Alinor (16 page)

Too far. The village was much too far. Even though her horses were far better than those of the men who followed, they could never outstrip the arrows. The shot that hit her man might have been an accidental accuracy, but a similar accident might strike her. There were too many in the group that followed them to chance it. Of 12 to 14 quarrels, at least one or two were bound to hit something in so compact a fleeing group. It was also useless for Alinor to tell her men to spread out in different directions. That might save the men from injury, but it would mean certain capture for her. There was no hope that the pursuers might follow a wrong lead. The light was more than strong enough for them to make out the difference between her dress and the clothing of the men-at-arms.

Alinor was not afraid of being harmed deliberately, but she cursed herself bitterly for having forgotten that Simon's death again made her a marriage prize. Ian might cry out with perfect truth that he did not desire her lands, but Ians were few and far between in this land at this time. Many men would cheerfully dishonor themselves and her to gain control of her property—and Simon's, too, because Adam was a child. An arrow passed between two of her men and missed her horse very nearly before it flew ahead of her onto the road.

"Halt," Alinor ordered.

"Lady—" Cedric protested.

"They will do me no harm," Alinor assured her man. "My unharmed person is necessary to their purpose."

She reined in her mount and came forward to face the pursuers. Whoever had taken her was going to receive a very rude surprise, she thought. There was no need, however, to give him warning. Alinor lowered her blazing eyes and set her teeth into her full lower lip while she struggled with her temper. By the time her small party was surrounded, she had won her battle.

"You have made a mistake," she said quietly. "Go your way and allow me to go mine, and I will not recount this incident to my betrothed husband, Lord Ian de Vipont."

Alinor had spoken deliberately to inform her captors that she was useless as a marriage prize. If she were already betrothed, the Church would readily annul any forced marriage. Moreover, Ian's name would give weight to the idea. Any nobleman would know that Ian de Vipont was a familiar of the king's and had long served him. Thus, it might be expected that John had approved the marriage between Ian and Alinor and would press the annulment of any other union. Alinor had a brief qualm as the thought crossed her mind that the abductor might be one of John's henchmen.

"Norman bitch," one of the captors snarled in English.

"Peace!" Alinor hissed as her men stiffened with outrage.

The remark was momentarily incomprehensible to her. Her reaction in restraining her men had been instinctive, a response to the hopelessness of their position. Slowly it dawned upon Alinor that no servant of a nobleman in England in this day and age would use "Norman" in that derogatory sense. This was no abduction to gain a marriage prize. These were the reavers—or, at least, a part of that group. What did they want? Could they be mad enough to desire to take revenge upon her for the hurts done them by others? Alinor stared down at her mare's braided mane to hide her expression. She hoped her captors were too busy disarming her men-at-arms to notice her quickened breathing and the slight tremor of her hands. Then her tension eased. Ransom! That was what they wanted— ransom.

"Cedric," Alinor said, "ask if we may go back so that I can see to my man's hurts, if he be still alive."

Cedric's guttural question sparked an argument which Alinor followed with interest, although she kept her eyes on her saddle so that the men would not guess she understood them. There were two differing parties —a bolder one, which had suggested abducting her and was now willing to go back for the wounded man-at-arms, and a more timid one, which had opposed her abduction in the first place and now only wished to retreat to the safety of the woods with all speed. The more cautious group was now in the ascendant. The whole party was put into motion and hustled toward the shelter of the wood, where they would be concealed from the eyes of any chance traveler.

Soon they stopped again at a place that gave evidence of previous habitation. At first, Alinor promised herself that she would have her huntsman's head off for overlooking a nest of thieves so close to the town and keep. In a few minutes, however, she realized that this was no camp, merely a place the group had stopped to rest and probably to wait for news of prey. It was almost full dark now. Alinor wondered whether they would stay the night, but it was quickly apparent that was not their purpose. Alinor's men were pulled from their horses, stripped of their armor and tied hand and foot to the sorriest of the beasts the outlaws had been riding.

Another argument then ensued, the cautious party desiring to leave Alinor alone and warning that laying a hand on her, even to tie her wrists, would worsen their situation. Any insult would make pursuit more determined. They nearly won again, but the man who had called her a Norman bitch burst into a passionate tirade. Alinor could not follow all of it, but she caught enough to realize he was recalling the men's wrongs to them and urging them not to give even such comfort as the smooth gait of her own horse to one of the hated oppressors. There were murmurs of protest, but doubtful ones. Alinor was wrenched from her saddle. Her men struggled fruitlessly with their bonds at the insult.

"Norman bitch!" the man who held her spat again.

Alinor's breath caught at the expression on his face. Hatred was rapidly overcoming good sense. Although she had little concern with the purity of the body, Alinor certainly did not wish to be raped by 14 men. It would be an act of insanity. They would be hunted the length and breadth of England for such an act, but the danger was that they had no acknowledged leader. Any idea presented forcibly enough to their minds could sway them. The grip on Alinor tightened.

"If you harm me, your own captain will kill you," Alinor remarked quietly.

Before the man could make any response, one of the most nervous of the party started. "Something moved," he whispered tensely. "There is someone in the wood."

Quarrels were trained in one direction, then in another. Now all was silent except the hard breathing of the men, who stared nervously this way and that

"Let us go. For God's sake, let us go. They may gather wood for the town here. Someone may have gone to get help."

"If someone has gone," the "Norman bitch" man snarled, "it is not for help. No one wishes to help these masters of ours."

"So you say, but I had a good lord—till the king ruined him," another replied. "I would have helped him, if I could. I say leave the lady here and let us fly."

"That would be even worse. Do you think she would hesitate a minute to put the whole castlefolk on our tails? You should have thought of that before," the timid man spat "Let us go farther into the woods and kill them all and bury them deep. No one will know."

"Fool! What is the profit in that?" asked the man who had proposed the abduction in the first place.

"Our lives are the profit. They will not hang us for this—they will draw and quarter us."

"They will draw and quarter us anyway," the "Norman bitch" man laughed. "Let us use her first and bury her after. Thus we will have a little profit. It will be no small pleasure to lay a Norman bitch. I wonder if their little holes are daintier than those of our women."

"That is not the kind of profit I meant, you swine."

"Fools! Fools! To stand here and argue about doing this or that. Let us go, I say. When we are safe off this land, then we will have time to talk of what to do."

Ian did not permit himself to give a single thought to Alinor. If he did, he would run mad. He concentrated instead upon each individual step of what he had to do. The cowherds had to be told to take their cattle out to pasture again and scatter them so that they could serve as bait for the reavers another time. The men had to be roused and called to arms. The huntsman was fordone. He could run no further. Wulf of the Lea must take him up to ride pillion to direct them.

Everything seemed to take a million years to accomplish, but Ian did not scream at his men or threaten them. To acknowledge the need for haste would break the blankness that he was keeping in his mind. Any crack in that blankness would somehow connect with what lay behind the black wall that covered his childhood. Something would come out through a crack in that wall that would destroy him utterly, changing him so that he, in turn, would destroy everything and every one around him. Ian's hand trembled a little on the rein of his mount. The gray destrier reared and pawed the air and neighed. Ian swallowed and tightened his grip. The horrors gnawing away at the black wall were coming closer.

Actually, the time between Ian's comprehension of what the huntsman told him and the time the troop started was between ten and fifteen minutes. It took much longer to ride across the fields and pastures that separated them from the forest, but it was a far shorter time than was safe. Ian led the troop at a full gallop, and they followed, cursing and praying under their breaths that the horses would not spill them in the dark. By God's grace, only two men were lost to the troop. More took falls, but neither they nor their mounts were badly injured, and they remounted and followed. The gray horse never missed a step.

The moon rose. To the men who had been straining their eyes in what luminosity the starlight gave, it was light. Ahead, however, blackness loomed. Ian stared at it without comprehension, aware only of the little writhing things in the corners of his mind.

"Slower, master," the huntsman hissed. "The wood is near. Those we seek must have traveled far in the time I came afoot. They might hear us, or we might pass those who watch."

Near. The word caught Ian's attention and permitted him to listen and understand. He pulled in his horse. The beast resisted, sensing his quickened breath, his quivering eagerness. Again the stallion reared, bucked, lashed out. It was a blessing. While he fought his mount, the wriggling madness retreated a little. Reined in, the party approached the woods at a walk. Suddenly, a nightjar whistled almost in Ian's ear. Some distance south, a figure detached itself from the edge of the shadow and began a steady loping run toward the oncoming horsemen. The nightjar whistled again.

"Stop," the huntsman urged.

Ian ground his teeth and tried to pray.

"They have not passed this way," a coarse voice muttered when the running shadow reached them. "Either they are farther in the wood or they have stopped. Go south of the moon for a little. Horn is in the wood."

Stopped. If they had stopped—Ian took a grip on that thought, strangled it, and buried it. He turned his head to give further instructions to Jamie the Scot about what was to be done when they came upon the group they hunted. Alinor's men pressed close behind him.

"Quiet!" Ian snapped. Their angry muttering set his own rage boiling under the tight lid he had on it.

They moved forward again, slowly now, because the trees blocked the moon except for intermittent brighter patches, and there was the constant danger of being swept from the saddle by low-hanging branches. The coarse-voiced huntsman also rode pillion, from time to time emitting the nightjar whistle. The shrill sound was doing Ian no good. Each time, something inside him shivered. At last, the birdcall woke a response other than birds; the whistle was followed almost at once by a weasel's shriek. Ian jumped, but the huntsman uttered a grunt of satisfaction and bade them stop again. Horn came slipping through the trees, nodding recognition as the nightjar whistled still again. He did not speak but, as soon as he was sure they had good sight of him, beckoned them to follow and ran south.

Ian moved his shield to his arm and unhooked the morningstar from his saddle. Owain stared at his master. He had never seen
him
use that weapon before and had had lectures, when he was being taught to use it himself, about the impropriety of using it except in emergencies. He could only presume they would be badly outnumbered. He thought about it as he slid his own shield from shoulder to arm. Then he heard Ian's voice, low and sing-song. "Did you speak, lord?"

There was no reply. The morningstar swung suggestively on its barbed chain, but the continuing spate of words were too low to hear. Owain licked his lips nervously and settled his helmet firmly over his mail hood. Something bad was going to happen.

There was not much longer to wait, which was just as well, for Ian's mental balance was teetering nearer and nearer the edge of dissolution. Horn stopped and pointed ahead. Faintly there was the sound of voices; the tone indicated that men were shouting, although distance softened and made the words indistinguishable. The two huntsmen slipped from the cruppers of the horses and moved west. Ian signaled, and some of the troop, Jamie leading, followed them.

"Wait," Ian whispered to himself. "Wait. Do not spoil all. Wait."

One last time the nightjar whistled.

"Forward!" Ian snarled softly, but the men heard.

The shouting increased in volume as they moved, increased until there was one louder shriek of alarm. Then all sound cut off.

"Forward!" Ian bellowed, setting spurs to his horse.

It seemed as if a single stride took the stallion the last few yards. He burst into a small clearing where three men stood centered within a larger group, all motion arrested by surprise. Another leap took the horse into the group. One man flew from the destrier's shoulder, another shrieked as he fell beneath the iron-shod hooves. There was a sweet, wet squelch as a third was brained by the morningstar. That man did not cry out at all, but another screamed as the return stroke tore half his face away, and screamed as he fell, and went on screaming. The tableau shattered. The clearing was full of frantic motion—men-at-arms on horses swinging weapons and men running, dodging, crawling, shrieking with pain and fear.

"Kill them!" Ian screamed. "Kill them! Kill them!"

He swung the morningstar and missed as the destrier's momentum carried him past a bloodied, white-faced thing that held up unarmed hands in supplication. Cursing, Ian loosened his shield and cast it from his arm, flung himself from his horse, swung the morningstar again, and again, and again. In a single glimpse he had seen a heap of bodies at one edge of the clearing and, a little to one side, a smaller heap that, even with the colors bleached by the moonlight, was wearing the dress of a gentlewoman.