A Warrior's Heart

by Laurel O'Donnell

  Slowly, Ryen scanned the room…until she saw the tapestry. She moved to the elaborate hanging and stared at the devil’s face. His dark eyes seemed to be staring at her, his dark hair waving in the mysterious night breeze.

  Bryce. His smug smirk. The muscles that gleamed under the moonlight. She followed the picture up to the sliver of a moon and then to the rod that held the tapestry.

  A rod of gold!

  A sword!

  She stretched onto her toes and removed the rod from the thin strings holding it. Sitting on the floor, Ryen yanked the rod onto her lap and pulled it free of the tapestry. It was a bit long, but it would have to do. She got to her bare feet, throwing the rod from one hand to the other, weighing it. She tested it by arcing it over her head, then by thrusting. Ryen took tentative thrusts and parries until she became used to the weight and awkward height of the rod. Then, she gave it her all. Thrusts, dodges, parries, arcs. Everything.

  Bryce stood in the open doorway.

  Ryen froze, staring into his dark look. Her hair was wild about her shoulders, the skirt of her chemise hanging down on one side, having fallen loose from the towel. She held the rod out at him. The thought made her grin. It was ludicrous that a small, thin rod would stop him. She watched his dark eyes slowly lower, taking in every curve. Heat rose into her face and Ryen lowered the rod and snatched a blanket off the bed to cover herself with.

  Bryce stepped into the room. His eyes shifted to the rod she held in her hand. Then, his gaze whipped to her right.

  Ryen watched outrage filter across his face, saw the clenching of his hands. She turned to look at the object of his sudden rage. Only when her eyes found the crumpled tapestry did she recall it. Her head snapped back to Bryce, who was approaching her, his brows narrowed accusingly over his turbulent eyes, a muscle clenched in his jaw. Instinctively, she brought the rod up, halting him three feet from her.

  Bryce stared hard at the rod, as if he couldn’t understand its purpose. Then he raised his eyes to Ryen. The storm of anger threatened to sweep her into its whipping winds and furious lashing waves. Bryce swatted aside the rod so hard that the vibration shook her arm. He seized her shoulders in an iron grip. “Angel,” he said, from between clenched teeth.

  The shock of his naked touch against her skin sent tremors up her arms to her shoulders. Ryen clutched the blanket tightly to her chest, her tiny fist knotted into the folds of the cloth.

  His lips were drawn down into a frown of displeasure. Then, his rage exploded and he shook her. “Damn it, Ryen. Why do you have to be --?”

  Suddenly she was against his body, his lips searing agonizingly across hers. Hungrily his tongue forced her lips open, and when she parted them, he thrust deep inside, tasting her sweetness. He crushed her to his body, his large hands pressing her back closer against him, drawing her nearer.

  “Bryce,” Ryen gasped, tilting her head back to receive more of his kisses.

  He pulled back to gaze into her eyes and frowned down at her. He stepped quickly back, away from her.

  Ryen furrowed her brow in confusion, then raised her chin and swallowed the sudden pain of rejection that rose inside her.

  “Ryen –” Bryce murmured.

  She stared at him, large eyes sparkling like sapphires. Hope ignited in her heart. He was going to apologize, to tell her that she was beautiful.

  “You may use the kitchens,” he said.

  Ryen’s jaw slackened as disappointment stabbed her. Was that all? she wondered.

  Bryce turned and headed for the door.

  “Bryce!” Ryen called desperately.

  He paused not two feet from the door, his shoulders rigid.

  Ryen stared hard at his back, a thousand questions racing through her mind. “Why did you kiss me?” she asked softly.

  He did not move for a long moment. “Talbot will escort you to and from the kitchens. He will oversee everything you do.”

  The kiss was a punishment for the tapestry, Ryen thought, her heart aching. No, not the kiss, but the feelings that flooded her senses when he deprived her of another touch of those sensuous lips. That was the true punishment. She watched as he pulled the door closed behind him. Slowly her shoulder sagged and she sat on the bed.

  That night, Ryen ate alone in her room.

  Chapter Thirty Five

  Polly, Kit and Jimmy stood before Ryen in the rear of the Great Hall, staring at her with expectant eyes. Jimmy’s mother stood at her son’s side, her hollow brown eyes regarding Ryen with distrust. Her cotton dress was filthy; her feet were bare. She had no intention of masking the hostility that burned in her eyes.

  Ryen surveyed the room. At the tables near the front of the Great Hall, the soldiers attacked the bread the servants had just placed before them. The peasants lounged against the wall not far from her, waiting for their chance at the food. They all watched her with blank faces. Ryen couldn’t help but notice how Jimmy’s mother turned her gaze toward the food with a concerned look. She thinks she will go hungry today, Ryen thought, before turning to Polly.

  “Where do you usually sit to eat?” Ryen wondered.

  “Sit?” Kit asked, looking to Polly in confusion. “Why, we sit anywheres we can find a space. Sometimes we just stand.”

  “Aye,” Polly agreed. “It’s quicker to the food that way.”

  “A dark corner is the best,” Jimmy piped in. “Then ya might not get yer food taken.”

  A surge of sympathy swept Ryen. The poor child. There was no need to live like this. Everyone could have food – perhaps not as good as the nobles’, but nourishing and warm.

  Ryen led the group to an overturned table in the murky shadows in the rear of the hall. “Here,” Ryen said, bending down and placing her hands on the table’s edge. “Help me.”

  Polly and Kit moved to her side. But Jimmy’s mother stood, her hands rooted to her hips, glaring at Ryen. “What are ya up ta? Why should we work for you?”

  Ryen was about to reply, but Polly exploded. “Ya best not be talking to her that way!”

  “’N why not?” the woman demanded.

  “It’s all right, Polly,” Ryen said, after righting the wooden table with Kit’s help. She turned to Jimmy’s mother, studying her. Her face was streaked with dirt, her hair uncombed; two of her teeth were missing. Their life could be so much better. “Because,” Ryen stated, “if you help me, you will eat until you are full.”

  “’N why should I believe ya? Who are ya ta me?”

  “What do you have to lose?” Ryen wondered, bending to right a fallen bench. She was pleased to see Kit dragging another bench up to the opposite side of the table.

  “What ‘ave I got ta lose?” she replied, wiping a ripped sleeve across her dirty nose. “Ya’ll probably poison us all!” She grabbed Jimmy’s arm and pulled him away.

  Ryen watched them go. Her heart twisted for the boy. Because his mother was so stubborn didn’t mean the boy should have to go hungry. She heard snickers from the people around the room and turned to see the men and women at the tables watching her as they shoved bread into their mouths. Ryen raised her chin and turned her back on them. She didn’t need their help nor their approval. “Polly, your job will be to make sure this table is clean before every meal. And at the looks of this,” she ran a finger along the top of the table, then raised the dirt-coated tip before their eyes, “it may very well be a hard job.”

  “Aye,” Polly replied, beginning to rub the wood with her apron.

  “And yours, Kit, is to bring the meals. Polly will help, if need be.”

  Kit nodded.

  “There will be enough food to fill both your stomachs, as well as everyone else’s. So don’t be afraid to ask for more. And Kit, always set an empty bowl. Everyone is welcome at this table.” She shot a look at Bryce, who was sitting in his usual chair at the other end of the room. “Everyone.”

  When they were done scrubbing clean a small area of the table so that they could eat, Kit carried in their meal, a bowl full of pease
pudding for each of them. As Kit sat beside Ryen to eat, she gasped, “Gaw! It’s still warm! I never had a warm meal before. Gaw.”

  Kit plunged her hand into the porridge and Ryen blanched.

  “Kit,” Polly chastised, and when Kit glanced up, a smear of pudding on her nose, Polly scowled at her and shook her head. Polly lifted a trencher and delicately sank the bread into the pudding.

  Kit raised her own trencher and stared at it for a moment. “Gaw,” she said, before immersing it in the food.

  Ryen grinned in pride and was about to put her trencher into the pudding when she felt a tug at her sleeve. She looked down to see Jimmy standing beside her. He licked his lower lip as he stared at her food.

  Ryen smiled and pointed to the bowl next to Polly. She watched as the boy ran to the seat and ate to his heart’s, and stomach’s, content.

  And the people came. There were more peasants at the noon meal, and still more at dinner. The food was good. There was hot, fresh bread with each meal. As it turned out, it was Polly who was an expert in the kitchen, having been the eldest of twelve children.

  Two days later, they needed another table.

  Bryce sat slumped before the hearth, having failed to drown his lust in the mugs of wine and ale he had drunk through dinner and into the night. Now, as he stared into the fire, a mug of ale held loosely in his hands, he saw only her blue eyes in those dancing flames.

  “You can’t allow it to continue,” McFinley cried. “She’ll turn your people against you.” The redheaded knight glowered at his lord. When Bryce did not reply, he added, “I hear murmurings from the servants of how she’s not such a bad angel.”

  “You cuffed one of them yesterday for saying something like that,” another knight called.

  “And I’d cuff another if they said it again,” McFinley snapped, pounding his thigh with his fist. “She is the Angel of Death! How much worse can she be? Poisoning the servants’ minds, little as they may be.”

  Bryce downed the rest of his ale, tilting the mug until the bottom was raised. Then he lowered his cup and continued to gaze into the fire.

  “Did you hear me, Prince?” When Bryce did not reply, McFinley dismissed him with a wave. “Aw, you sit there like a wart on the king’s ass.”

  “I heard you,” Bryce grumbled.

  McFinley paled. The last man who had insulted Bryce was at the end of his sword the following day.

  “I just think you’re wrong,” Bryce said quietly.

  McFinley quickly departed and Bryce noticed that the seats around him had vacated. He bent his head to stare into his empty mug. She was wreaking havoc in his home, his castle…among his people. She was turning the peasants against him, or so McFinley claimed. But though he had seen her befriend many of the servants, had seen her treat them well, never had any of them shown any rebellion against him or England.

  So, what was he to do? The only difference he’d seen was in his men. They were angry because they feared her influence on him and his people. They thought the Angel of Death would somehow overrun the castle.

  That was impossible. What could she do with no weapons against a stronghold? But…he had underestimated her before. Was she truly turning his peasants against him?

  “You seem to have frightened off your men,” a voice stated.

  Without looking up, Bryce knew it was Grey. He heard the seat beside him creak as Grey fell into it. “May I offer some advice?”

  “No,” Bryce replied.

  Grey chuckled. “Your mood is foul, my brother. But I will give it to you anyway.”

  Bryce grunted. He knew that Grey would speak his mind, regardless of what he said. Grey was one of the few men Bryce respected as an equal. He was the only man he could never seem to defeat in battle, and who had never defeated him.

  “You are very stubborn,” Grey said. “Your Angel is a rare woman. She is smart, educated, be that good or bad, and beautiful. She can win the hearts of her enemy with just a look. And on top of all this, she is a warrior.”

  “And?” Bryce demanded sharply.

  Grey leaned forward so his arms were resting on his knees. His face was less than a hand’s breadth away from Bryce’s ear. “I see how she looks at you,” Grey stated quietly. “The way her eyes follow you when you cross the room.”

  “She is my enemy,” Bryce snapped.

  “Oh, no, my brother. She is just the opposite.”

  Bryce turned to look into his wise eyes. There was confusion etched into the wrinkling of Bryce’s brows, disbelief in the scowling of his eyes.

  “Forget the ransom. Make her yours,” Grey advised earnestly.

  “I can’t do that,” Bryce retorted angrily, returning his gaze to the fire. “How honorable would it be were I to bed her before the messenger arrived from France?”

  Grey studied him silently for a long moment. “Why do you make excuses? You are in love with her.”

  “No,” Bryce answered firmly. “I want her, yes. But I do not love her.”

  Grey sadly shook his head. “You are a stubborn man, Bryce Princeton. Answer me this. What does honor dictate you do when the ransom is denied?”

  “She will be mine. I will do with her as I wish.”

  “You will bed her and then perhaps throw her in the dungeon?”

  The image of Ryen chained in the dark, cold dungeon with murderers and traitors roused his fury. “That is not your concern,” Bryce ground out between clenched teeth.

  “And have you considered if her king agrees to pay the ransom?”

  “That is impossible.”

  Grey chuckled quietly. He was about to speak when he caught sight of Talbot entering the Great Hall and crossing the large room toward them. Talbot stared at Bryce for a long moment before he announced, “The French messenger has arrived.”

  The day had finally come. Ryen would be his.

  Bryce Princeton stood on a battlement of his castle walk, looking out over the town, past the harvested fields to the horizon. He found his heart soaring. He wanted to give Ryen everything. To make her happy. And he would finally be free to do this.

  He stared at the rising sun in satisfaction. For the first time in his life he knew the course of the future…and liked it.

  He turned from the scene before him and descended the stairs. He opened a wooden door and entered the castle.

  It was silent inside, quieter than the dawn before a battle. The receiving room was being prepared for greeting the French emissary. Four large pillars lined the empty room near the center aisle, looking more like four massive giants overseeing the justice that was rendered within. A large red velvet chair was being positioned against one of the walls…his favorite chair. The judgment chair.

  “Beggin’ your pardon, sir.”

  Bryce turned to find Ryen’s maid friend wringing her hands before him. Polly was her name, he remembered. His gaze finally came to rest on her hands, which were nervously twisting in her apron. None of the servants had ever spoken to him, nor he to them. He found that his presence intimidated them, and he could not abide their shivering and shaking. He looked back at the chair. “What is it?”

  “I was wonderin’, sir. What might ya be doing ta the Lady Ryen when no ransom comes for her?”

  Bryce’s gaze snapped to her, his brows furrowed. “That’s none of your concern.”

  “Yes, sir. But she is only a slip of a girl, and ya just can’t be throwin’ her into the dungeons now.”

  Bryce’s look clouded over like an approaching storm.

  But Polly was not interested in his frowns. “Sir, it jus’ wouldn’t be Christian –”

  Bryce grunted. He did not believe in God. He believed man made his own opportunities. But he had never voiced his opinion. The church wielded almost as much power as the king himself. He could not afford to be in disfavor with either of them.

  “She’s a good girl, sir. She don’t deserve ta be locked up like a common thief.”

  “Your opinion is noted. Not that you should have
one.”

  Polly bobbed a curtsy. “Thank you, m’lord.”

  Bryce watched her waddle away. What had Ryen done to his servants? Since when did Polly exchange two words with him, let alone have the courage to speak her mind? Bryce shrugged his large shoulders. It was inconsequential. His mind drifted back to Ryen. What would her face look like when she found out that her king would not meet his demands for a ransom? Would she throw herself to her knees and beg for his mercy?

  His lips turned up into a grin. Not his Angel. She would raised that defiant little chin and demand to know what he intended to do with her.

  “Will you break your fast?” Talbot wondered, entering the room.

  Bryce sat in his chair, his eyes coming to rest on his friend. “Not until she is mine. Show the messenger in.”

  Minutes later, the room was overflowing with the curious. Servants hid outside the door, hoping to hear what the French king would do. Some of Bryce’s men lined the room while his officers placed themselves behind their lord. The Wolf Pack, as usual, lounged in the shadows that the morning sun created behind the pillars.

  The messenger stood alone in the middle of the room.

  Bryce eyed him. The man was thin and short, certainly not an imposing figure to face the Prince of Darkness. Bryce’s spirits soared. He glanced at Talbot, who stood beside him. Talbot appeared cautious, his brows drawn together. Before Bryce had time to dwell on this, the messenger produced a scroll from his tunic. He unfurled it and spoke in broken English. “The royal King of France, his mighty lord, bids the English lord, the Prince of Darkness, to release his most valued –”

  “Get on with it,” Bryce growled. “Will he pay the ransom or no?”

  The messenger straightened with indignation. Dark eyes focused on Bryce as shaking hands rerolled the scroll and returned it to his pocket. “The King of France will not pay your ransom.”

  Murmurs broke throughout the room as the word spread.