Chapter 6 #3
Fear escalated, her temper soared, and she panicked, lashing out at him. This time, he was ready, and she didn’t land the first blow against him. He caught her wrists, and pinning them down, he stared at her again in taut anger, no longer mocking her. “I suggest you stop.”
“I suggest you go to hell!” she spat back, yet his eyes then touched her in such a way that she kept talking, quickly, else give away the depths of her fear.
“I’m freezing!” she cried. “I’ll die on you, and I won’t be worth anything.”
“You’re not going to die. Well,” he mused, “unless I lose control completely and strangle you.”
She forced herself to glare at him. “Whatever you’re going to do, do it—or let me up!” she challenged him.
“Do you know, m’lady, you’ve bargained, you’ve ordered, you’ve used all manner of words. Except one.”
“And what is that?”
“Please. Ah, but then, perhaps you’re not accustomed to using it.”
“I’m very familiar with the word.”
“Then?”
“However, I’m not accustomed to using it with a bastard mercenary who’s attacking me!”
His eyes narrowed. “Try it. What have you got to lose?”
“Let me up. Please.”
He smiled.
“Let me up, please! What are you doing now? You said that you’d let me up—”
“I said that you should try it. But you did call me a bastard mercenary.”
She gritted her teeth, then thought that she should really get a grip on her temper. No matter what he said. She needed to pretend to acquiesce to whatever foolish thing he said, if it would get her up.
“I’m freezing. Pl—”
“Naturally, you’re freezing. You’re soaked, and you’re naked.”
“Pl—”
“And you’ve been swimming in a wretchedly cold river.”
“I know why I’m freezing—”
“I’m not warming you in the least?” he inquired.
She shook her head. “You’re chilling me,” she said softly. “I’ve never been so cold in all my life.”
“Tell me, are you really afraid yet?” he asked.
She frowned. Of course she was afraid! She would never, never let him know it.
“Cowards such as yourself do not scare me,” she said.
“What a pity. I was about to let you up!”
“Oh!” she cried in sheer frustration. “Please, I’m afraid, I’m very afraid—please let me up.”
He leaned closer to her. “You’re not afraid, and you should be.
You think that your birth and the king’s distant hand can protect you.
Well, it can’t. You’re with me, and I won’t let you up, and you don’t know what I’m going to do.
You are a ward of the king. Basically, m’lady, he owns you.
You, and your person, and you have risked both, and, therefore, you’re guilty of treason. ”
“No! I’ve done nothing but—”
“Arrive in the midst of a situation where you are naked and freezing on a riverbank with a stranger ten times more powerful than you are.”
She fell silent, staring at him. If he was really so dedicated to the king, he wouldn’t touch her. And she could prove that strength lay in many areas within the human mind.
She closed her eyes for a long moment, then looked up at him with a tremulous shudder. “Please! You’ve made me very afraid, and I’m so cold … aye, I was wrong. If you’ve come to take me back to David, do so, please. I will beg his pardon, I … I’m so cold.”
Again, she closed her eyes, shivering violently. She hadn’t lied in some respects, she was certain that her lips were blue, and she was very afraid, pinned, unable to escape.
“Why don’t I believe you?” he murmured, and her eyes flew open and met his.
“I don’t know,” she grated. “I’m telling you the truth.”
He shook his head. “You are a liar. A wretched, petty liar, but we’ll change that.”
Despite his words, he came to his feet. She started to scramble away, fully aware he meant to help her up.
She lifted a hand to him, pleading, “No, don’t … don’t touch me. I’m getting up, I’m coming along.”
She stood, awkward, and so cold that her teeth were chattering as she hugged her arms around herself, feeling more vulnerable than she ever had in her life.
He had stripped down for his swim, but he still wore a knit wool shirt, and that he pulled over his head.
When she shied away from him then, he let out an impatient oath, jerking her close so that he could slip the wet shirt on her.
It was better than nothing. She didn’t move then, but stood before him with her head down, now shaking violently.
“Come.”
He caught her hand and started walking along the embankment to the boat.
She stumbled after him, not meaning to protest at that moment, but so cold that she could barely move.
Once again he swore, pausing to sweep her up into his arms. She clung to him to keep from falling, uneasily aware of his physical power.
His naked arms, chest, and upper abdomen were defined with muscle.
With dismay she thought that he was no one’s servant hoping to become a knight; he was already a warrior, a knight, one of the king’s men who had trained with the very heavy weapons and armor of war.
He stepped into the boat, set her down, and shoved off from the embankment. He pointed to her cloak and tunic, left behind when she had first decided to leave the little vessel—a lifetime ago, so it seemed.
“Get dressed.”
She reached for her things, starting to slip the tunic on top of his shirt.
“M’lady, I’ll take my shirt back, if you don’t mind.”
“But I do mind—”
“Why should you? I’ve already seen all that you have to offer.”
“I wouldn’t want to commit more treason.”
He smiled at that. “But I do want my shirt.”
She stared at him, feeling a ridiculous surge of anger inside her once again. He liked to bait her. Fine. He was the king’s man. And her “noble bounty” was something he mocked.
“As you wish,” she told him, and she pulled off his shirt.
She tossed the garment toward him. He caught it; they stared at one another.
The cool breeze caught her naked flesh, but she took her time, pretending she had lost her tunic again with the pile of clothing in the boat, and searching through her clothing.
When she found her tunic, she pretended to have difficulty with the garment before slipping it over her head.
As she did so, she started, frightened, afraid she had taken her taunt too far, for he was right next to her, nearly touching her, reaching for her cloak.
He practically threw it on top of her head.
Then he sat again, staring at her. She returned the glare.
He reached for his shirt. As he did so, the oar started to slip from the boat.
“The oar!” she cried.
He fumbled for it. Too late. It was gone.
He swore.
“Oh, my God, not again! You really are a fool—”
“One more word and I will strangle you!” he promised. “You needn’t worry this time!”
He tossed his shirt down and slipped over the rim of the boat, back into the water. He was going for the oar, she saw.
Then she realized that the second oar was still in the lock.
She hastily changed her position, trying to maneuver the small vessel with the one oar.
It wouldn’t move at first, but then she jerked the oar from the lock.
She spun herself in a circle, but then she managed to slip the oar in and out of the water, changing sides, and set the little boat out on a straight line across the water.
She dipped the oar to the left, and couldn’t lift it.
She struggled with it, then gasped. He had reached the boat.
He tossed the lost oar aboard. Desperate, she tried to strike him with the oar she was using.
He ducked. He rose on the other side of the boat, and she spun around in time to catch him on the shoulder.
Then she realized that she had begun a brutal fight, and that if she didn’t win …
She struck out hard, and wild, very afraid. Then she saw she was beating the water. He was gone.
She sat back, shaking. Tears stung her eyes, horror filled her. She forced herself to breathe deeply, and she tried to tell herself that she hadn’t just murdered a man, and if she had, it had been in self-defense, she didn’t know just what he had intended for her.
Still, she felt a wave of wretched misery engulfing her.
Whom had she killed? He’d been young, a king’s man.
A knight. A man loyal to the king. Perhaps he’d encountered dozens of the king’s enemies, and returned triumphant, and she had murdered him in cold blood upon the river in the midst of a beautiful fall day …
She looked up at the sun, figuring it was well past midday.
Early afternoon, now? Her stomach growled suddenly, and she was horrified that she had murdered a man, and felt hunger at the same time.
She had to stop sitting there, stunned and appalled by what she had done.
She had to move. She had to reach the Viking camp.
In just another few hours, it would be dark again.
Shaking, she tried to pull herself together.
Then she screamed again, for he was back.
He wasn’t dead, and she was indeed in grave danger.
With a sudden impetus, he came shooting out of the river like a water demon, hiking himself over the edge of the boat with swift force.
She thought he meant to kill her when he wrenched away from her the oar she had wielded.
She cast her arms over her head and ducked, awaiting his deadly blow.
She began a swift, silent prayer, the Hail Mary, waiting, waiting …
The words of the prayer faded from her thoughts as nothing happened. She lifted her head at last.
He wasn’t looking at her. He was seated in the middle of the boat, adjusting both oars again. She dared to breathe. She should have kept her quiet. But she was shaking, and she couldn’t quite manage to do so.
“You’re alive.”
“No thanks to you.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“To kill me? Aye, I think you did.”
“But you haven’t—”
“Killed you? No, my lady, I have not.”
“I see,” she said. “You wouldn’t want to return me to King David dead or bruised.”