Колин Глисон - Sanctuary of Roses

The wrist manacles kept his wife tight to the wall, and the flames licked only inches away. Gavin, his face so tight to his skull that he could barely form words with his mouth, gasped, “Madelyne, hold tight! Do not move!”

With every last bit of strength, channeling every iota of the desperation and fear he’d harbored, he seized his weapon with two powerful hands and brought it down onto the chains.

One of them snapped loose, and Madelyne sagged from the wall, toward, him, hanging only by her arm. He wrapped an arm around her waist, coughing into her hair, then released her to slam the sword down a second time. The stones held the chains more firmly, and this side did not release. The smoke clogged his nose and stung his eyes, and the warmth the flames made sent waves of sweat rolling down his back, dampening his hands.

“Dear God, help me!” he cried, and slammed the sword down again.

The reverberation sang through his arms, into his shoulders, and down his spine as the blade pulled the chain from the stone and crashed into the floor.

Madelyne fell into his arms, and Gavin swooped her up over his shoulder and turned to dash from the room. The flames had built higher, cutting a swath betwixt them and the stairs. By the speed of the fire, he realized his entire altercation with Fantin had been mere breaths of time rather than the long minutes it had seemed.

With a cry, one of battle and victory, Gavin tore toward the flames, dashing through them, feeling their heat sear them as he leapt through and stumbled to the stairs on the other side.

Jube stood there, waiting, and grabbed Madelyne from his master. They pounded up the stairs and collapsed on the floor in the great hall.

Gathering Madelyne into his arms, Gavin inserted himself betwixt her and Jube and pulled her to his chest. Kissing her head, her face, her mouth, he found himself murmuring wild things that made no sense…and at last had to pull himself away to look at her.

“Madelyne… ” was all he could say before crushing her into his arms, folding her tightly to his chest. He shook, knowing how close he’d come to losing her…over and over again. “God, Madelyne, I love you. I died a decade of deaths when I learned that Fantin had taken you. I begged the king to release me, and he did, but—”

“It was Fantin,” she told him, smothered against his chest, coughing softly. “Tricky heard him say it, and Clem too…he fixed the necklet for the queen, with the help of Rohan…the king will not say another word on it, I trow.” She kissed him at the vee opening of his tunic, her lips warm on his skin at the indentation at the base of his throat.

“I hope you are right in that,” he told her. “But I cannot help but agree—now that Fantin is gone, Henry will be much relieved.”

“Gavin.” Madelyne clutched at his arm, pulling away to look up at him, her sunken gray eyes like large moons. “I cannot believe this…but I have just learned that my father is not Fantin. ’Tis the markings on my wrist—Seton has them too, as his mother, and her father… I am the daughter of Seton de Masin, not Fantin de Belgrume!”

A rush of happiness and relief—for Madelyne, not for himself—flooded Gavin. “Did I not tell you that there was no madness in your blood? Only the blood of a brave and intelligent man, my love. We have much to thank him for.” He glanced at Seton, who, though slumped against the wall, appeared to be unharmed.

“He’ll be overjoyed to know that my mother is not dead.”

“Your mother?” Gavin stopped, staring down at her. “Your mother lives?” He saw the stricken look in her eyes, and knew that she’d forgotten the lie.

“Nay, she is not dead. I could not let the truth come out, Gavin…you understand why. But—oh, I’ve spoken treason to the king.” Fear leapt into her eyes and she clutched at his arms.

“The king will not harm you for protecting her as you did. And if he should try, I do believe Eleanor would stay his hand.” He kissed her on the cheek, amazed at the strength his little nun had shown over the last month of trial. “There is the matter of the land of Tricourten and whether you shall remain its lady…but I’ve wealth enough that should the king decide that you will not inherit, ’twill be no hardship.”

“Aye, Gavin, and truth to tell, I should not care if I ever were to set foot upon the lands of Tricourten again.”

“You will not, if you do not wish, my love. But I should not disavow the rents here, should the king allow us to keep the lands. I shall speak with him on it, my lady. My love.”

Content with his response, Madelyne glanced over his shoulder and what she saw made her smile. “You may beg my forgiveness now, my lord,” she said, nodding in that direction.

Gavin followed her gaze, twisting to look behind him, and saw Tricky and Clem entwined in a passionate embrace. He returned to his own love and gave her a rueful smile. “I beg your forgiveness, my lady…for doubting the prediction of your maid—it appears that she will have her way and her man.”

He looked at her closely and saw, again, the bruises on her face and the streaks of blood dried on her cheek, and realized what she must have experienced at the hands of the madman. The pace of his heart picked up speed, and a shudder rushed through him. “Madelyne, my love… can you forgive me for letting this happen?”

She tilted her head back to look up at him. “Gavin, love, please do not speak of apologies to me any longer. You have a penchant for speaking them much too oft! Save them for when you neglect the anniversary of our wedding or forget to bring me a new herbal plant when you travel to London…But for now, just kiss me.”

A lone knight approached the ivy-covered walls of Lock Rose Abbey.

Dismounting from his horse, he raised a mailed fist to pull on the bell rope, remembering the day over a decade before when he’d done the same. The low, rolling sound of the tolling bell rumbled through the abbey, reverberating through the silent forest.

Moments later, the robed figure of an old woman, stooped and slow, approached the gate. “Yes?”

“I bring word to Anne de Belgrume that her husband is dead.”

There was a pause, then the gate swung open silently, belying its age and the rust-colored bars. “You may wait here.”

He took a seat on the bench in the center of a rose garden, after tying his mount to an oak tree.

When Anne de Belgrume stepped into his line of vision moments later, his heart stopped. She was as beautiful as he remembered—moreso, for the years had been gentle with her. He still could not believe that she was alive…having heard the story of her death when Madelyne went to court.

“Anne.” He rose and reached his hands out toward her.

“Seton?” Gladness overwhelmed her voice and she rushed toward him.

Nothing had ever felt so good as when he folded her into his arms, heedless of the chain mail that that pressed into her. “Anne…oh, my beautiful one…I did not know if I’d ever hold you thus again.”

She pulled back to look up at him. “Is Fantin truly dead? Am I free?”

He nodded. “Aye, struck down by the husband of your daughter. Our daughter.” He looked closely at her. “You did not tell her.”

“Nay. I did not wish to burden her with that knowledge. Mayhap ’twas wrong, but I believed if Fantin should have learned it, he would have killed her. At the least, if he believed she was his daughter, he wouldn’t harm her.” She reached to touch his face, and the warmth of her hand stopped his heart.

“Aye. Our child…wed with a good man, safe now from your husband…and you are set free from this…sanctuary…should you wish to leave.” His words were a question that he’d waited a lifetime to have answered.