Captured by the Warrior (19 page)

Her shoes.

Bastien blinked, then lunged for the door. The soles of his mother’s shoes were dirty, smeared with green slime. He knew where Alice was.

He flew down the stairs, feet barely grazing the polished wood, every muscle in his body charged with new-found energy. Alice could only be in one place, the place where he and his brother had played when they were young. He even recalled his mother’s voice from all those years ago, chastising them both as they returned, tired, hungry and happy with playing, their clothes and shoes covered in the green slime from the river steps. Bounding down into the courtyard, he cannoned toward the river, oblivious to the astonished stares around him.

‘Alice! Alice!’ Almost falling down into the river in his haste to reach the hidden chamber, Bastien fumbled
with the iron bolt, skinning his knuckles as he wrenched the door open.

Nothing.

Black, foul-smelling darkness, but no Alice. His heart howled.

Desolation scoured him, grinding into his bones. He buckled, his big body crouching down on the steps, face sunk in his hands. His mind was blank, frozen. He had been wrong, and now it was too late.

‘Bastien.’ A hand caressed his shoulder, warm, tentative.

Joy kindled in his veins, flowing around his heart, gathering momentum as he twisted on the step and saw Alice standing there, whole,
alive.
Her gown was torn and dirty, her veil streamed in tatters from her curling blonde hair, smudges adorned her face but he didn’t think he could remember a time when she had looked more beautiful.

‘Christ in Heaven! It is you!’ He sprung upwards, crushing her body to his, tears of pure relief springing from his eyes. Enfolding her into his arms, he relished the tender, sweet feel of her. ‘Sweet Jesu, woman, I thought I’d lost you!’ He wrenched her veil from her head, sending jewelled hairpins flying, stroking the fine strands of her hair, tipping her face up towards his. ‘I thought I’d lost you,’ he murmured once again. Beneath his taut, tanned features, his skin held a grey tinge, shocked.

Her blue eyes sparkled up at him, blazing sapphire, her pale skin tracked with old tears. ‘She wanted to be rid of me,’ Alice stuttered out. ‘She shut me in there.’ She pointed at the chamber, finger trembling. ‘She left me to die.’ Her voice faded to a tremulous whisper.

Anguish hollowed the shadows beneath Bastien’s eyes. ‘I should have never left you here; I should have taken you with me, kept you at my side.’ He paused, frowning. ‘But, how did you…?’

‘She forgot about the passageway,’ Alice supplied, heart flaring at his possessive words. She would stay by his side for ever, if he would have her.

Bastien’s face cleared, the ruddy colour of health returning to his cheeks. ‘Of course, it leads to the other side of the wall. Very narrow, as I recall, even when I was a boy.’ He glanced over her ripped gown, his green eyes grim.

Alice grinned. ‘It was a bit of a squeeze.’

‘Thank the Lord you found it.’

Her hand moved gently over his velvet sleeve, the thick muscles of his forearm solid beneath her fingers. ‘You would have found me anyway.’

‘Aye, I would have,’ he concurred, hands falling from her face, gripping her shoulders. His square chin jutted forward with determination. ‘I would have taken this manor apart, stone by stone, until I found you.’ Raw emotion thickened his voice, the sinews in his throat constricting.

Alice’s eyes sparkled up at him, blazing sapphire. ‘Cecile believed…’ she took a quavering breath, attempting to find the words ‘…she thought that it would destroy you, if I wasn’t here any more.’

His big, capable hands moved back to her face, one thumb moving across her lips, petal soft, a dewy rosebud. ‘It would have killed me.’ His eyes glittered, haunted with the prospect of what might have happened. A shudder rippled through his lean, broad body.

‘But…but…when I saw you at Katherine’s tomb…?’

‘You were there?’

‘Aye, for a moment.’ She had to be sure, be certain.

‘I was saying goodbye, Alice. I had spent a lifetime grieving, and a lifetime fighting against it, until the day I met a maiden who gave me hope once more, who showed me how to love again.’

Her breath caught, suspended on a gossamer thread of flimsy hope. A sudden breeze from the river whipped at her skirts, the embroidered hem flailing around his sturdy leather boots. ‘You mean…?’

‘I mean you, Alice. From the moment I saw you, surrounded by soldiers in the forest, threatening them like a cornered terrier, you began to change me.’ He stroked her hair as she leaned into him. His heart thumped solidly against her ear. ‘I will never let you go again, do you know that?’

‘I do now.’ Delight shivered through her, her heart bursting with utter rapture. She wrapped her arms around him, hugging his big frame to her. ‘Oh, Bastien, I almost dare not to believe it!’

‘Believe it, Alice. Believe that I love you, that I cherish you, and want to spend the rest of my days with you.’ He smoothed away a wayward strand of hair from her forehead; she shivered under his light touch, a moth’s wing of sensation.

‘As I love you, Bastien. With all my heart.’

With a groan, he lowered his head, gathering her slight body into his big frame, sealing his lips to hers in a kiss to claim her for a lifetime.