Prisoner of the Flames (Leisure Historical Romance) (20 page)

“She will recover—you are certain?”

“Her body will,” said the healer, “quite unscathed, I expect, except for some minor scarring. See how the blotches fade? Most will disappear in time. But as to her spirit, that is quite another matter, and both are essential. The mind must will it, and I have no mystical remedy for that. That healing must come from within.”

Robert swallowed dry around a constriction that had formed in his throat suddenly, but made no reply.

“And you?” the healer queried. “How are you faring, young ram? Mayhap, have you managed to contract the thing as reward for your…hovering?”

“No,” Robert murmured.

“A miracle!” Nostradamus erupted.

“What now?” Robert asked him.

“She must have sleep,” said the healer. Leading him out of the girl’s range of hearing, he went on speaking in hushed tones. “I have a powder that, when mixed with wine, will make a cordial that will ensure she sleeps soundly, and that is best while we are away. It is time. We must be gone within the hour if we would execute my plan.”

Robert cast a skeptical glance in Violette’s direction. He had lost track of time, and now the prospect of leaving her alone so suddenly made him uneasy. He wanted to hold her again, to feel her arms around him, to hear her say those magical words once more just to be sure he hadn’t imagined them.

“She will be quite safe,” the healer assured him, producing a vial of powder and a cup of hammered silver from the pocket of his robe. “She will fall into a peaceful sleep that will let her body heal itself. She will not even miss us. And, God willing, we will return with your uncle before the nostrum has even begun to dissipate. We have no other choice. She cannot go with us. Would you rather that she lay here wakeful the whole while we are gone, fraught with worry? Think! In her blindness, still giddy from the fever, without reassurance she would go mad.”

“Do you think your powdered sleep will spare me that?” Violette scorned, turning them both toward her. Robert had forgotten her enhanced hearing sense. “Not even the fever of plague could manage to keep me from the brink of madness,” she confessed. “The dreams! I cannot bear them…”

“There will be no dreams in this sleep, little flower, I promise it,” Nostradamus said, having mixed the cordial. “Take it, child,” he charged, closing her reluctant fingers around the cup.

She hesitated, gripping the chalice. “You will be killed—the
pair of you, I know it,” she sobbed, “and I shall wake alone here to…to…!”

Robert sprang to her then. Setting the cup aside, he took her in his arms. “You have that little faith in me, lass?” he scolded. “Have I not just wrestled death for you, and won the joust?”

“You will be killed!” she insisted.

“No, Violette, I will not,” he promised. “I will not leave you in that way, or any other. I will return, I swear it, Uncle Aengus with me. I go to liberate the very priest whom I would have hear our vows.”

A satisfied smile creased the healer’s lips looking on, but Robert only gave it a passing glance. Gathering her into another embrace, he was aware of nothing but the warm and willing abandon of her, and the sweet, petal-soft lips that mated with his own. After a moment, those anxious lips parted, and Robert raised the cup on the floor beside them.

“Drink, Violette, and sleep,” he murmured, his voice shaking with passion, and something he dared not endow with a name. “Have faith, if not in me, in God, that when you wake…if you are willing, it is your wedding day.”

She took it then, and supporting her in his good arm, Robert helped her drain the cup to the dregs, cradling her gently in his arms until she’d fallen fast asleep.

R
obed as monks, Robert and the healer wasted no time
setting out, though the young laird had not laid all of his doubts to rest. The gnawing trepidation he wrestled with was clearly visible, and they hadn’t gone far when Nostradamus addressed it.

“You cannot think about the girl now,” he said. “Our success in this demands all of our wits be about us, and our full attention upon what lies before us. She will…fare well.”

“You hesitate.”

“I speak truth.”

“Then I must believe it.”

“You preach to her of faith. I advise you take your comfort from the same homily.”

“It is…difficult,” Robert admitted frankly. “She is so vulnerable…and so frightened.”

“She is very brave,” Nostradamus observed.

“How well I know it.”

“You are resigned, then, no…misgivings?”

“I love her, if that is what you ask. But you knew that, didn’t you?”

The healer nodded, cocking his head thoughtfully. “How is it that you would not admit it until now?” he queried.

“I am disfigured. She is blind. I had to be certain that it wasn’t a selfish emotion bred of convenience. Surely, you can see how such a thing could happen. It seemed too…easy, too convenient.”

“But she knows your face, young ram. She has seen it with her hands far better than any eyes could show it.”

“I am aware of that. I wasn’t putting her love to the test, it was
mine
I questioned.”

“I see,” said the healer. “And what happenstance was it that finally convinced you?”

Robert hesitated. “She was so very close to death,” he said. “I had not…had her, Doctor Nostradamus, and when I feared that I might lose her…! One cannot grieve so for the loss of something one has never had…unless he loves. I knew I could never leave her behind. I think I knew that from the start.”

“Why have you never ‘had her,’ young ram? She seemed willing enough to me.”

“I very nearly did,” he confessed.

“What stopped you?”

“She already has one handicap,” he replied. “She is proud of her virginity—proud that she has kept it in her blind innocence against all odds. If I were to take it from her—possibly leave her with child—and then fail in this madness…and die, what would become of her? I could not justify taking such a chance merely to satisfy my urges. I am no fool, sir. What we attempt is outright madness. The odds are hardly in our favor.”

“Ahhhh,” the healer warbled, nodding. “Commendable, young ram. But she is hardly your social equal. That matters not to you?”

“Not in the slightest,” Robert said without hesitation, well aware that the crafty old healer was baiting him, searching his soul. “If she will have me, I am indeed beneath
her.
And, who is there to challenge me? My mother? She puts no such class distinctions in her prayers that I wed and give her grandchildren to coddle. It wouldn’t matter if she did. It shan’t be the first time Cupid has meddled with the class distinctions of noble Scots, herself included. That uncanny fellow’s arrows go where they are sent. Mother would be the first to raise a loud huzzah to that, bigod! She has taken one
beneath her station—despite the land and title awarded him—as consort, intending eventually to marry, and probably already has by now if I am any judge.”

“You are learning,” the healer returned.

“How long a time before Violette will be fit for travel?” Robert asked him. “Once we free Uncle Aengus, it will not be safe for us to tarry in these parts.”

“That depends largely upon the girl herself, but I would venture an educated guess at a sennight if fortune smiles upon us—a fortnight…if not.”

“We cannot stay here that long, can we,” Robert said, answering his own question.

“Let’s not speculate so early,” the healer hedged. “We have enough to occupy us with the dilemma at hand without borrowing woes. Let the matter of our fair Violette lie awhile. Your uncle needs our total concentration here now.”

“You are right, of course,” Robert said. “I don’t even know where to find him in that godforsaken labyrinth of death.”

“Ahhh, but I
do,”
said Nostradamus.

“You know?”

“You didn’t think I’d leave that critical stone unturned, did you? I took the liberty of a pre-tour visit to just that purpose. Though I had to feign sympathy with the admiral’s cause, and deal with much that was irrelevant, it wasn’t such a difficult task. Garboneaux was quite accommodating. The dull-witted old maltworm was only too eager to point out the good monk’s cell to me, not all that far from the cell which you had occupied, so he told me with not a little satisfaction. Considering that Montaigne had him so severely chastised for your entombment, he was only too anxious to gloat over your kin’s incarceration.”

“The whoreson!”

They had nearly reached the jail, and Nostradamus took his measure. “Look sharp now, and stay close beside me,”
he charged. “There is just one thing…your posture worries me.”

“My
posture
, sir?” Robert said, puzzled.

“You are by far too stalwart a figure—too tall—too broad and muscular of shoulder for a monk, and too…noble. If you could hunch a bit—feign a limp…something. It needs humility, your bearing.”

“I will try,” Robert consented, “but I am charged for battle, and a warrior does not engage the enemy with humility.”

“This one will.”

Robert breathed a nasal sigh. “I will feel a good deal more at ease once you have left me and become yourself again,” he admitted. “I do not want you to come to harm at my hands here. This is not your battle.”

“But it is my victory. Be still now! And correct that posture. Our moment is upon us.”

And indeed it was, for the infamous jail loomed before them, and Robert shuddered in spite of himself at the sight of it.

“The king’s escort,” Nostradamus whispered, pointing as they neared the mounted guards and runners stationed outside the royal sedan. “They have arrived. Pray that Garboneaux, in his new circumstance as head sentry, is occupied afield of the course we must travel, as jailer he would not be. Come.”

Dismounting, they tethered their horses at a discrete distance from the royal entourage, though close enough to affect a hasty departure if needs must. That accomplished, they shuffled past the troops and guards and gendarmes waiting beside the portal, and entered in quite anonymously in their beaser-colored homespun. To their relief, it was the captain of the guard who met them and barred their way. Garboneaux was nowhere in sight.

“Hold there!” he barked, a hulking giant of a man standing in their path. “State your business here.”

“Good captain,” Nostradamus said, with disguised voice. “We are come to minister, and pray for the soul of our brother, Aengus—to plead and beg the Lord’s forgiveness for his crime. We will not tarry long. Would you be so kind as to direct us?”

“The monk from St. Michael’s Mount?” said the jailer.

Nostradamus nodded. “Forgive us our handkerchiefs, but…tell me, is the stench in here always so…arresting? How do you bear it?”

The captain laughed. “A body gets used to it,” he said.

“Well, I fear that these bodies shall not,” the healer groaned. “If you would but point out our direction, we will have our duty done, and be away, lest you, er…relish mopping up our bile?”

“Below,” the captain growled with a shrug, jerking his helmed head in that general direction. “The guards at the bottom of the stairs will direct you. Let them clean up your vomit. Hah! The stink is worse below. Beware—and be
quick.
There’s no time for your kind t’day. The admiral is abroad. Best not let him catch you. He’s not too fond of papists.”

Nostradamus affected a bow, and drew a small earthenware crock from the folds of his robe. “A token for your trouble,” he said silkily, handing it over. “Fine wine from our vineyards in the south. To your good health, sir! It has been blessed.”

The captain snatched the crock with a grunt, and with no more words wasted upon him, they hurried below.

“Come,” Nostradamus whispered. “I know the way. The guards at the bottom of the stairs in his sector occupy a recessed alcove. There are five of them—a rowdy lot, but our offering should subdue them.”

Robert followed his lead, a cautious hand straying to his waist for the comforting feel of the sword concealed beneath his robe. They passed no one in the cold, dank passageways, and heard no sound but the distant wails of the
inmates, and now and then a spurt of raucous laughter echoing from the guards as they approached them below.

Reliving his all too recent entombment in that quadrant, Robert shuddered afresh. He longed to fling all the doors wide, that pitiful were the wretched cries of despair that had come to life so often in his memory. They were real again now, his uncle’s among them, and with that to drive him, they reached the lower regions in record speed.

Nostradamus genuflected breathlessly before the guards come quickly to surround them. The eldest of the group swaggered close and stooped over, like a hovering vulture.

“And where do you think you’re going?” he barked. “Who let you in here, eh? Well? Speak up, speak up, what do you want here?”

“Your good captain kindly granted us permission to minister to our brother, Aengus. A brief moment is all we ask.”

“Indeed,” the guard jeered. “Well, I am captain here below, and good Brother Aengus ain’t receiving today. Be gone, holy ones. There is no soul in here worth saving, lest you fancy a go at ours.”

The others joined in a burst of rowdy laughter, and Robert stiffened, but the crafty old healer showed no signs of intimidation.

“We have no doubt that you are all devout and wise,” he flattered, “but, alas, our brother is not so blessed. We come to beg him mend his ways, and urge him—”

“Oh, he has been ‘urged,’” the captain interrupted. “We urged him a plenty, didn’t we, now?” he said to his men, extracting yet another outburst of revelry.

Again, Robert’s posture clenched, and Nostradamus went on quickly. “But, my good man, you do not let me finish,” he said. “We commend you for your attempt, of course, but it is our duty, this pilgrimage.” Producing a second crock of wine from his robe, he thrust it toward the guard. “Blessed wine, for you and your men,” he said.

“Eh?” the captain snarled, constricting stony eyes. “What’s this, then, a bribe?”

“No, no,” said the healer, his voice sounding vexed, “…a token of our gratitude for your indulgence, nothing more.”