The Unveiling - Tamara Leigh (rooftoppers TXT) 📗

clenched it through the material.

The large vein, Rowan had said. She raised her gaze to Wulfrith’s sinewed neck above the collar of his mantle. Four years she had prepared for this, and yet she quaked. But she could do it.

Just as you could loose your arrow on the deer?

The horse veered right, causing her to slip sideways.

“Hold to me!” Wulfrith shouted.

She whipped her arm around him and tightly clasped her hands.

Shortly, Wulfrith reined in. “Off!”

She threw a leg over and dropped to the ground. Though the clouds had yet to issue the torrent they promised—still no more than an intermittent drizzle—the absence of Wulfrith’s heat poured discomfort through her. How she wished she had thought to wear a mantle as he had done.

He appeared at her side. “Nock an arrow.”

Annyn lifted the bow over her head and reached to her quiver. Was the deer near? Surely the chase would have sent it farther afield. She fit an arrow to the string and trailed Wulfrith through the woods.

He slowed and glanced over his shoulder. “Your prey is near. Be ready.”

Hoping she would not fail again, she looked to her bow. Seeing the arrow had ridden up the string, she refit it.

Wulfrith bent low, darted forward, and halted behind an ancient oak.

Annyn crept to his side.

“Go.” He jutted his chin.

Moving slowly as Jonas had taught her, she peered around the tree. There, a pool, but where—?

There, but she would have to draw nearer.

“Lesson three,” Wulfrith hissed.

Act when told to act. She put a foot forward but was halted by a hand on her shoulder. Did she err again?

She looked around, but rather than disapproval, there was encouragement in Wulfrith’s grey-green gaze. Strangely moved, she looked away.

“You can do this,” he spoke low.

“I shall not fail you, my lord.” Pray, let her not fail him. She would rather—

What was wrong with her? This she did for herself, not her brother’s murderer! Which reminded her of the misericorde. Mayhap once she brought down her quarry...

She turned from Wulfrith and eyed the deer. Providing she stayed upwind of her prey, she would not fail. She slipped from behind the tree and on to the next. Tree by tree she advanced, acutely aware of the man who watched.

When the deer was within arrow’s reach, she raised her bow, pulled the string to her cheek, and sighted her quarry where its head was bent to the pool.

You can do this. With a startle, she realized this voice was not Jonas’s. It was Wulfrith who encouraged her as she did not wish him to do.

She fixed on the deer. A perfect kill. As little suffering as possible. Drawing a deep breath of moist air, she drank in the taste beget by rain upon the wood.

You can do this.

“Leave me be!” she whispered.

The deer lifted its head, exposing its chest.

You can!

Where was Jonas? It was his encouragement she wished.

You can!

And she did. The arrow ran the chill wood and found its mark.

The animal lurched, stumbled, dropped to its forelegs, and heaved sideways.

“Worthy!” Wulfrith shouted.

Was she? She swung around and searched his gaze as he advanced. Approval was there, and though she tried to deny the sensation that shuddered through her, she was heartened. And more so when he loosed a smile from that firm mouth of his.

Again struck by how comely he was, Annyn looked to the ground.

Wulfrith clapped a hand to her back. “It seems we shall have fresh meat for the table after all. Well done, Braose.”

“Thank you, my lord.”

He prodded her forward. “Come, let us see your prize.”

She matched his stride, though only because he did not reach his very long.

As they circled the pool, the drizzle turned to rain—large, brisk drops that flattened Annyn’s hair to her head and made her fear it might also flatten her tunic to her chest. Bound though she was, a thorough dousing might reveal her if any peered near enough.

Looking to the man beside her, she saw his hair was becoming drenched though he could easily cover it with the hood of his mantle. As she watched, a bead of rain slipped from his brow, ran the curve of his nose, and settled on the bow of his upper lip. For an unguarded moment, she longed to brush it away, to feel the curve of his mouth beneath her fingertips. But then he looked down at her.

She wrenched her gaze to the fallen deer and silently cursed the weakness of her sorry soul.

As they drew near the animal, the sight of blood pooled around it caused her throat to constrict. God had put animals on earth to feed man, Father Cornelius told. It was meant to be. Still, as she stood over the deer, staring at the arrow shaft she had put through it, her eyes moistened.

Before she could turn, Wulfrith looked up from where he knelt over her kill.

“I know,” she snapped and swung around, “lesson thirteen: men do not cry.”

He rose at her back. “But men do cry. Of course, ’tis best done when no others are present.”

Had she heard right? Had this man who so often pronounced her unworthy said it? She looked over her shoulder but found no evidence of mockery on his face. Her loathing for him floundering, she turned back to him. “You also cry, my lord?”

“I am far older than you, Braose.”

Not as far as he believed.

“I have learned to command my emotions. Still, I am not without being moved on occasion. Of course, that is when I seek refuge in God.”

Annyn felt as if slapped. He sought refuge in God? This man who was responsible for her brother’s death professed to know God? Aye, he attended mass and was not unfamiliar with Proverbs, but she knew that for what it was. At least, she thought she did.

Brow furrowing as if he were suddenly uncomfortable with the conversation, Wulfrith swept a hand to the deer. “Look to your prize and be gladdened. This night it shall feed hungering bellies.”

She stepped toward the deer.

“I knew you would not fail me.”

She lifted her gaze. “And if I had?”

“Then I would have to teach you better.”

She saw that he nearly smiled again. Where was the beast in him? The one who had put Jonas to the rope? Who was this man who spoke of God with such ease and familiarity? Though she knew she ought to leave off, she asked, “And if still I failed you, my lord? What price, then?”

The light swept from his face, and he was once more a trainer of knights. “Throughout your stay at Wulfen, you will fail many times. Did you not, of what use would be my training? However, for he who is unable to rise above a weak mind and body, the price is dire. To him falls dishonor. He is returned home.”

Sometimes dead? Remembrance caused Annyn to shiver.

Wulfrith swept the mantle from his shoulders and onto hers. “Worry not, young Braose, methinks you are not among those destined to return home in dishonor.”

Though the fortnight was only half done, already she had proven herself? “Truly, my lord?”

“We shall see.” He dropped to his haunches alongside the deer.

Disconcerted by his confidence in her, the unexpected kindness he showed in relinquishing his mantle, and his talk of God, Annyn fingered the collar of the garment that gave his heat to her.

“We shall put the deer over my horse and walk it out of here.” Wulfrith issued a shrill whistle that resounded through the wood and called his mount to him.

Though Annyn helped as best she could, it was Wulfrith’s strength that put the deer over the horse’s back, Wulfrith who bound it, Wulfrith who—

What was his Christian name? Surely he had one, though she had not considered it. He was simply Wulfrith. It was all she had ever heard him called.

As they left the pool behind, Annyn berated her pondering, though only because of Rowan. It was his face she glimpsed through the veil of rain before he slipped behind a tree, his questioning felt across the distance.

Wulfrith drew his sword. “Make haste, Braose. We are not alone.”

How did he know? Were his senses so honed?

As she hurried after him, Rowan’s questioning returned to her: Why had she not killed Wulfrith?

There was no opportunity, she silently defended herself. But there had been. If not the dagger, she could have turned the arrow on him.

What must Rowan think? Was he disappointed? Of course he was. Though Wulfrith had finally pronounced her worthy, she was not—yet.

Despite her churning and her brother’s warning about revenge, she silently vowed Jonas would be avenged. I give you my word, Rowan.

A score of men were mounted before the raised drawbridge, their flaccid pennants showing the colors of England’s future king, and on either side of them, Wulfrith’s men.

Fear uncoiling, Annyn halted alongside Wulfrith at the edge of the wood. Had Henry come for her?

“By faith!” Wulfrith growled.

“Who comes to Wulfen, my lord?” she feigned.

It was a long moment before he spoke. “Henry’s men.”

Not Henry himself? “Why do they come?”

His shoulders rose with a deep breath. “To make of me an ally.”

He was certain of it? Mayhap he was wrong and they came for her. But if not, would Wulfrith turn from Stephen? Go to Henry’s side? “Will they succeed, my lord?”

As if she had not spoken, he tugged the reins with which he led his horse and strode forward. “Come!”

Annyn glanced behind. No Rowan, but he was there. Somewhere.

Resisting the longing to flee to the wood, she drew the hood of Wulfrith’s mantle over her head and hastened after him. As they neared, evidence of Wulfen’s reputation as a formidable stronghold became apparent. Though most of those who stood on the walls were but squires, they were weapon-ready to defend their lord’s castle. Would it be necessary?

Annyn looked to the scabbard on Wulfrith’s belt. He had returned his sword to it as they came out of the wood, and there it remained. If he anticipated trouble, it was not apparent. Of course, his sword could be put to hand in an instant.

True enough, it was not Henry who awaited the lord of Wulfen, but a nobleman Annyn recognized as the one the duke had longest considered as a husband for her. As the hooded man nudged his mount over sodden ground to meet Wulfrith, she silently beseeched her heart to calm. She had the cover afforded by the hood, and even if she came out from beneath it, the man would not likely recognize her. Of course, he surely knew Jame Braose who had arrived with him and Henry at Lillia. If any called her by name, she would be revealed.

“Lord Wulfrith,” he shouted above the fall of rain. “I bring you tidings from the duke.”

Though the man did not appear drunk where he sat astride an ivory destrier, he presented as somewhat older than she had first thought. Was he older, or was it an excess of drink that aged him?

Garr halted and considered the man. So, Henry had sent Geoffrey Lavonne to do his bidding. Interesting choice, for not four years ago, Garr had himself knighted Lavonne alongside Sir Merrick in a ceremony that had been absent Jonas Bretanne.

Pressed heavily by memories of the young man he had returned to Castle Lillia in a cart, he put them from his mind.

In matters of warfare, Lavonne had proven himself worthy of knighthood. Forsooth, he had surpassed most,