Dragonheart (22 page)

“Here . . . widen your stance,” he suggested, and gripping her wrists, guided her arms up, swinging the ax aloft. “Up . . . then down.”

Their arms swung down together. Their bodies swayed forward. Again, she felt the studs pierce into her back, his loins tightly clinging to her from behind.

“That’s it . . . one fluid stroke.”

The downward arc of the ax almost threw her off balance again. But Bowen’s enfolding arms steadied her. She was glad for the support. She was beginning to feel light-headed. Too much time in the sun, she thought. The knight’s face was crushed into her hair, and as she turned to free him of its tangles, her lips almost touched his cheek.

“That could cleave a man’s skull,” Kara said of the maneuver. Her voice sounded husky and strange to her own ears.

“Like a pudding,” Bowen agreed.

He still had not let go of her. She wondered if he was going to show her another move. Well, no hurry. She could wait until he made up his mind.

But as it turned out, Gilbert made up Bowen’s mind for him.

“B-bow . . . K-K-Kara!” the friar breathlessly stuttered as he came running up, gesturing excitedly with an arrow, a dead falcon impaled on it. Frantic spittle and feathers were flying everywhere. “Ei . . . Ei . . . Ei . . .”

“You . . . you . . . you . . . what?” Bowen batted the bird away and grabbed Gilbert by the shoulders. It seemed to compose the priest.

“Einon’s men!” Gilbert blurted out, and pointed with his arrow toward the woods beyond the pasture.

Bowen snatched the ax from Kara’s grip, and shouting “Find Draco,” dashed off.

Gilbert caught his breath, then smiled at Kara and held up his arrow, the bird flopping limply on it. “Look, a falcon!”

Kara sighed and marched off in search of the dragon.

Brok bore down on the short peasant, amazed at how fast the man could run on such stubby little legs. These mad dogs were going to pay deeply for their effrontery. This sort of thing didn’t happen in his shire. Not that he gave a damn for Felton. The fool could bleed to death, for all he cared. But that falcon had been the best he’d ever had. And with their arrows, they had brought down three more of his men while on the run. Well, run they may, but they wouldn’t escape. Did they think they could retreat to their village and hide among the folk there? Brok remembered what enough of them looked like and he might just be willing to stretch a few innocent necks in order to flush out the others or even just as payment for his bird.

The short peasant was breaking from the forest. Fool. He wouldn’t stand a chance across open ground. Brok raised his blade and spurred his horse. But as he tore out of the forest and down the ridge, he suddenly reined the steed up quick.

So this is what Felton had been jabbering about!

Brok had found the runaway peasants. They littered the landscape. Hundreds of them! And they were well armed. A troop of them rushed toward the one-eyed rebel as he and his band came tearing down the ridge. They were led by a knight on a charger. Brok recognized him. Bowen!

Suddenly a roar echoed out over the valley, an alarm that alerted the whole camp to readiness. Bowen turned in his saddle and signaled to . . . a dragon!

The creature was perched on a rocky cliff behind the village, roaring out the alarm. At Bowen’s signal, he swooped off the crag, winging toward the ridge.

Brok did not wait for the dragon to reach his destination. He waved what was left of his party back and, whipping his horse around, sought the cover of the woods again. He had not come a-hunting for this!

“Oh, no! His scum wouldn’t dare run away!”

Half-concealed behind an arras, Aislinn watched from the balcony as Felton screeched his sarcasm at Brok and the king.

“No, they’d only host the whole bloody rebellion right under his hairy nose!” Felton flipped his stump at Brok. The wrapping was spotted with blood. “I may not have known where my peasants were padding off to, but at least I knew something was going on! You oaf! You cretin! You beefy, bullock-brained dolt! You’re responsible for this! Look at my hand, my liege!”

“Shut up, you screeching popinjay, or your neck will match!” Brok roared back.

“Shut up, the both of you.” The stark quietness of Einon’s tone cut short their bellowed bickering more effectively than a shout. The king stared at Brok. His eyes, dazed and distant, seemed to be seeking something, a memory. “Bowen . . . and the dragon . . .” His fingers ran along his chest and Aislinn thought she saw him shiver.

Bowen and the dragon, the queen thought. Fate, cruel for so long, had now chosen to be kind. Now all was inevitable. The time had come. Aislinn went to her chamber, and there, under the shadows of the cross and the watchful dragon icons, she proceeded to write four letters, which she sent off by courier that night. She hoped they would arrive in time. Four letters to five men. She knew they would answer her summons. She knew they would come. The dragon would lure them. She knelt in her chapel and prayed for forgiveness. The jeweled eyes of the dragon statues glittered in the candleglow.

Part VII

THE VOW

His word speaks only truth.

—The Old Code

Twenty-Eight

THE SWORD WITHIN THE CIRCLE

“You are my confidence.”

Bowen dreamed of dragons, the dragons he had slain. In his dream, he slew them again. Like somber statues of the dead, they perched on the gray, crumbling stone pedestals that littered the Roman ruins. He stood among them, listening to their trilling song of sorrow. And the sorrow swept over him and brought him to his knees. He begged for forgiveness and longed for the song to cease.

But it did not cease. And the large grieving eyes of the dragons held no forgiveness in them, only a baleful wretched contempt. The stones seemed to crowd in upon him, the dragons loomed over him. Then their wings spread out in unison with a gusty flap that sounded like a death rattle. And they descended upon him, swooping and diving, a swirling, spinning blur of glittery motion and crescendoing sound.

The flutter of their wings, the rustle of their wind surged and tore at him, howling discordant accompaniment to the trilling dirge. The song spoke mournfully of pain and loss and guilt, thrumming and echoing in his ears, deepening inside his head, overwhelming him with its agonizing beauty. Like Odysseus in the thrall of the Sirens, Bowen thought he would go mad. He screamed to blot out the woeful wailing, but his cry was drowned in its welling pool of pathos. He drew his sword and tried to strike down the exquisite horror, slashing out at the sparkled flesh as it came flying by. Ripping into it. Tearing. Rending. Brilliant scarlet light shimmered in the swath he hewed with his blade.

Soon all was a blood-colored dazzle of blinding brightness. There were no more dragons to hack. Only a glowing red haze, which made the sweat glisten on Bowen’s skin as he wildly pivoted to the reverberating lament, vainly trying to carve sound out of color.

Suddenly a sliver of silver sliced through the crimson curtain and clanked against his blade, driving him to his knees. At the hilt of the intruding sword stood Einon, pale and white against the red. He smiled and slashed. Bowen sprang to his feet and fought. Driving. Driving. He had one purpose. To kill Einon. And to atone for his sins. To silence the dreadful dragon song. He was lightning. A shooting star. The winter wind. Flash and speed and cold steel. Einon could not stand before his onslaught, could not hold back the whirlwind of his blade . . . could not stop smiling! Bowen’s sword slid into his chest. Einon lurched forward . . . and still smiled! His fingers clutched out and grasped the blade. Bowen yanked it back and Einon’s pale hand turned to a scaly claw, its talon scraping along the steel like screeching death, digging a jagged groove into the blade. Bowen looked up to see Draco plunge backward off his sword, spiraling back into the crimson glow that suddenly became a garish blur, rippling and swirling and being sucked into the dragon’s wound.

Bowen was pulled into the vortex as the red was overcome by black. The glare and the dragon were gone. Only the blackness now, a dizzying dark void into which Bowen floated and fell and spun, shouting for Draco. Shouting silently. He felt the words forming in his mouth, felt them throbbing in the muscles of his neck, felt them straining in his throat and bellowing from his chest. But he heard nothing . . . only the singing despair of the dragon trill seeping through the darkness, pervading his soul; becoming louder and stranger, distorting to a jarring thunderous peal . . .

He woke with a startled jerk, sweat drenching his face and bare torso. The deafening blast that had pierced his slumber sounded again and his groggy gaze squinted into the bright light invading his tent.

Kara stood in the open flap, a twisted ram’s horn in her hand.

“Battle trumpet!” She held it up for his approval. “Good tone, don’t you think?”

No, Bowen didn’t think. He had slept miserably, when he had slept at all; he was still tired. He reeled wearily in his cot and started to sink back sleepily. Kara threw his pants in his face.

“Sun’s up, Knight,” she announced cheerily—far too cheerily. “So’s the army. Why aren’t you?”

As he struggled to put his pants on under the blanket, he thought of suggesting that Kara turn her back for discretion’s sake, but he could only muster a grumpy mumble. Ignoring his demure gyrations, she stuffed a hunk of bread in his mouth.

“Breakfast!” she said.

Bowen just groaned.

“Too dry?” She yanked the bread out of his slack-jawed mouth. He puffed his lips and sleepily tried to blow the sprinkled crumbs off them. Kara dipped the bread in a goblet of wine.

“Here, sop it in some wine,” She crammed the soaked bread back in his mouth. It was last night’s wine and stale, like the bread. Both dribbled down his chin.

“Come on! Time’s a-wasting.” Kara hustled behind him. “Wash up.” Bowen felt something cold and wet slap his back and yelped his first word of the morning.

“Jesu!” Bowen jumped up. his pants fortunately and finally done up.

“Well, good morning to you too. A little cold?” Kara held a bowl of water and a wet cloth.

“A little fast!” Bowen snatched the cloth from her and wiped the sleep from his eyes. “What’s the hurry?”

“There’s much to he done!” Kara pushed him back on the cot and flung his tunic at him. “Troops to train, strategy to plan, crises to resolve!”

Bowen pulled on his jerkin. “What crises?”

“Well, that beard for one.” Kara grabbed his jaw in her hand and, squeezing his cheeks, jerked his head one way then the other. “It could use a trim.” She slipped behind him and, tilting his head back, grabbed a battle-ax. Bowen slid his chin out from under her hand and leapt away.

“Oh, don’t worry.” Kara sliced the ax smoothly through the air. “You taught me well.”

“To cut throats, not to shave them!”

Kara shrugged and set the ax down. “Well, if you don’t want to look like a victorious general . . .”

“I’m not yet,” Bowen reminded her. “Don’t get overconfident.”

“You are my confidence,” said Kara. “I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.”

Her smile was as bright and bold as the sun that shone into the tent and haloed her red hair. She held out her hand to him. “Come.”

Bowen took her hand and she led him from the tent.

Outside waiting for them was a delegation of peasant warriors led by Gilbert and Hewe. Kara still held his hand. Her brown-gold eyes stared at him, warm with pride. “Tomorrow we will look to you . . . glowing at our head like a shining beacon.”

She gestured to a cross pole draped in a heavy cloth and Hewe whipped off the covering . . . revealing a set of glistening armor—a coat of mail, a leather surcoat, a helmet, and a shield. Both the shield and the surcoat were emblazoned with the symbol of the sword within the circle. But it was slightly altered. Dotted through the circle was a pattern of stars, golden and bright . . . the constellation Draco.

“They made it for you”—Kara gestured to the assemblage—“all of them, all contributing what they could. Gilbert designed it. Hewe hammered and polished it. And over your heart . . . the Pendragon and Draco entwined as emblem of your courage.”

“It was all Kara’s idea.” Gilbert handed Bowen the shield. Bowen took it in stunned silence, gazing at Kara. Her eyes were still warm, but shining with something more than pride.

“A knight’s armor should shine as bright as his honor,” she said softly.

Unable to stand the beauty of her eyes any longer, Bowen cast his down, admiring the shield. His fingers lightly caressed the line of stars threaded through the sword within the circle. He felt honored and unworthy. Arthur and Draco. He scanned the cliffs above the village, seeking out the dragon, longing to look upon him, remembering his dream. But his gaze was not rewarded.

Something brushed against his face, and startled, he turned. An old woman pressed her hand to his cheek in silent reverence. Then others reached out to him. Warriors, women, children. All pressed close to touch him or give a word of thanks. It was too much. Overcome, Bowen bolted into his tent.

Outside, they shouted his name. He stared at the shield in his trembling hands. And he thought his heart would break.

Such faith . . . such faith they had in him.

“They want to see you in it.”

Bowen straightened himself, wiped the moisture from his eyes, and turned to Kara, standing in the entrance with his mail and surcoat.

“Shall I help you put it on?” she asked.

“Please . . .” Bowen said, hearing the tremor in his voice. Kara held the coat of mail out for him and helped to pull it over his head.

“How rapidly your heart beats,” she noted, her palms resting on his chest as she smoothed out the mail.

“They expect much.”

“They will give much.”

“And if I don’t lead them to victory?”

“Then you will have led them farther than they ever dared go before . . .” Kara helped him into the leather surcoat, her strong fingers swiftly fastening the straps. He watched her work. So close. So beautiful. As she bent over to cinch the final buckle, her hair billowed in a fiery wave beneath him, beckoning. He lifted a hand and reached out to stroke it. But just then she finished her task and leaned back to inspect him, and losing his courage, he dropped his hand to his side.