“You’re hurting me.”
She heard a door open, and Ruexner dragged her inside. He sat her down on a wooden bench. Something went around her ankles. Ruexner was tying them together, just as he’d tied her hands together behind her back. Then he tied a cloth over her eyes, knotting it behind her head.
“Why are you doing this?”
He didn’t say anything for a moment. “This is about Valten and me. He has to pay for what he did to me.”
“What do you plan to do to him? Haven’t you hurt him enough? Just please let us go,” she whispered out of desperation. Perhaps the man possessed a shred of goodness.
“Almost.” Ruexner’s voice was low and gentle. “Almost you persuade me. But Valten and I must end our fight now, once and for all. I will take him to my castle in Bruchen, and there we shall have our final duel.”
She heard him turn and start to walk away. “Please, don’t hurt him. You don’t have to do this. You don’t have to fight Valten. You can let us go and never have to see us again.”
“I don’t expect you to understand.” He seemed to hesitate at the door. For long moments she didn’t hear anything. Had he left?
The door squeaked open, then closed with a bang.
“O God, please help Valten. Please protect him. Please.”
Ruexner’s grimy henchmen held on to Valten and surrounded him, his hands tied behind his back, when Ruexner came back down the stairs without Gisela.
“Where is she?” Valten demanded, looking straight at Ruexner.
“She is safe,” Ruexner said, his eyes flashing with malice.
“Will you kill an unarmed man, inside a church?”
“I’m trying to decide if I want to take her with us when I bring you to Bruchen.”
“I’m ready to fight you. Give me a sword now and let’s fight. Even with a broken hand and broken ribs, I can still defeat you.”
Ruexner seemed to be savoring the moment, based on his evil grin. “No, I don’t think so.”
Ruexner went to speak to his men, leaving two in charge of Valten. When he came back, he told the priest, “We’re taking over this place tonight. My men are tired and need sleep. Now get out.”
“You can’t do that. This is a church.” The priest seemed genuinely upset, unlike how he had reacted when Ruexner had almost forced Gisela to marry him against her will. Although he had delayed the marriage, speaking slowly, as if hoping someone would come to their aid. He’d also refused to go on once someone had declared an impediment.
“Get out, or my men will throw you out,” Ruexner growled in the priest’s face.
“Bishop Fulco will hear about this.”
Ruexner ignored the priest as one of his men escorted him out the back door.
Ruexner wrapped a piece of cloth around Valten’s eyes, blindfolding him. “I shall keep you upstairs. Perhaps we will bring you some supper in a few hours, if you are quiet.” Ruexner then pulled him forward.
“Why blindfold me?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I suppose I want you to feel helpless. If you can’t see where you are, you might not be able to escape.”
“You’re a sick and deviant brute.” Valten’s rage was beginning to get the better of him. Lack of sleep was making it difficult to think. He needed to try to reason with him and project confidence. “You know the king will not approve of what you are doing. He will strip you of your knighthood, and possibly worse.”
Rough hands forced him to climb some stairs. Undoubtedly they were the stairs leading up inside the church tower. Gisela had been taken up the same stairs.
“I don’t worry about the king. He will reprimand me, but if I give him a few valuable trinkets for his coffers, I suspect he will forgive me. And instead of killing you, perhaps I will demand a ransom from Duke Wilhelm when I defeat you in a few days.” Still guiding him up the stairs, Ruexner added nonchalantly, “As it turns out, Gisela is the daughter of my mother’s sister. Strange, but it is apparently true. Therefore I shall marry her off to one of my knights. Who do you think she would better suit — Malbert or Lew?”
A door creaked opened, then Valten was pushed into a room of some sort. Hands on his shoulders forced him to sit, then they tied his ankles together.
The men shuffled away, Ruexner laughed, and the door shut.
He was already working his feet, trying to take off his boots. If he could get one of his boots off, the rope might slip off with it.
All was quiet, then he heard a sniff, and a woman’s voice from several feet away said, “Who is there?”
“Gisela? Is that you?” His heart tripped at her being in the same room.
“Valten!” She sounded like she was crying.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.” Her voice cracked and she sniffed again. “Are you?”