Rosehaven (Medieval Song 5)

“Ye done with the boy?”

She had no choice. She plunged the knife in again, this time higher, into his chest. The knife point hit a rib and wouldn’t go any farther. The man howled, twisted over, and fell to his side.

“Wot’s the matter?” The other man was at his side. As for Hastings, she was on her feet, running to Marella.

The man wheezed out, “The little whoreson struck me down and kilt me.”

Hastings was on Marella’s back in an instant. The other man was running toward her, yelling curses. Marella reared on her hind legs and struck the man hard in the chest.

He went over backward with a grunt.

It was at that moment that she heard more curses. Hideous curses curdled with the names of body parts and animals. This man wasn’t whispering. He was roaring.

She recognized that voice.

She kicked Marella’s fat sides. Her palfrey couldn’t move. There were three men on horseback blocking her. Hastings whipped her about to see Severin sitting on his horse behind her, three more men at his back. How had he positioned his men so quickly? Curse him.

She slid off Marella’s back, ducked around a stallion, and ran into the forest, Severin’s curses following her.

The curses stopped. The feet pounding the ground behind her didn’t.

Something huge and hard hit her square in the back, flinging her forward. She fell flat on her face, the boulder flattening her down.

“I should let you play the fool in my castle,” he said close to her ear. “My men would never stop their laughter. All you would have to do is recount what you have done this day, Hastings, nothing more.”

He was breaking her back, but she didn’t say a word. It would have been difficult because her mouth was pressed into the earth.

Severin rolled off her and came up to sit beside her. At least there was a half-moon. She didn’t move for the longest time, just lay there. He knew he hadn’t killed her with his lunge because her ribs were going in and out. Her face was flat down. Good, he hoped she had a mouth of earth. Mayhap a worm or two.

Then, finally, she pulled herself back onto her knees. Her head was down and she was breathing slowly, with difficulty. He merely watched her, saying nothing.

She sat back on her heels. She said at last, “No matter what you had done, I doubt I would have stuck Master Thomas’s knife in your belly. You’re my husband, after all.”

“Where would you have stuck Master Thomas’s knife?”

She just shook her head. “I don’t know.”

“I didn’t have time to save you.” He sounded incredibly angry.

“I didn’t need your help.”

“No, you didn’t, did you?” He sounded even angrier. Why? “What if there had been a third man?”

She would be dead, she thought, but didn’t say it aloud. “I would have dealt with him as well.”

Severin got to his feet, brushed himself down, then just stood there, staring down at her.

She felt suddenly very weak. Why was that? She started to rise but discovered she couldn’t. She felt a wave of dizziness. She looked down to see the knife on the ground where Severin had thrown her down. She had been carrying the knife.

She’d fallen on it.

She touched her fingertips to her side. They were wet and sticky. She looked up at him.

“You expect me to help you rise? See to yourself, madam.”

He turned to walk away from her, then said over his shoulder, “If you run again, I will surely make you regret it more than you can imagine.”

“I won’t run again.”