Rhiana

Tall, lean, and wrapped with muscle, Guiscard stood, feet spread and thumbs hooked at a hip belt of interlocked gold medallions. Thigh high boots, revealed by a sweep of his surcoat, emphasized long legs wrapped in parti-colors of emerald and black. He wore not the fashionable pudding-basin cut that had the men shaving the backs of their heads up to ear-high level. Long dark hair was braided at the baron’s ears to keep it back from his face. Possessed of bright blue eyes and cheekbones sharp as any blade, he easily slayed all females who fell to his allure.

Sapphires glinted at his fingers and along the gold chain that strung from shoulder to shoulder. Rhiana lingered on the gold. She liked gold, its brilliant and warm veneer. To hold it in her hand made her feel safe—comforted—strange as that sounded.

It was with great willpower she resisted reaching out and touching the finery that glittered everywhere on Lord Guiscard.

The baron had taken command of the castle upon his father’s death five years earlier. Pascal Guiscard had succumbed to fever after eating rotten fish, and following months of suffering, had died after three decades of benevolent rule over St. Rénan. He had been known for his gentle yet precise ways. It was Pascal who had discovered the hoard, and he who had chosen to share it with all.

Narcisse Guiscard shared his father’s attention to detail and possessed a forced kindness, but there were things about him that put up the hairs on Rhiana’s arms.

“Ah, the Tassot wench. Our very own rumored dragon slayer.” He spat the words through teeth clenched tighter than the fists at his hips.

She would not deny the truth. But until now, Rhiana had not known the castle was aware of her slaying activities. How could they know of this morning’s kill? Had Rudolph—?

Mayhap now she could explain the situation to Lord Guiscard, perhaps even suggest he loan her a few strong knights. If there was another dragon, as she suspected, she would require assistance. For where there were two, could there be even more?

“My lord,” she said, and bowed.

Her unbound hair spilled to the floor as she did so. The tresses were not clumped with mud, which relieved her, but certainly they were in need of a comb. The only time she was aware of her lacking femininity was in the presence of a powerful man.

The men standing around the baron, smirking and handling all manner of shiny weapon from ax to bow to leather-hilted sabre, focused their attention on the woman who so boldly approached.

Oh, but the bravado heavy in the air put her to guard. Absently, Rhiana slid her palm over her left hip. No dragon talon dagger to hand.

Guiscard glided out from his entourage and met her in the center of the keep. The clean lavender scent of his soap attacked her senses as if a fox dashing for the rabbit. Now she smelled everything, from the fennel and mint rising about her skirt hem to the barrage of musk that claimed the keep as a man’s domain. Women belonged in the kitchen and the laundry, she had heard Guiscard say before, or as ornaments decorating their man’s arm.

Curious blue eyes preened across Rhiana’s face, and then tilted a smile at her. Not a generous smile, most always devious.

“Tell me,” he said, “what it is about slaying dragons that intrigues you so? Be it the danger? The fight? The desire to touch such fierce evil?”

“Is not the desire to see my family safe enough of an attraction?”

“But you are a woman. Women do not gallivant after dragons. Why…” He glanced over his shoulder to a fellow knight and murmured, “Women are to be made sacrifices, no?”

A few snickers from the men enforced Guiscard’s cocky stance. A shrug of his broad shoulder tugged tight the gold chain across his chest and with a distracting clink.

Drawing in a breath, Rhiana grabbed back the courage and focus she had initially held. “My apologies for being so abrupt, my lord, but is it possible we may discuss the business of these dragons come to nest in the caves?”

“Dragons in our caves, my lady?”

“Three men have been devoured in five days.”

“You said dragons, as in, more than one?”

“Mayhap.” A surreptitious glance about saw many more eyes had become interested. She did wish to alarm no one, especially the women, so she lowered her voice. “Do you not wish it put to an end?”

The baron now regarded her with a lifted brow. Utter arrogance seeped from him as if the lavender scent. “And you propose to be the one to end it? My lady, I had not thought to entertain such a humorous farce this morn, but I thank you heartily for the amusement.”

He touched her chin with a finger that glittered with enough gold to serve a peasant family for an entire year, and lifted her head to look directly into her eyes. The look was familiar, and dreadsome. On occasion Guiscard caught Rhiana as she was entering Lady Anne’s room. A silent capture, which held her against the embrasure outside the solar, his blue eyes eating her apart with unspoken lust.

“You’ve been to the caves,” he said. “This morning? My men report seeing you leave just after lauds. Your return was not remarked.”

She would lie to no man, for integrity of word was important to her. “I did, my lord.”

“Such boldness to tromp about a dragon’s lair.”

“I killed one rampant this morn. But there may be another. I…sensed its presence.”

“Just so?” He spread his gaze across her face. A curious look. Fascinated or horrified? “You sensed another? Without sighting it? Sounds…magical, to me.”

“I have no magic, my lord.” She wanted to follow with, “I am not a witch,” but best to leave that word unspoken. For once heard…

“Who gave you permission to do such a thing?”

Permission? Rhiana gaped. To protect— To— Why, to see her family safe? She did not know what to say to that.

“You say there are others?”

“Mayhap,” she answered. Still at a loss—he expected her to ask before slaying a danger that threatened the very people of his village?

“So you are not sure. And yet, you boldly approach me with these ideas of another. You frighten us all, my lady.”

“I do not mean to. I only wish to protect—”

“Against imagined evils?”

“They are not imagined!”

“Did you see this other dragon?”

“N-no, but I—” Blessed be, why must the man be so difficult?

“You are not like other women.”

How many times had she heard that statement, and always as an accusation? It deserved the usual response. “I try, my lord, but sewing and cooking does little to satisfy me.”

“Ah?” He delivered a smirk over his shoulder. A few knights snickered. “Well, if it is satisfaction you desire….”

Oh, but she’d put her foot in it with that one.

“Is there a reason you had me escorted to you this day, my lord?”

“Indeed there is.” Mirth fell at Guiscard’s feet. The air of his forced humor instantly hardened. “I was boldly woken by my seneschal this morning with news of your foolhardy deed. Besides the rude awakening, I feel your cut against all in the village. How dare you take matters into your incapable hands.”

“But, my lord—”

“You are forbidden to prance about playacting at this nonsense of slaying dragons.”

“No one is playacting. You can find the carcass on the shore to the north.”

“I believe you, and I am horrified.” He said the last word with such drama, any who had not been discreetly listening now stared boldly at Rhiana. “How many others?”

“One.”

“You are sure?”

She nodded. Not sure, but willing to trust her instincts.

“I will not abide you to go near the caves. And should I hear you have gone against my wishes, I will have you chained and put in my, er—the dungeon.”

“But, my lord, the innocent people! Who will protect them?”

“That is what slayers are for.”

“A slayer?” But she was… Well, she wanted to be—no, she had slain two thus far. She was a slayer! “It will take well over a fortnight to call a proper slayer to St. Rénan. In that time half a dozen more will be plucked out from their boots. I can do this! I am—”

A woman who chases dragons.

The words caught at the back of Rhiana’s throat. Why could she not boldly declare her mien?

“And who will protect you?”

Her? Protection? The man did no more care for her welfare than he concerned himself with the crumbling infirmary that desperately needed repair.

“You, my lady, will heed my warning, and thus get yourself into the kitchen, where you can be taught proper skills such as kneading and sweeping and whatever else it is you females do. Isn’t that where your mother works?” A glance to Champrey verified. “Indeed. It is high time the woman trained her child to be the female she appears to be.”

The very nerve of him!

With nothing but snickers, male eyes bared, and weapons circling her as if a pack of hungry dogs, Rhiana thought the wiser at protest.

Nevertheless, her passions always ruled over her better sense. Girls are better than boys.

“I refuse to stand back and allow the dragons to take another life when I can stop it!”

The baron whipped a dagger glare from his arsenal. “You raise your voice to me, wench?” he hissed out of the side of his mouth.

Rhiana focused. She had become irate, her heart pounded, her shoulders tight. Lowering her head, she breathed through her nose, coming to accord with this ridiculous demand. Guiscard was a fool. Yet notions of a woman’s place were not unusual—to a man.

“It appears you have great concern for the womenfolk in your village. I can accept that.” No, she would not, but small lies were sometimes necessary. “Have you called for a slayer, then?”

Guiscard shrugged.

“You cannot dismiss the danger!”

“Champrey.”

At a nod from Champrey, three knights surrounded Rhiana, not touching, but it was evident they would wrangle her to their bidding if she spoke so much as one more word out of order.

A simple kick to their knees and a fist to a few jaws would serve her anger well.

“Now.” Guiscard sighed, and ran his fingers through his hair in an utterly vain display. “Will you be a good girl and listen to your betters?”

Betters? Rhiana required proof for that statement, but knew not to ask for such.

“Very good.” Guiscard took in the masses of hair spilling over her shoulders to her elbows.

The look made Rhiana clutch her arms across her breasts. ’Twas not a condemning look, more luxurious. Either one, it made her skin crawl.

Not sure if he considered, or if he merely played the moment out for effect, she waited nervously as the man stepped back from her and studied the floor, hands to hips. Finally he lifted his head, and again slipped close, so close Rhiana smelled his intentions, and they were not sincere. “Be you a witch?”

“N-no, my lord.”

“Come now, time to tell the truth. You’ve bewitched my wife.” He lowered his voice to a whisper, “You have bewitched me.” Spinning and stretching out his arms in declaration, he stated, “Obviously, you’ve the power to bewitch dragons to lie down before you and seek death.”

All eyes in the keep fixed to her. Chitters and smirks rose amongst the rough scent of power and dirt and rosemary-tainted curiosity.

“I have but skill and dexterity, my lord. I have been trained to know the dragon, its habits, its hunting rituals—”

“And yet you could not foresee the deaths of the three who have been taken from our bosom?” Allowing that fact to settle in, Guiscard grandly stalked the floor. “You know nothing, wench. Now, will you walk from the keep to tend the feminine skills, or must I have you arrested and thrown into the dungeon?”

“I will walk from the keep, my lord.” But she would vow fealty to no man. Especially one who risked the lives of innocents through his ignorance. “Good day to you.”

And she turned and walked away, feeling many eyes on her back, and likening it to a nest of hungry dragons. But these dragons did not kill for sustenance, no; these dragons toyed with women for their humor. They had put her in her place, upon a shelf to be regarded only when chores needed be done or fancy be met.

Not allowed to slay the dragons?

She’d see about that.

CHAPTER FOUR

What manner of soul did she possess?

That she had physical differences from others could not be dismissed. So she had red hair and freckles. Ignorance caused others to tease her. The color of one’s hair did not make them evil or unclean. There were many in the village with red hair. Of course, it was not so bold as Rhiana’s, as if sun-drenched garnets. And she could not disregard her unusual eyes. Only those who really looked at her noticed. She did not call attention to the fact one eye was gold, the other green. Lydia’s eyes were green. But when Rhiana asked, Lydia would not verify if her father’s eyes had been gold.

At the end of a stretch of houses, in the row facing the gardens, stood the chapel. Entering the always open doors, Rhiana genuflected toward the front of the church, then straightened and dipped her fingers into the fount of consecrated water. There was no permanent priest, but the one who traveled along the coast was currently in residence at the castle for a fortnight.

Tracing a cross over her forehead, she whispered a Hail Mary. Confession must be made soon; it would erase her venial sins, but not the mortal ones. So she did not sin mortally.

Or so she hoped.

Could slaying dragons be considered a mortal sin? She did not know if, by taking the life of a dragon purposefully, she robbed their souls of divine grace. God had cursed them. What grace could they have? Did they even possess a soul?

There were a few benches near the door. Most ladies brought along their own simple velvet-cushioned prie dieu to place in the nave. Rhiana liked the open space. No clutter, no sign of the riches upon which the village thrived. Just simple peace.

Striding to the front of the small church, she knelt upon the stone floor and pressed her hands together.

A wooden cross hung over the altar, supported by ropes on either arm of the cross. Carved from limewood and not oiled, the wood bore a few holes from burrowing insects, but that only gave it more charm, Rhiana mused. It was far from the grandiose cross embellished with rubies and gold that she had seen in the castle chapel. She did not care to worship a gaudy master.

Lord Guiscard’s penchant for finery oftentimes made her wonder if Lady Anne were not just another bauble in his collection. For truly, it was as if he had plucked her out from a treasure box. With no family to name, and no origins to claim, the woman had arrived in St. Rénan three years earlier, already wed to the baron. (Yet, for all purposes, she had claimed the grasshopper as her family sigil.) Barely seventeen at the time, Anne had spoken little, yet her round dark eyes had seen all.

She had reached out to Rhiana one eve during a hoard-raid fête, drawing her close into a hug.

“So pretty,” Anne had said of Rhiana’s hair. “Like fire. I like fire.”

That was all Rhiana had needed to hear to comply should Anne ever request her presence.

Though she was hardly an orphan, Rhiana felt an affinity to Anne. They were two alike, in a manner she could not quite decide. While Anne’s mind was not always her own, and she often flighted from reality, Rhiana could sense the young woman’s distinct need for belonging. To understand.

For Rhiana longed to understand.

“What am I?” she whispered now to the cross. “Why do I…?”

Not burn.

The preternatural trait must always be hidden from others. Rhiana would not speak of it, except to Paul, and only then when they were assured no others were close to hear.

Upon her sixteenth birthday Rhiana had forced herself to visit the Nose. The old woman had earned her name because she was always nosing about, had her nose into everything, and knew more than most even knew about themselves. The Nose moved in the shadows, held stealth in her breast, and yet, was no more threatening than the elder widow she was. She was not a witch, though mayhap a sage of sorts. Empyromancy is what she practiced, reading the future in the flames of a hearth fire or the wild ravages of a bonfire. The Nose lived at the south edge of the village, apart from all the rest, not caring to participate in the hoard-raid festivities, but quietly accepting her portion of the yearly stipend and pocketing it in the rags she chose to wear. Her participation in St. Rénan’s way of life was the fertilizer she created to cover the castle gardens that produced some stunningly large vegetables and abundant medicinal herbs.

After staring at Rhiana from across a table covered in moth-eaten cor-du-roi, squinting and sniffing as if determining her species, the Nose shot upright and declared her not a witch, but something so much more. Pressing a palm before Rhiana’s face, her withered fingers had moved like spider limbs testing the air, and then retracted as if stung by a bee in her web. With a shrill cry, she’d hastened Rhiana from her home and admonished her never to return.

Not a witch.

Something so much more?

But what then?

Touching the moist line of the cross she had traced onto her forehead, Rhiana now mused that it matched the kill spot on a dragon’s skull. Put there to remind the beast of what it could never have—divine grace.

Legend told of fireless dragons that long ago roamed the earth. Then the dark angels fell. And the dragons, enticed by the wicked creatures that had defied their God, had mated with them. In punishment, He had reached down from the heavens and touched the dragons’ foreheads. Their first offspring had been born breathing fire, a gift from the angels of hell—Lucifer’s breath—and an inverted cross upon its brow, the kill spot, a punishment from heaven.

Had she been put into this world specifically to slay dragons? It felt right. When she stood before a fiery beast and defied it with her crossbow and sheer mettle Rhiana felt in her element.

Why Guiscard insisted she not continue, she could only guess was because she was female. Surely, if a male dragon slayer offered to defeat the nest of beasts, the baron would agree to the offer?

“Would he?”

She’d not gotten that feeling from him. For some reason, Rhiana sensed Lord Guiscard would do nothing to stop the imminent threat to St. Rénan. And that feeling unsettled her.

Shuffling to sit on her haunches and spreading her legs out before her, Rhiana rested her elbows on her knees. Hardly a ladylike position, especially with the gown rucked to her calves, but she was alone.

There was some part of Narcisse Guiscard that Rhiana understood on a deep inner level. Gentle and patient, he cared for Lady Anne like no other. That he had even accepted a woman not always of her mind into his life spoke untold compassion.

And yet, each time Lord Guiscard looked at Rhiana she felt his desire crawl across her flesh as if a seeking insect. A duplicitous man. And while that very look was exactly the kind of regard Rhiana craved, she would not answer its plea.

“Never,” she whispered. Not from a married man. Not from any of the knights in the village who had pledged to Guiscard. They were all so brutish. The sort of man Rhiana desired must understand a woman, above and beyond her eccentricities. He must not be a brute. Yet, he must practice chivalry. An equal? It was too much to hope for.

Bowing her head she summarized a silent prayer. Thanks be for her strength and skills. Please to keep her family safe and all others in the village she loved and cared for. Paul and Odette. Her mother. Rudolph. Anne. Yes, even Guiscard, for he did love Anne.

And send understanding. Knowledge. Or mayhap, merely acceptance for the unknown.

Crossing herself from forehead to stomach and shoulder to shoulder, Rhiana then stood and glanced out the narrow stained-glass window to her left. The village actually echoed with voices. A good thing to hear after days of silent terror.

On the other hand, if the villagers became complacent only ill could come of their fall from vigilance.

Sweeping up her skirts, Rhiana strode toward the back of the chapel, but noted a glint of steel lying on the floor below the final bench. A leather-sheathed broadsword. The hilt was wrapped in scuffed black leather. Must belong to one of Guiscard’s knights, ever hopeful for a skirmish.

Rhiana drew it halfway from the sheath. The blade held more than a few dings and scuffs. A well-used weapon. Hmm, then it could not belong to any in the garrison. There had been a time when the garrison fought to protect the city from marauders and sea pirates. But the port had closed decades ago, and now the city rarely saw travelers of any sort.

Though it did not bear his mark on the pommel, Paul would know to whom this sword belonged. A small flared rooster crest be his mark, taken from his great-grandfather’s coat of arms. ’Twas Paul Tassot’s proof mark, a sign the armor he’d made had been tested by arrows and was impenetrable at a distance of twenty paces.

Sword in hand, Rhiana set out for the armory. The noon sky brightened her mood. A flash of brilliant white glanced off the bronze roof topping the bath house. Not a single cloud this day. The only thing that could make the day better would be a bit of rain to drench the crops on the south side of the curtain walls.

“I’ve killed it!”

That declaration sounded too ominous to be a good thing. Rhiana dashed for the bailey where a small crowd had gathered. They surrounded something that moved and struggled about on the dirt courtyard. Was it a fallen horse? She could but see a flailing dark limb.

“Stomp its head!”

“Have you another arrow?” someone cried. “Get me a dagger!”

Rhiana pushed between two teenage boys and spied what had caused the commotion. A shout burst from her mouth before she could even summon sense. “Back! All of you! What have you…”

Plunging to her knees, she splayed out her palms before the struggling beast. Gawky and thin, it resembled a gargoyle nesting the castle tower come to life. It had taken an arrow in the pellicle fabric of one of its supple black wings.

“Rhiana?” Paul’s voice, as he pushed through the crowd. “What is it? Oh…”

“It is a newling,” Rhiana said to all, hoping an explanation would cool their lust for its life. “A baby dragon.” The crowd gasped in utter horror. “It will harm no one. Why, it is no larger than a dog. Who shot it?”

Protests against self-protection and thinking it was a big bird shuffled out in nervous mutters.

“It is a dragon!” Christophe de Ver snapped. He’d sought to join the garrison, but his awful eyesight kept him from earning his spurs, and resulted in more than a few tumbles and visits to Odette for stitching. “You killed one this very morn, my lady. Why are you so keen to keep this one alive?”

So word of her kill this morning had already breached the masses? Couldn’t have been Guiscard’s doing.

“It is but a babe,” she said. “Can you not see it is helpless? Was it you who shot it?”

Christophe nodded proudly. Rhiana must, for once, be thankful that the man’s myopia had altered his aim.

The newling mewled. It struggled to sit its hind legs. Its wounded wing shivered and stretched. It was completely black, the scales shimmery, yet supple. Easily pierced with an arrow.

“Bring it to the armory,” she heard Paul say. “We mustn’t keep it overlong.”

“We must kill it!”

“No!” Rhiana stood and bent over the newling. “We will remove the arrow and tend its wound. Then we must release it, or its mother will come looking for it.”

“Its mother?” Someone spat. “There are more dragons?”

“She will come anon!”

“And whose fault is that?” She could not argue with the idiocy of these people. And their cruelty. To bring down one so small? “Paul, can you lift it?”

Her stepfather knelt before the newling, and sweeping his arms around the thing, managed to cradle it into his embrace. Vision blocked by the spread of a good wing, Paul hoofed it quickly to his shop. Mewls scratched the sky, and the circle of villagers followed their steps to the armory. Rhiana closed the door on the curious faces and followed Paul into the warmth of the shop.