I struggle to sit up, but the arms are like a vise and hold me firm. “Shhh,” the familiar voice says. “Do not flail about so, you’ll spook the horse.”
Beast.
The bastard has done it again!
The world spins as I try to sit up and put as much distance between us as possible, which is not so very much when we are sharing a saddle. Furious, I jam my elbow down into his thigh, pleased when he grunts in pain. “If you ever do that to me again, I will kill you. I mean it.” And while I do mean it, the words do not sound nearly as threatening as they should.
The other horsemen draw away, giving us the illusion of privacy, for I’ve no doubt that their ears are all straining to hear every word.
There is another rumble from his chest and I cannot tell if it is words or laughter, and my head aches too much to turn around to see. Besides, even though anger and annoyance rumble in my gut like bad fish, I bask in the strength of these arms, relieved to have them between me and the rest of the world. Between me and d’Albret.
Merde! “Where are we?”
“On the road to Morlaix.”
The jolt of alarm and dismay brings a fresh wave of nausea, but I grit my teeth and ignore it as I try to clamber down from the horse. Beast’s arms tighten painfully. “Are you mad?” he says. “Hold still else you’ll fall.”
“I have someplace I must be.”
He says nothing, but his arms tighten even more until I can scarcely draw breath. It would be easy—so easy—to surrender to the strength in those arms. Because I want to do just that, scornful laughter erupts from my throat. “My father will not pay a ransom for me, nor the abbess, if that is what you hope to gain.”
When he speaks, there is an odd note in his voice. “Is that what you think I want? Ransom?”
“Why else would you abduct me? Ransom or vengeance are the only reasons I can think of.”
“I didn’t abduct you; I rescued you!” He sounds affronted by my lack of appreciation.
“I did not ask to be rescued!”
His gauntleted hand reaches out and oh so gently turns my face toward his. “Sybella.” My name sounds lovely and musical on his tongue. “I will not let you go back to d’Albret.”
The tenderness in his eyes undoes me. It is stupid, I tell myself. It means nothing. He rescues everyone he passes on the road.
But my false heart will not listen. Just like he came back for his sister, he has come for me.
Fearing he will see the na**d longing of my heart, I turn my face away from his and search for the outrage I felt only moments before, but it is a mere echo of what it once was.
“I must go back,” I say, as much to convince myself as him. “If I do not, the abbess will send Ismae, or perhaps even Annith, who has never even left the convent before. Neither will stand a chance against d’Albret.” I was so ready to accept my fate—this time for the right reasons. Out of love, rather than vengeance. And once again this . . . man, this . . . mountain . . . has destroyed my hard-won resolve with a careless flick of his wrist. And even though none of the desperate reasons that compelled me to commit to that course of action have changed, I fear I will not be able to rekindle my determination.
“The abbess is no fool. Ruthless, perhaps, and unscrupulous, but no fool. She will not send one of her prized handmaidens to certain death. She is using them both to threaten you.”
“I am not willing to risk my friends’ lives on that,” I say quietly. “Besides, what if it is my fate, my destiny, to stop d’Albret, and I do not?”
He is silent a long moment, his cheerfulness disappearing like last winter’s snow. “Can we ever know our own destiny?” he asks. “I believed it was mine to rescue Alyse, but I failed, so clearly it was not. It is possible our fates cannot be known until we are cold in the ground, our lives over.”
Even though I fear he is right, I am not willing to give up. “What if your mission in Morlaix fails?”
“We will just have to be certain it does not.”
“It is a foolish commander who puts all his hope for victory in one basket.”
“Sybella. You cannot stop him. Not alone.”
His words are so seductive, I fear I will have to place my hands over my ears to keep them from tempting me. “But I must,” I whisper.
“Ah, but you have no choice, for you have been kidnapped by someone far stronger than you and there is no escape. Best set your mind to that and be done with it. Besides, I have collected your belongings, so the abbess will think you have left for Nantes, just as you were scheduled to do.”
I cannot help but admire his thoroughness, and some small part of me hopes it might work. To be free of not just d’Albret but the abbess as well? So must Amourna have felt the first time she was allowed to leave hell.
Beast places his big hand on my head and pushes it toward his chest. “Sleep now,” he says. “Else I will have to clout you again.”
Annoyingly, I do what he tells me. I assure myself it is only because I wanted to do it anyway.
When next I open my eyes, the horse has stopped moving, and the sun is angled low in the sky. We are halting for the night.
I blink as Winnog gangles over toward us and Beast prepares to hand me down from the saddle. At Winnog’s approach, the horse prances and paws the air until Beast does something with his heels and mutters a command, and then the horse stills long enough for me to slip from the saddle into the charbonnerie’s waiting hands. “What is wrong with your horse?” I ask once I am safely on the ground.
“That is no natural horse, my lady,” Winnog mutters, “but some foul creature straight from the Underworld itself.”
Beast flashes one of his lunatic grins then steers the creature to the edge of camp where the horses are being tethered.
“My lady? Do you need to rest?” Winnog asks, and I realize I am still clutching his arm.
I let go immediately. “No, thank you. I prefer to stretch my legs.”
He bobs his head. “Then, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll go help with the horses.”
I stand for a moment, watching the swarm of activity as the party rein in their horses and begin to dismount. A dozen men from the duchess’s army are on fine coursers and stallions, and they jostle for position, trying to steer around an equal number of charbonnerie on their sturdy rouncies and ponies. None of them appears willing to give way before the others, and within minutes it is a chaotic jumble of cursing men and prancing horseflesh. Merde. If this is the sort of cooperation Beast can look forward to, he was beyond stupid to keep me from being the contingency plan. We will be lucky to even reach Morlaix, let alone run off the French so the British troops can land.