Kristoph studied him a moment, trying to determine why he wanted to see his hand. Give me your hand. Nay, he didn’t want to see his hand. He wanted the hand. He began to feel the familiar rush of battle because he knew, no matter his injuries, that he was going to resist with everything he had. If Alary wanted his hand, then he was going to have to fight for it.
“If you tell me what you are going to do, I will consider it,” he said evenly.
Alary’s eyes narrowed. “I have given you a command, prisoner. You will obey!”
“Nay.”
With that, Alary stood up and made a grab for Kristoph’s arm, but the knight stood up and dumped the table over, tossing the remains of the meal back on to Alary. He then threw a big fist at the first man who charged him. As that man went sprawling, a second man charged and Kristoph slugged the man in the nose, sending him to the ground. The third man who charged him was the soldier who had been kind to him and had given him food, and that momentary hesitation cost him. The fourth soldier, seeing the fight, got his hands on one of the big iron pots near the hearth and struck Kristoph across the back of the head with it.
The knight fell like a stone.
Within a few minutes, the terrified rider from Westerham was back on his mount, carrying the top portion of Kristoph’s left pinky finger with him. The message he was told to deliver to Ghislaine of Mercia was simple:
Follow me and the next time I will send a bigger piece of the Norman back to you. His life is in your hands.
CHAPTER TWELVE
?
A Price Too High
He met them on the road.
A frantic young man, a portion of a finger, and a message to Ghislaine from her brother was all it took to bring a two-thousand-man army to a standstill.
Setting out from Westerham, Ghislaine had been permitted to ride up near Gaetan, which was evidently quite rare. Aramis rode behind her and off to the left so every time she looked over her shoulder, he was there glaring at her. And then he would flash a smile and look away, letting her know that he really wasn’t glaring at her. Something about besting the man the night before had made him something of her watch dog, or worshipper – Ghislaine couldn’t really tell but she thought it all rather wonderful. These Norman knights were starting to warm to her and it was something of a comfort.
But that all ended when the frenzied rider heading down the road towards them very nearly crashed into Gaetan and would have had de Russe and Wellesbourne not rushed out to intercept him. The young man was hysterical, asking for Ghislaine of Mercia and she was brought forward, but Aramis made sure to stay between her and the young man, who proceeded to pull out a coin purse that he handed to Aramis, who in turn handed it to Ghislaine.
She recognized the purse.
There was a star carved into the leather, the same kind of star that Alary had on a seal that he used to sign missives. As the young man babbled and sobbed the message that Alary had given him to relay, Ghislaine’s stomach was in knots as she timidly opened the pouch to peer inside. She couldn’t see much, however, so she shook out the contents into her palm.
The bloody tip of a finger appeared.
Horrified, she shrieked as Gaetan, who was now standing next to her, plucked the finger chunk from her palm. As Ghislaine stood there with both hands over her mouth, utterly appalled with what she was seeing, the young man spat out the message a second time when Gaetan demanded it. The lad added the circumstances under which the finger had been taken and Gaetan’s face turned pale.
It was Kristoph’s finger.
Follow me and the next time I will send a bigger piece of the Norman back to you.
With her hands still over her mouth, Ghislaine watched Gaetan make his way to the side of the road, the finger still in his hand, before promptly doubling over and vomiting the contents of his stomach. The rest of the knights were beside themselves when the reason for Gaetan’s illness was relayed to them, the revolting fact muttered from one man to another.
Even the knights from the rear of the column – today it was de Reyne, de Lara, and St. Hèver – heard from their comrades what had happened and they stood, as the others did, in a tense group, watching Gaetan struggle with his composure.
It was a horrific turn of events.
It was Téo who finally went to stand next to Gaetan, putting a hand on the man’s shoulder in a comforting gesture before taking the finger from him and going in search of the original pouch it had been delivered in. Ghislaine still had it and she handed it to him, watching the man grimly seal up the finger in the leather pouch before glancing to de Russe and de Lara. Something had to be done; they all knew it. Téo finally muttered to Aramis.
“Get the men off the road and into the trees,” he said quietly. “I do not want the army standing vulnerable if that Saxon bastard knows we are following him. Do not have the men set up camp but tell them to sit and wait. It is clear that something new has been added to the situation that the commanders must discuss.”
Aramis nodded, gathering Wellesbourne, de Moray, St. Hèver, and de Reyne to him, all of them the great movers of men, and the five of them began moving the column off the road and into the trees to the west. Horses, wagons, and men plowed through the thick wet grass and into the trees beyond. Meanwhile, Jathan had come forward and when Téo whispered what had happened, the priest took the leather pouch and began to pray earnestly over it.
Everyone was clearly in shock but they were working through it as their training kicked in. Moving the men off the road until the situation could be discussed was how some of them dealt with it while others, Téo and Luc and Denis, stood near Gaetan, waiting for a command to come forth. The hysterical messenger stood near Ghislaine and she pushed her revulsion aside long enough to pull the man away from Gaetan, pulling him back down the road towards his exhausted mount. When they reached the frothing horse, she grabbed the man by the collar.
“By all that his holy – what has happened?” she hissed. “How did my brother know I was following him? And how did you know to find me here?”
The young man had fluid leaking from every part of his face; mucus, tears, saliva. “Lady Gunnora sent me to find Lord Alary,” he told her. “She sent me last night. She said your brother had gone ahead of you and she wanted me to tell him to wait for you to catch up.”
That wasn’t what Ghislaine had expected to hear. Witchcraft or the devil’s own work had been on her mind, but not Gunnora’s intervention. Not her friend. When Ghislaine realized what the woman had done, her eyes widened dramatically.
“She did what?” she shrieked. “She told you to find my brother and tell him I was coming?”
The young man could see that the message he had carried from Gunnora had evidently not been welcome and, given what had happened this morning, he wasn’t surprised.
“Aye, my lady,” he said, now fearful of Ghislaine and her bulging eyes. “She said he should know. But Lord Alary… he was angry when I told him. He… he cut that poor man’s finger off.”