Microsoft Word - Jenny dreamed (32 page)

The usually confident and swaggering Wynn Courtland was at a loss for words, brought lower by Jenny's cutting remarks than if Dev had knocked him flat with a solid punch. He shuffled his feet and offered a grudging apology, suggesting that they start back on the trail again.

Dev bent to retrieve his rifle and secured its sling across his shoulder before taking Jenny's arm and clearing the path of vines. "This time, stay close to me," he warned, softening the order with a tender look that told her how much he worried over her safety.

They travelled on, fighting the steep, upward angle of the land as it rose toward the highlands of the Gran Sabana. Once, at Dev's insistence, they stopped so that Jenny could rest and bathe her face with the cool water of a small, clear lagoon, though for the most part Courtland set a hard pace that would have undone the strongest man, much less a woman unused to such travel.

Finally, when the sun was at its zenith, he called a break for the noonday meal. Jenny sat to one side with Dev while Wynn paced the camp with the pent-up energy of a caged animal.

"Mr. Courtland, Wynn ... if that were an expensive Persian carpet, you'd have worn a hole through it already," Jenny teased, smiling to show she'd somewhat forgiven him his earlier rash statements. "Why don't you sit and join us-there's something I'd like to discuss with you."

Wynn paused, studied Devlan for a moment, and when the younger man shrugged carelessly as if to say it was of no importance to him whether he joined them or not, he walked over and broke off a piece of bran meal loaf and sliced a portion of jerky. There was just enough room next to Jenny to sit, and Wynn took advantage of it, grinning at Devlan while he worked his teeth into the tough, dried meat and tore a piece free.

With a fastidious gesture that was ingrained in Jenny by years of correct social behavior, she brushed daintily at the bran crumbs that clung to her skirt. Both men studied her, amused by the dismay that flickered across her face as she reviewed the torn, rumpled state of her clothes and sighed deeply in regret. It was clear that Jenny was wistfully recalling the delight of a hot, scented bath and the feel of a silk dress against her skin.

"What was it you wanted to ask me, then?" Wynn inquired abruptly, breaking into Jenny's dreams.

"Oh just your honest opinion of our chances of success. I I'm afraid I was overconfident of my own endurance. I would like to end the search now and turn back to Caracas." She glanced at Dev for a moment and then faced Wynn. "If you really believe you can find Rodrigo or at least what his fate was, I'd like you to return and continue. Money is of no importance, Wynn. This rumor that my husband is alive places me in the ambiguous position of not knowing if I am a widow or still married. Whichever is the truth, I must know."

"Honest opinion, eh?" Wynn considered his answer for a while, knowing full well that it would determine her future actions regarding Devlan Cantrell. In truth, he believed that the chances of finding her husband were one in a thousand. One man alone did not survive long in the Guayana, and if it really had been the Duke that the Spaniard had seen, he must have been deranged, affected by the hostile environment to a degree that he hadn't recognized Alazar or sought his help in returning to civilization. Sane men didn't last long in the tropics, and a crazed one even less time.

Wynn would tell Jenny the truth but leave open that one, intriguing chance in a million that he was wrong. "If you want me to continue, I will. Your father will get his money's worth, ma'am, but the chances are slim that you'll ever know what happened to Morenes." He wanted to plant a seed of doubt, to ask what she would do if she married Devlan and Rodrigo appeared on her doorstep; but, remembering her earlier warning not to meddle in her private affairs, he restrained himself.

"Then we'll turn back in the morning … it's agreed?"

He nodded, and Jenny closed her eyes a moment in a sigh of relief. Back to Caracas, back to civilization at last! All she would need was the strength to survive the trip, and the horrible bugs and deadly creatures of the interior would be a memory instead of a gruesome, everyday reality. When she again opened her eyes, Courtland was walking away toward the spot where the bearers and Ramon were sharing a meal.

Dev took hold of Jenny's hand and she smiled at him, then tilted her head to one side, listening for a moment before she asked him if he heard the same, steady roaring sound she did. "Courtland told me there's a huge waterfall about a mile from here. That's the sound you're hearing." He pointed off to the right, and through the thick foliage and lush, heavy treetops she could just make out the outlines of a steep, granite mountain.

"We're just on the edge of a range of mountains. They call 'em tepuis here. They're sheer-sided and very high." A heavy mist obscured the peaks, and Dev explained further that they hadn't been explored yet. "No one's ever seen the tops. Our native friends over there think the tepuis are the homes of their gods."

Jenny tried to discern more of the distant scene but failed. She thought it would be interesting to see the falls before they turned back and was about to suggest it to Dev when the loud crack of a rifle shot broke the surrounding silence. Wynn's shout to Dev came a second later.

Dev jumped to his feet. "Stay here and don't move an inch!" he ordered sternly. He grabbed his rifle and ran across the campsite to the edge of an open field, disappearing among the trees and bushes at its edge.

Jenny knew she should obey, that she would only be in the way in the event they were being attacked by hostile natives, but after another shot, then another, she bolted across the camp toward the spot where Dev had disappeared. Branches clawed at her face, but she pushed through them, ignoring the scratches as she stumbled through the brush in a desperate need to know Dev was safe.

The scene in the open field was so bizarre and unbelievable that her mind rejected what her eyes saw. Dazed, she clutched at a nearby tree for support. But for the occasional loud crack of rifle fire and the raucous, keening cries of startled birds, the tableau was a violent intrusion of the past upon the present.

Across the field from Jenny, five knights, knights in full battIe armor, sat astride their liveried chargers, and the blood-eager destriers pawed the earth in anticipation of yet another charge forward. Metal visors and noseguards obscured the upper half of the attackers' faces, imparting a menacing aspect in sharp contrast to the innocent, heraldic plumed feathers that fluttered atop their helmets. Another knight lay sprawled on the ground, wounded by a lucky shot that had penetrated a weak spot in the .chain mail covering his left calf. The large, fleshy bulk of his mount lay before him, sheltering his body from additional shots by the defenders. To her right, Jenny saw one of the native bearers, the short, dark Indian known as Gualito, lying in a pool of his own blood, mortally wounded by one stab of a lance.

Jenny blinked hard to banish the imaginary vision, but when she looked across the field, the sun glancing off shiny metallic plate revealed that the aggressors from another time were all too real.

The charge began and the earth trembled beneath the thundering beat of the horses'

hooves, to the accompaniment of a round of defensive fire. Not twelve feet from her, one of the horses, struck by a bullet, crashed to its knees with a wild, snorting whinny of pain. The rider rolled away deftly escaping the great, crushing weight of the charger, to come to his feet with sword drawn. The steel flashed in the sun as the man cried out exultantly and rushed toward the woods to attack.

Dev was firing at the two others who had managed to pin down Courtland at an awkward, indefensible spot. In his concentration he failed to hear the approach of the man on foot.

Only Jenny's scream as she watched one of the knights plunge his sword into the base of Wynn's throat saved Dev from the same fate. He whirled in her direction and found himself facing his armored attacker.

One blow of the broad, double-edged sword sent his rifle flying, and as he rolled with the second lunge, Dev escaped death by a narrow margin. Instead of being struck by the sharp edge of the weapon, Dev was knocked flying by its thick, flat surface and crumpled to the earth before Jenny's horrified gaze.

She screamed again and flew to his side, disregarding the threat of the knight who loomed over his body or the fact that she was now alone in the forest, without any protection other than her tears. In her first hysterical reaction, she cradled Dev's head in her lap, sobbing as her fingers smeared the bright blood that matted the curls at his temple. Slowly, reason returned, and she carefully probed the swollen lump, checking to make sure his skull was not fractured. The blow apparently had done nothing more than cause him to pass out from the sharp pain, and she drew a deep breath and said a prayer of thanks.

The next moment she found herself jerked to her feet by the knight. He held her arm in a tight, vice-like grip, the metal scales of his gauntlet biting into the flesh of her slender wrist.

Jenny scarcely felt their sharpness, so consumed was she by the-fury that had replaced her fright. In the distance there was a gurgling scream of death, and she closed her eyes, shutting out the ugly sound as yet another of the native bearers met his death at the hands of these murderers. The knight who held her raised his visor, wiping the sweat from his eyes.

"M'Lady," he said, drawing Jenny's attention with the strange, rippling brogue in which he spoke. "I have orders to bring ye to the laird of Beann Gowd'en." The other knights now gathered around, their hauberks and emblazoned tabards smeared with the blood of their victims.

Jenny drew herself up straight and proud, disdainfully glancing down at her imprisoned arm before she raised her eyes to his with a haughty look. "And where is this den of murdering cowards who prey on unsuspecting travellers, most gallant knight?"

The stinging words had their desired effect. The man caught her other arm, whirling her roughly around to point out the mist-shrouded tepui in the distance. "There lies our land, and all who trespass its domain forfeit their lives." He made a mocking half-bow and added ironically, "All but ye, m'Lady Jennifer. Lord Rodrigo gave specific orders ye were not to come to any harm."

At the shock of Rodrigo's name, Jenny surrendered gladly to unconsciousness. She did not know that the knight's quick reflexes in catching her broke her fall. She did not feel his strong arms lift her into the care of one of his mounted companions. She knew nothing beyond the black, painless void that enveloped her mind.

Nineteen

Despite the fact that the armed knights had come down from their mountain fortress at Rodrigo's bidding, it was to Lady Fiona, hereditary leader of Beann Gowd'en by her descent from its founder, Sir Thomas the Rhymer, that they owed true allegiance. When the woman captive recovered consciousness on the. journey through the secret labyrinth of caves that honeycombed the immense mountain, the knight who'd swept her onto his mount had bound her arms at the wrist and covered her eyes with the scarf she'd been wearing.

Raddock had been given specific orders not to harm her, though no such ban extended to the only one of her companions to escape death. The tall, mustached man who'd suffered the head wound had been slung over the charger of one of the fallen knights and securely trussed, even though he'd stayed unconscious for the trip to the mountain top.

The knights made an impressive sight, their polished armor plate glinting in the noonday sun as they emerged from the the cave that opened onto the flat, fertile surface of Beann Gowd'en. To the lady waiting a distance away with her party of attendants and guards, it was no great wonder that the superstitious Indian tribes who inhabited the forest floor took the seldom-seen warriors as gods of the mountain. They always had, since her ancestor Sir Thomas had brought his followers to this secluded new land in the early thirteen hundreds.

Lady Fiona of Loch Gowd took a deep breath, trying to quell her excitement as the group of knights cantered forward and reined in their charges a short distance from her party.

Raddock had his orders. He knew that the lady he carried belonged to Rodrigo, the Spanish devil who'd usurped the leadership of their country and taken it upon himself to be declared the new Laird. He knew that she could not be allowed to overhear any conversation that might endanger his Lady. And so, before he approached her, he lifted Rodrigo's wife down from the stallion and left her in the care of another knight.

Fiona's voice was hushed as she bade Raddock to rise from his kneeling obeisance, then inquired how the foray had gone. "Two loyal squires down, m'lady, and none but the man there," he swung around and pointed with a gauntleted hand, "left of the trespassers. What be ye'r further wishes?" Fiona peered past her knight, studying the immobile form draped over the saddle. The germ of an idea took seed in her mind, and she asked how badly he was wounded. "'Tis but a head scrape, m'lady, a blow to his thick head and nae more. He'll live to rue the death o' m'men, tha' I swear."

"Nae, loyal champion mine, I've plans tha' include this fellow. Listen close," she ordered, coming nearer as she whispered her instructions. After a few minutes Raddock nodded, then bowed and turned away to rejoin his men and motion his second in command, Sir David, to one side for a quick conference.

Worn by the long trip and pushed to exhaustion by the shock of what she'd been through, Jenny lay listlessly against the hard, metal breastplate of the knight who held her, lost in a kind of limbo. She knew neither where she was nor why the party of men had stopped. Was Dev all right? That was the worry that consumed her. When she'd come out of her swoon, she'd been able to see that he was tied to one of the horses. Although he appeared limp, she consoled herself with the belief that they would not have bothered to bring him along if he were not alive.

Suddenly she heard voices and recognized the man who had originally captured her as he said, " 'Tis no use, Davie, the man is gone. All ye'r shakin' will nae bring a dead man back t'life! Stay behind wi' Balterry an' see t'buryin' him. E'en now, the Laird's wonderin' where we be!"