CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
A Boreas wind blew across the abbey forecourt, causing many a mantle to unfurl and flap in its wake. In that instant, Laoghaire wondered if some dark, malcontent spirit had suddenly taken up residence in their midst.
“The seventh hour has arrived!” Abbot Theodore announced as he gestured to the sundial affixed to the facade of the church.
Father Giroldus immediately bustled to the front of the pyre. “Bind the witch to the stake,” he ordered the deputies.
As Laoghaire was grasped roughly by the arms and yanked over to the ladder—on which she was expected to climb up to the platform that protruded from the middle of the stake—she trembled with fear, her courage flagging.
God’s heart! Where is my brother Iain? Why has he not arrived?
Holding the hem of her chemise aloft with one hand, Laoghaire grasped the ladder with the other as she made her assent.
Once she was situated on the platform, one of the deputies climbed behind her and secured her upper body to the stake with a heavy length of rope, crisscrossing it between her breasts.
Once he was finished with that, he then bound her wrists together behind the pole before he rejoined the crowd below.
From her elevated position, she was able to see the demented glee that emanated from so many of the onlookers.
There is not a sympathetic face among them.
“Venerable brothers,” Father Giroldus began, addressing his remarks, not to the throng, but to the monks who flanked either side of the pyre. “We have before us a momentous task, one in which I take no pleasure.”
The lie that he told was so flagrant, Laoghaire could not help but scoff, earning her a contemptuous glower from the priest.
“To save our own souls, we must purge the devil from this monastery,” Father Giroldus continued.
“If the devil is in our midst, he’s garbed in a black robe!” Laoghaire jeered, her exclamation causing more than one person in the crowd to gasp aloud with shock.
“Silence!” the abbot commanded, red-faced with anger.
He wants me meek as a lamb, but I’ll not go quietly to my death, she fumed, regaining some of her lost courage.
“Make no mistake: Where she roams—” Father Giroldus thrust an accusing finger in Laoghaire’s direction—“the devil roams. She is endowed with evil vices, lacking in all virtue. If she is not purged of the dark forces, she will cause the ruination of us all.”
“Take heed, priest!” a commanding voice suddenly boomed from the crowd. “Or you will meet a dire end.”
Sweet Jesu!
Instantly recognizing that deep, beloved voice, Laoghaire frantically searched the throng. When she finally caught sight of Galen—pushing and shoving his way to the fore—her joy at seeing him, alive and well, was so great that she shouted his name aloud.
Though she knew he must be weakened by his recent illness, she could detect no evidence of it. Indeed, there was a dangerous swagger in Galen’s step as he broke free of the crowd and strode toward her.
I have never been so happy to see that blood-red lion emblazoned on his surcoat!
No apparition, Galen finally stood before her in the flesh, his helm tucked beneath one arm, the linked mail of his hauberk shining brightly in the afternoon sunlight.
Outfitted for battle, he was a formidable sight to behold.
And given the stunned expressions of everyone present, it was obvious that they were as amazed as she was to see him.
Even the assembled monks, Abbot Theodore included, openly gawked, unable to hide their astonishment.
All save for Father Giroldus, who glared at Galen with a feral intensity, a mad dog ready to attack.
Galen peered up at her and the expression on his face softened ever so slightly. “How fare thee, lady wife?”
“Now that ye are here, I am much improved,” Laoghaire told him, smiling through her tears.
Galen briefly returned the smile before he turned toward the abbot. “Release her! She is an innocent woman!”
Having yet to regain his composure, the abbot’s hand visibly trembled as he smoothed it over the front of his habit. “I must humbly beg to differ, my lord. Lady Angus has been convicted of sorcery, a most serious crime, as well you know.”
At hearing that, Laoghaire’s head snapped back, her body jerking against the restraining ropes. Like Galen, she had erroneously assumed that, on account of his having revived, she would be cleared of the charges and set free.
Suddenly worried, she peered apprehensively at Galen.
His eyes glittering hard and flat like hammered iron, Galen stormed over to where the abbot stood before the gathered monks. “Suffering hell! She is no witch. Am I not the living proof of it?” he snarled, thumping on his chest with a balled fist for added emphasis.
“While I am relieved that you have survived the dark malady from which you earlier suffered, Father Giroldus was able to prove that the countess used devilish wile to strike you down,” the abbot stubbornly maintained, refusing to relent.
“And I can easily prove that she did not.” With a look of utmost confidence, Galen turned to her and said, “Do you wish me dead, lady wife?”
Without hesitating, Laoghaire vigorously shook her head. “I do not! And I would defend ye with my very life,” she added, raising her voice so that it would ring across the entire forecourt.
“There! What more proof do you need of her innocence?”
Having thus far remained conspicuously silent, Father Giroldus suddenly found his voice. “That she is able to spin a witch’s lie proves nothing. She confessed to wearing a pagan charm and practicing the evil art of divination.”
His last remark aroused the ire of the crowd, inciting someone to shout out, “Burn the witch!”
Even from a distance, Laoghaire could see a muscle begin to tick in Galen’s cheek. Though he was but one man, she knew that he would do all in his power to protect her against the angry mob. Or he would die trying. A dire thought that was too terrifying to contemplate.
“Is this how you take your revenge, priest? By falsely accusing an innocent woman of a heinous crime?” Galen taunted, his eyes burning with a terrible, unforgiving rage.
Father Giroldus’s heavy features twisted, his contempt made plain. “While I was none too pleased to bid my cods adieu after I left Castle Airlie—”
“Ye had him gelded!” Laoghaire could not help but exclaim, that being the first she’d heard of it.
“My actions are not motivated by malice,” the priest continued, ignoring her rambunctious outburst. “Rather, I am driven by a desire to rid this monastery of the devil’s taint.”
“I have no knowledge of the devil!” Laoghaire declared. “How many times must I tell ye?”
“Silence, witch!” the abbot rebuked, pinning her with a quelling glare. Then, returning his attention to Galen, he said, “My lord, you were overheard to say, ‘You have bewitched me, lady wife.’ What would prompt you to say such a thing?”
“Had you ever lain with a woman, you would know the answer to that question.”
Several of the men in the crowd chortled knowingly, and more than a few sly winks were exchanged.
Given the abbot’s indignant expression, it was obvious that he was not amused. “Your wife has been found guilty of witchcraft. The sentence stands,” he proclaimed in a voice as hard as winter’s ice.
Her heart in her throat, Laoghaire watched as Galen clasped hold of his sword hilt. “Then, I stand ready to prove my wife’s innocence with my body.”
Raising a beringed hand, the abbot gestured to a man who stood at the edge of the crowd. “I bid the court’s champion to now come forth.”
Simon Blàrach stepped forward, and almost immediately a cheer went up in the crowd.
A behemoth of a man, he stood nearly as tall as Galen, but with a much heavier frame.
Depending on how the contest unfolds, that could be to his advantage, Laoghaire fretted.
Although given that his nose sat crooked on his face—prominently so—it was obvious there had been at least one occasion on which the sheriff suffered a brutal beating.
With an ugly sneer plastered on his face, Blàrach came to a halt a few feet from where Galen and the abbot stood.
After casting her a dismissive glance, he said to Galen, “Your defense of the countess is naught but the ravings of a man besotted with lust. You are trapped in this witch’s web, and you will not be able to disentangle yourself .
. . my lord,” he added with mocking courtesy.
Laoghaire felt a cold shiver course down her spine. She knew Simon Blàrach’s type: an embittered man who despised those who wielded more power than he did. Such acrimony—having accrued over a lifetime—could often imbue a man with superhuman strength.
“Words will not resolve this matter,” Galen said without inflection.
“But a sword thrust through your heart should amply prove that you gave false witness.” That said, he turned his back on his opponent and said to the abbot, “Before combat begins, I would ask that you allow me to converse with my wife.”
Abbot Theodore granted the request with a grudging nod. “You may briefly speak to her.”
As the deputies began to push back the crowd to clear a space for the combat arena, Galen strode over to the ladder that was still leaning against the stake.
He quickly climbed several rungs, coming to a halt once they were at eye level.
At that close range, Laoghaire could see that beneath the three days’ growth of whiskers, Galen’s face appeared as white as a sheet of parchment.
Earlier, he’d fooled her with his commanding air and manly bluster into thinking that he’d fully recovered, but she now feared he was in no condition for combat.
“Please, Galen, I beg you . . . do not do this,” she urged in a lowered voice, terrified that the bout might prove deadly for him.