Page 63 of My Warrior
Only then did Cambria glance at the blood upon his shoulder where the mail had been severed. He was satisfied by a sharp intake of breath from her.
“Aye, this is the price I paid for worrying about your hide instead of mine.” He winced as his mail rubbed against the slash. “You’ve done a foolish thing, Cambria.”
“Foolish?”
“Aye. Didn’t you think how it might look to have two brothers dead by your hand?”
“But I didn’t kill—“
“There’s no proof you didn’t kill Roger, other than your word,” he said frankly. “There may never be enough proof.” He rubbed a weary hand over his chin. “Look. You’re making it difficult for me to protect you. From now on, I want you to stay away from Owen. I command it.”
She folded her arms across her bosom. “You’re making it difficult for me to protect my clan. I commandyouto stay away from Owen as well.”
He felt his anger dissolve like salt in water as she stared up at him with her elfin eyes. She might be a stubborn witch, but what she did, she did out of loyalty. After a moment, a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Agreed.”
When he took Cambria back to his pavilion, he set a guard at the entrance. He let her believe he didn’t trust her to stay inside, but in truth, the guard was there to keep intruders out. He wouldn’t rest easy until Owen was captured.
As expected, the gossip reached the king before he did, and Holden was subjected to Edward’s interest in the intriguing, romantic tale of his Scots wife defending him against her own people. Holden didn’t have the heart to correct the story’s inaccuracies, argue about Cambria’s less than pure motives, or mention that it was a Fitzroi she had shot. The king, delighted by what sounded like the stuff of a jongleur’s ballad, made him promise to bring the “Heroine of Halidon” into his presence on the morrow.
Cambria paced inside Holden’s pavilion, wearing down the nap of his rug. In the silence of solitude, images of Halidon returned to haunt her, like the nightmares slithering through her sleep lately. She murmured psalms to herself all afternoon, trying to keep her mind busy, attempting to distract herself from too much introspection. She would have given anything for a book or a game of chess, even with Sir Guy, something to take her mind off what she’d seen today.
She flopped down onto the pallet and closed her eyes. Still she saw the gaping wounds of beardless boys. She sat up again, rubbed the anxious wrinkles from her forehead, and began to study the design worked into the carpet.
It was the color of the sanguine battlefield.
A servant brought her roast for supper, but her dagger hand trembled as she cut into it, remembering the wounds inflicted at Halidon. Even the dark wine filling her cup resembled blood pooling beneath slain knights.
At long last, with the dropping of night’s hood, she was mercifully blind to the horrors of the day. She lit no candles, lest their light encroach on her hard-earned peace, and soon repose found her in the formless country between thought and dreams.
The rise of Halidon lay before her again. Cambria moved her mouth in the soundless protest of nightmares as her feet were drawn inexorably toward it. She shut her eyes against the sight, but the vision remained.
The dream was the same as before, but starker, clearer, rendered with details gleaned from the actual skirmish. The refuse of mass slaughter stretched as far as she could see—thousands of bodies strewn about as carelessly as rags, the once fine wool plaids stained with blood and mud. Far off, the high keening of widows rose on the air, at odds with the pleased chuckles from English knights nearby. The coppery smell of fresh wounds was strong in her nostrils, and her stomach lurched dangerously. She glanced down at her hands. They were drenched with blood. Frantically, she wiped them on her skirts, to no avail. The widows’ song blew through her soul like a melancholy wind, and the English laughter grew louder. She rubbed and rubbed her hands, but the blood wouldn’t come off, and the Englishmen kept laughing and laughing…
“Murderers!” she screamed.
Cambria’s moan brought Holden instantly to her side. He hadn’t wanted to disturb her, coming to bed so late, but it appeared her dreams had done that already. His candle cast a halo of golden light around her as he jostled her arm, trying to wake her.
Her eyes flew wide, and she drew back as if he’d burned her. “Murder!” she hissed in horror. “What the English did, it was murder!”
He gripped her shoulder to try to calm her, but she flung her arm wide, knocking the candle from his grasp. It guttered and extinguished itself, plunging the pavilion into darkness.
Then Cambria began to alternately sob and curse. She pummeled his bare chest, hard. He pressed his palm carefully over her mouth to muffle her cries and, guarding his injured shoulder as best he could, let her strike him.
He knew what she was doing. He’d seen it in green knights before, knights exposed to the horrors of war for the first time. All the fury, fear, and despair of battle stayed bottled up inside until it could find an appropriate outlet. For some, it was the lists, the tourneys, the harmless duels fought for honor and a lady’s favor. Others found it at the bottom of a jack of ale or in the arms of a whore. But Cambria had no such outlet. So he let her vent her anguish and helplessness on his own body.
After several moments, when her blows subsided and he could feel wet, warm tears on his hand, he leaned over her, speaking in gentle, controlled tones.
“It’s over, Cambria,” he said softly. “Their souls are at peace now.” He squeezed her shoulder. “The Scots knew the cost. All men know the price of battle. It’s not pretty. At times, it’s not even noble. But it’s the way of war.” He enclosed her hand in his own. Her fingers were callused, the nails bitten to the quick, but her hand was much smaller than one would expect, just as her heart was much softer. “Did you dream of the battle?”
She nodded. He could feel the tension in her, her brave attempts to stop the telltale hitching in her chest, and it clutched at his heart. He longed to take her into his arms, the way he’d wanted to comfort that wretched wildcat. But she was the Gavin. She was the laird. And lairds probably didn’t cry. For her pride’s sake, he’d ignore her tears.
He reached out and absently rubbed a lock of her hair between his thumb and finger. “Tell me about your father.”
She was silent so long that he thought she’d drifted off to sleep. When she spoke at last, her voice was quiet, tentative.
“He was a great laird. He loved Blackhaugh. He loved the land, and he loved the clan. He loved my mother so much that he never took another to wife…even though it left me as sole heir. He taught me everything—hunting, hawking, and ha-…” She sniffed. “Swordfighting. He bought me a palfrey when I was three years old and taught me to lead cattle raids when I was eleven.” She gave a little laugh. “I remember my first raid. I was so excited and proud riding up to Blackhaugh with a dozen stolen cows that my father didn’t have the heart to tell me they were Gavin cattle.”
He chuckled. He’d never led a cattle raid, but he’d gotten into plenty of mischief as a boy. “Your father must have been a great man.”
