Deborah MacGillivray - One Snowy Knight (Dragons of Challon, Book 3)

Scotland, December 1296

Searing agony ripped through his back. The muscles of his right side screamed a plaint, warning he erred in pushing too far this day. Despite the spreading numbness, which always followed the intense burning, Noel de Servian struggled to stay upright in the saddle. The icy winds cut like daggers against his stiff back, and with each ragged breath the pain increased tenfold.

At this late juncture, he realized he should have stayed in Berwick until spring as King Edward had suggested. Even more to the point, mayhap he should not have rashly ridden on ahead of his small party. His edginess had pressed him to dismiss customary safety measures and recklessly spur Brishen to the forefront, hoping to scout out the way to the passes. Pulling off his helm, he looked about him and frowned. His troops were nowhere in sight. Clearly, he had ridden on too far ahead. Noel exhaled his frustration. Wagons traveled so slowly. He chafed, impatient to reach Craigendan Keep. His new home. He would finally, for the first time in his adult life, have a home to call his own.

Despite the snow swirling about him so thickly he could barely see to the end of his horses nose, or that fiery pain racked his poor muscles, the thought brought a smile to his lips. Though one of Edwards most trusted knights, Noels reward had been long in coming. Too many battles. So much sacrifice. And it had nearly cost his life.

His mind cast back over a score year ago to when he had been a squire to the mighty King Edward, training alongside Julian Challon and Damian St. Giles. They had been proud to serve one of the most powerful monarchs England had ever seen. So naive they, little did any of them envision the horrors that lay ahead in their young lives, how bloody long the road to peace would be, the goal forevermore out of reach. His green mind had not counted on the brutal ugliness of warfare, not counted upon Edwards unquenchable thirst to be the king of the whole of Britain and beyond.

I had not counted on being unable to find the bloody passes to Glen Shane, he groused to his steed, Brishen, as he reined him to a halt. Reaching under his mantle, he withdrew the crude map from an oilskin pouch at his waist and studied it once more. Blinking against the falling snow, he tried to shield the parchment with his heavy woolen cape to prevent the big flakes from hitting it and smearing the ink. The passes should be here. We are close. We damn well have to be.

The horse gave him a tired nicker and shook his head up and down, the fittings of the bridle jingling like faery bells in the stillness; then he looked straight ahead as if saying, right there, fool. Noel wiped the snow from his eyes, squinting to see through the blinding storm. Was the gap in the hills really there and he simply lacked the wherewithal to spot the opening in this impenetrable whiteness?

Placing his hand behind him on the high cantle of the saddle, he turned to check his bearings. A spasm, white-hot, racked his muscles, nearly causing him to pass into blackness. The throbbing was that bad. That dangerous. He could not lose his awakening thoughts in this storm, or it might cost his life. After all these years of service to the English king, he had finally been granted the title of baron and the smallholding in this rugged Northland.

It would be sad, indeed, if I died out here in this blizzard, never to lay eyes upon the fief that is finally mine. Noel chuckled at the irony, but then flinched, as even that caused his back to ache more.

Just four months past, Edward had convened Parliament in Berwick, a city once called the pearl of Scotland. Of course, that had been before Edwards troops had invested the town in a three-day sack. The horrendous aftermath saw Noel waking in the deep of night, covered with sweat and unable to shake the ugly nightmares that plagued him. A foul miasma of half-rotted corpses still polluted the air come August when Edward Plantagenet had humbled all of Scottish nobility, forcing them to kneel to himnot as overlord of Scotland, but as their new ruler. After the rout of the Scottish army in April at the Battle of Dunbar, Edward had leisurely circled most of the conquered country. With an eye to seeing their defiant spirit crushed, the king demonstrated with redoubtable power, his wealth, his might, hoping to impress upon the Scots that he now held the country in his fist.

I have doubts on that, Brishen. I see these Scotsmen watching Edward when the king is unawares. A steeled obduracy bespeaks these Highlanders are not cowered by the English, but merely bide their time. Already small pockets of resistance are causing mischief. Soon, someonelike young Andrew de Moraywill light the fires of rebellion, and the coming storm will roll across these untamed lands. There will be no stopping it, I fear.

Brishens head bobbed up and down again, as if agreeing with the validity of his masters words. Noel gave a soft chuckle at the animals behavior. Sometimes his horse was too bloody intelligent.

Why I am eager to take control of the fief Edward conferred upon me, horse. I want everything settled before the impending madness erupts.

Slowing the transfer of the fief, in April he had taken a sword to his back in fierce single combat with the Baron Craigendan. The wound proved slow to heal. Oh, the muscles and flesh had mended. Vexing, the wound site remained tender, sore. The fever he battled after being injured had sapped his strength; he struggled still to regain it. Ten years ago he would have healed much faster.

He sighed. Ten years ago I was a young man. This day I feel old, seven and thirty years very old, so tired it hurts to breathe. With an exhausted resolve, Noel nudged Brishen forward with his knees. You are so bloody smart, horse, mayhap you can find the proper path into Glen Shane. The damn passes have to be near.

A strange racket arose, spooking the charger, causing him to bounce on his hooves and rear slightly. Ravens. Thousands and thousands of screeching ravens, their racket deafening. His horse had been through more battles than Noel cared to count, yet now stood trembling and refused to move any farther. The cacophony increased, as if a huge murder of ravens was taking flight. So peculiar, he had seen flocks of birds do this in autumn, but never in a snowstorm such as this. As the mounts fear increased, he began to back up. Noel tried to restrain the horse, but its alarm waxed out of control. The black mouth of hell opened before them. The birds came straight at them, pushing Brishen to rear high.

Merde! Noels back slammed hard against the high cantle of his saddle, the helm falling from his grip. Agonizing pain lanced through his whole body, so intense he barely maintained his seat. Numbness possessed his right hand. He could not even flex his fingers. His left hand grasped the squared pommel and held on, all he could manage. The damn horse spun on his heels and fled, not responding to Noels knee commands, the reins flapping uselessly just out of his reach.

Noel gritted his teeth. Tears poured down his face and mixed with the melting snowflakes until he was not sure how long the animal ran. And ran. There was no stopping him. Fighting waves of blackness that threatened to pull him into passing out, Noel lost all sense of direction as the horse galloped heedlessly along a narrow, steepening path, carrying him farther and farther away from the passes of Glen Shane and the shelter he hoped to seek with Julian Challon at his new fortress of Glenrogha. With the snow heavy, limbs of the pine trees bowed low, forcing him to dodge them. His mantle flapped each time he brushed one. The snow covered his surcoat and leathern hose and fell inside the edge of his cross-laced boots, the icy moisture leaching away his body heat. And still the crazed animal ran.