Wings of the Storm (29 page)

For a moment the familiarity of his touch com-forted her, the look in his eyes soothed her. Then he was looking inward, away from her. She didn't know what he was thinking, but it didn't appear to be a pleasant prospect. If time allowed . . . what did

he mean? she wondered. Couldn't they leave? Were they trapped?

She took a deep breath and made herself ask, "Do you mean you can't go back? Can't be David Wolfe instead of Daffyd ap Bleddyn? There's no going home?"

His greenish eyes suddenly sparkled with angry fire. "Go back? Go home?" The words were laced with bitterness and pain. She wanted to hold him. "There's no way to change anything that's hap-pened."

She stepped back and he released her. She turned her back to him. She didn't want him to see how much the knowledge of the finality of their situation affected her. She didn't cry. She didn't think there were any tears left. She hadn't had any hope. She'd coped with the world as it was. She was resigned.

Until she'd fallen in love. But she'd even thought she could cope with that. Then she'd found out who Wolfe was, and for a few hours, if only in the back of her mind, hope of return to the twenty-first century sparked in her. The spark was dead now. Ashes. Nothing left. She'd have to go on. Survive as she'd been surviving. Alone. Without the man she loved. He didn't exist.

She would be all right, she told herself, refusing to give in to the weary despondency threatening to over-whelm her. This was her world now. After tonight she would never speak or think in English again.

She would concentrate on what she had, be content with the world as it was. Her world was Passfair and Stephan and Sibelle and Jonathan and . . . and filth and disease and
routiers
and murder and rape and John and assassins.

Assassins.

John.

"Oh, my God!"

Her head came up sharply. Her hands flew to her mouth. She spun back to Daffyd. "King John! They're going to kill King John!"

28

Daffyd grabbed her shoulderswith his hands as hard as steel. He shook her. "What are you screaming

about, woman? Who's going to kill the king?"

"I was looking for you," she explained breathless-ly. "I was going to tell you, but then you weren't you and I forgot all about it and now it may be too late, but I stabbed one of them and—"

He shook her hard. "Jehane! Stop babbling. Calm down. Talk to me. Tell me." Another hard shake.

"Talk."

His face had turned to stone, hard, carved planes of cheekbone and aquiline nose and sensual lips thinned to a hard line. His eyes burned purposefully at her out of this carved stone mask. They caught her, calmed her.

"The two men who attacked me in the courtyard," she said more coherently.

"DeBourne and FitzWilliam. Two of John's favorites. Scum. They plan to kill John?"

She nodded. "Yes. I saw them earlier today. It's a long story."

"That's all right. Go on."

She drew a deep breath and tried to put her thoughts in order. Never mind Wolfe. Daffyd would take care of this! "I overheard them plotting to assas-sinate the king. They aren't going to do it themselves.

Hugh of Lilydrake's in on the plot. He's to be the actual killer. They plan to blame Stephan, or Sibelle's father, I think."

"Lilydrake." He gave a sharp nod. "When?"

"Tomorrow."

His eyes looked past her, toward the alcove door-way. She turned her head to follow. The curtain was pushed back. Night sky showed through the window. "How long until dawn?" she wondered.

"Not long."

They stood together silently for a few heartbeats, antagonism put aside, thoughts of the future distilled to concentrating on the day ahead. Jane felt curiously at peace. This is the way it must be, she thought. One day at a time.

As the silence drew out between them she became aware of something different in the environment, something unusual and wrong. Silence. Where was the usual silence? She was so used to silence in the dark of her room. But she could hear noise. It was distant and faint, but still there when it shouldn't be. It puzzled and disturbed her. What was it? Where was it coming from? She concentrated, listening intently.

"The hall," she said, breaking the silence between herself and Daffyd. "There are people in the hall.

Everyone was asleep when you dragged me up here."

"The party's been going on for some time," he said. "You just noticed?"

Jane nodded.

"I think your adventure in the courtyard must have gotten things stirred up," he told her. He ran his thumb

along the line of his jaw, and she heard the scratch of beard stubble. "Perhaps we should join them," he suggested.

She stiffened, pulling away from the circle of his arms. Rounding on him, she proclaimed, "It's the
routiers
down there. Can't you hear their drunken shouting? I don't know what they're doing, but I don't want any part of it. What about the king?" she reminded him. "I thought you didn't want to change history."

"I don't intend to change history." His insufferable smirk appeared. "Where do you think the king is right now?"

From the look on his face, there could be only one answer to the question. "Partying hard with Louvre-caire's men?" she ventured.

"It seems a logical guess," he affirmed. "Otherwise Stephan would have driven the revelers out of doors by now. A young lord needs his rest, after all."

"You're clever," she complained. "And smug, and I hate you very, very much."

"Yes, love, I know. Come along." He urged her toward the door.

She resisted. She did not want to face the king. "What do you need me for?"

"You're the witness."

"Maybe the king won't believe me."

"You don't know John. Bring the accusation, he'll find the proof," Daffyd assured her. "The man's a complete paranoid. He's got informers planted in every noble's household. The weasel's an expert at staying alive." His fingers slipped around her wrist like a handcuff. "Come along."

She followed him with dragging steps, but with no choice. She reminded herself all the way down the stairs that Wolfe was an expert in not giving her any choice.

There were two guards posted at the bottom of the stairs. She looked across the hall and saw two more standing in the screen entrance. Paranoid, she repeated. Made sure his back was covered even when he was relaxing with the boys. Made sense to her.

Men were spread out around the hall. There was a great deal of laughing and drinking. There was a brawl going on over near the doorway. At least four men were punching, kicking, and gouging at each other. Onlookers were shouting encouragement. The king, still in his surcoat of multiple shades of green, was at the high table. He was involved in some sort of dice game with Louvrecaire and several richly dressed courtiers. Someone must have spilled wine into the hearthfire, because the hall was filled with an acrid, alcohol-laden smoke.

Daffyd put his lips to her ear and whispered con-fidingly, "Male bonding in its most raw, untamed form."

She almost laughed as he started to tug her for-ward again. The guards stopped them on the bottom stair.

"None of the household's to be allowed down-stairs," one of the soldiers told them. "Go back to bed."

"I'm Captain ap Bleddyn. Let me through."

"Go back to bed."

"Bloody hell!" Daffyd grabbed Jane by the shoul-ders and thrust her in front of him. "This is the woman the king's been wanting. Do you want to deny him his pleasure?"

Jane glared back at Daffyd venomously. He gave her his best smirk. She kicked backward, but he quickly moved his leg before she could hit his shin. He shook her a little.

"Let go of me!" she said.

Her protest seemed to convince the guard. "Right. I remember hunting for the wench." He chucked her under the chin. "Too skinny for my tastes."

"You're not the king," Daffyd snapped impatient-ly. "Out of my way!"

The men stepped aside.

As they neared the high table, Jane was able to make out the faces of the men hovering around the dice game. Most were total strangers to her, though if she heard some of their names, she knew she'd be able to reel off facts about them. Perhaps she should go into business as a fortune-teller, she thought.

Her sarcastic speculations were cut short when one of the men in the crowd standing around the king's chair moved, revealing the man standing behind him. It was one of the conspirators. The one in chain mail with the boar's-head device. Daffyd said his name was DeBourne. Hugh of Lilydrake was standing on the other side of the king's chair. Both of them had eyes only for the king. "Daffyd ..."

He gave her a reassuring look, then pulled her up to the table. They stopped before the center chair, where the king sat with his men crowded around him.

"Sire," Daffyd said, bending the knee, then rising quickly as the king turned his small-eyed glare on them.

"Lady Jehane must speak with you."

"That's her!" DeBourne shouted, pushing to the king's side. "The one who attacked FitzWilliam!"

The king gave DeBourne a look of lazy menace. "Lady Jehane is known for her impulsiveness," he replied.

The man's lividly angry face stayed bright red. It almost glowed above the white of his tabard. He looked at her with contempt and hatred. lane looked back with a contemptuous sneer. "My liege," the man began.

John waved him off. "Let be, DeBourne. I've seen FitzWilliam. It's an amusing scratch. So the kitten has claws. She'll sheathe them for me." He turned a las-civious smile on her. "Welcome, lady."

What was this? Chivalry from the king? Well, he was a Plantagenet, she reminded herself. Perhaps he had a drop of the family charm.

The king stood. "Come to me, Lady Jehane."

She jumped and backed up, into the solid wall of Daffyd's chest. "S-sire," she stammered. Daffyd prod-ded her in the spine with a finger. It loosened her tongue. "There are men here who plot to kill you.

Please believe me," she pleaded with the king. His expression had gone cold as she spoke.

"Assassins?" he asked, voice deadly soft. He point-ed to his breast. "People trying to kill me? Where did you hear this rumor, woman?"

"I heard it from the men trying to kill you," she told him. "When the conspirators met at the tower in the woods near here. I was in the tower." She heard

DeBourne's gasp. She hoped the king did also. "The men are plotting with a pretender, a man claiming to be Arthur of Brittany."

The king looked her over slowly, carefully. The room was dead silent. Even the boisterous fighters in the lower hall had stilled. The silence had spread out from the high table like a shock wave. She could feel Daffyd's heartbeat, the rise and fall of his breathing, from where she was pressed against him. The warmth and size of him at her back was comforting. She wanted to look up at him, but her eyes were caught by the king's harsh scrutiny.

Please, she prayed, let him believe her. Don't let Daffyd be wrong.

"Who?" the king asked. There was death in his voice.

She swallowed hard. Words seemed to be stuck in her throat. She caught sight of Hugh of Lilydrake.

The man was fingering the hilt of a dagger. Two large men were flanking DeBourne, one of them between him and the king.

"FitzWilliam, DeBourne, and Hugh of Lilydrake," she said as loudly and as clearly as she could. The silence thickened dangerously. Eyes flashed to the men she'd accused.

The king threw back his head and laughed.

Oh, God, he doesn't believe me!

"Sire—" Daffyd began.

The king wiped a tear off his cheek. He spoke as though lecturing a class. "DeBourne I knew about.

And FitzWilliam. But it was the local lord in it with them I couldn't decide on." He laughed again, a little, wheezing sound. Jane gaped in astonishment.

"DuVrai seemed to have the most to gain," the king went on as the people around him began to shuf-fle and look at each other questioningly. "Osbeorn's more Saxon than Norman. Sturry's claim to the throne might be popular with the English." He spread his hands out before him, tilting his head with the air of a much puzzled man. "Which one, I thought? So many choices. So hard to decide. Perhaps it was all of them, I thought. But no. There were no meetings where all of them were present. Not before the lad's wedding. And I knew about the conspiracy long before then."

DeBourne lunged forward, but the men flanking him already had him in their grasp. He shouted pro-fanely, at her and at King John. Someone knocked him over the head. He sagged forward, blood

stream-ing onto his white tabard.

"Lilydrake, of course," John continued, "is the worst fool of the lot. Of course it had to be Lily-drake."

No guards were next to Hugh yet. His response was with his dagger. It was out of its sheath and speeding through the air as quick as light. A deadly missile aimed straight at Jane's heart.

Daffyd moved as swiftly as the dagger, throwing her to the floor, covering her with his own body. She heard the swish of air as the blade passed over their heads. Then Daffyd was up, his arm thrown back.

Jane saw it clearly from where she crouched in the rushes just below the dais. It was framed in her vision with crystal clarity, even through the thin film of smoke that obscured the air with a dreamlike haze. It happened swiftly, but she saw it slowly. She saw Daffyd's blade poised on his fingertips. She saw the graceful play of muscle as the dagger left his

hand. She saw it sail, a spinning mote of silver, the aim true and deadly. She saw Hugh of Lilydrake's head thrown back by the force of entry. She saw the hilt buried deep in the base of the man's exposed throat. She heard the gurgle of blood as he died. She saw the slow, crumpling fall.

She recognized the dagger as her own. She remem-bered David Wolfe taking it from her.

There was a great deal of shouting. A sea of feet and legs surrounded her. Hands hauled her upright.

She was cold. So very cold. A mantle was placed around her shoulders. The hands straightening it were David's..How had he known she was cold? How could he know her so well when she didn't know him at all?

She pulled it tight around her as David Wolfe led her to the stairs, helped her to sit. She looked up at him, this stranger who had just killed, acting so quick-ly his motions had to be reaction driven by instinct.