LITMIR.BIZ

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to see that Merry and John were trotting along the path in front of two more men in mail and tunics that bore the colors of Robert Bruce.

      Merry, seeing Igrainia, called out, and as fast as her round bulk would allow, she dismounted and rushed to her, ignoring everyone else. “Oh, my lady!” she cried in alarm, seeing the condition of her clothing and the blood that spattered it. “You’re hurt!” she said, reaching up to put her arms around her and hug her tightly.

      Igrainia wasn’t seriously injured, but she realized, as Merry’s arms came around her, that she was sore in every muscle of her body. Her throat hurt her and she had banged a knee and her hip hard against the ground when she had fallen. But the blood spattered over her was Gannet’s, not hers.

      She tried to reassure Merry. “No, I am not really hurt,” she said quickly as she eased herself from the caring yet tight hold around her and squeezed Merry’s hands.

      Eric left Gannet’s body on the road by the trees where it had fallen. He remounted his horse. “I’ll see to the others,” he said to Allan, “if you will escort these three.”

      There was something utterly dismissive about the way he spoke that sparked anger in Igrainia.

      She walked to him quickly. “They murdered people, simply murdered them in cold blood.” She was startled when she added, “Don’t be deceived by the women, they are the ones who killed first. The young men, if they are back there . . .”

      “They are aware of what they face.”

      He started to turn his horse.

      “Wait. Perhaps I can do something, help. They may not all be dead—”

      “You wish to help?” he said. His eyes were still cold and somewhat scathing. “They tried to kill you. They were common thieves and murderers.”

      “No . . . just that family. The others were just trying to reach a new life, they were riding with us for our safety.” The irony of the last filled her and her words ended on something of a high note that threatened both laughter and tears. “That you . . . that you should have come along to stop them . . .”

      “Ah, and there’s a wonderful note of gratitude!” he muttered.

      “They stabbed them, and struck them . . . someone may still be alive,” she said, ignoring his words. “I can perhaps help—”

      “And perhaps not.”

      And she knew by his tone that he referred to the fact that his wife was dead.

      “I saved your life!” she told him.

      “Perhaps a will to live saved my life.”

      “There’s a wonderful note of gratitude!” she mocked.

      She was startled as he dismounted from his horse. Perhaps because of her very near brush with death at Gannet’s hands, she backed away.

      He reached out, grabbing her hand. “What in God’s name ails you, woman?” he demanded. “We did not take the time to follow in your thankfully slow footsteps to murder you ourselves.”

      She tried not to wince as he caught her roughly about the waist, and she managed not to cry out, or wonder too long at his intent. He set her atop his great warhorse, mounting behind her. He said nothing more, but nudged the horse, and a second later they were moving at a heady lope back along the path until they came to the place where Anne and her party had tricked the young men.

      Joseph and Jacob had apparently attempted some fight; the two were dead, locked in a strange embrace where they had been deposited by the side of the road. Anne and her lethal sisters now cowered together near a tree, all but ignored, as two of Eric’s men, easily recognizable in their mail and tunics, worked over the fallen men. Two were prone and crumpled, but Brandon was obviously breathing; the one called Timothy was holding his head in his hands and trying to explain what had happened, yet still so stunned by the events that he didn’t seem to be making sense.

      “We never thought . . . who would have feared . . .”

      “It was them!” Anne called out. “They attacked us! We had no choice. And now you’ve killed my poor husband!”

      Igrainia cried out, “You wretched liar!”

      Eric reined in. Before he could dismount or help her down, she was sliding from the horse, nearly tripping and falling in her haste. She approached Anne with loathing and hatred, seeing that Thayer remained on the ground, not moving. She started for Anne, her fury so deep she didn’t know what she had intended. “You liar! You murdered good people, people trying to help you, my God, how could you—”

      Anne let out a scream as if she had been gutted. “She! She caused this. She knew that we had coins in our hems, she bewitched the men, she told them to attack us, it was her! We might have all died, and now our poor men are fallen for trying to defend us—”

      “Liar!” Igrainia charged, and kept coming, not at all sure of what she intended, only that she was so angry she had to strike out at the woman. But as she came near Anne, the woman let out another shriek and came tearing at her, a knife, which she must have hidden in her skirts, suddenly glittering in the sun as she moved. Igrainia saw the blade in time and sidestepped. Eric had seen the danger as well, and caught her from behind as she moved, casting her far from harm’s way. She fell in the dirt, but there was no need for anyone to go after Anne. Her force brought her crashing past the place where Igrainia should have been, and she tripped upon a pothole in the trail and fell flat upon the earth. She remained where she fell, and didn’t move.

      “Anne!” Lizzie shrieked, leaving Beth to stand alone as she raced to the spot where her sister had fallen. She turned Anne’s prone form, and Igrainia saw that Anne had unwittingly brought about her own destruction; she had fallen upon the blade of her knife. It protruded from her chest, and the blood that soaked her breast made it apparent she had managed to drive the blade into her heart.

      Lizzie let out a terrible wail.

      Igrainia picked herself out of the dirt, wincing as she did so, realizing more and more with each passing moment that she was bruised and sore.

      Again, she could feel nothing but a terrible coldness in her heart where once she would have felt sorrow at the sight of death.

      “What do we do with the other two?” one of the men asked Eric.

      “I don’t know—yet. But tie them—they seem to have weapons everywhere. Yorick, gather the horses you can find,” he commanded, speaking to another of the men. “It seems we will have a strange party returning.”

      Igrainia hurried to where Thayer lay, falling to her knees and trying to ascertain just where he had been struck, and how many injuries he had received—indeed, if he had survived at all. She let out a small sigh of relief; he was breathing. Slowly, laboriously, but his chest rose and fell at regular intervals. One strike of the knife’s blade had struck just beneath his shoulder, and another had gone through his side, and she could only pray that the blade had not damaged his insides. She began to rip at the hem of her linen gown for bandages to stop the flow of blood.

      As she wound material and pressed it against the wounds, she realized that large booted feet were at her side. She looked up. Eric was standing there.

      “He was trying to find a way to survive, and get money home to his mother and family. They were all off to make new lives . . . their lord was killed, their lands were decimated. . .”

      She was afraid that he meant to stop her. She was startled and nearly jumped when he came to her side.

      To her amazement, he took one of the makeshift bandages from her and expertly applied pressure to one of the wounds.

      “He has a chance, I think,” he said.

      “But he can’t ride.”

      Eric was silent. After a moment, he stood, and Igrainia realized it was because Merry and John had reached them. Merry had come to see what help they could give

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