Chapter 6 #3
It was not easy to look upon. He knew that and had come to terms with the difficult reality, accepting the fact that the fair-haired warrior, the physically imposing, flawless youth he had been once, was gone forever.
He was still undeniably tall and strong, as skilled and powerful of muscle and bone as ever before.
Clothed, none would know the difference between the man he had been then and what he had become after living through that hell.
But he knew—and now these men did as well.
“This,” he said, still without breaking his gaze on Gareth, “should allay any doubt that I was in the hands of the French Inquisition. As you can see, I was questioned by them most thoroughly.”
“And this”—he unsheathed his sword with a hissing, metallic sound—“should help to resolve any remaining doubt about the position I held as a Templar Knight, or my ability to lead this garrison.” He gave Gareth a tight half smile, cocking his brow as he inclined his head and added, “That is, if you’re willing to test the fact in a one-to-one sparring match with me. Here and now.”
Gareth paused for a long moment, the cracking in his voice when he spoke belying the outward composure he was plainly trying so hard to sustain. “What then—do you intend to fight without any armor or even mail for protection?”
“I need none. My sword and shield will suffice.”
Damien saw Gareth’s sudden paleness, took in his astonished expression, and added in a mocking lilt, “Come man, and let us begin. I vow before your captain and the rest of these men that I absolve you of any injury you may be fortunate enough to inflict upon me, if that is the worry holding you up from engaging your blade with mine.”
“Have a care, Damien,” Ben murmured from behind, as they waited for Gareth’s answer. “I would not take pleasure in stitching you again, when an injury could so easily be avoided with a bit less flair and a bit more caution.”
“Never fear, friend. I know my limits,” Damien muttered in return, low enough that none other could hear the exchange between himself and Ben.
More loudly he called again toward the group of men, “Well, Sir Gareth, what say you? I give my word to make this an exhibition only, for though your impudence has earned far worse, I am not of that ilk of castle lords who demand vengeance through the blood of their minions.”
He nodded, giving Gareth a sarcastic smile again, doing his best to prick at the man’s pride in the hopes of eliciting some action from him.
“Nay, indeed, it is to your good fortune this day that I am born of common stock, else I might decide to make a greater mockery of you than you have made of yourself already, with your cowardly hesitation.”
That was enough, finally, to shake Gareth from his indecision. With a growl he strode up the impromptu path of men, toward Damien, unsheathing his weapon as he came.
Damien was ready for him.
He met the first, overhead blow easily enough, countering with a hard, swinging strike from the side.
Gareth fended him off for a moment, but he wasn’t practiced enough to see the next strike coming—a quick feint to the opposite side that shifted at the last moment to a jabbing thrust. The move slid Damien’s blade along Gareth’s until they clanked to a stop, hilts interlocked.
Damien stood chest-to-chest with his opponent, the old, familiar battle heat filling him to make the effort to hold firm against him seem almost insignificant.
Only another two moves and he would be able to hook Gareth’s blade and hurl it from his grip.
He stepped forward, putting his foot between Gareth’s own and shifting his weight in preparation. Just one more move, now…
Suddenly, a flash of deep, blood red against black drew Damien’s attention to the edge of the yard.
A shock went through him. It was Alissende.
She had come outside, accompanied by Father Michael, and it was the priest’s long, dark robes that had accentuated her ruby-hued gown so dramatically.
Standing in silence, she watched their sparring match with an expression of combined surprise and worry shadowing her beautiful eyes.
Damien let his gaze linger on her for but an instant—and yet an instant was all it took.
Gareth used the moment of his distraction to slam his forearm hard against Damien’s chest, knocking the wind out of him and forcing him to step back enough to allow Gareth to effectively disengage from their locked position.
Scowling in disgust at himself, Damien scrambled to regroup, forced to seek another angle now, in order to approach and disarm his foe.
It did not take long, but it required more effort than he had intended to expend, and his back and arms had begun to ache by the time he’d managed to send Gareth’s sword spinning from his grip.
Then, just because he was irritated, he kept his blade raised to Gareth’s throat, keeping him immobile at the point of that glittering death a few moments longer than he might have otherwise…
until he saw some of the men around them begin to shift uneasily, clearly worried that he might renege on his earlier claim to make this naught but an exhibition and instead slice their comrade where he stood.
At last Damien pulled away, and Gareth collapsed to one knee, bent double as he gasped for air, while Damien stalked back toward Ben.
“A bit overzealous there at the end, don’t you think?” Ben waited until Damien had sheathed his blade again and unfastened the sword belt before handing him his shirt.
“He deserved it.”
“Perhaps.” Ben glanced toward the group of men who had clustered around Gareth. “But I’d say you made your point in a way none of them will soon forget.”
“That was my intent.” Damien fastened his shirt and tucked it into his breeches again. “And yet now it is just as important that I give them and Gareth a way to follow me in honor.”
After rebuckling his sword belt, Damien strode back toward the group, taking Gareth’s weapon from the knight who’d retrieved it off the ground.
As he approached the man he’d bested, he reached out his hand.
“Come, Sir Gareth, and accept my offer of peace. You displayed fine skill and good instincts, and I would be proud to know you serve willingly in my garrison.”
Gareth looked up at Damien, his expression unreadable for a moment.
He was still breathing heavily. At last he reached up and allowed Damien to help pull him to his feet.
Damien handed him his sword. After sheathing it, Gareth stood still and quiet, staring at the ground before finally glancing over to Damien again.
“I thank you, my lord, and I hope you will pardon me for the doubts I harbored—and so rudely offered you this day.”
“I consent on all counts,” Damien said, “and consider it a fair price to have paid for the privilege of having such a fine sword-arm at my beck and call from now on.” The second part was added half in jest, in an effort to put him at ease.
As Damien had hoped, Gareth looked pleased with the compliment, and in a moment he looked past Damien to the other men and Fitzgibbon. “If I am not mistaken, we will all be reconsidering the false judgment we placed upon you, my lord, and will follow you in honor from this time forward.”
In response, a few of the men let go a chorus of “Aye!” and “You have our allegiance, my lord!” which was soon picked up by the rest.
Damien shook hands with Gareth, Fitzgibbon, and several of the men closest, and when the cheers died down, he said, “I am glad to have your backing; however, it might be best if you reserve some of your enthusiasm for the training still ahead of us.”
A few groans, good-natured ones now, echoed from the group, and Damien nodded, smiling. “I know, I know…but we’ve much to accomplish, and the sooner we begin the sooner we will be done as well.”
As the men turned to do as he bid, Damien allowed himself to glance back to the edge of the yard for the first time since the distraction of seeing Alissende, which had cost him in his sparring match with Gareth.
She was gone.
Ben caught his glance as he approached Damien to stand by him again, and he raised his brow, offering a comment that struck Damien as being less innocent than it seemed. “I noticed your wife watching you at the edge of the yard earlier as well. She seemed worried for your safety.”
“So worried that she chose to leave with her cousin before she could speak with me.” Damien leaned over to pick up his shield, slipping his arm into the straps and trying to subdue his ever-turbulent emotions where Alissende was concerned.
Ben shrugged. “It looked to me as if she and Michael were carrying baskets of some kind. Perhaps they were on an errand. Though her hasty departure might well have had more to do with her worry over the possibility of seeing you wounded.”
“More like she was simply dismayed at the contrast between the man she once used to watch battle in tournaments and what she saw before her today.”
Making a clicking noise of chastisement, Ben shook his head. “Methinks you know less about the workings of the female mind than I do, Damien—and I am the one who has taken vows of celibacy.”
Ah, but I took such vows too once upon a time….
The thought swept through Damien with startling virulence, catching him unawares.
But he had no chance to say anything out loud, for at that moment he noticed a squire approaching them at a near run from the direction of the main hall.
The young man had been trained well; when he reached the limits of the group of men, he stopped, breathing heavily and looking nervous as he waited for Damien’s permission to come further.
“I wonder what this is about?” Damien murmured to Ben, at the same time gesturing the lad to him.
Some of the guard had taken notice as well, several of them turning and watching as the squire strode up to Damien and bowed in deference before he straightened to murmur, “My lord—pardon the interruption, but I come bearing news of approaching knights. A contingent of two dozen or more, fully outfitted for battle, bearing the arms of young Hugh de Valles, fourth Earl of Harwick—and led by Lord Harwick himself.”
Damien felt all his muscles clench for the second time in the past hour.
Damn. It was not that he hadn’t expected Alissende’s pursuer to appear in another defiant attempt to make claim to her, regardless of the proxy marriage she’d declared at court; after all, Alissende’s own mother and Father Michael had warned him of the likelihood of Hugh’s continued aggression.
He had just hoped he’d have more time to gain his bearings before Hugh showed himself.
Frowning, he swung his gaze to Ben. “We’d better ready the men for the possibility of a confrontation, then,” he said in a low voice.
“I must send word to Alissende and caution her of his approach, then go to the guardhouse and alert those still on duty there. In the meantime, if you will address the matter with the men here, I would—”
“Pardon, milord, but I must tell you that…that is, I think you should know that Lord Harwick—that he is…and that…that the Lady Alissende is—”
The squire stumbled over his words, pale of face and obviously worried about the harmful ramifications of interrupting his master not only once this morn but now twice, and the second time most rudely, in midsentence.
Damien tried to school his face into a less threatening glower, looking back to the youth and saying evenly, “Slow down, lad. You will earn no rebuke for speaking the news you have come to convey. Is there more to it than what you have already told me?”
“Aye, my lord,” the squire said, his throat working as he swallowed several times, and his brown eyes troubled.
“It is this: Lord Harwick approaches from the west. Lady Alissende, several of her maids, and their escorts departed the castle gates but a quarter hour past to go a-berrying in the woodland that borders the western portion of Glenheim.”
Damien felt as if he’d been impaled through the gut as the import of what he’d just heard sank home, even before the squire uttered the final damning words…
“Lord Harwick will come upon the Lady Alissende while she is protected by naught but a handful of men, Sir Damien. And if his actions in the past hold true, then she is in grave danger. Very grave danger indeed.”