Dragonblade Trilogy - 02 - Island of Glass (16 page)

He looked none the worse for
wear. He just stood there, gazing down at her, with a strangely gentle
expression on his face. Argus had told him everything when he’d entered the
hall a few minutes earlier. Then he had just stood there and watched her. Never
in his life had he seen a more compassionate act and it tugged at his heart to
know what the eventual outcome would be, no matter how hard she worked to save
him.

“Is the battle over?” she asked.

“For the moment,” he replied.

His gaze moved from her to the
boy and back again. She could read his thoughts.  “He will die if I stop,” she
said.

He took a long, slow breath.
Kneeling beside her, he watched her push and release, push and release. It
struck him as the saddest thing he’d ever seen.

“Unless you plan to do this for
the rest of your life, I am afraid he is going to die no matter what you do,”
he said softly. “It is his time, Aubrielle. Although your efforts have been
heroic, you must let him go.”

She slowed but did not stop. She
was staring at the young man’s face. “How can I?” she whispered. “His name is
Halla.  His wife is dead and he has a little daughter. If he dies, his child
will lose both parents.”

“War is cruel, on those who fight
it and those they leave behind. I wish I could tell you that he will awake and
hold his daughter in his arms once again, but he will not. He is slipping. Only
your strength of will is holding him here. You must not be strong anymore. You
must let him go.”

A sob escaped her lips. She
struggled against another one, but before long, she was weeping. Her pushing
slowed to a complete stop. Kenneth pulled her up and swept her into his arms.
He didn’t care if his men saw him or not.

“You did your best, my lady,” he
whispered. “He would have died a much more painful death had you not made his
last moments more comfortable.”

She wrapped her tired arms around
his neck and held him tightly, as if afraid she would slip off, perhaps follow
the young man into the jaws of death. She’d seen so much of it this afternoon
that she realized death was a very easy thing to come by. The years at St.
Wenburgh had protected her from that reality.

Kenneth mounted the stairs and
took her back to her chamber. Even when the door closed softly, he continued to
stand in the middle of the room and hold her. Two days ago, he was holding this
woman because he had been ordered to. Now he was holding her because he so very
desperately wanted to. As he sat on her bed, his lips against her forehead, the
day they had met seemed like a million years ago.

He reclined against the pillows. Aubrielle
was limp and warm and soft, and he wished that he did not have his armor on. It
must be exceptionally uncomfortable for her, but more than that, he wanted to
feel her against him. He’d never in his life actually wanted to feel a woman
against him for emotional reasons. But Aubrielle had awakened something within
him that was struggling to be let loose.

The little dog lay beside them,
his chin on Aubrielle’s leg. She was so still and quiet that Kenneth thought
she may have fallen asleep. He, too, was able to relax for the first time that
day. But she suddenly sat up, startling both him and the dog.

“My castle,” she said. “How did
it fare in the siege?”

He smiled inwardly at ‘my
castle’. “No damage to report to the walls or stone structures. The flaming
arrows managed to cause minor damage to the front gates and to some of the
structures inside the bailey, but nothing that cannot be easily repaired.”

She pushed the hair from her
eyes. “And you?

“My lady?”

She gestured at him. “Are you
undamaged, too?”

He smiled faintly. “I am.”

Now she looked serious, her
sea-colored eyes boring into him. “This was my first battle.”

“I see,” he could have guessed
that from her reaction to the wounded. “I would have never known. Your bravery
was astounding.”

She looked away, flattered,
modest. She reached out to absently stroke the puppy’s back. “Not very much, it
wasn’t. But I do thank you for your gracious lie.”

His smile broadened. “If you
haven’t a taste for battle, I would not worry overly. They are few and far
between out here.”

“That’s not true. The day I came
here, you were returning from battle. And now, two days later, we have
another.”

“This is not the usual, I assure
you.”

She rose from his lap, pacing
over to a long, thin table that held a pitcher and some cups. The dog jumped
off the bed and followed her. She poured two measures of honeyed wine, handing
one to Kenneth. He didn’t like honeyed wine, but he took it from her anyway.

“You have been fighting battles
for many years, have you not?” she asked him.

He nodded. “I saw my first battle
at ten years of age. I was a squire and my master decided it was time to take
me into battle rather than leave me at camp.”

Her face tightened with concern.
“But you were so young.”

Kenneth’s ice blue eyes grew
distant with the memory. “My master served the earl of Cumbria, on the Scottish
borders. My first introduction into battle was against none other than William
Wallace himself.”

Aubrielle had heard of the Scots
hero.  The monks used to speak of him and his blasphemous fight against the
English.

“It must have been a fearsome
experience.”

“It was. Wallace’s men fought and
died for him like rabid dogs. If nothing else, battling the Scots taught me the
true meaning of loyalty. I admired Wallace’s ability to garner that.”

“You admire a rebel?”

Kenneth looked at her, knowing
she had only heard the English version of the battle for Scotland’s
independence. He had seen it all first hand.

“Wallace was a patriot,” he said
simply. “If England was under occupation, I cannot say that I would so easily
accept it without putting up a fight.  Wallace did what any good Scot would do;
he resisted. But he was blinded by his patriotic ambitions. He did not have the
experience to realize that he had neither the support of the Scottish barons
nor the strength of arms to accomplish this against Edward Longshanks.”

Aubrielle took a sip of her
drink, sitting on the bed beside him. “But he died a traitor’s death. He was
captured and killed for his resistance. Though you admire a man’s ability to
earn his countrymen’s loyalties, do you also admire the futility of his
convictions?”

He sat there, gazing at her
lovely face, his mind churning up memories he had long forgotten. “I admire the
man’s strength. His convictions would not have been futile had they succeeded.”

“You speak as if you see nothing
wrong with rebellion and treachery.”

He set the cup aside, his manner
calm and quiet. “My lady, I am as loyal to England as any man alive and more
so. You see, when I was fifteen, my master, a knight by the name of Sir Bretton
de Touvier, was sent to Scotland on a secret mission to rendezvous with another
knight by the name of Sir John de Menteith. De Menteith’s liege was the earl of
Moray, a man loyal to England.  I was present when De Menteith and my master,
among others, captured Wallace under a guise of truce.  I was also there when
Wallace was drawn and quartered. I myself took his right arm to
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, where it was mounted on the main bridge for all to see. It
is something I shall always remember, etched into my memory as if it had been
permanently burned there. I watched my master and those men loyal to Edward
betray Wallace, who had come to them with trust. At fifteen, I was very
impressionable. It is something I shall never forget.”

Aubrielle’s eyes were brimming
with surprise and horror.  She remembered thinking, once, how hard Kenneth was
behind those ice-blue eyes, as if something horrible had happened to him once
that still lingered, still hardened him.  It was something he could not let go.
Perhaps this was part of it.

“And you were a party to all of
it.”

He nodded. “I did what I was
ordered to do and what needed to be done. So you see, my lady, my loyalty to
England is beyond question. I have proven myself to the degree where the king
himself prizes my services. When I said I admired Wallace’s ability to garner
loyalty, I simply meant that it is every man’s desire to earn such devotion
from his men. It has always been my desire to emulate Wallace’s ability, no
matter what the man’s political allegiances.”

Somehow, a light conversation had
taken a heady turn. Aubrielle was amazed at Kenneth’s past, one he spoke of frankly,
without arrogance. Though she was more than curious, it seemed to her that he
did not wish to delve further into that period in his life. Though he spoke
openly, it seemed to her that deep down, talk of it disturbed him.

“Well,” she sought to change the
subject. “I can truthfully say that, as your wife, you will have my loyalty.”

His grin returned. “Loyalty, aye.
But will I have your obedience as well?”

“What do you think?”

He shook his head as if horrified
by the thought. “I think that I am in a good deal of trouble.”

She cocked an admonishing
eyebrow. “Come, now, sir knight. We are not afraid of a woman, are we?”

He folded his massive arms across
his chest, protectively. “Perhaps,” he said coyly. “I would rather face a
thousand battles like the one today than just one battle with you.”

Her expression sobered. “And I
would rather you not fight in any more battles at all. The thought of you lying
wounded like those men in the great hall…”

She trailed off, realizing she
sounded like a fool. She tried to rise, but he clamped a big hand over her arm
and would not let her stand.

“Finish your sentence.”

“No.”

“Finish it.”

She tried to free her arm, but it
was useless. “I was going to say that the thought of you lying wounded like
those men in the great hall fills me with enormous joy because by virtue of
some great gaping wound, you’ll cease to be a thorn in my side.”

She said it far too dramatically
to be convincing. Kenneth smiled at her, his grip on her arm loosening. But he
did not let her go completely. He gave a good tug and she fell forward, against
his chest. He enfolded her in his great arms, gazing down into her face as a
mother would when cradling her child.

“Your concern is touching, my
lady,” he murmured.

His face was an inch above hers.
Gazing into his ice blue eyes, Aubrielle found it difficult to breathe. She
also found that his proximity loosened her tongue tremendously.

“After we are married, do you
plan to go to war again?” she asked breathlessly.

“I am a knight. If there is a war
that concerns me, then I must fight it.”

“But… but what if I did not want
you to go to war ever again? What if I’d rather have you here, with me?”

“You’d rather have me fighting a
war here, with you?”

She scowled. “You are impossible!
That is not what I meant and you know it.”

He laughed softly. “I know it.
But I want to hear you say it.”

She growled in frustration. “Let
me up, you baboon. I shall not say anything remotely nice to you ever again.”

He snorted as she struggled. “You
are not going anywhere, my lady. Would it help if I say it for you?”

“By all means, go right ahead.
Make a fool of yourself if it suits you.”

“Very well,” he cleared his
throat. “You were going to say that the past two days has seen you fall madly,
hopelessly in love with me and you cannot bear the thought of my being killed
in battle.  You would, therefore, prefer it if I never go to war again and
remain here at Kirk, safely confined within her massive walls.”

She stopped in her struggles,
looking at him with the biggest eyes he had ever seen. His smile faded.

“What? Did I say something
wrong?”

She swallowed hard. “What if I
told you that you said everything right?”

***

“I do not recollect anything,”
Lucius looked horrible. “Why do you ask?”

Reid and Everett had corralled
the man into the great hall to access the wounded from the brief skirmish with
the Welsh. He had been given a tally of twenty-two wounded and six dead. Lucius
was less concerned for the battle he missed and the injured or dead men than he
was for the pounding in his head.

“Simple curiosity, my lord,”
Everett passed a long glance at Reid.  “We tried to wake you up for the battle,
but you would not respond. We were simply curious if you remembered anything at
all since last night.”

Lucius ran his fingers through
his dark, dirty hair. He coughed and spit onto the stones by the hearth. It was
apparent that he did not wish to respond to their question.

“Where is Kenneth?”

“The lady took the battle hard,
my lord,” Reid said. “He is attempting to calm her.”