Rowena Through the Wall: Expanded Edition (27 page)

Ivan released my arm and charged across the room. The dog followed, barking furiously. Ralph launched into the air and knocked Cedric to the floor, then proceeded to jump on Cedric's back.

Cedric growled. "Will somebody get the damn
―"

Ivan hauled back, preparing a vicious kick to Cedric's head.

"Stop it!" I screeched like a banshee. "Stop it!"

I had to do something, so I acted on instinct. I jumped Ivan from behind, circling my legs around his waist. He hollered, but I had his head i
n a double armlock, and he couldn't see.

"Satan's whore!" he yelled.

We swung around, glued together like a rodeo cowboy on the back of a bucking bronco in a really bad western. Round and round we lurched, me holding on like a boa constrictor and Ivan trying to tear my arms off his head.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Kendra reach casually for the cauldron on the stove. Hot meat stew hit Ivan square in the chest and face, and me on his back.

"What the devil was that?" he roared.

We went down sideways in a slithery tangle of arms and legs, meat chunks and cooked carrots. I gasped for breath and tried to get up on my knees, but the stew was everywhere. I slipped and fell on my face.

"Bollocks!" Ivan bellowed, clawing at his eyes.

Kendra let out a whoop. "Food fight!"

"Woof!" Ralph apparently agreed with her and decided to clamber off Cedric, who was now also swimming in meat, vegetables and gravy.

As the dog skidded past me on a sea of stew, a bun hit the back of my head. Then another. And another. The air was suddenly filled with flying buns, vegetables and platters of antipasto.

I yelped and scrambled under the table.

Cedric crawled over to Ivan, slipping and sliding and cursing like a sailor. Ivan pushed up on one knee and opened his mouth to speak. A plate of marinated octopus landed on his head and slithered down his face.

He roared, clawing with his hands.

Down he went again.

"Get him, Kendra!" I screeched with all the class of a gangster moll. "Get Ivan!"

Shrieking and hollering, I remained under my table of safety, while Kendra continued to pelt Ivan with seafood antipasto. The dog barked, excited by the feeding frenzy, and leapt in the air to catch tasty bits before they hit the floor. Cedric reached Ivan and they rolled on the slate floor, food mashing beneath them.

"Geronimo!" Kendra hurled a plate of lethal asparagus spears.

None of us had noticed the crowd gathering.

"Holy Mother of God," Grandfather said from the doorway.

Richard and Logan stood at his side like stone statues.

Silence.

Cedric and Ivan stopped swiping at each other. Kendra froze, a plate of fruit in her hands. Even Ralph stopped eating.

"What are you doing?" Grandfather demanded.

I poked my head out from under the table and wiped a shrimp from my hair. "We couldn't wait for dinner."

We might as
well have sold tickets for the audience our food fight had attracted. Everyone was there―even Thane. He smiled widely and shook his head at me. Gareth and Janus were laughing their stupid heads off.

Sargon, who missed the first act, turned up for the appla
use. I think he was miffed, but it was hard to tell because he was also splitting his gut. I think it was the collection of seafood I kept pulling out of my bodice that got him going.

"Ick," I said, removing another shrimp.

Sargon rubbed his forehead. "I don't even know why you bother to get dressed in the morning. You ruin everything you put on."

He escorted me past the snickering unwashed hoards to the showers. They weren't wearing entire food groups like I was.

"What started this?" he asked.

"Ivan came with his henchman to carry me off. Cedric stopped him and Kendra helped."

He cursed. "I hate being indebted to Cedric. Where is Ivan now?"

"Don't know, don't care." I picked a baby carrot out of my hair. "He can rot like a bat in hell, for all I care."

Later, I heard that Richard and Grandfather managed to get Ivan out of the castle and squirreled away to a safe place. Patrick didn't make it. The king's men caught him with the getaway horses. Sargon beheaded him personally to set an example for any others who might want to abscond with the queen. I didn't like Patrick. But to be killed in such a fashion? The poor man.

How could Sargon be so cold blooded?

I despised him all the more.

I went to Kendra's room to get ready for tonight. I wore the sapphire blue because that was the only good gown I had that would cover my wounded shoulder. I loved the dress. It was cut too low for somebody wanting to blend into the woodwork, but I didn't tend to blend well anyway as a rule. I wore the Tintegal broach around my neck.

Kendra wore her red dress and looked very sweet.

"That's a real stunner," she said, surveying my gown. "Don't wreck it."

I groaned. "At the rate I'm going, I'll be completely out of clothes by Sunday."

The men came to get us an hour later, which was great because I wasn't going into the hall without them. No sir, no way. I was through with men today. There was a whole pack of them I could do without seeing. Sargon, Cedric and Gareth, all in one room?

Gulp. Talk about nightmares. The ghosts of lovers past…

The mood in the great hall was boisterous. Nothing like a good beheading to set the tone.

I stepped into the room, trying to make as little commotion as possible. The men began to cheer. Kendra moved to my side as they whooped and hollered.

One man yelled, "The shrimp's here."

"Oh, horse poop," I muttered.

Everybody who hadn't been at the food fight had at least heard about it. It was the talk of the castle.

Kendra waved to the men and I smacked her hand. "Don't encourage them."

"We should take up mud wrestling here." She giggled. "We'd make a fortune."

We made a beeline for the head table and sat quickly.

A fist raised in the air, Sargon silenced the room. "Welcome, friends. Tonight we celebrate a double victory. Our enemy, who sought to abduct the queen t
oday, was vanquished―"

"By the queen!" some idiot yelled.

The hall exploded in laughter.

Sargon raised his fist again, but even he cracked a smile. "And tonight we celebrate the revival of our annual Games of Skill, the Tournament of Sargonia. Men from far
across the island have traveled here for fame and glory. We honor you. Enjoy the feast tonight. And may God give you strength tomorrow." He raised his goblet. "A toast!"

Everyone stood, including Kendra and me.

"To glory!" Sargon said.

"To glory!" the crowd echoed.

"And to the queen!" someone said.

"To the queen!"

"To the queen's knickers!" another idiot added.

Someone dumped a tankard on the moron's head and the place roared with laughter and profanity.

Thane was positioned behind the drunken fool. I watched as he lifted the man out of his chair as easily as he might a child. Out the doors they went.

Things calmed down a bit and we actually got to eat. Since the birds had come back, I was always starving. I ate everything within reach, including a few pieces of chicken I pinched from Kendra's plate. I had to drink two goblets of ale to wash everything down.

At the corner table with Grandfather, Jon, Richard and men from the far south, Cedric watched me with hooded eyes. He had cleaned up pretty well and didn't show any injury from the food fight. I noted that he always sat with his back to the wall, like they did in old westerns.

Gareth sat at the center table with Janus and several of the Danes. At one point, he caught my eye and smiled. When he raised his tankard to me, I smiled back and blew him a kiss. That was a mistake. His whole table hooted and hollered.

"Slow down," Sargon warned "You're drinking too fast." He took my goblet.

Crap, I thought, I shouldn't be drinking so much. Not with the baby. First thing tomorrow, I would go to the kitchen to boil some water for drinking.

Kendra urged me to join her en route to the washroom.

Yes, even in Land's End we went in pairs.

Giggling, we exited the hall. Raucous laughter followed us through the hall. We stepped outside. It was a lovely night.

For privacy's sake, we headed for some bushes. I got to go first because I was "older and preggers," as Kendra put it.

When it was Kendra's turn, I waited around the corner, staring up at the stars. There were millions of
them here―bright, twinkling, almost scary in their numbers. I never saw that many at home, not even in the desert.

Cedric came up behind me and pulled me into his arms. I was about to tell him he was crazy, when he turned me around and kissed me. His mout
h came down hard on mine, and it was all I could do to keep standing upright. In fact, I couldn't. I'd drank too much. With a giggle, I fell back against his arm, which gave way. Then I was on the ground, sprawled like a starfish.

Cedric cursed. He gave me his good hand and hauled me up.

Gareth rushed down the castle steps. "Rowena, did he hurt you?"

Cedric frowned. "Norland, stay back. I've no quarrel with you. It's that wolf-fiend who does her evil. I'm not the one trying to eat her alive."

He pulled the dress off my shoulder to expose the wound, but his actions did more than that. My breast fell out.

Could I be more embarrassed?

Gareth swore in a language I didn't understand.

I shrugged out of Cedric's reach and adjusted my dress. "Ssstop doing that," I slurred. "Everyone's always pulling my bodice down and it's getting really, really annoying."

Kendra appeared. "Leave her alone. Both of you. Hasn't she been through enough today?"

"Yes, leave her alone," Sargon snarled, emerging from the shadows. "We've already had one beheading this eve."

His threat was palpable. I felt barely contained fury all around me.

"Come wife," Sargon said, grabbing my arm. "It's time you were to bed."

I looked over my shoulder. "Kendra?"

She followed a few steps until Sargon said, "Stop there. She has no need of you tonight."

I gave a little sob as he hauled me inside the castle. When I looked back, Cedric and Gareth were talking, while Kendra stared after me, a worried frown on her face.

When we reached the room, Sargon waited until I was inside before leaving me to return to the celebration. He locked the door behind him.

I slept like the dead that night. It hardly mattered that I was in a strange bed in a strange room at the top of the castle somewhere.

Sargon was elsewhere and I felt safe.

Chapter 28

At first light, I took stock of the new room. It was actually a suite with two rooms. The first contained only the bed I had slept in. The second held a single desk, a chair and an entire wall lined with doors.

I opened the first door and found a closet full of weapons. I closed it quickly. Then I went to the farthest door. Inside were my dresses, hanging neatly in a row. My vet bag was at the bottom. My pink backpack and cowboy boots as well. Kendra's work, no doubt.

This suite was sparsely furnished. It looked disused, for the most part. There were no draperies or tapestries on the walls. Windows opened to the front courtyard, toward the drawbridge. You could see for miles down the dirt path leading up to the castle.

Good for surveying all who might want to force the gates, I reckoned.

I dressed in the sleeveless lilac dress with the scoop neck. It had a filmy capelet off the back that attached at the shoulders and swept down to my waist, spanning the distance between day dress and evening gown. I wore a matching headband and the broach.

I went to find Kendra. She was in her room.

"Wear something nice," I said. "We'll be on the podium most of the morning."

Today was the longbow trials. I was rather excited. Thane would be competing.
Probably Janus too. It was going to be a good day―a great day.

Shows how wrong a girl from the golden west can be.

We stopped in the kitchen first for something to eat. It was miraculously clean and showed no ill effects from our episode the day before. Ge
orge was frying up bread left over from last night's feast. Believe it or not, bread fried in pork fat is one of the most delectable things on earth when you're starving.

I had a revelation.

"Hey, Kendra, I'm not throwing up."

This was the first day I hadn't started with the chamber pot as my best friend.

"That's a relief," she said. "I worry about you losing weight."

"I'm making up for it now."