Margaret Moore - [Maiden & Her Knight 03] (6 page)

DeFrouchette addressed the blond Norseman. “Where is the rest of your crew?”

Ingar pointed to the woods a short distance away. Isabelle followed his gesture, to see more fierce-looking Norsemen coming toward the ship, carrying dead sheep slung on poles between them. “Men must eat,” he said.

Surely this raid would tell Connor where she had been taken … unless he would think this marauding had nothing to do with her abduction at all and was simply a random act of thievery.

DeFrouchette raised a brow. “All that for twenty men?”

“For later, too. Oswald does not pay enough. We take great risks coming so far inland.”

“And you have taken a greater risk with this unnecessary raid. Why not just make a signal fire?” DeFrouchette demanded sarcastically.

“We will be long gone before anybody realizes these sheep are missing.”

“We had better be.”

“Well, well, well, what have we here?” someone called out from the stern of the vessel in the lazy drawl of a Norman nobleman.

Isabelle looked over her shoulder to see the slim man rising in the stern, his hands against the sides of the vessel.

She was shocked to realize he was not a Norseman, but there was no mistaking his accent, or the fact that he was dressed in the height of Norman fashion. His hair was nearly as blond as hers, cut round his head and the ends curled under, as smooth and glossy as a woman’s—or a very vain man’s. The vanity became more obvious as she ran a young woman’s knowledgeable gaze over his clothing, which was a little rumpled. He wore a peacock blue brocade tunic with an embroidered white shirt beneath. His hose were likewise blue and clung to slender legs that lacked the muscle of a man used to riding or even walking far. His black boots shone and were gilded in a swirling pattern, like his swordbelt. A red jewel sparkled in the hilt of his sword. His dress, his manner and his voice all made her wonder what he was doing on this ship, for she could hardly imagine a man more different from a Norseman, or DeFrouchette, either.

The fellow seemed unsteady on his feet as he staggered toward them, as if he had just woken up and needed something to support him. Then she saw the wineskin in his hand and realized that he was drunk.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” he exclaimed, waving the wineskin as he came to a swaying halt on the rocking vessel. “Are you a pair of squabbling children?”

DeFrouchette and the Norseman exchanged glances, like two confederates caught in a lie.

Who on earth
was
this man, that two such warriors would stay silent as he jeered at them?

The man turned his attention to her. He paid no heed at all to the Gascon.

“Is this the beauteous Lady Allis I have heard so much about?” he asked with a sodden, insolent grin. He put his index finger to his lip and shook his head. “Surely this disheveled creature with the shrew’s tongue cannot be the fine, the splendid Lady Allis who has caused so much trouble?
You
are the woman men fight over?”

Whoever he was, he was aiding in her abduction and was therefore outside the law. “Yes, I am the Lady Allis,” she said, getting to her feet with all the dignity she could command. “Who are
you?
A minstrel seeking employment, perhaps, to judge by your garments. If so, sirrah, I do not think a band of Norsemen are likely to appreciate your merry tunes.”

The man stopped smiling and drew himself upright. “I am Osburn. You may recall my father, my lady. Lord Oswald.”

No wonder DeFrouchette and Ingar deferred to him.

She bowed slightly and gave Osburn a smile she reserved for peddlers who tried to cheat her. “Of course I recall him, especially the day his treachery was discovered. It was a very memorable time.”

Osburn waved the wineskin in a dismissive gesture. “A terrible misunderstanding,” he slurred. “Terrible and most unfortunate for my poor father, who has been stripped of his lands and titles. That is why you must spend some time with us.” Osburn leered at her. “You understand, my dear? We must repay you and your husband for what he has done to us, as well as enable him to repay us for what was taken away.”

“I find your logic as disgusting as your methods, and I pray God you will all be caught and hanged.”

DeFrouchette glared at Osburn, and she could almost feel his heated rage. “We should get underway, my lord, as soon as Ingar’s men are aboard.”

“Why, of course we should!” Osburn cried genially, as if he had already forgotten what she had said. “The sooner we are gone, the sooner I am back with my mistress, who is much finer company than a shipful of men.” He ran an impertinent gaze over Isabelle. “I am not yet so desperate that this bedraggled creature will tempt me.”

DeFrouchette stepped forward. “It was agreed that she would be treated as a guest.”

“I am very friendly to my guests.”

His expression fiercely stern, DeFrouchette took another step toward Osburn. Alexander didn’t speak, and he didn’t have to. Osburn flushed and backed away, and she could breathe again.

“Out of the way!” one of the returning Norsemen cried as he and his fellow tossed the first of the dead sheep, pole and all, over the side of the ship.

DeFrouchette moved quickly; Osburn was not so fast, and he nearly got clouted by the pole.

“God’s blood, be careful, oaf!” he muttered as he stumbled back toward where he had been sleeping in the stern.

If she had been in a mood to find anything amusing, she would have found their scramble to get out of the way mildly funny. As it was, she hugged herself and fought back fear and rage and despair, more determined than ever to get away from this ship, its crew, that drunken sot and the man who was like Hades, lord of Hell, made flesh.

I
n the great hall of Bellevoire, the flickering torchlight illuminated a group of anxious maidservants huddled near the kitchen corridor. The evening meal had been served, but the tables had not yet been taken down. The food left behind by the soldiers, who had set out to search for the missing sister of their mistress, was still to be cleared away.

“No sign of her at all, they say,” Efe noted, twisting her apron in her middle-aged hands. “Like she up and vanished.”

The younger, prettier Leoma tossed her head, leaned in closer and said, her voice likewise hushed, “Run off, I think. With a
man
. She’s been moping around so much these past few weeks, it has to be that.”

The elderly Gleda, who had served in Bellevoire during the time of DeFrouchette and had apparently been frowning ever since, sniffed skeptically. “What
man
? Have any of you ever seen her make eyes at a
man?
As for moping, I ain’t noticed it. She’s happy here.” She eyed Mildred, the girl of fifteen who served as Isabelle’s maid. “Ain’t she?”

Chewing her thin lower lip, Mildred glanced about uneasily as she nervously tucked a lock of black hair behind her ear. “Aye, she’s happy and she’s never said anything to me about a man.”

Leoma didn’t believe it for an instant. “Yes, she has! Who is he?”

“No, no, it’s not like that,” Mildred protested, holding up her hands. “It’s just that once, she told me it was a pity the baron was so evil, because he was not a bad-featured fellow.”

The women all drew back, hissing like snakes in a pit, except for Gleda.

“Well, he wasn’t,” she asserted. “Not a good master, but he was handsome, in a dark sort of way. It didn’t surprise me to hear she’d offered to marry him.”

Leoma shook her head. “Not
him
. She always liked Sir Connor a little too much, if you ask me. Maybe she run off because of him. Girls with broken hearts do strange things.”

“I don’t think it was anything like that,” Efe murmured, drawing their attention. “I think she was … taken.”

“Like by magic? Spirited away by the faeries?” Gleda demanded, her hands on her ample hips.

Efe shook her head. “According to Bartholomew, a Frenchman got one of the merchants drunk, so drunk he wasn’t minding his cart. Lady Isabelle was looking for ribbons, which this fellow sold, and the last time anybody saw her, she was standing near a strange young man at that cart. I think
he
took her.”

“How’d he get her out of the village? The cart’s still there.”

Efe shrugged.

“Maybe he’s her lover,” Leoma suggested.

Gleda frowned even more, and Mildred was clearly not convinced.

“Well,
somebody
wanted that merchant out of the way,” Efe offered, “and they did it. Maybe they lured her somewhere and…”

Efe colored as she fell silent. The other women looked ill, and Mildred started to cry.

Full of remorse, Efe patted the girl on the back. “There, there, now, don’t take on. They’ll find her. After all, there was no blood, neither.”

Her comforting words only made Mildred cry louder.

“If only somebody’d noticed she was missing sooner,” Gleda muttered.

“Don’t be saying that where Sir Connor will hear,” Efe cautioned as she continued to pat Mildred. “He feels terrible enough as it is. Searched high and low when he couldn’t find her, questioned everybody, called out the guard and even got Bartholomew on the run looking for her. He hasn’t had a bite to eat, either, between organizing the search and trying to comfort his poor wife. I thought she was going to faint dead away when he came to tell her.”

“D-did you see
his
face?” Mildred asked, sniffling and wiping her eyes with the edge of her sleeve. “He looked like he’d rather be dead than have to tell her something like that. But Lady Isabelle was right in the village and in the market, too, so it’s not his fault.”

“Hush!” Gleda commanded, nodding at the steps from the lord’s chamber. “Here comes my poor lady, white as a sheet. Stop your crying, Mildred, and we’d all better be about our business. There’s nothing more we can do anyway.”

But they didn’t move, because at that moment, Sir Connor came striding through the door. They watched as his wife’s face lit up even more than it usually did when he returned, all of them just as hopeful that Isabelle had been found, alive and well.

They also saw him grimly shake his head.

Her knees drawn up to her chest and her arms wrapped about them, Isabelle sat huddled in the center of the Norse ship. The Gascon sat a little ways off, still cross-legged and comfortable, eating some bread and cheese. She was very hungry, but she was certainly not going to ask anything of him, or anyone else on this cursed ship.

The Norse crew chewed on salted fish and drank from skins as they rowed without speaking. Their oars also made very little noise as they rose and dipped. It was no wonder they had proceeded as far inland as they had without being seen. In addition to the silence of their passage, the walls of the villages along the river were set back in case of spring flooding, and tonight the river was barely lit by a sliver of a moon.

Her lip curled with disgust as she regarded Osburn snoring softly in the bow, his wineskin cradled to his bosom like a lover. He was a vain fool who probably did nothing more than drink, wench and complain about his servants. She suspected he was never without a wineskin nearby, as some men were rarely without a sword.

She glanced back at the stern. Ingar held the steering board to guide the vessel. He must have the eyes of a cat; no lanterns were lit, and yet they stayed in the center of the river. Wrapped in a cloak against the chill night air, DeFrouchette stood beside him like a great, black bird of prey.

Connor was a powerfully built man, too, but there was always a lightness about him, no matter how terrible the times, as if he radiated honor and chivalry. If this DeFrouchette radiated anything, it was a brooding, bitter anger that had been festering for years.

The Gascon rose, then sat down beside her, crossed his legs and held out a loaf of coarse brown bread. “Will you eat, my lady?” he asked in a whisper. “I am sure you must be hungry. It is not the finest of fare, and I know you are used to better, but it is the best we have to offer.”

She was tempted to shake her head and refuse. However, if she was going to escape, she would need the strength to do it. “Thank you,” she said, likewise whispering as she accepted the bread and took a bite.

It was good, and she was glad she had agreed.

She slid her companion a glance. “Do you know where we are going, or is that to be kept a secret from me?”