The Warlock in Spite of Himself - Warlock 01 (21 page)

Rod's hands tightened, and he heard the peasant girl give a little cry of startled pain.

He let go his grip, and looked up at her; and Catharine's face swam next to hers.

He looked on the two of them, the one bent on using him, the other bent on being used by him, and anger suddenly burned in a band across his chest, anger at Catharine for her self-righteousness and determination to bend her world to her will; and at the peasant girl for her mute acceptance and deep resignation, for the depth of her warmth and her gentleness. The band of anger across his chest tightened and tightened, anger at himself for the animal in him, as his fingers bit into her shoulders, and he drew her down in the hay. She gasped with the pain, crying out softly till his lips struck hers, crushing and biting and bruising, his fingers clamped on the points of her jaw, forcing her mouth open and his tongue stabbed hard under hers. His hand groped over her body, fingers jabbing deep into the flesh, lower and lower, gnawing and mauling.

Then her nails dug into his back as her whole body knotted in one spasm of pain. Then she went loose, and her chest heaved under him in one great sob.

Half his anger sublimed into nothingness; the other half turned about and lanced into him, piercing something within him that loosed a tide of remorse.

He rolled to the side, taking his weight off her. His lips were suddenly gentle, warm and pleading; his hands were gentle, caressing slowly, soothingly.

She drew in breath, her body tensing again. Fool, the detached voice within him sneered, Fool! You only hurt her the more!

Ready to turn away from her in shame, he looked up into her eyes.. . and saw the longing burning naked there, craving and demanding, pulling him down into the maelstrom within her. Her lips parted, moist and full and warm, tugging and yielding, pulling him down and down, into blind, light-flooded depths where there was no sight nor hearing, but only touch upon touch.

Rod levered himself up on one elbow and looked down at the girl, lying naked beside him with only his cloak for a rather inadequate coverlet. It clung to her contours, and Rod let his eyes wander over them, drinking in the sight of her, fixing every feature of her body in his mind. It was a picture he did not want to lose.

He caressed her, gently, very tenderly. She smiled, murmured, closing her eyes and letting her head roll to the side.

Then her eyes opened again; she looked at him sidelong, her lips heavy and languid.

'You have emerald eyes,' Rod whispered.

She stretched luxuriously, her smile a little smug, wrapped her arms around his neck, and hauled him down to her, her kisses slow, almost drowsy, and lasting.

Rod looked into her eyes, feeling enormously contented and very much at peace with the world. Hell, the world could go hang!

He raised himself up again, his eyes upon her; then, slowly, he looked away and about him. There was only the bowl of hay under and about them, and the blue of the sky arching overhead.., and a mound of clothing to each side.

He looked down again; there was nothing in his world now except her, and he found, vaguely surprised, that he rather liked it that way. The peace within him was vast; he felt completely filled, completely satisfied with the world, with life, at one with them and with God - and with her most of all.

He let his hand linger over the cloaked curve of her breast. She closed her eyes, murmuring; then, as his hand stilled, she looked up at him again. Her smile faded to a ghost; concern stole into her eyes.

She started to say something, stopped, and said instead, almost warily,

'Are you well, lord?'

He smiled, his eyes very sober; then he closed them and nodded, slowly.

'Yes. I am very well.'

He bent to kiss her again - slowly, almost carefully - then lifted away. 'Yes, I am well, most strangely well, more than I have ever been.'

The smile lit her face again, briefly; then she turned her eyes away, looking down at her body, then up at him again, her eyes touched with fear.

He clasped her in his arms and rolled onto his back. Her body stiffened a moment, then relaxed; she gave a little cry, half sob and half sigh, and burrowed her head into the hollow of his shoulder and was still. He looked down at the glory of her hair spread out over his chest. He smiled lazily and let his eyes drift shut.

'Rod.' Fess's voice whispered behind his ear, and the world came flooding in again.

Rod tensed, and clicked his teeth once in acknowledgment. 'Big Tom is dressed again, and coming toward your haystack.' Rod sat bolt upright, squinting up at the sun; it was almost to the meridian. Time and distance nagged him again.

'Well, back to the world of the living,' he growled, and reached out for his clothes.

'Milord?'

She was smiling regretfully, but her eyes were tight with hurt - a hurt which faded into the deep acceptance and resignation even as he watched.

'The memory of this time will be dear to me, lord,' she whispered, clasping the cloak to her breast, her eyes widening. It was a forlorn plea for reassurance a reassurance he could not honestly give, for he would never see her again.

It came to him then that she was expecting refusal of any reassurance, expecting him to lash out at her for her temerity in implying that she had some worth, that she was worthy of thanks.

She knew her plea would bring hurt, yet she pled; for a woman lives on love, and this was a woman near thirty in a land where girls married at fifteen. She had already accepted that there was to be no lasting love in her life; she must subsist on the few crumbs she could gather. His heart went out to her, somewhat impelled by the jab of selfreproach. So, of course, he told her one of the lies that men tell women only to comfort them, and later realize to be very true.

He kissed her and said, 'This was not Life, lass, it was what living is for.'

And later, when he mounted his horse and turned back to look at her, with Big Tom beside him waving a cheery farewell to his wench, Rod looked into the girl's eyes again and saw the desperation, the touch of panic at his leaving, the silent, frantic plea for a shred of hope. A shred, Tom had said, would be too much, but Rod would probably never see this girl again. Not even a spark of hope -just a glimmer. Could. that do any hurt?

'Tell me your name, lass.'

Only a spark, but it flared in her eyes to a bonfire. 'Gwendylon am I called, lord.'

And when they had rounded a turn in the road and the girls were lost to sight beyond the hill behind them, Tom sighed and said, 'Thou hast done too much, master. Thou shalt never be rid of her now.'

There was this to be said for a roll in the hay: it had sapped enough of Big Tom's vitality so that he wasn't singing any more. Probably still humming, to be sure; but he was riding far enough ahead so Rod couldn't hear him.

Rod rode in silence, unable to rid his mind of flaming hair and emerald eyes. So he cursed at the vision, under his breath; but it seemed to his aloof self that the cursing lacked something - vehemence, perhaps. Certainly sincerity. It was his aloof self accused, a very halfhearted attempt at malediction.

Rod had to admit it was. He was still feeling very much at one with creation. At the moment, he couldn't have been angry with his executioner.. . . And that worried him.

'Fess.'

'Yes, Rod?' The voice seemed a little more inside his head than usual.

'Fess, I don't feel right.'

The robot paused; then, 'How do you feel, Rod?'

There was something about the way Fess had said that Rod glanced sharply at the pseudo-horse head. 'Fess, are you laughing at me?'

'Laughing?'

'Yes, laughing. You heard me. Chuckling in your beard.'

'This body is not equipped with a beard.'

'Cut the comedy and answer the question.'

With something like a sigh, the robot said, 'Rod, I must remind you that I am only a machine. I am incapable of emotions. I was merely noting discrepancies, Rod.'

'Oh, were you!' Rod growled. 'What discrepancies, may I ask?'

'In this instance, the discrepancy between what a man really is and what he wishes to believe of himself.'

Rod's upper lip turned under and pressed against his teeth. 'Just what do I wish to believe?'

'That you are not emotionally dependent upon this peasant Woman.'

'Her name is Gwendylon.'

'With Gwendylon. With any woman, for that matter. You wish to believe that you are emotionally independent, that you no longer enjoy what you call "being in love".'

'I enjoy love very much, thank you!'

'That is a very different thing,' the robot murmured, 'than being in love.'

'Damn it, I wasn't talking about making love!'

'Neither was I.'

Rod's lips pressed into a thin white line. 'You're talking about emotional intoxication And if that's what you mean - no, I am not in love. I have no desire to be in love. And if I have any say in the matter, I will never be in love again!'

'Precisely what I said you wished to believe,' mused the robot. Rod ground his teeth and waited for the surge of anger to pass. 'Now what's the truth about me?'

'That you are in love.'

'Damn it, a man's either in love, or he's not, and he damn well knows which.'

'Agreed; but he may not be willing to admit it.'

'Look,' Rod snapped, 'I've been in love before, and I know what it's like. It's . . . well . . .'

'Go on,' the 'robot prodded.'

'Well, it's like' - Rod lifted his head and looked out at the countryside - 'you know the world's there, and you know it's real; but you don't give a damn, 'cause you know for a certainty that you're the center of the world, the most important thing in it.'

'Have you felt that way recently?' Fess murmured.

'Well. . . yes, damn it.' Rod's mouth twisted.

'With Catharine?'

Rod stared, and glared at the back of the horse's head. 'How the hell would you know?' His eyes narrowed.

'Logic, Rod.' The robot's voice had a touch of smugness. 'Only logic. And how did you feel while you were with Gwendylon?'

'Oh . . .' Rod threw his shoulders back, stretching. 'Great, Fess. Better than I ever have. The world's clearer, and the day's younger. I feel so healthy and clearheaded I can't believe it. It's just the opposite to how I feel when I'm in love, but I like it.'

Rod frowned at the back of Fess's head. 'Well?' The robot plodded on, not answering.

'Cat got your tongue?'

'I am not equipped with a tongue, Rod.'

'Don't change the subject.'

The horse was silent a moment longer; then, 'I -was mistaken, Rod. You love, and are loved - but you are not in love.'

Rod frowned down at the roadway. 'Why not, Fess?'

The robot made a sound like a sigh. 'How do the two Women differ, Rod?'

'Well...' Rod chewed at the inside of his cheek. 'Gwendylon's human. I mean, she's just an ordinary, everyday woman, like I'm an ordinary man.'

'But Catharine is more?'

'Oh, she's the kind of woman I tend to put on a pedestal... something to be worshiped, not courted..

'And not loved?' the robot mused. 'Rod, of the two women, which is the better human being?'

'Uh. . . Gwendylon.'

'The prosecution,' said the robot-horse, 'rests.'

The demesne of the Loguires was a great, broad plain between the mountains and the sea. The low, rolling mountains stood at the north and east; beach curved in a wide semi-circle in the south; a sheer, hundred foot high cliff face towered in the northwest. The ocean battered at its seaward side; a waterfall poured over the other face into the valley. A long, old river twisted over the plain to the sea. The plain itself was a patchwork of fields, with here and there a cluster of peasant huts - Loguire's people.

Tom and Rod stood at the verge of one of the mountain forests, where the road from the North fell away to the plain.

Rod turned his head slowly, surveying the demesne. 'And where,' he said, 'is the castle?'

'Why, back of the waterfall, master.'

Rod's head jerked around, staring at Tom; then he followed the road with his eyes.

It wound across the plain to the foot of the waterfall; there, where the cliff met the plain, a great gate was carved in the rock, complete with portcullis and a drawbridge over the natural moat formed by an oxbow of the river. The lords of Loguire had honeycombed the cliff for their home.

An exclamation point formed between Rod's eyebrows as they drew together. 'Is that a dike to either side of the drawbridge, Big Tom?'

'Aye, master; and there are said to be charges of gunpowder within it.'

Rod nodded, slowly. 'And the land before the portcullis gate sinks down. So if unwelcome callers come knocking, you blow up the dike, and your front door gets covered with thirty feet of water. Very neat. Then you just sit and wait out the siege. The waterfall gives you plenty of fresh water, so your only worry is food.'

'There are said to be gardens within the keep,' Big Tom supplied helpfully.

Rod shook his -head in silent respect. 'So you're completely defended, and stocked for a ten years' siege. This place ever been taken, Tom?'

The big man shook his head. 'Never, master.' He grinned.

'Wonder if the old boy who built this place was maybe a little bit paranoid. . . . Don't suppose they'd have room in that place for a couple of weary travelers, do you?'

Big Tom pursed his lips. 'Aye, master, if they were noblemen. The hospitality of the Loguires is famed. But for the likes of me, and even yourself, who are no more than a squire, master, that hospitality lies in the cottages.'

The sun winked. Rod scowled and peered into the sky. 'There's that damn bird again. Doesn't it know we're too big for lunch?' He unlimbered his crossbow and cranked it back to cocked.

'Nay, master.' Big Tom put out a hand 'You've lost four bolts on it already.'

'I just don't like anything airborne following me, Tom. They're not always what they seem.' Tom's brow furrowed at the cryptic statement. Rod tucked the stock into his shoulder. 'Besides, I've taken one shot a day at it for the last four days; it's getting to be a habit.'