A Knight's Vow (2 page)

and looked down into his eyes with a grim expression.

"Yes, I know," James said, giving Riley's arm a quick squeeze. "The wound must be deep—my head feels like it's going to explode."

Wiggins stepped closer. "Allow me to help you mount, my lord. Or perhaps I should make a litter?"

"Nonsense! I can—" But he couldn't quite get to his feet. Wiggins offered a strong shoulder, and James stood up, then lurched into the saddle. He held his breath, praying he wouldn't retch.

"My lord, will you be able to ride?" Wiggins asked. "Perhaps we should wait for the others."

"The sooner I get to the castle, the sooner I can rest."

The three men mounted in silence, eyeing James as he swayed in the saddle.

For a few minutes, they trotted through the forest, two by two. James's head pounded out each beat of the horse's hooves.

"Must of been a lot of thieves, milord," Mort ventured.

James lifted his head, giving him the blackest look he could muster. "Two."

"Ahh." Mort nodded thoughtfully and looked away, a shaky whistle escaping his lips.

From the rear, Wiggins called, "One must have been quite a swordsman, my lord. That slash across your face—he could easily have damaged your eye."

"She."

"Beg pardon, Lord Bolton?"

James swung around, then clutched the saddle as dizziness overwhelmed him. "She. The swords woman."

Wiggins shrank away and mumbled, "Oh."

James turned forward again, swallowing back the contents of his stomach. In his mind he saw her, dark eyes, red lips, wild, wild hair.

A branch slapped him across the face and he cursed.

Chapter 2

Isabel Atherstone, the Black Angel, slid the sword into the scabbard at her waist, its steel as cold and heavy as the revenge that crushed her heart. The weapon felt natural there, its purpose assured. A dagger was concealed in her boot, for she was taking no chances. She stood wide-legged before a low fire that sputtered meager warmth into the crude hut. Yet she barely noticed the sparse room. A fierce thrill hummed through her. Her vengeance had begun. She removed the leather strip holding her hair back, and shook the long, black curls about her shoulders.

She looked down at the men's garments she wore. Her breasts showed she was a woman, but she no longer kept them bound flat. She wasn't ashamed of what she was. There was no feminine weakness in her—she was hard muscle and bone. No softness had graced her life, no finery or pretty things. She needed none of it. Her purpose had been fated from the moment of her birth. She would be the instrument of her family's revenge. She was all that was left of the Mansfields. The name would rise again.

Isabel would enjoy humiliating the Earl of Bolton, playing games he could not comprehend. A grim smile spread across her face. She remembered him lying helplessly on her pallet, a wound by her hand striking him low. Her father would be proud.

She had thought she would enjoy seeing Bolton weakened, but the feeling had eluded her. Ruining him would be a duty, not a pleasure, she realized. He had not seemed the monster her father had claimed him, but appearances were seldom reality. He had been charming and amusing through it all, the picture of a well-born nobleman. Lying at her mercy, he could still taunt her, could still imagine himself in control of her. The gall of him, to force her against his chest. She could still feel the hard, warm strength of him beneath her, feel the rise and fall of his ribcage against her breasts. She had looked into his eyes and wished desperately to see a vicious monster. But it had not happened.

No matter. His family had brought hers to its knees. His father had maimed her father, and the humiliation and bitterness had never left him. He had a scarce amount of time for his daughter, and then only as an instrument of his vengeance. There had been no traveling, no family visits to court or to neighbors. No young men came calling on her, no young ladies befriended her. There had been nothing in her life but the decrepit Mansfield tiltyard. And now all her hard work and sacrifice were coming to fruition.

This latest Earl of Bolton deserved to suffer the revenge his entire family had earned. Her father told her that Bolton had raped his betrothed, unable to contain himself until the wedding night. The girl had broken off the engagement and settled for his younger brother, but that was not enough punishment for the earl. The Boltons had to learn that there were people in the world they could not crush. Their line must end with James Markham. First the Black Angel would ruin him. And then she would personally lead him to the gates of hell.

The door opened with the sound of wood scraping against the dirt floor. Isabel tensed as she turned, hand on her sword hilt.

William Desmond paused in the doorway. He was really still a boy, just fifteen years of age. But he was as big and solid as any man, and perhaps too loyal to her. When her father died, William should

have returned to his own family, but he had refused to leave her alone, insisting she needed a squire. Perhaps he had somehow known what she intended to do. She had to admit that attacking the earl without William's help would have been much harder.

"Is something wrong?" Isabel asked.

William's dark blond hair hung in fine strands to his shoulders and his brown eyes were so full of compassion they made her almost uneasy. After a moment, he shook his head.

"It is nothing, I guess," he murmured, stepping inside and closing the door. "I just cannot get used to you wearing a thief's mask, leaving your hair loose."

Isabel wanted to smile, but she seldom could. "I am a maiden yet—surely I need not bind my hair like a village washerwoman."

"But you usually bind your hair like a soldier. You are dressed like one."

Isabel narrowed her gaze. "What are you implying?"

"You are wearing a man's garment, but showing that you are obviously a woman. Why?"

William stepped closer. Although he was broad through the shoulders, he was not exceedingly tall

for a man—consequently, he was forced to look up into her eyes.

Isabel stared back. "You know it is not enough that Bolton die—else I could easily have killed him before now. Humiliation is an important part of my plan. What better way to embarrass him than to make all realize that even a woman can best him?"

" 'Even'? Are you claiming that men are superior to women?"

"Cease your word games, William! You know full well that the honor of my family rests in what I do here. Do not question me about this again."

He lifted his hands in surrender and bowed from the waist. "As you wish, my lady." He slowly straightened. "When do we move next?"

"Not yet," she said, feeling her spirits come to life at just the thought of besting the earl. "We will let Bolton wonder how I'm spending the ridiculous amount of wealth he carried unguarded."

"Hardly unguarded, my lady. The forest was full of his men. We barely escaped."

"In a few more days we will strike at the heart of his empire, from within his own stronghold. He will feel violated."

The boy sighed. "I hope you have a plan, because I surely don't."

For once, a tight smile touched Isabel's lips.

James sprawled in a chair before the hearth in the great hall, exhausted, frustrated, angry. His men had searched the forest for two long days, with not a sign of this woman who called herself the Black Angel.

She suddenly appeared in his mind as vividly as if she swaggered before him. What drove a woman like her? And why was he thinking about her with other parts of his body besides his brain? She had been clothed like a man, she talked like a man, she seemed to light like a man. But that black doublet had swelled at her breast and hip, proclaiming her very much a woman. And now she was probably gone with her prize—his dowry.

James flinched as the wound in his cheek pulled. He vividly remembered the sight of the bleeding scab as he'd peeled the bandage away. She'd given him a scar—on his face, of all places—and for that, she'd pay.

He rested his chin on his hand and sighed. He knew the castle residents walked gingerly behind him. They were honest, simple folk. They looked to him as the man who shaped their futures, the man who could bring them prosperity or poverty. He could imagine what they were thinking, how their respect for him had lessened.

It was bad enough that Lady Katherine Berkeley had fallen in love with his brother and refused to marry him. But now he had allowed a woman to best him, to take the money that would have restored the estates and their farms. James's stomach twisted until it burned. He almost wished he were a commoner. Every lecture from his parents and foster parents to be the perfect earl rang deafeningly in his ears. For once he was thankful they were dead. He could only imagine the look on his father's face.

He thought of his brother, Reynold, enjoying the wife James was supposed to have, and his face heated with the anger of lost opportunities. His frustration continued to mount as the world he'd worked a lifetime to create slowly began to crack.

Why ever had he left London? He would still have Katherine Berkeley's dowry money to spend as he pleased. But the life he had led since the broken betrothal had grown tiresome and depressing. He had spent months drinking, dancing, seducing, spending money, and trying to forget what had happened.

By heaven, what was wrong with him? Nothing seemed to make him happy. There was an aching emptiness inside him, and he didn't know how to fill it. He had thought returning home would ease his frustration, but a barbarous dark woman with the body of a female Viking had ruined his peace of mind.

James could not allow her to continue making a fool of him. He would find the Black Angel if he had to ride every path himself.

Chapter 3

That same evening, visitors stopped for lodging on their way from London to York. James cursed their presence—he was forced to entertain Baron George Huddleston and his wife and daughters, rather than ponder his plans to capture the Black Angel. James could tell the evening would be long. The man talked of nothing but farming and sheep. The wife perched on the edge of her seat, nodding attentively to everything James said, while the daughters elbowed each other out of the way as they fought for a place beside an eligible earl. They were pale, mouse-haired, typical English girls, with nothing to say for themselves. And then one laughed and James saw why—protruding teeth. He withheld a sigh and gave a strained smile.

He should be flirting with them. He should be judging their merits as wives, though they be

daughters of a minor nobleman. In the baron's family, he sensed money—and he needed some. Looks were no longer so important when one was desperate.

But his wife-hunting skills were deserting him tonight. Only out of habit had he remembered to dress in a fine green velvet tunic. Every time he tried to think of a thing to say to these two country girls, an image of the Black Angel appeared full blown in his mind, leaning over his cot, her black curls brushing against him, her dark eyes burning with undiscovered passion. He remembered her breasts, lush and full as he held her against his chest. Why could he think of nothing but her?

Dressed in a peasant cloak and hood, Isabel sat at a trestle table in Bolton's hall, watching the earl hold court for his visitors. She had positioned herself between the baron's people and the castle residents, trying to seem to each group that she was part of the other.

It had been easy to slip into the inner ward with the baron's party of travelers. She only had to submit to a simple search. Her sword remained well hidden beneath her skirts. Bolton's security had obviously never been tested—after tonight he would understand what he was up against. He would again feel the shame of knowing he could not best a "mere" woman. Isabel barely restrained her grin of triumph.

Yet while she voraciously ate of his delicious food, she studied James Markham. When she had first attacked him, she had been caught up in her own daring, and then concerned she had fatally injured him too early in the game. In the darkness of her hut, he had seemed reckless, amusing, charming to a degree she would not have thought possible.

Even now, though he seemed distracted, he captivated the baron and his family. The silly daughters gazed at Bolton with every intention written on their faces, and even their mother seemed to preen.

Bolton wore outrageously extravagant garments that almost glittered. They must be clothes he wore to court to impress the king. How did a man fight dressed like that?

And the great hall itself—Isabel had to struggle not to gape. The walls were whitewashed, covered by woven tapestries of the most incredible colors. The rushes on the floor smelled like the outdoors, with nary a chicken bone in sight.

But soon Bolton would be able to impress no one, Isabel thought fiercely. They would all know what he was, what he had done. His name would only inspire mocking laughter.

Isabel crept away when the meal was through, just as the merrymaking was beginning. She strode boldly down a hall, as if looking for the garderobe, then snuck upstairs to find Bolton's room. She shadowed chatting maidservants as they aired rooms for the earl's guests, until she deduced that the formal doors at the end of the hall opened into the master's bedchamber. It was a simple matter to slip in when they weren't looking.

A low fire filled the room with shadowy light. Candles in silver candleholders awaited the earl on tables on either side of the bed, a massive affair that filled almost a whole wall. Heavy velvet bedcurtains were tied back, ready to encircle the occupant in privacy. Isabel wondered if this was the bed he had forced his betrothed to lie in. Had he simply misjudged her willingness? No, a man must know when a woman is unwilling, even if he won't acknowledge it. She herself had once stabbed a soldier for daring to touch her intimately. After that, she had hidden her womanhood as much as possible, so that no one, least of all her father, would remember that she was a daughter, not a son.

While keeping an eye on the door, Isabel hung a rope from the window down to the ward below, just in case she needed a quick escape. Then she wove black ribbons through the bedclothes. She closed