sweat coated Calder’s top lip, and his glare gleamed feral. He hesitated in the bind as if his strength waned. Calder had grown soft. Gregory shoved him out of the bind onto that weaker leg and closed again. Swift to the shoulder, blocked only in time, but not fast enough to prevent first strike. Gregory’s sword glanced off the mail of Calder’s upper arm.
Calder hissed, his lips tightened and a flicker of real fear crossed his face. No blood, but that would hurt. Gregory came in fast before the other man could recover, forcing Calder to fight off the left foot, leaving him to block cross body and testing that bruised arm.
Calder growled, his face tight with rage. Craven pig did not like his opponents to fight back.
Gregory danced out of the way, toying with him, inciting that anger. Calder lunged, angry, sloppy, thrusting forward and compromising his balance. Gregory ducked and let the sword carry over his head, exposing Calder’s chest. Gregory’s sword sheared into metal, deep enough to cut the flesh over the ribs.
Calder bellowed and swept blindly and backhanded. Gregory leapt clear before the blow arced through the air. Gregory thrust at the open left flank, straight for the belly.
Searing agony burst across Gregory’s shoulder blade and down his sword arm. He staggered forward, his thrust dying. Gregory barely stopped his sword tip from embedding into the ground.
A commotion broke out around them.
Keep your eye on the danger, man.
Calder grinned and attacked. Jesu, he had no strength to his sword arm. Gregory got the block up in time to save his neck, but struggled to hold the bind. Calder’s blade inched toward his neck.
Nay, this would not be how it ended. He kicked out blindly and hit Calder’s leg. The man stumbled and Gregory ducked out of the bind.
His fingers went numb around the sword hilt. Sticky wetness seeped over his back and down his side. He’d been stabbed. An inch lower and the knife would have hit his heart.
Cold, hard rage flooded him. His blood ran down his back. He had moments to end this. He grabbed the hilt with both hands. He had lost the advantage of speed and balance, and his strength waned with each heartbeat.
Calder pressed hard, his blows coming thick and fast as he sought the opening.
Gregory’s head grew light. Not now. He shook his vision to clear it. Concentrate. Find the weakness. The kick to the leg had cost Calder.
Gregory danced wide, his feet clumsy and heavy beneath him. He dropped the point of his sword. Victory gleamed in Calder’s stare as he raised to second ward, Calder’s favorite strike position.
Elation surged through Gregory. Double handed he hit Calder’s exposed flank, his sword cleaving straight through mail and into muscle.
Calder’s eyes bulged. His sword dropped from his fingers and thumped to the ground by his side. Whoreson! Gregory thrust and twisted, driving the blade deeper and opening the wound wide. Done. Power surged through his muscles in a clean, satisfied sweep of rightness. He twisted again, reveling in the agonized rictus on Calder’s face.
“Kill him.” Calder’s fingers tightened around the edge of the embedded sword. His stare swung wildly among his men. “Archers. On the wall. Kill them all.” Calder swung his head to his men. His glance whipped from one to the other, entreating, demanding.
Sir John turned his back first. The others followed.
Calder dropped to his knees.
Head light, knees weak, Gregory staggered back. Strong arms steadied him.
“Treacherous bastard.” Roger’s voice. “Never saw the knife.”
“Gregory.” He pushed back the closing blackness. Faye’s face swam into sight above him. He must be on the ground. Tears tracked down her ivory cheek. “Gregory.”
He wanted to tell her not to cry, but his tong
ue swelled in his mouth and wouldn’t move.
Her soft hands cradled his face. Warm and wet, her tears dropped on his cheeks.
Tired. So very tired. Gregory closed his eyes.
* * * *
“We need to get him help.” Roger drew her away from Gregory.
They raised Gregory’s limp form between them, taking care not to jostle him. So much blood, too much blood. The hungry ground swallowing Gregory’s life drop by precious drop.
“Help me.” Fingers plucked at her hem. Calder. His face ashen, dark gaze pleading with her. “Pain. End it now.”
Faye stared down at him. “Does it hurt?”
His breath rasped between his bloodless lips. “Please.”
Savage, blinding satisfaction coursed through her, and Faye staggered beneath it. She plucked her skirt from Calder’s grasp. “Good.”
* * * *
Faye cared not whether it was still night, or if day had broken. She sat in the still monastic infirmary and counted the rise and fall of Gregory’s chest. As long as he breathed, she would not give up hope. Roger and William had rushed Gregory here after Bess declared him beyond her skills, the monastery near Calder the closest point to get help.
Dear God, he would not die. God would not be so cruel. Except God must be wroth with her. She had done the unthinkable and taken one of God’s men for her own. Worse, she had been angry at God over Gregory’s choice.
From outside, the melodic rise and fall of the monks singing the mass drifted over her. Her father had taken Simon back to Anglesea with him. Simon had wanted to come, but Sir Arthur had firmly led the boy away.
Strips of linen swathed Gregory’s upper chest, pale against the dark of his skin. He lay still, his pallor horrible.
The whisper of slippered feet across stone announced the arrival of one the healing monks. “My child.” He had a deep, raspy voice that grated along the edges of her nerves. “You must eat.”
Faye wanted to fling away the offending hand. She forced herself to remain still. Eat? When Gregory lay here and fought for each breath? Even the thought of food turned her stomach. She had done this to Gregory. In startling clarity, she recalled each word of her conversation with William. Gregory had fought for her. He had taken Calder’s life to avenge her. Her chest tightened into a dull ache, reminding her she needed to draw breath.
“We pray for him,” the monk said. “We pray for the soul of our brother.” He is not your brother. He is my love. Her jaw locked around the words and she bowed her head. And I am Eve, leading Adam into temptation.
The monk drifted away to tend to somebody else. A dry, hacking cough broke the silence.
The monk’s voices rose in song. Réquiem ætérnam dona ei Dómine; et lux perpétua lúceat ei Requiéscat in pace. Amen. The requiem for the dead. Over and over again, echoing in her head. She wanted to scream at them to stop. Don’t pray for his soul as if it is already departed, pray for his life. Pray for a miracle. Too much blood, they said. Lowering their voices as if she would break if they spoke louder.
“God.” Her throat dried and she coughed. She could not anger God now. “Dear Father in Heaven.” Her mind emptied as she tried to pray. Someone had to pray for Gregory’s life. “You cannot let him die.”
It was not right. Regrets crowded out the words of her prayer. She should never have allowed him to help her when Simon was taken. Never have forced him to take her with him. Never have let him fight for her. If he had remained at the Abbey he would be alive now and with his brothers in prayer.
“Dear Heavenly Father, spare him.” The five words echoed again in her mind, receding with each echo until she could only repeat spare him, spare him, spare him in one looping litany in her mind. “I am sorry I took him from you.”
At the Abbey he had been safe. All his life Gregory had wanted to be a monk. Temptation he had called her. Temptation, the evil that had inserted itself between God and Gregory. “Spare him and I will make this right.” There must be some mercy in God’s heart for one of His own. “I will give him back to you.” How arrogant she had grown. “He was never mine. I took what was yours, but I will not anymore. Only please, let him live.”
“Faye.” Roger’s hand on her shoulder. “They need to tend the wound and you must come away.”
“I cannot.” She shrugged him off. If she left, Gregory would forget to fight. She needed to be here to watch for death.
“Faye.” His hand returned to her shoulder, harder this time. “They are monks and they need to bathe him. You are not his wife.”
Roger’s hand curled around her upper arm and tugged her to her feet. The edges of her vision darkened and she swayed on her feet. Bathe him. Prepare the body for the last rites. “He is not dead.”
“Aye, Faye, he lives.”
“They why do they bathe him?”
“For cleanliness, sweetheart. They need to do this.”
“They will not take him away?” She scoured her brother’s face for the truth.
“Nay.” Roger nodded. “Not while he lives. Come now, you have not eaten in two days.”
Two days? She had been here for two days. “He cannot be alone.”
“William will remain while they tend him.” Roger nodded to where William stood on the other side of the bed. William’s beautiful face lacked his charming smile.
Her brother must not fail her in this. “Do not leave him.”
“I will not leave him.” William nodded. “I will stay right here until you return.”
“Come.” Roger’s arm circled her shoulders as he led her from the infirmary.
The sunlight confused her after the dimness of the building. Her world lay shattered at her feet and the sun shone as brightly as ever.
“Here.” Roger led her to a pond in the center of the courtyard. He helped her sit on the low stone wall surrounding it.
Fish flashed in the sunlight as they darted away from her shadow. From the meadow beyond a blackbird trilled a happy song. It seemed strange, as if it did not belong. Water cooled her fingers as she trailed them in the pond.
Roger set some fruit and cheese beside her. Faye laughed at it. Everyone insisted on her eating. How ridiculous. She couldn’t seem to care what happened to her, but Gregory must live.
“I will not allow you back to the infirmary until you have eaten.” Roger took a seat beside her. Boxing his ears would take energy she didn’t have, so Faye ate a plum and some cheese. Her boys needed their mother. Roger gave the food a pointed glance and she took more cheese.
“He is a strong man.” Roger held out a peach to her. Sweet juice flooded her mouth as she chewed and swallowed to please Roger. “I have seen wounds on a battlefield you would swear fatal and men have survived.”
Faye nodded because Roger meant to be kind, but she would wager he had seen many more wounds kill. She raised her face to the sun’s kiss. Nurse would fuss over freckles. Faye drew the sunlight into her very being, as if she could carry it deep enough within to banish the dark place.
Running feet snapped her back to the small courtyard. A monk appeared at the door to the infirmary, a smile split his beaming face. “It is a miracle.” He threw his hands up in the air. “God has answered our prayers.”
Faye’s heart lodged in her throat. She grabbed for Roger’s hand and held it. “Gregory?” She reached the man ahead of her brother.
“He is awake.” Tears glistened in the monk’s brown eyes. “We were bathing his wound and he groaned and then he woke. It is a miracle.”
“I prayed.” Faye ran down the dark infirmary corridors behind the monk, her feet pattering against the stone floor. “I prayed that God would spare him and he has.”
“You made a powerful prayer, sister.” The monk clasped her hand. “God has heard your prayer and granted you a miracle.”
Nay, not a miracle. Faye approached the bed with her heart pounding in her ears. Gregory moaned. Was his color better already?
T
he raspy-voiced monk smiled. “He will live, my lady.”
Faye collapsed against Roger. Gregory would live. It was more important than anything. Pain pierced her middle and she folded her arms about herself before she shattered. The deal was done. God had sent her a sign, an answer to prayer. A scream lodged in her throat and died there. She must not fight this. All her willfulness had led to this point. This was her test. She could not fail. For Gregory, she must find the strength to leave.
Chapter 25
Faye viewed the walls of her childhood home as if she saw it anew. Anglesea had not changed, but she had.
Roger and William still did not understand why she had waited only long enough to ensure Gregory was out of danger before she left. They pestered her with questions. She explained and explained and still they argued. Why did she not stay and speak with Gregory? Why did they not wait until he could ride and then bring him home together? They could not understand and it hurt too much to speak of it constantly. God had taken Gregory back. Her bargain was made and she would honor her part. Without honor, she was nothing.
Dear God, she ached. No respite from the tearing pain inside. She’d left her heart at the monastery. Her dreams and hopes, all gone. The tang of the sea brought the sense of homecoming to her.
Lady Mary stood with Nurse in the bailey. In her mother’s arms, Faye’s heart leapt, little Arthur.
“Mam!” He shrieked and bounced.
She barely waited for her horse to halt before she leapt from the saddle. William turned to assist her, but she hit the ground at a run.
Arthur must have grown an inch since she was away. Faye all but snatched her baby out of Lady Mary’s arms.
He wriggled and squealed. His chubby arms grabbed her neck in a strangle grip. Faye breathed in the sweet, sticky scent of little boy and relished the strong little body wriggling in her arms. Dear Lord, she had missed her baby. For Arthur and Simon she would find a way to smile again. Hearts did break. The pain in her chest stabbed as if from a hundred tiny shards of glass.
