the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.
“Ah, m’lord,” she said, turning to see what had frightened the deer. “I was just about to—”
“Lady Cristiane,” he said, flustered, “that was a deer just now. A—a deer standing next to you, touching your…”
“Aye.” Cristiane nodded as she crouched down to wash her hands in the stream. “Too young to know any better, though she’s a bonny one.”
Adam was thunderstruck. The doe had known well enough to flee when it had seen Adam. Besides, young or old, he’d never heard of a wild deer approaching a person in this manner. How had Cristiane done it?
“My lady,” he said. But then she stood and looked at him with those clear blue eyes and he forgot what he was going to say. Or ask.
’Twas ever so pleasant to have a man—a handsome, well-bred man—come to escort her back to camp. The knights had set up a lovely, spacious tent for her, and Lord Bitterlee explained that they had expected to be escorting both her and her mother to Bitterlee, then to York.
And so it was that Cristiane Mac Dhiubh settled down for the night, comfortably, with thoughts of her mother and better times running through her mind.
Morning dawned bright and sunny. They rode again as they had the day before, with Cristiane seated sidesaddle ahead of Lord Bitterlee. She was certain that every time he looked down, he noticed her bare feet protruding from the edge of her kirtle. At least they were clean now, she thought, still embarrassed to be without shoes.
They’d been taken from her in St. Oln, along with most of her other meager possessions. Cristiane would not have cared, except that now she would arrive in Bitterlee looking no better than the poorest villein. She had never thought of herself as overly proud, but this lack of shoes was one thing she could not abide. Yet there was no way to remedy it.
The day passed uneventfully, though rain threatened as they traveled farther south. Part of the time they rode along the cliffs above the sea. Sometimes the track took them through wooded lands, where Cristiane made note of the new green growth everywhere, and the small animals that darted and scurried to hide from the human intruders.
When dusk approached, she wondered if they would soon stop to camp, for she was weary and it had begun to drizzle. Her back and legs ached from the long hours on horseback. Eventually they came upon a village of sorts. Nay, she amended, ’twas not quite a village, but merely an inn with a few cottages nearby.
She hoped Lord Bitterlee intended to spend the night here. They rode into the yard and saw that a number of horses were already tethered there. Voices carried from the inn, and by the sound of it, the place was crowded. Lord Bitterlee dismounted, then turned to help Cristiane down.
“Shall I go inquire about rooms, my lord?” Sir Elwin asked as he tied his horse to a post.
Lord Bitterlee nodded. “Stay close to me,” he said to Cristiane. “While we’re so near the border, there are risks. Especially for you, but for us as well.”
Cristiane nodded. Hostilities ran hot along the Scottish border, and though they were actually on English soil, she assumed that strangers would not be trusted. She almost wished they’d stopped somewhere along the road, where she could spend the night in the tent they’d brought along for her. She would have felt a great deal safer.
Resigned to staying here, where raucous voices disturbed the peace of the day’s end, she drew close to Lord Bitterlee and waited for his knight to return.
There was a chill in the air, and Cristiane shivered. Then she felt Bitterlee’s arm go around her shoulders, and he pulled her closer. The fine mail of his hauberk should have been cold, but Cristiane could feel his heat radiating through the steel.
’Twas a long time since she’d felt so protected. Not since the sudden and violent death of her father had anyone helped her with life’s difficulties. She’d been so alone since her mother’s illness…Cristiane blinked away the sudden moisture in her eyes, brought on by the kindness of Adam Sutton and the strength of his arm around her.
“M’lord,” Sir Elwin said, “the men here are a rough lot. I don’t know that it would be wise to take Lady Cristiane inside.”
“Are there any rooms?” he asked as he glanced quickly at Cristiane. She was wet and shivering.
“Only one,” he said with a sigh. “I told the landlord to hold it.”
Lord Bitterlee nodded. “Is there a back entrance?”
“Through the kitchen, m’lord,” he said. “We might be able to get her ladyship in with no one the wiser.”
She felt the lord’s hand at her lower back as he urged her to follow Sir Elwin. He followed close behind, while Sir Raynauld remained to deal with the horses.
There was a haze of smoke in the kitchen, and a multitude of aromas hit her at once. Mingled with the smell of smoke were the strong odors of food, grease and ale. A raucous crowd had taken over the common room. Men’s voices were raised with excitement and lust over an upcoming raid.
“We’ll have to climb a staircase adjacent to the main hall, m’lord,” Elwin said, keeping his voice low. “’Tis the only place where her ladyship might be exposed to view. But there is no other way up the stairs.”
“We’ll flank her on the way up, and guard her from sight,” Bitterlee said. “Move quickly, my lady.”
He shielded her from the crowd below, but someone managed to catch sight of her and called out that there was a woman on the stair. Cristiane cringed with fear as Adam propelled her up the remaining steps. Then, along with Elwin, he turned and drew his sword.
Four men rushed them, drawing their own weapons, but Adam planted a booted foot on one man’s chest and shoved, knocking him back down the stairs, and two others with him. Adam turned to climb the stairs again, but more of the revelers closed in on them.
Quickly, Adam and Elwin engaged in battle. Swords clanged. Men grunted and cursed. Blood flowed.
And Cristiane’s limbs were paralyzed. She could move neither forward nor back, for she saw before her eyes the battle in which her father had been killed. She felt dizzy and weak. Her ears buzzed and hummed, shutting out the sounds of aggression just below her.
She went numb.
Then, as now, she had watched from a dark corner in the main staircase of the keep as her father had fought to save her from the Armstrong enemy. She had seen Domhnall speared through his chest, and had watched his life’s blood flow from him, spreading a dark stain on the landing and down the steps.
“Cristiane!”
Her father had managed to wound his killer, so the man had retreated. He’d left Cristiane alone, but she had cowered there in her dark refuge until all had gone quiet around her. The acrid scents of burning buildings and burned animal flesh filled her nose, her mind. The sight of her father’s blood dripping down the steps—
“Cristiane!”
Lord Bitterlee’s commanding voice finally penetrated her hazy consciousness and she shook her head. She blinked her eyes in confusion and tried to turn her attention to him.
But she still felt bound by the same sluggishness that had plagued her for weeks after her father’s death. Cristiane knew she should be moving, following Lord Bitterlee’s directions, getting to safety. Yet her legs would not obey his commands, nor would her body allow her to turn away from the battle being waged before her.
“Cristiane! Move! There must be a room—ugh!” One of the men butted Adam’s midsection with his head, and Adam slammed the flat of his sword down on him, throwing him off.
Raynauld arrived and fought his way to Adam’s side. Adam turned quickly, took two steps at once and gathered Cristiane in his arms. Seemingly without effort, he threw her over one shoulder and shoved his way into a room, slamming and barring the