Love Above All Read online

  “It’s heavy, if it’s holding only a silk gown,” he said, frowning.

  “Lady Agnes provided the matching shoes and the stockings and shift, too, as well as a comb, a jar of soap, and a towel,” Fionna explained. She couldn’t quite meet his gaze, preferring to look at his firm chin rather than into his eyes. To divert his attention from the saddlebag she asked, “Have I rolled the blanket tightly enough?”

  “It’s fine, though you must have dropped bread crumbs on it while you ate at midday yesterday. Odd that they didn’t fall off when you carried the blanket to your room last night.”

  “I never noticed,” Fionna said, her gaze now fixed on the blanket. She brushed at it nervously. Did Quentin know she was hoarding food? If so, did he guess her plan? She provided an explanation with a hurried rush of words. “Perhaps the crumbs are from this morning. I broke my fast quickly and wasn’t especially tidy. I could have carried a few bits of bread back to my room afterward, on my gown or my hands.”

  “No matter.” Quentin secured the blanket behind the saddle. “Will you be annoyed if I offer you a hand up?”

  “Thank you.” She was too frightened to argue with his suggestion.

  She placed her foot into his cupped hands – and then made the mistake of glancing directly into his eyes. The spark she saw in those grey depths shattered her composure. Was he laughing to himself about her foolish desire to ride to Abercorn? Or was his overly bright gaze the result of the same strange tension they had shared last night at her chamber door? Fionna couldn’t tell, couldn’t read Quentin’s feelings or his intentions. He was as alien to her as his fellow Normans were to the Scottish lowlands.

  “Ready?”

  Quentin’s question reminded Fionna of her position, standing next to her horse with a hand on the saddle and Quentin holding her foot.

  “Yes.” She could say no more. The single word sounded to her like a desperate gasp. At her nod Quentin boosted her upward until she sat astride.

  From the entry of the hall-keep Lady Agnes called farewell and Lord Walter waved a hand. Quentin reached across the space between his horse and Fionna’s mount, to rest his chainmail-gloved fingers over her hand.

  “I think you are sorry to leave them,” he murmured.

  “I am.” Let him believe her odd behavior was the result of sadness. She kept her head bowed, fearing if Quentin looked at her, he’d see the treachery in her mind. He had given his word to help her, yet she did not trust his promise. Her brothers made promises all the time, after which they did whatever they pleased. She had learned from them not to depend on any man’s word.

  Thus, Fionna planned to defy Quentin’s repeatedly stated good intentions the moment the chance presented itself, for even if he eventually kept his word she was absolutely certain that good intentions were not going to be enough to save Janet from marriage to Colum. In addition, Fionna was irritated with Quentin because he was forcing a delay that she was finding more intolerable with every passing hour. She was impatient to be on the road north, racing to her sister’s aid rather than riding meekly beside a Norman lord who thought his own business was more important than an innocent young girl’s future.

  They traveled fast, as Quentin had warned they would, the horses’ pounding hooves eating up distance, taking them farther and farther from Abercorn and Janet. And the farther away they were, the more relaxed Quentin became.

  “Pressed for time though we are,” he said to Fionna, “still, we are riding into safety. If this good weather holds, we’ll reach Wortham in another five or six days.”

  She did not respond. She refused to speak to him at all and a short while later he left her riding once more between Cadwallon and Braedon, while he moved ahead to lead his troop of men, with the man-at-arms, Giles, at his side.

  As the sun dipped low they approached a barren hill surrounded by a wood palisade. On top of the hill sat a crude wooden building.

  “What is that?” Fionna asked of Cadwallon.

  “It’s Brougham Castle,” he answered. Seeing the disbelieving look she cast upon the structure Cadwallon added, “It’s the original motte and bailey, not yet rebuilt in stone.”

  “I would not call it a castle,” Fionna responded distainfully.

  Her opinion did not improve after they arrived. The luxury of Carlisle Castle was entirely lacking at Brougham.

  “You will sleep tonight in the solar, along with the women of the castle. My men and I will sleep in the hall,” Quentin informed her after the lord of the castle had greeted them. “Here, there are no private guest rooms.”

  “I suppose you intend to place a guard at the solar door to keep me from running away?” Fionna snapped.

  “That won’t be necessary,” Quentin told her. “You will find it impossible to leave Brougham once the gates are locked for the night. Don’t make the mistake of judging the castle by its aging appearance. It is far more secure than some stone fortresses I could name.”

  “Well then,” she said, tossing her head in annoyance at the way he seemed to know what she was thinking, “you and your men may sleep peacefully tonight, though I am certain I will not sleep at all.”

  “Do you want to quarrel?” Quentin asked with infuriating calm. “If so, I am sure we can find a subject on which we disagree.”

  “I cannot think of a single subject on which we do agree!”

  “Unless,” said Quentin, “we can agree on the pleasure to be found in a tub of hot, clean water at day’s end. I doubt if we will find that pleasure here.”

  “I doubt if there are any bathing facilities at all,” Fionna responded. She had already noted how the lord of the castle and all of his men who were nearby reeked as if they had not washed for months. So did the women, including the lord’s sister, who acted as his chatelaine.

  “I believe I will not bother to change into my other gown for the evening meal,” she said.

  Quentin grinned at her. Unable to resist the urge, she smiled back at him.

  “I wish I could stay angry with you,” she said. “Even though I do not want to ride south with you, I do understand that you have a duty to fulfill.”

  “Well, then, we have found a second subject on which we can agree.”

  That evening, seated at the greasy, uncovered high table at one end of the filthy great hall, Fionna merely picked at her food. For courtesy’s sake she made herself swallow a mouthful of bloody, barely-roasted ox and a crust of stale bread before, pleading extreme fatigue, she fled from the hall to the solar. There all the women of the castle slept on the floor, on thin, musty-smelling pallets, guarded from unwanted intrusions by a pair of sentries at the door.

  Unable to sleep and convinced her blanket would be infested with vermin by morning, Fionna spent most of the night planning her escape. It was going to have to be soon. Each day took her farther from Abercorn and lessened the chance that she would reach Janet before her brothers decided to remove the girl from her convent school. For all she knew, Colum had already returned to Scotland and Janet had been taken away from Abercorn and forced to marry him.

  The mere thought of her sister in Colum’s power – or in his bed – terrified Fionna, and all the more because she realized there was no point in arguing with Quentin about the problem. She was sure Quentin wouldn’t listen to her. Manlike, he was bent upon fulfilling his mission for King Henry before he would think of anything else.

  “Tomorrow,” she silently promised herself as she lay wide awake among a dozen women who were snoring or tossing restlessly, or whispering to each other. “It must be tomorrow. I dare not wait any longer.”

  As it happened, chance favored her. The next afternoon the clear sky began to give way to lowering clouds. Quentin, eager to press onward while the road remained dry, urged his party to greater speed before the rain began. Perhaps it was inevitable that a horse would founder and unseat someone. It was the captain of Quentin’s men-at-arms who landed hard in the middle of the road.

  “Giles!” Quentin cried,
pulling his mount to a halt. “Don’t try to move until we’ve checked your injuries.”

  The entire group drew up and several men, including Quentin, Cadwallon, and Braedon, dismounted to see to both man and horse.

  “I’m not badly hurt,” Giles insisted to Quentin. “I can go on.”

  “But the horse cannot,” Cadwallon announced. “Its leg is broken. The bone is showing through the laceration. There is only one thing we can do for the poor beast. We’ll have to put it out of its misery.”

  Fionna could not bear to watch while the horse was dispatched. She glanced around, noting how the overgrown road they were traveling on stretched straight and true through a wooded landscape, its direction carved out of the countryside in centuries past by the Roman legions who had once occupied the land as far north as Carlisle. Fionna’s mother had told her stories about the Romans, claiming she was the descendant of one of their generals who dared to venture into the land of the Picts. And there, in the misty northern hills, the Roman found a red-haired woman whom he had kept by his side for the rest of his life.

  Scanning her surroundings in haste and seeing no one on the road except Quentin’s party, Fionna knew this was the opportunity she needed. She decided it ought to be possible for her to disappear among the trees, but only if she moved quickly.

  The men were either concentrating on the injured horse, removing its trappings and discussing how best to finish it off, or making certain that Giles was as lightly injured as he claimed. For once, neither Quentin nor either of his lieutenants was watching her. If she slipped away into the forest they might suppose for a time that she wanted to avoid the bloody sight of a horse being put to death, or they might imagine she had seized the opportunity to respond to a call of nature. Either way, she could almost certainly count on at least a few minutes before anyone thought about her or decided she needed to be found.

  As quietly as possible she pulled her horse around and left the road, moving into the trees in a northerly direction. Almost immediately the road and the men on it were hidden from view, which Fionna took to mean they wouldn’t be able to see her, either. The underbrush was thicker than she expected and she had to be careful not to let her own horse trip on the uneven ground, but in a remarkably short time she was well away from the road.

  She heard no one calling after her, and no sound of pursuit. Perhaps they hadn’t missed her yet. She kept going until she came out of the trees onto a meadow and saw hills in the distance ahead of her on her right. She recognized those heights from the ride south. Now she knew she was going in the right direction.

  Once away from the trees and bushes she was able to advance more quickly. By the time she was back in the forest again she had located a stream that flowed northward, so she followed the streambed.

  The day was growing darker, with heavy clouds and a rising wind. Her horse rebelled at the first roll of thunder, but Fionna kept her seat and her control of the animal. She pushed steadily onward, knowing she was heading for the border. Once she crossed into Scotland, her way would be clear to Abercorn and Janet.

  Chapter 6

  “You are fortunate,” Quentin said to Giles. He clapped his man-at-arms on the back with a light hand, taking care not to cause him more pain. “A wrenched neck and shoulder, a sprained wrist, a few cuts and bruises. The damage could have been much worse.”

  “I know it,” said Giles. “I could be dead, like my horse, or lying in the road with a broken neck and unable to move. I am sorry about the horse, Quentin.”

  “It couldn’t be helped. I’d rather lose a horse than a loyal fighting man. We need the men-at-arms free for action, so you’ll have to ride double with one of the squires until we reach English soil. That can be your penance for allowing your mount to step into a hole,” Quentin said, knowing that riding double, however humiliating it was to Giles to give control to a mere squire, would provide the respite the injured man needed to recover from his spill.

  “Let’s move on,” Quentin called to his men. He reached for the reins of his horse, preparing to swing back into the saddle. Only then did he pause to look around. “Where is Lady Fionna?”

  “She can’t have gone far,” said one of the men-at-arms. “This countryside is too lonely for a noblewoman to want to wander off by herself.”

  “Fionna wouldn’t wander,” Braedon said. “Not that lady. If she has left us, it was with a definite purpose in mind.”

  Quentin turned slowly around, searching first the empty swathe of straight roadway, next seeking for movement in the dense woodlands that grew close to the road. Nowhere could he detect any sign of Fionna.

  “She could have done as I just did and stepped behind a bush for a private moment, to relieve herself,” suggested a squire.

  “And took her horse along?” Quentin asked. His mouth closed into a hard line as he turned around again, still looking for Fionna’s slim figure. “She’s bolted, like a hare from its hole. Did anyone see her go? Speak up; there will be no punishment for not telling me the instant she left. I need to know which direction she took.”

  “We were all preoccupied, either dealing with the injured horse, or seeing to Giles,” Cadwallon said when no one else responded to Quentin’s demand. “What do you want us to do now?”

  “Let her go,” said Braedon with a careless shrug. “We’re all aware that she didn’t want to ride with us, and we are in a hurry.”

  “We cannot allow a young woman to travel unescorted,” Cadwallon stated firmly. He cast a dark look in Braedon’s dirrection before telling Quentin, “We’ll have to split up. One group will search for Fionna, while the rest of us travel on to Wortham Castle.”

  “Damnation.” Quentin uttered the single word through clenched teeth. He was by now examining the damp ground along the sides of the road, trying to find a sign to indicate which way Fionna had gone, though he could guess easily enough. Letting loose a long, disgusted breath, he made his decision. “Braedon is correct when he says we must hurry. The messages we carry are overdue.”

  “Then, we’ll leave her behind,” Braedon said.

  “You and Cadwallon will,” Quentin told him. “I will not. I must go after Fionna.” And all the more eagerly because he had just spotted something that confirmed his speculations. He made another decision, not to tell his men what he had noticed.

  “Hold on, there, Quentin,” Cadwallon protested. “Think about this for a moment.”

  “Listen to me.” Quentin’s peremptory tone silenced his friend and reminded every man present that he was their leader. He pulled a sealed parchment packet out of his saddlebag and handed it to Cadwallon, who took it with open reluctance.

  “My report to Royce was written the night before we left Edinburgh,” Quentin said, “but, Cadwallon, you are carrying in your head the information we agreed should not be committed to ink and parchment. Therefore, you are the one who must lead my men to Wortham and hand over this report to Royce. After Royce has read it you will tell him what you learned in Scotland, and Braedon will add the information he was able to gather among the squires and the royal servants. The rest of you men will answer honestly whatever questions Baron Royce asks of you. You will hold nothing back. Is that understood?” He let his commanding gaze range over the troop of horsemen who surrounded him.

  “Aye, my lord.”

  “Yes.”

  “As you wish.”

  One by one Quentin’s men agreed to his orders. All of them, except Cadwallon.

  “I am not happy to see you riding off into the borderlands without men-at-arms at your back,” Cadwallon objected.

  “When you reach Wortham, tell Royce where I’ve gone and why, and ask him to send a few men-at-arms after me.”

  “And just how in the name of heaven,” demanded Cadwallon, “do you expect us to find you again in this wilderness?”

  “Do you enjoy riding so much that you’ll come back with them?” Quentin asked with a wry smile. “I think we can be certain Fionna won’t head for Car
lisle. She’ll be afraid Lord Walter will detain her while he tries to contact me and she’ll tolerate no further delays. No, I’m sure Fionna will stay well away from Carlisle. Instead, she’ll head directly north, taking as straight a route as she can to Abercorn.

  “I hope to catch her today, or tomorrow at the latest,” Quentin went on. “When I do, I’ll compel her to ride for Wortham with me. I’ll tie her to her horse, and tie her horse to mine, if I must. With luck, we’ll join you at Wortham within hours of your arrival there. The chances are good you won’t have to come after us at all, but if you do, we’ll most likely meet on the road.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want even a single man-at-arms to go with you?” Cadwallon persisted. “It would make two searchers, instead of just one.”

  “I don’t expect her to be difficult to find,” Quentin said. “I know where she’s going. And I can move faster if I’m alone.”

  “This sister of hers must be a remarkable woman, to inspire such devotion,” said Cadwallon, who had learned during the past two days about Fionna’s deep concern over Janet’s fate. “Or, perhaps, Fionna is the remarkable sister. Either way, I don’t want to miss what happens when those two meet. When Fionna finally reaches Abercorn, I intend to be there, too.”

  “We are wasting time. Let’s move on,” said Braedon, who wasn’t troubling to hide his annoyance with Fionna. “The wench isn’t worth another hour of delay.”

  “He’s right about that,” Quentin said to Cadwallon. “Ride as fast as you can while still avoiding any more accidents. It’s vital for you to arrive at Wortham safely, and with that packet in your possession. Royce will know what to do with the information it contains.”

  On that, they separated. Quentin did not waste time gazing after them. The sky was growing darker, the air was becoming noticeably damper, and he feared a heavy rain would wash away all signs of Fionna’s passing. While searching along the edge of the road he had noticed hoofprints heading into the trees in the direction he expected Fionna to take.