Autumn's Flame

by Denise Domning

  The frown on Jos's brow came and went quickly. "Give me the archers. That is my strength, and I can lead them in our defense."

  Gilliam laughed. "His aim is something to be reckoned with. Nicola vows he left a burn across the back of her neck in April when he shot across her nape."

  Geoffrey drew the boy to his side, laying his arm over Jos's shoulders. "Think he is too young, Rannulf? See the scars he wears? These he took in a battle to save his lord and lady. Although small in size, this lad owns a lion's heart."

  "Thank you, my lord," Jos said, his face suddenly pink.

  Against such a barrage Rannulf gave way. "Gilliam, he is yours to do with as you see fit, and I was wrong to interfere."

  "And it’s time you learned that, old man," Gilliam retorted, grinning at the only father he'd ever known. "Rest well, we've God's work to do on the morrow." He waved the boy to his side and crossed the hall to the place where Ashby's men slept.

  "I am getting too old for this," Richard complained quietly. "Where Gilliam finds his joy in battle, I see only a hard day's work and the possibility of injury, which pleases me naught at all. Of late, I find my life a very precious indeed." He rose, then set his hand on Geoff's shoulder. "What of you, brother? Is your heart at ease with all this?"

  "At ease?" Geoffrey looked up at him, then smiled. For the first time in his life, he allowed himself to savor the value of owning brothers such as these. "Ease will I have when my daughter and my wife are once again safe within my grasp. It’s confidence I gain because of you and your aid. Like Gilliam, I find myself looking forward to the morrow. Dawn brings me to the day I anticipated from Gradinton's first attempt at stealing Cecilia."

  "Aye, but then I think me you wished only for your own death," Rannulf said, his voice low and soft. "Do you still see death in your future?"

  Geoffrey stared at him in astonishment only to have surprise give way to understanding. How could he have believed he hid his thoughts from those who knew him best? "On the morrow I fight for a long and full life, Rannulf."

  "You have changed so?" The man who had stepped into Henry of Graistan's shoes craved greater assurance than mere words.

  Geoffrey sought for, then found, the way to give him what he needed. "It has been a long while since we were all beneath one roof," he said, a slow smile spreading across his face. "Come to Coudray for Christmas."

  Rannulf freed a quick laugh. "Will that be to keep Christmas or celebrate a wedding—the one you seem to have forgotten to mention to me?"

  Geoffrey raised his brows. "Now, there’s the pot calling the kettle black. I seem to have been excluded from your most recent joining as well."

  “It wasn’t my fault," Rannulf protested, his mouth lifting into a smile. "Her father forced me to it."

  Richard gave a scornful snort. "Do not believe it. Lust got the better of him, and he let a puny old man twist his arm." Rannulf laughed at that.

  Geoff smiled, enjoying their easy banter. "If Elyssa and I live past the morrow, I'll not wait three months to wed her. As for Christmas, I know Gilliam will come," Geoff said. "Keep Christmas with me, Rannulf. You, too, Richard." He glanced up at his eldest brother. "I find myself even more curious as to what sort of woman you now own."

  "Wait until you see," Rannulf laughed, and Richard cuffed him on the shoulder.

  "Will it be only we four and our families?" Richard asked. "My wife is very shy and cannot abide those outside the family."

  "It will be only family," Geoffrey replied, surprised at how deeply this event now appealed to him.

  Pleasure colored his eldest brother's face. "Then Philippa and I will come, bringing our daughter with us," Richard replied, and left them for his own men.

  Geoffrey rose to follow. Rannulf looked up at him, his elbows set on his knees. "It’s good to have you back. I have missed you."

  "And I, you,“ Geoff replied, then sought out his bed with Crosswell's men.

  Although the grayness that had plagued them these past days lightened only a little, Elyssa sensed dawn's coming and roused herself from a fitful slumber. Over the past week she'd managed only to grab an hour or two of nightly rest. Rain pattered against the keep tower's roof. Gentle and steady, it continued uninterrupted as night gave way to day. She breathed deeply. The air was cold, but fresh, washed clean by the moisture.

  The woman on the pallet next to her turned, dropping her arm onto her lady as she did so. Elyssa pushed her aside. If it was crowded with only her womenfolk in this wee room, what would it be like once the gate fell and the few who survived to defend Freyne joined them?

  From behind her, Clare sighed as she woke. "How fare you this morn?" Elyssa asked. For yet another night, her cousin had sobbed in her sleep.

  Clare drew a shaking breath as tears once again overtook her. "I never knew I could ache so," she said quietly. "Lyssa, in all my life, he is the only one I have wanted, and I cannot disregard my caring for him."

  "But he takes Freyne down around our ears," Elyssa protested, rolling onto her stomach to see her cousin. "You yourself say he comes for Simon."

  Clare's face was ragged with grief. "I know that in my head, but my heart is fixed and cannot be moved. Knowing he loves me no more is more than I can bear. I cannot understand it, I can only feel it."

  Elyssa shook her head and laid her hand atop Clare's. "Love, now there’s a strange and mysterious thing, no?"

  Clare tried to smile and gave up as she came to sitting. Their quiet conversation had set more women to stirring. Johanna prayed, her singsong words like a lullaby as she cradled Simon in her arms. Elyssa's usually happy son had fussed the night long. She didn't doubt he was affected by the tension of the women around him.

  There was no need to dress; all of them had slept in their clothing. Elyssa now wore the same rough homespun attire Freyne's maidservants owned. Her finer things, gowns and furniture, were stored in a shed along with her steadily diminishing hopes for the future.

  Wetting the hem of her overgown in their bucket, she wiped away what grime she could, then straightened and plaited her hair into a single braid. There was no wimple to cover her head. Propriety had long since given way to need, and head coverings had become bandages for injured men. A rustling woke in the keep's darkest corner, and Elyssa's heart broke for her poppet.

  Easing her way over women and behind Johanna, she crouched beside Cecilia. The child clung tightly to her plaything, her sad face pressed against the hard stone walls. "Will my grandsire throw stones at us today?" she asked in a tiny voice.

  "Come, poppet," Elyssa said, bringing the child out and into her arms. "It isn’t right that Gradinton should make you a pawn to his greed. Let him throw what stones he wants. I'll not give you to him."

  "I want Papa," Cecilia cried softly, her tears warm as they soaked through Elyssa's gowns.

  "So do I," she agreed wholeheartedly, even while she fought back her own certainty that Geoffrey knew nothing of their plight. "I must rise now, poppet. There's more work to be done, but I'll soon be returning to you."

  Aye, and that would be soon, indeed. Sir Gilbert said the gate would not withstand another day's punishment. When it gave way, they'd all be trapped in this chamber, waiting for a rescue that didn't seem to be coming. If they couldn't starve, not with all the food stored below them, Reginald would surely take down their door, or so she hoped. Such a death would be far swifter than one brought on by disease. With so many in such close quarters, illness was more than a possibility, and her infant son its surest victim.

  Elyssa reached out to where her son's head curved beyond Johanna's arm to run a finger along the thickening thatch of Simon's bright hair. Only Cecilia would survive. But what sort of life might she own after watching yet another mother and brother die? Elyssa sighed, fearing only her mother's madness for Cecilia.

  Despair, born from days of falling stones, splintering wood, and injured men, washed over her. She pressed a kiss to Cecilia's head, then rose and picked her way over women to the door
way with Clare on her heels. When she drew open the door they stood together at the floor's end, nothing but open air beyond their toes. The stairway was already gone. In its place hung a net of hemp, easy to climb and easily lifted up after their last retreat.

  "Will you descend first, Lyssa?" her cousin asked, her voice yet hollow.

  "Look at what he's done," Elyssa said in sorrow, overwhelmed by the enormity of it all.

  Directly below them, bits of greased cloth clung to the motte's wooden palisade, shielding the men too injured to battle any longer on Freyne's behalf. The dead lay near the gate, stiff and still. Well over half their defenders awaited eventual burial. Campfires dotted the hill's flattened top, men lying as close as they dared while rolled in blankets against the October's damp chill.

  In the bailey the hall was no more. Walls were bent at sharp angles over the raised, stone cellar, the roof in pieces on the torn floor. Near the gatehouse only rubble adorned the top of their wall. The damage was so extensive none could walk safely upon its broad width. Their catapult was shattered, Gradinton's stone yet standing at its center.

  Looking beyond the wall, Elyssa studied Gradinton's army. Nothing her men had thrown at them seemed to decrease their numbers. So many were their fires that the smoke hung like a cloud near the ditch. She could barely see the ram where it crouched on its bridge of felled trees.

  By a trick of the stone wall she could hear the echoes of the besiegers when she couldn't hear those directly below her. In you camp soldiers coughed and cleared their throats as they rose. Spoons scraped at iron pots. Someone began to whistle a lilting tune, the high-pitched piping eerie against dawn's quiet.

  Beyond Gradinton's lines the village stirred warily, yet unconvinced of the army's disinterest in them. Framed by a forest alive with autumns color, thatched roofs gleamed brown over white walls. Plows had turned fallow fields until only dark rich earth showed, apples lay in bright piles near presses, sheep and gray geese grazed on golden stubble.

  "How can so beautiful a world contain such violence?" Elyssa murmured sadly as she watched doves rise from their cotes to circle in placid appreciation of a new day.

  In her grief she turned her gaze on the remains of Freyne's garden. Gone were the peas and beans that had once garnered her scorn. Where the pear tree had stood, there was now only a tangled pile of branches. Tears filled her throat.

  "I think me this will be the day I must let both Cecilia and Simon go." She freed a harsh laugh. "Is this not an irony? My life's ending will be but a reflection of my worst fears. Here again do I face a man who, by might alone, steals my happiness and my will from me."

  "You are doing all you can," Clare said, trying comfort when she had none to give.

  "It’s not enough," Elyssa said softly, then turned to climb down the ladder.

  Her foot had barely settled into the netting when chaos erupted from across the wall. Men screamed commands. Shields rattled as soldiers ran. Ladders appeared from beneath cloths. The ram's chains shrieked in complaint.

  Watchers on Freyne's walls shouted, begging for aid against attack. Elyssa fairly flew to earth as the motte's drawbridge thudded down against its stop. Their own soldiers sprinted into the bailey, grabbing up crossbows and long poles to dislodge ladders as they went. Sir Gilbert was at their head, wearing only his gambeson and chausses.

  The ram crashed against their gate, the sound echoing throughout the bailey. By the time she'd reached the motte's gateway, Gilbert had scaled the ladder that had taken the place of the gate's crumbling stairwell. Gradinton's slingers sent a volley winging over the ditch while Freyne's men ducked behind merlons or shields. Pebbles and stones hit the wall like a hailstorm, pinging where they struck metal.

  Again, the ram groaned as it was drawn back from its brace. On Freyne's wall top, men fanned flames from the coals beneath the scattered cauldrons. Left to simmer last night, the oil and sand within them remained at skin-searing temperature. Bags of quick lime were sent, hand to hand, to those places left without another defense. Elyssa hied herself to the wall's base.

  "What goes forth?" she called frantically to Sir Gilbert.

  As the ram again thundered against their door, he leaned over the edge of the wall, his thin face bright with a broad grin. "Gradinton thinks to scale the walls."

  "And this makes you smile?" she cried.

  "Nay," he whooped then slid down the ladder to stand before her. "His men are crying that a force comes to relieve us, my lady. Do you not see?" he shouted. "He is trying to break in, thinking to protect himself from attack while he uses us as hostages."

  Sir Gilbert grabbed her by the shoulders, his face suddenly intent. "We must throw everything we have at them, seeking to thwart them or, failing at that, to deplete our stores so there will be naught left for them to use against our saviors. Know that as we do this, we'll make ourselves defenseless. When all is gone, we will retreat into the tower with nothing but hope to keep us. Here's our dilemma. Gradinton'll spread his men along our wall's base, more concerned in gaining a foothold atop the wall than how many he slaughters while he does so. I have too few to do what must be done. Will your women help us?"

  "Aye," Elyssa answered without hesitation.

  "Run, then. Have them take shields from the injured. His slingers and archers will not be idle."

  As the ram again tapped none too gently on her gate, Elyssa turned and ran.

  ***

  Elyssa freed a frightened breath, then glanced again into the distance. There was no sign of horsemen. She turned her attention back to the task at hand.

  It had taken but a few moments to learn she must wait until men were on the ladder before she tilted it off the wall with her pole. If it was empty, the men only caught it and set it right once more. Only when climbers were upon it was it possible to cause them injury when she toppled it.

  It took her but a few more moments to realize she would soon be exhausted. A strand of hair fell forward as she strained against the weight of three men now racing upward toward her. They shouted in dismay as the ladder shifted. Although the lower two leapt free, the third fell back into the dry moat where he lay still among the growing number of men that filled that ditch.

  Good. She leapt from her stance to Clare's aid against two ladders. While Clare shoved at one, Elyssa tore open the stitching on the quick lime's bag. On the second ladder the men neared the top. She leaned into the crenel and emptied the contents onto those below her. The caustic stuff took the first man's eyes as it ate his skin. As he fell screaming to the earth, he made those beneath him on the rungs vulnerable to her attack.

  Screaming men dropped until the ladder was empty. Taking up her pole, she shoved viciously. The ladder tumbled into the ditch, broken beyond use. The ram again struck the door, while the trebuchet groaned in warning of attack. "Down," Elyssa shouted in general warning.

  She and Clare ducked behind a merlon. The boulder roared as it flew. With an echoing retort, it hit the wall top then bounced down the outer wall.

  Although one of Freyne's few screamed and another fell silently to his death, the stone crushed a ladder full of Gradinton's men as it dropped. A cry of triumph rose from Freyne's defenders, while their enemies moaned in protest against this turn. Again, the ram knocked.

  Elyssa leapt up, her eyes again at the horizon. "Where are you?" she hissed to these rescuers who had yet to appear. Surely, it must have been hours since the assault began. Down the wall from her a man was reaching for the crest, four more hot on his heels.

  "'Ware!" she cried out to the two maids guarding that section. The women rolled a cauldron toward the rising man. As he lifted his head, they tipped their kettle. Boiling water poured over him and down to the climbers below. The first screamed in agony, others yelping as scalding liquid reached them.

  Men fell. Balance lost, the ladder dropped. The two women rolled the empty iron pot toward another ladder and threw it at the climbing men. It took five with it.

  Sir Gilbert stood fart
her down the wall from these maids. Dressed in his mail, his helmet was in place, his sword in hand. Its blade was rusty as he yet again separated a hand from its owner. "They call back the trebuchet!" he shouted in relief, then pointed to the crushed remains of the merlon. "Can you take their place, my lady?"

  Ducking behind her shield as the slingers and archers fired, Elyssa ran from Clare toward the empty spot. Pain tore through her, so stunning she stumbled and fell behind the merlon. Her pole dropped unheeded from her fingers, and she grabbed her thigh. Where she was sure there was a bolt, there was nothing.

  Her eyes watering against the pain, she drew up her skirts. So hard had the stone hit her it left an indentation and broken skin. Blood trickled down her leg.

  "They come!" Sir Gilbert roared in triumph.

  Blood oozing between her fingers, Elyssa lifted herself to see. Even this small motion made her leg scream in agony. Horsemen broke from the woodlands. The gray day couldn't disguise the flashing silver of mailed men.

  "Rid yourselves of what's left now," Freyne's castellan shouted, the message carried, voice to voice, from either side of him.

  The ram struck their door one more time. There was a terrible splintering as the great bar broke. Hinges squealed in defeat. Gradinton's forces raised their voices in a ferocious battle cry as the ram swung again.

  "To the keep!" Gilbert's cry echoed in Elyssa'a brain.

  She tried to rise, but her leg refused to hold her. Tears filled her eyes. How was she to reach the keep and protect her babes? Catching back her despair, she started toward the inward ladder, trying to drag her leg behind her. Stars woke before her eyes. The door below moaned as it gave way.

  "Lyssa!" Clare shrieked, racing across the wall to her.

  "Down, Clare," she gasped. "I'll follow as best I can."

  "You'll follow or I'll carry you," her cousin retorted. She started down the inner ladder, then held out her arms to brace Elyssa.