By Queen's Grace (5 page)

As the morning wore on, watching Judith bounce on the horse’s rump became harder. She would be sore this night, as she’d been sore the night before. There was no help for it. To evade the sheriff, they must keep up the pace.

Nearing midday, Judith’s right hand released its hold on Thurkill’s hauberk. She made a fist and hit him hard on the shoulder. Corwin bit back a smile. Had Thurkill refused a request to halt one too many times?

Corwin urged his destrier forward to come alongside
Thurkill. “I know of a cave not far ahead where we might take a rest.”

“I have no wish to rest. The sheriff-”

“Will not find us there. ‘Tis a truly secluded site.” Corwin shrugged, as if uncaring one way or the other. “I think of your horse, Thurkill. He carries a greater burden than the others. But if you wish to go on, I will not object”

“Aye, think of your horse, Thurkill,” Judith said in a sarcastic tone. “This
burden
he carries would be most pleased to cease bruising his boney backside.”

Thurkill rolled his eyes heavenward. Had Judith been giving the man an earful of complaints and snide remarks all morning? Possibly.

The victim of a kidnapping, Judith had every right to protest. Her mind-numbing, hand-trembling terror had passed, but not her fear. She used anger to mask it, but Corwin didn’t want her to goad Thurkill too hard. The man might be under orders to bring her safely to his lord, but every man had his limits. Coping for hours on end with Judith’s sharp tongue might be more than Thurkill could tolerate.

“The cave is but a few minutes away if you care for a respite,” Corwin said.

Thurkill studied him for a moment. “How do I know you do not lead us into the sheriff’s snare?”

“You do not know if I lead you into a trap, just as I do not. know if you lead me into one at journey’s end. You will have to trust my word.”

“Humph. How does one villain learn to trust another?” Judith interjected. “Neither of you deserves anyone’s trust.”

Through clenched teeth, Thurkill ordered, “Find the cave.”

After a few moments of searching, Corwin found the
overgrown path he sought, and at its end, the cave. Brush hid the mouth of the cavern located halfway up a steep hill. A stream bubbled along at the base. The narrow sloping path from the stream to the cave proved a challenge for the horses, but all made it up without incident.

Corwin dismounted, planning to help Judith down from Thurkill’s horse. Oswuld beat him to it. ‘Twasprobably for the best. The less he had to deal with Judith just now, the better. Her hands pressed into her back, she walked stiffly toward the mouth of the cave, with Oswuld a step behind her.

“How know you this place?” Duncan asked, his voice echoing in the large chamber. “‘Tisrather far from where you say you live.”

Corwin noted the suspicious undertone in Duncan’s question. “‘Tis far, but a friend and I once used this cave to shelter from a storm. Luckily, Stephen knew of its existence.”

“Thiscompanion you speak of must travel much to know of so remote a spot.”

Corwin slid his hands from his riding gloves, thinking of Stephen, his best friend and Gerard’s youngest brother. Aye, Stephen liked to travel, rush headlong into one adventure after the other. Corwin had gleefully joined him on several of his journeys.

“He does love to travel, more than most men I know.”

Duncan huffed. “He must be a Norman, then, to have the coin and time to waste roaming about the land.”

Stephen did, but on that particular journey Stephen had performed a valuable service for Gerard, and Richard, their half brother. Having acquired several new holdings in a court judgment, Gerard had given most of the land to his brothers. Stephen had offered to visit all the holdings, determine
the condition of each, then report on which needed repairs or where the people needed immediate assistance.

The Norman who’d previously owned the lands had been a cruel man, and Corwin saw firsthand how the peasants had suffered, then witnessed their joy when told they’d been placed under Wilmont protection. None had truly cared which brother became overlord. Each man had a reputation for fairness, even benevolence.

True, most Normans looked to their own wealth and comfort and never noticed any hardship suffered by the people who provided for them. Telling Duncan that some Normans could be generous and honorable, however, wouldn’t aid Corwin’s ruse.

“Aye, the Normans are a selfish, cruel race,” Corwin proclaimed. “‘Twas a sad day for England when King Harold lost the battle to Duke William of Normandy.”

Duncan’s mouth twisted into a sneer. “When the bastard invaded England he killed or maimed all who would not submit to his rule, burned crops and forests and huts at will until those country folk left could barely survive. A sad day for England, indeed.”

Corwin now knew with certainty from where Duncan hailed. Only in the far north had the Conqueror taken such drastic measures to bring the old Saxon earls to heel. Corwin’s ancestors hadn’t joined in any rebellion, but had accepted the Conqueror as king and pledged fealty to the man the new king declared their overlord. The transfer of power had been peaceful, so unlike the experience of Duncan’s family.

Corwin laid a hand on his destrier’s neck, a fine example of Wilmont’s herd. He’d benefited greatly from Norman rule. Would he be less complacent if his ancestors had lost everything, if his Norman overlord had been less honorable?

“This lord you follow, he has a plan to overtake the kingdom without any of the peasants suffering?” Corwin asked.

“Aye. We must first be rid of King Henry. Then the barons will give way in due course.”

Duncan, clearly, knew nothing of the ways of war and less of Norman barons. Even with the king vanquished, the Normans wouldn’t give way. Each would defend his strongest castle and challenge the Saxons for possession. A battle for the entire kingdom would be fought castle by castle, with the peasants suffering the most.

“Father!” Oswuld cried out as he ran into the cave. “She is gone! Lady Judith-I cannot find her!”

A cold fist gripped Corwin’s innards.

“You were supposed to be guarding her!” Thurkill shouted.

“I allowed her privacy to take relief and she slipped away.”

Cursing himself roundly for not anticipating this attempt at escape, knowing which way he would go if in Judith’s situation, Corwin bolted out of the cave, hoping to get there ahead of her.

S
he couldn’t find the path.

With hands on her hips, Judith slowly turned in a full circle, looking carefully for any sign of her escape route. Four horses had ridden through this area not long ago, trampled down the grass and pushed aside brush. The
path
had to be here somewhere, and she must find it quickly before Oswuld noticed she’d fled.

Her plan was a simple one. Find the road and head north toward whatever town lay ahead. Send someone to take word of the rebellion to Scotland. Enlist a trustworthy person to act as her guide to London. Surely her kidnappers expected her to flee south, back toward the safety of the abbey. But she could trick her kidnappers, if only. she could find the path.

Judith wiped away the moisture gathering in her eyesfrom weariness. She wasn’t crying. She wasn’t afraid. She didn’t have time for either.

She spun at the sound of rustling in the brush behind her. A small animal, gray-brown and furry, scurried into the heavier brush beyond. A squirrel, perhaps. Or a rabbit. Not a man.

She blew out a long breath and struggled to regain her
concentration. Nothing looked familiar, until she spotted a tree with two wind-snapped lower branches. Had she seen it before, during the ride to the cave? Aye, there, just beyond the tree the grass lay flat.

She hiked up her robe to run down the path to freedom.

“Judith!”

Corwin.

She stared at the path.
Run!
A useless effort. Corwin was too close. He would catch her in a trice. She unclenched her hands, letting the fabric fall. At the edge of her vision, she saw the glint of a sunbeam flash off his chain mail.

Close. So very close to freedom.

Once again, ‘twas Corwin who thwarted her. He would take her back to her captors, and they would watch her so closely now she might never get away.

Corwin closed the distance between them, until he was so near she could reach out and touch him if she chose.

“I beg of you, Corwin. Let me go,” she said. To her own ears she sounded desperate. Perhaps she was. She looked up into the azure eyes she’d once so admired, still considered beautiful. The eyes of a traitor. “Join the rebels if you wish, but I want no part of their scheme. Let them find another woman for their queen, one who believes in their cause. I have no heart for it.”

He smiled, almost tenderly. “‘Tis not your heart they desire, Judith, but your name and womb. However, if someone asked me to choose a more perfect woman to make their queen, I could not come up with another’s name.”

His flattery fell far short of whatever mark he hoped to hit.

“Then you betray me again, force me to stay with the rebels.”

“I cannot let you go, Judith.” He sighed. “I will try to explain—”

Judith crossed her arms. “I heard your traitorous reasoning last eve, and have no wish to hear it again.”

Corwin took a long, intense look around them. “I am no rebel, never will be.”

Astonished and hopeful, Judith stammered. “But-but last eve you said. are you saying you have changed your mind?”

“My mind is set on joining the rebels, but not for the reasons I gave Thurkill. We have not much time before we are found, Judith. Come, this way. ‘Twillgive us a measure of privacy a moment or two longer.”

He grabbed hold of her hand and tugged her toward the path. His hand was warm, large and encompassing. The strength of it didn’t surprise her, but the tingling sensation that snaked up her arm at his touch set her mind to spinning and her knees to shaking. An unwelcome and unwise reaction to a man she needed to guard against.

“I go nowhere with you,” she declared, and jerked her hand from his grasp. “I care not why you wish to join the rebels. I swear to you, Corwin, if you join them, I will ensure you are punished in suitable fashion.”

The man had the gall to smile. “Chopped to bits and then hanged, or was it the other way around?”

She forced away a vision of Corwin hanging from a rope, not wanting to imagine the rest. How could she save him from that dreadful fate when he wouldn’t listen?

“‘Tis a gruesome punishment you risk, no matter the way of it.”

Judith flinched when he put his hands on her shoulders.

He frowned and released her. “To my mind, the best way to thwart this rebellion is to join it. I need to learn everything I can-in particular the camp location, their numbers and the leader’s name-before going to King
Henry. I could use your help, Judith. The more quickly done, the more quickly over.”

Corwin pretended to join the rebellion? Judith wanted so badly to believe him her heart ached. Except last night he’d made very convincing arguments to the contrary. She could have sworn he truly intended to join the rebels. Did he lie to her now?

“Help in what way?”

“I ask you to do no more than make this journey easier by not trying to escape. I cannot do what needs be done if I must chase after you each time you take it into your head to flee.”

She’d been seized by strange men, bounced around on the back of a horse until her backside bore bruises, been forced to sleep on the ground-known fear and anger such as she’d never known before. Corwin now asked her to allow further indignities willingly. Of course, if the villains need not worry over her, the journey would go faster. But to what end?

“You want me to assist these knaves?”

“Only until I obtain the information I need.”

“And how long might that take?”

“Depends upon how soon I can get them to trust me.”

Judith voiced her greatest fear. “What if that never happens? What if you learn nothing of import until we ride into the rebel’s stronghold?”

Corwin took a deeper than normal breath. “I am hoping that will not happen. I have no more wish to ride into their stronghold than you do.”

“You only hope. There is no certainty,” she said. “Last eve, Thurkill vowed to tell me no more of his lord or the rebels’ plans until after we arrived at wherever we are going. I doubt he. will reveal more to you, either. Then what,
Corwin? After we are in the rebels’ camp, we may both be trapped.”

Corwin shook his head. “I will not let that happen.”

Judith scoffed. “So you say.”

“So I give you my oath.”

Last eve, he’d vowed to serve the rebels’ leader in exchange for the reward of Wilmont. Which oath did Corwin truly mean to keep?

“Please, let us go now. We know enough to set the king’s men on their trail. Let the soldiers find the camp and stop the rebellion.”

This time, when he put his hands on her shoulders, Judith didn’t flinch, merely accepted the comfort offered in his massaging fingers.

“I know you are frightened,” he said softly. “I would take you away from here now, if I could. But Judith, if we flee, Thurkill will hunt us down to the ends of the kingdom if need be. And what would we tell the king if we managed to get to London? That we know of three men who
say
there will be a rebellion, who
may
have a large army gathered somewhere, with a leader who
might
be capable of leadership? I promise you, as soon as I know more of this rebellion, we will escape.”

He sounded so sure of himself, so reasonable. Yet.

“So we wait to make our escape until there is an entire army at hand and eager to hunt us down.”

“We wait until I have a solid plan and we both have horses. Try not to worry, and think on this. This Saxon noble they follow. Very likely he is, or was, connected with the court of the Scots. Have you any idea who the man might be?”

“Nay, I.”
Oh, dear.
Shocked, Judith realized Corwin might have the right of it. She might very well know this person who’d ordered her abduction. She might have stood
next to him in the palace hall, talked to him in the gardens, shared a jest during one festivity or another.

She’d been but a young girl when her parents sent her to the abbey, but she remembered most of the nobles, their names and faces. Which of them might have turned traitor?

“If it helps,” Corwin said, “I believe we are headed for the far north, mayhap nearly to the border. The man may have a holding there. He may truly be Saxon or mayhap an exiled Scot. I know this is hard.” Corwin went very still, save for a brief, nearly imperceptible glance left. “Thurkill comes. I will turn you around and give you a push, toward the cave. We will talk more later.”

Even though forewarned, Judith stumbled and cried out at the force of his shove.

She began walking, becoming angry all over again. “Was that necessary?” she said, tossing the words over her shoulder.

“It looked good to Thurkill. He needs to believe you and I are at odds.”

“What makes you think we are not?”

Judith sat against the cold cave wall, trying to ignore Thurkill’s loud, echoing voice, trying not to feel guilty for getting Oswuld into trouble with his father. She shouldn’t care if Thurkill punished his son severely, as he threatened, for allowing her brief escape.

Corwin busied himself with the tack on his destrier, apparently also trying to disregard Thurkill’s shouting. He didn’t quite succeed. At times, he would glance at Oswuld with a puzzled look on his face, as if wondering how much more Oswuld could bear without fighting back.

Duncan hadn’t yet returned. When he did, they would leave. She wished he would hurry. Then she wouldn’t have to listen to Thurkill’s ranting, and wouldn’t wonder if his
wrath would turn on her. He-hadn’t said a word to her since her capture, only thanked Corwin for his quick thinking and speedy action.

Thanks to Corwin’s suggestion, names of Saxon nobles whirled around in her head, but she couldn’t think of one she knew who had reason-and the means-to lead a rebellion against England’s king.

Judith pulled Ardith’s note from the folds of her tattered nun’s robe. As always, the sight of her friend’s lovely script proved soothing. Over the years, Ardith had written of her everyday life at Wilmont, of the trials and joys that came with the duties as chatelaine to so large an estate, as well as being a wife and mother. No matter how much she complained at the price of some commodity, or how difficult she found it to get everything done within the space of a day, Ardith sounded as happy as any woman could possibly be.

She’d married a wonderful man, both lover and friend, who treated her with respect and who she respected in return. The two of them worked and played, shared joys and sorrows, always together. To Judith’s mind, they enjoyed the ideal marriage. What must it be like to know, deep within your heart, that one very special person would always be there when needed, would love and cherish you forever?

“Is aught amiss?” Corwin asked.

He stood before her, his arms crossed over the wide expanse of his chest. So much was amiss she didn’t know how he could ask her such a question. But then, he wasn’t looking at her, but at the parchment she held in her hands. ‘Twasnot for her that he voiced concern.

“Nay. What leads you to think so?”

“Youlooked. saddened. I thought mayhap Ardith wrote of ill tidings, and I wondered what they were.”

On that, she could set his mind at ease. “Ardith writes of the boys’ antics, of her husband’s protectiveness and of not being able to see her feet. ‘Twill please her greatly to have her child born.”

Ardith also wrote of her brother, but Corwin already knew that. Judith had ungraciously told him so last eve after he’d handed her the letter.

The corner of his supple mouth curved into a brief smile. “She will push this child out with hopes of having another. Last I heard, she wants six at the least.”

“And Gerard?”

“Will grant her every whim, so long as it does not harm her health.”

Judith glanced down at the note. “Her happiness shines through in every word she writes. She and Gerard have the perfect marriage, do they not?”

Corwin shook his head. “She misleads you in her letters, then. Both are headstrong. When they argue, the rest of us stay well away.”

The one time Judith had seen Gerard and Ardith together, Gerard had been in a fine temper, bellowing Ardith’s name, plunging through the abbey’s passageways as he looked for her. Upon finding her, he’d growled his displeasure. When Ardith had chided him, assured him of her well-being, that bear of a man had gentled almost instantly. Judith could well imagine the sparks that flew when Ardith’s temper clashed with Gerard’s. She doubted, however, if any argument could cause a permanent rift in the marriage. The two loved each other too well.

“Yet when their disagreement is over, their love remains undamaged, does it not?” Judith asked. At Corwin’s nod, she continued, “‘Tis as it should be, and worth bearing most any hardship. If there is a rebellion, Ardith will stand with Gerard, come what may. Be they in castle or hut, she
will be happy so long as they are together. This assumes, of course, that Gerard does not die in the fighting.”

Corwin grinned. “Do not worry over Gerard. The man is quite skilled at holding his own in any fight involving swords.”

In the ensuing silence-and there was silence, for Thurkill had ceased his tirade-Judith refolded the precious piece of parchment and tucked it safely away.

Duncan returned to the cave. “Ah, the princess is found,” he said, giving her a mock bow. Judith refused to acknowledge his insolence.

When she gave no retort, he turned to Thurkill. “While searching for the lady, I spied a small village. One of the women was spreading garments over bushes, I assume to dry from washing. Now might be our chance to pilfer a gown for her ladyship.”

“Why did you not just take one?” Thurkill grumbled.

“I was busy looking for the princess. Besides, what sense taking one if she had not been found?”

Judith took the hand Corwin offered to help her up. She didn’t want to let go. The man did strange things to her mind. Though she wondered if she could trust him, she still felt safest when he was near.

“My lady,” Thurkill said, “I will warn you only this once. Should you attempt another escape, I will order you tied to one of us at all times. You will not know another moment’s privacy.”

He said it without a dram of emotion in his voice. Not a plea for cooperation nor an angry threat, ‘twas the statement of a commander of men.