My Lady Jane (27 page)

Edward sighed. “All right. Come on.”

He turned to go.

Jane stepped forward. “Wait. You'll join us,” she said to Archer. “And it will be for one very simple reason.”

Everyone was looking at her now.

“Times are hard.” Jane hid her trembling hands behind her back and moved to stand before Archer. “You're a powerful band, but that doesn't make you immune to the world's problems. The
Pack is being hunted. You say you're not concerned about the mass burnings Mary has scheduled for the E∂ians, but I heard your voice catch when you talked about it. Likely some of those palace servants work for you, and you know there's nothing that you can do to help them. But Edward could help them. He could stop the huntings. The burnings. The endless circle of killing and being killed. If you align yourself with the king, it will benefit the entire Pack. Are you so full of pride that you don't see that?”

Archer lifted an eyebrow in Edward's direction, and Edward took the opportunity to puff out his chest. “If I regain my throne, the Pack will be pardoned, on the condition all illegal activities cease. And I will make this country safe for E∂ians. I swear it on my life.”

“Right. But why do you care so much about E∂ians?” Archer challenged.

“Because he
is
an E∂ian,” Jane said.

Archer's gaze swung appraisingly to Edward. “You? You're an E∂ian?”

“Yes.” Edward met the Pack leader's stare. “I am.”

“What creature?”

Edward looked down at his hands. “A type of bird. Like a falcon.”

The side of Archer's mouth curled up. “Interesting.”

“We do not make these promises lightly, Mister Archer,” Bess cut in, before the man could ask them to prove their E∂ian status and they'd all have to get naked. “A pardon, food, medical supplies,
coin, whatever you need: all will be made available to you.”

Archer's eyes flashed greedily. They'd done it, Jane thought. He would agree to fight alongside them.

“No, I don't think so,” he said after a long moment. “I just don't believe you're the kind of king I want to fight for.”

Edward was flabbergasted. “Why?”

“Let's be honest.” Archer leaned back in his chair. “The kingdom wasn't in the greatest shape before you allegedly died. Verities still hunted E∂ians. The authorities were corrupt. Even a shilling isn't worth what it used to be. You never did anything to help us then. You may be an E∂ian, and you act like you're the one in charge, but your ladies have been the ones making all the compelling arguments.” Archer gestured at the others in the tavern. “We have a decent life here. None of us want to risk our skins for someone who hasn't proven he's worth the effort.”

Edward took a deep breath. “How would you have me prove my worth?”

“There's something I want,” Archer said, and Jane suspected he'd had this in mind all along, maybe even before they'd made their initial plea. “If you can deliver this item, I will join you.”

“What is it?” Bess asked.

Archer looked at Gracie. “I want Gracie to return the item she stole from me.”

After a moment of surprise, Jane and Edward both turned to Gracie.

“Well?” said Jane.

“Go jump in a river,” Gracie said to Archer. “You're not getting it.”

“It belongs to the leader of the Pack,” he argued.

“It was Ben's, and he'd have wanted me to have it.”

“Er, Gracie, the fate of the kingdom is at stake,” Edward murmured, but she ignored him.

“I offered you ten sovereigns for it,” Archer said. “You could buy a hundred knives with that.”

“A knife?” Edward gaped at Gracie. “The bounty was over a knife?”

“
My
knife.” Gracie's hand went to the pearl-handled knife strapped to her hip. “I can't give it up. I won't.”

Jane thought all this fuss over a knife was a bit excessive, even if it was an attractive weapon, to be sure. But then Edward sighed and touched Gracie's shoulder. “All right.” He turned to Archer. “There must be something else I can give you.”

Archer's eyes went back and forth from Edward to Gracie, stopping at where Edward's hand rested on the girl's shoulder. He scowled. “I want the knife. There is nothing else I desire.”

“The knife is not mine to give. It's Gracie's,” Edward said. “But there must be something else. A task, perhaps. Something
I
could do for you.”

There was a heavy silence throughout the room. Finally, Archer laughed and said, “All right, then. Kill the Great White Bear of Rhyl.”

Jane scoffed. “That's an absurd demand. The Great White
Bear is a myth. I've read every book on the subject, and all the experts agree that the beast is nothing more than a fiction.” Legend had it that the Great White Bear was tall as the Cliffs of Dover. As wide as the English Channel. Mothers and fathers often told their children the Bear would come after them if they didn't go to bed on time or do their chores, but that was all. An old wives' tale. A fable.

“Oh, the bear is real, all right.” One of the men at a table pointed to a set of long scars that ran down the side of his face. Claw marks. “It doesn't live but a few miles from here. It attacks this village regularly. Steals food. Plunders far more than the Pack does.”

Archer gave a rueful grin. “That's my condition. Kill the bear. Take it or leave it.”

“Excuse us for a moment.” Edward gestured for Bess, Gracie, and Jane to join him in the corner. They huddled together and spoke in low voices. “What do you think?”

“The GWBR?” Jane shook her head. “I don't believe it exists.”

“Or it does exist, and Archer's just trying to get me killed for his own amusement,” Edward said grimly.

“Either way, it's a diversion.” Bess frowned. “We have France to see to. A country to regain. We don't have time for a goose chase—or a bear hunt.”

Edward nodded. “I know. But if it's the only way to get the Pack on our side . . .”

“What about the knife?” Jane snapped. “Let's just give him the stupid knife.”

Grace straightened. “My knife is not stupid. It's the only thing I have left of Ben. Archer only wants it because he knows that.”

“You're not giving him the knife.” Edward reassured Gracie. Of course. He liked her. He was showing off. And Archer was competition. But this was
not
the time to go around proving his dominance.

“The question remains.” Bess kept her eyes on her brother. “Do we do it?”

“You said before—we probably don't have enough men to take on Mary's army,” Edward's jaw tightened. “We need them. Whatever it takes.”

He stepped out of the huddle and faced Archer once more. “Very well. I'll do it.”

Archer glanced from Gracie to Jane to Bess to Edward, and at last gave a slow, easy nod. “Fine. We have a deal.” He slammed a fist down on the bar. “Time to celebrate!”

While the others passed drinks all around, Jane went outside to move the horses into the stable, and to tell Gifford the news.

They were going to fight a mythic bear.

TWENTY-FOUR

Gifford

As soon as the sun touched the horizon, G flashed into a human, and Jane hurried him inside and started talking. Fast.

“You heard me tell you we're going to kill the GWBR?” He nodded, and she embraced him quickly, for their time was short. “Good. Now, I've saved all my bear knowledge for when you're human so you'll remember easier. Firstly, bears are always hungry. So when you encounter the bear, don't act like food.”

“Huh?”

“I read it in a book last summer, called—”

G held up a hand. “Don't tell me the name! No time.”

“Right. As I was saying, bears are always hungry. Try not to act like food.”

“How does one act like food?”

“I'm simply telling you what I know.” Anticipating her change, she adjusted her skirt underneath her cloak, and in her haste, she flashed G the briefest of glimpses of the milky white skin of her leg.

G stopped breathing.

“The next thing you should do is try to make yourself appear bigger than you are.”

G didn't say anything; he still wasn't breathing. Because, soft skin.

“Maybe hold your cloak above your head. Or puff out your chest. G, are you listening?”

G squeezed his eyes shut and scratched his forehead and tried to focus on bears and not skin. “Yes. Don't act like food, make myself look bigger. Anything else to add?”

“Yes. Use anything at your disposal to defend yourself. Rocks, sticks, anything. Only don't bend down to pick it up, because then you'll appear smaller and more vulnerable.”

G sighed. “So, grab any weapons that happen to be at shoulder level.”

There was a knock at the door and Edward stuck his head in, Gracie and Bess standing just behind him. G waved them in.

Jane kept talking. “And if worse comes to worst, play dead. But if the bear starts licking your wounds, that means he's planning on eating you, and you should do something else.”

“So, play dead unless he starts eating me.”

She shrugged helplessly. “I'll do whatever I can, of course. I'll distract him and then run up a tree to safety.”

G shot a look toward Edward, surprised that the king had let her believe she would be accompanying them. Edward smiled in a she's-not-my-wife-I-shouldn't-have-to-tell-her-no kind of way.

Should G inform her that she wasn't coming? The last time he'd told her that, she'd come anyway, and she'd gotten hurt.

He wasn't about to let that happen again.

Jane didn't notice the exchange of glances. “I have the perfect way to distract the bear,” she said. “I read in a book once that bears can't turn their heads very far in either direction, so I was thinking I could climb up onto his back and pull his fur, and he'll spin about trying to get me, and that's when you and Edward can go in for the kill.”

It was almost dark. They had only seconds before Jane would change. G had to tell her. “You won't be there.”

“How will I not be there?” She narrowed her eyes at him.

“How? Because you're not coming.”

“Oh, I'm going with you. I won't have it any other way. Tell him, Edward.”

Edward scratched the back of his neck, but he didn't answer. When she realized she would be getting no help from her cousin, she turned back to G. “You are my husband, not my master.”

“Yes, my lady,” he said. “You will always get your way. Except for right in this instance. And any others which may endanger your life.”

“Gifford Dudley, you do not get to decide when my life may or may not be in danger.”

G bowed his head. “Of course, Jane. And in the future, I will most definitely keep that in mind. But not tonight.”

Jane pressed her lips together in a thin line. “You can't stop me.”

His eyes happened upon an empty birdcage in the corner of the room. “And I would never dream of it. Except tonight, when I will do whatever it takes to stop you, even if it means locking you up.”

“You wouldn't dare!”

“Not even if a hundred Carpathian bulls threatened to trample me. Except tonight, of course, I'm going to have to lock you up unless you promise not to come with us.”

She gasped in outrage. “You can't treat me like this! You can't catch me!” she said with enough force that the air around her trembled. With a flash, she was a ferret, but G was ready to pounce. Before she could shake off the disorienting haze of the transformation, he had her by the scruff.

“I would never treat you like this,” he whispered in her ear. “Except tonight.”

Then he placed the squirming ferret inside the cage and latched it.

“Are you sure you want to do that?” Gracie remarked. She and Bess had been silent up to then, but they looked tense.

“I'm sure,” G said, and he was. “I want you to promise me that you won't let her out. That you'll protect her.”

The princess nodded and settled into a chair beside Jane's
cage. “I suppose this time we're actually staying behind to guard Jane. I'd object, but I don't know how I'd be useful in a bear hunt.”

“I won't let her out,” Gracie agreed. “But she is going to murder you later, I think.”

She sat down at the edge of the bed.

“Wait, Bess
and Gracie
are both going to stay behind?” Edward looked startled. “Why shouldn't Gracie come? She'd be useful.”

“I don't trust the Pack,” said Gracie. “Especially Archer. I should stick around here in case he's up to something while you're gone. Keep an eye on him. And Bess can stay with Jane to make sure she doesn't ferret her way out of that cage.”

“Can you use
ferret
as a verb?” G asked.

She shrugged. “You can now.”

Edward's eyebrows were furrowed.

“Sire?” G said. “Are you troubled?”

“No. Everything is fine. With Gracie. Staying behind. With the Pack. And . . . Archer. That's fine.”

“Right,” G said slowly. He picked up his sword. “We are off, then?”

“Without hesitation,” Edward said.

And for a few moments, they hesitated. Then they were off.

It was just G and the king, then, alone on this quest, and as the dirt path passed beneath them, G could not help the niggling memory that had been pricking at the back of his brain ever since they'd arrived at Helmsley. It was the image of his half-conscious wife
pushing him out of the way so she could get to Edward. Yes, she had believed her cousin was dead, and it must have come as a happy shock to see him alive.

And yet, the niggling thought . . . well . . . niggled.

G remembered how close he'd been to losing her. How weak she'd been. How much blood she'd lost. It wasn't until her eyes had fluttered open that G realized the hold she had on his heart.

But then she had stopped just short of shoving him out of the way because she'd seen Edward. It turned out that the most important person to her, the one she wanted to embrace upon defying death, was Edward. Her dearest and most beloved friend—wasn't that how she'd phrased it in the letter?

Maybe hunting a legendary bear would be a welcome distraction from his thoughts, which he was sure were irrational. After all, Jane had never come right out and said that she was in love with Edward, and she was the type to tell him how things stood. And Gifford knew she was fond of him—he did. She smiled at him. She always hugged him after the change. She tried to translate his horse-thoughts to the others.

But she'd signed that letter to Edward with “all my love.”

Yes. Hunting bears. Right. Here they were.

But that niggling thought still niggled.

And of course he was happy that her dear cousin was alive, but it was also a bit troubling. After all, G knew from Edward's pre-wedding talk, the one that went something like, “Hurt my cousin and I'll kill you, even if I'm dead,” that Edward loved Jane,
and maybe in more than a cousin kind of way. Perhaps he'd only betrothed Jane to G because he was dying, and now that he wasn't dying, perhaps he regretted the arranged marriage, and perhaps Jane was thinking the same thing.

Oh Lord. Too many
perhaps
es. Perhaps he should focus on how to kill a giant bear.

But then G wanted to ask Edward about his feelings toward Jane, and, more specifically, what the two of them did while he was a horse and they were alone and human.

G did not like to entertain the thought of all the hours they'd had to spend together while he was a horse. But he was the one who was actually married to Jane, he reminded himself. Not only that, but kestrels were hunting birds, and would no sooner hesitate to eat a ferret than they would a squirrel. There. G was her husband, and Edward might eat her. Those were two very good reasons why Jane should stay with G. And hair! G couldn't believe he'd forgotten about his full and rich locks that outshone the sad ponytails of most other men in the kingdom. Even the king's.

So, he was her husband, Edward might eat her, and no one's hair could rival his.

G sighed. None of that could really compete with the King of England.

So instead of asking Edward those questions, he said, “Did Jane tell you all she knows about bears?”

“Yes,” the king replied. “Don't act like food, inexplicably double your height and weight, and play dead unless it doesn't work.”

“She didn't, perhaps, mention how we might kill the beast?”

“No,” Edward said. “Her information was more the useless type.”

They traveled onward in silence for a while, until—

“Sire, you love Jane.” G hadn't meant to blurt it out, but there it was.

“Of course I do. She's family.”

“But you, Your Majesty, I think,
love
her love her.”

Edward didn't protest, although he looked a little confused, possibly due to the phrasing.

G let the rest spill out. “And I know you arranged for our marriage at a time when you thought you would die, and now you're not going to die, and if you want her for yourself, I will step aside. I will do the honorable thing.” His voice cracked in an embarrassing way at the end.

“Gifford,” the king said.

“Call me G,” G said.

The king ignored him. “Your wife loves you.”

G looked at the king and raised an eyebrow.

“She does. She leaves your favorite apples in the stables, even though she has to walk over a mile to get them. She brushes your mane, and is meticulous about picking the burrs out of your coat.”

“That's all just logical horse maintenance.” G lowered his eyes. “She didn't want me to be her king. She didn't want me ruling by her side.”

“That was when she didn't know who to trust. Believe me, Gifford, Jane loves you.”

G was silent for a moment, hoping it was true.

“At least, she loved you before you threw her in a cage.”

And there was that.

Edward was quiet for a moment and then sighed. G thought he might be about to confess something. Like how even though yes, Jane loved G (or so Edward claimed), that was just too bad because the king was in love with Jane, too, and now it was going to be G's duty as a citizen of England to give her up to the king. For the sake of the country.

“What did you think of Gracie?” Edward said, while at the same time G blurted out, “You can't have her!”

“Sorry, who?” G said.

“Gracie.”

“Oh. I like her.”

Edward pressed his lips together and nodded. “And that whole thing with Thomas Archer . . . You don't suppose that there's anything between them?”

“Jane said Gracie wouldn't give up the knife.”

“No, I mean romantically.”

“Ah. Romantically. Well, Jane mentioned Archer was Gracie's ex, so I suppose there used to be something romantic between them.”

Edward's shoulders slumped.

G added, “As for whether it's still there, I don't know. But
then, I wasn't actually
inside
the tavern when they were in the same room.”

Edward sighed again. “I wish I knew what to say to her. Every time I try to tell her how I feel, I end up looking stupid.”

G literally sighed in relief. Praise the heavens above—Edward fancied Gracie! Of course he did! Gracie was very fetching, if you liked that kind of beauty. G preferred redheads, of course. Warm brown eyes. Soft skin. Bookish. Opinionated. But Gracie was lovely; yes, he could concede that.

G wanted to sing, he was so happy. And he knew just what Edward meant about looking stupid. “Yes, well, love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind,” he said.

“What?” Edward gazed at him blankly.

“I mean to say, the course of true love never did run smooth,” G clarified. That was good, he thought. He'd have to write that down later.

“Is that from a play?” Edward asked.

“No, it's . . . um . . . just a thought I had.”

“Hmm. You're a bit of a poet, aren't you?” the king said.

G felt heat rise in his face. “I dabble.”

“I like poetry,” said the king. “And plays. I used to put on little theatricals at the palace. If we survive this, and if I get my crown back, and if there's time, I'd like to open a theater someday.”

“If we survive this, you totally should,” G agreed.

They both tightened their grips on their swords and coughed
in a manly way that meant that they weren't scared of a silly old bear. “Do you know any poems about courage?” Edward asked after a moment.

G didn't. He endeavored to make something up. “Um . . . cowards die many times before their deaths,” he said. “The valiant never taste of death but once. Screw your courage to the sticking-place, and we'll not fail.”

“The sticking-place?”

G shrugged. “It's the best I could do on such short notice.”

“That's good,” commented Edward. “You should write that down.”