“I cannot be responsible for your life,” she said softly. “I can only be responsible for mine.”
“You will not be responsible for me,” Rosalind insisted. “I alone am responsible for my life and for my actions, and everyone in this room is witness. You will not be blamed if something happens to me because I am going with or without your permission.”
Margarethe tried to talk to her sister but Rosalind gently pushed her away. Her focus was on Ellowyn as the woman locked gazes with her. It was evident that Ellowyn was very reluctant but she did not want to argue with Rosalind. Much like Brandt, the woman was evidently resolute and stubborn. They could all see that trait. Finally, Ellowyn nodded her head.
“Very well,” she said. “But we travel light and fast. In this weather, there is no telling how long it will take us to get there. Days if not weeks.”
Rosalind nodded firmly. “I will be ready.”
As Ellowyn continued to look at the young woman, she began to feel a bond with her, a common goal. Moreover, the woman was of Brandt’s blood. Ellowyn would love anything born from Brandt. Rosalind was brave and determined much as her father was.
“Foolishness!” Mme. Simpelace cried. “Stupidity! You must not go!”
Ellowyn turned to the old chatelaine. “Iwillgo,” she said, jaw ticking. “If you will not help me, then get out of my way.”
Mme. Simpelace seemed to go through the throes of fainting without actually accomplishing the act. She was distraught, as were they all, but there was no changing the course that Ellowyn and Rosalind were about to take.
They went their separate ways to prepare for the journey, both women with people trailing after them begging them not to go, but they were determined. Eventually, those same people gave up the battle and began to help. There was no discouraging the inevitable.
With a purpose, with resolve and bravery bred from a love for her husband that ran deeper than the earth itself, Ellowyn was mounted and ready to ride only a few hours later. Astride a leggy warm blood stallion, she was dressed in peasant clothing disguised as a male just as Rosalind was. It was determined that would be the safest way to travel.
With six armed soldiers from the contingent guarding Melesse and with Sully in the lead, Lady de Russe and Lady Rosalind thundered from Chateau Melesse, heading south into the fiery jaws of death and destruction.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
20 September 1356
Near the woods of Nouaillè
Ellowyn was onthe edge of a meadow, looking at a massive castle in the distance, partially obscured by sheets of driving rain. In spite of the weather, smoke rose in ribbons over the damaged battlements.
Overhead, the sky was the color of pewter with fat, angry clouds, but upon earth, the field was flooded from the unforgiving rain that had been falling for days, perhaps weeks, mayhap even months. It was difficult to know. It seemed as if it had been raining forever.
A great battle had concluded the day before upon the field and there was a sea of bodies strewn about, like pieces of driftwood upon an endless muddy sea. Ellowyn’s heart was in her throat as she observed the scene, her breathing coming in panicked little gasps. Something was here for her, something she loved so desperately that she couldn’t think of anything else. Even though she couldn’t see Brandt, she knew he was here.
“Sweet Jesus,” Rosalind breathed at the sight. “Is this possible?”
Ellowyn couldn’t even speak. Her eyes were drinking in the horror that she had seen in her mind’s eye before. Everything was as it should be down to the color of the sky. The castle towards the northeast was heavily damaged, the top of the walls nearly sheared off from the projectiles flung at it. With the rain and the debris, it gave the illusion that it was melting.
Melting….
Ellowyn fought down the panic. She handed her reins over to the nearest soldier. It didn’t matter that she was exhausted from over a week of travel in horrible weather and still recovering from birthing a child. All that mattered was that she locate her husband. She knew he was out here, somewhere. She had to find him.
“One of you stay with the horses,” she ordered in a trembling voice. “The rest of you fan out and look for the duke’s men. Find them!”
The soldier holding Ellowyn’s horse was designated to stay behind. He collected everyone’s reins as the small group began to descend into the pit of Hell where men were dead or dying, and a sea of mud was slowly swallowing everything up. Rain, buckets of it, was falling and no matter how tightly Ellowyn pulled close the oiled cloak around her shoulders, she was still wet. She had been wet for days. But that did not deter her. Brandt was here and she had to find him.
She thought back to that terrible dream. She had found him lying beneath a tree.A tree. She began to look around frantically for something that seemed recognizable to her, but the landscape was slightly out of place from what her dream had conveyed. Rosalind was next to her, peering at the dead and dying to see if she recognized Brandt’s colors and, indeed, she came across several dead men bearing Brandt’s standard. There seemed to be quite a lot of them. Rosalind eventually turned to Ellowyn in confusion and horror.
“So many of my father’s men are lying here,” she hissed. “What does it all mean?”
Ellowyn was struggling to remain calm. God help her, she was. “It means that they were the bravest,” she said hoarsely. “It means that they were the first into battle and fought the hardest.”
She trudged off with Rosalind hanging on to her and together the two of them slugged through the mud as Ellowyn tried to get her bearings, struggling to separate the dream from reality, looking for her husband with such desperation that her stomach was in horrific knots. Twice they had to pause as she dry-heaved, riddled with nerves, but nothing would stop her. She had to find him.
“My lady!” Rosalind hissed, tugging at her and pointing off to the right. “Is that not one of the duke’s knights?”
Ellowyn was electrified with the possibility, straining to see through the rain at what Rosalind was indicating. She began to move in that direction even though she couldn’t clearly see, but soon enough a big man bearing the Duke of Exeter’s tunic appeared.
