Authors: Carolyne Cathey
Gaston twisted. "My prisoners? Freed? You had
no right."
"I beg to differ, Gaston, but you had no right.
By the by, your army has diminished, while ours has miraculously
swelled." Henri swept his hands to indicate the soldiers who lined the
walls. "All are welcome."
"You attempt a bluff,
Sire Henri. My knights dare not desert me." Gaston drew his sword and
nodded to the sentries. "Take all the prisoners, including Sire Becket,
Lady Rochelle and Lady Isabelle to the dungeon, post haste, else you’ll be my
next victims."
Becket’s pulse raged through his veins as fierce and as
icy as the DuBois waterfall. Praying for inspiration on how to save them all,
he yanked again on his blasted wrist fetters. “Henri, find something to break
these chains.”
"Gaston,
non!"
Becket’s mother rushed
to Gaston, clasping Gaston’s legs as she fell to her knees, sob-like cackles
stuttering from her throat as if she had fallen over the edge into madness.
"I’ll wed you. I’ll do whatever you ask."
"You betrayed me yet again, Isabelle. And yet
again, I will punish you. This time you’ll not survive."
Isabelle broke into frightened cries.
Becket placed himself between Gaston and his mother.
"Leave her, Gaston. The Council is in charge here."
"I am in charge! Guards! Do as I command! Take
the prisoners below!"
Drawn swords rasped in chorus as the sentries moved
toward Henri and the too-few soldiers! Men and women screamed, scrambling
backward into the troops who rushed into the chamber.
Gaston chuckled, victorious. "Becket, your death
approaches at lightning speed. My forces surround and out-number yours by at
least three score to one."
"Sire Gaston!" The monk’s voice pulled
Gaston around. "We will not allow you to punish those whom the Council
has set free."
"Watch me."
"The Council forbids..."
Panicked to break loose while the monk argued with
Gaston, Becket scanned the room for possibilities. Henri and Davide rushed
toward him with axes! Where had they found them, and so quickly? Becket
dropped onto his haunches and stretched taut his wrist fetters on the floor.
"Break the chain. Hurry!" Becket struggled
to control his breathing as the men banged against the metal links. He knew
that no matter the Council’s protests, Gaston would never let him live, and
there he waited, bound, with no armor and no means to defend himself or his
supporters.
Or Rochelle.
A link cracked!
"Harder! The one next to my right wrist
band."
His pulse now pounding so fiercely that his body shook
from the force, Becket glanced up from his struggles in dread of seeing the
certain slaughter.
Gaston’s soldiers thrust their swords! Hilt first?
They joined forces!
At Henri’s nod, Becket’s knights filed in to take
defense positions along the wall.
Bless them. Bless them all.
Gaston
had lost his army. And yet Becket knew that Gaston still held a sharp and
lethal blade meant for Becket’s heart.
With the unexpected insurrection, the monk seemed
emboldened, eyes bright with purpose as he glared at the startled Gaston.
"Sire Gaston, How do you plead to the
charge?"
"They lie!"
"Then you do not admit to heresy?"
"I do not!"
"Then I use as example your own behavior as to how
you wish to be treated. You will be tortured until you confess. Every method
you have used against others will be used against you. Once you have
confessed, you will die by fire."
Shouts of approval vibrated the rafters.
"Never!" Gaston raised his sword. "I
will die by my own hand before I will allow any to torture me. And I refuse to
go to hell alone." With cobra-like speed, Gaston struck at Becket.
"Die,
bastard
.
Die!"
The sentries around Becket scattered. Becket held up
his hands catching the blow on the metal restraint that still bound his
wrists. The cracked link split in two! Ducking and spinning in hopes to miss
the deadly slash, Becket leapt over his neck-chain, then hand-over-hand,
hurriedly pulled in the accursed tether. Gaston jumped onto the silver snake,
jerking it to a halt. Becket lurched forward, swallowing a cry of pain as
Gaston’s sword pricked his chest.
Gaston sneered at Becket as if at a doomed animal.
"
You
lose
."
"
Au contraire."
Becket smiled. He
grasped his neck-chain and jerked. Gaston tumbled backward, a look of shock so
incredulous on his face that Becket nearly burst into laughter. Gaston
scrambled upright. Becket whipped the chain around Gaston’s ankles. Gaston
tumbled again, then surged to his feet like a wild beast hungry for blood.
"Curse you, Becket!"
"I but use the gift you gave me."
"Then take this." Gaston swept the sharp tip
at Becket’s stomach. Becket leapt back, scrambling to remain out of Gaston’s
reach as he hurriedly reeled in the chain again.
"Becket! Catch!" At Henri’s shout, Becket
whirled and snatched the tossed sword from the air.
Rochelle screamed.
Becket jerked as the sting of a blade ripped across his
shoulder blades. Groaning from the pain, he thrust his sword backward, hit something
solid.
Gaston cried out.
Exhilarated, Becket turned, swinging the blade as he
spun. Metal jarred against metal.
Past Gaston, Becket saw his mother worry with a button
on her bodice, lift her hand to her mouth, then close her eyes. Foreboding slithered
through his confidence.
The buttons.
Filled with poison! ‘Twas how
she had murdered the children. He shouldn’t care that she took her own life,
but--
"Mère!"
Becket ducked a
swung sword and lunged for his mother as she sank to the floor.
He felt a snap on his neck chain.
"Die, bastard!"
"Your battle cry lacks originality, Gaston."
Becket rolled onto his gashed back and jerked at the metal tether. Gaston
stumbled forward, tripped over a fallen chalice, then determined, drove his
sword toward Becket’s heart.
In a flash, Becket whipped the dangling left wrist
chain around Gaston’s blade, yanking the blade aside as he pointed his own
weapon upward.
Eyes wide with realization, Gaston stumbled to a halt,
the tip pressing against his chest, perspiration beading on his face as he
desperately flailed to keep from falling forward.
Behind Gaston, Becket saw the monk gesture to someone
beyond Becket’s vision.
"Guards, take him below."
Becket grinned up at Gaston. "You lose. ‘Tis
your turn to suffer."
"To hell!"
A dagger flashed from Gaston’s hand!
Rochelle cried out.
Becket twisted to miss-- Gaston lurched forward as if
shoved, impaling himself on Becket’s held-out sword. Becket grunted as the
handgrip rammed into his side. Blood flowed from Gaston’s chest, the weight of
his body sliding him down the crimson-wet blade, his glazed pewter eyes wide
with surprised horror, until he thudded against the hilt and collapsed like a
lodestone atop Becket’s blood-soaked body.
Who had pushed Gaston?
A cheer resonated in Becket’s ears. Resting his head
on the floor, Becket closed his eyes, thanking God for yet another miracle,
praying for his mother’s doomed spirit, wishing he had remained ignorant of
Rochelle’s hatred of him, for now he must face the most difficult of all--not
succumbing to the woman he loved more than his own soul. Taking a deep breath,
he shoved Gaston aside and pushed to his feet, wiping his sticky, red hands on
his breeches.
"Becket!" Rochelle rushed toward him, pale,
but radiant and far-too beautiful.
He grasped her arms, preventing her from touching him,
his anger so at odds with the merrymaking around them. Trembling from the feel
of her in his hands, he inhaled her heady fragrance wafting stronger than the
sickeningly sweet stench of Gaston’s blood. He hated himself for wanting her
with such passion that every sinew in his body ached for him to accept her
renewed pretense.
"Lady Rochelle, let me make clear our
relationship. You will reside at DuBois, your ultimate goal, but you will
never rule as chatelaine."
The glow of her smile faded. "What do you
mean?"
"I mean you will share my bed but that is all.
You are never to go near Pierre. I will never take food or drink from your
hand."
"But I love you, my precious husband! I risked
all for you!"
"You risked all for DuBois."
"I shoved Gaston onto your sword!"
"So ‘twas you." Seeing Henri approach,
Becket dragged Rochelle to behind a stone column as hard as her heart, fighting
not to press his mouth against hers and be damned with the consequences.
"You waste your devious efforts, my traitorous gyrfalcon, for no matter
your actions and protestations, I know how you truly feel."
"I do not hate you,
mon amour
! I but lied
so as to save you. Once I explain--"
"There is naught you or anyone else can say to
convince me. I will never again believe your lies so like the ones fed me by
my mother."
Her blue-gentian eyes sparked fire. "How dare you
equate me with that she-wolf."
"She is how I recognize her kind."
Rochelle blanched, then lifted her chin in tell-tale
defiance--that elegant porcelain chin he longed to kiss along with the rest of
her exquisite body. Well, by damn, he would, but on his own terms.
"You confuse me, husband. If you distrust me so,
then why lower yourself to share your bed with me? From love you are loathe to
admit?"
"I have never loved you. I never will. Like King
Charles, all I feel for you is lust."
She recoiled as if he had slapped her. "Then I
refuse."
"You have no choice."
"I’ll go to the convent."
"How ironic a twist. You now seek refuge in the
nunnery, but I’ll not allow you to leave me. So heed me and heed me well.
Like the DuBois wine, you are part of my blood and I must have you. And like
the wine, in order to slake my accursed thirst for you, even if to the point of
drunkenness, you will surrender your essence to me whenever I demand. Gaston’s
poison has tainted you to the core thus I will wear protection so that my seed
will never take root in your polluted body. When I decide to have an heir I
will set you aside like an empty keg and will take another to wife, but I will
never let you go. Never."
She gasped, her pale face as bloodless as her conniving
soul. "But you are from your mother, and yet I love you still."
"Dangling hopes in front of me as did your
father?
Oc
, I am from my mother, but I did not sacrifice Pierre for
greed, I did not switch sides according to the winner, I did not fake my
affection for profit. I did not willingly destroy the lives of those who
trusted in me. No, you are Gaston’s daughter, a descendant of evil, a truth
you can never change for eternity. I pray my seed is not already growing
within you. I shudder with the certainty that any child of yours would inherit
Gaston’s wickedness."
A cry soughed from her ivory throat that, during her
sated slumber, had rested against his chest. He cursed himself for wanting her
so much that his entire sweaty body trembled with desire for her.
Alberre, Giselle, Henri and the knights surrounded
them. Pierre plunked Sire Spitz around his neck and tugged on Becket’s hand.
"We’re a family, now, Sire Becket! We’re a family!"
A bogus one.
As if desperate, Rochelle reached out for Pierre, but
Becket scooped him into his arms and turned away from her, shutting her out as
he placed his other arm around his father and distanced himself from her.
"Becket!" Alberre leaned closer as he
shouted above the revelry. "Lady Rochelle risked her life for you."
Becket scoffed. "You are as much a fool as I,
mon
père
." Unable to keep his gaze away from her, he glanced to where she
stood alone among the celebrants, hands pressed against her mouth, tears
streaming down her marvelous face. He fought every urge to go to her and pull
her into his arms. He
would
hold her but not yet. Later. When
darkness hid her incredible eyes that revealed she didn’t love him but only
used him. Well, he would use her. He would pound out his rage within her
tempting body.
His loins tightened. A sad ache for her swelled to
painfulness within his breast, an ache he would take with him to his grave.
"Heed me, son." Alberre tugged on Becket’s
arm, his mouth set in a scolding line. "Lady Rochelle forbade us to
come. She planned to come alone to rescue you, then to come for us in
Toulouse. We argued with her and tried to stop her, but she chose you over her
own safety. Henri and his soldiers arrived to join us as we left. If anyone
is to blame for Pierre being here, ‘tis I, for I insisted on joining Rochelle
so that I could lead the way to the dungeon for your release."