“You do seem to be popular with your people,” Essex allowed me. “New though you are to the title.”
“New to the title, but I am hardly new to the people,” I told him with a shrug. “But I hope they don’t start to think me a midwife,” I said, scrunching my nose. “I have many skills but this is not one of them.”
To my surprise, he smiled a bit. “Return soon, my lady. Unless you would still like an escort?”
I looked to the knight; if a woman felt uncomfortable with a man there, I wouldn’t betray that. “No. I’ll be well enough, but thank you.”
The knight looked grim at Essex, and Essex gave him a good scowl in return.
We walked out through the open gate, heading into the forest. We seemed to be walking straight in, rather than off toward Edwinstowe.
“Where are we going?” I asked the knight, glancing back behind me to where he stood.
“Just a little farther, my lady,” he said.
I turned forward again, and just as I did I heard the whisper of metal sliding.
Turning back once more, I gasped and ducked as the knight swung his heavy blade at me. I ducked and he swung wide, and I ran past him, trying to grab at my knives. With my hands covered, I couldn’t draw them out.
He turned and raised his sword again as I yanked at the bandages, tearing one with my teeth. He swung his blade toward me again, and I dived behind a tree. The metal bit deep into the wood, and I earned a moment.
The tear were enough to unravel the bandage on my full hand, and I grabbed for a knife as he came at me again. He lunged at me, and I crossed my body to push the sword off with my good hand, leaving me off balance.
He saw this and grabbed for my hair, but I were quick and he didn’t get me. He tripped me at the same moment, though, his foot hooking round mine while I tried to escape him.
I fell hard to the forest floor, and his sword thrust down, glinting in the afternoon sun.
Rolling to miss it, I got my hands under me to push up, but his foot smashed down on my back, pressing my face into the dirt.
“Stay,” he growled.
A roared yell came from behind us, and the knight—if he were such—turned. I heard metal scrape on metal, and I scrambled to my feet to see Essex fighting him, swords flashing bright.
“Stay out of this!” the knight yelled at Essex.
Essex hammered a hard blow. “What is this?” he demanded.
The knight moved fast, parrying and lunging, forcing Essex back. “No business for an earl,” he returned.
“You are a traitor,” he accused. “Trying to harm your lady!”
“She’s not my lady,” the knight snapped. “I owe allegiance elsewhere.”
“To whom?” Essex demanded, but I already knew, and the knight wouldn’t tell Essex that.
Essex were excellent. He had perfect form, and a practiced speed and precision most nobles were far too lazy to develop. I already knew the knight were quick and skilled, but they were a surprising good match.
With a hard blow, Essex disarmed him, and without a moment’s breath, ran him straight through. My breath stopped and I covered my mouth.
“My lady, are you hurt?” Essex asked. He pulled his sword out and the man fell; Essex bent down and used the man’s tunic to wipe his blade clean before he sheathed it. “My lady?”
“No,” I said quick, shaking my head. “Let’s get back to the wall.”
He nodded, and I walked to him and we went to the gate. I looked back once, seeing the man’s body lying in the woods.
Once the gates were shut tight behind us, Essex kept walking, but he turned to me.
“If you ask me if I’m hurt once more, I swear I’ll flatten you,” I warned him, walking faster.
He glanced at the gate, then back at me. “You’re bleeding,” he told me.
I touched my face. The side of my face were scratched up good, and the skin above my eye were cut. I swore, and he looked at me. “Oh, for Heaven’s sake,” I grunted. “Don’t look at me like that. I think you’ve rather discovered I’m a different sort of girl than Isabel.”
He looked ahead. “In some ways,” he told me. “Yet I think if she found a way to break free of court, she’d be rather similar to you indeed.”
This thought startled me, but I thought it better not to say anything to that.
We reached the castle and the knights set running about, and before we reached the upper bailey, David were there with Allan behind him, and Rob were striding across the courtyard.
“My lady!” David cried when we were closer. He dropped to one knee. “I didn’t think—I should have thought to protect you, my lady. I cannot ask for your forgiveness.”
“Forgiveness isn’t needed, David. Please stand up.”
“What happened?” Rob asked, shouldering past David. “They said you were hurt.”