The Last Arrow RH3 (16 page)

The arrow hiss-ssed straight and true to the center of the butt, but it was the explosive power behind the shot that caused the pale green eyes to narrow. The bolt struck the target with the force of an axe, sending the bale flying backward to crash and roll on the ground.

Renaud stared at it a moment, then touched a long, tapered finger to his eyebrow in a mock salute. "A fine shot. The target, like the tree yesterday, did not stand a chance."

"Had it been a man," she said calmly, "his leg would have been pinned to his horse and the bone shattered, even through armor."

"At fifty yards," Renaud conceded agreeably, "it is possible for a crossbow to accomplish the same thing."

"If the horseman agreed to bare his leg and hold himself still while the bowman set his shot. Meanwhile, I would have fired ten times and skewered ten more limbs."

"A confident enough boast, but would it hold true at a greater distance?"

"It might," she said, her eyes steady on his. "If there were enough incentive."

"That sounds like an invitation for a wager," he mused.

"How much do you have to squander?"

"In coin? Very little."

"I would settle for a few honest answers." He gave her a lopsided smile. "A higher price than you realize. What are you willing to wager in return?"

"What do you want?"

"I doubt you would be willing to pay it."

"Try me. I have been known to bid recklessly."

"Very well then." He glanced away for a brief moment, and when he faced her again some of the tightness in his jaw had relented and the guarded look in his eyes had softened to something verging on boyish mischief. "My prize ...

would be a long, sweet, unreserved kiss. With your hair loose and"—he grinned faintly—"your feet bare."

Brenna opened her mouth, closed it, then opened it again to release a small, pent-up breath. "Too much to ask?"

"What?"

"The bared feet... was it too much?"

Whatever she imagined she had seen in his eyes was gone, shielded again behind the hard, cynical gleam. His mouth was again set with a mocking curve and his brow assumed an ironic tilt that made her doubt she had glimpsed anything at all beneath the cold, impervious surface.

"The day you outshoot me, sirrah, I will lay naked on the grass and let you do what you will with me."

"Brave words, demoiselle."

"Backed by my oath of honor, I assure you."

"I will hold you to it," he warned gravely.

"I would expect nothing less."

He held out his hand, inviting her to shoot first. Brenna selected another arrow and moved to align herself with the target placed a hundred yards down the run. She held her bow arm rigid, nocked the arrow and drew the fletching back to her cheek, sighting but a moment before she snapped her fingers away from the string and fired at the second butt. This time she not only struck the center ring of the target but sent the arrow clear through it and into the grass several feet behind.

She relaxed her arms and looked at him, her own eyebrow crooked upward.

"Damned fine shot," he admitted reluctantly. "Difficult to match."

"Not for a man who claims to have no weaknesses."

"When in God's name did I claim that?"

He looked so perplexed she almost smiled. "Last night at the castle gates. Do I assume it was just an idle boast?"

He frowned and picked out another arrow, fitting it to his bow as he approached the line. This time he altered his stance to match Brenna's, and put all of the latent strength in his arms to good use, drawing, sighting, and firing with a fluid ease of motion that had her following the flight with a quick snap of her head.

The arrow struck the butt a finger's width from the first hole and well within the center ring. It went through the bale of straw as well and left the tip buried in the grass alongside Brenna's.

She stared at him and he accorded her a smile that would have had most women's tongues sliding down their chins.

"Lucky shot," he said, shrugging his big shoulders.

Beginning to suspect there was more than mere luck behind it, Brenna took half a dozen arrows from the quiver this time and stuck all but one upright in the dirt by her right foot. She fired all six, one barely leaving the string before the next was grasped, nocked, and drawn, sending all speeding in a slight arc toward the third and farthest butt, two hundred broad paces away. All six, the boys were quick to report, had struck in a cluster dead center of the target, the arrowheads jammed so close together the iron on some was bent.

"My compliments again," he said, bowing slightly from the waist.

"A child's trick. I could do it before I was ten." Something kindled in his eyes, she saw it a split second before he took up a single arrow and walked to the shooting line. He ground the heel of one boot into the dirt to set himself and raised the bow, the muscles across his back and In his arms bulging with the strain. At the last possible instant, the very moment his fingers released the string to launch the arrow, his gaze flicked away from the target and found Brenna. She did not look away. She did not even follow the flight of the arrow, for she suspected, even before the boys ran panting back across the green, what they would say.

Renaud's arrow, finding no space at the heart of the target, had traveled along the shaft of one of the earlier bolts, splitting it from end to tip and driving the arrowhead through the bale and into the wooden palisade behind. Proof was produced by one of the lads, a tow-headed, violently freckled youth who came scampering back with the split shaft and the two iron broadheads wedged fast together.

Brenna stared at the arrowheads, knowing on the one hand she had been duped, yet knowing also that no one— not Robin, not Will, possibly not even Gil Golden could have made that shot. Not at a hundred yards. Not even at fifty.

A gull swooped by, riding a current of air, screeching with laughter as it circled above the two unmoving figures.

Higher up, a ragged veil of clouds passed across the sun, and cast a brief bluish shadow over the bailey.

Griffyn Renaud leaned on the shank of the bow to unhook the string and disarm it. He brought it back to the bench and propped it beside the other, and when he straightened, he stood shoulder to shoulder with Brenna and inclined his head so that only she could hear what he whispered in her ear. Two bright spots of color blossomed in her cheeks. She had not moved since he had loosed the arrow; she did not move now as he took the liberty of tucking an errant curl behind her ear before he strolled casually away.

He doubted very much she would come. He had whispered the time and place in her ear before he had left the archery run, and reminded her to come barefoot, but he had no real expectations of seeing her there, despite the oath of honor she had given. Brenna Wardieu was no scullery wench or serving girl eager to tuck an extra coin in her cheek. She was not even the type of woman who appealed to him these days. She was too outspoken, too brazen, too loose by far with her wit and her tongue. Griffyn preferred his women round and lush and eager, with open thighs and closed mouths. The plainer the better too, for they expected nothing from someone like him and showed their?

gratitude in ways that left his skin singed.

This one was too damned clever for her own good and had suspected he was not what he appeared to be from the outset.

Mercenary. How she had spat the word off her tongue as if the mere saying of it tainted her. Since it was not likely she had had to beg for anything more serious than a second helping of sweetmeats, it was no wonder she could only look down her decidedly uptilted nose at someone who fell measurably short of her impression of what a noble, val-orous knight should be. Perhaps it was just as well she continued to think of him with such disdain and contempt, for he had come to Amboise as a dispassionate observer with never an intention of getting any closer to any member of the family than was absolutely necessary.

He had originally planned to approach the chateau on his own, but a brief foray into the village of Amboise had told him it would be nearly impossible to pass through the gates without drawing attention. Unlike some castles, where the sentries were so lax a man could live within the walls for months without anyone questioning his business there, it was obvious the Black Wolf guarded his privacy and took his family's safety seriously.

Griffyn had just returned to his campsite, just caught his evening meal when a bronzed forest nymph in the guise of Brenna Wardieu had stepped into the setting sun and insisted he accompany her to the chateau. Lucky for him he had held his instincts in check, for she had caused all manner of unforeseen reactions in his body—reactions he could not afford to let distract him.

She was not going to come to the archery run and for that he had the sense to be grateful. Experience had taught him harsh lessons against ever letting emotion govern his actions, and with Brenna Wardieu, the warning bells had gone off in his mind the first moment he had set eyes on her. They had gone off again, nearly deafening him, when the feel of her hands gliding over his oil-slicked body had all but caused him to explode into the furs. He had deliberately tried to frighten her then, to bring her to her senses and warn her away, but it had not exactly worked out the way he had anticipated. He had not expected her to taste so sweet and warm, or to have melted in his arms like a woman who had no inkling of the powers of her own sensuality. Angry with himself, he had returned to the keep and drunk himself stupid trying to clear the taste of her out of his mouth. He had diced with the brothers and won the eager services of a lusty wench, but the act had been perfunctory and unsatisfactory. Worse, the ache had still been with him, tight and fisted around his groin, when he had seen Brenna stride into the bailey that morning.

Madness had prompted him follow her to the archery run and madness had made him take up the bow and accept the smug challenge in the wide violet eyes. At least he could be thankful one of them had come to their senses and he would be able to put her out of his mind the way he put most things that spelled trouble and confusion out of his mind—things like a conscience, a soul, loyalty to anything or anyone other than himself. He needed to stay clear-headed and focused if he was going to succeed where others had failed with Robert Wardieu.

He needed to keep that bitter taste of revenge in his mouth if he was going to succeed in destroying the champion of Amboise.

To that end, he had watched Wardieu practicing in the yards today and had studied his every move. He was not deluding himself that it would be easy work or entirely without risk to his own neck. Wardieu's style of sitting, of leaning slightly forward and to the right, twisting at the last moment, had not changed much over the past five years, but Griffyn had been surprised to see how easily the champion tired, and he did not think it was all due to the quantity of ale and wine they had consumed last night.

Conversely, Wardieu would have only his memories to prepare him and five years eroded a good deal of sharpness from any man's mind, sometimes even adding embellishments that were never there. That was where Griffyn would have the distinct advantage for he had spent those same five years honing and sharpening his skills, learning to change his stance, to alter his attack to counter anything an opponent could throw at him. He could predict, just by studying the way a challenger sat in the saddle and how he held his lance, where the blow would come and how much conviction would be behind it, and after today's display, he was satisfied that Wardieu was good, but he was not unbeatable.

Griffyn looked down at the pale outline of his hand and flexed the scarred fingers, crushing them around the piece of straw he had been shredding to pass the time. She was not coming. He knew she was not coming, so why was he still out here in the damp midnight air leaning on a bale of hay contemplating his own foolishness?

He tossed the scrap aside and pushed away from the bale but he only managed a step or two before he stopped again.

Someone was coming across the green, staying close to the wall to avoid the sharp eyes of the sentries. Griffyn had deliberately positioned himself in the deepest shadows by a small storage hut so he could see without being seen, and he melted back against the wall now even though the slivered moon was hidden behind mist and low, heavy clouds. Instinct sent his fist curling around the hilt of a knife he had not been generous enough to hand over to Littlejohn at the gates, and he slipped down into a crouch, his muscles tensed and poised to spring.

Brenna kept her head down and the hood of her cloak pulled low over her forehead. She had decided, firmly and adamantly, not to meet Griffyn Renaud in the archery run as he had ordered. She had decided it at least a dozen times throughout the afternoon and long, endless evening. How could anyone expect her to honor such an outlandish, outrageous wager? How could a treacherous, conniving, deceitful mercenary expect the daughter of one of the most noble and feared barons on the continent to ... to lay herself naked in the grass and let him do what he would to her?