Enchantress (Medieval Trilogy 1)

Logan’s eyes were round in the torchlight, and his little lips quivered. Morgana’s heart bled for him. “Come, child, I will keep you safe.”

His eyes moved to the wolf, and Morgana smiled. “He will watch over both of us, little one. See?” She petted Wolf’s thick fur and was rewarded with a wet tongue against her hand. “Come on.” Carefully she cut Logan loose from his bonds and hauled him up. She grabbed the blanket she’d seen in her dreams and draped it over the lad’s shoulders. He was stiff and unyielding in her arms, and she knew that only time and his father’s love would heal his memory of the horrors that he’d lived through.

Carrying the torch and the boy, with the wolf at her heels, she carefully climbed the steps. Over the steady roar of the sea, the guard’s cowardly cries followed her up the stairs. Oh, she would send someone for him, but not until the man had learned a lesson about children. Would that she did know a spell to kill his seed so that he could spawn no more like himself!

As they emerged from the dungeon, the east wind again caressed her face and tickled the silken strands of Logan’s hair. Luck was grazing in the moonlight, noisily plucking blades of spring grass. The boy brightened when he saw the stallion.

“Would you like to ride him?”

He didn’t reply, just stared at the horse.

“Come. He’s a great war-horse and deserves

a rider-like you.” Morgana lifted Logan onto Luck’s bare back and took the reins in her hands. She led the horse through the trees, away from the cliffs where Ware and Cadell had plunged to their death, and into the darkness of the forest.

Part of her quest was complete. She’d found Logan. Now she had to find a way to save Garrick and Abergwynn, and that would take time. If, indeed, Garrick was still alive. She ached to the very bottom of her soul, and she longed for vengeance against Strahan. “Hold on, child,” she whispered, to herself as much as to the boy. “We face a long journey.”

“I do not want him to die yet!” Strahan said, eyeing the bed where Garrick lay. Garrick hadn’t moved all night, and despite the continual droning prayers of Morgana’s sister, Glyn, he seemed to be worse. Even Clare’s ministrations had no effect.

“If you didn’t want him to die, you should have ordered your men not to shoot!” Clare snapped, her lips curled in disgust. “Your greed and treachery has led to this, Strahan, and if you are stupid enough to trust Osric McBrayne, then you deserve all the suffering that God will send your way.” She rubbed some ointment upon the wound in her brother’s shoulder and turned her back on Strahan.

“He must live,” Strahan said. “Make sure he does.”

“Then you’d better find Morgana of Wenlock.” Turning toward him, Clare lifted her pointed chin defiantly. Even with scratches on her hairless scalp, she was a commanding woman, a woman Strahan sometimes feared. “For my brother needs stronger medication than I can give him, aye, stronger than that of any physician or apothecary. Only Morgana can save him. Elsewise, I suggest you tell Father Francis to administer last rites.”

“You lie,” Strahan said.

Clare’s eyes turned sad. “He is my brother, Strahan, my only brother still living, if your men tell the truth. I would do anything to make him well again, but ’tis out of my hands.”

Strahan felt a rising panic. True, he had oftimes envisioned Garrick’s death, but always in a heroic setting. In his fantasies Strahan saw himself as a great leader of men who set others free of Garrick’s rule. He wanted Garrick, before he died, to understand why he’d stolen Abergwynn and to watch as Strahan took the things he most valued — his castle and woman. As for Logan, Strahan would not have hurt the boy — not truly hurt him. He only wanted to see Garrick stripped of everything he cared for. But now, as he stared down at the white face of his cousin, he felt an absurd twinge of guilt.

“M’lord.” A soldier stepped haltingly into Garrick’s chamber, and Springan slid past him, eyes downcast as she carried a bowl of chicken stew. She, too, was without hair, and Strahan felt a glimmer of satisfaction that her lush red tresses had been shorn from her scalp. Always a little uppity, that one. Well, the whore knew her place now.

“What is it?” Strahan asked the soldier.

“’Tis the boy, Logan, sire. He’s missing.” Strahan’s spine stiffened. “We searched all night, but found only this—” The knight motioned to the hallway, and a pathetic man stumbled into the chamber, bringing with him an odor so foul that Strahan wrinkled his nose. “Your guard, Kent of Hawarth.”

“Where is the boy?” Strahan demanded.

The man, red-faced from too much mead, seemed to tremble. “The witch has him, m’lord.”

For the love of God, the man was actually quivering! “You let a woman best you and steal the boy?” he demanded, as the heat of fury swept up his back.

“But, Lord Strahan, she swooped up from the very depths of hell with a beast from Satan that lunged at me and nearly took my throat. While the creature held me to the floor, she chanted curses and grabbed the boy afore she flew from the chamber and left me bound in the darkness!”

“You ass! Do you expect me to believe—”

“’Tis true!” the man insisted, his beady eyes moving from Strahan to the knight who had brought him here. He fell to his knees, groveling for his miserable life at the toes of Strahan’s boots. “Please, I beg of you, believe what I say!”

Strahan’s stomach turned over. This man had been entrusted to him by Osric McBrayne. “One of the finest fightin’ men Castle Hawarth has to offer,” the old man had said, and Strahan, fool that he was, had believed him.

He glowered down at the sorry lump of flesh in front of him. “What I believe is that you were lazy, drank too much mead, and let a small woman scare you! You’re lucky I don’t curse you myself!”

The journey took all of four days, but at last, travel-weary and nearing exhaustion, Morgana guided Luck through the trees to see Tower Wenlock jutting upward to the cloud-strewn sky. Tears filled her throat at the thought of seeing her parents again. She knew her father would at first be furious, for she was still banished, but eventually he would listen to her. He had to.

“Come,” she whispered to the boy sleeping in her arms. “’Tis time you had a warm bath and a fresh bed.” She kicked the stallion’s sides, and the game horse responded, ears pricked forward at the sight and sounds of the tower.

Morgana smiled as she heard the sentries shout. She threw back the cowl from her head and let her hair fly free. Wolf raced beside them, and a horn blasted, announcing her arrival.