Chapter 18
Lily felt like singing. Not in all her born days had she felt this kind of freedom. She had never ridden a more powerful animal, either.
He was enormous, magnificent, and tireless. He must belong to one of the knights, she surmised. His ride was as smooth as flowing silk. Exhilarating.
As they cantered down the winding way, weaving and coiling between tall grey trunks, Lily’s heart fluttered. What a mount! He seemed intuitively to know what she wanted, and at a word responded. Just as well, for she had no tack, no saddle, and could only hope that he wouldn’t throw her off.
She laid her head close to his neck and told him how splendid she thought him. He nickered softly, stretching out his velvet muzzle.
On her right, the night woods slept. To her left, the ground sloped down into shallow valleys, or so she thought.
Do not get caught up in the woods, she told herself, else we’ll lose the way for certain.
She proposed to follow the edge of the trees.
Sometimes inadvertently, she found herself inside the eaves and wasted time trying to get out again.
Her hope was to find the way to the cart track they’d traveled earlier that afternoon.
By retracing her steps, she would find Spelling Mylen.
One road led out of that village, and it went directly to Fawlsend and the Mowbry estate.
“See,” she told the horse, “’Tis simple.”
Two hours later, she wasn’t so sure.
Three hours later, her worry had bloomed into something bordering on panic. Surely, she ought to have seen the millhouse or, even more likely, heard it. Noises in the night were louder, weren’t they?
And that was the other thing, somehow the left-hand way was often precipitous, and she’d been forced right and into the woods on more than one occasion.
Under the trees, it was darker and full of sounds she did not like.
Snuffling sinister noises coming from under the scattered branches.
Noises that made her skin crawl and caused her to look over her shoulder.
The night darkened. She was grateful for the moonlight, fitful as it was, for without it she would not have been able to see anything. Certainly, it was enough for the horse. It was his skill that prevented them from becoming snarled in the tangle of roots and branches.
She grew to dislike the wood and suspected it of housing malevolent spirits. She’d heard in tales of such things. She believed it was possible for trees to waylay travelers. She grew more afraid.
Where could that hamlet be? She must have gone wrong somewhere, but she had no idea how to fix it. Distances and directions baffled her.
The dark grew. The moon vanished. She could barely see her hand in front of her face.
She became fearful of stepping too close to the slope on her left.
In the darkness, she didn’t know how steeply it banked.
Again, she found herself forced to the right and into the maze of the trees. On they went. The night grew old.
Had she heard the stuttering of birds? Could it be that late, or early?
She was chilled now and tired, fighting sleep, and worried that the horse, too, must be weary.
They seemed to be in a clearing not too far from the edge of the forest. Down low in the east, a grey light seeped in as though a leak in the door of night.
Lily halted and slid down. It was a long way to the ground in the murk. Gripping the halter, she reached up to soothe the horse with soft words.
“Don’t be frightened, my splendid friend,” she said in a low voice. “I’m right here beside you, never fear.”
The animal’s expressive eyes shone like polished stones and flickered as if he followed her every word. “You trust in me,” she said, half delighted and half surprised by the revelation.
“Well, my fine friend,” she said, sliding her hands down his thick neck and withers, “we’ve got a village to find. Rest now, that we can find it more easily in the broadening light.”
She could not have slept very long. It felt like a blink or less, leaning up against the great beast. Her eyes felt gritty with the lack, her limbs heavy.
The scuffling, sniffling sounds in the undergrowth multiplied in the early light. There was a tension in the air.
Something approached. Both she and the horse rose. A curl of morning fog snaked through the grass and twisted about the tree roots.
The horse’s flanks and shoulders twitched. Ears pinned flat. He snorted. The breath in front of his flaring nostrils whitened.
“What is it?” Lily whispered, reaching for the halter. His muscles coiled with tension, flexed beneath her trembling fingers for just a second. Then he exploded from the clearing and vanished into the shadowy wood. He was gone.
Lily felt the sting of the halter rope that had burned her hand.
The cry of dismay died on her lips, for at that moment two men loomed up out of the trees opposite from where the horse had vanished. One carried a lantern that he uncovered. The other held an ugly length of rope.
Lily backed away, mute with shock.
Her heart catapulted out of her chest, for she thought she could guess the ruffians’ intent. It was written loud across their evil faces. They did not intend her any good.
Nor did she wait to discover more. She fled.
The men yelled and came after her, running fast. But she was the quicker running helter-skelter across the open spaces, weaving this way and that between the trunks.
A light rain began to fall, making her situation more dangerous as the ground became slicker.
Lily ducked and swerved to avoid branches, stumbling and sprinting in spurts. Without any sense of direction, she ran deeper into the woods.
To her dismay, she discovered that the pair behind her were not alone.
Three more ruffians appeared a little way ahead.
They were closing in on her. Had she caught the glint of knives?
A frantic look, from side to side, and she found herself trapped in the middle of a clearing.
There she stood, heaving from the exertion, trying her best to anticipate the most immediate threat. They surrounded her.
“Oh ho, Noodle, good work. Caught in the snare,” said one of the brutes. He had a garish red scar where his ear should have been.
“Bring your lantern, Noodle, let’s have a little light on the pretty thing,” said another.
Lewd laughter broke out around her.
“Aye now, there be a sight,” said Noodle, holding up his lamp. “An’ sure as sure, ‘twill please me’lud.”
“Quality it is,” said a whiny voice. “Not but what I’d like a bit o’daylight, the better to look.”
“No matter the light, she’d be quality,” quipped another. His leering face contorted with greed. “No need to guess why me’lud is a’chasing her.”
Lily shuddered.
“Nay, nay, bonnie louts,” said Noodle, who by his swagger seemed to be in charge. “None of that. She’s for me’lud, untouched, unspoiled. Those be me orders.”
“Aw, Noodle. He’s not even here,” complained the scarred one.
“An’ I spoke, Scabby, an’ won’t say it more. So shut it, or I’ll make sure you speak never again,” said Noodle.
Another of the rascals snapped his fingers and called out, “Here, pretty… kitty, kitty, kitty.” He made a grab at her skirts.
Noodle thwarted him with a stiff cuff to his head. ”You deaf? What’d I say?”
“’Eee, Noodle, don’t be like that,” said the whiny one, and he and Scabby exchanged ugly looks.
Seemingly oblivious of the minor mutiny brewing, the leader took a step closer to Lily and bowed. Lily could smell his foul odor and fought the urge to retch. “Don’t touch me,” she said, fighting to get the words past her teeth. To her dismay, her voice sounded like the croak of a sick crow.
At that moment, Whiny and Scabby decided to rush him, but Noodle was the quicker. Like a lightning strike, he swung his lamp. Smack, it hit their scowling faces. The horn coverings shattered with the force of it and flames hissed.
That was all it took, and the two ruffians sprinted off into the trees, yowling and half blind. Noodle chased after them.
Mayhem shook the forest trees. Yells and screams and a clash of steel.
Lily heard none of it. The instant mutiny broke the ranks, she fled. Ducking between the two remaining brutes, she dashed away, weaving through the tree trunks, her heart in her mouth. For a second, it seemed she might get away, for she was light and limber, and her attackers were clumsy and dull.
But the ruffians were stronger and crafty, too. They did not like to be told nay, not when it seemed unreasonable.
In any case, the big boss hadn’t arrived, and Noodle was off seeing to the mutineers. They seized their chance.
Lily heard the heavy thump of their boots running her down. Black thunder surrounded her. Terror. Her legs toiled. Her heart pounded. She could smell her pursuers, and the threat of them gave her speed.
“No, no, no,” she screamed as a grip, horribly strong, clamped itself around her right ankle and plucked her off the ground.
Lily landed on the forest floor in an open space between the trunks.
Even winded and blank-minded from shock, she instinctively realized her jeopardy.
Panicked, she twisted about and sank her teeth into her attacker’s shoulder as he came over her to anchor her down.
The foul and bitter taste made her sick, but the man gave a roar and let go of her ankle. She heard his snarled threat and squeezed her eyes tight against the inevitable blow from his raised fist. At that moment, she thought she’d come to her end. Despair and fear almost blinded her.
Into her darkness, a horn-call rent the night. It sounded just like Lambert’s hunting horn, but it couldn’t be.
It was followed by a pause, a hush and then, a thin whistle sounded through the trees. It came from afar, low and as musical as a chime. Once it sounded and then twice more. The morning wind carried the sounds aloft, twirling and spinning them this way and that.
Lily came to her knees.
There was a jangling of harnesses and spurs, and three knights charged into the opening, waving the swords in their hands.
A roar of fury rent the air. At the same moment came a cacophony of shouts and horns blaring, and her own high-pitched scream. Pain exploded in her head. Her attacker had a large rock in his hand.
Just before everything went black, Lily saw one of the knights charge her attacker and run him through. Lily felt the shock as a separate blow to her head.
She knew that face, the knight’s colors, also, but where? How? Pain washed all thoughts away and she did not hear the ruffian’s death scream, nor was she aware of her own body sagging to the ground. Night swept her mercifully away.