Lady Of Fire (14 page)

Throughout, Lucien prayed the horses had not been discovered. It was their only hope of escape. Even then, it would not be easy. A land journey was dangerous and would take considerable time compared to travel by ship. Worse, he would have to deal with Alessandra’s determination to remain in Algiers.

God’s rood!
he silently cursed. He almost wished she had not told him of her loathsome sire. Until then, he had been more than willing to take her to England. Now it was a struggle not to leave her behind.

What prevented him from doing just that? He knew the answer, of course—was simply loath to admit it. It was more than attraction he felt for this impetuous desert flame. What had sustained him throughout the punishment Rashid had ordered was the desire to know Alessandra beyond carnal urgings. But now…

Stay the course,
anger spoke through him,
take what she gives, for how sweet the revenge of returning her spoiled to her father.

Sweet?
his conscience railed.
Until she is infected by the Brevilles, she is one in name only, and what kind of man would you be to use her so? More, what kind of Christian? And if a child results from such a union?

Lucien’s wandering thoughts were nearly his undoing. Just in time, he caught sight of the horse loping down the street they were about to cross. He drew Alessandra back into the shadows and pressed her face to his chest.

He was surprised when she melted into him, her labored breathing evidencing her exhaustion. He had pushed her hard.

“Leave me, Lucien,” she whispered as the rider neared. “I will only slow you, and you will never know freedom. Never will you return to your beloved England.”

He lowered his mouth to her ear. “If you truly wish to remain in Algiers, here is your chance. Call to him.”

Alessandra put her head back and peered into his darkened face. It was a dare he issued, and she nearly rose to it. But she would not be the cause of his death. If she was to escape, she must do so in such a way that he would come to no further harm.

She pressed her face against his chest and waited for the rider to pass.

He did not.

The man halted his horse at the mouth of the alley and leaned forward to peer down its length. “Who is there?” he demanded in Arabic.

Lucien released her and reached inside his robes. The barely perceptible glint of light on steel revealed a dagger.

The man ahead dismounted, drew his sword, and stepped forward.

There would be bloodshed, Alessandra knew. As soon as the man’s eyes adjusted to the dark, he would see them.

In the next instant, Lucien pushed her against the wall, lunged forward, and fell upon the man.

Clasping her arms to her chest, Alessandra watched the two shadows become one, heard their grunts and curses, could not discern who had the advantage.

“Dear Lord,” she breathed, “do not see Lucien harmed.”

The men crashed to the ground where the struggled continued until one rose victorious and moved toward her.

Alessandra took a tentative step forward. “Is it you, Lucien?”

He took hold of her arm. “I hope you are not disappointed.”

Suppressing the impulse to throw her arms around him, she allowed herself to be guided around the silent form that lay in the alley.

“Is he dead?” she asked.

“I may be a De Gautier,” he muttered, “but I am not so cruel as to leave a man suffering.”

Shortly, he lifted her onto the dead man’s horse and swung up behind her.

“We might be seen,” she said over her shoulder. “Would it not be better to continue on foot?”

“’Tis a necessary risk. Once Rashid’s men are spread over the city, we will not be able to reach the horses.”

Those left behind that were provisioned for the land journey they must now make.

The alleys being too narrow and cluttered for the large animal, Lucien negotiated the streets, proceeding with caution and traversing side streets when other riders approached.

After what felt like an eternity, they were finally free of the city and, it seemed, all hope of her escaping Lucien de Gautier.

All through that day and into the night, they rode, pausing only to refresh the horses and share the food Khalid had packed for them.

Few words passed between them, Alessandra keeping grief at bay with imaginings of revenge upon Leila, his thoughts likely upon keeping hold of his newfound freedom.

Not until the sun rose on the second day did they stop for rest, Lucien having determined it best if, henceforth, they traveled by night to elude their pursuers. Though they had followed the caravan routes heading west, he now turned the horses north to the sanctuary offered by the rocky Mediterranean coast. It was there, in one of many caves, they bedded down to await the coming of night.

“I am cold,” Alessandra finally admitted to one of two reasons her body could not sink into the sleep it desperately needed. Though the effort required to suppress memories of her mother’s death was more weighty than the chill pervading her limbs, it was not something of which she would speak.

When her words were met with silence, she asked, “Lucien, are you awake?”

Across the dim, she heard him sigh. “I am.”

She rose and, taking her blanket with her, crossed to where he lay and knelt beside him. “I am cold.”

Though it was midmorning, the cave had not warmed, nor was it likely to for some time considering its west-facing location on the rocky shore.

Lucien looked up at her, but there was not enough light to distinguish his features. “What do you want?”

Resenting his deliberate obtuseness, she said, “Do you wish me to beg?”

“A Breville beg? Never.”

Weary of being associated with a family she did not know, she snapped, “I am not responsible for things in which I have had no hand.”

He levered onto an elbow, reached up, and pressed fingers to the pulse in her throat. “Yours is the same blood.”

She shoved his hand away and started to rise, but he caught her arm. “You have not yet told me what you want.”

“I want naught from you! If you are going to hate me for being a Breville, I shall hate you for being a De Gautier.”

“Thus has it long been between our families,” he said and pulled her atop his chest. “Would you like me to warm you, Lady Alessandra?”

Her pride urged her to retreat, but the moment his heat seeped through her clothing, she was lost. Slowly, she relaxed, savoring his warmth while wishing his arms had lost their previous appeal.

After a time, he shifted her down against his side, tugged his blanket from beneath her, and drew it over her. “Sleep now,” he said. “We have a long ride ahead of us this night.”

Head pillowed on his shoulder, she closed her eyes. However, sleep was elusive, this time due to her awareness of him.

“Why must we be enemies, Lucien?” she asked. “There is no ill between us.”

“You are wrong. You and your mother deceived me.”

“I did not do so knowingly. I knew nothing of my mother’s plans, and do not forget that you deceived me in pretending to be a eunuch.” Which he was not at all. Of that she was now certain.

“We deceived each other,” he said, “which is what our families have been doing for the past one hundred twenty-five years.”

That long, she mused. “It must end sometime.”

“Not likely in my time.”

“Why?”

He was slow to answer, but when he did, he sounded weary. “Alessandra, there is so much you do not know, nor understand.”

“Then tell me of it.”

“You will learn soon enough.”

“Was my family responsible for your enslavement?” As the Brevilles thought the De Gautiers were responsible for her mother’s disappearance, it followed they might have retaliated in kind.

Bitter laughter answered her. “That is a burden I alone carry.”

“Tell me.”

After a long silence, he said, “What do you know of the war between England and France?”

Though it was a subject much removed from everyday life in the Maghrib—the coastal portion of North Africa that included Algiers—Alessandra’s mother had kept apprised of the long-standing conflict and occasionally spoken of it.

The backs of her eyes pricking as a vision of Sabine rose before her, she forced her thoughts to the war.

It had come about when the English laid claim to the French throne during the last century. Though it had not been a continuous war, for the most part, England had been victorious throughout. Only recently had it met its downfall. Now, it seemed, France would remain a separate country under the rule of a French king, and England would have to content itself with its island kingdom.

She shrugged. “It is a war that looks to have finally been lost by the English.”

“Aye, a foolish war that should have ended more than a hundred years ago.”

“You fought in it?”

“I did.”

“Why?”

“Pride, arrogance. Thus, I crossed the channel to fight for a king who does not know his own feeble mind.”

“You speak of Henry the Sixth?”

“The same.”

“What happened?”

“What happened was Lord John Talbot, the Earl of Shrewsbury. The old man was impetuous—reckless. At Castillon, I and another tried to convince him to forgo the frontal attack he insisted upon, at least until our infantry arrived, but he would not listen.”

 
The strategies of war meant little to Alessandra. Though she was versed in many subjects, owing to her mother’s carefully devised studies, war had not been covered in detail. “Why would the earl not listen?”

He snorted. “If the English have a failing, it is that of stubbornness. It prevents them from knowing when the game is lost.”

“It was lost at Castillon?”

“It was lost long before then.”

“Then of what import is Castillon?”

“Talbot died, along with nearly all those who fought for him. They were blown apart by the French artillery. Like rain, their life’s blood sprayed upon the battlefield.”

Alessandra’s imagination painting the scene for her, she pressed nearer him. “How did you survive?”

“I fell with the others, but mine was not a mortal wound, and I rose again to take up my sword against the French.”

“Did you kill anyone?”

“Aye, one of them the eldest son of a duke. For that, I was sold into slavery following my capture.”

“You were not ransomed?”

“Not by the French. The duke vowed I would suffer a fate worse than death, and it nearly was. Only after I was sold into slavery and had served several months on a galley did the captain attempt to ransom me. Then…”

“Then?”

He shook his head. “You wanted to know how I became a slave. That is all there is.”

“That is not all. Why did your family not pay the ransom to bring you home?”

Lucien ground his teeth. It was a question to which he also wished to know the answer. When the ransom demand had been sent, he had thought his freedom assured. The long, agonizing months of waiting had finally brought news that the payment of monies had been denied. It had made as little sense then as it did now.

Why would his father, with whom he had been close, refuse to pay a ransom he could afford? True, he had been against his eldest son defending the English claim to the French throne, but that had been the extent of their disagreement. What had transpired at Falstaff to change that?

“Lucien?” Alessandra touched his cheek.

Hardening his jaw against the sensation her fingertips roused, he said, “I do not know why the ransom was refused, but I shall discover the reason.”

She slid her hand down, laid it to his chest. “Perhaps your family did not have enough money to pay it.”

“My family does not want for anything.” He was unable to keep anger from his voice. “The De Gautiers are as prosperous as the Brevilles.”

“Unless something changed that.”

Why did she defend his family? Resenting that she did not behave like those he had been reared to despise, he said, “Go to sleep, Alessandra.”

She fell quiet—for a time. “Tell me of the cross burned into the bottom of your foot.”

As he had suspected, she had seen it the night she had crouched at his feet in his quarters. He drew a deep breath. “We have not many hours ere we ride again.”

She slid her hand up his neck, over his jaw, and traced the scar on his face.

“What of this, Lucien?”

“Cease!” He gripped her hand and lowered it.

“I would know,” she beseeched.

He had no intention of speaking of it, and would not have had he not been struck by the thought that if she knew how cruel and deadly the world outside the harem was, she might think better of escape.

“The scar on my face is the symbol of the Islamic faith—the crescent.” Though he strove to speak matter-of-factly, he could hear the bitterness in his voice. “It and a hundred lashes were the reward for my second attempt to escape the galley where I was enslaved.”

She shuddered. “It was intentional, then.”

“As intentional as Rashid’s sentence.”

“And the cross?”

He could not keep his muscles from bunching. “Punishment for my third attempt.”

“Why a cross? Why the sole of your foot?”

“Can you not guess?”

She shook her head against his shoulder. “I am afraid to.”

“I was branded that I might forever trample the symbol of my faith.”

She caught her breath. “And forever display your enemy’s upon your face.”

Lucien saw again the cutter’s dagger, the man’s smile, his glittering black eyes the moment before the blade drew the crescent. He saw the red, glowing poker and felt the searing pain as it was applied to the bottom of his foot. The scarred flesh of his back crawled as he recalled all the times his defiance had earned him the whip. In those moments, he lived again the rage that had fired his being and kept him barely sane throughout the ordeal.

He had not cried out, had not begged for mercy as many of those before and after him had done. Though his stubbornness had angered his captors, earning him greater punishment, he had not yielded.

Softly, Alessandra said, “I am sorry that my people—”