Queen's Heart: An Arthurian Paranormal Romance (Arthurian Hearts Book 2) (7 page)

My hair prickled as I realized the harper-who-was-not-a-harper was watching our exchange with an intensity well beyond the pale of simple curiosity.

“What, have you a claim on every woman who solicits my attentions?” I struggled to keep my voice conversation-low, to not explode in rage against this man into whose care I had been charged.

“My care is for everything that affects the Lady Yseult.”

My eyes narrowed. “Are you sworn to her then?”

“I am…” He faltered, though it was clear he would have simply ended it there if circumstances were different. He seemed to sit between two worlds. At feasts, harpers were often given places of honor among the nobles who expected them to play for the privilege. But Drustan spoke and acted as though such privilege was his always. Pride vaulted his tone, elevating his words from the base. To me, perhaps because I was more stranger to this House than even they could guess, it seemed Drustan had more freedoms and control than was any simple harper’s wont.

“You are—” A fool is how I meant to end that, but King Anguish once again rapped his trencher for attention.

Still looking somewhat abashed by the sudden and unexpected departure of his wife and daughter, Anguish nevertheless seemed determined not to let their absence ruin the celebration nor their desolation sway his course. ”The Lady Yseult will leave for Cornwall directly after the tourney. She will require escort, and assuredly I would trust my daughter’s care only to the most noble champion of this House. Therefore, the one among you who acquits himself best at the tournament shall win the privilege of seeing her safely to Tintagel.”

Mead enough had been consumed by then that the knights in the hall seemed to have forgotten the fate of the last Irishman to be sent to Tintagel. Cups and trenchers clattered when the knights began pounding tables in appreciation of this bonus honor to be given to the best. I lifted my own cup toward the king with the rest, confident he bore no expectation yet of entrusting his precious daughter to a stranger knight with unmarked arms.

Beside me, wine sloshed over Drustan’s hand as he likewise thrust his cup toward the king.

“For Yseult!” He and I breathed her name in unison.

Somewhere in her cavern by the sea, Fate nodded her approval.

For the next days leading up to the tourney, Yseult kept to her chamber. I waited in vain for her to emerge, although I saw her handmaid from time to time shuttling food and trenchers to and from the kitchens.

On one of her early trips, I caught her out and pulled her aside. “Tell your lady I will be forever grateful for her drawing the poison from me. If she desires entertainment to keep her spirits up, find me day or night—my harp and voice are hers whenever she wishes.”

Brangien only returned me a wounded look and mumbled, “Gramercy,” before scurrying off to her duties.

With a sigh I headed for the stables to find the horse master.

“Another palfrey for you today, good sir? And will our Lady be joining you again?”

I shook my head. “I’ve come to beg a favor, which needs your strictest silence. You can keep a confidence, can you not?”

“If my Lady Yseult trusts you, so do I. And the horses have heard enough secrets to bring down the kingdom many times over. I’m sure they can bear another in silence.” The man’s tone, sincere and laced with warm humor, put me at ease right away. An effect I suspected he’d learned from the beasts in his charge.

I drew him into a quiet corner. “As some here have already rightly guessed, I am not a simple harper but a knight of some renown. For reasons between myself and God alone, I elect to keep my name hidden. Still, I would participate in the coming tourney, but as I’ve arrived here without a mount, I need loan of an experienced charger.”

The horse master stepped around me, eying me as critically as he would a promising colt new come into his care. ”You ride well?”

“Expertly.”

“Come.” He led me through a pasture and to a stallion barn with its stout stalls and stouter corrals. The first horse to sense us bugled an alarm that was echoed from horse to horse till two score of them had trumpeted their disapproval at our intrusion. Another score of stalls were empty, their occupants presumably out on business with their knights.

We stopped before a courser with a great brute of a head and a coat as pure as night. I inhaled sharply at the sight. “Uncanny. He could be brother to my own.”

“He’s green yet, but sensible enough for a youngster. Smart, too, though that means he’s a mischief-maker and always looking for a way to prove he’s the one in charge. He’ll carry you grandly so long as you keep a firm hand on his reins.”

“You trained him then?”

“Nah. He was given us by his dead knight’s widow. Sir Marhaus was training him up, but he took his senior mount to Cornwall.”

“Sir Marhaus?” Coincidence? God’s jest?

“The queen’s brother. The Morholt killed by Tristan. You’ve heard of him surely. The House still mourns and the tourney’s to be held in his honor.”

“Yes, I’ve heard of him.”

“The horse will suit you then?”

“Aye. But I’ll need to work him in secret. Tell your stable hands only that someone will be training with him in the night.”

“That I will. Otherwise, they’ll be saying it’s the fae stealing him to ride in The Wild Hunt.” He laughed at his little joke, but it sent the same chill through me as finding out this was The Morholt’s horse.

“Does he have a name?”

“Fallax. In the Latin tongue it means—”

“—Deceit.” Of course.

~ ~ ~

I returned at sunset with my sword, Curtana—mercy, its name meant—and a shield and lance borrowed from the armory. The rest of the day I’d spent constructing a quintain and laying out a practice field in a small clearing in the woods not far from where Palomides had found Yseult and me laughing on the bank of the stream.

Fallax shifted with nervous energy as I led him, saddled, from his stall. I gave him rein to run a few furlongs in the twilit gloom, letting him work up a lather, tiring him so he’d pay attention to the work ahead.

As we galloped into the low hills, beyond sight of the castle, a loud, clear belling broke the dusky night. I hauled Fallax to a halt at the clearing’s edge. He pricked his ears as the belling drew closer, then swiveled them back at my murmured, “Damn.” The last thing I needed was some hunter chasing his hound to chance upon us.

Not that any did that first night as I delivered blow upon blow to the practice dummy, testing how well my shoulder tolerated the shock, pleased with the degree to which it had healed. Not so pleased with the feeling I couldn’t shake that someone watched in the night.

My consternation grew when the belling followed us the next evening too, only to go quiet as my practice session began. With yesterday’s success with the sword boosting my confidence, tonight I couched a lance, urged Fallax into a trot and plunged the lance at the quintain. The pain that echoed back into my shoulder nearly unhorsed me. I was still slumped over Fallax’s withers catching my breath when he snorted and sidestepped beneath me.

“Perhaps you’d have better luck singing at your opponent.”

Some unnamed hunter’s voice would have startled me less that Palomides’ wry tone. More startling still was lifting my head and seeing him naked in the moonlight.

“That would indeed be a reasonable weapon against one armed with nothing more than a smile,” I quipped back. “What are you doing here?”

“Like you, I’m a nightling. I was swimming in your stream when I heard you here.”

Not a hair upon him glistened in the pale light. Perhaps he’d been lying on the bank drying. Perhaps, but my gut thought otherwise. Though what other explanation could there be?

“If I didn’t know you for a harper,” he said easily, “I would think you’re readying for the tourney.”

A warhorse. A quintain. A lance. It was useless to deny I was training. As it was useless to deny why I was so accoutered. “You’ve caught me out. Like you, I prefer anonymity.”

“You mean to accompany Yseult to Cornwall.”

It was not a question.

“I do.”

“You’ve heard the roster of knights attending?”

“I have.” While the list was impressive, notables such as Lancelot du Lac and Percival and Sagramore would not be here. The Orkney clan and King Arthur, should he show, would be my greatest rivals. “There is none attending who I have not defeated before.” It was not a boast, simply a statement of fact. I watched Palomides carefully for his reaction.

“King Anguish has given me reason to win. It will be mine to accompany Yseult to her bridal bed.”

I gave Palomides a sharp look. He spoke deliberately, choosing his words carefully. Played as they were, he could mean either of the double entendre there.

“Yseult
will
go to King Mark,” I said, though the words pained me more than my shoulder. “I will see to it. For Cornwall’s sake.” I was perfectly aware of the clue I’d just thrown Palomides as to my identity, but there were still enough sympathizers on Cornwall’s side to not make it too entirely obvious.

“And for Ireland,” Palomides agreed, though the duplicity continued to ring strong in his voice. It mattered not. I would best him in jousting or sword play or the melee—or all three. Then I would be the one responsible for Yseult.

Palomides, meanwhile, remained unflustered. “We have a common goal. In my clan, we act as one to achieve results. Perhaps if we train together, fight together, we can assure one of us wins the king’s privilege. A pact then. A truce and treaty between us.”

“All I’ve seen of you,” I pointed out, “is a sharp sword and a well-bred horse. Only if you have the skill to back up your hubris will I agree to that.”

“Then shall I meet you here tomorrow night armed with something more than a smile?”

I snorted. “If your swordplay is half as effective as your charm, I imagine we’ll be formidable indeed.”

He grinned, taking me captive to his will as surely as if he’d put iron chains around my wrists. Had I been a woman, I would have risked all to be bedded by that grin, especially when it was coupled with the physique he bore so casually nude under the stars.

As it was, only a gesture from him quite possibly stood between my following him back to the lush banks of the stream and confronting what I had never had the courage to explore.

I hung there on the precipice, the night’s fate in Palomides’ next move. Silence stretched between us, held us. He faltered. Then said gently, “Tomorrow.”

It could have been a promise.

But I knew it wasn’t.

Our moment had passed.

Perhaps forever.

Most days I welcomed the hour I ran as a hound. Other days galled me with the inconvenience of a shift I could not control.

Yesterday, after running down a brace of hares, my hound had found Drustan alone in the woods with sword and quintain. Hidden, I’d watched him, first as hound, then as man. Whatever else I might have felt about him, rival as I deemed him in my affections for Yseult, I had to concede he was a master warrior. His body was built to carry a sword—thick muscle with more brawn than my own yet maintaining a natural suppleness of form that allowed him to move
with
his weapon, not simply beat down his opponent with it.

Once healed, there were few who would stand against him. I trusted his words that none coming to the tourney had. I also trusted that if I had a chance myself it would be because I knew his every move before he made it. My curse had cost me nothing in either strength or skill. Those gifts remained mine. No matter how many years Drustan may have trained with a sword, I had trained for battle at least twice as many.

Horse and lance, however, added dimensions in which I had no practical experience. Watching Drustan today had reminded me of that. And that horses needed to be reminded of their lessons too.

Just as I apparently needed constant reminding that all in life was always more complicated than it appeared. That alliances weren’t necessarily forged for the benefit of both sides, and that choices weren’t always right… sometimes they weren’t even choices at all.