Dragon Tree (15 page)

Any thought
Amie had of obeying vanished when a second pitiful scream echoed
off the stone walls and she found herself hurrying instead toward
the sheltered end of the stables.

~~

The inside of
the long wooden structure was gloomy, the floor littered with
sticks of straw that stabbed into the soles of Amie’s feet. The air
was thick with dust and smelled fiercely of horses, manure, and
leather. She saw Roland and another hostler standing in front of
one of the open stalls. Inside, a large mare lay on her side, her
belly heaving, her head jerking and thrashing with the pain of
birth. Amie crept silently forward, passing three empty stalls
before stopping alongside one that held a whining donkey. She knew
asses were often used to calm the bigger warhorses but to all
appearances, it seemed the ass was the one in need of reassurance
now.

She placed a
hand on its rump to soothe the worried beast, and moved up to the
wooden bar that separated the two stalls. The screaming had
stopped, replaced by heaving breaths that sounded like a smithy's
bellows.

Marak was on
his knees, his sleeves pulled back, his one arm buried almost to
the shoulder inside the mare’s womb. Tamberlane sat with the
animal’s head cradled in his lap, his hands stroking the velvety
snout, his mouth bent close to her ear murmuring words meant to
calm and reassure her. The mare whinnied and grunted, her eyes wide
with fright, but she seemed to be listening to his voice, hanging
on to his every softly spoken word.

There was a
good deal of blood and slime in the straw beneath the mare’s rump
and at first Amie did not see the newborn foal. But it was there,
covered in birthing fluids, its legs still curled against its body,
not moving. Marak pulled out the sac containing the afterbirth then
swore softly when he saw the gush of bright red blood that
followed.

Amie had seen
enough animal husbandry to know there was a deal more blood in the
straw than there should have been. Marak had already started
packing the womb with fistfuls of herbs and moss. His hood was
pulled back and his expression was grim, although when he spoke to
the mare, his words were laden with the same gentle encouragement
Amaranth had heard murmured over her own sickbed.

Amie tipped
her head slightly, trying to see with more than one eye around the
thick post. The movement, slight as it was, was noticed and Marak
waved her over with a bloodied hand.

“The foal
needs help, he's not breathing. 'Twould be a shame to lose it now
after all this pain.”

Amaranth
quickly ducked beneath the wooden bar and sank down on her knees
beside the unmoving foal. The eyes were sealed shut, the nostrils
clogged with mucus. She used her fingers to clear the slippery mess
away then grabbed a handful of straw and began wiping down the
foal's body. A leg twitched, then another and with something akin
to a sneeze it began to breathe and squirm. One large brown eye
rolled opened, blinking as it looked around and inspected this
strange new world.

Amie continued
to wipe him down, using fresh handfuls of hay. There was a bucket
of water nearby and she dampened the tips of her fingers, using
them to clean around the eyes and nose. The foal was kicking out
stronger now, trying to straighten the long, spindly legs.

One kick hit
Amie on the knee and she flinched back, hitting the water bucket
with her arm, and overturning it. The contents spilled out but
instead of spreading in a puddle, she heard it drip down between
the wide, straw-covered planks that formed the floor and land with
a hollow echo somewhere below.

Marak,
meanwhile, had managed to stop the mare’s bleeding. Tamberlane’s
steady murmurs and long, stroking fingers had soothed the beast
enough that her eyes lost the look of wide, glazed panic and she
was actually trying to lift her head, to see behind her where the
foal had begun to bleat and squeak.

“There, you
see?” Tamberlane’s voice was so low it barely carried beyond the
mare’s ears. “You have a son, my beautiful Isolde. A son who will
grow to be as fine and strong and proud as his sire. Look you how
he struggles to put his legs beneath him, how his eyes gleam with
wonderment. Look at the breadth of his shoulders—the shoulders that
caused you so much distress—look at the power they show already. He
will be a champion.”

He glanced up
and noticed that Amie was watching. Their gazes locked and she felt
such a strong wave of heat pass through her that she could swear it
left part of her melted. His eyes were rife with emotion and in
that single glance, she saw the full, haunting depths of a
self-imposed isolation that forbade him from allowing anyone to get
close to him. She was able to recognize the emotion because the
same sense of loneliness was present in her own breast. A dog, a
horse, a small child... these were safe because they gave love
unconditionally and asked nothing in return. They did not know how
to deceive, how to hurt, how to lie or cause pain. They did not
know how to take something that had been full of hope and beauty,
and twist it into ugliness, fear, and pain.

Amie forced
herself to look away, but Tamberlane continued to stare, drawn by
the silky wisps of hair that lay against her cheek, the slender
arch of her throat where a beam of sunlight traced a soft pattern.
His fascination was observed this time by a pair of pale, almost
colorless eyes and to conceal his surprise, Marak moved to examine
the foal, running his long fingers gently over the trembling body,
down each of the thin, bony legs.

“He’ll be big,
like his sire, Tristan, with the same piebald coloring.”

“What of
Isolde?” Tamberlane asked.

Marak glanced
back at the mare. “We must keep her quiet until the herbs take
hold. In an hour or so, she might try to stand... which will be a
good sign. If she makes no effort...” He offered up a slight shrug.
“But she is strong and has a brave heart. I expect she will be
nipping your ears again before the sun sets on the morrow. As for
you, Little One,” he said, frowning sternly at Amaranth. “If you do
not wish to undo all my good work , you will return to your solar
at once, find your bed, and remain there until I give you leave to
rise again. Roland... your arms will do. Carry Amaranth back to the
keep and make no stops along the way.”

"I am
perfectly capable of walking," Amie protested.

"And I am
perfectly capable of having you slung over a shoulder and carried
back like a sack of grain. Roland...?"

The squire
grinned. “Only say the word and it shall be as you command.”

Tamberlane
stood and used a scrap of cloth to wipe his hands. When he was
finished, he reached down to Amie, his mouth twisted in a bit of a
smile as he shared a secret.

"I, myself,
have yet to win an argument with the faithless heathen. You would
do better to save your breath and concede now."

She looked at
the outstretched hand for a moment and knew a peasant girl would
hardly refuse a command by her overlord. She put her much smaller
hand into his and when he pulled her up, she was aware of an
energy, an underlying power he held carefully in check. She could
well imagine that power exploding. She could believe him capable of
slaying dragons and the thought sent a flush of sensations rushing
from her fingertips all the way into her toes.

In the next
instant, Roland was by her side, lifting her with an easy swing of
his muscled shoulders. Her hand slipped out of Tamberlane’s and the
contact was broken. For a very long moment she wished it was the
knights arms that were holding her close against his chest, and in
that same moment, she thought she saw a flicker in the dark green
eyes that mirrored her own desire. In the next blink it was gone
and Tamberlane turned away, leaving Roland to carry her out of the
stable and back to the keep.

CHAPTER NINE

Roland was
diligent in his duty and insisted on carrying her to her room high
in the tower. He ignored her protests, once they were out of sight
of the stables, and merely crooked an officious eyebrow when she
said she could walk the rest of the way herself. He carried her
through both wards and up the pentice, which required him to bend
forward enough that his face was nearly pressed into her breasts.
He strode through the great hall and all the way up to the narrow
landing outside her chamber where, finally, the look in her eye and
the set of her jaw finally stopped him—that and the silent presence
of Inaya, who stood on the threshold guarding the inner solar like
a silk-clad barbican, her eyes daring him to step across it.

With obvious
reluctance, Roland set Amie down and retreated before the
glowering, kohl-rimmed eyes. Inaya took one frowning look at the
strain showing on Amaranth’s face and shooed her into bed, filling
her with hot broth and a posset that had her sleeping soundly
before the liquid had dried on her lips. She slept through the rest
of the afternoon and evening and well into the night, waking only
briefly when Inaya brought food and added more wood to the
fire.

She awoke
again, much later, having had an odd, disjointed dream wherein she
had been holding the newborn foal in her arms. She had been
stroking its neck, smiling at the tickle of the soft fuzz on its
snout when a larger, more calloused hand had covered hers. The hand
had raised her fingers and pressed them against a mouth that was
warm and exquisitely tender. The eyes above the mouth were
crystalline green, and they were telling her how beautiful she was,
how desirable, how precious to him she was. They were also filled
with such unspeakable longing that the shock of it had brought
Amaranth wide awake and sitting upright in bed.

The image of
those green eyes lingered a long, dreamlike time before it faded
away in the harsh reality of stone walls and a smoldering fire. The
candle that marked the nocturnal vigil was burned down to the
bottom line that was scored in the wax, indicating it was nearing
the hour of Prime.

Amie swung her
legs over the side of the bed and walked on slightly tender feet to
the garde-robe. Inaya had scolded her earlier in her own strange
language over the cuts and scrapes on the soles of her feet, and
Amie noticed that pair of soft leather slippers had been placed by
the side of the bed.

She returned
to the warm nest of linens and furs, but in the end, when further
sleep eluded her, she removed the top blanket and draped it around
her shoulders. Her hair had been brushed out of its tight braid for
sleeping and it fell in a thick cloud of russet waves to below her
knees. The absolute stillness of the hour before dawn had always
been her favorite—a time for gathering thoughts and, in more recent
months, courage to face the day ahead. Tucking her feet into the
slippers, she walked toward the long woven tapestry that hung in
the corner of the solar.

Purely by
accident Amaranth had discovered the staircase hidden behind the
tapestry. During one of her many episodes of pacing back and forth
across her room she had paused to rest and nearly tumbled on her
arse when she leaned against what she thought was a solid wall.
Recovering her wits, she had inched the tapestry aside and found
the concealed steps that led up to the roof.

With the
blanket wrapped around her shoulders and stray hairs snagging on
the close stone walls as she climbed the narrow spiral, she made
her way up through the darkness and emerged onto the roof through a
low arched portal. The sky above was still black as a sinner’s
heart, but the easterly horizon was beginning to show a wash of
paler blue. The moon was long gone and the stars were fleeing
before the dawn. The four corner towers of the keep rose above the
darkness, the stone crenellations jutting up like square teeth
along the parapets.

Amie walked to
the nearest gap in the stone and looked out over the absolute
stillness.

There was no
wind, no breeze to rustle the tops of the trees that followed the
shoreline. A layer of morning mist hung thick over the surface of
the lake and as the light grew stronger in the eastern sky, it
turned the shifting mass a luminous gray. Somewhere on shore, night
birds called to one another before retreating to their niches for
the day. Sounds were amplified and the plop of a frog jumping into
the water came to Amie as if it happened a foot away. The arched
window in her solar faced out over the lake, but the sill was so
deep, she would have had to be as small and agile as Jibril to peer
over the stone casement.

When the light
allowed, she found a second staircase that led down onto the main
roof of the keep. She followed the parapet along to the section
that overlooked the baileys. She could just make out the emerging
shape of the stables at the far end of the outer ward and she
wondered how the foal and mare had fared during the night.

From such a
height she could see the sleeping village as well, the thatched
roofs of the cottages nosing up a darker shade of gray through the
mist. It was still too dark to see any manner of road or path
leading up to Taniere Castle, but she assumed it followed the curve
of the lake and was therefore hidden within the trees. The forest
itself stretched out vast and unbroken for miles in all directions.
The only cleared acreage appeared to be behind the village and she
could well imagine the neatly laid out squares of cabbages and
turnips and grain.

There were
faint lights glowing through the slits in both of the massive
barbican towers that guarded the main gate. A scraping sound,
followed by a brusque laugh had her hopping up and leaning far over
the store ledge between the merlons, whence she was able to catch
sight of two lackeys walking across the inner courtyard toward one
of the outbuildings.