“It will not, Agnes. All will be well.” It had to be. After an entire life of being apart because of rules and opinions, she would not lose him the day after he kissed her and made her dream of something more with him. Again!
Please, God, not again.
Nicholas ran towardthe front doors of the castle in his search for Molly and Margaret. He had checked their chambers just in case they had returned, but the women were not there. He knew the way to the walls so he’d parted ways with Rauf and went the opposite way.
He kept Julianna’s scabbard in his hand, unsure if the enemy had already encroached upon the inner wall.
He left the castle and hurried down the stairs. He searched the grounds looking for them. He searched the shadows and the hen houses. How dangerous was the threat? He had to find out. What about the villagers? His belly turned. Where was the bishop? Lancaster? He had to get back. He needed to know what was out there. Was there still enough time to help the villagers?
The battlements were busy with guardsmen hurrying out and scattering to the four corners with their long bows and arrows.
Nicholas hurried to the wall to look over the situation. There were about three hundred men. Rauf was correct. The guards needed his and Rauf’s help in battle. It would require much determination to win and stamina to see it through.
He’d fought in two small skirmishes for the king before he married Mattie, and in France, with the people of a village in Sainte-Enimie. He was taught to wield a blade by his brother, Cain, and was called fearless in battle by Rauf. But he had nothing to fight for then. Nothing to lose.
Now, he would be even stronger, more determined and ready to fight because he had everything to fight for.
He took up a bow and a quiver from the stack leaning against the wall, aimed over the battlements and began firing. He took down many but they were getting through the outer wall!
Throwing down his bow, he picked up a sword from the many brought out from the tower and strewn along the floor and ran toward the north wall. He looked up at the tower and at the archers firing from the embrasures. He motioned them to aim north then spotted Rauf across the walkway. He called out, “Did you find the women?”
Rauf shook his head.
Sadly, Nicholas thought, the women would have to wait. He prayed they were unharmed. “The north wall is about to be breached!”
Without another word, Rauf raced to it, shouting orders to the men as he went. Nicholas reached the wall first and hacked at a man who’d climbed up a long ladder and was about to climb over the wall. The man received a sword through the neck instead. The man behind him on the ladder looked shocked and then terrified when Nicholas leaned over the crenelated wall and saw him. He didn’t have time to lift his sword arm before Nicholas swiped his blade across the man’s throat. Blood splashed onto the three men below him before his body fell.
“Come on!” Nicholas shouted at them while blood dripped off his blade. “Come up!” He swung but he couldn’t reach, so he pulled back and ran for the nearest archer. After taking the soldier’s bow and arrow, he ran back to the ladder. Some courageous fool from the other side leaped over the wall and landed on Nicholas’ battlement wall.
Almost instantly, Nicholas nocked his arrow and let it fly. The victorious man fell over the wall backward with an arrow in his chest.
Nicholas was upon the next man an instant later. The rest were just out of reach. Nicholas wanted to leap over the wall and fight them, kill them all.
From the corner of his eye he saw another ladder go up a few feet away from him. He straightened and shouted for Rauf. Where the hell was he? There was no time to find him. He nocked another arrow and fired it at the first soldier climbing the second ladder.
He held both positions, keeping his enemies away—until he saw Molly below—outside the castle walls in the clutches of a hooded man, who was holding his hand up to Nicholas.
“We are here for the Earl of Lancaster. Bring him out or I begin killing everyone we caught—starting with her.” He took a dagger from his belt and held the edge of the blade to her throat.
No! Nicholas held out his hand as if to reach for her, though she was too far away.
He swore to himself that by the end of this, he would kill this man. What the man was asking him to do was to turn his back on peace for the life of a servant. What if Lancaster was the only way to rid Scotland of Edward? Nicholas didn’t truly believe that and Lancaster had chosen the path of fighting his own countrymen. Molly had not. Her life was just as important. He liked Molly. He didn’t like Lancaster. And besides, he’d promised Julianna that he would bring her friends back to her.
He was about to call out to the man that he would see it done, when someone on his side of the wall fired an arrow at the man holding Molly. He missed, and the man’s hand swiped across Molly’s throat.
Nicholas felt sick. His eyes had to be deceiving him. Molly could not be falling to the ground. Dead or dying at the hands of this bastard! Nicholas dropped his sword as his enemy ran to pluck another prisoner from the small crowd of villagers he had taken captive.
Nicholas lifted his bow…nocked an arrow…let it fly. It did not miss but struck the soldier in the lower back. He went down, and an instant later so did Nicholas.
Chapter Fourteen
Nicholas opened hiseyes then squeezed them shut again at the blinding light in his eyes. He was moving…or being moved. He was bound and lying on a cart. Every time the cart went over a pebble in the road, Nicholas almost lost consciousness again from the pain. What had happened? Was he dead? No. He felt his heart beating. Faint, as if it were far away. He groaned loudly when he tried to sit up and found it impossible, for his ropes were tight. Shoved under his bound arms was a bloody plaid. Agonizing pain radiated from his ribs and coursed down his leg and up his left side. A few ribs were likely broken. He’d also been shot in the left shoulder and he was almost certain his arse had been beaten. The cold was likely the only thing keeping him alive, numbing the pain. He was a prisoner. Of whom? He remembered one of them demanding the Earl of Lancaster or he would kill…Molly. They killed Molly.
Julianna! He thought as his memory returned. He left her inside the castle with Elias! He never thought they would breach. He was no soldier, no commander like his brothers, but he was an excellent swordsman and archer. The more he remembered, the harder he struggled to be free. He’d taken her only weapon.
He wanted to scream and shout and go berserk like the Northmen of old, break free and go get her and his son and kill anyone in his way.
What about Rauf and Margaret, and Walter—everyone else from Lismoor.
