Helen’s heart jumped with every horrible clash of steel. Though she knew the king was one of the greatest knights in Christendom, it didn’t take her long to realize that the man who faced him was no common brigand. He wielded his sword with a strength equal to that of the king—if not more.
The battle between the two men seemed to go on forever. But where were the others? Why had no one come to his aid?
To her horror, she realized that the brigand was purposefully moving the king toward the pine trees where they were hidden, away from the main battle.
The closer they drew, the more the tension in the small group began to mount. She motioned for the others to stay quiet, but from the wide, horror-filled eyes of her ladies, she feared they weren’t going to last much longer.
They could hear the heavy breathing of the men as they exchanged blow after blow, until finally, the king’s blade met the other man’s with such force, the sword slipped from his hands.
Helen nearly gasped with relief. The king lifted his sword to deliver the death blow. But the other man was not going to surrender to death without a fight. Somehow he managed to extricate a battle-axe from his body. Even as the blade of Bruce’s sword was slicing through the air, the brigand landed a one-handed blow of the axe to the king’s head.
Momentum finished the king’s job for him—the brigand’s neck was nearly severed in two—but Bruce staggered, the blade of the axe still stuck in his helm.
He lowered to his knees, and then stopped himself from keeling forward by extending his hands.
Helen didn’t think. With the bag that Magnus had made for her looped over her shoulder across her body, she ordered the rest of the group to stay there and raced forward to help the king.
When she reached him, she fell to her knees at his side. It was dark, but there was enough moonlight shining through the mist to see the blood gushing down his face.
It was like some macabre farce. The blade of the axe was stuck into his helm and had penetrated the steel into his brow.
Dear God, let it not be deep.
“Sire,” she said gently. “Let me help.”
He was rocking side-to-side, obviously in a daze. “My head,” he mumbled.
She soothed him as best she could, easing him back until he was seated on the ground.
Every instinct recoiled from removing the helm and its hideous appendage—fearing what she would find—but she had to see the extent of the damage and stop the bleeding.
“I need to take off your helm,” she said gently. “Can you help me?”
He tried to nod, but winced with pain.
Helen held her breath and slowly started to pull the helm from his head. There was one horrible moment when it seemed the helm would not come off—that the axe was embedded too deep in his forehead—but with one hard tug she pulled it free.
Helm and axe fell to the ground as Helen did her best to staunch the blood gushing from the king’s brow with one of the swatches of linen she kept in the bag. But the small pad of fabric was soon drenched.
If only it weren’t so dark. It was hard to see the extent of the injury. But aside from the ringing to his head the king was sure to be feeling from the blow, it looked as if the vertical gash bisecting his left eyebrow and forehead was deep but not necessarily deadly.Ifshe could stop the bleeding.
The king’s shock had seemed to fade with the removal of the helm and axe.
“You shouldn’t be here, Lady Helen. I told you to hide.”
“I will. Just as soon as I tend your wound. Does it hurt badly?”
A silly question to ask a warrior. In her experience, nothing ever hurt.
“Nay,” the king said, true to form. “Where’s my sword?”
Helen gazed toward the body of the fallen man where the sword had landed when the blow had struck.
The king lunged for it, but Helen had to keep him upright when he nearly fell over, dizzy. “You’re losing a lot of blood. I need to get something to bind the wound.”
He was able to hold the pad as she used the scissors in her bag to cut a section of linen from her shift to make a larger pad, and a second thinner piece to secure it with. She knew it wouldn’t last long, but she needed something until she could get some salve—
Suddenly, she heard men moving toward them. The king heard them, too.
