In the Shadow of Midnight - By Marsha Canham Page 0,177

in his flesh … and his eyes crossed and rolled to the back of his head.

Eduard caught him before he could splat onto the hard ground, quickly ascertaining this faint was for real. It was just as well he remained unconscious for a time; without the benefit of needle and thread to close the wound, they had no choice but to staunch the bleeding by cauterizing it with a glowing faggot from the fire.

Within the hour, and under a cloak of darkness, they had been packed up and on their way. Sparrow, still oblivious, was strapped securely onto Robin’s saddlepack and did not rouse again until they stopped on the far side of Salisbury. They rested during the day and at dusk took to the roads again, skirting well clear of towns and villages, breaking the pattern only when it became necessary to send one of their number to purchase foodstuffs they could not scrounge from the land.

On the morning of the third day, Sedrick announced his decision not to stop and rest with the others but to strike out due west and to keep pushing day and night until he reached Pembroke. Someone had to warn Lady Isabella before the king thought to dispatch a troop of men to take her and the children hostage in retaliation. Since he, with his gruff appearance and Celtic accent, could move more anonymously through the border Marches than Henry, Sedrick had elected himself to the task without any consultation or argument.

The marshal had not survived the various Angevin temperaments for over sixty years by being taken unawares. No doubt his spies had already informed him of the princess’s escape and he was already taking steps, albeit reluctantly, to divert suspicion away from any personal involvement. They had discussed this at Amboise and Henry had, with his usual casual indifference, accepted the possibility of full blame falling on the De Clare name, and also that his presence might not be too welcome in England for some time. He had assumed Ariel would be safely hidden away in the wilds of Deheubarth, and he had assumed he would be equally isolated at Cardigan where nothing short of an armed siege would pry him loose.

That was, of course, before Ariel had announced she had no intentions of fleeing to Wales or of marrying Rhys ap Iorwerth. It was also before he realized he was falling in love with Eleanor of Brittany.

“I do not think I will be returning to Normandy with you, Puss. Not just yet, at any rate.”

“Not return?” She sought her brother’s face, brightly lit under the wash of moonlight. Henry had said he wanted a private moment of conversation with her, and for all that they had stood apart from the others, admiring the walls of Kirklees Abbey for nigh on ten minutes, these were the first words he had spoken. “But why not? Where will you go? What will you do? You cannot go back to Pembroke; you said yourself the king will declare us outlaws and traitors. Where can you go, other than Normandy, where you will have less chance of someone recognizing you and bringing the royal hounds down on your heels?”

“Actually—” He paused and looked around them, his hazel eyes focussing on the black crust of forest that bristled across the horizon. “I was not planning to go far. Not until I can be sure the princess is safe and none of those same hounds have sniffed her out here.”

“And if you are recognized? Will you not be drawing them to her?” Ariel asked gently.

“As Henry de Glare, aye, I might,” he agreed. “Even as a solitary nameless knight, my presence might stir a rumour or two. But I have been listening to some of Robin’s tales too (he had been regaling them all with more tales than a troubadour, hoping to distract Eleanor from her worries with more pleasant reminiscences). The one that stalls in my mind is the one about his mother’s first meeting with the Wolf and Alaric FitzAthelstan—do you recall it?”

Ariel shook her head, too perplexed to think of tales told around a fireside.

“She had been kidnapped by Lord Randwulf and managed to escape briefly into the woods. Drawn by the bells of a monastery, she sought refuge there, unaware the grounds had been long abandoned. Lord Alaric, disguised as a humble friar, had answered her plea for sanctuary, and she had thrown herself at his mercy only to discover he was the Wolf’s