Bound In Darkness 02 - The Devil's Knight Part 1

Bound in Darkness 02 - The Devil's Knight.

by Lucy Blue.

Acknowledgments

Endless thanks to Timothy Seldes, a dear man and a truly magnificent agent, and Lauren McKenna, brilliant editor and friend. I'd love them even if I didn't need them so much. More thanks than I could ever express to my family (the Addisons and Sorensons forever included) for everything-no writer has ever been given better, more constant support.

And finally, thanks to Michael Hemlepp, the best lawyer in the history of time.

Prologue

Siobhan scrambled through the th.o.r.n.y brush at the foot of the hill, the Norman knight hot on her heels. "You'd best hope I never catch you, poppet," he shouted, hacking away at the vines and brambles with his sword. "You'll be begging me to kill you."

Siobhan wished she was already dead, that it had been her head cleaved off in the first shock of the attack instead of her father's.

The Norman king's men hadn't even bothered with a royal proclamation this time. With no warning at all, they had poured into her father's village in the middle of the night, setting the wooden walls aflame. She and her mother had run from their burning manor house just in time to see her father's head fall from his shoulders in the narrow street and roll into the gutter, his angry face still moving. If Siobhan should somehow survive this night and live to be an old woman of a hundred years, she would never forget the sight, the way his eyes had blinked and his mouth still moved as if to curse them all.

But she couldn't stop to think about it now. She dropped to her knees to crawl under a thicket, the thorns tearing at her back as she reached the bare face of the druid's hill. She had never thought she would have to run so far; she had a.s.sumed the Norman knight would give her up when she reached the thick of the woods, where his horse couldn't follow. But no such luck.

"I will catch you, poppet!" he promised from behind her, closer now. She huddled in the briars, hoping he had lost her trail, but his voice grew closer still. "Where will you go now?"

She straightened up against the rock, a long thorn tearing at her cheek. The steep hillside was completely overgrown, a natural defense for the ancient tower on its summit. When the king had issued his first proclamation, her mother had wanted to come here, to give up their cozy manor house for the cramped stone tower. "We can defend the druid's keep forever," she had insisted. But her father would not be moved. The old king had given his father these lands in his treaty with the Saxons, making Da a n.o.ble lord the same as the Norman b.a.s.t.a.r.d the new king meant to replace him. He had made a formal protest, written in his own beautiful hand, and had insisted that would be the end of it. But maybe young King Henry couldn't read.

"Come back here now," the knight who was chasing her called out, stopping at the worst of the briar thicket. "Come back, and I won't hurt you."

Siobhan looked back and snorted-did he think she was stupid? She had seen what his friends had done to her mother before their captain had shown her the mercy of cutting her throat; she knew what this one had in mind for her. She might be only eleven years old, but she wasn't stupid. She turned back to the rock face and started looking for a way to climb.

"Little b.i.t.c.h," she heard him grunt, struggling through the thorns, and her heart raced faster with panic. What would Sean do? she thought, kicking off her shoes. If her older brother had been there, she was convinced that none of this would have happened. He would have reasoned with their father, made him run or at least put up a better defense than n.o.ble right and pride. But Sean was far away, learning how to be a knight himself.

"Come down here, you little monkey," the Norman said from behind her, laughing. He was very close now. "Where do you mean to go?" He was right, of course. The rock face before her was too high and steep; she would never have the strength to make it all the way to the top. Even if she managed to climb out of his reach, he would only have to wait for her to come back down again or fall. But she couldn't just give up and let him have her.

She saw something shiny in the rock a foot or so above and to the right of her hand, a bit of quartz, perhaps, and she moved toward it just to give herself a goal. Glancing down, she saw the knight break free of the thicket and touch the rock face just below her, cursing the brambles as he came. She looked away, refusing to be distracted.

Her hand closed over the glimmer in the rock, and the cliff gave way around it like sand. The stone was not a stone at all; it was metal, a handle. Clinging with her other hand and feet, she pulled, drawing something from the rock. It was a sword, barely half as long as her father's but perfect for her, gleaming dully in the moonlight.

"Got you!" The knight grabbed her ankle and yanked her down from the wall so abruptly she fell, sc.r.a.ping both knees and her nose and spraining her wrist. But she didn't let go of the sword.

"Aren't you the pretty little thing?" He had taken off his bucket-shaped helmet somewhere in the brush, and his face was shiny with sweat, a round white cheese in the moonlight. "That was quite a chase." He towered over her as she straightened up, one fist planted on the wall by her head, the other hand already fumbling with his hose. "You'd better learn how to behave."

She brought the sword up hard into his stomach, clutching the hilt in both hands. If he had been wearing chain mail, she couldn't have given him more than a scratch-she wasn't very strong. But the night was hot, and the battle hadn't been much; the knight had left his heavy armor in his tent. The blade pierced him straight through the gut.

He clamped a hand around her throat, and for a moment Siobhan was certain they would die together. She twisted the sword, dots of color appearing in front of her eyes, and his eyes glazed over. His fingers loosened, and she wriggled free and stepped aside as he crashed to the ground.

"Murder," she whispered, still clutching her weapon in her fist. She held it up and saw the Norman's blood gleaming scarlet on the dull silver blade. "I have done murder." A cold tremor shook her in spite of the warm summer night, but she smiled. Tucking the blade into her belt, she bent down to look for her shoes.

CHAPTER 1

Tristan sat on the battlements of his half-finished castle with his daughter in his arms. "Were they bad men, Papa?" Clare asked, pointing toward the gore-streaked trophies mounted on the gatehouse just below them.

"Yes." He tugged one of her braids, turning her face to his. "Very bad men." He cuddled her closer, kissing the top of her head.

"That is why they died." Five years old was much too young to understand the brutal politics of Henry's England or to witness their effect. In truth, five years old was too young to be living in this wilderness at all. But in both matters, this little one's father had no choice.

"Are there more bad men in the woods?" she asked, laying a hand on his cheek.

"Yes." That was the problem. No matter how many of these brigands he managed to capture and punish, more always seemed to appear. And now Henry had taken all but five of Tristan's knights and more than half his soldiers to sort out some dispute in Brittany-only by begging and promising to lead a force in the next war had Tristan escaped having to leave his new home to fight himself. "But our castle is nearly finished." He looked down at her and smiled. "That will keep the bad men out." a.s.suming he could finish it at all, he thought, looking down on the darkening forest. He had already spent every penny of his meager inheritance; if he didn't start collecting rents from the villagers soon, he and his household would starve, little Clare included. But the peasants in this G.o.dforsaken border country were already itching to revolt. If he couldn't somehow prove he could protect them before he put them under tax, they would throw in with the brigands completely, and he, like his predecessors, would fail no matter how many he killed. And now he had no army to speak of to defend him. He swallowed a sigh, cuddling his daughter close. His cousin the king was determined to put a friendly fortress here on his border with Scotland, and Tristan had been glad to take the t.i.tle Lord DuMaine to help him. But neither of them had expected it to be so hard or that it would take so long to do it. "Are all the people bad, Papa?" Clare said, sounding worried for the first time in their conversation. She had many friends among the children of the peasants being held here, and she was very fond of her nursemaid, Emma, a local wench as well.

"Of course not." Below them in the bailey, his master of works, Silas of Ma.s.sum, was paying his craftsmen their wages. "Most of the people are good." Three carpenters and two master masons had been murdered since work on the castle began, their throats cut while they slept. "But they are afraid of the bad men in the woods," he said. "One man in particular, their leader, Sean Lebuin." A woman would say he shouldn't be telling a child such things, he knew, giving her bogeyman a name, any more than he should let her see the trophies of his righteous executions. But he wanted his Clare to know the truth, to be ready for whatever evil the world might hold and to know he would always protect her. "All of the good people are afraid of him," he told her, caressing her hair. "Every time King Henry sends a knight to protect them, Sean Lebuin tries to kill him."

"Oh, no!" She leapt down from his lap. "Will he kill you?"

"No." He cradled her cheek in his hand and smiled. "He will not kill me." No one in his life had ever cared so much if he should live or die. Perhaps that was the only real reason he loved this child so much, this odd habit she had formed of loving him. "I promise he will not."

Silas turned away from his a.s.sistant for a moment to find young Emma, nursemaid to Lord Tristan's daughter, hovering behind him in apparent distress. "What is it, dear one?" he asked her with a kindly smile.

"Master Silas...you...thank you," she stammered. "You've always been so kind."

"Have I?" he asked, bemused, as he finished his notes. After twenty years as a master mason and a dozen English castles built at his direction, he must be an old man at last. Pretty wenches now mistook all his flirting for kindness. He rolled the scroll and tucked it into the money box. "What is wrong?"

"Nothing, really." She sounded genuinely distraught, and he looked at her, surprised. But then she smiled. "I just...it's time the little one was put to bed."

"Ah, I see," he nodded, understanding. "You're afraid to disturb Lord Tristan." He looked up at the battlements, where the lord of this new castle was surveying his domain, and smiled. He had served some of the most powerful men in England, King Henry included, but Tristan DuMaine made him a little nervous, too. "Come, I will go with you."

Little Clare ran to her nurse as soon as she saw them. "Emma!" she said, hugging her as the girl picked her up.

"My lord," Silas said with a nod as the knight stood up, struck as always by the sheer size of the man. Many of these French-born n.o.bles were tall by English standards, but DuMaine was broad as well, as thickly muscled as any of Silas's own masons. His dark hair was streaked from the sun and longer and much less neat than was the current n.o.ble fashion, adding to his barbaric appearance, and his blue-green eyes had a disconcerting tendency to pierce the very soul of anyone unfortunate enough to find themselves under his gaze. No wonder poor little Emma was afraid of him. "Mistress Emma was concerned that Lady Clare might be missing her bedtime," he explained, giving the nursemaid a wink.

"We were looking at the bad men," the little one explained, pointing toward the grisly display on the gatehouse.

"Indeed," Silas said, trying to hide his shudder. He did not dislike his current master by any means. But he did think Lord Tristan's skills as a parent left a bit to be desired.

"Take her, then," Tristan said, giving the older man a scowl of impatience as he took his child back into his arms for a moment. He liked Silas very much and had nothing but admiration for his learning. But his delicacy could be rather annoying. "Go straight to sleep," he told Clare, giving her a kiss.

"No, Papa," she corrected. "Prayers first." He smiled. "Aye, then, as you will." He handed her over to Emma. "Prayers first, mistress, then sleep."

The wench looked for a moment like she wanted to smile back but couldn't quite make herself do it. "Yes, my lord."

Watching Tristan watch them go, Silas saw he was not the only one to appreciate Mistress Emma's ample charms, and he smiled.

"Lady Clare is quite beautiful, my lord," he remarked when they were gone. "Does she favor her mother?"

Tristan rewarded this jibe with a smile. "She must," he answered. "Though in faith, I don't remember."

"Who was she?" Silas asked, intrigued. He had asked the same question of many of Tristan's men in the months they had spent at Castle DuMaine, but none of them would surrender so much as a word of their lord's private business.

The young knight did not seem offended or surprised by the question, just not terribly interested. "No one," he answered with a shrug, leaning against the stone wall. "Some woman...a minor baron's widowed sister." He frowned as if searching his memory.

"Amelia, I think her name was. Or Alice." He shrugged again, dismissing the problem. "Maybe it was Anne."

"My lord!" Silas scolded, genuinely appalled. "You truly don't remember?"

"I truly do not." The old scholar looked so disapproving, Tristan couldn't help but smile. "I met her at her brother's house on my way to a campaign," he explained. "When I returned, they said she had died giving birth to my child, Clare, and the baron seemed to resent the inconvenience of another mouth to feed. So I took her with me."

"Did you grieve for the mother at all?" Silas asked. "Did you regret her loss?"

"She was never mine to lose," Tristan answered. "If she had lived, I would likely have made her my wife, but she did not." Silas's reproach was beginning to annoy him. "She was just a woman, Silas."

"Aye, my lord. She was." The master of works could see his n.o.ble employer was fast losing patience with this topic, but he couldn't resist one more jab. "Your Clare will be one as well. I hope no man ever dares to forget her name."

Tristan opened his mouth to reply and stopped, his attention caught by a sudden flash of fire in the woods. "En garde!" one of the guardsmen shouted from his post atop the gatehouse as a flaming arrow soared over the wall.

"Silas, get down!" Tristan knocked the older man flat to the stone walkway as a full volley of fiery missiles sailed just over their heads. In less than a moment, the wooden palisade that still protected the unfinished parts of the bailey wall was blazing, along with the thatched roof of the stable. Swearing the worst oath he could think of, Tristan leapt back to his feet and sprinted for the stairs.

"Protect the house!" he shouted into the chaotic throng of his guardsmen. "Wet down the roof-and take my daughter to the tower on the motte!"

"Aye, my lord," his captain answered, gathering a detail to obey.

"My lord!" his squire, Richard, was shouting, running toward him leading Daimon, his horse. "Will you ride out?"

"Of course not," Tristan said impatiently, taking the reins from the boy as the horse reared in fury and fright. "The gates will hold them, fire or not."

"No, my lord," Richard answered, his face ashen under smears of soot. "The gates are breached."

"Impossible." The front defenses were solid stone; the gates were banded oak and iron. A full-on siege with proper equipment couldn't have broken through this quickly, much less a mob of brigands armed only with arrows and rocks.

"We are betrayed," his squire said, his youthful voice cracking in panic. "The peasants...at the first arrow, they attacked the gatehouse from inside."

"The peasants?" he demanded, anger becoming full-blown fury. He was trying to defend these people, to protect them and make their lives easier and safer. Why should they betray him? "Lebuin," he muttered, swinging into the saddle. Drawing his sword, he galloped for the gates.

The battle should have been over quickly. The Normans had never expected treachery from within, and Sean's brigands outnumbered them at least two to one. But DuMaine's reputation as a warrior was well founded. He managed to get what was left of his knights on horseback before the stables collapsed and the rest of the horses were released by the brigands to flee. This mounted force was small, but fierce, cutting through the outlaws like reapers through wheat, their lord ever leading the way. If they could cross the wooden bridge to the castle motte and burn it behind them before the outlaws, the fortress could still hold, the attackers held at bay by the deep ditch around the motte.

Siobhan stepped back into her archer's stance and took careful aim, shooting one of the riders straight through the throat as he raised his sword against Evan, her brother's closest friend. The Norman knight fell backward, blood spewing from his lips, and Evan turned and saw her.

"Thanks much!" he called out with a grin, waving. Then he dragged the dying knight to the ground to commandeer his horse.

Tristan wheeled Daimon in a circle just in time to see his captain fall. The bowman who had killed him was no more than a boy and a skinny one at that, but his aim was deadly. He wore the green and black that marked him as one of Lebuin's own kin, somebody's squire, no doubt. Another brigand now mounted on the fallen captain's horse was bearing down on Tristan, and he turned to meet him, broadsword raised. But with his other hand, he drew the dagger from his belt and flung it at the boy.

Siobhan felt the blade pa.s.s through her shoulder and staggered, gasping in shock. Blood poured from the wound as her arm went cold, her bow falling out of her grip.

"Siobhan!" Sean ran toward her, bashing a Norman foot soldier's skull with his sword hilt as he came. He caught her as she fell, dropping his weapons to hold her.

"I'm all right," she insisted, wrapping a fist around the dagger's hilt. The devil's knight had missed her heart, but her arm was all but useless.

"You're fine," Sean agreed with a shaky little laugh, pressing a kiss to her brow. Clasping his hand over hers, he yanked the dagger from her flesh, holding her close as she screamed.

Her head swam for a moment, the world going black, but she didn't faint. "Go, Sean, hurry," she ordered, pushing her brother away. "I will be all right."

Tristan dispatched the brigand who had meant to challenge him to a joust so easily, it was almost laughable. Whoever he was, he rode well enough, and he probably fought well enough on his feet. But doing both at once was obviously beyond him. Tristan broke his left arm with a single glancing blow as he bent low over Daimon's neck to avoid the clumsy swing his opponent was making with the heavy pike in his right. Then as the outlaw swore in pain and let the reins fall from his hand, Tristan swung about and kicked him squarely in the chest. The brigand slipped sideways in the saddle, losing the last of his control over his mount, and Tristan struck him in earnest, splitting his skull with his sword.

"Evan!" he heard a woman scream, and he turned to see the little bowman he had meant to kill still standing on his-no, her- feet. She was staring straight at him in horror, and the man beside her turned to stare as well. Sean Lebuin. The outlaw leader saw his man fall beneath Tristan's sword, and his blue-painted face twisted in fury. Grabbing for his own horse, a pure white mare with an unkempt silver mane, he leapt onto its back, ready to fight.

"Sean, wait!" Siobhan cried, taking up her brother's sword and running to hand it to him, her own pain forgotten. DuMaine had slaughtered Evan like he might have been a child playing knight on a pony. They had fought many n.o.ble knights in their quest to free their people, but she had never in her life seen a man move so quickly or maneuver his mount with such skill, not even Sean himself. "Do not challenge him alone," she shouted over the din, but her brother wasn't listening. Taking the sword, he kicked his mount and charged into the fray. "Sean!" DuMaine was smiling, she realized, a devil indeed with the flames of the palisade behind him. He wasn't the least bit afraid.

"My lady!" Someone was grabbing at her wounded arm, trying to get her attention, and she turned impatiently. "My lady, help me, please." The woman was about her own age, dressed like a peasant, and her face was vaguely familiar. Siobhan had seen her before, probably in one of the villages where the brigands had been given sanctuary. Clutched in her arms was a child, a small blond girl wearing a pink silk gown. "Lady Clare is only a baby," the woman said. "Please, you must help me protect her."

"Lady Clare?" She took rough hold of the little one's chin, turning her face to the light. She had green, almond-shaped eyes that regarded Siobhan in solemn fear, but she did not make a sound. "This is Tristan DuMaine's child?" She looked back at the battle, and her heart leapt into her throat. Both horses were reared up on their hind legs, flailing at each other with their hooves, and blood was already pouring down Sean's face from a gash in his forehead.

"Yes, my lady," the peasant woman answered. "But she is innocent."

Siobhan turned back to them in a panic and saw the child still watching her. Tristan DuMaine's only child. "Here," she said, holding out her arms. "Give her to me."

For the first time since he'd realized his gates were breached, Tristan felt hope. If he could kill Lebuin outright in single combat, there was every reason to believe his followers would surrender. And he was very near to doing that exactly. The rebel leader fought more skillfully than Tristan would ever have expected him to do, but the death of his companion had blinded him with rage even before Tristan's sword had blinded him with blood.

Tristan pulled Daimon alongside the brigand's mare and slashed at him again. Lebuin managed to twist and dodge the worst of the blow, but he lost his balance in the saddle. More skilled by far than his man had been, he shifted his weight and rolled to the ground by his own will instead of falling, using the horse as a shield between Tristan and himself. But on the ground, he was done for. Daimon kicked out at him, knocking him flat on his face, and Tristan leapt out of the saddle and pinned him to the ground.

"Stupid b.a.s.t.a.r.d," he muttered, grabbing the brigand by his hair and yanking his head back, ready to release it from his neck and end his own troubles forever.

"DuMaine!" It was the woman's voice again, the unnatural creature who had killed one of his five precious knights with a single arrow. Looking up, he saw her coming toward him and froze, his blood running cold. She was holding Clare in her arms, a dagger pressed to his little one's throat.