Love Above All (28 page)

Before Royce had a chance to call his people
to a halt or issue any orders, the Scots drew their swords, a
motion Fionna heard, rather than seeing it. An instant later,
raising a fierce battle cry, Murdock’s company attacked.

Fionna was using one hand to shield her eyes
from the sun’s bright glare. Despite the helmet that covered part
of Murdoch’s face, she quickly recognized him in the forefront,
brandishing his huge broadsword as he charged directly for Quentin.
Gillemore was riding at his brother’s left shoulder, heading for
Royce. On Murdoch’s right side Colum loomed bareheaded, his dull
brown hair tied back to keep it out of his eyes, his unshaven face
split by a wide grin that showed his broken and discolored
teeth.

Fionna heard Janet’s cry of horror as she
recognized her betrothed. Knowing Janet would be terrified by
Colum’s appearance, Fionna wheeled her horse to the left, trying to
reach her sister, who was only a few feet behind her. She was
prevented by the swirl of battling men and by Braedon, who was
stationed on her right side.

“No!” Braedon shouted at her. “Don’t go
there. You’ll be killed.” Lunging toward her, he caught the bridle
of Fionna’s horse and attempted to lead her out of the crush of
struggling men and horses. The Scots were sweeping down the line of
Royce’s people, yelling and hacking away at their opponents with a
bloodthirsty abandon that appalled Fionna.

“You don’t understand,” she cried, struggling
to free herself from Braedon’s restraint. “I have to get to
Janet!”

She knew Cadwallon would protect Janet with
his very life, but Colum was a brute and a bully. He would not
fight fairly. Janet was going to need her sister’s help in addition
to Cadwallon’s aid. While she pulled at Braedon’s fingers, trying
to make him release her horse, Fionna heard Colum’s glad shout.

“Why, look ye, lads, here’s me wee bridie,
just awaitin’ fer me ta tak’ her inta me lovin’ arms. Come ta me,
Janet, lassie!”

With a roar of fury Cadwallon shoved his
horse in front of Colum and struck hard with his broadsword before
Colum could reach Janet. Fionna saw Cadwallon deftly parry a wicked
swing of Colum’s sword. Then the two men were lost to her
sight.

“Janet!” she screamed. “Braedon, help her, or
give me a weapon and let me help her.”

“I’ll do it. You stay here,” Braedon ordered
her. By this time he had succeeded in dragging Fionna’s horse to a
spot a little apart from the contest. He didn’t release his grip on
the bridle until she and the horse were partially concealed by a
clump of bushes. Then he issued the abrupt kind of order no squire
ought ever to give a lady. “Don’t move! Stay where you are and pray
your brothers don’t notice you. I’ll find Janet and bring her to
you.”

With that, Braedon was gone, leaving Fionna
torn between trying to help Janet, and trying to find Quentin. She
told herself Janet now had two dependable men – and probably more
than that – striving to protect her from Colum. As for Quentin, he
was wearing his chainmail and she had seen him shortly before the
Scots appeared, riding along the path with his mail coif pulled up
to protect his head. The men-at-arms spoke with great respect of
Quentin’s prowess on the battlefield. Surely, he would survive the
fray.

Her efforts to calm and reassure herself
weren’t working. From the place where Braedon had left her, she
couldn’t see Quentin. Or Royce, either. She couldn’t see much of
anything. She could hear, though, and the noise was deafening. Men
shouted threats at their opponents, or cried out when they were
wounded. Weapons clashed, blade upon thrusting blade. Horses
neighed continually.

Never before had Fionna been so close to
warfare, and she found the scene thoroughly confusing. The action
was too fast for her to follow the individual combatants. All she
could see was a tangle of rearing horses and slashing weapons,
steaming male bodies and dust rising from the horses’ hooves – and
glaring red-gold sunlight that kept getting in her eyes and
blinding her. The smell of blood and sweat was sickening. And the
noise went on and on, never lessening, never ceasing.

“Quentin, where are you?” With one hand above
her eyes to shut out the sun’s glare, Fionna stood up in her
stirrups, trying to get a better look. She saw Royce handily
fighting off Gillemore’s maladroit attack. Untrained in weaponry
though she was, still she could recognize poor swordplay when she
watched it, and she was certain Gillemore wasn’t going to win the
contest against Royce’s obviously superior skills.

Then she saw Quentin. He was just beyond
Royce, engaged in combat with Murdoch. As usual, Murdoch wasn’t
dealing honestly. He ducked under Quentin’s raised arm to slash,
not the man, but the horse. With a scream of pain that rose over
all the other sounds of battle, Quentin’s mount stumbled to its
knees.

Fionna was scarcely aware that she had left
the shelter of the bushes and was riding toward the two men. She
had no thought of what she was going to do; she only knew she had
to stop Murdoch before he killed Quentin. Urging her horse forward
without regard for her own safety, she skirted the fringes of the
battle scene until she reached the front line, the place on the
road where the combatants had first met.

And all the time, she kept her gaze on
Quentin, for he was the lodestar guiding her, drawing her onward.
With the sun now behind her, she watched with terrifying clarity
while Quentin rolled off his bleeding horse’s back, to land on his
feet with his sword still in his hand, though his shield lay under
the dying horse. Without his shield only the strength of his sword
arm protected him from Murdoch’s determination to kill him.

Fionna saw Murdoch grin and reach outward
from the saddle, striking at Quentin from above. Steel blade met
steel blade, the blow sending sparks flying. Fionna could see how
Quentin was trying to pull Murdoch off his horse. Bending far to
one side as he was, Murdoch was unbalanced before Quentin grabbed
him, but miraculously he kept his seat.

Fionna’s horse stumbled over a body and she
almost lost her own seat. By the time she had righted herself and
controlled the frightened animal, she couldn’t see Quentin any
longer. But she could see Murdoch. He looked horribly, dreadfully,
happy. His face was one big grin and he was bellowing a wild and
bloodthirsty song, a tune she’d heard too many times in the past,
when Murdoch was in his cups. He sounded as drunk now as he ever
did in the hall at Dungalash. Either he had already killed Quentin,
or he was about to do so.

Feeling sick, Fionna forced her unwilling
mount around a pair of blood-covered men who were hacking at each
other, though they could barely stand any longer.

“Quentin!” she cried, knowing he probably
couldn’t hear her – if he was still alive to hear. “Quentin, where
are you?”

At last she found him again. He still held
his sword, but he was down on one knee, with blood flowing from a
gash in his thigh, and he was struggling mightily to rise to his
feet. Above him loomed Murdoch, still on horseback, with his sword
arm lifted, poised to strike. Fionna heard her brother’s cruel
laugh and knew Murdoch’s next stroke would lop Quentin’s head from
his body.

“Nooo!” She didn’t hesitate, didn’t stop to
think, or look elsewhere for help. She knew without pausing to
think that if she didn’t stop Murdoch, no one else would reach
Quentin soon enough to save him.

She kicked her horse hard and rode straight
for Murdoch. As she rode she shrieked aloud her rage at him, for
all the terrible things he had done to her and to Janet, and for
the dreadful, intolerable crime he was about to commit.

Through his bloodlust Murdoch heard her and
turned his head toward the sound of her voice. For just an instant
he went perfectly still with the shock of seeing her. His mouth
dropped open in surprise and his raised sword arm slumped a
little.

“What’s this?” Murdoch yelled at her. “Are ye
still livin’, then? Weel, it won’t be fer lang.”

Guessing that Murdoch hadn’t completely
recovered from his amazement at the sight of her, Fionna seized her
advantage. She kicked her feet out of the stirrups and launched
herself off her horse and onto Murdoch, grabbing his helmet,
knocking it off so she could scratch his face and stick her fingers
into his eyes.

“Let go, ye she-devil!” Murdoch shouted at
her. Swiftly he brought his arm down to clip the side of her face
with the hilt of his sword.

Stars swam before Fionna’s eyes, but she held
on, clutching Murdoch’s greasy hair, kicking and scratching and
screaming at him until she succeeded where Quentin had failed, and
pulled her brother out of the saddle. She went with him, and
Murdoch had the wits to turn as he fell, so she landed beneath him,
with the breath knocked out of her by his weight.

Murdoch recovered first. He straddled Fionna,
one knee on either side of her legs so she couldn’t kick him again,
and then he raised his sword, pointing it at her like a huge
dagger, with both of his hands on the hilt. Fiery red sunlight
reflected off the lifted blade.

“I thought I’d killed ye weeks ago,” Murdoch
said, his pale blue eyes glittering with rage and hatred. “But now
I’ll see ye dead for certain before this day ends. Nay, I’ll see ye
dead before yer heart beats thrice more. Say a prayer, lassie.”

Murdoch’s sword descended with what seemed to
Fionna amazing slowness. She tried to twist to one side to avoid
the blow, but Murdoch was holding her lower body immobilized, so
she couldn’t move far.

Fionna watched with detached interest as
Murdoch stabbed her. It didn’t hurt at all. She had twisted away
just enough that the blade missed her heart. It was going to take a
second blow to finish her off. When Murdoch lifted his sword again
she noticed with the same cool detachment that the blade was
stained with her blood.

Suddenly, belatedly, her body reacted to the
wound Murdoch had already inflicted. An incredible pain lanced
through Fionna’s left arm and her side, pain that was searing hot
and icy cold at the same time. In its terrible grip she could not
move to try to save herself.

“How very odd,” she whispered, and waited
patiently for Murdoch to stab her again. She wished he’d hurry and
end her pain; her eyesight was beginning to blur and she was so
cold she’d be shivering violently if she weren’t already paralyzed
and dying. But as long as Murdoch was preoccupied with her, he’d
leave Quentin alone.

Then a furious, wordless roar assaulted her
ears, a shout so loud and so agonized that it banished her cool,
distant detachment, turning paralyzed indifference to abject
terror. A mailed hand seized Murdoch’s sword, wrenching it from his
grip. A chainmail-clad arm encircled Murdoch’s throat.

Fionna thought Murdoch’s heavy weight was
lifted off her body, but she couldn’t be sure. She seemed to be
floating slightly above the ground, and all the noises around her
were sounding more and more far away and indistinct. Blessedly, the
pain was receding, too. She was aware of someone bending over her
but, with her dim eyesight, she couldn’t see who it was. She felt
something wet falling onto her cheek, like hot raindrops, which was
strange, because she was so cold. Then she heard a voice that came
to her fading senses like a soft whisper, though some part of her
mind recognized it as a shout of despair.

“Fionna!”

Quentin
, she thought, very calmly.
Good, he’s still alive. I must warn him about Murdoch.
But
when she tried, she couldn’t utter a single word.

* * * * *

“Get him out of my sight,” Royce ordered his
men-at-arms, two of whom restrained Murdoch while a third bound his
wrists behind him. To Murdoch he added, “If your sister dies, I’ll
cut your throat myself. You won’t have to wait for Quentin to
return with your brother.”

Murdoch’s only response was a mouthful of
spittle that landed just short of Royce’s boot. Royce jerked his
head and his men dragged Murdoch away.

“Keep Murdoch separate from his remaining
men,” Royce instructed Sir William, who had come running up to ask
about the disposition of prisoners. There weren’t many prisoners.
Unlike their leaders, most of the Scots had fought bravely to the
death. “William, please tell me Colum is among the dead. Life will
be much happier for Janet if he is.”

“I’m sorry to say, he’s still alive.
Cadwallon has him trussed up like a suckling pig at Christmastime.
It seems he tried to run Cadwallon through from behind, and
Cadwallon did not react kindly to the attempt.”

“I can’t say I blame him for taking offense.”
Royce shook his head in disgust at Colum’s cowardly act. “Where is
Janet? Was she hurt?”

“The Dungalash ladies are an amazing breed of
women,” William said. “Janet snatched a dirk from one of those
Scottish lunatics and when she saw Cadwallon threatened, she used
it to stab Colum in his right shoulder. From the front, I should
add. Unlike her betrothed, Janet is no coward. Colum will not be
wielding a blade again for quite a while. If ever.”

“Where is Braedon?” As Royce asked the
question he was surveying the battlefield, counting his men,
reviewing the numbers of wounded and dead on both sides.

“Braedon and the cook are seeing to the
wounded. Janet is caring for her sister. As for Quentin—”

“I know where Quentin is,” Royce interrupted,
thinking he should have killed Gillemore instead of letting him
live after the Scot was defeated. Having given his word of honor to
cause no trouble to his captors, Gillemore seized his first
opportunity to break his word. He stole a knife from the youthful
squire who was set to guard him. After inflicting a serious stab
wound on the squire, Gillemore promptly disappeared from the scene.
“As soon as Quentin’s wound was washed and bandaged, I ordered him
to recover the few men who escaped. There’s nothing he can do to
help Fionna, and he was getting in the way and annoying Janet while
she was trying to sew up Fionna’s wounds. That’s why Quentin is
presently on one of the spare horses, tracking Gillemore and the
remainder of those cursed Scots.”