Daughter of Fire (46 page)

“You are my faith and heart, mistress. With your sweet vision to guide me I shall not fail.”

Tears stung at her eyes as she moved into his arms with a restless urgency, the fur falling away as her fingers went back through the thick silk of his hair, and her mouth sought his with a desperate hunger to taste and feel his strength and warmth.

She was like fire in his hands, burning everywhere he touched, tears like glistening diamonds at her cheeks as he pressed her back into the furs, all wet heat and urgent demand as they came together in a violent claiming that spoke of all the uncertainty that lay just beyond the coming dawn.

~ ~ ~

William’s knights and soldiers filled the yard amid the noise of shouted orders, jangling harness, and the dull gleam of swords and lances under a leaden sky. Hundreds more waited beyond the walls, preparations made throughout the past days in the armed encampments that lined the river.

The king was determined to lead his army. No amount of argument from Rorke or any of his knights could dissuade him. Some knights were already mounted, making the final adjustments to their armor. Squires hurried about, delivering pouches of provisions for the journey, several days’ ride to the north.

Among the horses, Vivian saw Tarek’s Arabian mare, as she moved with a purposeful urgency, darting out of the path of a cart, wending her way through mounted riders. Tarek al Sharif caught her as she almost went down before a cart, at the mud that sucked at each step.

“This is no place for you, mistress,” he said with a glint of amusement in his blue eyes that Vivian always found so disconcerting. He grinned wickedly at her.

“Unless you have it in your mind to take another form and steal away in Rorke’s saddlebag, and accompany us north.”

“I had thought of it, but I do not have that ability,” she reminded him.

“Ah, but for the Jehara there is always a way. And I am not looking forward to sleeping on the hard, cold ground and listening to my friend complain of it and grow surly for lack of your warmth beside him at night.”

Color flared at her cheeks. “I would ask a favor of you.” He usually had great disdain for all knightly manner, but now struck a knightly pose.

“Your wish is my command, mistress, for I would not wish you to turn me into some low-form creature.”

She laid a hand at his arm. “The favor I would ask is that you guard your friend’s back well. There is great danger.”

He nodded. “There is always danger, mistress, and I have always guarded his back.”

“But danger may take many forms,” she cautioned. “It is the danger you cannot see that will strike the deadliest.”

His expression grew somber. “Have you seen something in your visions, mistress?”

She shook her head. “The visions are unclear. There is much darkness.”

“And cold, no doubt,” Tarek snorted disgustedly. “I have heard the north country is a cold and forbidding place. I pray to your god and mine that we could find a war in a warm place.” Then he became serious once more. “You have my promise.”

“What promises do you make my friend, that will be impossible to keep?” Rorke asked as he led his warhorse over to where they stood. “Especially to beautiful young women.”

“I keep all of my promises,” Tarek corrected him. “I have never promised myself to a young lady because I have not yet met one with a true heart. Perhaps only the Jehara possess true hearts. I shall have to look for one.”

Stephen of Valois walked with Rorke, his features rigid with anger and frustration.

“I would ride with you, milord,” Stephen pleaded with him as Rorke swung astride his warhorse. “Be damned what my father says! He thinks me a coward!”

Rorke leaned over to lay a hand on the young knight’s shoulder. “He is also your king,” he reminded Stephen. “And cowardice was never spoken of.”

“But he thinks it,” Stephen glared. “ ’Tis worse. If it was plainly spoken, I would challenge him on it.”

“He thinks of your safety, Stephen,” Rorke gently explained. “You were injured in the battle,” he gestured to the layer of linen bandage barely visible at the neck opening of Stephen’s armor. Vivian had bandaged a deep sword cut that had almost severed his arm from his shoulder. He had ridden three days with the almost-useless arm bound to his side with a strip of leather harness.

“I have another good hand,” Stephen argued with the recklessness of youth. “I can still wield a sword.”

“While you hold your horse’s reins in your teeth?” Rorke suggested, and continued before Stephen could argue further, “You must recover and hold the fortress for your king.”

“He leaves my uncle to protect his throne,” Stephen spat with contempt.

“The bishop thinks himself a capable warrior,” Rorke dared to speak aloud, “But he wields fear of the holy cross more effectively. If there is trouble in London, there must be one who remains to meet the challenge,” he said with hidden meaning, then added, “and there is a favor I would ask no other.”

“Anything, milord,” Stephen replied without hesitation.

“I would ask that you protect Mistress Vivian.”

Her startled gaze searched his, but he looked only at Stephen, myriad messages conveyed in that steely look. “I would entrust her safety to no one else.”

“Aye, milord,” Stephen agreed. “With my life.”

“I pray it shall not come to that.”

She and Stephen exchanged a look. She sensed his inner turmoil, yet knew he would keep his word to Rorke, even before he obeyed his king.

The order went out along the column of mounted knights and soldiers, seeming much as they had that day at Amesbury—fierce, ominous in the rain that had begun to fall. They were followed by a long line of creaking carts filled with supplies they would need on the journey north. Rorke leaned down from astride the stallion, his hand slipping through her hair. He plucked a satin ribbon from the plaited braid of her hair.

“I would carry a part of you with me.”

She removed the thin silver chain from about her neck and placed it about his, the blue crystal glinting with hidden light on such a dreary day.

“Unknown dangers await,” she said, her voice breaking softly over what they had already spoken of. “Keep the stone with you at all times. As long as you wear it, there is a bond between us that cannot be broken.”

Rorke’s fingers closed over the crystal as if it were the most precious jewel on earth.

“Until I return, I will keep it close to my heart, mistress, as I hold you close in my heart.”

Vivian ran into the royal fortress and climbed the stairs to the highest tower. There, with rain streaming across her cheeks to mingle with her tears, she watched that dark column, like a long ribbon as it wended its way through the streets of London. It stretched all the way through the city, until the darkness of the storm closed around them and she could no longer see them.

“May the power of the Light protect you,” she whispered.

Twenty-three

T
hey rode north for nine days, following a parallel route to the one Stephen and his men had traveled as a precaution against attack by raiders. Horsemen, stripped of the cumbersome armor that would have readily given away their presence, rode far afield to seek out any sign of the invaders.

At night they made cold camps with no fires that would give away their position. By day they rode hard to reach the location of the attack at the north coast. Stephen had been forced to leave two dozen badly injured men and Rorke’s squire carried pouches of medicines that Vivian had prepared. With the Queen’s time so near there had been no consideration that she could accompany them.

The fourth night out, their camp was once again cold, their meal consisting of days’ old bread, cheese, apples, and watered-down wine—just enough to warm against the forbidding north country cold.

Tarek swore, “I had not thought it could be any colder than the bone-aching dampness of London. But that cold, damp slag heap pales in comparison to this frozen land.”

“You would not have been so cold in London had dame Judith been well pleased,” Rorke commented, pulling his fur mantle more closely about him as they sheltered for the night in the lee of a rock outcropping.

“She seems to have been pleased enough,” Tarek snorted. “I’ll wager her bed is warm for she is most quarrelsome when it is not. Although it is difficult to say who warms it now. She was most disagreeable over the loss of her place in William’s bed, and then yours. Knowing her ambition, she no doubt hopes to regain that coveted place.”

“I promised Judith nothing. She has always known how I felt about women.”

“Until the Jehara, my friend?” Tarek asked, glancing over at him.

“Vivian is unlike any woman I have ever known.”

Tarek squinted through the narrow slit of his fur mantle at his friend, barely visible in the fading light. There was something in his friend’s voice, something that spoke of more than mere ambitions of Anjou and new conquests.

“Can it be that the conqueror has been conquered?”

“That is William’s ambition. It was never mine. All I ever wanted was Anjou.” His voice had lost the steeliness that was always present whenever he spoke of his childhood home.

“And now, my friend?”

“I grow weary of fighting, of cold camps, and the ever-present threat of the kiss of cold steel.”

“Perhaps you find yourself thinking of evenings spent before a warm hearth, good food, drink, and a remarkably beautiful woman.”

“A fire before a hearth,” Rorke repeated, thinking also of the woman he had shared it with only days earlier, her silken body spread with fiery splendor beneath his, her soft cries of need, the sweet gasps of surprise he startled from her lips over and over, and then their fierce joining that made him weep with joy at her breast as his body wept its seed within hers.

“Aye, a fire,” he murmured, longing for her.

“Will you take her to wife, my friend, or risk another man taking your place when you return to Anjou?  For she is a rare prize.  And what if she were to bring forth a child? Such has been known to happen.” He did not speak lightly, for he had experienced the curse of a bastard’s birth.

Rorke stared thoughtfully into the fire.  “I would not leave that mark on any child.”

~ ~ ~

The next morning they rose before first light, driven by the cold, unyielding stone that had been their pallets, certain the backbreaking hours ahead atop their horses could be no worse.

If possible, the day dawned even more bleak than the previous one, with a portent of snow. They found what was left of Stephen’s encampment the following midday.

There were no fires lit for warmth, only the charred remains of a several days’ old fire and several mounded shapes blanketed beneath the mantle of snow. Otherwise the camp was completely empty and silent, except for the howl of the wind.

With curved blade drawn, Tarek was the first to dismount. He gently prodded one of the mounded shapes with the toe of his boot. Firmer prodding overturned the object to reveal the body of a soldier. The others were turned over as well to reveal the others Stephen had been forced to leave behind, all dead.

“This fire has been cold for days,” Tarek said angrily. “They must have been attacked almost as soon as Stephen left.”

William stared at the camp with disgust, his features etched with furry. “If he had true courage, he would never have left them!”

“It took far more courage to do what he did,” Rorke said grimly as he kicked the snow from a large shape—a warhorse that had died beneath its rider. William stared at him hard. Rorke ignored his look as he gestured to the fallen steed, and at least three dozen more that had been scavenged by carrions.

“The difficult choice one must make is to choose those who will stay, and those who will leave. This place is well sheltered,” he pointed out. “With ample food and weapons.” He frowned as the others were found, among them companions well known.

“Your son, milord, made the only decision he could make. They should have been safe until our return.”

The dead were buried, the carcasses of the dead horses left where they had fallen. It was a grim task. William watched stone-faced his thoughts unreadable. He moved with much stiffness in his leg from the past days astride a horse, but there was hesitation in his orders.

“I want the entire area searched, every village, croft, and farm. The men who did this will pay.”

“It shouldn’t be too difficult,” Rorke interjected, rising from a crouched position where two dead Norman soldiers had been found. He held a long-bladed knife in his hand, the handle elaborately decorated with intricate carvings. He handed it to Tarek.

“What think you of this?”

Tarek needed no more than a brief glance. “It is of the Danes also.”

“Aye,” Rorke said thoughtfully, sheathing the blade at his own belt.

Unwilling to risk being caught as Stephen had been with his men all in one command, William split his army into three, each to follow a set course that would take them along the coastline, north, south, and the third further inland in the event the Danish raiders had gone there. Riders were to keep the three contingents within constant communication with each other in the event there was an attack.

Rorke and Tarek sat about a fire that night. The encampment was heavily guarded, with Rorke’s men positioned along the perimeter, and then another perimeter of guards beyond. It was something he had learned from Tarek al Sharif—always expected the unexpected.

“You are thoughtful, my friend,” Tarek said as they ate roast fowl, their first warm meal in over four days. “Something troubles you.”

“Horses,” Rorke commented, separating a portion of meat from the bone with his teeth.

Tarek looked at him askance. “You think of horses, when you could be thinking of a very beautiful red-haired Saxon? There are times, my friend, when the workings of your mind worry me greatly.”

“How many sets of tracks did you see at Stephen’s encampment?” Rorke asked.

Tarek shrugged, cleaning off the last of meat on a roasted leg of fowl. “Many, and even more partially concealed by the snow. No doubt there were far more we could no longer see.”