Risen (23 page)

“Release him. If he charges, kill
him. But…he will not.”

Two soldiers moved up to stand
beside their mistress, either side, lances crossed. Tor was
released, his bonds withdrawn, and he stood feebly on his only good
leg in front of Nicolette, his face exhausted, his soul drained.
His expression was almost one of gratitude, of impending sweet
release.

She stepped toward him and held the
blade up, lying flat across her palms. “I promised,” she said
quietly, “your freedom.”

Tor was motionless, his eyes
flitting back and forth between the blade and Nicolette’s face. He
swallowed and asked her, “How does Ravan gather for himself one
such as you? How does such a thing happen?”

She only tilted her head in mild
surprise and nearly smiled. “If you knew the man, you would ask,
‘How not?’”

For the first time in many years,
his eyes softened bitterly, “I am done and undone.”

“Yes,” she murmured and handed him
the blade.

Tor received it with a swipe of his
hand, and before her guards had even the first chance to intervene,
he plunged the blade into his own chest. His eyes widened, and he
staggered backward, away from Nicolette and caught by no one.
Stumbling, he fell heavily onto one hip before hitting the ground
hard, his head a dull thud on the stone floor. His breathing
caught, and yet he kept his eyes only on her.

She stepped to the dying man and
knelt, cradling his head on her knee and whispered, “I am sorry for
your son and his mother. Go to them now.”

The man’s breath caught and he
gurgled, blood running from the edge of his lips as he held her
eyes. One last cough and he gasped, “Thank you…” and was
gone.

Nicolette eased the dead man’s head
to the floor and stood. All others present were shocked by the
bizarre string of events.

She looked at Moulin, and requested
of him, “Carry him to the South Cemetery. Bury him there, as he
wished.”

“My Lady, he is our enemy,” a
knight said, stepping forward and arguing softly.

She stopped him with only her gaze.
“Yes, and he is now dead. We had an agreement. I will not dishonor
him. Neither will you. Bury him.”

“Yes, my Lady,” the knight bowed
deeply, submitting to her wishes, and Tor was buried later that day
in the town graveyard—a proper Norse burial.

Nicolette was not there.

* * *

Moira peeked from behind an arch
into the solar hall where Nicolette sat alone and, evidently, lost
in her thoughts. It surprised her when, as she was fairly hidden,
her lady snapped about to spy the maiden peeking from behind the
brocade curtain.

“Forgive me, I’m so sorry to have
disturbed you,” Moira stammered and started to leave.

“Come here,” Nicolette
commanded.

Glancing about as though her
mistress might be talking to someone else, Moira
hesitated.

“Moira, come here. I wish to speak
to you.” She was not impatient, only insistent.

Edging from behind the heavy
curtain, Moira held her stump hidden behind her good hand—a habit
she’d adopted the day she lost the hand and one she never
surrendered—and walked across the expanse of marble floor to stand
in front of her lady, head bowed.

“Sit…here beside me.” Nicolette
patted softly the cushion of the ornate velvet chaise upon which
she sat. “I have some things I wish to say to you.”

Stepping gingerly up the three steps
to the elevated platform, Moira paused. Nicolette patted the
cushion again, and the maiden sat next to her but as far away as
the small chaise would allow her to be.

Before Nicolette could say a word,
Moira rushed to unburden her heart. “I’m so sorry, my Lady. You and
Lord Ravan have been so generous, have taken me in, saved me when
surely I would have died. I take full responsibility for Risen gone
missing. I—”

“Nonsense,” Nicolette interrupted
her.

“I-I…I beg your pardon?”

It was true. Moira believed herself
entirely responsible for the disappearance of the boy and had even
considered ending her own life because of it.

“That is complete nonsense, and you
know it. You shall never again speak of it.” Nicolette waved the
issue aside.

“But he…both of them were left in
my care. I was supposed to keep him safe, to stay with them. I am
the reason he is gone. I am the reason…” She averted her eyes,
unable to finish her thought or bear the scrutiny of the mother of
the missing child.

“Risen is very clever. We both know
that,” Nicolette explained. “He is also impulsive when he gets a
notion in his head. He is perhaps like his father in that way.” She
gestured gently with her hand…a gesture, Moira thought, not unlike
how Niveus sometimes did.

This almost prompted a small smile
from her, and she was completely surprised when Nicolette reached
out to take the stump of her arm in both hands. It very much
shocked her, for few would be so comfortable as to do such a thing.
She went to pull it away, but Nicolette held firmly.

“Moira, my son waited until a
favorable moment to send you away so that he could make his escape.
Of that I have no doubt. I wish you no longer to harbor guilt about
this.”

“But, I know him; I should have
known that he would do such a thing,” she argued feebly. “And
Niveus, I should never have left her at such a time. What if
she…what if she’d…” She dropped her head and wept
softly.

Nicolette reached to touch her face,
to direct her chin so that she could see into her only eye, and
exhaled slowly. “We all presume to know those we love, don’t we?
But all of us have those chambers of our heart that we keep
secret—all of us. Moira, this is true. You know it to be.” She
released her and gestured to the expanse of the foyer. “I cannot
presume to know all of another’s secrets, even those of my husband
or my son, than I could presume to know every star in the
sky.”

Moira believed that Nicolette may
very well know every star in the sky.

Nicolette brought her attentions
back to the maiden. “My son orchestrated his flight, and Niveus is
capable beyond what most would believe. You must burden yourself no
further.”

“But, my Lady, you know things that
most people don’t. I mean to say…” She looked away, obviously
embarrassed by what she was implying.

“Yes, that may be true. But
everyone can, at times, fall short of good intuition.”

“You, my Lady? No, I would never
think that of you.” She shook her head fiercely.

“I did not know until too late that
my son had feelings, that he loves Sylvie. I knew they were friends
but could not see that he would leave to try to save her. That is a
severe oversight for a mother, wouldn’t you say? Especially for one
like me?”

Moira’s brow creased as she thought
about what Nicolette was saying. “Will Lord Ravan find him? Can he
save him? Is there hope?” She clasped her hand over her stump and
leaned toward Nicolette, willing it to be so.

“I don’t know,” she answered
truthfully. “I cannot seem to determine that—the outcome of his
fate.” Nicolette uncharacteristically bit her lip as she said this,
seemed to withdraw into her own thoughts somewhat, but then just as
easily refocused on the girl. “And so I need your help. I wish to
affect his fate, their fate.”

This surprised Moira a great deal.
She leaned toward Nicolette and spoke quietly, obviously drawn into
the intrigue of the conversation. “Affect his fate? Certainly!
Anything! But you wish my help? I don’t understand.” She shook her
head. “What could I do that would possibly be of any help to
you?”

Moira, perhaps more than any other
save Ravan, knew the strange gifts that Nicolette possessed. It was
true that many in the realm shared secret conversations about the
raven-haired mistress of their dynasty, that she was a witch. Talk
such as this was intriguing but lighthearted for all in the domain
sincerely respected her. Even so, she was exceedingly
unapproachable, and few truly knew her.

But Moira was a part of the tempo of
this fair maiden’s life as much as any other. She observed her lady
day after day in the world that was Nicolette. Naturally, Moira’s
thoughts wandered to a distant afternoon…

* * *

It was very early in the summer and
dreadfully dry, even for this time of year. The farmers’ crops were
struggling, threatening to wither before even setting their fragile
roots into the soil. Ravan, the townspeople, everyone was worried.
Famine had been a constant concern for as long as most could
remember for several reasons: Adorno had been pitiless with his
charity, cruel with his heavy taxation, and the years had been
unusually cold, shortening the growing season
considerably.

Lady Nicolette had every intention
of establishing food reserves—that is what she claimed—but this was
her first season as ruler of the realm. There was no reserve yet,
and Ravan had just appeared a few months before. All were still
getting to know the new rulers of the domain.

After the wedding, a mere month ago,
the two of them had gone straight to work, swiftly establishing the
granaries for anticipated stores. But if the weather remained so
dry, it would not be this year that they were filled. Bad fortune
lent to misgivings; Lord Ravan had expressed his concern that the
trust of the villagers was at stake.

The baby was sleeping, and Moira was
washing linen in the attached bathing chamber when she heard
someone enter the bedroom suite. She heard Nicolette’s soft voice
float on the air as she visited, murmuring to her sleeping
baby.

Moira was yet unfamiliar with the
Lord and Lady of this strange realm, for they were certainly a
difficult pair to get to know, but she already had a fierce loyalty
to both of them, especially to Ravan, for he’d saved
her.

As her thoughts wandered farther
down the trail of her memories, she blushed, for there was no
denying what she felt—a visceral attraction to the mysterious
mercenary turned ruler of the Ravan Dynasty. How could she not? He
was so tortured, so wretched when he showed up at the inn with his
fine horse. Then, he spent the better part of the evening in a
state of transformation. When he stepped back downstairs, she’d
scarcely recognized the man, brutally handsome, even with his
scars.

Moira blushed again as she recalled
seeing him nearly naked, walking in on him as bathed, shedding his
past in the small room of the inn. He never spoke of what the
terrible circumstances were that brought him to that horrid state,
and she never asked.

Then, in a whirlwind of ferocity and
amazement, he rescued her, holding her in his arms as he fled the
inn. For nearly a week, they traveled together. In that time, he
scarcely said anything at all, only that he had business south of
Paris. He said he would help her, do everything in his power to
make sure she had a new beginning, a better life. It was all the
time Moira needed to fall deeply in love with the dark, brooding
man.

She had no way of knowing if where
they were going was safe, and she really didn’t care. It was the
most wonderful thing that ever happened to her, to be rescued and
swept away, like a dream. If she died tomorrow, she would be happy
as long as she could ride with him, his arms around her. It was the
happiest she’d ever been.

At long last, they reached the
beautiful castle, and the fantasy for Moira was ended. In a flash,
there was Nicolette and the mercenary’s newborn son. Of course! It
all made sense! After meeting the mysterious beauty—the mother of
Ravan’s child—Moira knew exactly why Ravan had been driven as one
gone mad to return to the realm. They were meant to be together; it
was destiny as purely raw and divine as it ever could be. Only,
Ravan didn’t know that Nicolette had killed the dreadful Adorno. He
thought he was riding to his death when instead he was riding into
the welcome arms of a new and wondrous life!

Moira’s heart was immediately
broken, but she could not have been happier for him.

This prompted a small smile from
her, for she sincerely rejoiced in the reunion of these
star-crossed lovers. How glorious it had been! And it’d opened up a
new life for her as well. She was grateful for this, and it was
what she thought about as she swirled the baby’s soiled linens in
the wash tub, watching as the herb infused soap bubbles gathered
obediently in lacy ribbons on the edge of the basin.

She heard Nicolette’s voice again, a
soft conversation, and kept at her wash, leaving her Lady to her
private moment with her infant son. Moira had come to recognize
some time before that Nicolette seemed to prefer to remain
undisturbed unless absolutely necessary, and so she continued
quietly with her task—laundering the infant’s garments, believing
that her mistress was perhaps retiring for a midday
rest.

To her surprise, she now heard two
voices—those of Nicolette and a deeper, agreeable male voice. She
blushed. Of course, it must be Ravan. Standing, she at once meant
to make herself known, but when she was about to step into their
bedroom chambers, she caught a glimpse of the two of them just
inside the balcony, facing outside, pondering the dry
day.