Unending Love (26 page)

As the soldiers followed in an uncertain group,
Brighton came across his charger over by the far end of the bailey and tossed
Adalind up into the saddle.  He vaulted on behind her and, reins in one hand
and holding both Adalind and the dagger in the other, he made haste from
Canterbury’s chaotic keep.

We have played along side millions of lovers, shared in the same
Shy sweetness of meeting, the same distressful tears of farewell-

CHAPTER
FIFTEEN

She wouldn’t let the physic touch her.

Fortunately, the wound on Adalind’s neck had
stopped oozing but she wouldn’t let anyone near her to tend it.  Whenever they
tried, she screamed and threw fists and feet until they backed away. 
She
was like a caged animal, incoherent and mad, causing
[J43]
 
chaos and concern with her behavior.

His first thought after leaving Canterbury was
to find a church so they could be married right away.  He would have the
priests send for a physic to attend to Adalind’s wound, but that plan had not
worked out as he had hoped.  Adalind cowered in the corner of the sanctuary at
the small parish church of St. Barnabas, absolutely out of her mind with grief
and terror.  Every time Brighton approached her, she screamed as if he was
preparing to murder her.

The priests, three of them, had no idea what to
do.  There was a man in charge, Fr. Matthias, who was a sane and just man who
had once been a knight.  While his two subordinate priests spoke in hushed and
fearful tones, he remained silent, watching the well-dressed but blood stained
lady collapsed against the cold stone wall on the western edge of the
sanctuary.   A physic they had brought from the town sat on the floor several
feet away from her, trying to coax her into allowing him to tend her wound, but
she put her hands over her ears and blocked him out. 

The big blond knight just stood and watched
her.  The man had hardly said five words to them in the hour or more that he
and
[J44]
 
the lady had been there, and even then it was to
demand a physic.  Since that time, the man hadn’t uttered another sound; he
wouldn’t answer any questions from the confused priests.  He simply stood about
a dozen feet away from the lady, watching her, his face etched with exhaustion
and quite possibly anguish.  It was difficult to know.  One thing was certain,
however; whatever was happening between them was horrible and tumultuous.

Fr. Matthias was observing the situation just as
the knight was, only he was observing the entire scene.  The knight seemed to
only be focused on the lady, but Fr. Matthias envisioned the global view.
Nothing escaped his scrutiny.  Nearly two hours after the knight had brought
the kicking and screaming lady through the door, Fr. Matthias had enough
curiosity and concern.  

At first, he hadn’t wanted to involve himself in
the situation.  It was safer sometimes to stay out of these hectic situations
and hope that they simply go away. But this one was not going way. He wanted to
know what was going on and what all intentions were from both the lady and the
knight.  He suspected the knight would only tell him the arrogant and
self-important versions that knights were so capable of, and thought the lady
might be the only one to give him any semblance of the total truth.  If he
could only ease her fear.

Fr. Matthias broke away from his anxious
companions and made his way towards the lady.   The physic, a younger man with
a bald head, sat on the ground several feet away in his attempt to communicate
with her.  Fr. Matthias moved past the priest but didn’t get too close; he’d
seen what happened if the lady felt threatened.  He moved to the stone wall, so
cold and moist, and leaned against it as he focused on her terrified and
huddled form.

“My lady?” he said softly. “I am Father
Matthias. My lady, I realize you are frightened but I do not know why.  Will
you please tell me what has happened?”

Adalind was in a haze of terror and grief.  She
heard the man speak but started to press her hands over her ears again until
she heard him introduce himself as the priest.   Then, her head came up from
the protective embrace of her arms and her big green eyes were abnormally
bright within her pale face.   She wiped unsteadily at the mucus and tears
smeared over her face.

“Please,” she whispered. “Help me.”

“What help do you need, my lady?”

Adalind couldn’t even bring herself to look at
Brighton but she knew he was standing nearby.  She could feel it. 

“The knight,” she murmured. “He has killed my
husband and has abducted me. Please… give me sanctuary. I beg of you.”

Fr. Matthias frowned as he dared to move closer
to the lady.  He crouched down beside her, putting himself more on her level as
he spoke calmly and softly.

“Who are you?”

Adalind swallowed. “The Lady Adalind de Lohr de
Aston,” she said. “My grandfather is the Earl of Canterbury.  Please give me
sanctuary and send word to my grandfather and tell him I am here. He must
know.”

The priest was rather shocked to hear the
woman’s name.   He looked up at Brighton, still standing like a great stone
sentinel several feet away.

“Is this true?” he asked. “She is Canterbury?”

“She is.”

“Did you kill her husband and abduct her?”

Brighton sighed heavily. “I did not kill her
husband,” he said, trying not to sound as if he was defending himself. “He was
her betrothed.  I challenged him and I won.  She is rightfully mine and I will
marry her today.”

Adalind began sobbing pitifully at the mention of
Maddoc. “You murdered Maddoc, you contemptible bastard,” she cried. “I will
kill myself before I will marry you, do you hear me? I hate you and I hope you
die a horrible, painful death and then I hope you spend Eternity in Damnation’s
fiery pits.  I hope you burn!”

She was off crying again and the priest hastened
to reassure her. “My lady, please,” he said, daring to put a hand on her head
to soothe her.  “Do not upset yourself so. I will help you, I swear it.”

Brighton unsheathed a long, wicked-looking dirk
that had been in the folds of his armor. “You will marry us now.”

Fr. Matthias looked up from Adalind’s lowered
head, unimpressed by the weapon
as it
[J45]
 
flickered in the weak light. “Are you to kill
me, too, if I do not?  There will be no hope for your soul then. “

“Marry us
now
.”

“No.”

“Do it or I will kill all of you and burn this
place over your heads.”

Fr. Matthias didn’t doubt him for a moment. The
knight had an edgy look about him.   Moreover, Matthias was unarmed and in no
position to enter
into
[J46]
 
a physical altercation with the knight.  At
least not at the moment. He would have to be more clever than that to gain
control over the situation.

“Perhaps some food and rest will make you both
feel better,” he said. “I have no desire to lose my church or die in the
process, so let us make the lady a priority between us.  The physic will tend
her wound while you and I discuss your immortal soul and the fact that you are
so close to losing it.”

Adalind looked at the priest fearfully. “But…
please… I must….”

Fr. Matthias patted her hand, cutting her off as
he stood up. “Allow the physic to tend your wound, my lady,” he said evenly. “I
will speak with your suitor until you are satisfactorily rested and fed.  Do
not worry.”

Adalind didn’t want anyone touching her.  In
fact, she started to panic.  Bolting to her feet, she ran away, darting around
the sanctuary as the physic and Fr. Matthias attempted to calm her.  Brighton
kept his eyes on her as he backed up to be near the door so she couldn’t slip
past him.  When Adalind dodged between a pair of pillars and realized her exit
was blocked, she went even further into madness.  

Off to her left were dozens of candles against a
small statue of the Virgin Mary.  Some were lit, some were not.  She raced at
the candles and began throwing then at Brighton, making contact with him more
than she missed.  Brighton found himself fending off a barrage of heavy tallow
candles, at times being sprayed with hot wax across his mail.  As Fr. Matthias
pleaded for calm, Adalind hurled insults and declarations of her hatred for
Brighton along with the candles.  Her screaming lifted to the rafters.

When her supply of candles ran out, Adalind
looked around for other things to throw, but the sanctuary with its cold dirt
floor and beamed ceiling was scantily furnished.  It was then that she noted
that the sanctuary was lined with thin lancet windows and she realized that a
couple of them were low enough to the ground that she could possibly escape
from them.

Gathering her skirts, she raced across the
sanctuary and threw herself at one of the windows, realizing too late that it
was a tighter fit that she thought.   Struggling through the window gave
Brighton time to come up behind her and pull her, kicking and screaming, out of
the window.

Adalind fought him for everything she was
worth.  Feet and fists were flying, smacking him as her body twisted violently,
but Brighton held fast.  She was surprisingly strong for a woman and twice he
lost his grip as she twisted, but he managed to regain her again.  At one
point, she hit him in the nose and blood trickled, but he remained relatively
calm.  He never tried to hit her back or otherwise hurt her.  He only attempted
to restrain her.  But when she started biting, he snaked his hand into her
blond hair and held her head still so she couldn’t snap at him.  Then, he sought
out the priest.

“You will marry us now,” he commanded.

Fr. Matthias, standing a few feet away, shook
his head. “I will not.”

Brighton’s ire began to rise. “Do it or you all
die.”

“You cannot kill us and hold her at the same
time.”

He had a point, although Brighton wouldn’t admit
it. Not now; he’d come this far and his entire mission was beginning to smack
of pride more than passion.  He could not, and would not, surrender.  Being a
clever man who achieved his means through any way possible, he was not at an
end.  He had a plan. Using the butt-end of the dirk he was carrying, he balled
his fist around it and hit Adalind in the head fairly hard.  She yelped and
went limp but was not fully unconscious, so he hit her again and knocked her
out completely.  Lowering her carefully to the ground, he turned on the
priests.

Fr. Matthias, startled but not surprised at what
the knight had done, took off at a dead run.  There were weapons in his chamber
if he could only get to them. Being a former knight, he felt naked without some
manner of weapons and kept them safely hidden. Brighton bolted after him and
they raced through the sanctuary and into an alcove that had a small door used
only by the priests.  The door led to a courtyard outside and Fr. Matthias ran
to another section of the complex, a low-ceilinged structure that housed the
priests. But the door latch jammed as he tried to open it, allowing Brighton to
catch up with him. 

When Brighton grabbed him, Fr. Matthias balled a
fist and slugged Brighton in the face.  The knight stumbled back but still
managed to grab the rather muscular priest, and the two of them went blow for
blow across the cloisters.  It was a dirty fight, and brutal, but Fr. Matthias
held his own for several minutes before finally succumbing to Brighton’s
stronger fists.  The priest hadn’t been in a fight in years and was therefore
not particularly prepared for this one.  One last hard blow from Brighton eventually
knocked him out completely.

With Fr. Matthias out of the way, Brighton
staggered back into the sanctuary where Adalind was just starting to come
around.  Gathering her into his arms as she tried to slap him, he ordered one
of the subordinate priests to perform the marriage mass but the brother wasn’t
fully ordained yet and could not complete the task. Frustrated, Brighton could
see that his visit to St. Barnabas was at an end and carried Adalind out into
the late afternoon, mounted his charger, and continued on his quest to find a
priest who would marry them.

After his experience at St. Barnabas, he wasn’t
so sure he was going to find the task particularly simple.  In fact, he was
starting to doubt all of it.

Old love but in shapes that renew and renew forever

CHAPTER
SIXTEEN

Two
weeks later

David could hear the sentries shouting.

Sitting in his solar on a lazy afternoon, he
could hear the excitement and he rose from his chair before the fire, shoving
the dog aside as he made his way to the keep entry.  He took the stairs slowly,
as he was moving slow in general these days, listening to the shouts going on
around him.  By the time he hit the bottom of the stairs, he could see the
guards scrambling at the gatehouse and the old iron portcullis straining against
its chains as it was slowly lifted.  Gerid, who had been at the gatehouse with
the commotion going on, went to meet him.