The Penwyth Curse (16 page)

“Don't think your curses do any more than make me laugh,” he said, and still he was laughing even as he leaned down and kissed her. But it wasn't her mouth he felt, it was something raw and slick. He lurched back and saw not Brecia lying there naked, but a dozen ropes all looped and tangled together, like twisted snakes, and there was wet blood on them, dripping onto the dirt floor.

Brecia was gone.

In the next instant, the bluestone altar was gone. There was naught but a white gown lying on the ground.

The prince was so surprised that he was held quiet. He
had
taken her gown, but she'd managed to give him an illusion that she was still clothed. How had she done that? He threw back his head and bellowed the only promise he knew she wouldn't ignore. “If you don't come back, I will leave and take your wand with me.”

She was standing in front of him again, the white robe that had been lying on the ground suddenly on her, neatly belted by the gold chain at her waist. But her feet were bare, her golden sandals probably left in oblivion.

She was his now, and he knew it. He hoped she knew it as well. “Now,” he said, “if you are so powerful even without your wand, then you will cast a grand spell that will provide your multitude of ghosts, all the old priests, and all your followers with enough food, water, and shelter to last them a thousand years.”

“Why would I do that, prince?”

“Because I'm taking you with me. Together we will produce a son to master any wizard now living or ever to come on this blessed earth.”

“I will have nothing to do with you. You lied to me. You wed another. I could kill you if I really tried.”

“The marriage—it is over. I am free and now here for you. Now, you say you want nothing to do with me simply because I am more powerful than you. You say that because you fear me, since you know I can overcome you. Aye, Brecia, you will come with me. You will mate with me.”

She was silent, but he knew she was sorting through his words, even seeing herself breeding a fine heir, one for each of them. A wizard and a witch.

He said, his voice more gentle, drawing her in, that voice, “I remember when I first saw you in the sarsen circle, just behind the altar stone. You held both your hands flat against it. You were whispering something to it. A wish? A curse? Then you turned and you saw me.”

“Aye, I turned and there you were. You looked dark and powerful and infinitely wicked. I believed I could come to trust you, but I was wrong. All you want is to best me, to conquer me, to possess me.”

He looked at her thoughtfully. “All that? I remember thinking then that you recognized me as your mate, just as I recognized you as mine. Now there is nothing to prevent our joining.”

She laughed at that. “Oh, no, I wasn't recognizing you as anything, prince. Actually, I was looking at you and thinking about my great-grandmother, whose hair was so red that some claimed flames leapt out of it.”

He waved away her words. “That is enough. It is time for us to mate. You know you can trust me.”

She shrugged, studied his face, looked into his eyes. Was she trying to look into his mind as well? She couldn't—he was closed to her. Then she snapped her fingers right in front of his nose, huffed a little breath.

And she was gone. Simply gone.

She hadn't managed to rescue her wand. It still lay flat on his palm, stone cold, the gems flat and opaque, as if stripped of all light, all power, all meaning.

The prince stood there, miserable to his feet. Why was nothing ever easy?

16

Present

“
B
ISHOP
,
WAKE UP
.” S
HE
shook his shoulder. “What are you dreaming about? You're laughing, nearly choking on your laughter. Come, wake up and tell me what you're seeing in your dream. Are you dreaming of me and how clever I am? Is my wit making you laugh?”

He was standing inside a huge tower, some sort of stone altar in front of him. He saw no one, heard no one. He wanted to howl, he wanted to kill her—Brecia—it was Brecia, with her glorious red hair. He really wanted to take her throat between his hands, and at the same time he wanted her beneath him, her legs spread wide. Then, quite suddenly, he was laughing and shaking his head at her cleverness
.

He awoke to Merryn's hands shaking him, lightly slapping his face, and he was still laughing, but it wasn't a funny sort of laughter, he knew that. He was laughing because there was simply nothing else to do.

He shook his head, not laughing now. “I begin to
believe that nothing in this beleaguered life is ever easy for mortals.” He paused a moment, frowned. “Nay, maybe even for those who are not mortal, those not from our time.”

“What,” she said slowly, “isn't easy for mortals? What do you mean about those who are not mortals? Come, Bishop, why were you laughing your head off? What is this about those not from our time?”

“I don't know,” he said slowly. What had happened? What was going on here? He shook his head, sat up too quickly, and hit his head against the tent pole. No laughter in him now. No, he felt niggling fear from the sharp stirring in his blood, from the still-faint images in his brain, but it was all retreating now, slowly, very slowly, until the echoes of his laughter, the echoes of that stone altar faded away. Brecia faded away.

Bishop wanted to leave Cornwall right now. He wanted to go to the far islands to the north where the Vikings had settled. He wanted to hunker down in a stone hut with a warm fire. He wanted no mysteries, nothing he couldn't grasp with his hands, with his mind. He wanted to look at the icy sea water crashing against those islands, feel the water cascade over his bare feet—for an instant, he saw bare feet, scores of them, faint, somehow hovering above the ground. No. He shook the thought away. Damnation, he wanted to actually feel the cold water on his feet. Aye, he wanted what was real, what was solid.

“You look very strange. What did you dream?”

“I don't know, but it really wasn't funny at all,” he said.

“Well, that's good, isn't it?”

Wit at this hour. He shook his head at her and crawled out of the tent. The early-morning air was sharp on his face. He raised his face skyward, looking at the sun, still low in the heavens because it was just past dawn. As he stood there he wondered why he was riding to Tintagel. It came into his mind and he knew, simply knew, that he was going there. But what was there? He shook his head
and breathed in deeply. Whatever it was, he knew without a single doubt that it would become clear to him.

He turned to see Merryn on her knees making a fire. He stood there, making no sound, just watching her, the way her hands moved on the twigs, twisting them exactly the way she wanted them, leaning down to blow the small spark into life. She sat back, her palms on her thighs, and nodded, satisfied, as the nest of fire spread to the larger sticks and sent out warmth. Her gown was wrinkled, her hair falling out of its braids, long red tendrils touching her cheek, curling at her neck. Suddenly, she looked up at him and smiled, a sweet smile that was only for him, a smile that reached her eyes. He saw awareness of him as a man, awareness of what they'd done the previous night, how she'd touched him and held him. And she'd liked it, a lot, he'd known that. And he realized that she liked reflecting the memory of it now. He couldn't think of a thing to say other than
Would you like me to pull up your gown and put my mouth on you?

She said, that smile fading now, “Bishop, I'm worried about you. Can you remember anything about your dream?”

He joined her at the fire, coming down on his haunches, taking the hunk of cheese she handed him. He chewed, tore off some of the bread Philippa had wrapped in thick white woolen cloth, and in that instant he saw a gown that was as white as that woolen cloth—Brecia's gown. Then it was gone.

“When I first awoke,” he said, looking into the flame, “I saw myself, only I wasn't really me, and I was laughing because I simply couldn't believe what had happened.”

“What do you mean?”

“Think of yourself standing in the middle of a great hall, filled with people. Suddenly your clothes disappear. Everyone stops talking and stares at you.” He shrugged. “Would you laugh, because there was simply nothing else to do?”

She looked at him blankly.

He grinned. “Ah, mayhap a man would do that, not a woman. Women have many more interesting parts to cover than men.”

“I think your parts are far more interesting than mine. I'm just me, but you're—”

“What?”

She sighed and chewed on a piece of cheese. “Your parts are undoubtedly more interesting than poor dear Crispin's when I saw him naked. But I did feel you. That part felt very interesting.”

For a long moment he couldn't speak. He hurt. “You got me off track,” he said at last, staring into the fire, not at her, because if he did he just might take her down and rid her of her virginity.

She said, “You mean about being naked in a hall full of people and laughing?”

“What would you do, Merryn? Would you yell a nice full-bodied curse, even though it wouldn't help?”

She was laughing and nodding. “No. Nor would I run away because that would make me look even more foolish.”

“That's right. That's what the end of that dream was like. There was simply nothing else to do but laugh.” He chewed on the bread. She handed him a flagon of Dienwald's ale. It was tart and fresh and it warmed his innards, settled him back firmly inside himself, which was a grand relief.

She realized he wasn't going to say any more about the dream. It was probably faded now, nearly gone. She was looking at his hands, strong and tanned, and she could see his hands stroking her arms, maybe even the length of her legs, maybe even scratching her scalp. Who knew what men did with their hands? She thought of his mouth going where his hands went.
Oh my, oh my.
She swallowed and cleared her throat. “Where are we going, Bishop?”

He swept his hand to the north, saying nothing.

“Do you know what is there?”

“No, but I know I have to go there and I have to take you there with me. I also know that we must go now,
without delay.” He paused a moment. “It has something to do with the curse.”

She shook her head, looking at the fire spark.

“What is it, Merryn?”

She was silent.

“There are a lot of things I don't understand, you know that. Do you think you could trust me, Merryn?” He waited, watching her intently.

Merryn stirred a stick in the embers, sending more sparks into the air. Finally, just at the point when he was ready to curse the air blue, she said, “Yes, I trust you.”

His breath nearly whooshed out. Relief poured through him, relief and something else. Gratitude, perhaps, that she was willing to go into the unknown with him.

“But you don't trust me, do you?”

He was looking at her mouth as she said the words. He wanted her mouth on him.
Stop it, just stop it.
He looked at her eyes and hated the pain he saw there. He said simply, “I would trust you if you would just tell me what you're keeping from me.”

She more than trusted him. In two short days, she'd come to admire him—his humor, his rage, his smile. She'd come to look at him as she'd never before looked at any male, and she wanted to touch him just about all the time. Hmmm. This was more than trust, and so she said without hesitation, “I think my grandmother poisoned Sir Arlan de Frome, my first husband. I didn't tell anyone, particularly you, because I don't want you to punish her, to hang her for murdering that man, because that is what the king would expect you to do.”

Not the curse?
No, he refused to believe it. It went against everything he felt. “Tell me why you think this.”

“I heard her laughing with my grandfather the next morning, saying she didn't want to give Sir Arlan's trencher to the pigs, they just might keel over dead.”

“That's all you heard?”

“Aye. It was enough.”

“And the other husbands?”

“I don't know. All their symptoms were different. She wasn't ever near them. Some died sooner than others. My grandmother learned all about plants, their uses and how to mix them, from her mother, Meridian. She knew all about different plants that could kill.”

“But you have no proof that she poisoned Sir Arlan?”

Merryn shook her head. He reached out his hand and lightly touched his fingertips to her nose, smoothed her brows, touched her mouth. “Thank you, Merryn. Aye, I trust you.”

“Were you dreaming about a woman, Bishop?”

“Yes,” he said without thinking. He frowned. “Perhaps, but not entirely. It is strange, Merryn.”

“Something very odd is happening to you, isn't it?”

There, she'd said it aloud.

He said, “Aye, but I'm not yet certain what it all means.”

“You will tell me when you are.” She wanted to leap to her feet and do a little dance, maybe even sing a little rhyme.
He trusted her.
And he needed her to be with him. But why did he need her with him? “The curse,” she said, “it always came back to that. All this strangeness, this quest of yours. Maybe my grandmother didn't poison Sir Arlan.”

“Stop worrying about it. We'll find out the truth.”

She nodded. She had no idea now what to believe. One thing she was very certain of—she wasn't at all afraid, not of him at any rate. She knew Bishop would protect her if attacked, knew to the soles of her leather shoes, finely stitched by the weaver Crake, who was so old his hands shook as he sewed.

“Merryn, did your grandmother and grandfather write the Penwyth curse?”

“Not that I know of.” She paused a moment. “There were whispers, of course. And I wondered because the second part of the curse spoke so specifically to me—red hair, green eyes. But I truly don't know.”

He nodded, gave her his hand and pulled her to her
feet. He wanted to kiss her, wanted to bring her hard against him, but he knew he wouldn't. It wasn't the time. He was being pushed and prodded to ride ever northeast. And so they rode throughout the morning, staying close to the beach. The sea was beautiful, the water glistening beneath a bright sun as far out as she could see, and the sea air settled on her skin. As the afternoon lengthened, fog billowed from the water over the land and over them as well. Bishop pulled Fearless back from the cliffs because of the thick fog.

The sun was lowering behind them when Bishop said, “If there is a curse and we don't get rid of it, then you will die alone and sad, just as Crooky said. No man could risk wedding you.”

“I know. But there is a solution, Bishop. You must ask the king to make me Grandfather's heir. I can protect the western end of England from all possible invaders. Truly, my father and grandfather taught me strategy, taught me to use a bow and arrow, to throw a knife. It's true that I do not wield a sword well—they are too heavy for me. But I have guile, Bishop. I have incredible guile. If the French wish to invade, why, I'll drive them into the sea.”

“I'm strong, Merryn, and I can wield a sword, and yet I have eleven soldiers always with me.”

“Except for now.”

“Yes, that's true, and I am taking a risk, not just with my own life but also with yours. So who will be your soldiers, Merryn? Who will fight for you to protect Penwyth? Surely not all those old men?”

She was silent.

“A man-at-arms must be able to draw back a bow and aim it as he holds it steady; he must be able to fight on horseback; he must be able to see the enemy creeping up on him and fight him with his bare hands if necessary. He must wield an axe, and as you know, they are heavy, those axes. All those old men must die one day, Merryn, and then what will you have?”