Linda Barlow

by Fires of Destiny

  Her patient obediently swallowed the brew. “I feel faint,” he whispered a few minutes later. He sounded anxious. “What did you give me, Alix?”

  “I gave you a drug for the pain. You’ll sleep a bit, and feel much better when you wake up.”

  When Alan slipped back into unconsciousness, Alexandra made her preparations for setting his broken leg. Roger strolled over to help. He was still wearing most of his damp clothes, although he had removed his boots and his cloak, and set them in front of the fire. For several minutes they worked in near-silence. She spoke only to give directions, and he followed them without comment.

  The break was clean, just above the ankle. When the bone was set, splinted, and bandaged, and the patient peacefully asleep on his pallet, Roger held out his injured hand, saying, “My respect for your talents increases. I expect you can patch me up almost as skillfully as you slashed me. Just don’t lace it with poison.”

  A retort leapt to her lips, but she left it unsaid. There was a persistent pounding in the depths of her stomach, and she felt alive to every nuance about him: the shifting tones of his voice, the light nervous quality of his movements, the slight crinkle of his rain-slicked hair. It struck her that despite all his callousness toward his brother, he had shown nothing but gentleness in helping her set Alan’s leg. He had ignored his own injuries—the palm that was still seeping blood, the ugly bruise on his forehead. They must hurt, but he hadn’t complained.

  I have injured him, she thought, staring at the wound that ran diagonally across his palm. Actually, he had caused the wound himself, seizing the blade with his bare hand, but she was responsible. He had a new line now for Merwynna to read. She wondered if it would change his fate.

  She numbed the area with a special herbal ointment before stitching it quickly with Merwynna’s stout medicinal thread. He bore the operation in tight-lipped silence. “Very nice,” he said as she bound a clean cloth around it as a bandage. “Are you always so tender with brother-killers?”

  She sank down on Merwynna’s stool in front of the fire. “You came upon me with a drawn sword, Roger.”

  “I’d been using it to kill a bloody snake.”

  “You laid the edge of it against me.”

  There was a silence. The logs on the fire hissed their warmth into the small room, and Roger paced for a moment in front of the hearth, then pulled an empty mattress up beside her and sat down. He had also stripped off his wet doublet, leaving his shirt and his breeches and hose to dry on his body.

  “I shouldn’t have done that. It was not done with any intention of harming you.”

  “Then why—”

  “There was an odd look on your face when I came into the cave. I misread it, obviously. Some women like to be taken fiercely. Not hurt, but mastered. As a child, you loved it, being tied to trees and such. For a moment I thought you were playing a game with me, an adult version of our antics of long ago.” He paused, his eyes glowing with the reflected flicker of the flames. “For a moment I wanted to play.”

  Alexandra was speechless. He was speaking of things that were beyond her experience, things that made her realize how much of an innocent she still was. And yet she was not shocked. If anything, his words aroused her. She flushed as it occurred to her that the intense excitement he’d engendered in her years ago was not unlike the feelings she had for him now. Her love for Roger had always been tied up with yearning, with passion. In that way it had been very adult.

  “But I ought to have known that you of all women would defend your honor with a knife.”

  “It was my life I was defending. At least, that’s what I thought at the time.”

  “Against me?” He was shaking his head. “Because I am lustful, your honor may be in danger from me, as I’ve warned you several times. But your life? God’s bones, until now I thought I could count on having at least one sensible friend, one person who saw me neither as a god nor a fiend. Your faith in me was something I thought I could depend upon.”

  Deeply ashamed, she countered, “You told me a few days ago not to put any faith in you. You didn’t want it, you insisted. You didn’t deserve it, you implied.”

  “I was in a fury that day. You know how irrational I get when I’m angry. I’d have said anything to be left alone. Anyway, since when do you take my warnings to heart?”

  “Then you deny killing anyone?”

  “I deny killing anyone lately. I certainly didn’t murder Will or your friend Ned. He hanged himself.”

  “He couldn’t have hanged himself. It’s impossible. Don’t tell me he hanged himself, Roger.”

  “Anyone can hang himself. Don’t let your affections get the better of your reason.”

  She laughed at the irony of this. “It’s my reason that accuses you. My affections are clearly influenced in your favor.”

  He put his head in his laced hands. “Let’s go through it. I want to hear exactly what you’re accusing me of.”

  “It began with Will’s death.”

  “You can’t seriously believe I murdered Will. My life has been violent and I’ve done many things I regret, but I draw the line at murdering my own flesh and blood.”

  “Don’t try to tell me you were out of the country at the time,” she went on, determined to have everything out. “I know you were back in England. If you lied about that, you could have lied about a lot of things.”

  “How the hell do you know how long I’ve been back in the country?” He raised his head and she saw the tight little lines around his mouth. “I’ve been at Whitcombe for only a fortnight, and already you have my entire past mapped out and chronicled? Forgive me, but I don’t think that’s possible, not even for an expert meddler like you.”

  “You’re the only one who gained by Will’s death. You’re the heir to a wealthy barony now.”

  “That doesn’t make me his killer. Do you imagine I need the Whitcombe riches? Ask around—I made my own fortune long ago. And, by God, if I wanted to murder someone, I’d have chosen a more reliable method. Will died a clumsy, messy, accidental death.”

  Doggedly, she told him the rest, even though she had lost faith in her own theories. “I thought you had sent him a message asking him to meet you secretly that night. He would have been excited—that’s why he got drunk and rode so recklessly. Will would never have acted like that under ordinary circumstances. The proof lies in his character, and in Ned’s. An accident happens to a man who rarely drank and never rode wildly out at midnight? Suicide happens to a halfwit who is too simpleminded to conceive of such an act? It smells bad, Roger. That much you’ll have to admit.”

  He stared at her. His expression was unreadable. “Go on.”

  She continued with her analysis of the crime, explaining about the dagger that had been in the ditch, and Ned’s fear. “My mother told you that I was worried about the dagger. You didn’t know how much Ned might have seen on the night of the murder, but you learned from her that he was frantic to tell me something. You realized he was a danger to you, so you followed him and hanged him. As for me, I’d guessed too much. You said that yourself out on the cliff. You had to kill me too.”

  “Why, then, are you still alive?”

  She was examining the knuckles on her fingers with great concentration. “There’s the rub.”

  “There indeed. Of course I haven’t fucked you yet. I always fuck the women I murder, especially the redheaded ones.”

  She lifted her head and met his harsh brown eyes. His mouth twisted into a caricature of a smile. “I didn’t do it, Alix. I didn’t touch either one of them, and that’s the solemn truth. When I was speaking of your knowing too much about my doings, I was referring to something else entirely. Disbelieve me if you choose. If you’re determined not to trust me, I can’t think of any way to change your mind.”

  Shame and regret overwhelmed her. He wasn’t guilty. Perhaps she had always known it, deep down where reason didn’t reach. In her quest to make sense of the man he had become, she had ignored
what he’d always been: a fundamentally decent person. Like everyone, he had passions and flaws; like everyone, he could be insensitive and cruel. Indeed, he was probably more sinful than most people—“I deny killing anyone lately,” he had said.

  But he wasn’t heartless, he wasn’t depraved. His code of ethics might be unconventional, but it bound him nonetheless. I draw the line at murdering my own flesh and blood. There were some things he simply would not do.

  Her mistake had been in failing to listen to the voice that had occasionally whispered, “But this is impossible.” In her efforts to see behind his mask, she’d trusted rational analysis instead of instinct. Merwynna had been right: her excellent judgment had failed her. “Ye are proud,” she’d warned her. “Ye will suffer for it.”

  She rose from her stool and fell to her knees before him on the straw pallet where he sat. “I believe you,” she whispered, bowing her head against his upthrust knees and mentally castigating herself for her thickheadedness. “Forgive me.”

  He didn’t touch her, but she felt his entire body stiffen.

  “I ought to have known better. I’ve deeply wronged you, Roger. I’ll never doubt you again.”

  She felt his fingers slip under her hair, caressing her ears, the sides of her head, the nape of her neck. He leaned forward, pulling her close against his body until she was all but sitting in his lap. “I wouldn’t go that far. Trust me as far as I deserve, and no farther. I assure you, Alix, I’m very far from being a saint.”

  “I know.” Her voice was muffled against his shoulder.

  “Some of this foolishness was my own fault. When I came into that cave and found you frozen there, I should have recognized that something was amiss.” His un-bandaged hand slid over her shoulders, smoothing the tension away. “I won’t soon forget how you fought me. You’ve the wit and courage of a champion, you know that? Would you were a man, and at my side in battle, lass.” He paused, allowing his hand to drift lower, then inward, toward the swell of her breasts. “No, I take it back. I’m glad you’re not a man.”

  Alexandra drew a jerky breath and lifted her face to his. His slightest touch could make her forget that there was anything else in the world between them besides this craving, this passion. Eagerly her lips parted. Her fingers trembled as she fixed them on the thin fabric of his shirtsleeves. Aching with desire, she closed her eyes and waited for him to bend his head and take her mouth.

  But he didn’t. He pushed her away and rose to his feet. By the time she’d opened her eyes, he had already flung another log on the fire and turned to Merwynna’s shelves. “Is there anything to drink in this hovel?”

  “If you mean spirits, no.”

  He swore and slammed his fist down on the herb table. Alexandra bit her lip and tucked her knees up, hugging herself.

  “What are you thinking?” she asked, watching him stare for several minutes into the fire.

  He turned abruptly and allowed his gaze to rove her body, leaving no doubt in her mind what he was thinking. But his reply denied it: “That there are several points about your story that disturb me. Will’s behavior in particular. You knew him well; you were betrothed to him. If you say he wasn’t likely to do what he did that night, I’m inclined to believe you.”

  “And Ned, Roger. Why would he hang himself? It just doesn’t match up with what I know of him. I mean, whoever heard of a peasant boy hanging himself in a fit of melancholia?”

  “You told me yourself that he led a wretched existence. He was the butt of everybody’s jokes, the village outcast. Peasants have hearts and souls too. They’re just as entitled to be bitter about life as the rest of us.”

  “I know, but the timing is suspicious—you’ll have to give me that. He’d been trying to find me, trying to tell me something. He gave me the broken dagger, and he was terribly frightened. Now he’s been silenced forever.”

  “Where is this broken dagger you keep talking about? I’d like to have a look at it.”

  “It’s back in my chamber at Westmor.” She described how she had found the blade that fit the broken hilt in the ditch where Will’s horse had thrown him. “You saw the hilt that day in the forest when you and Francis Lacklin were practicing swordplay. I thought you had recognized it.”

  “I remember noticing that the hilt was carved of ivory, and I did wonder about that,” he said slowly. “It looked foreign, possibly Turkish, but I’m not an expert. It also looked old and broken and not worth worrying about.”

  “Ned was worried about it.”

  “You’ve already admitted that the boy was a halfwit.”

  Ignoring this objection, she continued, “The only people who knew about that dagger were Ned, my mother, Pris Martin, Francis Lacklin, and you.”

  “Pris Martin? The widow? How did she know about it?”

  “She happened to be there when my mother passed the broken hilt along to me.”

  He considered. “It’s hard to imagine her strangling anybody. What, if anything, had she to do with Will?”

  “Well, she was acquainted him, of course. Your family has been kind of her since her husband died, and my mother has also tried to help her. But, no, I can’t see her as a murderer, either.”

  “Almost anyone can be a murderer if they have sufficient reason.”

  “What about Francis Lacklin? He’s been in the Mediterranean region. Might he own a Turkish dagger?”

  Roger was silent for several seconds. She looked curiously at his face, but she couldn’t guess what he was thinking. Finally he said, “He might. But I can’t think of any set of circumstances where he would feel free to slaughter my brother.”

  “I don’t trust him,” she said with some trepidation. She didn’t want to reveal how much she knew about Roger’s interaction with Lacklin. It was clear that he already suspected her of knowing something. That must have been what he’d meant out on the cliff when he’d accused her of interfering in his affairs. Treason might not be a horrific a crime as fratricide, but if he were ever caught, he would die for it. “It seems to me that he’s far more concerned with secular power than he is with religion.”

  “In his eyes, they go together.”

  “He’s nearly as bad as the queen: if people don’t agree with him, they must be either converted or destroyed.”

  “He’s not that fanatical.”

  “He was at Whitcombe when Will died.”

  Roger was staring down at the bandage on his hand. He was considering the possibility, she would swear it. Her mind leapt. It could have been Francis Lacklin. Before his accident, Will had become disillusioned with heresy. He had been about to recant; at the end he had even asked for a priest. Perhaps he had guessed that Lacklin was plotting against the queen. Perhaps he had threatened to reveal what he knew to the baron, and Lacklin had felt it necessary to silence him.

  “Of course he’s not here now,” she said reluctantly. “He left for London. We know Ned was alive this morning.”

  Roger raised his eyes. He glanced at Alan, then back to her. His mouth twisted. “I just can’t believe that Francis would dirty his hands in such an affair. Even if he did have some reason for doing away with Will, he would refrain for my sake. In honor I’d have to avenge my brother’s death. I’d have to challenge him. And since he’s more skilled with the sword than I, he would be forced to kill me. Which he would never do. No, Alix, you’ll have to do better than Francis if you want to convince me that there’s anything more than your fertile imagination operating here. I know him; he can’t be guilty.”

  He sounded confident. She was shaken. In a few seconds she’d seen Roger accomplish what she herself had been unable to do: acquit a friend of suspicion. His sense of loyalty was stronger than hers. If their positions had been reversed, he would never have doubted her the way she’d doubted him.

  She felt ashamed again. Rising, she went to search Merwynna’s shelves for a headache powder. “I can’t think anymore. I feel ill.”

  He pulled her stool closer to the heart
h and made her sit on it. “Your hair is still wet, and you’ve been sick. Get closer to the fire.” He returned to the shelves and began rummaging. “I hope there’s something to eat in here. All this excitement is making me hungry.”

  “Me too.” She smiled tentatively at him. “This afternoon in the cave, I was certain I’d never eat again.”

  “Idiot,” he said, giving her soaking hair an affectionate tug. He found bread and cheese and laid them on the table. “This looks tempting. Let’s have some supper. After that we’ll discuss how I’m going to punish you for your vile suspicions of me.”

  Alexandra laughed to hide her sudden ungovernable yearning.

  Chapter 11

  Outside Merwynna’s cottage it was raining again, and the wind had risen to a whistle. Merwynna had not returned. She often stayed away for many hours if a new mother’s labor was protracted. Even if the babe were already born, Alexandra knew of no family who would send the midwife away on a night such as this.

  After a supper of hard bread and cheese, Roger moved aimlessly about the tiny cottage, poking into Merwynna’s strange jars and packets before finally sitting down to stare at his sleeping brother. “He’s resting easily. Will he sleep through the night?”

  “Undoubtedly. I gave him a hefty dose of medication.”

  “You don’t need me then. I’d best go.”

  She surveyed the bandage on his head. “You’re in no condition to go anywhere.”

  “Have you forgotten the searchers? There are three of us missing now.”

  “I don’t care. ‘Tis a wild night, and too long a distance to Whitcombe for you to tramp with your injured hand and that lump on your head.” To emphasize this, she went to the door and opened it, waving a hand at the driving rain. “No one will be out in this. Your men will conclude that we’ve sought shelter for the night.”

  He came to her side and stared into the storm. When he spoke, his voice was tense. “It is far better, Alix, that I go.”

  His deep brown eyes, the arch of his eyebrows, the warm curve of his throat, his clever, long-fingered hands… She retreated to the hearth. Am I mad? she asked herself. Of course it was better that he go. Now that her fear of him was gone, there was nothing to restrain all her other feelings. “Your head must ache,” she heard herself say.