The two young women who had followed her towards the thicket were hiding, cowering like fools. She could hear them sniffling. They didn’t want to collect valuables and they didn’t want to cut off fingers. The fighting in the foliage had gone on formuch of the night but when day broke, she’d seen the Scots ride off north, at least those who had survived, and she’d also seen the English head back towards the south, some of them carrying wounded or dead.
She didn’t expect she’d find much in the thicket.
She was wrong.
As the slender fingers of dawn began to penetrate the canopy, creating streams of light, she saw a boot. An enormous boot. But the rest of the body was in the shadow, tucked up underneath the bank that was crowned by the trunk of a tree. Half of the earth had fallen away, revealing the roots and creating a cave of sorts. The body that belonged to that boot was tucked up inside the cave.
Annaleigh could see everything but his face, shrouded in shadow.
“Well?” he said, his voice weak. “If you’ve come to rob me, I shan’t give you much of a fight.”
His voice was deep and rich, even in his weakened state. He rumbled like thunder. She could tell by his accent that he was English and her heart began to race. She had a dirk with her, but the size of the man’s body was enormous. He was three times her size and then some. If he tried to charge her, even in his weakened state, she probably couldn’t have given him much of a fight herself. It would be an odd battle– a tiny woman against an enormous, but wounded, knight.
“Ye’re hurt?” she asked.
“I’m not sitting here to enjoy the sunrise, my lady.”
“How bad?”
“Bad enough.”
She heard him sigh, heavily. So far, he hadn’t moved a muscle. He’d only spoken. Fingering the hilt of her dirk, she debated about what to do. She could have turned the other wayand disappeared or she could try to take something of value from him. He had told her to, after all.
Or, she could help him.
Annaleigh wasn’t unmerciful by nature. In fact, that sense of compassion is what had gotten her into trouble in the first place, the same sense of compassion and decency that had started this entire battle. She’d been the lass who had been accosted by the English soldiers because one of them had seemed ill and she meant to help. As it turned out, he was only drunk and he took her offer of help to mean something else.
So here they all were.
And this English knight was dying because of her.
So, perhaps she simply couldn’t turn away, after all.
“What happened tae ye?” she finally asked. “Where are ye wounded?”
He didn’t say anything for a moment. “I’ll not give you any more help,” he said. “You know I am weak. Take what you want and leave me to die in peace.”
Those words brought Annaleigh closer, to within a few feet of his boots. As she drew near, she could see both of his legs now. She could also see the way he was sitting, sort of on his right side. It took her a moment to realize he was keeping the weight off his buttocks and lower back because she could see copious amounts of blood on the earth beneath him.
No wonder he was so weak.
The man was bleeding to death right in front of her.
“I’ll not take anything from ye,” she said. “But ye’re injured badly.”
“I know.”
“Willna ye tell me what happened?”
He grunted, shifting slightly, and she caught a glimpse of his face. Straight nose, square jaw, and well-shaped features. Handsome features, in fact.
Veryhandsome.
“I took a pike to the back,” he muttered. “And a short blade to the back of my left knee. Is there anything else you wish to know?”
She regarded him a moment. “Ye’re a knight.”
“Brilliant observation.”
