The man reached up and pushed the hood off his head, revealing dark hair and a smooth face.
Evan blinked. He must be dafter than he realized, although with the person less than a stride away, it was hard to miss what his eyes took in.
A woman?
Even through his shadowy vision, he could make out the delicate angles of her face. Those piercing dark eyes.
“You have come to Laurent. Now you will tell us why.” The lilt in her voice sounded different now that he could see her. With her tone so melodic, how could he not have recognized her as female?
A fresh wave of dizziness washed over him, and he braced his feet. A hand gripped his arm, that same small hand as before.
“Your purpose, monsieur. Before you swoon, if you please.”
Even if he wanted to tell her, his mouth had turned to cotton. Blackness circled the edge of his vision, increasing until he could only see her blurry form through a small hole, like he was looking through a field glass. This lightness in his head almost took over completely. His body sank like it weighed twice as much as usual.
Lord, don’t let them kill me. Not yet.
He had too much to make up for. Too much left to fix before he faced the final judgment.
2
Brielle knelt beside the crumpled form on the ground, a knife in her hand. His collapse was most likely due to the sleeping potion she’d coated the arrowhead with, but she couldn’t be too cautious with an outsider. She worked two fingers under the collar of his coat, then stilled as she felt the flow of his life blood. Not a strong surge, but steady.
She allowed her gaze to roam his face. Strength resonated from the tanned skin around his eyes, although most of his lower features were covered with a close-cut beard. Its shortness almost made him look like a vain popinjay that spent hours on his appearance, except for the untrimmed edges. Perhaps a fresh growth for the winter months, as a few of her villagers allowed.
The man’s lips parted slightly, his steady breaths tinged with a ragged sound. She glanced down at the blood spotting his middle. The patch had grown to cover most of his midsection. He should be moved inside, where Audrey could attend him.
Straightening, she looked at the four men forming a semicircle near the stranger’s feet, awaiting her instructions.“Leonard, fetch his horse. Philip, Geoffrey, take him to the holding chamber. I’ll get the healer and follow soon.”
She pushed to her feet and stepped back, clearing the way for the others to carry him inside. The man’s clothing wasn’t much different than her own people’s, although she’d never seen that style of foot covering.
From where had he come? And for what purpose? They’d worked so hard to keep their village hidden from the outside world. Even a hundred years ago, when the grandfathers had left New France to settle here, they’d traveled months to find an area this far from civilization. The mountain caves had provided the perfect place to build their community.
But now a stranger invaded their privacy. The only other time Englishmen had entered their circle had been ... awful.
That day had changed Laurent forever.
But at least those murdering Englishmen hadn’t escaped to tell of the hidden French village. Perhaps this man had heard of their people from the Dinee natives and come to see for himself. But whether he meant ill or was only curious would have to be determined before he could be released.
Turning, she scooped up her bow and strode toward the mountain that curved to form two sides of the open courtyard. The other two walls were made of stone. Some of them had been placed there by God, but the gaps had been carefully filled in by former generations to make the courtyard secure and not obvious from the outside.
She aimed her steps toward Audrey’s quarters. Her sister, Charlotte, would be irked that Brielle wasn’t coming straightaway with news of the stranger, but a healer was of greater import just now. And besides, the girl would be safest away from the stranger until they understood his purpose.
She couldn’t risk losing her sister the same way their mother had been taken.
The burning in Evan’s gut pierced deep, yanking him from the haze of sleep. Scuffling sounded near his head, and he forced his body to remain still as he cracked his eyes. A figure stood over him, and he tensed, preparing for a fight. The person moved in a graceful rhythm, like that of a female.
He opened his eyes wider to make out her features in the dim light. The woman seemed to be working on something. Then, an icy substance touched his middle. He inhaled a sharp breath before he could stop himself.
She glanced at his face, and the light illuminated part of her features. “I’m sorry, but we must clean it.” Glancing up, she nodded at someone across the room, then returned to her work.
The cold spread across his belly as she scrubbed, probably at dried blood. At least, he hoped the stuff had dried and the wound wasn’t seeping still. Each pass of her cloth tugged on his injury with an aching jolt. He forced his focus away from the pain of her movements and looked over to see what she had glanced at.
Another person stood against the far wall. A familiar form with an animal-skin cloak still draped over her shoulders, yet the hood no longer shrouding her face. A single black braid hung down her shoulder, light from a torch flickering off the ebony strands, turning them golden.
He focused on her face, this woman who had so ruthlesslyshot him in the gut, then bound him and marched him like a prize turkey back to her tribe—or whatever these people called themselves. In his experience, women were a bit daintier than she’d acted so far. Even the sturdy pioneer stock wore dresses to their ankles and knew their place was cooking and caring for the home. His eyes skimmed unbidden to where her cloak ended, not much past her knees. In the shadows of the room, he could only make out the outline of her lower limbs, which gave his mind just enough leeway to fill in the details.
He jerked his eyes back up to her face, catching her gaze as she studied him with a hostility he’d certainly not earned.Hewas the one who’d been shot, by saints. It was high time he regain the upper hand, even if his own were still bound. At least they were now tied in front of him instead of behind.
