“Drop it.” He pulled the blade, just a little, and she cried out. As blood streamed down her neck, she let her only weapon fall.
“That’s better.” Twisting his hand into her braid, he dragged her around the corner of the keep. “Now, we are going to fetch my horse and ride out of here.”
IT AS A
short, brutal fight, over before the blood could fully slake the white heat of Gunnar’s fury. When it was done and the moans of the dying had been silenced, he, Brand, and Torvald stood in the bailey, breathing hard and looking over the gore-covered things that had once been men.
“They weren’t very good fighters,” said Brand, echoing Gunnar’s thought. Brand cut a scrap of fairly clean linen off the body at his feet and used it to wipe his blade before he sheathed it, then passed the cloth to Gunnar. “We’ll deal with the bodies and meet you back at camp. Go find your lady.”
“She is not my lady.” The words tasted as bitter as they sounded. Gunnar cleaned his own sword and wiped the blood off his hands. “One of you should see to her.”
“Gunnar . . .”
“No. I will be poor company. I still want to kill something.” He put his sword away and tossed the cloth to Torvald. “I almost wish there had been more of them.”
“There were.”
“What?”
Holding the scrap of linen, Torvald turned a slow circle, frowning as he scoured the bailey. “Did one of you kill a man someplace else?”
Brand and Gunnar looked at each other and shook their heads.
“There were one and ten counting Lady Eleanor. She’s . . . wherever she is. I see only nine dead.”
Gunnar counted quickly and came up short, too.
“Shite. Eleanor. Eleanor!” He ran toward the last place he’d seen her, by the fire.
As he neared the spot, a flash of movement toward the rear of the bailey caught his eye. Gunnar ducked behind the keep and peered around the corner. He spotted Eleanor untying one of the horses; an outlaw held a sword at her back.
Not just any outlaw. Tunstall.
Gunnar signaled Torvald and Brand to send them circling around the far side of the keep to come up from behind, then flattened against the wall, where the shadows would hide him while he crept closer.
“Over by the block,” Tunstall ordered, prodding Eleanor with his sword.
There was no way Gunnar was going to let this asp ride away with Eleanor in his hands. The bastard had been ready to kill a squire for a kiss and a bit of silver. The gods only knew what he’d do to save his own life. But with that blade at Eleanor’s back . . . Gunnar said a brief prayer to Baldr to make her as quick-witted as she had been at Raby.
He stepped out into the moonlight. “Hold or die, Tunstall.”
The man turned with a start. He squinted toward Gunnar, and recognition dawned across his face. “You!”
He wrenched Eleanor away from the horse, holding her before him as a shield. Moonlight flashed off his blade as he waggled it at Gunnar, threatening. “Back away. You already cost me one prize. You won’t take this one. I’ll kill her first.”
Eleanor met Gunnar’s eyes, then moaned faintly and collapsed, seemingly having swooned away. Tunstall caught at her limp body, but it was like holding water. She oozed through his arms and pooled at his feet. With a cry of frustration, he grabbed for her.
Gunnar threw himself at Tunstall, carrying him away from Eleanor before he could touch her again. They landed amongst the horses, hooves flashing around their heads as the animals shied away. Gunnar threw the outlaw off and rolled clear, but the other man, lighter and quicker, was up and running before Gunnar could get to his feet.
Torvald and Brand ran out of the shadows behind the keep, blocking Tunstall’s escape. Snarling like a cornered fox, Tunstall whirled back toward Gunnar and rushed at him, sword held high in two hands. Gunnar parried the blow to the side, reached beneath his blade before Tunstall could recover, and thrust deep between his ribs, a quick in, twist, and out.
Tunstall froze in mid-stride and looked at Gunnar with that surprised stare men have in the instant they realize they’re dead. His sword sagged as the blood drained from his arms, and he swayed like a willow in an autumn storm. He looked down at the gaping hole in his chest where air and blood foamed together. “You have killed me.”
“I have.”
“Good.” Eleanor appeared at Gunnar’s side, her face hard. “I am not your prize,” she spat at Tunstall. “I am no man’s prize. I hope you burn in Hell.”
Fury roared up out of Tunstall’s throat, giving him a last burst of strength. He lifted his sword to strike. Gunnar shoved Eleanor aside and blocked the blow, then struck. Tunstall’s guts spilled and he collapsed, dead.
Brand threaded his way between the horses and took a look at Tunstall, then at Eleanor, standing white-faced behind Gunnar. “Get her away from here, Gunnar. It is not the place for a woman.”
“I told you, I cannot.” He spoke in Norse. “You take her, Torvald.”
“Gunnar . . .”
“Take her,” snapped Gunnar. He couldn’t. She wasn’t his, and if he held her before him on a horse the way he had on May Day, so long ago, he would never be able to send her back to her husband. “I will follow after we are done.”
Shaking his head, Torvald stepped forward. “My lady. Come with me.”
Eleanor ignored the hand he offered and stepped around Gunnar to look down at the body. Her eyes were hooded, her face as blank as a death mask. She stood there for a moment, then turned away and walked off, stiff backed. She got about a dozen steps before she stopped. Her shoulders sagged and she covered her face with her hands and began to cry.
In three steps, Gunnar was at her side, scooping her up, holding her, sheltering her. She curled against him and clutched at his bloodied shirt, trying to say something, but the words came out so muddled with tears he couldn’t understand.
“. . . dead . . .” he thought he heard. “. . . couldn’t . . . Henry . . .”
“
Shh.
You are safe. I have you.” He kissed the top of her head, and she sobbed harder.
Torvald gave him a nod. “I’ll get your horse.”
“Just bring him when you come back,” said Gunnar, and carried her home.
By the time he waded through the creek at the bottom of the dene, Eleanor had stopped crying and started shaking. He’d expected she would. He’d seen enough men get the shakes after the heat of battle faded—had even suffered them himself a few times—to know they were coming and that they were no sign of weakness. Eleanor might not have borne weapons, but she had fought a battle, the gods only knew for how long, and now that it was over and she was safe, the strain was catching her unawares.
“You need something warm in you and then a sound sleep,” he said as he settled her on a stool beside the dead fire and draped a blanket over her shoulders. “I’ll be as quick as I can.”
She nodded, and he went to work, gathering his flint and steel and laying a fire in the thin light that filtered through the mouth of the cave. Despite working mostly by feel, he soon had a good ember, and he tipped it into the tinder and breathed over it until the flame flared to life.
“It is y-you.”
Her whispered exclamation made him look up. She was staring at him, eyes round and bright as silver pennies in her ghost-white face.
“Aye, it is,” he said gently. He so much wanted to hold her, comfort her, kiss away the fresh tears that trickled down her cheeks. Instead, he fed a few twigs and sticks into the fire. “Did you doubt it?”
“I j-j-j-ust . . .” She surrendered to the chattering of her teeth and simply shook her head and pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders.
Gunnar kept adding small wood until the fire burned hot and true, then added three fat logs to keep it going and make enough coals for proper cooking later. He sloshed a good measure of the wine Brand had brought into a kettle and nestled the pot into the space between the logs to warm. “I don’t have spices to mull this properly, but it will do you good anyway.”
He got no answer, and when he turned to look, Eleanor was lost in the fire, barely blinking at whatever she saw in the flames. He sat back on his heels and took a good look at her now that he had enough light. Other than a shallow cut on her neck that had already stopped bleeding, she appeared unharmed.
Thanks belonged to Jafri for that. If he hadn’t seen her, if Ari hadn’t brought the message, if Torvald hadn’t been there, if Brand and he hadn’t . . .
His own hands began to shake as he considered the many ways this night could have gone sour.
What the devil was she doing out here? How had she fallen into Tunstall’s hands? Where were the men who should have been protecting her?
He had a hundred questions—and no right to ask them, any more than he had the right to reach across the narrow space between them and brush that tear-dampened wisp of hair off her cheek.
Those rights belonged to her husband, the careless fool who had let her wander into danger. Had he made her Countess of Gloucester yet? he wondered, that prick of a husband she would return to.
Anger propelled Gunnar to his feet. He grabbed the leathern pail, muttered something about needing water, and escaped out into the night.
He filled the pail, then stripped off his blood-spattered gown and anchored it in the edge of the stream with a heavy stone so the current might wash away the stains, then plunged his head into the water as well, in the hopes it might carry away some of the darkly possessive desire that seethed inside him.
It helped. When he hauled the water back inside, his head was indeed clearer and the wine had begun to steam. Eleanor, however, still sat staring. He placed the pail near the fire to take the chill off the water, then poured some wine.
“My lady?” Nothing. “Eleanor.”
She flinched and came partway back from wherever she was to meet his eyes.
He held out the wine. “Drink. It will help.”
She nodded and cupped the bowl between two hands. She still shook badly, but she managed a sip, and then another, and then she heaved a great sigh, drained the bowl in one long draught, and held it out. “More.”
“I told you it would help.” He poured more, and watched her drink that, too, though considerably more slowly, and when she’d finished, he took the bowl, dampened a clean cloth, and offered it to her, indicating the side of her neck. “You are hurt.”
Eleanor touched the wound, wincing, but didn’t seem to register what she should do with the cloth.
Gunnar hesitated, unwilling to step right back into temptation when he’d only just escaped it, but in the end, he took away her wine and set to work, gently tipping her head to the side so he could daub away the blood without reopening the wound.
By the time he’d wiped the tear streaks off her cheeks, the wine was making her sag and yawn and his senses were so full of her he could hardly bear it. He tossed the cloth aside and tugged her to her feet. “Come, my lady.”
“Where?”
“To bed.” He caught her as she swayed. “Before you fall over.”
He led her a few steps to the recess where he slept, when he bothered to sleep. He’d built a rough bed years ago, a simple frame of pegged logs and netted rope that served to keep a straw pallet off the damp floor, but which could be broken down and hidden away when he and Jafri moved elsewhere. It was not the sort of fine bed she was used to, but it had blankets and furs and a mattress of sweet grass hay. She would be warm in it, and she would be safe, and that was what mattered for now.
Gunnar flipped back the furs and motioned for her to sit, then knelt before her to unbuckle her boots.
Tugging them off unbalanced her. She reached out to steady herself, and her hand flattened against his bare chest. For all that she shivered, her fingers burned like hot irons, marking his flesh as hers. Gunnar closed his eyes, struggling to remember his place, to remember she wasn’t his and couldn’t be, to muster the will to turn away. But as he won, as he started to pull away, he heard a quiet plea.
“Don’t go.”
“I go nowhere but the fire.” He pried her fingers off his skin and pressed her back onto the bed. It was all he could do not to follow her down. “Close your eyes, my lady. Rest.”
She stared at him a moment, then her eyes drifted shut. An instant later, they popped open. “I c-cannot. He is there, inside my h-head.”
“He is dead.”
“They are all dead. His men. My men. My waiting woman. All of them. And it is my fault.” Her voice slurred with exhaustion and wine and the threat of fresh tears. “If you hold me, maybe I won’t see their faces. Or him.”
Hold her? He couldn’t. He mustn’t. “My lady, I—”
“Please.”
That single, bereft word went straight to Gunnar’s soul, breaking him, shredding his resolve. With a groan of surrender, he lay down beside her and wrapped his arms around her. Three long years turned to smoke.
She burrowed against his chest, weeping in earnest. He could do nothing but hold her and let her cry until her tears went dry and she fell silent, then longer, until her breathing said she slept.