Lady Danger (The Warrior Maids of Rivenloch, Book 1) (25 page)

Deep within a storeroom of the keep, Miriel hushed the children and their mothers, ever vigilant for the sound of a battering ram.  As long as the outer walls were secure, she knew, they would be safe.  And if Sung Li had successfully slipped out the front gates, help would arrive within a day.

Meanwhile, she would do as Sung Li had advised and listen for sounds of invasion, for if the siege turned into a full-scale attack, if Rivenloch’s security was breached, she might be forced to disclose one of the castle’s most closely guarded secrets.

Failing that, Miriel had one other option.  She eyed the small cache of weapons she’d stowed in the corner of the storeroom—her sais, tonfas, kamas, and nunchakus.  If the need arose for close combat, she wouldn’t hesitate to use them.  She’d have a lot of explaining to do later, but at least she’d be alive to do it.

High atop the curtain wall in full armor now, Helena loped past the archers she’d stationed at vantage points along the eastern perimeter.  So far, she thought, the English were focused on only the west side of the castle, but that could change at any time.  It was essential that the archers watch for small bands of sappers.

She smiled in grim satisfaction as she gazed down the long row of attentive sentries.  At least
these
men didn’t gainsay her every command, unlike the bullheaded Norman she’d held captive for the last several days.

She bit her lip, wondering what had become of Colin.  She hoped, after all the pains she’d gone to caring for him, defending him, helping him limp back to Rivenloch, that he wouldn’t do something foolish and get himself killed.

He had a lot of audacity, thinking he could order her into the keep along with the other helpless females.  Hadn’t he discovered anything from their escapades?  Didn’t he realize she wasn’t an ordinary wench, but a Maid of Rivenloch?  Couldn’t he accept that she was just as worthy a warrior as his own fellows?

Colin du Lac had much to learn about Helena of Rivenloch.  That much was certain.  She only hoped he’d live long enough to be taught.

Colin winced as pain shot through his thigh.  Sweat dampened his brow as he ascended the steps of the western tower of the outer wall, leaning heavily against the rough stone.  He still hadn’t found Helena’s father, but at the slug’s pace he was forced to, the old man likely outdistanced him at every turn.  Colin was clearly not the man for this task, not with his half-healed leg.  But at the moment he was glad of the distraction, for all he could think about was Helena and her stubborn insistence on participating in the battle.

God, she was a wayward wench.  Once she put her mind to something, it seemed neither common sense nor wild chargers could sway her from her course.  It had been so with abducting him.  No matter how he reasoned with her, assuring her that her sister wouldn’t suffer at Pagan’s hands, warning her that Pagan’s justice would be harsh if she insisted on ransoming him, persuading her that all would be forgiven if they returned safely, she wouldn’t listen.

Of course, her tenacity had also saved his life.  She’d been uncommonly brave in the face of grave peril.  Indeed, he might have bled to death were it not for her determination to keep her hostage alive.

But this...this was different.  There was an entire army out there, and no matter how invincible she believed she was, her flesh was still mortal.  Mortal and vulnerable and...and as smooth as fine silk.

He furrowed his brow, cursing the lusty thoughts that drifted through his mind too frequently of late.  After all, he didn’t
love
the wench.  She was amusing, aye, and attractive.  Desirable.  And fascinating.  But she was trouble.  Besides, if she continued living so dangerously, with no care for her own safety, she’d not last out the siege.

He staggered against the wall as another pain streaked through him.  This one, however, pierced not his leg, but his heart.

Directly above Colin, at the top of the outermost tower of the castle wall, the Lord of Rivenloch listened to his beloved Edwina.  She was calling him, calling for help.  A sob clotted in his throat, and tears rolled down his cheeks, for no matter where he wandered, he couldn’t seem to find her.

“Edwina, my love,” he called, his voice grating with despair.

She wept softly, and he tried to discern the source of the sound.  But it seemed to envelop him, coming from everywhere and nowhere, and he spun slowly around and around, gazing upon nothing but empty gray stone.

He felt helpless, so helpless.  He pulled at his hair in frustration, straining to hear, but now it seemed only the rain murmuring upon the stone sill.

He plodded to the window and peered through the arrow slit.  Upon the knoll before the castle, an army had gathered.  They were not Rivenloch’s soldiers, nor were they the knights belonging to the Norman.  He wondered from whence these new men had come.  He gazed at the strange company with a sense of detachment, as if he watched preparations for a Christmas play.  They had some wooden thing, he saw, that looked like a giant child’s toy.  He absently scratched his head as they blocked the wheels into place and fussed with the various ropes and protrusions.  Then several men hefted a great chunk of rock onto the platform at the back.

As if from Thor’s hand, a hail of fiery arrows suddenly descended from the heavens to kill the great wooden beast.  But the flames instantly sputtered out, drowned by the downpour.

Then, like a loosed crossbow, the toy sprang with such violence and speed that he barely glimpsed the missile catapulting toward him.  The rock hit the tower, impacting with a deep thud, then an ominous crack, shuddering the stones beneath him and dropping him to his knees.

Like a bone-jarring roll of thunder, the rock around him rumbled and quaked loose with an unholy roar.  Before his eyes, the western half of the tower crumbled away, and he could do no more than huddle on his hands and knees, cling to the oak planking of the floor, and watch the walls disintegrate.  Wet wind suddenly whipped his hair and stung his face, and he squinted against the abrupt brilliance of the open sky.

He must have displeased the gods, he decided as the rain pelted him like angry tears.  The devastation around him was clearly the work of Thor’s hammer.

Deirdre’s hand tightened on the wet stone of the parapet as she watched the far west tower collapse, along with the section of the wall walk connecting it.  Her heart stopped, and she could suck no air into her lungs.  She’d beheld the arm of the trebuchet as it flung its burden with incredible force, but she’d never imagined the powerful blow it would deal—the earthshaking impact of the rock and the deep, gaping wound it would leave.

All around her, the Rivenloch men stood in mute awe, clutching their bows with white knuckles, though such weapons now seemed as useless as a feather against a sword.

For the first time in her life, fear and doubt made sweat trickle at the back of her neck.  These were no mere mortals with blades they battled, but a monster fashioned upon Lucifer’s forge.  How could they hope to triumph against such a machine?

Despair lurked over her shoulder like a carrion crow, eager for the spoils of war, threatening to consume her before she was even defeated.

Then she glanced over at Pagan, who gazed out at the enemy with a fierce glare and a clenched jaw.  He was not vanquished.  Far from it.  Pagan of Cameliard would not surrender.  He would
never
surrender.  Even if that damned trebuchet flung a rock straight at his belly, he’d die facing the English with a raised fist and a defiant sneer.

How could she be any less brave?

Inspired by him, Deirdre of Rivenloch straightened her spine and steeled her nerves, loosening her grip on the wall and clenching a fist instead around the pommel of her new sword.  “Hold your fire!” she shouted to the archers, surprised at the steadiness of her voice.

The walls were still crumbling, sending up white plumes of dust and rubble, as the English prepared to strike again.  The soldiers held their ground.  They didn't need to advance on foot, not when they wielded such a formidable weapon.  She studied their position, the trajectory of the trebuchet.

“Will they aim for the same tower?” she asked over the drumming of the rain.

Rauve nodded.  “Aye, to make a point of entry.”

“Good.  A single point is easy to defend.  We’ll move the men-at-arms there.”

“‘Twill be easy” Pagan agreed gravely, “unless they move the trebuchet.”

She lowered grim brows.  “Then let’s kill them while we can.”

Pagan frowned.  He didn’t intend to allow Deirdre into the thick of battle, no matter how much she insisted, no matter how much he respected her skills, no matter how much she begged him.  It would be too distracting to him to worry about her safety while he engaged the enemy.

Besides, if it was true that she was with child...

He wouldn’t meet her eyes.  “I need you to command the archers from here.”

“But the archers are useless.”

“The rain may let up.”

“Then they will know enough to fire.”

He sighed.  “I want you up here, Deirdre.”

She was silent long enough for him to realize she knew the truth, that he didn’t intend to let her fight.  “Oh, aye,” she said bitterly, “while you’re down there risking your neck, I’ll be dancing upon the parapet, waiting for the sun to appear.”  She spat on the stones.  “This is my castle, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let a Norman—“

”Faith!” one of the archers cried.  “‘Tis the lord!”

Pagan followed the man’s gaze along the west wall to the distant tower.  Through the white haze of rising dust, he saw a figure crawling across the splintered floor at the top of the ruin.  It was Lord Gellir.  “Bloody hell.”

Beside him, Deirdre drew in a ragged gasp.

“Bloody
hell
,” he repeated.

As he watched in dread, the lord crept closer and closer to the ledge, where the rock yet trickled away.  What possessed the man to pursue his own ruin, Pagan couldn’t fathom.  Maybe his dead wife beckoned him to join her.  Whatever drove him, Pagan knew he’d never reach the lord in time.  The wall walk between them was damaged.  The only passage to the tower was through the courtyard.  But one glimpse of Deirdre frozen in horror at his side, her face a mask of helpless torment, and Pagan knew he had to try.

“Look!” Rauve shouted.

Another figure emerged upon the tower floor.  At this distance, covered in dust, bowed in fatigue, limping across the planks, he was barely recognizable.  But Pagan knew his man like he knew his own scars.  “Colin.”

The parapets silenced as everyone watched, breathless with hope.  Slowly, Colin advanced across the ruined chamber.  He appeared to converse with the lord, for the old man turned and listened for a bit.  But eventually the lord resumed his course, heading inexorably for the precipice, and Colin hesitated to follow.

“What is Colin doing?”  Deirdre demanded in a whisper.  “Why  has he stopped?”

“Their combined weight might collapse the tower.”

“But...can’t he...my father...”

Pagan shared Deirdre’s frustration, as well as a heavy measure of guilt.  He should have seen to the lord’s safety himself before he faced the enemy.  It was his fault the lord was at risk now.

Everyone watched, murmuring prayers or curses or both, as the lord inched toward the ledge.  Colin’s hands were cupped about his mouth now as he shouted over the storm, likely trying to convince the lord to come back, maybe attempting to override the voices the haunted man heard in his mind.

For a moment, as the lord stopped at the outer rim of the precipice, Pagan thought he might have at last awakened to reason, that he would now retreat.  But nay, the lord climbed to his feet there and held his arms high, as if beckoning lightning to strike and the heavens to claim him.

With the English already reloading the trebuchet, Colin could stand idle no longer.  Casting aside caution, he dove forward, catching the lord about the ankles.  But instead of tripping him, the excess weight caused the planks to slip, and the entire floor listed forward.

“Nay!” Deirdre screamed, the sound like a slash across Pagan’s heart.

The lord slid over the edge, head first, saved from plummeting to the earth only by Colin’s firm grasp upon his ankles.  But Colin couldn’t hold him long.  A ledge of rock was all that braced him against descent, and that leverage slipped with every spray of pebbles that sifted loose.

“Stay here!” Pagan barked at Deirdre.  He didn’t know what he could do for her father, didn’t even know if he could reach the west tower in time.  It was a terrible risk, one he knew better than to take.  But he had to do something.  The anguish in her face was intolerable.

He grabbed Sir Rauve by the front of his surcoat and hauled him aside, riveting him with an iron glare and biting out the words he didn't want Deirdre to hear.  "Listen.  No matter what happens, you hold this keep.  Do not negotiate for hostages.  Not me.  Not Colin.  Not Lord Gellir.  Your loyalty is to the King."

Satisfied by Rauve's grim nod, he released him.  Then he bolted down the stairs three at a time, banging his elbows on the narrow walls.  He slipped once on the wet grass of the courtyard, but charged forward, sending up sprays of sod with each desperate stride.  As he passed the armorer's shed, he snatched a coil of rope from the wall and slung it over his shoulder.

The west tower stairs were clogged with rubble.  His lungs heaving, he hauled rock out of the way, clawing at stone and choking on dust, until he could clamber through the wreckage to the next floor, certain the trebuchet would fire at any moment.  His fingers bleeding, he scrabbled at the mortar and grit, climbing higher and higher until he felt the welcome kiss of raindrops upon his head.  He scrambled up the last few steps, surfacing upon the skewed, rain-slick planks.

Thank God, Colin was still there, grasping the lord with a grip as rigid and bloodless as the Reaper’s.

“Hold on!” he shouted.

But in the next instant, a bolt like thunder pounded the earth, rattling the stones of the tower as if they were dice.  The ground beneath him trembled.  An ungodly shrieking of timber and rock echoed from the depths.  And the world turned on its edge.

Deirdre screamed.  Though the impact happened in an instant, she saw the tragedy play out with torturous sloth in her mind’s eye.

The trebuchet arm slowly shot forward, loosing its heavy burden.  The chunk of rock tumbled gracefully through the air, obliterating the raindrops as easily as swatting gnats, arcing with dark purpose toward the curtain wall of Rivenloch.  After an interminable flight, it found its target, kissing the gray stone, then sinking deep with a reverberant thud, opening another mortal wound in the tower at the second floor.  A hollow, ominous silence followed.  Then the already damaged tower above the breach lazily collapsed in a waterfall of rock and rubble and ruin.

Everything happened in a terrifying rush after that, and from Deirdre's perspective, the men looked like chess pieces flung by an angry child.  Pagan, flattened by the impact, slid across the tilting planks, his fingers scrabbling for purchase.  Momentum cast him over the edge.  He was saved only by catching hold of a splintered beam protruding from the wreckage.

Colin was thrown hard onto his back, striking his head on a rock before he, too, slipped across the floor.  When he finally came to rest, he lay silent, his body in an unnatural sprawl.  One knee snagged by chance on a chunk of stonework, or he might have fallen to his death.  If he wasn’t dead already.

Meanwhile, in a macabre imitation of the sledding Deirdre used to do on snowy slopes, her father skidded down the steep side of the disintegrating tower, turning and twisting as he rode atop the shifting rocks.

God must have watched over him the way he did drunks and fools.  By some miracle, Lord Gellir survived.  At the end of his jarring ride, though the old man lay helpless atop the rubble at the base of the destroyed tower, he yet flailed with life.

Still, he was on the enemy side of the curtain wall.  In a matter of moments the English would intercept him.  And once they discovered what a valuable hostage they held, she'd lose all leverage.

She couldn’t let that happen.

Snapping to attention, she shouted, “Archers!  Watch my back!  Rauve, take my command!”

With those orders, she fled down the stairs, scraping her heel on the bottom step, then hobbled across the courtyard toward the remains of the tower.  Helena, having left her post on the eastern wall to investigate the deafening sound, met her halfway.

“What the Devil are those bastards using?” she asked, unsheathing as she trotted beside Deirdre.  “Thor’s hammer?”  When she looked up and saw how little was left of the west tower, she skidded to a halt.  “Ballocks,” she said in awe.

“Come on!” Deirdre urged.  “We have to save Father.”

“Father?  What—“

”Hurry!”  Deirdre caught Hel’s arm and pulled her along.

Though the second impact had demolished the flooring of the tower and collapsed a good portion of the exterior wall, by sheer luck, it had also exposed what remained of the stairs, allowing them access to the top.  They scrambled heedlessly over the rubble, gouging their hands on the sharp rocks and coughing on powdery mortar.

Helena gaped at the wreckage, incredulous.  “Holy angel of...  Was father...?  Is he...?”

“He’s unhurt,” Deirdre called over her shoulder as they climbed.  “Colin climbed the steps and managed to—“

”Colin?  Colin was here?”

“Aye, but—“

”Bloody hell!”

Hel shoved past her then, as if demons snapped at her heels, ascending the winding stairs at breakneck speed.  She burst through a pile of debris blocking the passageway and emerged first from the stairwell.  Before Deirdre could shout a warning about the shifting floor, Helena gave a shrill cry, then hurtled forward to fall upon her knees beside Colin’s unmoving form.  Luckily, the planks held.

But Colin was not Deirdre’s foremost concern.  She frowned, eyeing the splintered beam protruding from the ledge that had saved Pagan’s life.  It still jutted from the rubble like the sturdy root of a tree, but no hand clasped it.  Where was Pagan?  Her heart pummeling at her ribs, she charged forward with no thought for her own safety, for once as impulsive as her sister.

She slipped on the slick planks, sliding down the sloping floor, and would have followed her father’s course to the bottom of the tower, but for that same beam.  She quickly thrust out her left arm to catch it, and a pang of agony tore through her shoulder as all of her weight wrenched against it.  Somehow she managed to grapple her way back up to the ledge, and once there, breathless with exertion, she peered down over the edge, clutching her damaged arm.

Already the sun was sinking below the horizon, behind the thickening clouds, and it was becoming difficult to see in the fading light.  But she discerned that to one side below her, secured around the stone frame of what had been an arrow slit, a rope hung taut with its burden.

Pagan.

He’d lowered himself to the ground.  She watched with halted breath as he rushed over to her father, who appeared groggy and battered, but none the worse for his dramatic landslide.  A wave of relief dizzied her.  Bless Pagan’s brave heart, he was rescuing her father.

Not far away, however, she could see the dim figures of the enemy approaching at a cautious lope.  Rivenloch’s walls were still not easily scalable, so it was not likely their intent to make a full-scale attack upon the castle yet.  But the English surely recognized from Pagan’s heroic maneuvers that the man who’d fallen from the tower might be a valuable hostage.

“They’re coming!” she shouted down to him.

He looked up at her and nodded.  Then, hauling the lord up with rough haste, he secured the rope around the old man’s waist.  “Can you pull him up?”

She wasn’t certain.  She scrambled down to where the rope was secured, but there was little leverage there.  She was strong, aye, but her father was no small man, and her injured shoulder throbbed with pain.  “Helena!  Help!”

Hel came to the edge almost at once.  She seemed distraught, her cheek wet with more than rain.  But she immediately assessed the situation, glancing at Pagan, the advancing army, and the gap closing between them.  Slithering down to where Deirdre waited, she lent her hands to the task.  Together they hauled their father up, straining against the frame, their palms slipping on the wet rope.

Meanwhile, Rivenloch arrows arced across the rain-peppered air toward the approaching enemy, felling a few.  But their numbers were too great, and the day growing too dim for accuracy.  By the time she and Helena deposited the lord safely atop the wall and loosed the rope from around him, a dozen English knights had reached the base of the outer tower.

Deirdre stared down in despair.  The rope she’d planned to toss back down to Pagan coiled uselessly at her feet.  She was too late.  The enemy had already captured him.

“Hold your fire!” she screamed to her archers, praying they could hear her.  “Hold your fire!”

Pagan didn’t fight his captors.  He was a valiant soul, but he was wise enough to know when he was outnumbered.  Deirdre felt tears of frustration well in her eyes, watching in helpless horror as they hauled him roughly to his feet.

It wasn’t fair, she thought.  It was a travesty of justice.  She wiped angrily at her tears.  Curse Lucifer!  She’d not allow it.  Not when Pagan had made such a noble sacrifice, saving her father at the peril of his own body.

“Nay!” she cried.  “Let him go, you bastards!”

He pulled back once then, wrenching his head around to answer her.  “Do not surrender the keep, no matter what!  One man is a small sacrifice.  Do not let Rivenloch fa-“