The Miracle Thief (23 page)

“Am I to be taken back as if I am your prisoner?”

“No, my lady. As if you are my charge.”

“I command you to release me.”

He turned and looked at me over his shoulder, a sad smile on his face. “I have pledged my allegiance to your father. I am not yours, my lady, to command.”

I did not fancy being led about as if I were some addle-brained girl too dull to know her own way. “At least do not parade me about. Spare me the indignity of that.”

He passed a sideways glance at me.

“Let us not stop at the taverns or the inns. I would not have it said the princess was being led as if she needed a nursemaid.”

He did not answer, but late that morning, he slowed his courser as we passed a clearing in the wood. “Will this do?”

“For what?”

“For a place to take a repast. I've little liking for the count's men either.”

He had decided to listen to me then! “Perhaps… Can we stop away from the road? If I must be returned, then I wish for you to do it and not the count's men.”

Another look he gave me, as if wishing to take my measure.

I stared right back.

He steered us past the clearing until we found trees once more, which screened us from the road. There he unfastened his mantle from his shoulders and spread it upon the ground before lifting me from the horse. There we ate, and there we rested, and when he moved to lift me, I stayed him with a hand to his arm. “I've need of a few moments in the wood. If you could help me to stand…”

He ignored me, lifting me into his arms instead.

“I do not think—”

“I know what you need, my lady.” He set me down some distance farther, where the trees were thicker. “I will return at your call.”

I watched him retreat before I made any move. The trick would be to work my way back around to my horse before he decided to return for me on his own. I tested my ankle, finding it not much improved. I would simply have to do what I must quickly; this opportunity was too providential to ignore.

Taking great care with the placement of my feet, keeping one eye trained on the knight's broad back, I prayed I would be fleet enough to accomplish my goal.

My horse was in my sights when I first took note of a rustling in the wood behind me.

Fearing it was Andulf, and not daring to slow my pace, I pressed on. Two paces, three. I had not much farther to go when I heard a distinctive grunt and snuffle, those sounds that struck fear in the heart of every mortal man.

Slowly, I turned.

Not ten paces from me was a boar. Its long, protruding snout and large upward-curving teeth were unmistakable.

Behind me, the horses snorted, pawing at the ground. So close I was to freedom, but I feared an attempt to reach them would only provoke the boar into charging.

The beast lowered his head. With a snorting squeal, he started toward me, and I knew my attempt at escape was finished. I only hoped I would live to see the morrow. As I closed my eyes, not willing to witness my own death, a hand seized me about the collar of my mantle and tossed me aside.

I landed on my belly, struggling for breath, as I watched the boar head toward the horses. But just as I whispered a prayer of thanks, the beast changed his course and turned instead toward me.

Pushing my fists against the earth, I scrambled to my knees. And then, realizing I hadn't the ability to save myself, I threw my arm over my face and prepared for death.

The beast's breath scorched my face, its grunts assaulted my ears, and then, as I steeled myself for its attack, it fell into my lap.

“Sweet Jesus!”

And it just…lay there.

Breath caught twixt my soul and my throat; I hardly dared move. When I gathered the courage to look down, the boar gave one last gasp, and then its eyes rolled back into its head as its lifeblood poured out onto my tunic from a gash in its belly.

Andulf staggered into view, took it by the ears, and drew it away from my lap onto the ground.

“Is it?” Was it dead?

“He—” Andulf's mouth was working to form the next word, but then his face went white, and he collapsed beside me.

I waited for him to recover himself, but he did not move. Nor did he open his eyes.

He had saved me, and now I was free! Scrambling to my feet, I gave him wide berth and then limped toward my horse. Grasping the reins, I moved to mount, but then I thought the better of it.

Had Andulf moved? He wasn't…he could not be dead, could he?

I peered around the horse's neck to get a look at him. His position had not changed. Neither had the boar's.

Taking a tighter grip on the reins and putting a hand to the saddle, I told myself he did not matter. He'd wanted to return me to the count and had refused to listen to my entreaties.

I put a foot to the stirrup.

But if he had perished, then it was on my account.

I stepped down.

Although I had not asked for him to save me, had I?

I put my foot back and pulled myself up, sucking in my breath as my bad ankle took my weight.

I cast another look at Andulf as I grasped my saddle. With any luck he might remain senseless for an hour or two, if he were not dead, that is.

I struck the saddle with my fist. If he had indeed died, then it was in the act of saving
me
from certain death.

Although he had not saved me for my benefit, but rather for my father's.

But it could not hurt to find out if he were truly dead.

Abandoning the horse, I limped back to kneel beside him, putting a hand to his jaw to turn his head toward me.

His breath fanned my face.

He was alive then. Elation took wing inside me. If he was alive, then I could leave without guilt. But, could I leave without shame?

By God and all His saints!

Cursing myself for a fool, I decided to stay until he awoke and I could make certain he could care for himself. At that point, I could still slip away and make for the abbey. That decided, I took him by the hand and dragged him away from the boar.

Or tried to.

His hand slipped from my grasp before I could shift him. My faith, but he was heavy! I took up his hand again and heaved, putting my back into it to spare my poor ankle. But I fell to the ground when a scattering of acorns caused my heels to slide out from under me.

If I could not move the knight, then perhaps I could move the boar. I knelt and put my hands to him. He did not move.

Was I to be afflicted by both man and beast?

Resigned to having to look at the both of them, I ignored the tangle of guts that spilled from the boar's belly and looked instead at Andulf's wound.

Wounds.

Three long, deep, dirt- and leaf-filled gashes from the boar's tusks.

It could not be good that there were more than one or that his blood had made a trail down his thigh to the bottom of his knee, where it was pooling at his gartered hose.

Unfastening the girdle from my waist, I moved to fix it about the wounds, pushing and pulling to guide it beneath his hulking thigh and then knotting it tight. It seemed to stay the bleeding, although the wounds still gaped. I pulled the bloodied, torn fabric of his hose from them and then tried to push the skin closed.

It wouldn't stay.

Finally, I gave up and sat on the ground beside him, waiting for him to wake.

As the air grew colder and the shadows grew longer, I unfastened my mantle and placed it over him, deciding he needed the warmth more than I.

Eventually, he woke with a sputter and a start, full face toward the boar. Giving a great cry, he lurched from the beast, and then he started again, clasping a hand to his thigh. He looked down at the girdle I had wrapped around it and then looked over at me. “You're still here.”

“I could not leave you. Not after you had saved me. I would not have wished you to perish on my account.”

He grunted.

“Does it pain you?”

“Everything pains me.” His gaze moved beyond me to the horses.

“I tried to move the boar, and I tried to move you, but I could not do it.” That's what he got for collapsing after he'd saved me. “You fainted and then…” He looked quite angry and not very grateful for my help. But then, if I had not tried to escape him, he might not have been wounded at all. “I just…want to say…thank you for saving me.”

Out in the forest around us, creatures were about. I heard the hoot of owls, and underneath them the brush of leaves out of synch with the wind, and then, the distinct sound of a footfall on the leaf-littered ground.

The horses blew out a long breath and shook their heads, as if to rally their senses as they pulled at the reins that bound them to a tree.

Andulf put an elbow to the ground, rolling onto his side, and sent a piercing look into the wood. “Whatever is out there must smell the boar. It wants the meat.” He fell onto his back, covering his wounded thigh with a cupped hand. “We must do what you ought to have already done: get away from here.”

“I tried! But you're too tall and much too heavy, and you wouldn't move!”

“Bring the horses.”

I hobbled toward the horses and made quick work of untying them as I eyed the twilight-shrouded wood in front of us.

Out in the brush, a twig snapped.

Andulf pushed to sitting and reached up toward the reins. “If I could just—” He leaned forward and tried to leverage himself up.

I bent to help him.

With a groan, he rolled onto his knees. “Get on the horse.”

“I can't. My ankle.” When I had ridden before, he had helped me to mount, but now he was on the wrong side of the horse.

“Draw the horse around, and I will help you.”

I tried to turn the horse back in the other direction, head toward the wood, but it shied. I tried once more, but the horse nearly jerked the reins from my hands.

Andulf was scarcely able to sit; he could not be expected to walk around the horse to help me, though he looked as if he were contemplating that very thing. “You'll have to mount on your own. If the creature comes, the horse can save you.”

“And what of you?”

“I have my sword.”

“Little good it will do you! I am not leaving you to die after sitting here the long of the forenoon waiting to see if you'd live.”

“And I will not have you perish after I've given my blood trying to save you!”

A snuffling squeal came from the wood.

“We need fire.”

We needed many things, the first of which was to get us far from here!

“In my bag on my horse, I have a fire-steel and flint”—he left off for a moment as he took in a long breath through his teeth—“and touchwood.”

Standing on the tips of my toes, I tried to retrieve them, but the falling gloom made for difficult work.

“At the bottom.”

I seized upon them, pulling them from the bag, and then I handed them to him.

He reached for them, wincing, and then gave up, dropping his hand. “You will have to do it.”

Though my hands shook, I managed to lay the strip of touchwood atop the flint and then to strike the rock with the fire-steel. Once. Twice. At the third try, a spark finally arched to the touchwood, but it died as it struck. It took a fourth and a fifth time before the touchwood began to smolder. But a hair-raising growl came from the wood before us as a snuffle came from behind.

There were more creatures out there in the wood than just one.

Keeping the touchwood to hand, I scrabbled about the ground for something: a stick, some fallen leaves. Scraping the ground with the bottom of my hand, I assembled a small pile and put the wood to it.

It did not take.

“Blow on it.”

“Blow on…?”

“The smoke. Blow on the smoke!”

Thinking him mad, but not knowing what else to do, I blew upon it. As if by magic, the smoke birthed a flame that devoured the tinder.

“A limb! Find a limb and hold it to the flame.”

Leaving my smoldering fire, I searched around us for a fallen branch or a large twig, something we could burn. As I came by a short, stubby branch, the fire guttered for a moment.

I felt my breath catch.

But then the flame flared.

A shadow darker than the surrounding forest emerged from the trees before us.

Holding my branch to the fire, I prayed the flame would take. As the shadow moved closer, the branch burst into flame. Rising, I stepped in front of Andulf and then brandished the flaming branch in front of us. Sweeping it to the right and to the left and then back again.

Andulf had shifted and was crouching now. “You cannot do that forever.”

“I will do it as long as I have to.”

A rippling shriek echoed through the forest.

The horses blew out a deep breath and took a step closer to us.

“If you can help me to standing, we should leave.”

Holding the branch out before me, I knelt at his side. Fixing his arm across my shoulders and grasping his hand, I heaved to standing. He hung from my shoulder for a moment and then rallied, gaining his feet. Releasing his hand, I took up the horse's reins. “Can you advance?”

“I will try.”

The fire had shortened my vision to its flickering flames, but the horses were growing more anxious by the moment, and that shuffling snuffle was getting closer.

I started out, away from the approaching beast.

With every step, Andulf shuddered.

“We must stop. You are not—”

“Keep on. I've more planned for myself than to finish as some beast's midnight feast.”

I took more of his weight as he seemed to slump.

When he next spoke it was into my ear. “Walk on.”

“To where?”

He raised his head, took a look about, and then nodded toward a large tree that beckoned through the moon's light. “There.”

It took many steps and much effort. We nearly fell, the both of us, when I stepped into a hole, which wrenched my already throbbing ankle, but we made it to the tree, where his arm slipped from my shoulders and he slumped into me with a loud sigh.

Gripping the flaming branch with one hand, I threw the other about his waist, trying to keep him standing. “You cannot die!”

He sagged against me, and I fell to the ground. As I clasped my arms about his chest, the branch tumbled to the ground as well. “Do not die. Please. Do you not die!” I buried my head in that thick neck of his and held on.

In the distance, back from where we'd come, I could hear the tearing of flesh and the grunting of beasts.

He put an arm up over mine, clasping me to himself. We stayed there for some time as he took in a series of long, deep breaths. Then he set me aside. “Sit there.” He indicated the tree trunk behind him with a violent jerk of his chin. “With the tree behind you, and me before you, at least you will be able to sleep unmolested.”

“I will not sleep. I cannot! That beast may follow us if he smells the scent of you.”

“He'll be plenty satisfied with the boar.”

“What if—what if—” I could not bring myself to speak the words I feared and so settled for a different thought entirely. “What if you fall asleep?”

A hiss escaped from between his teeth. “I could not sleep right now for all the gold in the archbishop's treasury.”

“But I do not know if—”

“You are the most stubborn girl I have ever had the displeasure to try and save.
Get
behind
me!
”

Picking up the skirts of my tunic, I stepped into the space between him and the trunk.

“Sleep.”

I would not do it, but it would do no harm to let him think I might. That way, should anything come for us in the night, then I would know it, and he would not have to fight it off alone. Not having any cushions or a counterpane, I settled myself as comfortably as I could into the curve of the tree's roots and then drew my mantle around me.

The knight pushed himself back toward me, gasping as he did it, and pressed me against the tree. Then he threw his mantle out over his shoulder, letting it pool onto my feet. And there, God help me, in spite of my best intentions, I must have fallen asleep.