Claire Delacroix (15 page)

But the falconer claimed the rabbit, hooded the peregrine, then gave the bird a morsel. He sang to it softly. Aileen could see the tension in the creature, the lust to finish what it had begun, even as it was taught what it must do instead.

The falconer then turned his gaze upon Aileen, his expression oddly knowing. Aileen had the sense that he recognized her, though she had never seen him before, and the hair prickled on the back of her neck.

“It is an unnatural business, training a wild creature to do man’s will,” Nissa muttered.

“What of hounds? Or horses?” Aileen asked mildly. “Or even children?”

Nissa laughed.

Aileen turned and followed the maid, her thoughts churning. Was she being allowed her lead, as the falcon was allowed to fly to the end of its tether? Doubtless there was a finite distance she would be allowed to go without interference.

The outer gates were clearly not that limit. The women passed through them without comment from the sentries and Aileen eyed the hills before her. To the right and the left, the land folded upon itself with greater vigor than had been visible from above. She could not perceive the narrow valley that the leaping river followed downward.

There was only the barest glimmer of a distant spire perched upon another hill. Had the spy come who had been captured scaling Inverfyre’s walls come from there? If so, these were the Hawk’s foes, and they might be willing to assist her.

But first, she would have to escape.

* * *

The wind whipped ‘round the women as they reached the corner of the wall, its nimble fingers snatching at their cloaks and burrowing beneath their layers of garb. The twelve trees, too, were larger than Aileen had guessed. The river roiled behind them, the ground falling away in an undulating line that echoed the river’s path.

The trees stood in a perfect line, so closely planted that there was but two paces between them. Their barren branches stretched like black fingers toward the sky, knotting and tangling with each other like a high hedge. There was something ominous about them, and indeed, Nissa halted and refused to go closer.

Aileen approached the trees alone. There was an eerie stillness in this place. It was not the usual silence of the wilderness. It seemed that all held its breath here, though Aileen could not guess what these trees anticipated. Even the river’s gurgle was muted, perhaps by some trick of the land’s curve, perhaps by sorcery.

She could hear only the whisper of leaves overhead, though the tree branches were bare. It was a whispering akin to women gossiping at the back of a church and the sound sent shivers down Aileen’s spine. She thought again of the visions that the Hawk had poured into her thoughts, the two vines twining with each other so thoroughly that they could never be separated.

Aileen swallowed, not liking how tenuous her grasp upon her wits seemed to be. It was not possible for trees to whisper, for Nissa’s tale to be true, for another to infect one’s thoughts with his own.

She strode closer to the trees, determined to put these whimsies to rest. The bark of each tree was silver and smooth, unlike the bark of any tree that ever she had seen. It was more like pewter flesh than bark. Aileen laid a hand upon one tree, wanting to prove its texture to be like that of any other tree, but it felt warm.

Foolery! Her fingers were merely chilled by the wind. She wrapped both hands around the trunk, determined to find the wood no warmer than it should have been.

A pulse beat beneath her palm.

Aileen snatched her hands away and took a hasty step back. Her breath came in haste, her fear that she dreamed while awake grew with every moment. She surveyed the line of trees and saw then that there were more than twelve.

Aye, there was a small one at the end of the line, so small that she had not discerned it from her chamber. It too was a silvery tree, though it was no taller than her waist.

Thirteen. Aileen counted them again but it was the thirteenth, of that there was no doubt. A lump rose in her throat, for true to Nissa’s tale, there had been nuptials just days before.

Aileen’s own nuptials.

This must be a jest! She strode boldly to the young tree, her heart thundering at its portent. There was not a footprint before her own. The icy filigree of the frost was shattered around the trunk, as if the tree had thrust itself through the earth. It must have done so the night before, or perhaps this very morn after the frost had fallen.

Impossible!

But the evidence was before Aileen’s own eyes. She snatched at the tree and found it solidly rooted to the spot. She doubted then all she knew to be true. She feared that her mother truly had been mad and that she, Aileen, had inherited the taint herself.

She was losing her wits in this place.

Aileen spun to face Nissa, hoping the maid had played some trick upon her. The maid’s level gaze confessed nothing, but it was not her expression that made Aileen’s own heart clench.

It was presence of the Hawk of Inverfyre himself, standing tall and silent beside the maid. His dark cloak lifted in the wind, his arms were folded across his chest. His gaze was fixed upon Aileen, his expression grim.

Aileen fancied then that she could hear the echo of thirteen hot pulses close behind her. Their pace was urgent, as if they beat a warning, a warning to the new bride. He had tricked her, captured her, would rape her. He sought to drive her mad. Perhaps in a year and a day, he too would have a fancy for sucking the marrow of her bones.

Aileen’s mouth went dry. Part of her insisted that Nissa’s tale was madness, but still there was the tree... and the resonance in her own thoughts, the name that came more readily to her lips than her spouse’s given name.

Magnus.

“Leave us, Nissa,” the Hawk said firmly. She did not so much as hesitate, this servant who had seemed so kindly. She turned immediately upon her heel, marched back to the gates and abandoned Aileen to whatever fate this man would decree.

Aileen tasted her morning meal anew as he said not a word. Nissa’s footfalls, crunching on the new frost, faded to nothing. Her form disappeared through the darkness of Inverfyre’s outer gates.

Then there was solely the steam of breath between husband and wife. The Hawk watched her, his expression inscrutable. Did he know already that she had pronounced an order in his hall? Though she had anticipated his disapproval, she had not thought to face it in such solitude.

The silence pressed against Aileen’s ears until she could bear it no longer. Though it seemed weak to be the first to speak, she surrendered to this contest of wills.

“I hear that your forebear had uncommon taste in brides,” she said finally with an audacity she did not feel. Indeed, she tossed her hair over her shoulder, as if untroubled by tales, trees or spouse. Aileen’s fingers latched on to the small tree and she clutched it, as if it alone would keep her upon her feet.

“It has long been said that we had much in common, Magnus Armstrong and I,” the Hawk said.

“Because you claimed Inverfyre by force, not caring for the price?”

“Among other deeds.”

Aileen stifled a shiver. “It would seem an expensive matter to claim bride after bride, when surely just one, well-treated, would suffice.”

That half-smile tugged at the Hawk’s lips, softening his features and making him yet more handsome. Aileen reminded herself not to be beguiled.

“Do you suggest that a man should not lay claim to what he desires most?”

“I suggest a man should be moderate in his desires, all the better that they might ultimately be sated. It seems a lesson neither you nor Magnus were inclined to learn.”

He smiled truly then, as if he found his bride an amusing diversion. “Do you give me counsel, Wife?”

“That would depend upon your intent. What do you desire of me?”

“I desire what all men desire of their wives, as I have told you afore. Indeed, it seems we linger overlong in sating that desire.” His gaze slid over Aileen and her face heated beneath his appreciative perusal.

She had been told a thousand times that no man would yearn to possess her, that if she ever wed it would be for some other advantage than the claiming of her meager charms.

“Do not lie to me! There may be a thousand reasons why you have chosen to wed me, but desire for me cannot be one of them.”

“Can it not?” he murmured, his voice like silken velvet. Aileen saw his gaze darken, she saw the confidence in his smile.

She saw the Hawk take a step toward her, then another. There was intent in his every pace, intent that sent terror dancing along her veins. No man had ever looked at Aileen thus and she was frightened by the portent of his desire. So bright was her fear that she did not remember her own plan to either win his trust or his disgust. She did not wait to see what he would do.

She fled.

There was but one direction in which she had a chance to elude a larger and faster captor, one route upon which she would be pursued by him alone and not his sentries, falcons and hunting hounds. Aileen turned her back upon the keep and its high gates. She leapt into the gully of the river, forded its coursing waters and dove into the shadows of the forest.

Like the hare, her sole chance lay beneath the undergrowth of the forest, within the tangled brambles where a hawk could not fly.

Her husband swore. Aileen gained the far bank breathlessly, ducked into the forest and ran.

* * *

The forest seemed to favor Aileen’s quest, for the brambles fairly parted before her. Aileen glanced back once and could not discern the path she had taken, though it was clear before her. She heard the Hawk curse with vehemence, but his voice was more distant than she had expected.

Did he simply try to trick her into slowing her pace? She would have expected as much of him, would have expected him to step out from behind a tree into her path and snatch her up in his talons.

Aileen ran faster. She thought of the distant tower and knew it to be her best destination. She wasted precious moments glancing back through the trees to study the walls and tower of Inverfyre to guess her position relative to the neighboring tower.

Aileen had been in the forest afore and knew how to set a straight course. She fixed her gaze upon a large tree that was located in the direction she wished to go, and made her way toward it. The brambles fought her passage now, but she did not sway from her objective.

That was the way of becoming lost.

Once she reached the large tree, she drew an invisible line betwixt it and the ford of the river that she could still see through the forest’s shadows. She pivoted then and imagined that line stretching out in the opposite direction until it reached another distinctive tree.

Aileen’s father had taught her this means of crossing a woods and it worked without fail. The trick lay solely in choosing a tree each time that was sufficiently distinctive from each side that it could not be confused with another. She knew that she must be able to recognize the previous tree or two to plan her ongoing course.

The sounds of the Hawk’s pursuit faded with every step Aileen took. Gradually, she became convinced that he had abandoned the chase, for the moment, and slowed her pace from a run to a quick walk.

Only the sounds of the forest, the agitation of her breathing and her own furtive footfalls echoed around her. The sun climbed higher, but with Fortune upon her side, Aileen knew she would be at the hearth of that neighboring tower by nightfall.

She also knew that this would be her sole chance to escape her husband’s hand. If she failed, she would never be granted leave from that tower chamber again.

The very prospect quickened her pace.

* * *

The Hawk could not believe his own eyes. His lady wife was gone, as completely as if she had been swallowed whole by the forest, or taken captive by the fey. He hunted with diligence but found not a trace of her.

His fear grew with every moment. What would Dubhglas MacLaren do to Aileen, if he managed to seize her? The prospect was terrifying, for Dubhglas was without remorse.

Scratched by a thousand brambles, the Hawk shouted to those at the gatehouse. He called for hounds and horses, and set nigh every soul in Inverfyre to finding his wife.

He cared not what they whispered in the kitchens, he cared not if they said he was driven nigh mad with desire. He knew a fear to his very marrow, a fear that he could lose far more this day than his bride. He had frightened her and now he feared that she would pay the price of his error.

The Hawk would not rest until Aileen was safe within Inverfyre’s walls again.

* * *

The woods surrounding Inverfyre had the advantage of being of mixed kinds of trees. Aileen chose a kind of silver-barked tree for each of her points, as their bark could be readily spied at a distance. They also seemed relatively uncommon in this woods.

They seemed to glimmer, even beneath that day’s overcast skies. It was only after Aileen had walked for a goodly measure of time that she realized these were similar trees to those thirteen that grew outside Inverfyre’s walls. She shivered, knowing herself to be fanciful, and laid her hand upon the next one to prove her whimsy wrong.

The bark was warm, as it should not have been.

Aileen pulled her hand away hastily, not wanting to feel that eerie pulse beneath her palm again. She halted and listened, for the forest was filled with an uncommon, watchful silence.

She could still hear the gurgle of the river. She wondered whether this river curled back upon itself, for she should have left it far behind by now. There was a strange hut in the clearing before her. She peered ahead into the forest and could not spy the walls of that neighboring keep. It could not be as close as she had hoped.

Indeed, she could still discern the walls of Inverfyre through the trees behind her and almost hear the shouts of its sentries. She was perhaps a third of the way between the keeps.

Aileen frowned, for she had not come far at all.

What jest was this?

She studied the hut, for it seemed almost to glow in this afternoon light, as if it tempted her to look more fully upon it. Aileen could not imagine why. It was uncommon, for it was wrought of living trees, but humble and abandoned. The boughs of trees looked to have been coaxed over years to bend into roof and walls, though they were as deadened as the slumbering forest surrounding her.