Beauty's Curse (5 page)

“Open your mouth, sir,” Galiana said softly, yet in a way that left no room for denying her.

He did, and a saucer was placed against his lips. The sweet taste of honey surprised him, and he found he was able to swallow the bitter marigold without his throat closing around it.

“It will ease the ache. You've been fighting this fever, I will venture to say, since before you entered our forest.”

“Your forest? All lands are the king's land.”

He'd been attacked twice in the three-day ride from his keep to Montehue Manor. The first time, when he'd gotten cut on the calf, had been by bloody-thirsty mercenaries. He'd wondered if Lord Christien had been behind it. The second attack had come from Lord Harold. Brutal and sneaky, the attack was just like the man. Rourke had bested Harold with a blow to the chest, and the knight had wisely retreated.

Prince John was playing them all.

He heard her whisper something about patience and virtues unrealized. “So what, Lord Rourke, were you doing in the king's forest with your sword drawn and your knights thundering so loudly you scared even the squirrels from the trees?”

Reaching to scratch his ear, his hands didn't get far, and he tugged against the restraints with frustration. “Why am I bound? You cut them before.”

“I had to put them back; the eye is healing, and you keep wanting to touch it.”

His strength was fading, and he lacked the will to argue. “You've had no news from the village outside your manor walls?”

“Your knights have locked my knights and my injured brother in the solar. The priest is not allowed to leave, and the only servants we have here are the ones who live in. The snow won't stop falling. How are we to get news?”

“That's right.” Thank God, he thought, for that small favor. The agonizing pain in his head was relentless, and even though he fought against the oncoming tide of darkness, he knew it was no use.

“You are not going to tell me what you were doing in the forest? Fine then. How did you come to be at Montehue Manor? It's off the beaten path.”

She was smart; he would grant her that. And relentless in her pursuit of the truth. “Protect me whilst I sleep, my lady.” He kept his tone as light as he could, but he meant every word. “One day I will return the favor, upon my word.”

“Protect you from what?”

He licked his dry lips, the throbbing in time with his heartbeat. Sluggish and heavy and agonizing. It was good his hands were tied, else he'd certainly pluck his eyes from his head. Anything to make the thumping stop.

“Lord Rourke? Oh, dear, protect you from what? I know only how to make perfumes and lotions.”

“Not bad with a rock,” he managed to mumble.

“Aye, I suppose that's true. Though before yesterday, I had no knowledge of it. An arrow, yes.”

Rourke heard her rise, then felt a cool compress being laid over his forehead. Her fingers, soft and delicate, massaged the skin above his eyebrows, and the darkness receded just enough to warn her.

“Treachery,” he whispered against the faint lemony scent of her neck as she leaned over him. “Beware.”

“Treachery?” She sat back, wondering if she'd heard him correctly. It was hard enough to hear him when he spoke so low, but when he switched from French to English to Latin, and then to what she assumed to be some form of the Scottish tongue, it was challenging to say the very least. She'd been schooled in all but the latter, and it was close enough to Welsh in parts that she could make a guess. Although why he'd talk about Merlin escaped her, unless it was a story from his childhood that he liked and remembered.

Frankly, he did not seem the fairy tale sort of man.

With his tanned, rough skin, and the shadow of a beard covering his chin, and his dark, menacing brows, Galiana assumed he was a brooding, arrogant man used to getting his own way. He was gorgeous.

If he couldn't pick a language to charm his way, he'd call for his knights and battle for what he wanted. The idea thrilled her, and she clasped her hands together in her lap, perched on the edge of a low stool. It was time to finish the stitches in his calf, now that he'd lost consciousness. Cleaning the area again, she passed the needle through the candle's flame, doing it because her sister had written how important it was to heat the tip.

Galiana clasped his leg, his calf so muscled that she could not reach around it with her fingers. Rourke stirred against her, uneasy and no doubt in pain.

Picking a soft song that she'd learned long ago from one of the traveling minstrels, Galiana hummed softly in an attempt to soothe Rourke enough that she could finish stitching his wound. She tapped her finger against her lower lip, wondering if she should pluck the hairs on his leg so they didn't get caught, and mayhap worsen the infection.

It made sense.

And since no one was about to teach her, and she had no magic at all, she had to follow her instincts. By the time she finished, the area was plucked clean, and a neat row of black knots held the edges of the wound in place.

“I've never seen a finer job,” Jamie said from behind her.

Pride flooded through her as she sat back and wiped her hands in a basin of violet-scented water. “Thank you,” she answered, exhausted as the adrenaline she'd been living on faded.

“I'll sit with him, if ye'd like to get a morsel or two. I ordered yer bailiff to see to feeding my men and yours. He sure is a surly enough fellow.”

“Surly?” Galiana rose and discreetly stretched her back muscles. “Perhaps he simply dislikes you.”

Jamie laughed. “For a lady, you have a smart tongue.”

She lifted the hem of her tunic and glided up the stairs. For a lady. What did he know? This lady was going to eat an entire chicken and a loaf of bread to go with it. And drink a full mug of ale, too. Galiana's stomach rumbled, and, once out of sight, she ran across the back hall to the kitchen. She slipped past Rourke's knights, who were eating at trestle tables in the great hall and flirting with the serving maids.

Cook, having done her part for the late meal, was snoring from her cot next to the fire. It was her job to keep the large pit burning at all times. Her two young helpers dozed nearby. Galiana grabbed a rosy red apple from a basket on the counter and then opened the walk-in pantry for something more substantial. A round of cheese, mayhap.

From out of the recesses of the kitchen pantry, a hand grabbed her elbow and yanked her deeper into the dark shadows. She opened her mouth to scream, certain she was going to be mauled by one of Rourke's knights.

“Shhhh, Gali, it's me, Ed.”

She stopped kicking backward immediately and turned in his arms. “Did I hurt you,” she asked in a whisper, running her hands over his face and shoulders. “Are you all right, Edward? Answer me.”

He put his hand over her mouth. “Shh! They'll find me for certain if ye don't hush, Galiana. I hid in the forest and watched them bring you and Ned in … and that injured knight. Is it true you brained him? Who's the blustering giant who orders everyone about?”

Galiana peeled his hand from her face. “They don't know about you, then?”

“The servants aren't saying a word; neither are our men.”

“Have you seen Ned? Father Jonah says he is fine—not a single stitch needed.”

Ed grinned and rubbed his chest at the spot where his twin would now carry a scar. “Talking about it like he earned it in battle. He said he jumped in front of the horse to draw the knight's attention away from you. Did he do that? Did he?”

Nodding, Galiana brushed silly tears of happiness from her cheeks. “He was very brave.”

“Lucky bas—, I mean, what a story, aye?”

“Is that envy in your voice, Ed? Your brother could have been killed!” Galiana's harsh whisper echoed around them in the stuffed pantry.

“Nay.”

She heard the sound of his shoes shuffling against the hard-packed dirt floor.

“Okay, mayhap a little. If I was there, I could have tackled him from behind and then—”

“Hush, just hush.” Galiana wrapped her arms around her waist, nauseated now instead of hungry. The thought of both her brothers injured, when she'd been in charge, made her stomach knot like a Celtic braid. “You, Ed, are very smart. You can take a letter to Mother and Father right away; do you hear me? Lord Rourke might have more men in the village; I don't know. Jamie, his ‘brother,' doesn't do a lot of talking, except to threaten me.”

Remembering what Rourke had said of treachery came to mind, so she added, “Trust no one. Stay off the main roads. Bring dry clothes. Sweet Mary Magdalene, was it really just this morning that I was filled with joy at the falling snow?”

Suddenly, Galiana realized Ed had been shaking her arm until she finally stopped rambling. “I'm not going anywhere, Galiana. The snow has not stopped, and we are snowed in just as surely as our enemy is.”

His green eyes flashed in the shadows, and Galiana sighed. “What have you planned?”

Rourke sensed that he was not alone, but there was no harm in it. It felt dark, safe. Like the deepest part of the night when secrets could be shared in whispers and sign language.

Quill to paper, paper to pack, and then it was time to travel. Horse's hooves wrapped in cloth, so as not to make a sound. If the sentry heard a thing, he'd have to be killed.

The last thing Rourke wanted was more blood on his hands. How much of the stain could his soul absorb before turning a rotted black? Serving two kings was ripping him asunder; serving a third would do it for certes.

The safe feeling gave way to night terrors that had been nipping at his heels like a rabid dog. There was an urgency bidding him to wake up, to get up. Merlin, magical wizard, a man with a long, scraggly, white beard. The stuff of lore and legend, yet he'd been haunting him. Dragons, claws, blood. So much blood. But there were still two lions he had to face before he could be free. He stretched his body; his hands were tied.

The atmosphere shifted, and he tensed, torn between the fogginess of sleep and the need to be aware. Cool liquid dripped on his leg. Quickly passing from cold to hot, it burned, and he smelled the stink of singed hair. “Begone. What is the meaning of this?” He kicked out, relieved his legs were free at least, and yet his feet connected with nothing.

Ghosts.

An eerie laugh surrounded him, and more drops of liquid fire rained down on his bare skin. He struggled against the bonds that strapped him to the bed, angry at being tortured as he lay bound and injured. He'd foolishly thought he was safe. This could not be a figment of his imagination; the pain was sharp and fresh, and the stink of sulfur and wax wafted pungently beneath his nose. What need had Merlin of tricks? “Coward. Face me, if you dare.”

A disembodied voice clucked like a chicken, then mocked, “Face me? Why, Sir Knight, ye have not any eyes left to see.” The tone came from the left, and then the right. Rourke tilted his head from side to side. It seemed like someone was speaking through a tunnel, or a shell, mayhap. Or were they separate voices? He strained against the ropes.

“I have eyes, damn you.” he tried to open them, concentrated with all his will, but the darkness remained. This was his worst nightmare, and he was trapped within it. “Jamie,” he called out. “Galiana?”

“Nobody can hear you,” whispered a devil to his left.

“You are locked deep in the bowels of the earth.” The cruel voice to his right chuckled, but the chuckle turned into a gargling choke; then Rourke felt more drops of liquid fire hit his skin. He could not die; he had not yet made his peace with God. “Go back to hell, demons. I deny thee. Go to hell!”

The opening of a door seemed to suck the very air from the room. Footsteps raced down the stairs. Soft footsteps, a lady's slippers. He hated being so dependent upon every sense but sight.

God help him if he never regained his vision. All would truly be lost, and all of the suffering he'd caused or done in the name of royalty would be for naught.

“Sir Jamie! Awake, you—how dare you? Oh—drunk? Shame, shame.”

Galiana, his lady protectress, lambasted his childhood friend and foster brother with five sharp, loud claps.

The swish of her dress as she walked announced her arrival at Rourke's bedside as surely as did her citrus perfume. “Lord Rourke, you were but having a bad dream.”

Relieved to be awake and not stuck within the pit of his own mind, he joked, “'Tis hard to believe you are the same angel who sang my pain away. You sound like a fisherman's wife on the docks.”

“I do not want to know what you know of that, sir. Your brother”—he imagined her gritting her teeth—“is dead to this world. Ale, and plenty of it, from the way his head is lolling to the side.”

Rourke swallowed, his mouth dry. “A pint sounds fine, actually.”

“Oh?”

He felt the weight of the mattress dip as she sat on the edge of the bed. He longed to reach out and touch her, to ‘see' her without the aid of his eyes.