“I got lost.”
Even though it was too dark to see anything, Gisele knew that Nigel had just looked at her. She also knew that that look had not been a flattering one. It struck her as odd, even a little funny, that after her first shock at seeing Nigel at the bedside she just accepted his rescue as nothing so unusual. She had not wanted him to risk himself by trying to save her, or even thought that he would after she had deserted him, yet it did not completely surprise her that he was there, dragging her along a dark hallway toward freedom. Her thoughts were cut short when Nigel stopped, and a moment later George bumped into them.
“We are there?” asked George.
“We are where?” she asked.
“At the end of Sir Vachel’s little hiding place,” Nigel replied as he inched open the door and peered out to make sure that no one was there to see them leave a place they should not even know about.
“He sleeps in this dark, dank hall?”
“Nay, there is a passage or two off this one. His wee bed is probably down one of them.” Nigel looked at Gisele and grimaced. “It would have been easier to get ye out of here if they hadnae taken your laddie’s clothes away.”
“Wait here,” George said as he slipped past them and out the door.
“Are you certain you can trust that man?” Gisele asked as Nigel pulled the door shut enough to hide them, leaving a bit of room for the light to shine in.
“Now I am. I had my doubts at first. No longer. He may not be the bravest and most honorable of men, but he didnae like what was going to be done to you. I think he even had a few doubts about your guilt after ye met him sword to sword.”
She was glad the light was too dim to see well, for she could feel herself blush. “I do not know how well I did, for I was stopped before any true test of my skill occurred.”
“He seemed to think ye were verra good. Ah, George,” he greeted the man when he returned and handed them a cape. “Not only clever, but a good thief, I am thinking.”
Gisele saw George frown, and patted him on the arm. “He means that as a great compliment.”
The moment she was wrapped in the cape they all slipped out of the passage. Until Nigel signaled him that they could go on alone, George led them through all the confusing twists and turns. Gisele said nothing as Nigel led her the rest of the way through the keep, flattening herself against the walls and ducking into corners each time he did. Her heart began to pound so hard and fast when they entered the baily that she was afraid the people around them would hear it.
Suddenly they were outside the gates. Gisele felt a little dizzy that it had happened so fast. She could tell from the tension in Nigel’s lean body that he shared her urge to run, but they ambled along toward the small wood as if they had nothing to fear. The moment they were in the shelter of the trees, she sat down on the ground, her legs too weak to hold her upright any longer. Her whole body shook, and she realized that a lot of her calm had been hard wrung, a facade even to her.
George arrived a few moments later and greedily accepted the drink of wine Nigel offered him. “I believe that will be the last honorable deed I do for a great while,” George said, wiping the sweat from his brow with his sleeve.
“Ye did weel, George,” Nigel said as he took hold of the reins of Gisele’s horse. “I am glad ye were able to get this fool beast back.”
“His lordship was not yet aware that he had gained a mount,” George explained as he handed Nigel what was left of the money he had given him. “His stablemaster was more than pleased to let it go and pocket the coin.”
“If, somehow, they guess that ye had aught to do with this and ye feel a need to leave this land, ye are welcome on mine. The Murrays of Donncoill. Ye will find how to reach us in Perth. In most any port, in truth, for we deal in some trading.”
George nodded his gratitude, then sent Gisele a small smile before quickly riding away. Still weak, Gisele allowed Nigel to help her on her horse. She ached to rest, to lie down and close her eyes and pretend the horror of the last few hours had never happened, but she knew it was important for them to get away. Vachel was not dead, and when the man woke he would not be in a good temper. As she followed Nigel out of the little wood, she suspected that all she had accomplished with her bid for freedom was to make sure that the hunt for them would grow even more determined.
Nineteen
“We will camp here for the night, lass.”
Those soft words were enough to pull Gisele from her stupor. She looked around, but noticed very little until she saw the small brook. Without a word she slipped off her horse, unpacked her drying cloth and sliver of soap, and walked to the edge of the brook. Still silent, she shed her clothes, stepped into the shallow cold water, slowly sat down, and began to wash.
She could hear Nigel tending to the horses and setting up their camp, but she kept her back to him. Once they had started on their way, fleeing the wood and Vachel’s lands as fast as they could, she had failed to stop herself from thinking about what had happened to her. From time to time Nigel had spoken to her and she had struggled to answer, his frowns telling her that she was doing a poor job of it. Nothing, not Nigel’s concern or her own strong will, had stopped her from slipping into a dangerously dark mood.
From the moment Sir Vachel had touched her, she had ached to have a bath. It was the same sick, unclean feeling her husband had always left her with. During her brief marriage she had sometimes scrubbed her skin raw, stopped from doing herself real harm only by the watchful eyes of the maids. They had lived with Michael long enough to understand what she was suffering. Just as she had after Michael had used her, she now felt as if she needed to peel away every piece of skin Vachel had touched. Only once did she pause in her continuous washing, and that was to stare in surprise at the cuts on the palms of her hands. As she briefly soaked them in the cold water, she wondered how she could have buried her fingernails so deeply into her own flesh and not been aware of it. Then, almost blindly, she returned to scrubbing her skin.
Nigel leaned against a slender tree, took a slow drink from his wineskin, and watched Gisele carefully. She had said nothing since they had left the DeVeau keep. He had kept looking back at her, afraid she had fallen asleep and was at risk of slipping out of her saddle. Each time he had been made uneasy by the almost lifeless look upon her face, the strange distance in her eyes. The few times he had spoken to her, tried to pull her from her intense silence, her response had been spoken in a voice nearly as dead as her eyes.
When he had first rescued her she had seemed fine, no more than a little shaken. Now he was not so sure. He was also not so sure that he had been in time to save her from all Vachel had planned to do to her. Perhaps that was not the first time the man had been on that bed with her. She had been alone at the keep for several hours before he had found a way to reach her. More than enough time for the man to have already raped her once, mayhap more.
He cursed softly and ran a hand over his chin. It did not take a very clever man to see that something deeply troubled Gisele. What did require a great deal of cleverness was knowing exactly how to help her. This was the sort of thing a woman often did not wish to talk about, yet, how could he know how to help her if she did refuse to talk about it? There was also a reluctance lurking inside of him, a wish to not know anything about what had happened to her while she was trapped inside of Vachel’s keep. If he did not wish to hear anything and she did not wish to say anything, they would certainly not get very far in solving her problem, he thought sourly.
There was one thing hecoulddo, he decided as he tossed his wineskin aside and moved toward the brook. He could stop her incessant scrubbing. If she continued with it for very much longer she would be nothing more than a tiny lump of raw flesh. Nigel had the unsettling feeling that that was her intention, that she wanted to remove the flesh that had been defiled by Vachel. He was surprised that she could sit in the water for so long. Her shapely backside had to be nearly frozen to the rocky bottom of the brook. She was also frightening him a little, for she seemed to be caught up in some repetitive dream, so that she was not completely aware of what she was doing to herself. It was almost as if the insanity of the DeVeaux had finally infected her.
“Gisele,” he called, but she paid him no heed, so he reached out to gently touch her shoulder. “Gisele!”
