Knight's Prize (2 page)

Sung
Li had
insisted
on
being purchased. 'Twas Destiny, the curious peasant had sagely proclaimed. And
at thirteen summers old, Miriel wasn't about to argue with Destiny.

Her
father, Lord Gellir, had not approved, nor had her older sisters, Deirdre and
Helena. For a long while, the denizens of Rivenloch turned disparaging Scots
glares upon the wee foreigner with the strange eyes and impertinent tongue.

But
they'd grown accustomed to Sung Li now, and no one questioned the presence of
the crone of a maidservant who clung as tightly to Miriel as a duckling to its
mother.

Of
course, if they'd known that the wee old woman was in sooth a wee old man, if
they'd known that he devoted most of his hours with Miriel teaching her the
fine art of Chinese warfare, and if they'd suspected that under his tutelage,
Miriel had blossomed from a timid child into a fierce combatant to rival her
warrior sisters, they might have taken exception.

But
as Sung Li was fond of saying, The greatest weapon is the one no one knows you
possess. Certainly no one suspected meek, innocent, docile Miriel of possessing
the skills to kill a man.

"Hmph."
Sung Li was staring out the window, his narrow white brows furrowed.

"Hmph,
what?" Miriel fastened the silver girdle at her hips and wiggled her feet
into her leather slippers.

"A
knight arrives."

Miriel
tensed instantly. 'The Night that comes to swallow The Shadow?"

Knees
bent, arms raised, she was ready to fight this * very moment, whether against a
human foe or the dark forces of nature.

Sung
Li turned on her with an annoyed scowl, then shook his head. "You are like
a child today, starting at your own shadow." He left the window and began
tidying the chamber, clucking his tongue. "It is only a common
knight."

Miriel
lowered her hands and fired a scathing glare at the old man, a glare wasted on
his back. A child. She was weary of being called a child. By Sung Li. By her
father. By her sisters. She was
not
a child. She was a woman full grown.

With
a sniff of disdain, she moved to the window to peer out for herself. There
was
a
knight on horseback cresting the rise above Rivenloch. He was in full battle
dress, chain mail and surcoat, a wise choice, since a stranger alone could make
fast foes in the wilds of
Scotland
.
As he rode down the hill toward the castle, the silver helm beneath his arm
caught the light of dawn, glinting like fire.

She
couldn't make out the crest upon his brown tabard or see him clearly, not with
the shaggy mane of chestnut hair that obscured his face and reached almost to
his shoulders.

"Who
do you suppose—" She looked around to Sung Li, but the elusive servant was
already gone, probably on his way to filch the best bread from the kitchen for
his mistress's breakfast before any of those ravenous
Normans
could take it.

Miriel
returned to the window. Mayhap the knight was a guest arriving early for
Helena
's wedding. He
paused then, halfway down the rise, to scan his surroundings. As his gaze swept
across the castle, Miriel felt an uncharacteristic shiver of trepidation
skitter up her spine. She ducked reflexively behind a shutter, out of sight.

After
a moment, scolding herself for her cowardice, she peered out again. The knight
had changed course. He now reined his mount into the dense forest that surrounded
Rivenloch.

Miriel
frowned. 'Twas most irregular. Why would a strange knight travel all the way to
the remote keep of Rivenloch, only to swerve at the last moment into the woods?

By
the Saints, she intended to find out. With Deirdre and Helena distracted by
their Norman lovers, someone had to keep an eye on the castle defenses.

Her
sisters believed that Miriel had sealed up the secret exit from the castle, the
one at the back of her workroom beneath the keep, after Rivenloch's soldiers
had made use of the tunnel to defeat the attacking English army last spring.

But
Miriel had done no such thing. That passageway was too useful to close off.
After all, 'twas the only way Miriel could leave the keep without being under
the constant scrutiny of her overprotective siblings.

So
she'd hung a tapestry over the entrance, pushed her desk against the opening,
and piled up books of accounts to obscure the passage. 'Twas little trouble to
move them out of the way whenever she needed to escape.

As
she did now.

'Twas
yet early morn. Later,
Helena
would need her to help with wedding preparations. But Miriel could spy upon the
stranger in the woods for a bit and steal back to the castle before anyone was
the wiser.

She
smiled grimly to herself. 'Twas clandestine adventures like these that
relieved her of both the boredom of managing the castle accounts and the oppression
of playing the helpless little sister of the Warrior Maids of Rivenloch.

************************************

Rand
la Nuit sensed he was no
longer alone in the forest. 'Twasn't that the intruder made a sound or exuded
a scent or even cast a shadow. But years of training as a mercenary had honed
Rand
's senses to a keen edge. By the faint prickling at
the back of his neck, he felt sure he was being watched.

He
casually eased one hand over the pommel of his sword and moved to the far side
of his horse, placing the beast between him and where he guessed the intruder
to be. Then, hunkering down as if to check the horse's girth, he peered beneath
the beast's belly, scouring the bushes for some trace of a trespasser.

Aside
from a few wraiths of steam chased from the wet oak trunks by the warm glare of
the rising sun, the misty copse was silent. Branches of lush cedar drooped in
slumber. Thick ferns stood like quiet sentinels. Not a beetle stirred the leaf
fall.

He
frowned. Mayhap 'twas an owl late to bed. Or mayhap some lost spirit haunted
the Borders woods. Or, he thought, patting his horse's flank and rising again,
mayhap 'twas his imagination, and he was only growing weary of the hunt, like
an old hound whose sense of smell was failing.

Still,
he'd always trusted his instincts. Just because he couldn't locate the threat
at this moment didn't mean it wasn't there. He'd have to keep one eye on his
surroundings and one hand on his blade as he searched the woods.

He
didn't know exactly what he was looking for yet. All he'd been told when the
Lord of Morbroch hired him was that the outlaw he sought was a man who worked
alone, an elusive thief who roamed the forests of Rivenloch.

The
task had seemed simple enough at first. In
Rand
's
experience, robbers were seldom clever. 'Twould be an easy matter to locate the
fellow's hideaway, take him by force, and convey him to Morbroch for judgment.

But
when
Rand
learned how much the lord and
several of his neighboring barons were willing to pay him to catch the thief
who had lightened their purses, he began to wonder if 'twas not so simple an
undertaking after all.

Apparently,
the denizens of Rivenloch didn't mind their local outlaw. To them, he was but
the subject of fireside tales and jongleur's songs. Even knowing the scoundrel
had relieved numerous traveling noblemen of a vast quantity of silver, they
refused to expend any effort to capture the man. Nor did they welcome the
interference of outsiders.

Thus
Rand would have to work in secret beneath the noses of one of the most
formidable forces in
Britain
,
the Knights of Cameliard. The Norman knights had come last spring to take
command of the Scots castle, and already they'd routed a huge force of rogue
English lords who'd tried to lay siege to the keep. If they wished, they could
easily prevent one paltry mercenary from capturing their outlaw.

So
Rand
would have to be clever.

He
needed three things: a believable pretext for coming to Rivenloch, a reason to
linger there, and access to the intimate workings of the keep. The Lord of
Morbroch had offered him a deception that provided him with all three.

Of
course, if he could catch the robber at once, there would be no need for
deception.

He
scanned the path again for signs of inhabitation— footprints, discarded bones
from a meal, remnants of a fire. The sooner he could find some clue as to the
thief's whereabouts, the sooner he could quit this place and collect his
reward. But all he sensed as his gaze ranged the woods was that eerie feeling
that he was being watched.

He'd
been searching for some time when his ear caught a new sound intruding upon the
silence of the forest. Footsteps.

'Twas
not the stealthy passage of a thief he heard, but the purposeful approach of a
pair of men.

He'd
expected as much. Rivenloch's guards had likely spotted him as he'd approached
the castle, and now they'd, come to investigate the stranger lurking in their
woods. They'd find him in another few moments.

He
needed to act quickly. He stepped to the side of the path and casually began to
whistle. Hefting his chain mail, he unlaced his braies. Then he swiftly yanked
them down to relieve himself upon a bush.

A
sudden loud gasp sounded from the branches high above him, his heart bolted,
his whistle suddenly turned to air, and he almost missed the bush.

God's
eyes! Someone
was
there.
Nearly on top of him.

And,
he realized in wonder, by the sound of the gasp, that someone was distinctly
female.

But
the shrubbery along the path was already parting to make way for the
approaching men. There was no time to confront the naughty spy hiding in the
tree.

"Wicked
lass," he softly chided, casting an amused grin up toward the concealing
foliage.

Then,
shaking his head, he resumed whistling and returned unabashedly to his task.
The way he looked at it, if the sight of a man pissing offended the maid, she
deserved as much for her mischief.

************************************

Miriel
was appalled. Not by the man's rude display, though 'twas most audacious and
disconcerting. But by the way she'd gasped.

For
years
she'd ranged these woods, as silent as mist,
as
invisible
as air. Thanks to Sung Li's guidance, she knew
how
to
make herself imperceptible, even to the keen-eyed owls that inhabited the
trees. She could flit from branch to branch as nimbly as a squirrel and blend
seamlessly into the foliage.

How
the stranger had startled such a loud gasp from her, she didn't know. True,
she'd never seen
that
part
of a man before, but 'twas not so much different than she'd imagined.

Worse,
she'd almost caught her breath again when he'd peered
up
in
her direction with that smug grin. Not because he'd discovered her presence,
but because his handsome face—that strong jaw, those curving lips, the unruly
hair, the perplexed furrow between his brows, and those dark, sparkling
eyes—literally took her breath away.

"Good
morn!" Sir Rauve's booming voice almost toppled her out of her perch. She
watched as the giant black-bearded Knight of Cameliard, dogged by young Sir
Kenneth, tromped forward, one cautious hand on the hilt of his sheathed sword.

"Good
morn!" the stranger called back cheerfully. His
voice
was
rich and warm, like honey mead. "And pardon
me," he
apologized,
making a show of hauling up his
trews.
"Just taking care of a
bit of business."

Sir Rauve
nodded,
wasting no time and mincing no words.
"And what type
of
business do you have at Rivenloch, sir?"