Candle in the Window Page 13

  “Aren’t you going to do anything for Arthur?” Saura asked, bewildered by William’s hurry, by his callous pronouncement of death.

  That got his attention. “Do anything for him? God’s teeth, I can’t kill him more than once, much as I would like to. Do you realize what he was going to do? Besides rape you, which means nothing more than pissing to him? He was going to kill you for making the mistake of associating with me.” He stopped tugging the candle stand out of the door and walked back to grasp her shoulders and shake her. “What foolish fancy made you speak to him? I’d tried to keep his attention focused on me, and you blundered into our conversation.”

  “Making mistakes is more honorable than doing nothing.” She broke into his tirade. “You need to know who the other conspirator is, and I thought he might tell me.”

  “Aye, he’d tell a woman long before he’d tell me, but Saura, don’t you ever do anything so foolish again.” He spaced the words individually, dealing a warning with them one by one. “I lost ten years when he jumped on you. What if he’d had a knife?”

  “It did not improve my outlook, either.”

  “I’m glad we agree. Now, come.” He leaned down and picked up something from the floor beside the mat. “Your ribbon,” he said, and she snatched it from him and tucked it in her pocket.

  Halfhearted pounding barely shook the door now, and William said, “’Tis time to leave this accursed place.” He pulled the door open and waved the three young men inside. “He’s there,” he said, pointing. Tucking Saura’s hand in his arm, he waited as they rushed through the door. Then the prisoners strolled out, and William slammed the door behind them.

  seven

  A twist of the key in the lock, and a quick toss out the arrow loop, and William dusted his fingers with satisfaction. “They’re safely confined.”

  He pulled Saura along the short corridor until they reached the stair winding down the tower. Tucking her hand into his elbow and placing her hand on the wall, he added, “At least until they use that candle stand to break the door. The steps are uneven.” He paused while she found her footing and then hurried her down, keeping up a steady pace, easy for her to follow. They neared the level of the great hall, and he slowed. “I’m going in to scavenge some bread.”

  “William!”

  “And I want you to stay on the stair. Stand here on the landing.” He placed her firmly against the wall and handed her the blankets. “Wait. I’ll be right back.”

  “You fool,” she called. “Let’s leave now.”

  He ignored her, trusting his instincts. The danger didn’t exist in the keep, and a moment’s worth of preparation would arm them later.

  “Halt! Who—what are ye doin’?”

  William gawked. The quavering challenge issued from the only servant in the great hall. Tattered clothes and dirty face couldn’t disguise the fair young man. Tall and muscular, he displayed the kind of healthy glow that makes women stare and men snort in jealous disgust. His long brown hair shone with auburn highlights, encasing a face angular in its beauty. His beardless jaw jutted out with authority, his skin displayed the kind of texture that made a woman itch to touch it. He held in his hand a carving knife, and it trembled and tilted as he called again, “How did ye get out?”

  William growled in response, but Saura glided out of her hiding place. “Bronnie!”

  The rest of what she said was lost in the buzzing of William’s ears. This was Bronnie? The sniveling coward at the riverbank, Saura’s caretaker, was this comely youth?

  He turned to look at Saura, and a gracious smile lit her face as she spoke to Bronnie. She liked the idiot! Fondness etched her face in lines of indulgence. He looked down at himself, at his rough warrior hands and his tough warrior body, and realized blindness could indeed be a blessing. He trusted Saura, but good God! This boy could tempt a saint!

  “See, m’lady?” Bronnie was saying. “All your worryin’ last night was for naught. The lord is fine, just fine.”

  “And he can see,” William warned and watched with disbelief as the youth hopped behind the table.

  “Not true!” he protested.

  “’Tis true,” Saura affirmed. “A miracle.”

  “Oh, aye, m’lady.” His head bobbed madly. “But what of—” He jerked his head upward.

  “Lord Arthur decided to let me go.” A pounding echoed down the stairway, belying his story. “And he suggested I take a horse from the stables.”

  “And bread and wine, Bronnie,” Saura added.

  “Oh, aye.” Bronnie’s eyes had widened so his silky lashes swept his upper lids.

  “And a sword, Bronnie,” William mocked.

  Cowed by William’s towering animosity and the outbreak of yelling from above, the boy backed even further around the table. “Lord Arthur would cut off my hands. I dunno aught about swords an’ such.”

  Brushing her sweeping hair back over her shoulders, Saura soothed, “We know you don’t. The weapons room is undoubtedly in the undercroft—”

  “And we can break down the door,” William interrupted.

  “There’s…there’s this sword right here on the bench. Lord Arthur dropped it off on his way upstairs, but he should—”

  “Thank you.” William vaulted across the table and seized the sword in its scabbard. “Very nice,” he said.

  “But Lord Arthur—”

  “Will be glad to loan it to his old friend.” William pulled the sword and pointed it with meaning at the trembling servant.

  “Put that sword away and stop intimidating him, William,” Saura scolded, and he jumped guiltily and sheathed it. “Bread, Bronnie? And wine?”

  When at last Saura waved good-bye to the palsied boy, they rode the two finest horses in Arthur’s stables and carried their goods in a leather saddle bag. “That’s exactly the kind of watchdog I’d expect Arthur to have. Anxious to unload everything to save his neck,” William confided as he hurried them across the drawbridge, Saura’s leading rein in hand. Pushing their mounts into a gallop, he muttered, “The sooner we’re away, the happier I’ll be.”

  Hidden in the trees, the silent watcher observed as they fled. The morning sun illuminated William, his giant body filled with vigor, his hair and beard golden as they flailed in the wind. The joy of sight lit his face, and no one, certainly not the silent watcher, could mistake it for anything else. He observed William and Saura, and cursed them with the most fluid and virulent curses he could bring up from hell. And cursed Arthur, too, for his intervention, and wondered if the stupid fool had spoken his name to William, his dear friend, his deepest enemy.

  “We’ll stop here,” William decided, looking around the tiny copse. A shelf of rock broke the wind and created a fall for the tiny stream where he would water the horses. The mixture of oaks and rangy poplar provided a sort of shelter, giving a protected feel to the hollow.

  “But why?” Saura asked in bewilderment. “I thought you wanted to ride to Burke tonight.”

  He raised his head and sniffed the air. “We’re safe enough now, I can feel it. And you’re tired.” She was more than tired, he knew. He’d watched her squirm on the saddle for the past hour, trying to find a comfortable position. She hadn’t complained, but he suspected the riding he’d done the night before had stretched her tender muscles long past the point of comfort. And they were safe. That prickling of caution had left him as they rode away from Arthur’s castle. He’d keep his trained senses alert and make her rest all the night. Rest and heal, for tomorrow at Burke Castle would be difficult for her.

  “Where are we?” she questioned.

  “Nowhere,” he replied with satisfaction. “I dare not stop at a castle. The explanations would be too tedious, and this episode has taught me a caution I never possessed previously. Now come,” he ordered, going to her horse and touching her ankle. She slung her leg over without complaint and slid down into his arms. He held her for a moment, her body no bigger than a will-o’-the-wisp against his muscular chest.


  “William?” she said. “My feet are dangling.”

  “Aye,” he breathed. “And you’re a bonny woman.” He held her one more moment, and then he placed her on the ground and lightly slapped her bottom. “Stop tempting me.”

  Surprised by his abrupt change of mood, she stepped away, rubbing herself. “I’m not tempting you! How am I tempting you?” she asked indignantly.

  “You sit on the horse, riding with such grace and dignity, and all the time I know underneath that lady’s camouflage, you’re a wanton. Not just any wanton, either. You’re mine, gracious to everyone else and waiting for my touch to ignite.”

  She pulled a face of disbelief. “Can I safely walk to the water?”

  “Aye, the ground is smooth, and the pool is that way.” He gave her a little push in the right direction and watched her limp toward the water that gathered beneath the tiny waterfall. “And you deny you’re tempting me!”

  “Not at all,” she said. Gathering her skirt high, she tied it with the rope around her waist. As William gaped at the shapely display, she waded into the ankle-high water and sank down with a sigh of delight. “Tempting you is my primary ambition.”

  Turning to the horses, he muttered, “You’ve succeeded.” He groomed the horses, watered them, pegged them to graze. He rummaged through the saddlebags and spread the blanket across the soft grass. Then he lay back and watched the clouds form themselves into fluffy representations of feminine calves and thighs and buttocks. When Saura called him at last, he wished he were not a conscientious man. An âme damnée, like Arthur, would have eased himself with her with no thought to her misery.

  He could not. He rose and caught her hand as she waded from the water, ignoring her dripping flesh. He placed her on the blankets, ordered her to stay and walked upstream to fashion a pole and fling it into the water. By the time he returned, freshwater trout strung on a string of vine, Saura napped in the late afternoon sunshine and reason ruled his body once more.

  She woke as he kindled the fire, sitting up with no warning to say, “William?”

  “Here.” He fed twigs to the fire and watched as she relaxed. “Are you hungry?”

  “Aye,” she said bluntly. “Did you have luck on your hunting trip?”

  “Fishing. And aye, we’ll eat well tonight. You’re an independent woman, aren’t you?”

  She raised one eyebrow at the question, coming as it did out of the ether.” Aye, I’m independent.”

  “And you take pride in doing a woman’s duty?”

  “I doubt this questioning relates to our activities in the night.” She chewed her lip. “But aye, I do a woman’s duty.”

  “Good! Then you can clean the fish.” He sat back on his haunches and burst into laughter at the look of fastidious disgust on her classical features.

  “I’ll tell you what I always tell my brothers. You caught them, you clean them,” she said promptly.

  The sun said good morning to the gliding clouds with intense hues of gold and orange and pink. It lit the treetops and wakened the birds, but William needed no waking. Like a child before Christmas, he woke early, anticipating the return of the sun, the return of his sight. Would he ever stop marveling at the dawn’s light? he wondered. He cuddled Saura closer under his chin, tucking the blanket around her shoulders to ward off the chill. The pine boughs covered by one blanket provided a fragrant, springy mattress for them.

  He hadn’t let her take off her clothes to sleep, hadn’t let her touch him in any way, and she’d cried until he’d made it clear his rejection was only temporary. “Saura,” he’d said, “we’ll have many days ahead of us.”

  But she’d only cried harder, shaking her head and clutching at him. He’d rubbed her back, soothing her until she slipped off and then he’d drifted into the light sleep of a warrior. He’d kept one ear tuned to pursuit, but as he expected, none had disturbed them.

  Now he quivered with the expectations of a child on Twelfth Night. By the glove of God, today he would feast his eyes on the world, on his world. He would view Burke clad all in the glory of summer, see the face of his son, puzzled at first and then overjoyed, see his father break into the manly tears that characterized his deepest emotions. He’d show them Saura, tell them about his plans to marry. He snagged her caressing hand.

  “Awake, little girl?”

  “Um.” She rubbed her head on his chest and strands of her loose hair caught in his beard. As he disentangled it, her other hand crept across his thigh.

  Scooping her wandering fingers up and out of the blanket, he kissed her palm. “You are, indeed, the sort of woman Bronnie worried about.”

  She laughed, a musical sound that blended with the rustle of the leaves and the ripple of the stream. “And you’re too determined.”

  “Determined to ride home today.” Sweeping the cover away, he stood and urged, “Rise.” His grip on her wrists tugged her erect on the grass beside the blanket.

  She stumbled and swayed, and he supported her until she steadied.

  “Wash and prepare yourself,” he commanded. “We ride to Burke at once.”

  Some of the cheer faded from her face. “Of course, William,” she said and went to do his bidding.

  She performed her ablutions, combed her hair with her fingers and braided it. He glanced at her as he folded the first blanket. Wondering at her sober mien, he kicked the boughs aside, lifted the two corners of the other blanket and said, “Help me fold this.” As she found the other corners and placed them together, he studied her. “Saura, what’s wrong?”

  “’Tis nothing,” she assured him, a weak smile curving her lips.

  Folding once more and then flipping the cover to straighten the wrinkles, he grunted disbelievingly.

  “Truly, my lord,” she assured him as they walked together and she handed him her half of the blanket.

  “You’re an abominable liar, dearling.” Hugging her, he trapped the cover between them. “You don’t know how to arrange your features correctly.”

  She hesitated, fighting it, but at last she burst out, “Oh, couldn’t we stay here another hour? One more hour before we go back to reality?”

  He searched her upturned face, dewy with unshed tears, and without a word shook out the freshly folded blanket and spread it on the grass. He placed the other blanket, folded, on one edge as a pillow. Sweeping her into his arms, he knelt and laid her in the middle. He tumbled with loose grace at her side, fit his shoulder against hers, and a silence fell between them.

  “I should not have asked,” she whispered. “But this time with you has been,” she didn’t know how else to describe it, “golden.”

  Too few golden times had graced her life, William realized, and his contentment deepened. It was his company, his love that made her happy. Watching the leaves quiver in the light wind, curiosity stirred within him. “If you could change aught about your life, what would it be?”

  “My height,” Saura answered promptly.

  “Your height?” Startled, he turned his head and studied the woman lying beside him. She stared up at the leaves, too. He would have sworn she saw them. “Why your height?”

  “I always wanted to be tall and willowy, instead of short and lumpy.”

  He swept his eyes across her tiny, elegant figure and whistled with amazement at her own warped imagery. “Your lumps are…well arranged.”

  She ignored him. “Tall people have a presence short people don’t have. You know that. You get respect for having a greater length between your toes and your nose. ’Tis easier to reach upper shelves, ’tis easier for small children to find you in a crowd.” She laughed. “What do you want to change about yourself?”

  “It has been changed.”

  “What?” she asked, puzzled for a moment. “Oh, you mean your sight. Happy is the man who’s totally pleased with himself.”

  “Isn’t that something you’d like to change about yourself?”

  Saura thought about it. “Nay,” she drawled. “Nay, I don’t think ab
out it. My lack of sight is simply a part of myself. I’ve never seen the world, and I don’t miss it.”

  “I had seen the world, and I hungered to see it again,” he murmured.

  “Aye, I can understand that. You couldn’t function as a knight, do your duty, unless you had your sight. I do almost everything a woman of my status is required to do: order the meals, care for my serfs, direct the sewing. I’ve cared for my younger brothers, raised them to manhood until they were ready to be fostered in another knight’s household.”

  “You just deal with your handicap without thought, neither seeking pity nor expecting it.”

  “Pity makes me want to spit,” she retorted fiercely. “And there are blessings to being blind.”

  William started, for that was his exact thought of the previous morning. “What blessings?”

  “I don’t have to feed my eyes on ugliness, and I’m not easily fooled by what people say. I believe people have a great capacity to lie with their faces and hands, but not with their voices. When my mother wanted to know another’s thoughts, she’d have me listen to them. I could always gauge their sincerity.”

  “A useful skill.”

  “Aye.” Sniffing, she rolled her head back and forth and she said, “Mint! Can you smell it?” Eagerly she lifted the blanket, and pawed the grass bent with her hand. “Here!”

  Breaking the sprigs, she carried them to his face, and he caught her wrist. Bringing her hand closer to his nose, he breathed the zesty aroma. He looked at the dark green leaves clasped in her delicate fingers, at her short nails with the gloss of shell. He looked beyond that, at her face lit by dappled sunlight and by simple pleasure, and a tenderness welled up in him that quelled his pity. Whatever Saura deserved, it wasn’t pity. He transferred her hand to his mouth and carefully bit one of the leaves. As he chewed, the minty flavor refreshed his mouth, and he led her hand back to her own mouth, urging her to sample the herb. The dainty snap of her white teeth, her smile as she chewed and the tang of spring developed on her tongue; they all enchanted him.