The Knight's Prisoner (Medieval Discipline 1)

He left the candle lit, and both he and the midwife woke every time Dani groaned with cramps during the night. She continued to bleed and also to pass tissue. The midwife's tight, pinched face told him all he needed to know—Dani was not improving. Finally, the midwife made some sort of decision and pulled out a tiny clay pot of oil, pouring some on her hands and rubbing them. It smelled of garlic.

“I'm going to check her,” she said.

He didn't know what she meant but watched as she parted Dani's legs and slipped her fingers inside her. Though he knew it was necessary, he bristled at the invasion, especially when Dani whimpered and moaned at it. The midwife's expression was one of intense listening, which then turned to satisfaction, and she pulled her hand back out.

“There was something caught in the opening to her womb and I removed it. Hopefully its removal will help slow the bleeding.”

It did, in fact, seem to have an effect. Dani did not wake again till daybreak, and judging from the rags between her legs, the flow had slowed considerably. He stroked her hair and kissed her forehead while the midwife coaxed her into sipping some broth.

“How do you feel?”

“Better.” She leaned up on her elbows and looked up at him through her light eyelashes. “I Saw something,” she said in a low voice so that the midwife wouldn't hear. It took a moment for him to understand she was speaking about her Sight.

“What was it?”

“Tell…” her eyes darted toward the midwife “…our friend… he will be double-crossed.”

“By whom?”

She lowered herself back to the bedding, and shook her head, looking tired. “I don't know.”

* * *

It hadn't been Sight exactly—it was more a sense of knowing that had come to her. She couldn't see any faces attached or how the double-cross would come, no matter how many questions the Prince put to her. It was not until a month later, when he sent for her to ask the whereabouts of a missing party of his men, including the knight Sir Godfrey, that she understood.

She was sitting beside him on a rock overlooking a lake down in a valley, Sir Ferrum nearby, melting into the background.

“Danewyn, I sent four soldiers to meet a contact in London. They should have returned by now,” the Prince said, looking down at the landscape.

She knew immediately—a sense of warning flooded through her. “It's the double-cross,” she said tensely.

The Prince's face sharpened. “Where are they? Are they alive?”

She closed her eyes but saw nothing but a swirled jumble of images. She frowned and tried harder.

As if the Prince could sense her confusion, he placed a finger between her brows. “Shh. You can find it. Just listen.”

She strained to See, but the jumble became even more chaotic along with her thoughts, which swirled around fears that she would not be able to See.

“Shh,” the Prince said, more insistently. “Relax. It will come to you.”

She cleared the clutter of images from her mind and imagined instead the clear blue lake below them. In the days of Avalon, the priestesses Saw by looking in scrying bowls, filled with water. She created a clear image of the lake in her imagination and stared at it, absorbing the peace and calm of its still waters. An image appeared of a struggle—then Sir Godfrey and his men being led away at sword point.

“They were attacked, led away… by the King's soldiers, I think.”

“Are they still alive?” the Prince asked.

She heard a yes quite clearly in her mind. “Aye.”

“Where?”

She Saw the men again, being forced into a dwelling crowded beside other dwellings. It must be London… unless there were other settlements that looked the same.

“London?” she said, unsure. Yes, she heard clearly. “Aye, London.”

She opened her eyes and looked at the Prince, who was wearing his battle face.

“Can they be rescued?” he asked tersely.

She was surprised that the Prince would risk the lives of more men to retrieve these few. She respected him for it. From what she had seen, his men would follow him into hell and back. And it seemed it was for good reason—he truly cared about them.

Yes. “Aye. They are still in London. I can't say where, exactly, but there are not so very many of the royal guard holding them. Less than a dozen, mayhap.”

The Prince looked at Sir Ferrum, who also had a battle face on. “You will go. Take Danewyn so she can lead you to them. Take a dozen men.”

He shook his head. “Nay, a dozen men will attract too much attention. I will take six.”

The Prince nodded. “As you see fit.”

“We'll leave at first light,” Sir Ferrum promised, and held out an arm to lead her away.

They rode out in the morning, and she felt sick and conflicted about returning to London. It was what she'd been wanting, except when she thought about it, there was nothing at all she missed from that life. Still, this was her chance to escape—the escape she'd been planning for more than two months.