The Rose of Blacksword (22 page)

“No!” The scream tore from her lips as she dashed down the few steps then pushed her way through the staring crowd. She heard the sharp crack of the whip even from across the bailey, followed by the gasp of the crowd, and she winced as if the wicked leather had cut her own skin.

“No! No!” she cried out once more, unaware that it came out only as a frantic sob. But the spectators’ attentions were no longer focused on her. Everyone had heard the gossip: Some fiend had been foolish enough to attack Sir Edward’s daughter. Now he was to pay with a painful stripping away of his flesh until he begged for the final relief from his pain at the hangman’s noose. With every snap of the vicious whip, the entire assemblage jerked in response. Yet they waited still for the next and the next, both repelled and uncontrollably drawn to watch the grisly flogging.

But Rosalynde felt only a sickening anguish for what was happening. Sobbing and gasping for breath, stumbling blindly as she ran, she broke into the little clearing as the whip drew back then snaked cruelly out once more. She watched in frozen horror as the stiffened tip of leather cut
through the air then flicked with deadly precision across Blacksword’s broad, sweating back.

“Stop! Oh, please God, stop!” she prayed aloud as her stomach twisted with revulsion at such a cruel deed. Standing unbowed, his hands tied in place against the sturdy wooden gate, Blacksword could not see her. But she could see him, and what she saw filled her with terror and shame. His back already showed the fierce red welts of too many strikes of the whip. The last one had finally drawn blood. Before her unbelieving eyes the whip struck once more, and she saw with agonizing clarity the thin red tear against the firm brown flesh and then the several bright lines of oozing blood that slid down that strong unyielding back.

Unable to bear it even a moment longer, Rosalynde tore her eyes away. Then she saw her father and she knew what she must do.

“Stop this, Papa! Stop it!” she pleaded as she rushed to his side. She grabbed both his hands to force his attention to her. “You can’t let this go on! You can’t!”

Her father’s face was grim as he finally met her eyes. “He gets no more than he deserves.”

“He deserves none of this. None of it!” she begged, heedless of the tears that flooded her face. “I promised him a reward.”

“So you said before, but ’tis clear he was too impatient to wait for it. In his greed and lust he wanted something more—” He broke off then and signaled to the man with the whip to resume his gruesome task. Once more the unforgiving leather cracked, and this time Rosalynde felt as if it struck her to the very heart, tearing her—ripping her—asunder. She could not let this go on! In a fury she rounded on the man, seeing in her fear and pain how he drew back once more to flog the unbending man who refused
to sag or whimper beneath the whip’s savage bite. In an outburst of energy she flung herself at the thick-muscled arm that held the whip.

Her strength was not enough to stop the man. Had she been able to think clearly, she would have recognized that fact at once. But the scowling fellow knew better than to strike the very woman whose honor it was he now avenged. One swat of his other hand would have rid him of her pesky interference. But he dared not. It was her father who finally dragged her away. It was Sir Edward who grabbed her and shook her until her teeth fairly rattled in her head.

Then he took an angry breath and glared down into her frightened, stubborn face. “Mind what you do, daughter! Do not shame me by this unseemly display!”

“If you flog him—” She gasped for breath as she locked her haunted eyes with his furious ones. “If you flog a man whom you should reward, then you shame yourself.”

There was an unearthly silence in the castle bailey. Not a soul moved. No one dared speak. Every ear strained to hear what passed between father and daughter, and a hundred possibilities circled in as many minds. But their words were low and muttered, and no one heard a word save the two of them.

Finally the glowering Sir Edward turned and, with only a terse shake of his head, signaled the man with the whip to halt. Then, ignoring both the waiting crowd and the still-bound prisoner, he dragged his unruly daughter away.

12

“Impossible!” Sir Edward shot his daughter a furious look. “I’ll not reward a ruffian for his misdeeds.”

“Papa, please. I beg you!” Rosalynde clutched her hands tightly at her stomach as she watched her father’s angry pacing. “You’ve listened to Cleve. You’ve listened to Sir Roger. Why can you not listen to me?”

“This is not your concern. Women should not interfere—”

“It is solely my concern!” she shouted in self-righteous indignation.

At such a blatant contradiction of his words, her father turned and gave her a baleful glare. “Is this the same biddable child I sent to Millwort? Is this foul temper a sample of the lessons you learned at your lady aunt’s knee?” He studied her with ill-concealed impatience. “I am Lord of Stanwood, miss. Everyone—everything—here falls under my protection. Those who dare to threaten anything of mine do thereby threaten me. And I take no threat lightly. There is no way but for him to pay, and harshly.”

“But not with his life,” she pleaded in a voice gone softer with her rising fear for Blacksword.

Her father did not respond for a long moment, and in the nerve-racking silence Rosalynde considered the wisdom
of confessing all to him. If he knew the man was her husband then perhaps … She pressed her fingers to her mouth as she struggled to decide. Perhaps he would free him, she hoped. But the stubborn frown on her father’s face held more promise of dire consequences to the man who dared compromise his one daughter than it did reward. No matter that pagan ritual of marriage—if her father was angry now, he would be uncontrollable if she was to tell him everything that had happened. No, she decided reluctantly, she must never reveal her secret, for that would be the final death sentence for Blacksword. Yet even so it seemed he faced much the same fate unless she could somehow convince her father to spare him.

With a vow to remain calm and unemotional no matter what, Rosalynde lifted a reasonable expression to her father. “Cleve has told you grim tales of Blacksword. I know he has. But you must understand—”

“What sort of name is that anyway? Blacksword, indeed. ’Tis the name of a ruffian, a knave, and only confirms what the boy has said.”

“His name is Aric,” Rosalynde put in. “He is from a place called Wycliffe.”

Her father stared at her with narrowed eyes. “He told you this?”

Rosalynde nodded and stepped nearer to him. “He did not deny that he had an unsavory past, but he agreed to help us. And he was most solicitous. He even built a sling to carry Cleve in.”

“A sling?”

At her father’s curious tone, Rosalynde felt a faint spark of hope. “Didn’t Cleve tell you? He was hurt and unable to walk. Blacksword—I mean, Aric—built a clever frame so that he could pull Cleve to safety.” She watched as her father digested that bit of news and thoughtfully pulled at
his chin. Then before he could dismiss that information she continued. “He hunted for us and kept us fed. He even made me a pair of slippers from the two rabbit skins.”

Her father pursed his lips and looked away from her. When he finally returned his gaze to her, his face was still suspicous.

“The boy said that the man was struggling with you. That he had to protect you from—” He halted abruptly, clearly loathe to bring up the one possibility he wished not to think about.

“Cleve misunderstood.” The lie slipped softly from her lips and she cringed inside at the unfair light she cast Cleve in. She would make it up to him, she promised herself. But she just could not let Blacksword die. “Cleve was still groggy from the wound to his head. He was suspicious of the man. He—he was perhaps a little ashamed that he was unable to provide for me.”

Rosalynde held her breath, fearful to hope, yet unable to discount the considering expression on her father’s face. Please, God, she earnestly prayed, please let him spare Blacksword.

There was a short silence before Sir Edward cleared his throat. In his solemn eyes Rosalynde fancied she could see his need for vengeance warring with a desire to be fair. Then he spoke and her hopes plummetted. “He is still a self-proclaimed murderer. A thief. A blackguard.” He spat the word out in disgust. “The name Blacksword no doubt was earned through less than noble endeavors.”

“But … but …” Rosalynde fumbled for words. “He wants to change. I know he does. If you could just give him a chance …” She trailed off despairingly.

“Mother of God, but you ask much of me!” he muttered with a scowl. Then he sat down in a sturdy chair and
glowered over at her. “He’s been flogged.” He stopped. Then he took a slow breath and Rosalynde knew he had made up his mind. One way or the other, he had decided Blacksword’s fate. “He’s been flogged but he stood it well. I’ll spare his life, Rosalynde. I’ll spare his life. But that’s all I’ll do. There’ll be no reward for him, only a hard job under a watchful eye. He’ll be fed but he’ll work strenuously for his due. Then when he proves himself—
if
he proves himself … Well, we’ll see what happens then.”

At this unexpected compromise, Rosalynde was completely taken aback. He would spare Blacksword’s life! Blacksword would live! In a rush of heartfelt emotions, relief foremost among them, Rosalynde flew to where he sat. “Thank you, Papa. Oh, thank you,” she cried as she hugged him fiercely. Then, when he stiffened in surprise, she stumbled back, embarrassed by her demonstrative outburst. But it was her turn to be surprised, for her father was staring up at her with a face suddenly stripped of any protective expression. For the span of less than a second he was not the strong father, the invincible man she’d always known. She saw a softness there, something touched by her spontaneous display of affection. In that instant she was reminded of the father he had been in her early years. Before everything had happened. But then he blinked and the father of the past eight years returned.

They stared at each other without speaking until he rose and dismissed her with a nod. For another moment Rosalynde lingered, still staring at him, but hesitantly now. Then she gave him a wavering smile and murmured another quick “Thank you,” before she turned and walked away on legs that trembled. She did not see the bittersweet expression of both longing and sadness that swept over his face, nor the way his eyes followed her out of sight.

But her heart was lighter than it had been in a very long time.

Aric was dizzy from the pain, yet he refused to yield to it. In red-hot waves it washed over him. Every beat of his heart drove fresh daggers of fire into his back; every least trickle of sweat stung him with new and cruel agony. Flies buzzed around his head and settled on his tortured flesh, and he was torn between the excruciating torment of shrugging them off and the unbearable misery of letting them stay.

Christ’s blood! When would this accursed waiting end? He’d stood the ungodly flogging, refusing to break no matter what torture her father meted out. He would die on his feet without a whimper or moan if it was his last act on this earth! But then the flogging had abruptly halted and he’d been left now, these long, agonizing minutes, to stand in the glaring sunlight, surrounded by the restless castlefolk, waiting for God only knew what would come next.

He closed his eyes against the bead of sweat that traversed his brow, then he shook his head sharply to clear his vision. Only by the most stringent exercise of willpower was he able to suppress the groan of pain that immediately rose to his lips, and he trembled from the very exertion of it. Once more he considered revealing the truth to her father. Maybe if he knew they were wed. Maybe if he knew she could already be carrying the fruit of his seed … Maybe there was still a way to save himself. Yet Aric was not so blinded by the painful blows to his back to realize the absolute futility of that line of reasoning. He gave a frustrated tug at each of the ropes tied so snugly at his wrists, then clenched his jaw in anger. She had probably run straightaway to her father with her tale
of woe, painting him as foul a blackguard as she could. No doubt this flogging—and now this interminable wait—could be traced directly to her lily-white hands.

He swung his head slowly from one side to the other, searching among the faces that waited for the culminating of this public punishment. There were tradesmen and serfs there, men-at-arms and servants. Children crowded in among the women, clinging to their skirts as they peered in round-eyed awe at him. One little girl off to his left did not look afraid, however, only curious, and for some reason Aric stared at her. But then her mother grabbed the child and hustled her behind her skirts. “The devil dwells in those eyes,” she hissed at her daughter and for everyone else’s benefit. “Don’t stare at him over long.”

It was this which irritated Aric the most. He was beneath the contempt of every soul present. Even the little children were frightened of him, for their parents made certain of it. God, what hope was there for anything but a quick and merciful end to his suffering? Then a commotion rippled through the crowd and he braced himself against the expected resumption of the vicious flogging.