Magick by Moonrise Page 5

  “Thou cannot keep me here,” she whispered, voice taut. “For the peace of both our realms, sir—”

  “Rhiannon!” Ansgar’s shout rang over the sudden thunder of hooves. Springing to her feet, she caught a pale blur of movement, her beloved Astolat flying toward her, perfectly attuned to her needs. Across the clearing, metal whined as her foster-father unsheathed his blade. Black wool swirled as Lord Beltran unrolled to his feet, firelight flashing red on his holy sword.

  As the mare swept past, Rhiannon launched herself toward the saddle. The tooled leather struck her belly hard, knocking the wind from her, but she scrambled deftly into place. Needing no reins to guide the mare, she had only to spy Ansgar’s mounted form and they were sweeping toward him, her steed’s mane floating like a silver cloud around them.

  The mare sailed over the dying fire as though winged, the wind of her passage billowing Rhiannon’s pale skirts around her.

  “In God’s name, halt!” Lord Beltran’s bellow sounded like the blast of trumpets. The holy Name struck her like a blow to the belly. Beside her, Ansgar cried out.

  Forewarned by that uncanny bellow, Rhiannon twisted to glance behind her. What she found filled her with panic—the Blade of God fallen to hands and knees, pure cobalt fire spilling from his eyes, strong features contorted with pain. Around him, above him, a halo of flame was burning.

  Goddess save us.

  The mare leaped into the trees without slowing. Rhiannon ducked wildly as a gnarled branch nearly swept her from the saddle. Catching a bare glimpse of her foster-father’s grim features as he raised his sword, she screamed at him.

  “You cannot fight him. Flee!”

  As they raced through the darkness, twisting among trees they could barely discern, branches reached from the night like the Hand of God to pluck her from the saddle. Twigs snared her skirts and tore at her flying hair. Sightless, wind stinging her cheeks, ears filled with her own crashing flight, Rhiannon clung to the mare’s neck and let the faithful creature find her own way. Unless they stumbled across the Queen’s Highway, they’d be lost in the forest.

  Better even that, than the form of fire.

  Above, through a web of trees, a violet moon hung low in the heavens, surrounded by a glittering net of stars. Using these celestial signposts, Rhiannon steered a course southeast toward London. Here she was in familiar terrain; the moon served as her compass for navigating through time and space behind the Veil. Even the stars shifted in their courses in that enchanted realm.

  Now, as she fled, the trees seemed to shift around her—here a tangled thicket of malevolent oak, there a moon-threaded glade of slender aspens, somewhere the roar of a river cascade such as never poured through this mortal wood. Was it Morrigan’s vengeful hand that spun the sinister thread of enchantment? Rhiannon must not allow herself to grow befuddled, or all was lost.

  Behind her, the cherry-red glow of fire edged the black trees in silhouette.

  Though he’d started out behind her, she could no longer see Ansgar. She fretted for his safety but feared to cry his name, lest she lead their pursuer straight to them.

  Her mare burst into a familiar clearing, hemmed by a high jumble of rocks and a rain-swollen stream. Twisted forms littered the ground, dead men and dead horses, reeking of blood and loosened bowels. Her stomach rose into her throat as she galloped through the glade where they’d fought for their lives, and the last of her Fae escort had lost his.

  Before them, suddenly, a shadowy figure cried hoarsely and struggled upright—some chance survivor of the slaughter. Astolat shied violently and reared, hooves striking out at the apparition and thudding into flesh. A scream tore Rhiannon’s throat as her grip on the saddle dislodged. The world spun around her, the star-strewn heavens somehow below her, the ground rushing to fill her vision.

  The slam of impact knocked the breath from her lungs. For a few moments she lay crumpled on the damp ground as the mare thundered away, bones aching beneath the voluminous skirts that had cushioned her fall, the farthingale crushed flat beneath her.

  When she could drag breath into her lungs, she pushed to hands and knees, head spinning too madly to risk her feet. Frantically she kicked free of the ruined cage of fashionable wire and scurried across the soil, tangled curls falling forward to screen her vision. Clinging to her wits, she sensed Astolat’s panicked presence, snorting and shying, crashing through the trees and struggled after her.

  Mortal, not monstrous, that creature who’d risen before her. Just one of the brigands Ansgar smote before he’d fallen. If the grievous wound that had torn open his chest didn’t kill the man, she knew with her healer’s instinct that Astolat’s hooves had cracked his skull. Scrambling across the soil, she assured herself the doomed man behind her was nothing to fear.

  Yet, somehow, fear closed her throat and dried her mouth.

  Around her, smothering silence fell like a hammer blow, obliterating all sound including her own gasping breath. Dread spilled through her like ice-water, pressed her flat against the soil like the wrath of the Christian God. Beneath her palms, the earth trembled. She knew what had entered the clearing behind her.

  Lady of Light, Goddess, Mother, protect me. Her lips moved soundlessly as she struggled against the soil like a crushed insect. Easy prey for the Blade of God, or whatever vengeful angel he’d become.

  Suddenly, the crushing pressure eased. Sound leaked back to the night—Astolat’s distant snort of alarm, her own desperate breaths, the scrape of wind against leaves and branches. Behind her, the wounded mortal was sobbing.

  Gathering her courage, Rhiannon risked a glance behind her. Surprise riveted her in place as surely as divine wrath had done a moment past.

  Lord Beltran Nemesto had indeed arrived, but only in mortal form. Astride his white charger, he frowned down on the wounded bandit, ebony cape unfurled and snapping behind him in the wind. Even as she watched, the fire dimmed and dwindled to a shimmering halo around his form, burnishing his cropped hair to tawny gold. At his feet, the bandit groveled.

  “Lord Jesus Christ—forgive me,” the poor wretch groaned, clearly fighting for every breath. “I need a priest—before ye—take me.”

  Flinching from the holy Name, Rhiannon shook her head sadly. By his lights, the poor man was dying with mortal sin upon his soul. Without confession and whatever sacred rite the priests performed to absolve him, the wretched creature was destined to burn in hell. For her mother had taught her that as men believed of the life beyond, so it became. Each soul created its own reality.

  Moving with a catlike grace that belied his powerful frame, Lord Beltran swung a leg forward over his saddle and leaped down. The cloak swirled around him as he strode forward and dropped to one knee beside the dying man.

  “Jesu forgive me!” The bandit’s voice splintered. She sensed the bleeding inside his skull, pressure building against his brain.

  “Such a terrible waste of life,” she whispered, a healer’s pity welling in her heart. The least she could do was ease his passing. Driven by a lifetime of habit, the instinctive need to comfort, she gathered her trembling legs beneath her.

  Heedless of her halting approach, the Blade of God leaned forward to cup the man’s head gently in one large hand. Based on her limited knowledge of Beltran Nemesto, she would never have dreamed he could touch a living creature so tenderly, display such compassion as the terrible wrath eased its grip on his harsh features. That voice that could roar like a lion or
the blast of trumpets rumbled soft, bringing sudden tears to her eyes.

  “Your soul requires no priest, Rurick son of Angus.” Those fiery cobalt eyes glowed like banked coals. “Repent sincerely. Ask God for forgiveness. I shall intercede on your behalf.”

  The amber glow of Beltran’s aura spilled across the man before him, lighting the bandit’s grizzled face with a child’s wide-eyed wonder. Staring into those glowing eyes as though they were windows into the Christian heaven, the poor creature gasped. Rapture lit him from within until the last breath seeped from his lips. Slowly then, the divine fire faded, until Beltran Nemesto knelt over a dead man.

  Rhiannon stood riveted, too awestruck by his strange magick to move.

  “What manner of creature art thou?” she whispered. “I vow this poor soul thought thee his Maker. And how did thou learn his name?”

  Without lifting his gaze, Beltran voiced a bitter sound. Propping one elbow on his bent knee, he heaved a breath.

  “I’m only a man, no better than this poor wretch. Will you make me hunt you into the ground, Rhiannon le Fay, and bind you hand and foot like a criminal?” he asked the soil wearily. “I managed to control it—this time. Surely now you realize it’s wiser if you don’t provoke me.”

  * * *

  After that foolhardy escape—an attempt that had nearly succeeded—Beltran decided to bind her. Last night’s debacle had already cost him one prisoner. He’d lost her wounded paramour with his antique armor, who’d eluded his dead-of-night search.

  Pity, because Beltran would have liked very much to interrogate the fellow. His relations with the strange girl alone made him suspect.

  Now, as shafts of morning sunlight slanted through the trees, Rhiannon le Fay swayed gracefully in the saddle, as though heedless of the rope that bound her hands before her. Her dainty little mare, the color of smoke and moonlight, stepped gamely along without protest beside his Serafin.

  Still, though his captive seemed to be behaving for the moment, a tinge of rose stained her slanted cheekbones. Imperious as any princess, she rode with her chin tilted at a mutinous angle. She’d been adamantly opposed to leaving her comrade behind and argued passionately that his wounds required tending.

  “Your faithful protector abandoned you to your fate,” Beltran said curtly, as he knotted the rope around her fine-boned wrists. “I suggest you resign yourself to doing the same for him.”

  She’d looked as though she wanted to run him through with his own sword.

  The girl was still simmering as she rode beside him, one gilded ringlet swinging against a rigid shoulder. Still no sign of a proper hood. When they watered their horses, she’d knelt beside the tumbling brook like a river nymph and coiled that mass of silver hair into a coronet around her head. It gave her the illusion of respectability, despite the travel-stained cream velvet billowing around her. Her red mantle spilled over the mare’s silken haunches like a royal banner.

  By daylight, the girl’s beauty was undeniable. Light as a bird, she perched in the saddle, waist small enough to span between his hands, her breasts round and sweet as apples beneath her tight-laced bodice...

  Damn it! Remember your oath, man.

  No good. Even a man sworn to celibacy—though he routinely tumbled into sin—couldn’t be immune to her enchantment, her ethereal innocence, those flashes of wildness like a forest creature.

  Fashioned by the Devil to beguile, no doubt. He’d have to be blind not to want her. Just to kiss her once, feel her startle and kindle beneath his touch, yield against him as her arms stole around his neck...

  Beside him, the girl slanted him a guarded look, as though sensing his lustful thoughts. “Where dost thou take me, Lord Beltran Nemesto?”

  He cleared his throat and banished his carnal cravings, forcing his thoughts resolutely away from the cock-stand beneath his codpiece. “To the abbey for questioning, to determine whether formal charges of witchcraft should be brought.”

  Her leaf-green eyes widened with trepidation. Firmly, Beltran quashed a pang of discomfort. The time for subtlety had passed, with the lady flown and barely recovered. He could only thank God he’d managed to hold another fit of holy madness at bay when he woke from a sound sleep to find her fleeing him.

  Now he hardened his heart against her plight and adjusted Serafin’s course, angling them away from the stream. If his reckoning was correct, they should be emerging on the Great North Road near Hatfield.

  He’d leave her at the abbey there, explain the situation and be on his way within the hour. The abbot was noted as a rigid doctrinarian and a strict questioner. He would have time to bother with the girl as Beltran did not, to question and counter-question her, pick apart this outlandish tale she’d concocted and get at the truth of the business.

  Possibly, he would find Rhiannon le Fay to be merely deluded. If not, the abbot would turn her over to Bishop Bonner—and then God help her.

  “Why cannot thou question me, as we ride along?” she asked. “If question thou must.”

  He kept his voice curt. Now was no time for sympathy; better for her to grasp the gravity of her situation. “I’ve no time to oversee your interrogation. Questioning a suspect properly takes days. The business can’t be rushed, though some enthusiasts barrel through it to judgment.”

  Hearing the censure in his own voice, he checked himself and made his face impassive. “The best interrogators build a relationship, of sorts, with the accused. One must establish credibility and authority as well as fear.”

  “Thy performance thus far seems more than adequate,” she murmured, slim fingers twining in the mare’s flaxen mane.

  Heat kindled in his blood. On the lips of another woman, a comment like that would have been an invitation. Was she truly so innocent of seduction? Or did she play his passions like the lap-harp she’d used to sing him to sleep?

  Grimly he halted these dangerous speculations. “I’m expected in London, and long overdue. But I place full faith in the abbot. He’s questioned dozens—if not hundreds—of suspect heretics and witches. He’ll know how to question you without botching it.”

  “I’ve nothing to confess,” she whispered. “I’ve done nothing wrong. I’m a stranger to this land.”

  When her lip quivered, a twinge of remorse plucked at him. Forsooth, needful though it was, he never relished making these poor unfortunates fear him.

  “If you’re innocent of the charges, girl, you’ve nothing to fear,” he said gruffly.

  “I fear nothing.” Her pointed chin lifted, battle-ready once more. “Have thou examined the documents in my belt-pouch, my letters of introduction and safe-passage, the treaty with Queene Maeve’s own seal?”

  “I’ve said I have no time, girl. Your interrogator will examine the evidence in due course.” He paused. “Frankly, unless those letters come from Pope Paul himself, I don’t care who’s written them. It’s unfortunate you’ve fallen into the hands of the one man in England least able to show you mercy, Rhiannon le Fay.”

  Indeed, he’d worked hard to become so ruthless, to become the terror on the battlefield and in the interrogation chamber known to God-fearing Christians as God’s Vengeance. Compassion had no place in the holy work he did, or so he’d always believed. His place was to carry out judgment, not cozen the accused with mercy and sympathy.

  Beneath their hooves, bracken crackled as the smoke-colored mare sidled, no doubt sensing her rider’s distress. The girl murmured under her breath, and
the mare settled.

  “If thou wilt not question me,” she said tightly, “then will thou listen? And open thine eyes to the evils that bedevil this land? Plagues, famine, flooding such as England has not witnessed in generations. Crops have rotted in the fields three years running because these villages have buried all who would harvest them.”

  Beltran nodded grimly at that. All of Europe knew of England’s misery.

  Looking encouraged by this small acknowledgement, the girl rushed ahead.

  “England is drawn into the bottomless pit of Spain’s unceasing wars. Queen Mary is hopelessly besotted with her Spanish husband, enslaved to the will of his brother the Holy Roman Emperor. They’ve been burning Protestants here for years, though once the English isle was known for tolerance and moderation. This entire isle teeters on the brink of civil war.”

  “Aye, they’re burning more heretics than ever,” he conceded, drawn against his will into this matter that concerned him so closely. “Though, with proper handling, many of those might be saved. Some of God’s servants are too quick with the torch.”

  Sensing her apprehension, he allowed her a tight smile. “You needn’t fear. The abbot will be just. Honest repentance and willingness to take instruction in the Catholic faith will avail you greatly—”

  “Repentance?” she cried, brows rushing together above stormy eyes. “For what should I repent? For being who I am, and what I am—half Fae and half mortal, a misfit who belongs nowhere, neither in one world nor the other? An oddity dwelling always on the fringes, peering through the window at a fellowship I’m not permitted to share? What have I done my whole life but regret and grieve for that?”

  Startled by her passion, he stared at her. For a breath, the English forest melted away around him. He was a boy again, weak with hunger, face still swollen from his father’s fists, the shabby peasant rubbing elbows with his betters at San Miguel. How the noble brats and the merchants’ sniveling sons at the monastery had hated him!