Page 4 of Lord of the Forest

Cursing himself for his heroic folly, he set off in pursuit, keeping to the verge to avoid the painful cobbles and ankle-turning potholes of the roadway. Even with his speed and strength, he had no idea if he could outrun a horse-drawn vehicle, but a fundamental sense of urgency insisted he try.

The driver of the cart seemed to be having some difficulty. Lancelot could see the horse weaving from side to side, looking decidedly skittish. From what he could remember of horses, it wouldn’t have liked those feminine screams.

Lungs aching, he eventually drew level with the cart and saw a man and a woman in the back, engaged in a desperate struggle. So—it was an abduction, was it? Like Queen Guinevere, stolen by the evil knight Meliagrance. A pox-marked man with a grizzled beard sat at the front, reins in hand.

Wasting not a moment, Lancelot threw himself onto the tail of the cart, grasped the woman’s attacker by the shoulders, and threw him bodily onto the highway. The horse let out a frightened whinny, so he hurled the driver of the cart onto the roadway as well, and seized the reins.

“Whoa, boy.” His voice came out as a croak, startling him. He spoke so rarely that he’d almost forgotten how he sounded. Fortunately, the animal responded to the commanding tug on its reins and clattered to a halt.

There was a moment of stillness, during which nothing could be heard save the jingle of harness as the horse steadied itself, and the exacerbated huff of its breathing. Then the evening air was severed by another scream, right by Lancelot’s head.

“They’re coming after us. Pray, help me, sir!”

The woman, who had wrestled free of the cloak in which her abductor had been attempting to subdue her, pointed back the way they’d come. “We must make haste. My home is that way. Can you drive us thither?”

He wasn’t taking this cart anywhere. The last thing he wanted to do was show his face at someone’s house.

“Nay.” His voice was a crude grunt. He’d rescued the woman but still needed to deal with the two men. Lifting her over the side of the cart, he set her down, jumped after her and waited, arms folded across his bare chest.

The bandits bore down on him, red-faced with fury, one of them with blood pouring from a cut above his eye. Neither man paused to consider Lancelot’s shape or size—which was exceedingly foolish of them. He seized one by the collar, virtually strangling him, and used him as a battering ram to knock the other over. Then, while keeping the downed man immobile with a foot on his throat, he gave the other a blow to the side of the head. The man measured his length on the ground, knocked out cold.

The other fellow, arms and legs waving like a cockroach on its back, choked and gurgled as Lancelot pulled him to his feet and subjected him to the same treatment.

With both assailants collapsed on the roadway, he licked his sore knuckles and permitted himself a small smile of triumph. Gazing around to make sure no one else was about, he climbed into the cart to see if it contained anything worth scavenging.

Some empty sacks. He took those—useful for carrying and storage. He could stuff some of his bedding into them to stop it moving around too much. There was an old cloak also, which would make a fine coverlet, once he’d cleansed it in the brook. There was naught else—not even some ancient neep that had rolled, forgotten, into a corner. It would have made a welcome change to have neep in his cony stew, rather than just roots and herbs.

“Ahem.”

Ah, yes, the woman. He leaped down and faced her.

“Aren’t you going to take me home?”

She was quite young and much prettier than the village girls he was used to seeing. She wore some kind of headdress, which had been knocked askew in the struggle. A cloud of light hair had escaped from it, though he couldn’t tell its color in the encroaching gloom.

“No.” He stepped past her and strode back toward the forest.

“What?” She sounded outraged. He could hear the patter of her dainty feet as she tried to keep up with him.

“Drive yourself home. I’ll have naught to do with it.”

There. That was the longest pronouncement he’d made in years. It proved he could still speak—assuming, of course, that what he was saying made sense. It didn’t seem to make any difference, though. She was still trotting along behind him.

“What makes you think I can drive, you great oaf? Do you really mean to leave me here, to be picked off by any vagabond or bandit who happens along? Why bother to rescue me if you’re just going to abandon me again?”

She talked too much. Shrugging his shoulders, Lancelot veered off beneath the shadow of the oak trees. She wouldn’t follow him into the forest—she’d think it too full of threats. She’d lose her way in no time, especially if he picked up his pace and left her behind.

“No, wait. I didn’t mean to call you an oaf. I just don’t understand. Please, wait, sir. I don’t want to walk home alone, and I want to recover my basket.”

He pulled to a halt. If she stayed on the road, in the open, would he end up having to rescue her all over again? The less fuss that was made, the lower the risk of anyone seeing him.

“I’ll get your basket.” His voice was a growl. “And then you must spend the night with me.”

“What? I’ll do no such thing—I shall get my basket, and walk back home alone since you have so little gallantry. It would do no harm to admit you don’t know how to manage a cart. I’d think no less of you for it. I can even overlook the fact you are undressed—though I cannot imagine why you would be at this hour of the day.”

He almost laughed. That was something else he hadn’t done in many a moon—there was little amusement to be had living like a hermit in the forest, with only the trees and the creatures for company.

He started walking again and, as before, she followed him. Behind them, in the distance, he could hear the slow clip-clop of hooves as the puzzled carthorse continued on its way alone. His ears were finely attuned to sound now, and the racket his female companion made was loud enough to wake the dead. Hadn’t she learned not to step on dry twigs, or walk right through piles of last year’s leaves? As soon as those ruffians recovered their senses, they’d be on them in no time.