The Faithful Heart (43 page)

Jack didn’t have time to answer before
another door burst open and Toby and Joanna rushed out. “The house
is surrounded,” Toby told them as Madeline joined them, dressed in
a shift. “We could see them out the window. They have torches and
swords.”

He didn’t need to hear anything more. He drew
his sword from its sheath and sprinted down the hall towards the
small gallery at the top of the stairs. The others rushed after
him. The edge of the carpet under one of the windows near the front
door was blazing with flames that were already licking their way up
the wall and catching on a tapestry beside the fireplace. Simon
dashed out from the hallway leading towards his room with a
blanket. His teeth were bared in a snarl as he swatted at the
flames.

Jack jumped the last few steps, spinning to
the wall and yanking another tapestry off of its fastenings to join
Simon in beating the flames. Madeline herded Aubrey and Joanna away
from the center of the room towards the hallway. Aubrey’s face
contorted in a sharp wince. Toby ran for the front door. He threw
it open and moved to charge through when a crossbow bolt smacked
into the doorframe with a loud thwump and a crack. With a yelp of
shock he jumped back, slamming the door shut.

“There are dozens of them!” He stumbled back
towards the women.

Another loud crack split the air as a
crossbow bolt smashed through the hall’s other window, shattering
the glass and ricocheting off the wall near the stairway. Jack
whipped around with his sword drawn as if he could do something
about it. “Oy, they’re supposed to be at Windale!”

His glance shot to Madeline’s as she backed
further down the hall with Aubrey and Joanna. He dropped the
tapestry, leaving Simon to fight the fire, and took one step
towards the women before a flaming ball came tumbling through the
newly broken window. It landed on the floor and shattered with a
blast, a wall of flame spitting up between him and his wife. He
jumped back, singed by the new conflagration. Toby fell on the
other side of the fire and scrambled towards his sister and
Aubrey.

Simon’s head shot up in alarm when he saw the
new fire but he continued to battle the flames of the first one.
Jack scrambled for the tapestry he’d dropped as the smoke grew
thicker and stung at his throat. He coughed hard as his hand closed
around the charred cloth of the tapestry. When he raised it he saw
that it was consumed in flames itself. He dropped it and reached
for Simon just as a third fire bomb came crashing through the
window, blasting into a sheet of flames against the stairway.

“Oy!” he shouted at his friend, voice
strangled by coughing. He grabbed Simon by the arm and pulled him
away from the fire. He couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Simon didn’t need to hear anything else. The two men rushed through
the burning room towards the hall. Jack covered his face and jumped
through the growing wall of fire to reach the hallway and Madeline.
She grasped at his arm and pulled him on towards the back of the
house as Simon pushed his way through the flames behind them.
Aubrey stood only a few steps behind and yanked Simon to safety as
they all rushed to the still untouched pantry where Toby and Joanna
waited.

“They aren’t in the garden,” Toby told the
two coughing, blackened men, eyes wide with alarm. “At least I
can’t see anyone out there. We can escape!”

Jack pushed his way out of Madeline’s grip
and past Toby to the door. Trying to be quick and cautious he
cracked the door and stuck his head out into the early-dawn light.
The garden was empty but he could see flickers of flames, signs
that the manor house wasn’t the only building being torched. He
pulled his head back inside as billows of smoke reached the pantry
from the main hall. “It’s clear,” he addressed Simon, eyes hard,
“but not for long.”

“We can’t fight them if they have distance
weapons,” Simon strode past the others to look out the door
himself. He cracked it open again. “We have a clear shot to the
orchard,” he turned to face Jack, eyes resting on Aubrey and then
Madeline. “From there we can secure the women in the
storehouse.”

Jack nodded and sprang into action. He took
Madeline’s hand in his left hand while holding up his sword with
the right. “Quietly as we can,” he told her, eyes traveling on to
Joanna, Aubrey, Toby. They all nodded as he pushed open the door
with his shoulder. He scrambled into the garden with Madeline,
running as fast as he could with her in tow. Toby took Joanna’s
hand and followed, a struggling Aubrey and Simon bringing up the
rear.

With the orchard to hide them Jack changed
direction. He slowed enough to pick their way through the
low-hanging branches. Above the trees they could see the outline of
the manor house, tongues of flame dancing up through its roof.
“Bloody hell!” he muttered, picking up the pace.

They continued to dodge through the trees,
but Aubrey and Simon were falling behind. When they reached the
edge of the orchard near the storehouse Jack stopped and turned
back to the heart of the village. Dark, swarthy men with swords and
crossbows clustered around the house like a swarm of wasps
attacking. Sitting high atop a horse in the middle of them was the
unmistakable figure of Lydia.

There was no time for rage. His heart leapt
to his throat when a tight cluster of villagers rushed at the
attackers from the side. The scar-faced man with the crushed nose,
Connor, rallied a gang of men and charged them. Men shouted battle
cries on both sides as they met with a clash of steal against steal
and wood.

“They don’t stand a chance,” Simon shouted as
he caught up.

Jack’s face hardened with grim realization.
He thought of the men and women that had become his responsibility,
the faces of the forest people who had looked to him for help, the
girl Kitty. None of them stood a chance. “I know,” he tightened his
grip on his sword. “Come on.”

He grabbed Madeline’s hand and sprinted with
her out of the orchard and across the road, to the storehouse. All
six of them crossed the distance unseen and pressed themselves up
against the side of the building. They watched the pitiful
resistance the villagers of Kedleridge were putting up a hundred
yards away down the road with wide eyes. The manor house was
engulfed in flames along with two or three buildings close by. A
second mounted figure shouted with mad rage at the burning house,
Roderick.

Simon stopped dead, arms dropping to his
sides, when he recognized his son. “Come on!” Jack shouted, pushing
Madeline, Toby, and Joanna into the safety of the storehouse.
Aubrey groaned and followed them, but he had to grab Simon’s shirt
and tug him hard to snap his attention back to preserving himself.
“You can deal with it later!”

The storehouse was stacked high with crates
of produce and bundles of grain. Jack herded the others deeper into
the heart of the vast room. It was little consolation that the
walls of apples and plums would be able to protect them from stray
crossbow bolts. “Oy, I’ll give Ethan this much. He was right. They
attacked at dawn.”

“I thought they were going to attack Windale,
not us.” Madeline rushed to him, grabbing his arm for comfort.

“We were wrong.” He held her tighter, feeling
helpless. How long would it be before Lydia and Roderick or Connor
and his goons figured out they weren’t in the house? How long until
they came looking, torches, crossbows, swords and all? They
couldn’t hold out against those odds. “We need a plan.” He turned
to Simon.

“Our plan is at Windale!” Aubrey snapped,
following her words with a grunt of pain that doubled her over.

All eyes snapped to her. Jack connected the
dots moments later. “No!” he rounded on her. “You are not having a
baby, do you understand?”

Aubrey glared at him, ready to tear his
throat out. “Somebody has to get Crispin!” she snarled back, her
voice cracking. Bloody hell. Aubrey was scared.

“I’ll go,” Toby volunteered in an
instant.

“No!” Joanna clamped her hands around his
arm. “Toby you can’t leave me. You’re all I have left!”

Sharp pain in his eyes, Toby hugged his
sister and looked deep into her eyes. “I’m the only one who can go.
I’ll be useless if I stay here.”

Jack rushed to Toby. There wasn’t time for a
scene. “It’s only about fifteen minutes if you run the whole way.
Can you do it?”

Toby nodded, steeling his nerves for what he
had to do.

“Here,” Aubrey forced through clenched teeth,
sweat breaking out on her forehead. “Take my sword.” She thrust it
into his hands then staggered back to sit on the ground, Madeline
helping her, eyes wide and numb with alarm. “I want it back.”

Toby stared at the sword in his hands.
Resolve hardened his usually kind face. He glanced up to Jack with
a nod, then turned to Joanna. “I love you, you know.”

Joanna nodded, tears streaming down her face.
“I know.”

Toby rushed forward to kiss her on the cheek,
then turned and dashed out of the storehouse and into the
brightening dawn. For several minutes they were all silent. Jack
drew in a breath then turned to Simon. “Our people are out there
getting slaughtered,” he told him. Simon stared back at him,
understanding. They both knew what they had to do. He turned to
Madeline. “Build a shelter out of the crates,” his voice was hard
as stone, eyes passing over the other two women as well. “They’ll
hide you and they’ll take longer to burn.”

“Wait, Jack, no!” Madeline jumped up from her
place at Aubrey’s side. “What are you going to do?”

“Protect you.”

“Jack, no!” She clutched at his shirt, green
eyes wild. “Stay with me! Stay with me!”

It broke his heart, but he had to pry her off
of him. He sighed in agony and pulled her closer, kissing her, eyes
closed, before pushing her back and drawing the second sword in his
belt. She clutched at the rosary around her neck as he turned and
nodded to Simon. Without hesitation the two men jumped into action,
sprinting for the storehouse door and out into the chaos of the
morning.

Toby’s lungs burned as he ran down the hill
from Kedleridge into Windale. The silence over Windale, almost
peaceful, was an eerie contrast to what he knew was going on behind
him. In the dim light he could see scores of men sleeping out,
their swords at the ready. Several were already awake. Crispin was
among them. As he ran Toby could see him pacing among the men, eyes
on the Derby road. Ethan sat on a horse close to him.

“Help!” Toby shouted, waving his arms as he
gasped for breath. “Help!”

Crispin turned. He scowled when he saw Toby.
That scowl hardened into something much worse when his gaze shot
past Toby to the sky over the hill. Toby slowed down and checked
over his shoulder. There was a flickering light over the crest of
the hill, almost like dawn but coming from the wrong direction.

Toby jumped in fright as Crispin charged
towards him, face as black as his clothes, sword drawn. He forced
himself not to run from the man but to shout, “They’re being
attacked! There are dozens of them! They’ve burned the manor!” He
couldn’t get out another word before Crispin was on him.

“Aubrey! Is she alive?”

Toby recoiled when it looked like Crispin
would just as soon run him through as hug him. “They’re in the
storehouse! She’s in labor!”

Crispin didn’t even break stride as he shot
past him and on towards Kedleridge. Toby spun as he shot past,
nearly losing his grip on Aubrey’s sword. When he recovered enough
to run further on the path he was met by Ethan riding towards him.
“Ethan!” His chest burst with joy and relief.

“Toby!” Ethan called back, pulling his horse
to a stop. “Where’s Joanna?”

Every ounce of fear and danger poured back
over Toby and his knees felt so weak he was afraid he’d fall.
“She’s in the storehouse, in Kedleridge.” He rushed towards his
master. “They burned down the manor house but Jack and Simon got us
all out. Ethan, there are dozens of them. Dozens! They need help
and they need it now or-”

“We have to help them,” Ethan reached out his
hand. He rushed forward and grabbed it as Ethan pulled him up to
sit on the horse in back of him. From the back of the horse he
could just see over the ridge of the hill and into the village of
Windale. The soldiers were rising in the midst of the sudden panic.
They scattered for their horses and weapons like ants awaken from
an anthill. Tom had found a horse and a sword and rode through the
men, shouting for them to hurry and mount up. It was all he needed
to see and all he had a chance to see. Ethan kicked his horse
forward and began to gallop back down the path in the direction of
the thickening smoke coming from Kedleridge.

Jack and Simon kept to the shadows along the
side of the buildings stretching up the road from the storehouse to
the conflagration of the manor house. “Oy!” Jack tossed his second
sword to his friend as they tried to go unnoticed as long as
possible. “You’re gonna need this, mate.”

Simon caught the sword and closed his hand
around the hilt. The morning sunlight was now pouring down on them,
lighting the lopsided battle that spread through the streets around
the crossroads in the center of the village. Atop his horse
Roderick had turned and noticed them making their approach. His
eyes grew wide with energy and he yanked his horse’s reins to turn
the beast, then galloped towards them. Simon raised his weapon in
time to deflect the blow that his son hammered down on him as he
tore past. The force of the impact caused both of them to drop
their swords. Simon stumbled.

Jack lunged to help him, but the sickening
thunk of a crossbow bolt slamming into his thigh spun him around
and threw him to the ground. He cried out in pain and clutched at
the thick bolt that protruded from his leg as another bolt whizzed
through the air where his head had been seconds before and a third
tore through his shirt, grazing his arm. He looked to Simon in time
to see him lunge and roll towards his dropped sword. He grabbed it
as Roderick jerked his horse to a stop and dismounted, pulling his
long dagger from his belt.