Claudia Dain (6 page)

"Go, brother," Roger encouraged with a lopsided grin. "I can find my way without you."

"Find your way, aye," Avice said. "The tower is before you, its shadow slight and thin in the midday heat. All light, it is. Surely you can find your way into the very heart of Stanora."

"Words of encouragement indeed," Roger said with a chuckle. "Find my way I shall. I take it for a promise, Lady Avice. You will not betray?"

"I make no promises, my lord," she said. "The way will not be easy for you."

"In that you prophesy," Ulrich said with a grin as he turned to gather the reins for his mount. "In all the ways of women, the way is never easy for Roger of Lincoln."

"Be gone, brother," Roger snarled cheerfully. "Have you not game enough of your own?"

Aye, he did, and he only hoped he had kept her waiting a sufficient time to ruffle her. In this hunt and by her sister's words, he thought that Juliane le Gel had played by her own rules long enough. It was time to play by his.

* * *

"By the saints, where is the man?" Juliane growled softly at the clouds. Baldric smiled in response, but he was not such a fool as to smile in such a way that Juliane would see it. "Can he not come when and where he is bidden? I called to him most well, did I not, Baldric?"

"Most well, lady," he answered softly. "Perhaps he is short of sight?"

She only grumbled at that. 'Twas not possible for a knight to be poorly sighted and still make his way among the living. Short of sight indeed. He was not that, no matter what other shortcomings he might possess. Tardiness was surely one. Perhaps obstinacy? Almost certainly.

Would he best her?

Resolutely not.

"How fares Morgause?" she asked Baldric, who held her merlin upon the block.

"Restive, lady," he answered. As were they both, and small wonder. "She yearns to hunt."

Juliane could not possibly have been more sympathetic. "Then let her fly," she instructed. "Let at least one of us enjoy the hunt today."

"Aye, lady, but I think he will come. In time."

"In time? In his own wretched time, I will vow," she said, adjusting her gloves.

They were gloves for hawking, aye, but they were also of lambskin dyed a most pleasing shade of red. She would have worn her oldest gloves if she had thought to hunt alone. Certainly, Baldric did not care which gloves she wore. As to Ulrich, he would not be the man they sang of if he spent more than a moment noticing the fineness of her gloves. Nay, by all tales, his eyes would be elsewhere.

Yet by the tales, he should be here, by her side, striving against her chill courtesy even now.

Tales were wretchedly unreliable things.

Baldric loosed the leash that tied Morgause to the block and set her free. The merlin set straightaway to ring up, her sails glistening black in the sun as she climbed in circles high into the summer sky. It was a beauteous thing to see. On she flew, upward and ever upward until she hovered at the top of her pitch, waiting on for her master to spring the game for her eager beak and talons. 'Twas the nature of a hawk, this joy in the hunt and in the blood of the kill. This joy at being unstoppable and unbested; this joy in beauty and power and skill; this joy in taking quarry in a stoop of speed past measuring: aye, Juliane could not possibly have been more sympathetic. She understood Morgause to perfection and shared her joy in the hunt and in the kill.

Of course, her own path was far less bloodthirsty. She killed no man and wanted no man dead, but still, she did hunt after a fashion, and in this battle of seductions there was only one victor. And that victor was she. Ever it had been so and ever it would be.

Even if her present quarry, one Ulrich of Caen, hid himself within the sedge of summer, she would find him and take him and defeat him. If he would only appear so that the game could begin.

"She waits on, lady," Baldric said.

"Aye," said Juliane, her eyes focused high above the earth upon a small black dot circling in the heavens, ever patient, ever sure that she would be served and that she would know the thrill of the stoop that led to the kill. "Aye, she waits on, yet will not for long. 'Tis not in her nature to wait. Serve her, Baldric. Drive out the grouse which I know huddle in the turf. This is fair ground. There is good game here for Morgause."

And so Baldric beat the ground, a long stick he had taken up working well for a bludgeon. In time, the grouse sprang loose from the grass and took flight. In an instant, Morgause stooped, dropping like the very hammer of God down, down, down to earth, without hesitation, without slowing, without caution. She was the master of this game, and she would take the grouse in beak and talon and cold, unblinking stare.

The grouse could find no place to shelter, and to take to the air would have meant only death more quick, yet take to the air it did, hungry for life, desperate for escape. If the grouse escaped this first stoop, its chances for survival would rise dramatically. Like a bow shot, the grouse flew across the meadow, bouncing, trying to find cover and finding none. Upon her horse, Juliane raced to outrun the grouse, eager to be there for the kill. In the next instant, the merlin flew into the grouse, a small and dainty hunter, outsized yet not outmatched, making the kill, tearing into the flesh, claiming her prey.

Juliane let her merlin devour what would have made a respectable showing upon Stanora's table; grouse was good eating. Yet she would not steal away Morgause's victory. She understood this sweetness, this satisfaction too well to rob it from another.

"A fine stoop," Baldric said, coming up behind her. "She grows in strength and in ferocity."

"That she does," Juliane said softly as Baldric swung the lure to call Morgause back to the block.

The grouse was only feathers and bone and a smear of blood upon the long grass of summer. Morgause came to the lure, sat upon her block, and preened. As well she should.

And so it would be with Ulrich, his name for winning hearts only a smear of broken pride upon the grass of Stanora. If only he would be flushed from his protective cover so that the game might truly begin. What bludgeon could she use to drive him out? What means beyond the glimpse of her profile and the beckoning curve of her back and breasts? What words to make him flush with pleasure and then with shame as his manhood lay shrunken and small and soft against his thigh?

She had no beak and no talons and she did not thirst for blood. Nay, not blood. Yet she had her weapons and her skills and the will to use them. Let Ulrich only show himself.

It was upon that thought that Ulrich came.

Chapter 4

Her hawk was blooded and stood upon her block, watching him with glistening eyes of black. A more distant match for her mistress Ulrich could not imagine. The merlin was all black and white and sharp talon and beak. Juliane was white and gold and soft blue eyes, a curving line of gentle womanhood, her mouth bowed in a gentle smile of pale rose lips and white teeth. All welcome. A haven of beauty in a hot summer day. A woman to make a man dream of love.

And then she grinned and tilted her head at him, and with the change he understood her better: This was a woman adept at the game. All to the good, for he would not play against a woman who was not his equal in these amorous wars. Not again. With this woman, with Juliane, he would not need to tread softly. Nay, she could take whate'er he gave her. A match of equals. A jousting of like hearts in the ruthless games of courtly love. This was a woman to conquer.

Ulrich smiled. At conquering women he was well adept, and what was love but a weapon? Upon the point of that weapon he would defeat her, this woman who glowed with sensual beauty like a summer sunset, hot and shimmering and golden. Upon that point, aye, upon that point... and with that thought, he sprang up, hot and ready.

"Good morrow," she said softly, her voice pitched low.

"Good morrow, lady," he answered with some hesitation. When was it ever that a woman spoke directly to a man unless bidden to do so? His point did not fail him, yet his blood thinned and cooled by the barest measure. By what rules did she play?

"You found your way," she said, smiling in tepid amusement. "Finally."

So all Avice had said was true. Juliane had swung the lure and he had followed. Well, there were worse charges to make against a man, and she was a worthy lure.

"Do not all ways and all paths within the bounds of Stanora lead to Juliane? So I have found you. Finally," he said, matching her tepid smile.

They were both horsed, as was her groom, the bird well upon the block and watching him with bright eyes. Juliane looked as if she were ready to run. Would she? Would she run from him again, luring him to follow? Or would she match him point for point? He watched her carefully for her next move in this pleasant parrying.

"Only within the bounds of Stanora?" she queried, smoothing the leather reins against her gloved hands. Her gloves were red, like drying blood, and covered her arms to the elbow joint; costly gloves and most fine. "Did you only seek me then once you had found your way into Stanora? Did not the name of Juliane find you in your sleep and call to you, my lord Ulrich? Did not you cross the very breadth of this isle in search of me?"

The smile was gone from her lips, yet her eyes glowed still in amusement. Was she laughing at him? This woman-girl who had no man to warm her bed and no children to give her life form?

Yet... yet how had she known his name if not for the strength of his own legend? Ulrich smiled. Aye, she knew him and, if she be wise, she feared him. He would not fall to her, and in that standing, her name would fall into defeat. No other wound would he inflict, but this woman, this golden, gleaming woman, would not laugh at him again. She had not met his like before; it only remained for him to show her that truth.

With his knees he urged his mount forward, closing the gap between them, setting himself between Juliane and her groom. The groom gave way without hesitation. Juliane eyed him coldly and with grim amusement, and it was then that he saw her eyes were like Avice's, of the same icy blue bound by rims of deepest lapis. The same large almond shape, the same arching brow. Yet not the same, for Avice's eyes were soft and tender with all the aching need of women, while Juliane's eyes offered the hard, cold stare of a man confronted, his pride pricked, his honor challenged.

Juliane had not the soft look of a woman.

His point slipped and faltered, and Juliane smiled.

"Come, answer, lord knight," she commanded, holding his gaze. "How far did you come in search of me, and how quickly did you think to defeat my name? Was I to last even the hour?"

"Lady," he said softly, holding her gaze, holding her icy look within his own, claiming her, controlling her if only in this. "Lady, I came far, but it was not your pride I longed to build; nay, it was only your ardor."

"And your own name?" she asked, taking his look and devouring it, drinking it, possessing it. He would not cow her with a look; she was a mightier foe than that. "Was that not also something you wished to build?"

"Between us, Lady Frost," he whispered, "there can be only fire, the fire that burns body, bones, and even names into dust. What I bring to build the flame is the flame-bringer's art. Do not look too deep into that fire or you will lose yourself... in me."

She kneed her horse a step away from him and then laughed in pure delight. A worthy foe she was. All his fears for her vulnerability faded into mist. She needed no protection from him; she could well protect herself. The tight band of caution loosed itself from his chest, and he breathed freely for the first time since this unsought wager had been set.

"You are truly Ulrich of the Sweet Mouth. I have named you well," she said with a laugh.

"If you have named me Ulrich of the Sweet Mouth, you have indeed named me very well. Lady, you have the gift of prophecy. In God's time, I will prove it upon you."

"In God's time?" she said with a grin of soft joy. "I may have mistook you, my lord, for I would have wagered that all things done were to be done in Ulrich's time and not the Lord of Hosts'. You enchant me, my lord, with your modesty and your piety."

"That I enchant is enough. As to my piety, if you find it fits, you may rename me Ulrich the Pious. If the name comes from Juliane of the Flame."