“Who else heard it?” No answer came, and Derek grunted. “It is as I thought. They will not come this far afield to look for her. We have only to cross the meadow and we will be safe.”
“Iwill not feel safe until we are rid of her. This was not such a good idea, Derek. Our usual prey do not have such large escorts.”
They moved out, keeping close together. But they were not even halfway across the meadow when a horse and rider moved slowly out from the trees facing them.
“Tell me that is your lord, Derek.” Dread filled the voice.
“Of course it is not. He is not such a large man. But do not panic now,” Derek warned. “This is a full-armored knight. She had no such knight with her.”
“Why does he sit there and stare at us?” Osgar asked uneasily. “Why doesn’t he move?”
“Wait, he comes now,” Derek cautioned. He set Leonie down and shoved her at the others. “Hold her. I may have to fight him.”
“Youfighthim?”
“With your help, fool,” Derek hissed just as thelarge destrier came abreast of them. “How may we serve you, my lord?”
“Show me what you have there.”
“Just my lord’s runaway wife. We are often sent to find her and bring her back. She is given to mental affliction.”
“Strange. She looks so like my own wife. Of course, if I thought the lady of Kempston was being rough-handled, I would not like it.”
Derek seemed to lose his tongue completely.
The large knight on the destrier eyed the rough man, waiting for him to speak.
“I think we are meeting the new lord of Kempston,” Derek whispered.
“But the Black Wolf now has Kempston. You mean—”
“Yes. I think—I think this is his wife we have here.”
“God’s mercy, look at her eyes!” the third man cried. “She knows him!”
Osgar’s brother started running before the words were out. The huge destrier cut off his flight in seconds, the flash of a blade felling the man. The bloodcurdling war cry that followed set the other three to running, all in different directions. But it was only moments before the war-horse had run down two, the heavy sword following swiftly.
Osgar ran back the way they had come and would have escaped into the cover of trees before the destrier could cross the clearing, but another knight rode toward him from those woods and dispatched him with a spear.
Leonie could not move. The bodies of her four abductors were strewn around her, but she felt no relief. She was safe—yet not safe. A new ordeal was beginning.
“Finish here, Piers, and then send the men back to camp.” As Rolfe spoke, more of his men rode into the clearing. “If one of those men is still alive, I want to know where they were going with her.”
“Are you…?” Piers began.
“I will be along shortly—with my wife.”
Leonie had removed her gag, but she was too frozen with terror to speak.
Rolfe dismounted and came to stand before her. His face was hidden beneath his helmet, and she could not tell what he was thinking. Silence held her.
Finally, he asked, “Did they hurt you?”
How coldly formal he was! “They—meant to, but the sound of your horses frightened them.” She looked directly up at him then, her eyes imploring. “My lord, I would speak with you—”
“Oh, we will speak, my lady. Do not doubt it.”
Leonie gasped as he gripped her arm and propelled her toward his horse. He mounted, pulling her up into his lap. They rode off toward the woods, then—not toward camp, but away from it.
