Lion's Bride (6 page)

A young soldier was holding the horse’s reins while Ware mounted.

“I should go with you.” She hopped on one foot as she put on a sandal. “You’re not being reasonable. It may take you a long time without me.”

He didn’t answer.

She put on her other shoe. “What if you come back with the wrong leaves?”

“Then I’ll go out and get the right ones.”

“And I will help him.” Kadar was riding out of the stable and across the courtyard toward them. “But I doubt if that will be necessary. My eyes are as keen as my falcons’. I could recognize the smallest leaf from miles away.”

“You’re staying here too,” Ware said.

Kadar shook his head. “You need me.”

“I need no one. I go alone.”

Kadar yawned. “It’s too early to argue. Take an escort and I’ll let you go without me.”

Ware’s gaze went to the mountains. “I’ll risk no men when I can offer them no plunder.”

Risk? Thea stared at the two men in bewilderment.

“Then I’ll have to go with you,” Kadar insisted. “I must protect my belongings.”

“I don’t belong to you.”

Kadar nudged his horse forward. “I hope you carry food in that pack. We cannot eat leaves like the worms.”

“You’re not going.”

Kadar smiled at Thea. “Trust us. We will see that your worms do not starve.”

Ware said coldly, “This is not a battle of wills. If you try to go through that gate, I’ll knock you to the ground and I won’t be gentle about it. You don’t go with me.”

“Ware, I…” Kadar trailed off as he met Ware’s gaze. He sighed. “It’s very difficult owning a man like you. You will take care?”

Ware nodded and nudged his horse toward the gates.

He was wearing armor. Thea had been vaguely conscious of the chain mail, but it took on new meaning in light of the conversation that had transpired between Ware and Kadar. “Is there danger? He’s just going to the foothills.”

Kadar was frowning as he watched Ware ride through the gates. “It’s very early,” he muttered. “He may be safe.”

“Are there bandits in these mountains?”

Kadar shook his head. “Not bandits.”

Ware disappeared from view and Kadar turned to her. “Stop frowning. The fault is not yours. You didn’t know.”

She still didn’t know, she thought with exasperation. He was making no sense. “I only asked him to fetch me some mulberry leaves, and you act as if I’d asked him to conquer a town.”

Kadar smiled. “He would have taken an army if you’d asked him to conquer a town. He could not, in honor, take one to conquer a mulberry tree. He says he has no honor, but you can see that is not true.”

“I know nothing about his honor. I know only that you’re making too much of a simple task.”

“Perhaps you’re right.” He took her elbow. “At any rate, we cannot help Ware now. We can only wait. Would you like to see my falcons?”

“You raise falcons?” She let him lead her toward the steps. “For hunting?”

“Partly for hunting. Partly to watch them soar. There’s no more glorious sight on earth than a falcon in flight.” He stopped as they entered the castle. “But first you must break your fast. You’re still not well.”

“I’m much stronger today, only a little tired.”

“Weariness can lead to illness. Garner your strength. You will need it to nurture all your worms. Are you truly a fine embroiderer?”

“The finest in Constantinople.” She looked at him in surprise when he burst out laughing. “Well, I am.”

“I don’t doubt it. I was just delighted by your charming lack of modesty. In truth, I find confidence very admirable. It’s like the lovely sheen on a piece of exquisite wood.”

“Lord Ware told you of our discussion? I wasn’t certain he would remember anything I told him last night.”

“He remembers everything.” His smile faded. “Which is sometimes a curse.”

“Yes.” She herself had memories she would rather forget.

“I thought you would understand.” Kadar led her toward the great hall. “Now, let us get you fed so that you can admire my beautiful birds.”

“THIS IS ELEANOR.” He took the falcon out of her cage. “Is she not handsome? I named her for Eleanor of Aquitaine.”

The bird was indeed splendid. “Why?”

“Because she’s wily and fierce and has a profound dislike for being held captive. It took me over a year to train her.” He chuckled. “Which is better than King Henry did with his Eleanor. He never succeeded in taming her.”

“Did your father tell you of Eleanor?”

“My father gave my mother his seed and never looked back. My mother told me he died a great death battling her people.” He smiled into the beady eyes of the falcon. “It’s a pity he never realized his greatest achievement was producing me.”

There was no antagonism in his voice, she realized wonderingly. “You don’t hate him?”

“When I was a boy, I hated him. My mother died when I was five, and life was not easy for me on the streets of Damascus. I was a purloin and shunned by both my peoples.” He put Eleanor back in the cage and opened the next enclosure. “But I rose above it.”

“How?”

“Knowledge. I stole learning as I did fruit from the bazaars. I learned from the Franks and I learned from my mother’s people.” He took out another falcon. “To my horror I discovered both were right…and wrong about most things. How can you hate when there is no truth that cannot be challenged?” He held out the bird to her. “This is Henry. He’s less fierce than Eleanor and does not have her sense of purpose. She never relents once she sights prey. I’ve discovered that the female can often be more determined when in full flight.” He met her gaze. “Haven’t you made that discovery also?”

He was no longer referring to his falcons. She said, “But first she must reach full flight,” then added, “And there are always those who wish to put her in a cage or use her. Even you, Kadar.”

He nodded. “It’s the nature of man.” He put the falcon back in the cage. “But when their use is fulfilled, I’ll set them free.”

“And their use is to hunt?”

“Actually, to intercept.” He carefully latched the cage. “Saladin and a few Frank commanders use carrier pigeons to carry orders to their troops. Ware decided we should use falcons to make sure the pigeons never reach their destination.”

Though Kadar had spoken casually, almost indifferently, Thea shivered. She had a sudden, vivid picture of fierce Eleanor savagely plucking a pigeon out of the sky.

“Life is always a battle. You can’t stop it; you can only choose the battleground,” he said as if reading her thoughts. “If a pigeon reaches its target, men die. If a falcon stops the pigeon, different men die.”

There was no savagery in his voice. Yet she was suddenly seeing a harder, darker side of Kadar. “And you choose Lord Ware’s battleground.”

“For the time being.” He chuckled. “It’s my bane for saving his life. Now I find I cannot bear to see him destroyed.”

“How did you save his life?”

“I found him wounded and near death. He had fled to the Old Man of the Mountain for safety but didn’t reach him in time.”

“Old Man of the Mountain?”

“Sheikh Rashid ed-Din Sinan. He is the King of Assassins. It was a clever move on Ware’s part. No one ventures into Sinan’s domain without invitation.”

“Then what were you doing there?”

“Knowledge.” He smiled. “One must know the dark paths as well as the bright. But sometimes there’s such a thing as learning too much, of delving too deeply. I was becoming lost and was ready to return to Damascus when I found Ware on the path. I nursed him back to health and took him to Sinan’s fortress.”

“From whom was he running?”

He hesitated and then shrugged. “I reveal nothing that everyone in this land doesn’t know when I tell you that he was running from the Knights Templar. What do you know of them?”

“What everyone knows—that the Knights Templar is an order of warrior monks. They’re the finest soldiers in Christendom and the wealthiest. They sell their services both to merchants and to royalty for vast sums. Nicholas paid them once to guard a caravan he was sending to Cairo.” Her brow wrinkled in thought as she tried to remember anything else she had heard. “A goodly portion of their fees go to the Pope, but some of their gold is said to be kept in their own storehouses.”

“Ah, yes, and you can see why the Pope has such affection for the order.” He stroked the falcon’s feathers with a gentle forefinger. “And gave them such power that they are feared more than Saladin.”

“Why were they pursuing Lord Ware?”

“Unfortunately, they have no fondness for prodigal sons. They wished to wipe him from the face of the earth.”

She shook her head. “I don’t understand.”

“Ware was a Knights Templar, perhaps the greatest warrior in the order. When he was cast out, the Grand Master issued an order that he be killed.”

She stared at him, stunned. “He was a
monk
?”

Kadar burst out laughing. “I found it surprising, too, until I came to know him. He has many more sides to his character than you would think.”

A vision of Ware sitting in that firelit room while Tasza caressed him with her mouth came back to her. “A monk?” she repeated.

“I’m told sometimes a battle can be as stirring as a woman, and the Knights Templar are a special breed.”

“Why did they cast him out?”

His smile faded. “You will have to ask him.”

“I don’t have to ask.” Sensuality breathed in every line of Ware of Dundragon’s body. He would not have been able to bear abstinence. “He is no monk.”

“Not now.” Kadar tilted his head. “I’ve told you what danger Ware was fleeing. What are you running from, Thea of Dimas?”

She stiffened at the sudden attack. She had been so absorbed in unraveling the complex personality of Kadar and trying to comprehend the astonishing truth he had told her regarding Lord Ware that she had been caught off guard. “I came here to open my own house of embroidery.”

“A laudable ambition. But this land is hard for a woman alone.”

“All lands are hard for a woman alone, but I have a skill that’s respected here. I’ll be able to find a place for myself until I have enough money to open my own house. The Damascenes have been trading embroideries for a long time, and they’re truly excellent.”

“But not as good as yours?”

She shook her head. “They lack imagination. A true artist designs as well as executes. The Damascenes are still doing the same embroideries they did a century ago.”

“How long have you been a craftsman?”

“Since I was a very small child. I can’t remember anything else. They first put me to knotting rugs, but my mother convinced him I would be better at embroidery.”

“Him?”

Every answer led to another trap. The only safety was in not answering at all. She turned away from the cages and moved toward the window. The grounds of the castle were not all stone walls and fortress, as she had thought. To the north stretched a long green, abounding with grass and trees, that fell off abruptly into a steep cliff. “You can see very far from this tower.” Her gaze traveled back to the mountains. “What are those houses to the south?”

“That’s the village of Jedha. All of the servants and soldiers here at Dundragon were brought from there. Dundragon was given to Ware as payment for services by a Frank lord who found this land too unsafe for his taste. When he went back to France, he took all his people with him, and Ware had to recruit his officers and soldiers from among the Muslims.” He shook his head. “The lords who hired Ware could use the excuse that any tool is justified when fighting Satan, but no one wanted to offend the Knights Templar by actually going over to the renegade’s camp. It’s a dangerous practice to ally yourself with the Temple’s enemies.”

“Yet you did it.”

“I told you, I had no choice. He belongs to me. Besides, living in the shadows with Ware has taught me as much as I learned from the Old Man of the Mountain.”

Shadows. But this day seemed bright and clear and without threat. “He surely should be back before dark.”

“Yes. If God wills.” He joined her at the window, his gaze fixed on the mountain. “If he’s not, I’ll go searching for him.”

Again that intimation of danger. She didn’t understand any of these people. Kadar, whom she had thought kind and gentle, had been taught by murderers. Lord Ware, whom she knew to be brutal and ruthless, had evidently risked much to seek out her mulberry leaves. Nothing was clear or reasonable in this new life into which she had been tossed.

But this disarray was better than the suffocating orderliness in the House of Nicholas. The serenity and concentration that abounded there were necessary to produce fine embroideries, but not the strictures of a cage. Here at Dundragon, she had more freedom, and once she left, the chaos would disappear entirely from her life. She would only have to be patient.

“You can trust us, you know,” Kadar said quietly. “We know what it is to be hunted.”

She could not trust anyone. She did not have the right when Selene was also at risk.

When she did not answer, Kadar turned away from the window. “It’s going to be a long day. Would you like to play a game of chess?”

“I don’t know how to play chess.”

“You prefer another game?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know how to play any games.”

“Ah, but games are very important. They stretch the mind and ease the heart.”

“I don’t need them. I have my work.”

He took her elbow and urged her toward the door. “I think you need them more than most people. Come, I will teach you chess.”

Ware finally found a grove of mulberry trees after noon of that day. It was not soon enough for him. He was hot, his head was aching and his temper correspondingly raw.

He sliced a huge branch off a tree with one stroke of his sword and watched it fall to the ground. He dismounted, then began plucking the leaves and throwing them into the basket.

Mother of Christ, he felt like a damsel picking flowers on May Day. This was no task for a knight.

How much was enough? Every time he bent down, his helmeted head felt as if it were going to roll off. He finished stripping the branch. He glowered at the contents of the basket; the leaves barely covered the bottom. He cut another branch and then another.

Enough. If that wasn’t sufficient, the damn worms could starve to death. He closed the lid and lifted the basket back onto the saddle.

He was being watched.

He froze in the act of fastening the basket, every muscle rigid.

Vaden.

He always knew when it was Vaden. The bond between them had never been broken; it had only become twisted. God, how ironic to die like this. Not in battle, but gathering leaves for a bunch of silkworms.

He leaned his head on the saddle, waiting. Jesus, he was weary of it all. It seemed as if he had been waiting a lifetime for this final moment. He suddenly felt a wild, reckless desire for it to be over.

He whirled on his heel, tore off his helmet, and gazed up at the rocky hillside. “Here I am, Vaden,” he shouted. “A clear shot. Aim for the eye. It’s surer than trying to find an opening in the armor.”

But he had seen one of Vaden’s arrows find such an opening. He possessed strength, a steady hand, and a deadly eye. Vaden was the finest bowman Ware had ever known.

He stood waiting, head lifted.

No sound. No whir of an arrow in flight.

But Vaden was
there.
Why didn’t he strike?

He slowly put his helmet back on his head. He waited again before he mounted.

It seemed Vaden was not in the mood for killing this day.

But Vaden was not driven by moods, only by cool reason.

Ware waited once again, giving Vaden another chance, before nudging his horse toward the path leading up the mountain to Dundragon.

He could still loose the arrow.

Vaden kept his vision narrowed on the exact spot in Ware’s back where the armor joined.

He slowly lowered the bow.

If he’d been going to loose that arrow, he would have done so when Ware had been standing staring up at him in despair.

He could have killed him and it would have been over. He could have returned to the Temple, and the secret would have been safe.

The Grand Master would have said not taking that shot was a betrayal of the Temple. With Ware dead and unable to defend Dundragon, he would have given the order for the stronghold to be razed to the ground and all its inhabitants murdered.

Vaden returned the arrow to the quiver on his saddle. He had never been guided by the Grand Master, and he would not be now. He was the chosen executioner, and he would judge for himself who would have to die and who could live. He didn’t know for certain that Ware had revealed to anyone what he had seen in the storehouse. God knew enough blood had been spilled since that night.

He put spurs to his horse and reluctantly veered left to the path leading south. From there he could cut across the valley and be in Acre by tomorrow night. Another message had come from the Grand Master summoning him to a meeting at his encampment outside Acre. He had ignored the first one, but the man’s temper was explosive and erratic, so he had best try to soothe it before irreparable damage was done.