Fire Dance (33 page)

She wanted to believe that. But Hell reached out to her to claim her for her sins. Fyren would win.

Never. He would not take Alain. He would not take her. He would have no more victims.

And who was she to stop him?

"Lie down with me, now, love. You have waked for me, and the dream is gone, now. And you see, it did not hurt you."

"Aye," she said, and let him ease her back to the straw pallet. He did not have to know the truth.

For a moment, she lay still, absorbing the tender touch of the Norman's huge hands as he

smoothed back her hair. In the dim glow from the hearth, his eyes sparkled with an uncertain kind of intensity. Tentatively, she ran her fingers over his cheek, bristly with the day's unshaven beard. He kissed her fingertips as they neared his lips.

"What happens?" she asked.

"Next?"

"I mean, when I dream."

"You are afraid, although I do not know of what. You cry out, and that is when I come to you. I think sometimes you dream of a place that is cold and dark. Do you know of such?"

"Aye."

"Tell me, love."

"There are deep pits in the cavern below the castle. When I would not do– what he wanted, he would make me– he would put me in the pit. It was so dark I couldn't even see the top, unless he held a lantern over it. And I didn't dare move, because I was afraid I would fall in even deeper. And cold."

"Did he give you anything to eat?"

"Nay. But there was water. I could lick it off the rock."

"If he were alive now, I would kill him."

"It is not important, anymore."

The Norman drew her closer into his arms.

Mayhap Fyren would claim her, but she would not let him have her husband. Alain did not deserve to die. Somehow, she would save him. Somehow.

* * *

Melisande woke when the hearth had burned down to embers and the air was chill. The tip of her nose ached with the cold. Beside her, her Norman lord lay awake and watching, his dark eyes like smoldering coals, as if he had not slept at all.

The pads of his huge fingers brushed across her cheek. His kiss brushed across her lips. He whispered in her ear.

"Never think I do not desire you, lady. But no amount of desire will ever bring me to force myself on you."

"None?"

"None. You cannot tempt me beyond my bounds. Do you choose to challenge it?"

"A challenge? How so, lord?"

"Anything you should ask of me if I violate my pledge."

"Anything? Anything at all?" She almost felt a smile come to her lips. The opportunity? Was this it?

"Anything, my love. But you cannot win it, for I will never do it."

"Men are ever boastful."

She felt the rumble of his laughter in his chest, for it almost could not be heard. "A challenge, then?"

"I will think on it."

When she woke with morning's first light, her back curved neatly into the haven of his body, touching from head to toe. She held the hand that cupped her breast.

She could not bear the thought of losing him, but she could not change that. The very act of love he craved of her, she also craved of him, though it would bring about her destruction. Yet, oddly, she almost wished for it sooner, rather than later. It would have made no difference to her, did it come early or late, save that somehow she must wrest the cloak from him first.

* * *

Alain stood in the bailey of the new motte while his squire lifted the shiny hauberk over his head and adjusted it into its proper fit.

Now he was going to have to tell her. She deserved to know. Needed to know. Aye, he did wish for a way to put it off longer, for he could not tell how she would take it. And he did not want to lose her trust again. But how? He didn't know how, only that it must be done. He could not allow her to fear for her life at his hands any longer.

He began to devise in his head the words he would use. It reminded him of the way a blacksmith fashioned a helm, trying again and again for fit until it was perfect. But he could find no perfect fit. There was a flaw in every word he chose. There must be an answer. There was a way. He had to find it.

He watched her as she made her last check of the men she had aided. And when she went to Robert and issued instructions to the squire, something more tugged at his heart.

Aye, she had him by his heartstrings.

For now, though, he had a different set of problems, as his knights prepared to leave the motte and return to the castle.

"I am grateful that you came, Alain," said Hugh. "It is a terrible thing, to know a friend is in need, and so close, yet to be helpless to aid him."

"Aye." He knew. He had ridden with Hugh and Robert a long time, nearly as long as he had been with Chretien. Robert had been with them in the household of the Conqueror when they were but boys. "I'll leave Robert and his men with you. God willing, he will heal properly."

"And no little thanks to your lady. I am not sorry you brought her, Alain. Yet I cannot see why."

"I cannot explain, Hugh. Aye, I know all think me a fool, Chretien most of all. Yet how can I waste one such as she on the minding of a castle's meals?"

"I think her much changed from our first meeting. She has a fondness for you. Yet there is still something."

"Aye." How could he say? It was not for sharing. "You have things in good order, Hugh. And I am pleased that you could dig the moat so deep."

"It went well enough, with the timber so close. Mayhap we will have the tower complete before aught more befalls us."

"My northern frontier is now in your hands. I must do what I can to secure the south and prepare for Rufus."

"Anwealda knows she is with you, now."

"And that we must return. If I thought her safer here, I would leave her with you. But that would only encourage Anwealda to gather all he could find to throw against you. And in that instance, I doubt you could hold."

"As you wish, Alain. But I do not doubt every man here would defend her to the death."

Alain smiled. "But that is the last thing she would want. She would give herself up for even one of them."

"What will you do if Anwealda captures her?"

He studied the dirt of the bailey. The very thought brought him fear. "I know not."

Hugh's eyebrows raised, but he did not reply.

"None has heard of Dougal's doings?"

"Not even your captured Saxon, and I vow he tells the truth."

And that increased the risk, for all that they speculated Dougal was in Carlisle. Yet, he did not regret his choice. It was as if, in healing others, she began to heal herself. He wanted that for her, would die to give it to her. How could he expect them to understand?

He watched as two squires lifted a heavy hauberk over the lady's head and eased it down over her body. Although it had come from a small man who had died, her slim proportions still left it bagging at her sides.

"It does not fit," she protested. "You did not make me wear such a thing before."

He smiled at her complaint. "Anwealda did not know you were with us before. It will help keep you safe."

"It did not do much for its previous owner."

The knights chuckled while she looked at them in confusion, having no notion that she had made a joke. But he knew their hearts. They wanted their lady safe. If they had not valued her before, they now thought of those she had saved, some of whom could now actually stand about and watch the departure. Now they saw her differently.

"Yet, you said yourself, the mail saved Robert's life. And Chrétien's, as well."

"Aye, lady," Chretien added. "If we must wear the stuff, then so must you. When you are safe again within the castle, you may shuck the shell, and tell all what tyrants we are."

She mumbled something. He was not sure what. Then Alain boosted her into the saddle.

Although it was little more than a track where villeins passed to reach their flocks, the road along the river seemed the safest, the surest. He would take no chances that did not have to be taken, and his eyes scanned for every movement.

CHAPTER 17

Please, God, make the day hot. It is not for me I ask. You know it is not. Make it so hot that he cannot stand the cloak even over his mail.

Even as she continued her silent plea, the sun rose higher and sent down its blistering rays. She reveled in its heat upon her face. The mail began to feel as if it burned her skin, all the way through her kirtle, and burned against her scalp. She shoved at the heavy metal coif impatiently until she dislodged it and it fell back against her shoulders, tangling her braid in the rings. With her free hand, she fumbled with it, but could not separate it from the mail.

"Hold, lady, I will help you."

Her Norman had not ridden beside her for over an hour, having things, she supposed, to discuss with his knights. But now he slowed his pace and leaned in his saddle to free her hair from its trap. It slid easily away as he worked at it.

"We will stop at the stone ford," he said. "The horses need water."

"I could also use some," she replied.

"We will drink, but we cannot stop to eat. Anwealda could be down upon us quickly."

"But we are not so far from the castle now."

He nodded. "Soon. We must stop for the horses anyway. But, one thing, Melisande."

"Aye?"

"When we stop, the coif must go back on."

"Why?"

"We will be vulnerable. We should expect an attack then."

"I have been a burden to you."

"I have willingly accepted it, and you have rewarded me greatly. Be assured, my men will protect you with their lives."

"Aye," she said.

At the ford, the knights dismounted by groups, some always in the saddle, and none far from it. Reluctantly, she drew the rough mail coif over her head again. Its fit was poor. It snagged her hair, and like the hauberk, bagged uncomfortably.

Melisande dismounted and brought her grey courser to the stream in the first group, then remounted the moment it was through. She drank only a little.

As the last group of knights finished refreshing their mounts, the first began to ride out. Norman knights surrounded her, while their eyes scanned restlessly about the hillsides and down the stream.

Still, nothing happened. She had begun to believe Anwealda had lost his taste for a fight. The castle was almost too close now for him to take the chance.

"Do you think we will make it, Chretien?" she asked, as that knight came up beside her.

"Mayhap. Or Anwealda could have taken the castle."

"Do you think he did?"

"I cannot tell. These are dangerous times, lady. We must take no unnecessary chances."