Chapter Seven
Dunstan stood staring into the trees and listened distractedly to Walter’s report.
They had made good time today and had halted early enough to scare up some fresh game for the evening meal.
The weather might hold another day, and they were that much closer to his mission’s end. Why did he not feel better?
Glancing around the fire, Dunstan rubbed the back of his neck, where the muscles had tightened uncomfortably.
The men seemed to be in good spirits, and even old Benedict was teasing that strange crone who served Marion…
. Marion… Dunstan had tried to ignore her since this morning, but as if possessed by its own will, his gaze traveled toward her tent, seeking her out.
His eyes narrowed when he did not immediately see her. When he could not find his squire, either, his jaw clenched, and when he caught sight of Cedric picking at the last bits of meat on the bones of the night’s supper, Dunstan felt a chill right to his own marrow.
“Cedric!” Startled by the force of his master’s voice, the youth dropped a morsel onto the ground and jerked to attention. Dunstan closed the distance between them in two strides. “Why are you not with Lady Warenne?”
“She is bedded down for the night,” the boy answered, flushing beneath Dunstan’s glare.
“And who gave you leave to desert your post?”
“Uh, no one, my lord. I just thought that since she was sleeping…”
Dunstan tried to control his impatience even as raw fury, mixed with some foreign emotion, threatened to lay claim to him. “Is Benedict watching her?” he asked through gritted teeth.
“No, my lord.” Cedric was staring at him, wide-eyed, apparently too witless to comprehend the enormity of his misdeed. Not trusting himself to speak, Dunstan turned and made for the lady’s tent, Cedric at his heels.
“But, my lord, she was tired,” the boy protested.
Dunstan marched on, hoping that his instinct was wrong and that the wren would not be so foolish.
By the Lord’s grace, let her not be so foolish…
. Without preamble, Dunstan jerked aside the flap to the accompaniment of Cedric’s gasp.
Inside the dark cocoon, a form lay upon the ground, seeming undisturbed by his entry, and Dunstan felt his blood go cold.
Although Cedric breathed a soft sigh of relief at the sight of the heaped blankets, Dunstan was no empty-headed youth.
A grim knowledge moved him to action, and with a swift flick of his boot, he tossed away the blanket to reveal to his astonished squire the mound of clothing and pillows that lay underneath.
“She is gone!” Cedric squeaked. “But I never thought—”
“Yes, she is gone! Heed you this, boy,” Dunstan growled. “When I give an order I expect it to be obeyed without question. You were not given leave to think!”
“My lord, forgive me!” Cedric fell upon his knees.
“Get up!” Dunstan hissed. “And forgive yourself should we find her dead.”
With a startled look, Cedric glanced at the woods, and Dunstan followed, staring into the fields and forest that lined the roadway.
The sun was setting behind a hill, casting the ghostly glow of twilight all around them and heralding the coming night.
It would be upon them soon, with only the moon and the stars to guide any search.
Dunstan’s heart sank down to his toes as he realized the enormity of the situation.
She could be anywhere—up a tree, hiding in a cave or fallen into a ravine—and he had not the resources to find her.
It was too late. To divide up his men and send them off into the darkness would be just as foolhardy as her own recklessness. He could not do it.
Walter’s voice broke through whatever force was gripping Dunstan, holding him stock-still. “She has fled again?” the vassal asked without surprise.
“Yes.”
“We had better hurry,” Walter said. Surprised, Dunstan shot a swift questioning glance at his vassal. Walter’s eyes were hooded in the twilight, and, when Dunstan said nothing, they turned to him, strangely bright. “We shall spread out and find her.”
“No,” Dunstan said wearily. “It is too dangerous. I cannot risk separating the men and sending them off into the woods in the night to look for a needle in a haystack.”
Walter opened his mouth as if to argue and then closed it again. “The road is quiet, and naught is abroad but one lone female,” he reasoned. “If we began now—”
Dunstan shook his head, cutting off his vassal’s words. “You have fought beside me long enough to know the folly of such a course. Yes, in all probability there is no threat among these hills, but I did not stay alive this long by taking such chances.”
A muscle in Walter’s cheek jumped at the implied reprimand, but Dunstan paid it no heed.
He stared off into the trees, trying to decide what to do.
He ought to abandon the foolish chit to her fate, but the thought of the wren alone out there did something to his chest, making it constrict painfully.
“But the lady! Surely, you cannot mean to let her run away,” Walter argued. “What will your father say?”
Something in Walter’s voice made Dunstan lift his head and look closely at his vassal. Was that scorn he heard? Contempt? Walter’s face showed nothing but taut lines of concentration in the vanishing light.
Dunstan rubbed the back of his neck. On top of everything else, he was imagining things.
Perhaps he was hearing taunts where there were none because of his own sense of frustration and helplessness.
What was he to do? “I will go alone,” he said finally.
“And I will find her.” Or what is left of her, he thought grimly.
In truth, he had not considered his father’s reaction should he fail in his mission or, worse yet, if the woman his family adored came up dead or missing when in his charge.
Campion’s disapproval or Simon’s scorn suddenly seemed a lot less important than they once might have.
Right now, Dunstan just wanted to find her alive.
Then he would kill her himself.
Stopping only to grab up his pack, Dunstan headed toward the woods.
Cedric begged to come along, but knowing the boy would slow him down, Dunstan bade him stay.
He wanted no distractions as he sought her trail in the dusk.
He spared a moment to consider the workings of her mind, but decided that was beyond any sane man.
Instead, he simply took the most likely route away from the camp toward the cover of the trees.
Dunstan trod softly, taking the easiest way and hoping she did not veer off in her cleverness.
If she hoped no one would discover her missing until morning, she was probably putting as much distance between herself and the camp as possible.
Dunstan suspected that was her course, but the knowledge gave him no comfort, for moving as swiftly as he could to catch up, he might never find her in the blackness.
It was full dark under the trees, the moon casting its light but faintly through the branches overhead.
Dunstan stepped more carefully, afraid that he might miss her form huddled off the track he had discovered.
It twisted and turned over fallen logs and slippery ditches, which made him wonder if she would break her neck in some gully.
Actually, that was the least of the possible fates that disturbed him.
There were so many other dangers, so many threats to a woman alone in a strange forest in the dark, that Dunstan could not even consider them.
He concentrated solely on following her—on a muddy footprint, glimpsed in an open glade, or a bush, visibly disturbed—while he tried to ignore the weight that pressed down upon him, making him feel powerless for the first time in many long years.
Although Dunstan was not a superstitious man, what finally kept him going was a blind faith that she was ahead of him. And with no other clues to guide him, Dunstan did not stop to question whence the alien feeling sprung. He simply heeded it, moving forward with increasing urgency.
He went swiftly because something was not right.
He could feel it as surely as a man sensed a coming battle—or an ambush.
The woods were too quiet, the normal noises of night animals stilled, and even the air hushed with danger.
Dunstan paused to listen, his very soul reaching out into the blackness.
And through the silence, she spoke to him, though it would not have been the call that he desired. The sound that rent the night was a scream that made his blood run cold, for it was a woman’s scream of terror and pain and it belonged to Marion. His body flew to life in response.
Afterward, Dunstan cursed himself as ten times a fool for charging off like a madman, but at the time he could do nothing else.
He saw red, his own blood seeming to burst through his brain to cloud his vision.
All his soldier’s training and years of caution went by the wayside as he rushed toward her.
Another scream was cut off, muffled somehow, but the first still rang in his ears, driving him onward, and, unsheathing his sword, Dunstan burst into a clearing.
In less than a second, his mind took in the scene before him, lit by a small fire: Marion stretched out between two men, one holding her arms, while the other bent over her, pushing up her skirts.
In less than a second, Dunstan had raised his blade, overwhelmed by a blood lust such as he had never known, and bellowed his rage.
The one between her legs looked up, his face registering a startled expression before Dunstan severed his head from his body in one blow.
Blood showered through the air, making the other man shriek and fall back, fumbling for a weapon.
But Dunstan was too fast. Leaping over Marion’s body, Dunstan sliced the man’s arm where it reached for a sword and then ran him through.