Columbine (28 page)

“I doubt it’s much comfort, but she’s said the same of you,” answered Kit, trying very hard not to laugh. He wasn’t sure which one, Attawan or Diauna, would be more upset with him if he did, and besides, it would probably not help his aching head at all. But the sight of Dianna in her tattered dress determinedly herding a disgruntled Attawan with a musket that was nearly as long as she was tall, was almost too much for him. Lord, how much he loved her!

“Lower your gun, Dianna. Attawan’s the best friend we have in these parts, and I’d prefer to keep him alive.” I Reluctantly Dianna uncocked the musket and rested it back onto her shoulder. She hadn’t expected to find Kit awake yet, let alone dressed and washing ;I by the stream, and she wished she’d had a comb or brush to make herself look more presentable. She’d grown so accustomed to him ill and unconscious that to see his green cat’s eyes once again watching her so attentively was somehow disconcerting. Despite all that he had told her last night, or maybe because of it, she felt oddly shy around Kit this morning, almost as if they were beginning all over again, and she tried to hide her skittishness by concentrating on Attawan.

“I suppose, then, I should ask your forgiveness, Master Attawan,” she said stiffly, “but my experiences with Indians as of late have not exactly taught me to trust your people.”

“Not my people. Abenakis.” Attawan sniffed scornfully, confident that no more explanation was necessary. He touched his fingers to the bandage on Kit’s head as he sat on the ground beside him.

“Does tiny woman carry a tOpaahawk as well as a musyour ket?”

“You can’t blame the damage on her, Attawan, only the healing.” His smile flashing white against the dark beard, Kit looked past the Indian to Dianna, and she blushed with pleasure at the warmth in his expression and looked down, self-conscious in from of Attawan.

Attawan’s eyebrows rose skeptically, not at all convinced this woman was worth the effort she’d cost.

“I hope she does better tending your wounds than making your friends welcome, for you cannot linger here longer. Trailihg that French priest Was easy enough, but you, eh, you nide yourself away like a squirrel and I wasted three days finding you.”

Anxiously Kit leaned forward, all trace of teasing gone.

“Have you found Mercy Wing?”

Dianna rushed to Kit’s side, “Is she well? They haven’t hurt her, have they?”

Attawan shook his head.

“The fat priest and the soldiers brought her to the mission at Deux-Rivires, and left her there with Pre Vernet. They want her stronger before they take her to Montreal, but I don’t know when that will be. A week or in the spring.

They may have gone while I searched for you.” He looked pointedly at Dianna, as if the delay were her fault alone.

“We cannot wait.”

Kit stood unsteadily, closing his eyes until the dizziness passed, and Dianna took his arm with concern.

“You’re not ready to travel, are you?” she asked softly.

“It was only yesterday that the fever broke.”

“I have no choice, dear ling Kit patted her hand on his arm to reassure her, but Dianna saw the strain etched around his eyes.

“I have to get Mercy before they take her north.”

“The mission is only a day’s journey, Sparhawk, not hard travel for a strong man.” Attawan studied Kit shrewdly.

“But will you be any use when you get there, eh? Will your aim be true, your knife sure?”

“It will be, my friend, I swear to it. I’ll be ready. I must. We can’t very well rap on the door and ask them sweetly to give up the girl.”

“Why not?” asked Dianna.

“I’d think we’d have a better chance that way than to have you two go crashing in with knives and guns and God knows what;” “We’ll hardly go crashingin anywhere. Kit frowned.

“Dianna, love, you don’t know how these things are best handled, …. “Nay. you listen to me!” said Dianna urgently.

“I’ll tell them Mercy’s my daughter, that Indians kidnapped her and I Want her back. I’ll pretend I’m French, and you can be my guide. I’ll say the Indians set upon us, too, so that’s why we look so shabby.

With the beard, no one would ever recognize you.”

“True enough.” Kit ran his hand across his jaw, thinking. He knew he’d be no use in a fight, but he hated to admit it, even to Attawan, and especially to Dianna.

“I don’t speak French, and they wouldn’t understand why you hired an Englishman. Best I be your husband and Mercy’s father. They can’t quarrel with that.”

Dianna smiled shyly, equally pleased that he would listen to her and be willing, even as a ruse, to be her husband.

“And Attawan,” continued Kit, “you’ll stay outside to cover us or go for llp if we don’t come out ,/

when we should.”

“With the French, that’} wise.” Thoughtfully At tawan stroked his long scalpqock.

“Perhaps this woman of yours has merit after all.”

Dianna groaned with exasperation and stalked off toward the wigwam to pack.

Kit grinned and slapped Attawan on the arm.

“Watch your back, my friend. She not only has merit, but she’s the very devil with that musket.”

Uncomfortably, Pre Vernet regarded the two people standing in the hall before him. Because the mission at Deux-Rivibres was so deep in the wilderness, Pre Vernet often went months without seeing another white face. And here, in less than a week, had first come Monseigneur le Abbe de Saint-Gilbert and now these two, an English settler and his French wife. Even with her clothing shamefully torn, the young woman seemed graceful and modest, her genteel French a pleasure to hear, but the tall man was mistrustful, his hand never straying from the knife at his belt. So be it, decided the priest. If the sad tale they told of their missing daughter was true, the Englishman had reason to be wary.

Troubled, he thought of the child now sleeping in the kitchen. The monseigneur had described the girl’s mother as a shrill, blasphemous Englishwoman, and Pre Vernet had readily agreed to keep the child until she was well enough to go to the sacred sisters in Montreal. But the tears of the young woman before him touched his heart, and it would be clear enough if the child were hers.

Kit caught Dianna’s arm as they began to follow the priest.

“Has the little rascal admitted he’s got Mercy?”

“He says there’s an orPhan in his keeping, and we must judge for ourselves,” she whispered anxiously, chewing on her lower lip.

“It must be Mercy, Kit. It must!”

“Attawan wouldn’t have made that kind of mistake,” he said thickly, hoping Dianna didn’t realize how close to collapsing he was. Somehow he’d walked twenty miles this day, most of it hanging on to Attawan, and only sheer will and fear for Dianna and Mercy had kept him on his feet.

“We’ll take her from here as soon as you can make our thanks. I’ve no great taste for French hospitality.”

The priest led them into the kitchen, where an old Indian woman with a conspicuous cross on her breast sat dozing over her knitting by the dying fire. To one side of the hearth was a small dishevelled pallet, and at once Dianna recognized Mercy’s dark unruly hair poking from the mound of coverlets. With a little cry

Dianna ran forward and lifted the sleeping child gently into her arms. Still too sleepy to comprehend, Mercy rubbed her hand across her eyes and muttered to herself before she slowly realized it was Dianna holding her, and Kit was there, too, bending over her.

Without a sound she threw her arms around Dianna’s neck and hung on as if she’d never let go.

Pre Vernet wouldn’t soon forget the sweetness of that reunion and the satisfaction of having done fight by bringing it about. To witness such happiness, a child restored to loving parents, was a rare blessing, indeed. It had, then, been most unfortunate to see the poor father succumb to the shock of the ordeal and topple to the floor, his senses dead to the world.

Dianna undressed by the faint glow from the banked fire and climbed beneath the musty coverlet, being as careful as she could not to make the straw-filled mattress rustle and wake Kit. It had taken two of Pre Vernet’s Christian Indians to manOeuvre Kit’s exhausted body up the narrow staircase to the mission’s tiny bedchamber reserved for travellers, and he’d been asleep even before she’d stripped off his moccasins. Awkwardly she hugged the edge of the bed away from his body, listening to the even rhythm of his breathing. She had never slept with a man, and she wasn’t sure what to do, whether to touch him or not. But it was cold, and slowly she inched across the bed and tentatively snuggled her body against his back.

He was instantly awake, every nerve and muscle acutely aware of her imprint against his. Gingerly her hand crept around his waist, holding him, and he couldn’t help groaning.

“Oh, Kit, I’ve wakened you,” she whispered with disappointment, and he felt her begin to move away.

“Forgive me, but I was cold. Here, I’ll move back.”

“Nay, stay.” His fingers tightened around her wrist as he pulled her back, wondering how she could be cold when it seemed to him the very mattress was on fire from her nearness.

With a contented sigh she eased herself against him, her legs curled into his and her cheek turned against the broad muscles of his back. Her heart fluttered faster as her skin touched his where her tattered shift pulled up, and she inhaled deeply the special fragrance that was his alone. Sternly she reminded herself of how weak he still was, but her hand seemed to be moving on its own wanton volition, her fingers trailing through the curling hair on his chest.

“Did I really swoon away like a weak-kneed maid?” Kit asked, his voice strained. She had come to him innocently because she was cold, and in return he was randy as an old goat. If she’d only lie still!

““Twas not your fault, Kit. The kitchen fire was too warm, that was all, and you’ve pushed yourself too far. Pre Vernet understood. And the other priest,

the one who took Mercy, isn’t due back here for a fortnight, so we’re safe enough here tonight” Safe enough from Frenchmen, thought Dianna guiltily,

but not from her.

“I sent the old woman in the kitchen to tell Attawan we were unharmed and would meet him in the morning.”

“You’ve taken care of everything, haven’t you,

sweetheart?” said Kit softly. He said it proudly,

without blaming or faulting himself, and Dianna didn’t answer, smiling to herself in the darkness.

“You sang to me when I was sick, didn’t you?”

he asked.

“I only now remembered it.

“Greensleeves,” and “Hangman’s Tree,” and “Pray, Fair One.”” “Would you have me sing to you now?”

“Nay, Dianna. I’d have you marry me. Now, this night, if that priest below didn’t believe us already wed, but as soon as we return to Phimstead, if you’lI have me.” Dianna froze, positive she’d misheard.

“You don’t owe me anything, Kit,” she said in a tiny voice.

“Not this. Whatever I’ve done for you—I expected nothing in return.”

With a swiftness that startled her, he rolled over and trapped her against the pillows, his face so close to hers, she felt the hot:hrgency of his words upon her cheek. / “Listen to me, Diaa,” he said.

“When I thought I’d lost you forever, that I’d never touch you again, I knew then I could not go on living unless I found you. I want you in my arms by night and at my side by day, and I wish never to be parted from you again, Never, understand? I’m offering you everything I have, Dianna—my name, my home, my heart—and I pray to God it’s enough. How I love you, sweet.

heart. How I love you!”

Dianna’s throat constricted with emotion.

“And I you, Kit, From the first, I’ve always loved you. Forever and always, Kit, my only love. Oh, Kit.,.” She sighed his name as his lips met hers, a kiss that signalled a reunion, a pledge, a future for them as one. He kissed her tenderly at first, teasing with his tongue over the swell of her lips until they parted with a tiny catch of desire, He had forgotten how sweet she tasted, or maybe the velvety delight of her mouth was simply beyond remembering.

Dianna pulled away, her breathing already labored.

“Your head, Kit,” she protested weakly.

“The wound—’ ‘

“The devil take it.” His voice was more a growl, deep in his chest.

“I’d sooner die than not love you now.”

He pulled her shift over her shoulders, unwilling to have any barriers between them, and Dianna curled herself around him, marvelling again at the differences between them. His body was so lean and hard where hers was soft, his strength so visible in every muscle of his arms and back, and even when the fever had held him, he still had a power, a physical presence that she couldn’t explain. He was unthinkingly confident in a man’s harsh world of right and wrong and sudden death. Yet behind it all was the gentleness that touched her now, callused hands that caressed her with the tenderness that made her feel cherished and special. Then the gentleness fled before the passion, and their bodies twined together, wildly arching toward fulfillment. And when at last he cried out and called her name, she melted into him and knew such sweetness that she almost wept with the pure joy of loving him.

“In seven days by the river, we’ll be home at Plumstead,” he whispered happily as they lay still joined together. He swept her hair back to kiss her ear, and Dianna felt a contentment she’d never known before. Home, her home, with her love, her husband, her perfect Master Sparhawk.

The lantern’s light was blindingly harsh as the door exploded open. The room seemed full of men,

leering Indians with eyes like jackals, and Dianna shrank behind Kit.

“You see how completely these two sinners have sullied your good hospitality, Pre Vernet,” said Fran9is Robillard triumphantly, the curl of his mouth distorted by the lantern’s upward glare.

“But I’ll teach them the folly of their wickedness. Aye, they shall learn, and learn well.”

(

Restlessly, Dianna paced the narrow length of the bedchamber that last night had been her sanctuary and now was her prison. The double-planked door was locked from outside, and the diamond panes of the casements were too narrow even for her to squeeze through. She wore the simple gown that had been brought to her, coarse grey wool fit for a penitent.