“It is not that simple…”
“It is cursed simple. You are the rightful baron!” she cried, interrupting him. “You bear the mark of the signet ring, impressed into your flesh by the smith when you were but a boy, at your mother’s command.” Duncan blinked at this revelation and Bartholomew’s neck heated. Anna took another step closer. “How dare you abandon us to this tyrant and evade your responsibility?”
Bartholomew ground his teeth. “I have no choice, Anna.”
“You have every choice, and you make the sole bad one!” She lifted the crossbow higher.
“Anna, you must understand.” He exhaled when it was clear she did not. “I make the solepossiblechoice. I must appeal to the king and the king’s justice to see this matter changed.”
She did not relent. “You should take Haynesdale for your own first.”
Bartholomew flung out a hand, his temper expired. “And what merit of a deed would that be? What would be the difference between me then and every other villain who simply steals what he desires for his own?”
“Might makes right,” Anna argued.
“Nay, never that.” He marched toward her, ignoring the crossbow in his anger. Indeed, he pushed it aside with a fingertip. “Do you not think I have seen the effect of such choices? Do you not think I have seen grown men steal food from children to sate their own needs? To steal whatever gold they lust to hold as their own, regardless of who rightly claims it? To savor a woman, whether she wills it or nay, simply for the sake of their own lust?” He flung out his hands and his voice rose. “What is the difference between us and barbarians, if our word has no value, if we cannot be relied upon to do what is right, if we do not cede to a higher justice?” He shook a finger at her. “What then is the point? I will not be as those fiends I have seen in Outremer. I will not take simply for my own desire. I will not disregard law and order and justice and truth, simply because it is not convenient for me to do as I have pledged.”
“Amen,” Duncan said quietly, but Bartholomew ignored him.
“And if it means that I shall die without the seal of my father’s holding in my hand, so be it. I shall die an honorable man.”
Duncan nodded approval of this sentiment.
Anna was less convinced. “Is it not just as foul to turn one’s back upon wickedness?” she insisted. “Or to abandon those in need of your aid?”
“I do not abandon you. I seek recourse by the only honorable means.”
“Kill Royce before you go, then!”
“I will not do as he has done.” Bartholomew glared at Anna, furious that she could not see the merit of his choice.
She glared back at him, evidently just as angry that he refused to do as she desired.
Suddenly she lifted the bow again and aimed once more at his heart. Bartholomew reached for his knife, though he knew he could not draw it in time. Indeed, her bolt was loosed before the blade was clear of the scabbard. It sailed over his shoulder, fairly nicking his ear as it flew past him.
He had a heartbeat to believe that she had missed.
Then he heard it sink home.
Bartholomew spun in time to see the victim raise a hand to his wound.
The assailant wore the baron’s colors. The bolt had caught him at the base of the throat and he bled profusely. His eyes were wide and he fell slowly, first to his knees and then fully to the ground. His loaded crossbow dropped to one side, released from his loosened grip.
His companion fled through the forest, no more than a flickering shape in the distance. His boot falls faded from earshot with all speed.
Anna strode past Bartholomew, another bolt loaded and trained on the bowman. She reached the man’s side and kicked his crossbow out of his reach, then rolled him to his back with a nudge of her foot. His hand slid limply to the earth beside him and his blood stained the snow. He stared at the sky, unseeing, and his chest did not rise again.
Anna waited a long moment, watching for some sign of life. She then removed the bolt from her own crossbow and slung it over her back. She claimed the fallen man’s crossbow, removed its bolt, then returned to Bartholomew.
She dropped to one knee before him and offered the weapon on the flats of her hands. “My lord,” she said and bowed her head.
She paid homage to him.
“You have killed one of the baron’s men,” Bartholomew said, when he had recovered his speech. “You have made yourself an outlaw in truth.”
“I have saved the true baron’s life,” Anna corrected, that familiar fire in her eyes as she looked up at him. “And I have ensured that he is armed.”
“And I wager that Sir Royce will know the truth of your identity soon enough,” said Duncan, his eyes gleaming as he watched. “You will be hunted to the ground, lad, sure enough.”
