Fionna nodded, but he could still see the uncertainty in her eyes.
“There’s more . . .” Galahad cocked his head, studying her.
“Must ye all see so much?” Fionna said ruefully. “I never—” she started, faltered, and took a breath. “I never thought of myself as a woman who would marry. I watched as my friends and fellow warriors fell to love’s fickle embrace, and I swore matrimony would never catch me.”
“Why?” Galahad asked. “Why would you not want something so wonderful?”
“Is marriage wonderful? Does not love cause many more troubles than it cures? The husband with the wandering eye? The chieftain who desires someone else’s bride? The young maiden who ends up pregnant and shunned by her tribe? Or shackled to some oaf who never wanted more than a roll in the hay?”
“Rather cynical,” Galahad said. “Was there no one in your life who was happy in love? What about your parents?”
Fionna’s silver eyes grew wistful, distant as the fog on the moor, and Galahad realized his misstep.
“My mother died when I was young. My father mourned her. He mourns her still.”
“But he has you, and your sister. He never would have, if not for love.”
Fionna snorted and gave him a playful push. “Must ye insist upon finding a positive angle for every one of my thoughts? Can a woman not wallow for a while in her own morose feelings?”
“Perhaps for a while,” Galahad said with a wink. “But I’m afraid if you wallow much more, I’ll have to unleash Percival on you. And he is far more annoyingly positive than I.”
“Ye dare not.” Fionna laughed.
“Oh, I dare.” Galahad raised an eyebrow. The sight of her smile warmed him. Around her, his thoughts were peaceful, though he knew how her betrayal should trouble him. He couldn’t bring himself to hate himself for enjoying the pleasure of her company, or worry for her loyalty. Perhaps Lancelot and Arthur doubted her but, somehow, he knew. He saw her soul—deep down where she hid herself—and she was as pure as a mountain stream, and as soft as the breath of a butterfly’s wings.
“Galahad . . .” she said. “I kissed Arthur.”
“Yes, the night of the faerie wine. Arthur told me.”
“No.” She shook her head. Her features were twisted, sorrowful. “The night I took Excalibur.”
He stilled as details came into focus. Fionna kissed Arthur . . . and then took his sword? “Perhaps,” Galahad began, slowly, “I now understand his upset more than I did before.”
“Yer not angry with me? After what we . . . shared?”
He tested the feelings within him, like taking the temperature of water, or feeling for the direction of the wind. No, he didn’t think he was angry at her. He could see that each of the knights meant something to Fionna, and her to them.
“Do you want me to be mad at you?” he asked softly.
“No,” she admitted, squeezing her eyes shut. “If ye were angry with me . . .” her voice wavered. “I don’t know how I could bear it.”
“Peace Fionna.” Galahad reached between them and rested a gentle hand on her thigh. Her leg was warm and firm, and the simple feel of her filled his veins with fire. “Thank you for telling me.”
She seemed surprised, but looked down at his hand, and rested hers on top. Her fingers were gentle, tentative. They held none of the sureness of their games in his chamber. That woman seemed a distant memory. But he would find her again.
“Yer welcome,” Fionna whispered.
“But don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing.”
“What am I doing?”
“Trying to prove yourself right. That love brings only pain. Don’t involve me in those schemes. I’ll have no part of them.”
“I’m trying to tell ye the truth. There have been too many secrets between us. I never want it to be so again.”
“Nor I, My Lady,” Galahad said, and then twined his fingers briefly through hers, squeezing.
“There’s a stream ahead,” Arthur called out. “We’ll stop to sup and to water the horses.”
Fionna pulled her hand from Galahad’s, perhaps a touch reluctantly, wrapping her fingers back around her reins. Her simple touch had buoyed him, filled him with light and energy.
But when they reached the river, Galahad’s spirits sank.
Lancelot threw an arm over his face, burying his nose into his tunic.
The smells of rot and death were powerful.
“The curse,” Percival said in dismay, running a hand through his copper hair. “The poison has traveled so far and so quickly.”
Arthur’s face hardened with fury. “We’re less than a day’s ride from Caerleon. Another few days, and the sickness will reach the keep.”
“Might there be any nearby rivers that are not yet compromised?” Galahad asked.
Arthur shrugged, the lines around his eyes deepening. “I can only hope. For without clean water . . .” he trailed off.
The knights looked at the brackish water, the bodies of fish and squirrels strewn along the bank. Summer was around the corner. There would be little rain in the coming months. Without these rivers . . . Galahad shook off the thought. They would find the Grail. They had a lead. The sídhe had smiled upon them and revealed the location to Percival. Surely, they must desire the curse to be broken as much as Arthur and the knights.
“We knew the urgency of this quest,” Lancelot said. “This revelation changes nothing. We must continue.”
Arthur nodded. “Indeed.” And with that, he urged Llamrei forward into a gallop, plunging through the leafy underbrush.
They followed Arthur for a time, slowing to a canter. Fionna’s jaw clenched as her shoulder jostled with each step of her horse. Galahad prayed that the wound wouldn’t reopen on the trip.
Several candle marks passed as they rode in silence. Several candle marks since they passed Talgarth, the village still in shambles after the faerie boar. Galahad fixed his gaze on the horizon while the sun began to sit low in the sleepy sky. Around them, the shadows of trees lengthened to spindly fingers in the twilight.
“Shall we stop for the night?” Percival asked.
“We ride on,” Arthur said. “The small village of Maesbury Marsh is close, if memory serves me. There should be an inn we can stay at.”
Galahad peered into the forest, his mind playing tricks in the low light. The thick bed of pine needles blanketing the loamy soil muffled the clop of their horses’ hooves. A flash of movement to his right drew his gaze into the dark shadows there. He squinted, slowing his horse, peering through the crisscross of branches and leaves. Something shone white in the dark. Arcing like a bow.
His horse shied beneath him, catching scent of something and dancing away. Something dangerous and deadly. Stalking them. Galahad pulled his sword from its scabbard as the apparition pushed forward through the blackness, emerging into the dim twilight.
The beast was as big as a horse, with white matted fur, grayed with dirt and blood. A spine of protruding ridges arched across the monster’s humped back. Black beady eyes gleamed with preternatural intelligence between two wickedly curved tusks as long as a man’s forearm.
This animal was nothing mortal. It was nothing he had ever seen before.
And Galahad could have sworn he saw the beast smile before it charged him.
I HEARD GALAHAD’S bellow first, his horse’s panicked whinny second. And then . . . an inhuman squeal that raised my hackles like sharp nails dragging down my spine.
I spun Aster around and the mount danced beneath me, far too sluggish of a response for a war horse. A pang of longing for Zephyr lanced through me but was immediately forgotten when I glimpsed, in the distance, what barreled toward Galahad.
A beast of nightmares—huge and deadly.
“By the goddess,” I breathed, my blood surging in my veins. “Arthur!” I called out, shouting to the other knights. I didn’t know how far ahead they were, only that Galahad needed help, and soon I would too. I kicked Aster
into a gallop. My mind went curiously blank as my honed battle training took over. With my sword in hand, Aster and I charged the huge white boar.
Aster shied from the unnatural beast as we passed, dancing and bucking beneath me. I struggled to hold her steady as I leaned out with my sword and slashed across the boar’s broad backside.
The creature—it could only be Twrch Trwyth—let out a scream of pain as a line of blood welled along its ridged back. The faerie monster rounded on me with impossible speed, regarding me with feral intent—its new target. But a grim smile crept onto my face. For if the boar bled, it could die.
Twrch Trwyth charged.
Panic seized me at the sight—white flesh and coarse hair, dust and leaves kicked up into the air, tusks lowered to impale my mount. In all my training as a warrior, I had never fought anything like this. But instinct is a powerful force. Intuition possessed me within a wild heartbeat, and I dug my heels into Aster’s flanks. She leaped away from the passing boar by a hair’s breadth, huffing her displeasure. My braids blew about my face in the beast’s wake. The monster’s smell was overpowering—a musk of death and decay that made the bile rise in my throat.
“Over here!” Galahad hollered to the creature, who spun on cloven hooves, digging furrows into the black soil.
The thunderous sound of hoofbeats cut through the pounding pulse in my ears, and I allowed myself a split second to glance over my shoulder. A blur of three horses and riders bolted down the leaf-littered trail and I nearly sagged in relief.
Twrch Trwyth charged Galahad, and the knight spurred his mount out of the way, just inches from the boar’s wicked tusks.
Arthur galloped past me like a man possessed, his face set and furious. Clearly my king had tired of curses and was ready to fight something flesh and blood. Something that could be killed. He stabbed his sword into the Twrch Trwyth’s flank, burying his sword to the hilt. With a roar, the boar twisted away. Excalibur yanked out of Arthur’s hands with the beast’s jerky movements. Then the faerie monster rammed into Llamrei with its burly shoulder.
Horror welled in me as Llamrei reared and toppled sideways, taking Arthur down with her.
The boar’s eyes went wild as the creature spotted its prey laying vulnerable and prone.
Large muscles bunched as the beast prepared to charge Llamrei and Arthur, who was struggling to pull himself out from beneath his horse. They would be gutted, for sure. I gauged the distance even as I spurred Aster into action, but I knew I would be too late. Arthur was too far away.
An arrow with white and black fletching zipped past me and buried itself—quivering and deep—into the eye of Twrch Trwyth.
The creature roared with pain, shaking its massive tusks while pawing at its face.
I whirled to see Percival on Kit, pulling another arrow from the quiver that hung behind his saddle. But I had no time to marvel at his incredible shot.
Twrch Trwyth was frantic with anger and pain. Terrified, Llamrei clamored to her feet, gaining the boar’s attention. Arthur managed to remount, his eyes on the skittish mare beneath him and not their enemy. The boar noticed too. With a monstrous grunt, it ran at Arthur anew.
“Arthur!” I cried out in warning.
His head shot up just as Lancelot and his horse barreled into the boar’s side, toppling the huge creature off its feet. Dust exploded in a yellow cloud as the boar crashed to the ground in a rippling heap of muscle and vengeance.
Lancelot angled off his saddle, his charger holding steady. Then, he pulled Excalibur from the creature’s side. A stream of black blood cascaded over the faerie creature’s dirty white flank.
Cheval—Lancelot’s horse—danced back a few steps. Still, Lancelot spun in his stirrups and tossed the sword to Arthur, who nimbly caught the blade sailing through the air.
Twrch Trwyth stumbled to its feet, rounding warily on the five of us, seeming to reevaluate its prey. The beast looked even more hideous with an arrow protruding from its eye, black blood dripping down its snout. Hot breath panted from the boar’s maw as the monster tossed its head to taunt us with those wicked tusks.
“We tire the beast,” Arthur said, his chest heaving. His crown had fallen to the ground somewhere, but he seemed unconcerned as he surveyed their enemy with cold calculation. “No taking risks or playing heroic. Percival, keep the arrows coming. We bleed it; we all leave here today.”
Another arrow whizzed through the air. The pointed head disappeared into the side of the beast’s neck with a sickening thwump. The boar released a guttural squeal and charged.
At me.
Arthur’s calm words rang in my head. I held Aster steady as the beast came for us, my sword slick with sweat in my hand. Then I dug in my heels. Aster sidestepped as the boar passed by, giving me an opening for another blow.
Or, at least, that was my idea. The boar pivoted at the last moment, moving with us—smarter and faster than I imagined from a mere beast.
Aster let out a wild whinny of pain as the boar’s tusks tore into her side. The world tilted as the force of Twrch Trwyth’s blow threw us both to the ground. My sword whirled through the air from the impact, and away from me. Then pain flamed across my upper body as I hit the ground hard with my wounded shoulder, stealing the breath from my lungs. The boar’s screams of triumph mingled with Aster’s shrill cries of pain and terror, creating a cacophony of animal sounds.
I drew breath into my lungs and scrambled from beneath her. Blood covered Aster’s white coat, dripping to the decaying leaves below. I wanted to vomit. I staggered back on unsteady feet as the boar rooted and dug into her flesh and bone with bestial cruelty.
My sword. I lunged for my sword and then jumped to my feet as Galahad rode up behind Twrch Trwyth and stabbed his blade deep into its spine.
The creature screamed in agony. The crimson-stained head whipped up from poor Aster’s exposed belly, spraying droplets of blood across me.
From the ground, Twrch Trwyth was huge. Taller than me. I could feel the heat of its unnatural magic from here. My stomach twisted painfully, and my mouth parched as dry as a rainless summer.
Galahad had scored a good shot. The creature moved sluggishly now. A hind leg wobbled with a meaty step. But even the death throes of a creature such as this could be deadly; warnings rang in my mind as the boar fixed its one-eyed stare upon me.
I held my sword angled before my body, and the scene seemed to slow. My eyes narrowed at the foul monster. The beast who had just horribly maimed an innocent creature. This thing, this faerie monster, didn’t belong on this earth. And I would be the one to send it back to whatever abyss it crawled out from. A strategy crystalized in my mind, and calm lapped at my pulse. Twrch Trwyth would charge me, and I would roll, before coming up and stabbing the boar’s throat or stomach. Or both. It wouldn’t survive another blow to its vital underbelly.
The beast leaped over Aster’s prone body and came at me, but I was ready. I tensed my legs, primed to move when the mass of muscle and death drew close enough.
But another body barreled into me from the side, shoving me out of the way. A blur of black hair and brown leather and strong arms.
“Lancelot!” I cried out. The fool man had pushed me out of the way. And now stood directly in the path of Twrch Trwyth.
The boar hit Lancelot with an audible crash, tossing his body across the clearing like a rag doll. Lancelot hit the ground and rolled to a stop against a tree trunk, his arms and legs splayed like a dead man’s.
Oh goddess . . . a gut-wrenching scream clawed viciously at my throat. My mind rebelled against the reality before me. Lancelot . . .
But there was no time for grief’s heart-stabbing pain, only reaction. The boar was rounding on me again. And where I had felt calm certainty before, I was now frozen with fear and desperation. Lancelot had to be all right. He had to be alive.
The boar pawed the ground, appearing to delight in the scent of my fear. It was all the time Arthur needed. Seemingly out of nowhere, my king appeared o
n his black steed. A warrior’s cry left his mouth right as he plunged his shining sword between the beast’s shoulder blades, severing the spine.
The blow was instantaneous. Twrch Trwyth gave a weak mewling cry and stumbled to its knees before landing in the dirt with a teeth-rattling crash.
Eerie silence hung in the forest around us. Twrch Trwyth was dead. And goddess help me, Lancelot might be too.
ARTHUR’S HEART HAMMERED in his throat. Lancelot was tough. But to survive a blow like that? His thoughts stuttered and stopped.
Behind him, Galahad and Percival launched off their horses. Then all three knights—running and scrambling—converged on Lancelot in a blur of action.
Fionna’s pale hands fluttered by his head, feeling for his pulse. A breath.
Lancelot quietly groaned. Stars above, he was alive!
Arthur released a ragged sigh, pushing back his surfacing emotions. He couldn’t lose Lancelot. He needed his dearest friend, far more than Lancelot probably realized. While Arthur had his other knights, Lancelot was his foster brother—truly the only real family Arthur had left. His half-sisters made their position clear, their familial titles more tradition than truth.
“Give the man some room,” Galahad said, pulling Arthur from his thoughts. But no one moved. They all needed to see. They needed to watch as Galahad probed Lancelot’s chest, his abdomen, felt upon his arms and legs for breaks or rends in the flesh.
Lancelot’s eyes fluttered open, his head tilting toward Fionna.
Galahad sat back on his heels, brushing a lock of blond hair from his eyes. “You have Hel’s own luck, brother. I can’t find a single scratch on you.”
Lancelot reached out a hand and Arthur grasped it, pulling Lancelot to a seat. Another groan escaped Lancelot’s lips as one of his hands flew to his back, his mouth tightening in pain.
Galahad was there in a moment, probing with strong fingers. “Can you move your legs?”
“I’m moving them right now,” Lancelot griped.
Gwenevere's Knights- The Complete Knights of Caerleon Trilogy Page 24
