The Dark Knight (22 page)

He cupped her cheek and kissed first her lower lip, and then her top, and then both lips together when she recovered enough to kiss him in return. He drew back before she could lead him too far astray. There was a little V between her brows and she wouldn’t meet his gaze. “What are you thinking?”

“I scarce know what to think,” she murmured. Her lashes lifted and the wary look was back in her eyes. “Yesterday you did not want me. Today you do. I am … confused.”

“Yesterday I was still trying to resist you.” He stroked her cheek with the tips of his fingers and watched her
eyes lose focus, and then she gave him an enchanting little shiver. “I should have known it was a pointless cause, me, trying to be noble.”

She made a sound of disagreement, and then her teeth worried at her lower lip. Uncertainty. “Did I truly seduce you last night?”

“Aye.” He couldn’t help but smile. She was seducing him right now.

“That was not my intent,” she admitted.

“I know,” he said. “You do not have to try very hard. Actually, you do not have to try at all. God help me when you intentionally set out to seduce me. You will leave me in ashes.”

Her lips curved upward. If she only knew the power she could wield over him. “I will try not to distract you again … when you do not wish to be distracted.”

“Mm.” Aye, she was more dangerous than she knew. It was time to move them both away from their bed before he weakened and decided to spend the day there. “Now is one of those times when I do not wish to be distracted. We need to eat and be on our way.”

“Oh.” She looked startled, as if she had forgotten where they were. “Of course. I will get my things.”

“Just leave those,” he said, when she began to gather up her cloak and saddlebag. He stood up and then held aside a handful of willow branches, indicating that she should precede him. “Rami will pack the horses while we eat. Let us refresh ourselves then find some food.”

She caught her lower lip between her teeth and hesitated. One of her fainter blushes stained her cheeks and he guessed the problem easily enough.

“Do not tell me you lack the courage to face a boy?” he teased. “A woman who fled her home with no more than a rucksack and braved the night of the Witches’ Sabbath in the wilderness is afraid to face a child?”

“I am not afraid of him,” she said, as she lifted her chin. “I am simply embarrassed. You should be as well.”

“I am a man. We do not get embarrassed over such matters.” He placed his hand on her waist and ushered her out of their cozy lair. “Trust me, everything with Rami will be fine.”

The view beyond the willow tree was nothing unexpected to him, but he allowed Avalene a few moments to get her bearings and let her eyes adjust from the shade to the bright sunlight. The tree they had slept under stood in the midst of a small clearing of deep green grass, spiked here and there with tall clumps of golden straw that had survived the winter in haphazard fashion. Behind them was a ridge where Oliver would be keeping a lookout. Ahead of them the grass grew gradually shorter then disappeared entirely, replaced by dark, mottled stone as the clearing gave way to a bluff. Armand sat cross-legged near the edge of the bluff with Rami seated next to him, both turned away from Dante as they studied the seemingly endless vista that encompassed a gently sloping valley and the lush forest.

The sight was breathtaking and the exact reason he had chosen this vantage point—to make certain they could see an enemy’s approach from miles away and flee at the first sign of danger. He wondered if Avalene would realize his strategy and question him. A knight filled with pride and honor would stand and fight to protect those in his care, no matter the cost. He was not a man of honor. Those who ran lived to fight another day.

Armand glanced over his shoulder, nudged Rami, and they both rose to face them. Although Oliver and Armand were his two most trusted men, they were nothing alike in looks or temperament. Oliver had the rough, hard-bitten look of a common soldier while Armand had a very youthful, angelic-looking face that made
women of all ages sigh. Ironically, Oliver had the softer heart of the two while Armand’s ruthlessness often approached that of Dante’s. He kept a close eye on Avalene to see how she would react to the handsome knight.

Surprisingly, she seemed to have eyes only for the boy, but her expression was one of confusion. He looked to Rami and realized something was definitely wrong. The boy’s face had lost all color and he began backing away in a pace that matched their approach.

“ ’Tis the woman in red,”
Rami said in Italian, now holding up both hands as if that could halt Avalene’s progress.

“Why is he looking at me that way?” Avalene asked.

“ ’Tis the same woman you just saw beneath the tree,”
Dante told him, also speaking Italian.
“What is wrong with you?”

“I did not see her face,”
Rami breathed, as he began to back away from them.
“Her face. ’Tis identical to the face on the card Oliver showed me.”
He began to back away faster as Avalene reached out to him.
“Do not touch me, jinni!”

The words were scarcely spoken when Rami’s heel caught on a rock and he began to tumble backward toward the edge of the bluff. Before Dante could reach the boy, Armand had his shoulder down and he rammed into Rami, knocking him sideways and sending him hard into the rocks. For a moment, no one moved, no one spoke.

“What on earth?” Avalene pressed her hands over her heart, and then rushed to the boy’s side. Armand stood up and brushed gravel away from his knees as she knelt down next to Rami. The boy’s head rolled back when she tried to lift him and it became obvious he had hit his head on the rock ledge and lost consciousness.

“There is no blood and he is still breathing,” she said,
as she carefully turned his head to reveal a nasty lump that was already forming near his temple. “Do you have any cold cloths I could use to bind his wound?”

Dante just stared at her. Did she seriously think he had cold cloths sitting around, waiting for use on an injury? A single jerk of his head sent Armand to search out the supplies.

“That was the strangest thing,” she said, as she patted the boy’s hand. “It was almost as if he were afraid of me. I heard him call me ‘the woman in red,’ which is plainly obvious from my clothing, and then something about my face. What else did he say to you?”

“He is afraid of you,” Dante said, frowning at the boy. He might as well tell her that much, since Rami was unlikely to be any fonder of her when he awoke. “You remind him of a picture he once saw of a
jinni
, an evil Arab spirit that sometimes masquerades as a beautiful woman.”

“You must tell him I am not evil!” She looked from Dante to the boy. “I suppose he will be frightened all over again if he awakens to find me hovering.” She stood up and moved to stand next to Dante. “You must see to his injury.”

“There is nothing to ‘see’ to,” he pointed out. “I will wrap his head when Armand returns, but there is little more to be done. ’Tis nothing more than a bump.”

Avalene placed her hands on his side and actually tried to push him toward the boy. “You must sit with him until he awakens. Every injured child should have someone to sit with them.”

He wanted to ask who had left her alone when she was ill. Instead he reached out and took hold of her wrists, pulling her away from his side and back toward Rami. “You are the woman. Tending children is not a man’s job when there is a woman available. Rami will
overcome his fear soon enough when he realizes you intend him no harm, and then you can dress his wound.”

“Ahgh.”
Rami began to stir. A moment later his eyes opened and then he tried to strike out at Avalene. Dante doubted Rami was even aware of his actions, but he had the boy’s arms pinned to the ground before Avalene could draw a startled breath.

“You will never raise your hand to this lady nor call her insulting names,”
Dante told him in Italian.
“Do you understand?”

“Ah-aye, my lord.”

“How do you feel?”

Rami gave Avalene a look that said he would rather be in a viper pit than be this close to her, but to his credit he gave a sigh of resignation and then gingerly felt his head.
“The light hurts my eyes, and now there is a demon inside my head, beating upon my skull with a hammer.”

“Is he all right?” asked Avalene. “Do you have a wineskin or something else he can drink?”

“Aye,” Dante said. “There is a wineskin next to my saddle beneath the tree. Will you get it for him?”

Avalene nodded, and then she was off to fetch the wineskin.

Dante spoke quickly, running his words together in the hope that Avalene would not be able to translate their meaning even if she overheard them.
“She understands a little Italian. Be careful what you say in her presence. Saying nothing at all would be best. Understand?”

“I am sorry, master,”
Rami said in a low voice. He gave Avalene’s retreating figure another worried look.
“Oliver showed me the cards and told me—”

“No harm was done except to yourself,”
Dante said. “
Still, you have insulted her. That will never happen
again. To prove your remorse, you will let her care for you and act grateful.”

Another nod, this one tinged with a look of fear.
“I will not fail you again, my lord. Please, let me prove myself worthy.”

“Do not prove yourself a burden,”
Dante warned.

Armand returned about the same time as Avalene, holding what had once been a finely woven linen shirt that was now a neat stack of dripping wet bandages. He laid them on the grass near Rami, and then turned to Dante. “Should I help Oliver ready the horses?”

“Aye, we should have left at daybreak,” Dante said.

“He cannot ride,” Avalene countered. “Look at his eyes. There is something not yet right with him.”

“He looks fine to me.”

“He needs to rest.”

“Absolutely not.” He gave Rami’s shoulder a gentle prodding and spoke again in Italian.
“Can you ride?”

“Aye, my lord.”
Rami struggled to his feet, ignoring Avalene’s outstretched hand. He wobbled back and forth in his efforts to steady himself, looking as if he were a drunken villager on May Day. He sank back down to the ground and knelt on the rock, breathing as hard as if he had just run a long race.
“I do not feel so good.”

Avalene had no need for the boy’s words to be translated. They became unfortunately obvious to everyone a moment later when Rami leaned forward and lost his breakfast.

“On second thought,” Dante said to Armand, “you might as well wait to get the horses ready.”

An hour later, there was little more to be done for the boy. Avalene announced the injury would require a day or two of rest before the boy’s nausea and dizziness would fade away. Armand had thrown sandy dirt over
the spot where Rami had become ill to smother the smell. Avalene had dressed the boy’s head and then gathered the necessary ingredients to make willow bark tea. Even now, Rami rested comfortably beneath the tree in the bed Dante had so recently vacated. All that remained was to wait for the swelling to go down.

Time was a precious commodity, but their vantage point would provide plenty of warning if they were being pursued. They could spare a day at most, Dante decided, as he eyed the midday sun. He would give the boy a day to recover and then they would continue the journey, one way or another.

In the meantime there was one chore he could do that would help set his mind at ease. He motioned for Armand to follow him up to the crest of the ridge where they found Oliver watching over the tethered horses and the valley to the east. It was his first real opportunity to speak to his men without Avalene underfoot and he assured them that all was going according to plan before he reviewed the specifics.

“There will be search parties set out by now from Coleway,” he told them. “The real Sir Percival will soon arrive and they will realize I have no intention of taking Avalene to Weston Castle. Faulke Segrave would be close by as well, and it’s possible he’s descended upon Coleway to offer his services to the search party. We must assume that one or more of the parties has thought to set out on the road to London. Indeed, ’tis the route they will first suspect once they realize she is not in the hands of the real Sir Percival. I am going to backtrack to see who is behind us. Armand, you will stay close to Rami and Avalene. Oliver, if I have not returned before moonrise, come look for me.”

“I had already started to prepare the horses for our
departure,” Oliver said. “Your horse is saddled and ready, my lord.”

“Excellent.”

“My lord, there is another solution to this problem,” Armand said, before Dante could stalk away from them. “The three of you could set out while I remain here with Rami. You could tell the lady that we will catch up with you in a day or two. If Rami does not recover quickly …” Armand lifted his shoulders in a way that left little doubt as to the boy’s fate should his injury linger.

“If that were my intention, I could eliminate the boy by slipping poison into the willow bark tea,” Dante told them. “He would simply appear to die of his head injury and Avalene would be none the wiser.”

He shook his head and actually felt a bit sorry for the boy; Rami’s luck had taken a decided turn for the worse. It was a matter of simple math; forfeit one life or five. Still, he had grown fond of Rami in the weeks since his rescue and he sensed that Avalene had a soft spot for the child as well. “Our press for time is not yet so urgent. I will give him today and this eve to recover himself, and then we will see where things stand. For now, Avalene seems to have taken an interest in the boy and that might prove useful.”

“Aye, my lord.”

“I will return early if I find a search party closer than I anticipate,” Dante said. “Otherwise, I will see you again around moonrise.”