Chapter 9 #2
He shrugged. “I am a mercenary and, as you are so fond of reminding me, a disgraced knight.
We all have enemies, awaiting their chance to hurt us, whether it be by word or blade.
Perhaps I have wronged someone and now they seek revenge.
Or mayhap ‘tis Sweyn they seek, in retaliation for one of his bad jokes.”
Sweyn pulled a face at him, too occupied with Mary to reply.
He was probably right, thought Briar. Enemies were everywhere, and Lord Radulf must have many.
She was among their number. The troop of men had been well armed, they looked like soldiers who had killed before, but mayhap they had not expected such seasoned fighters as Ivo and Sweyn.
Was that why they had ridden off like that?
Briar shivered, and Ivo’s arms closed more firmly about her. Keeping her safe. He brushed his lips against her hair, his voice quiet, “Let us go home, demoiselle.” As his horse set off at a slow trot, Briar closed her eyes, suddenly very content to be exactly where she was.
Briar must have dozed momentarily, for when she awoke, they had already reached the cottage by the river. Starlight washed the dark water intermittently as cloud slipped across the sky. Waves brushed the shore in soothing motion. The dwelling was a black shape, silent and faintly sinister.
Swiftly, Ivo dismounted and brought her down beside him. Briar had hoped he might carry her— she was oddly loathe to give up the warmth and safety of his arms—but understood he needed to have both his arms free. In case he had to fight for them.
“Wait here.” His eyes were very dark, a warning that he meant what he said. Briar nodded, though her frown told him she didn’t like it. He smiled, a faint lift of his lips, and turned away.
He was only gone a moment. It seemed like much longer to Briar, as she waited, her breath held.
“ Tis safe.”
His shadow appeared at the door, but at the sound of his voice, Briar had already followed him inside.
Fumbling, she found and Ut a candle. The wane light fought with the shadows.
Briar wondered how a single candle could give such comfort?
The same way in which one man, among all the others, tugged at her heart and made her so weak, so vulnerable.
It was incomprehensible, and very frightening. Once before she had believed in a man and he had failed her. How could she give herself to Ivo? He was near enough to a stranger.
“No one has been here,” she said huskily, carefully looking about her. “I would know if they had.”
He nodded, his dark eyes glinting in the weak flame. Moisture from the misty night sparkled on his hair as he bent to stir fire from the coals.
“Briar?” Mary’s voice trembled.
Her sister was standing within the door, leaning heavily upon Sweyn.
Briar hurried to take Mary’s hands; to her dismay the girl’s fingers were cold and shaking.
“Come,” she insisted, and with Sweyn’s help, lowered the girl onto a stool.
Ivo made quick work of turning the smoldering fire into a warm blaze, and dry heat began to chase the cold and damp into retreat.
“Briar, ‘tis you who needs care.”
“Hush, sweeting, I am quite well again.” Briar stroked her sister’s dark hair with gentle fingers. “The sickness is past. Truly.”
And it was so. She felt perfectly well again, if a little tired.
But then what woman would not feel tired after the evening she had had?
It was Mary who needed care now—they were back to normal, and the return of their equilibrium was a great relief to Briar.
She had begun to fear Mary no longer needed her.
Where would that leave Briar? She would have to begin thinking of life alone, just her, all by herself.
And she did not like it.
Ivo watched Briar while she busied herself making her sister warm and comfortable, and set a posset over the flames to heat.
He had known she loved her sister, of course he did, but to see it so clearly in her actions ... His firebrand, Briar, seemed suddenly softer, more womanly, very much gentler.
He remembered how she had clung to him on the ride from Lord Shelborne’s, her lips sweet on his.
He believed her. She felt no revulsion for his maimed hand—Briar was not the sort to cringe and turn faint at the sight of blood or damaged flesh.
His raw feelings where his lost fingers were concerned had deceived him into seeing something that was not there.
Ivo took a long slow breath and wondered where he could go from here. He would protect Briar, he would help her solve the mystery of Anna’s death, but after that? What then?
Matilda.
His sister’s name was a bittersweet memory, re-minding him of his failure once before. Not this time, though. Miles won’t win this time...
Sweyn caught his eye.
The Dane looked miserable and uncomfortable, as if he wished himself far away. Ivo jerked his head at the door, and Sweyn followed him back out into the night.
Mist from the river puddled about their feet. They could hear the voices of boatsmen and the wash of their oars, strangely muffled by the miasma. From inside the dwelling, the women’s soft murmurs spilled like candlelight.
Ivo spoke. “Radulf has asked to speak with me, otherwise I would stay. I must leave them in your hands, my friend.”
Sweyn nodded, his handsome, good-natured face more serious than usual. “I will guard them, Ivo. I will do whatever I must to keep them safe. Return to Radulf, and know they are in good hands.”
Ivo nodded. He wanted to stay, but Radulf had asked specifically for him. Radulf was a good lord, but even the best of them did not like to be disobeyed.
“Who were they?” Sweyn was watching him, waiting. As if he sensed Ivo had his suspicions.
The knot in Ivo’s belly tightened. “Enemies of Radulf, mayhap?” he offered.
Sweyn turned thoughtful. “They wore dark colors—no emblems, no signs as to who was their master, and yet a troop of men like that... They were disciplined, trained, not the riffraff who normally set out to steal and plunder. And they were mounted on good horses, too. Aye, Ivo, they belonged to someone. Twas some reason to it.”
“They were not afraid; that was not why they ran.”
Again Ivo remembered how the leader had thrust his sword at him so aggressively before he rode past. Ivo had blocked it easily, but there had been real menace and intent in that blow.
More feeling than one stranger should feel for another.
Personal feeling, old feeling, the feeling between those who are well known to each other. Mayhap even blood feeling...
“Was Miles among them?”
Ivo went still at Sweyn’s question. Had his friend read his mind? Sweyn said no more, waiting, until at last Ivo spoke, making his voice slow and measured.
“Miles hates me, ‘tis true, but he is in hiding. Why come out into the open and risk being arrested by the king’s men? Why show himself for my benefit?”
“Do you really think Miles would balk at showing himself, if it gave him the chance to do you harm, Ivo? He will know how you tricked him at Somerford, how you played dead and then escaped from him. He missed his chance to kill you that day, and he will have been brooding about it ever since. Aye, what else does he have to think of, now he is in hiding from the king? If he hated you before, then he will hate you more now. It could be that Miles has just set you a challenge.”
Ivo flexed the fingers on his gloved hand.
Miles wanted him dead. It was the truth.
A strange and incomprehensible truth to Ivo; his brother loathed and hated him, and longed to hurt him.
Mayhap even kill him. Did Miles see Ivo as his conscience?
Did he think that the only way to silence that conscience was by crushing it?
Ivo knew the evil of which Miles was capable, although Miles’s mind, even after all these years, was still a mystery to him.
But for all its puzzlement, the fact remained: Miles wanted Ivo dead.
“I recognized him,” he said quietly, as if speak?ing too loud was dangerous and would make something that he as yet only suspected into reality.
“When the troop leader came riding at me, I recognized him. Not with my mind, Sweyn. Inside my heart, deep in my belly. I felt his hatred like hot air on my face.”
Sweyn was silent, listening to the boatsman’s oars, the splash and dip drifting over the dark Ouse.
“And then I noticed the way he held his sword, the set of his head, the line of his shoulders, and I knew him. ‘Twas Miles.”
There, it was said now. Like something bad forced out of the shadows and into the light. But
Ivo felt no better for seeing it. Tension coiled in his stomach, made his throat ache. Miles was here, in York, just as Lord Henry had said he was. Miles, his brother and his most deadly enemy.
“You can’t be sure,” Sweyn said mildly, now playing at devil’s advocate. “A man might resemble another, it does not mean ‘tis him.”
“Mayhap.”
“Miles would be a fool to pit himself against you here, with Radulf at your back, and me at your side.”
Ivo managed a grin, and the knot in his belly loosened slightly. “Fool indeed, Sweyn.”
“Good.” Sweyn nodded, as if the smile had been his aim. “Go now, and speak with Radulf. Tell him of the troop of men, tell him what you think. It won’t hurt to warn him.”
“Aye. Stay here, and guard them well. I will return as soon as I can.”
Sweyn teased. “Do you plan to sleep at all, then?”
Ivo laughed. “Do you think I have slept since Briar came into my life? I am used to going without.”
Sweyn gave a roar of laughter, the sound drifting over the river. The silence following it was eerie. As if someone out there was listening to them, observing them.
“I will say my farewells, then,” Ivo murmured.
Sweyn nodded, and set his gaze upon watching the shadows.
Inside the cottage, Briar had settled Mary into her bed by the fire. The girl was almost asleep, her dark head cradled against her sister’s shoulder as