Page 191

“Isna he coming, too?” she asked.

She was aware that Paris had moved to stand beside her chair. Kieran pulled up a chair to sit in front of her. She studied his face, he looked pale and weary and not at all like himself. Her concern was igniting something far more powerful in the pit of her belly.

“What is wrong, Kieran. Where is William?” It was a calm, deliberate statement. She wanted an answer.

Kieran glanced up at Paris before answering her. “He is in London, as I said.” He let out a sigh, running his hand over his short cropped hair. “God, Jordan, I wish there was an easy way to tell you this, but I cannot think of one. Forgive me for being blunt and insensitive. I am here because William was wounded in a skirmish three weeks ago.”

Her stomach lurched. He had been wounded before, severely, she told herself quickly. He will survive. “How badly?” she asked calmly.

Kieran looked at her and she could read the pain in his eyes. “Bad, my lady,” he whispered. “We were fighting Welsh usurpers and were overwhelmed by the sheer number of them. There were so many that it was as if the mountains were alive with them. William was magnificent, as always, showing no signs of weariness, even though we had been fighting for nearly three days. We thought the heat of the battle had passed and we relaxed a bit; nothing unusual about that. William had raised his faceplate to wipe his brow when he was hit out of nowhere from a crossbow.”

She continued to stare at him calmly, fighting to maintain herself. It was the most desperate fight of her life. “Where was he hit?”

“In the face,” Kieran said in a raspy voice. “The arrow took out his left eye. He was lucky to have survived at all.”

She sat there a moment, her face draining of all color, and her hands gripped the arms of the chair like a vise. She was trying to will all of her efforts into controlling herself, but tears came in spite of her fervent attempt. She vaguely felt Paris’ hands on her shoulders.

“But he lives and that is all that matters,” she whispered.

Kieran sighed, his shoulders sagging. “He lives, but barely,” he murmured. “We nearly lost him to the fever, but it broke. Now he cannot seem to regain his strength. I do not know if he’s going to survive, Jordan. The king’s personal physician has spent day and night with him and even he doesn’t know. We have called a priest for him three times already.”

She was shaking violently, her mind racing. William was dying. Sweet Jesu,’ it wasn’t possible. He had promised to return to her. He had promised!

Her mind flew back to the moment she first met him when he lay dying on the dark rich earth of Scotland; a lifetime ago, it seemed. She had tended him and he had recovered. When she nearly died from the fever, he had tended her and she had lived. He had never left her.

Now he needed her again and she would go to him. He would live for her. He had to. Determination such as she had never known filled her, blocking out everything else in its violent wake.

Rising unsteadily but with conviction, she fixed Kieran with an icy glare. “You will take me to him.”

“Out of the question,” Paris told her as gently as he could. “You cannot travel.”

She whirled on Paris like a rabid dog. “I tended his wound once before; the thigh wound that should have killed him,” she snarled. “I will tend him now and he will live. I am going if I have to walk every step of the way.”

Paris’ jaw ticked. “I cannot allow it.”

“Go to hell.” she hissed, turning away from him. “Kieran, ye get a meal and rest. I shall send my servant to ye when I am ready.”

Kieran was stricken. “Jordan, be reasonable,” he said helplessly. He did not want to have a shouting match with her. “You cannot travel in your current state. I think….”

Jordan cut him off. “I shall send for ye,” she repeated through clenched teeth. She glanced at the expressions of the two men, not liking what she was seeing. Her anger cooled to stone-hard grit with steadfastness of epic proportions. When she spoke again, her voice was low. “Listen to me, knights, and listen well. William needs me and I am going to him. If ye try and stop me, ye will be very sorry. Nothing can stop me, so ye may either help me or ye be in my way. And if ye be in my way, I will kill ye.”

She disappeared into her bedchamber, and Kieran and Paris looked at each other after a moment.

“What now?” Kieran asked with desperation.

Paris scratched his head and kicked the chair, as emotional as Kieran had ever seen him. “She’s going to have the babe on the road if she goes,” he muttered. “Damnation!”

Kieran was feeling his exhaustion. He had ridden all the way from London in six days, and from Wales before that. He was tired to the bone.

“She’s going to go regardless of what you tell her, Paris,” he said quietly.

“Then what would you suggest, Kieran?” Paris demanded harshly. “For I am out of answers. If she goes, I cannot go with her and I would be breaking my promise to William to protect her always.”

“Why can’t you go?” Kieran asked.

Paris sat heavily, rubbing his forehead between two fingers. He was so damned tired, too. “The Scots are fortifying their defenses across the border,” he replied wearily. “Our scouts say that they are amassing. We cannot get a message to Laird Scott because the Scot line cuts between us. They are isolating clan Scott for an attack. I am needed here now more than ever.”

Kieran let out a long sigh. “Damn,” he mumbled. “Have you sent word to Beverley and Deauxville Mount?”