Lyn Stone - The Quest

“But, sir, you cannot mean to deceive your family into thinking I am your bastard,” Ev argued.

“Of course not. Never think I would ask you to deny your legitimacy, Ev, or the good man who sired you. But I mean to adopt you here and now if you do not object to it. While you can never be heir to my title, you will inherit a portion of my personal wealth. You deserve that for all you have done for me.”

“Then I thank you, sir. Though you are too generous.”

Henri sucked in a pained breath. “I fear you were right on one issue, Ev. A rest might be in order.” He grasped his side and felt the sticky wetness warm his palm. After days of this, he must be nearly bled out.

He gave what he felt could be his final order. “Go and find that village and fetch a cart for us, Ev. I will wait for you here.”

Then Henri lay down on his good side and watched Everand’s short legs pumping nearly knee to chest as he raced up the coast to seek help. When the lad became a speck in the distance, Henri muttered a brief prayer, closed his eyes and welcomed sleep. For however long it lasted.

“Begone from here and leave me be!” Intrigued as Iana was by the young fellow who had constantly bedeviled her for the past half hour, she was not inclined to hie herself off with him on some wild errand of mercy. She had been busy all day in preparation for leaving Whitethistle. There simply was no time for this.

She shifted the sling bearing the sleeping child to a less awkward position on her back, lowered the bucket into the well and waited for it to fill. If she washed their clothing now, it would dry before nightfall. They could leave the village before sunrise.

Pity for the young lad’s plight prompted her to speak as she began tugging on the well rope to draw up the wash water. “I have heard there is a healer a league or so north of here. Get her to go with you.”

“You must come,” he insisted, impatiently shifting from one foot to the other. “Thus far you are the only person I have found who understands a word I say. Does your husband speak my language, too? I will explain our plight to him so he will let you come. He would be glad of the reward we offer, would he not?”

“I have no husband,” she replied. “Nor do I have time to waste upon some wounded vagabond. Now, off with you.” She picked up the bucket and turned to go.

“We are not mere wanderers, I swear. Sir Henri will die if I do not bring him help. Please!”

None in this godforsaken place spoke any French at all, that much was true, Iana granted. Even should this lad make himself understood, no one hereabout would trust him. Earnest as he seemed, what woman in her right mind would go blithely off down a deserted beach with him when he might have older friends waiting to ravish her or worse?

Yet she could see for herself that the boy was no beggar, nor did he look to be an outlaw seeking sport. His clothing, wrinkled and ruined as it was, possessed a richness foreign to these cottagers. His speech indicated a worthy education and his manner indicated gentility. She did not truly doubt he was what he declared, some knight’s squire.

Iana set down the bucket again and faced him, hands on her hips. It troubled her to think she could save someone with a few moments of her time and a handful of herbs, when he might otherwise die. “How far away did you leave this fine master of yours?”

“Only a short distance,” he assured her. He lied. She could see it in his eyes and rebuked him with her expression. “Very well, then,” he amended, shamefaced, “I admit it is a good two hours’ walk.”

“Two hours?” Iana threw up her hand and rolled her eyes. “Why me? Why would you think I know aught of healing?”

He perched his hands on his skinny hips and struck a superior stance. “Most ladies are taught such, are they not? How else would they care for the people in their charge? Please, lady. I would not ask, but he is sorely injured and needs to be stitched. I will pay you well.”

She eyed him shrewdly. “You call me lady. If you believe me that, why would you think I need your coin?”

The sandy-haired youth drew up to his full yet meager height and looked her up and down, judging. “Your demeanor and your speech betray your birth, even though you dress little better than a peasant,” he observed.

He glanced around at the nearby cottages of daub and wattle. “And you live here. I would venture you have fallen upon hard times. Through no fault of your own, I am certain,” he quickly added.

His last words disclosed his doubt of that, and he avoided looking at or mentioning the sleeping child. She had told him she had no husband. He probably thought she had disgraced herself with some man, and been cast out of her family for it. Not far off the mark concerning her station and her exile, she admitted, though he had the cause wrong.

“Sir Henri and I reward good deeds, I assure you,” he said.

With a few coins of her own, she could more easily quit this cursed village where Newell had left her to stew in her rebellion. For days now, she had been thinking that anywhere short of hell would be preferable to Whitethistle. Though she had nowhere to go and no way to get there, she had been about to attempt it in her desperation.

She knew if she did not, she must give up wee Tam. Newell would never allow her to keep the bairn once he found out about her, and none of the villagers would take the poor babe. Surely God had sent this young man to provide the ready means for her escape.

“How much will you give me?” she asked, trying not to sound too eager.

The boy withdrew a finely worked silver chain from inside his salt-crusted doublet for her to inspect. “This,” he offered regretfully. “It was to finance our journey east, but I suppose it will do us no good if Sir Henri dies from his hurt. Tend him and you may have it.”

Her eyes grew wide at the richness he held. She could separate those links and easily support herself and Tam for months to come. As quickly as that, she decided. “We must return to my cottage first and gather my things. His wound is a cut, you say?”

Relief flooded the boy’s eyes. “More like a gouge. Not terribly deep, so he tells me. We bound it up, but it has kept bleeding off and on for nigh a week now. Loss of blood and fever have weakened him, but it has no stink of decay.” He winced. “Yet.”

Iana nodded and led the way to her cottage. As luck would have it, none of the villagers were about. The men were busy fishing and the women preparing meals this time of day. Even the young ones had their chores. So much the better if no one noticed her leave with this young stranger.

It would take no time at all to collect her sewing implements and the few things she could not leave behind. Tam wakened as they entered, so Iana removed her from the sling and fed her the last of the bread and milk. She then set the child upon a small earthern pot. The lad made a hasty exit and waited outside.

“There, sweeting,” she crooned. “There’s my good Thomasina! Ah, you’re a braw lass, are you not?” Iana took a few moments to clean the child all over with a cloth and the water she had just drawn, and dress her in a fresh linen gown.

The large brown eyes regarded her with such trust Iana felt tears form. She brushed her palm over Tam’s dark, wispy curls. “No one will part us if I have aught to say to it,” she assured her. “You have lost too much this past month, as have I. Now, here we go, love,” Iana said as she set the pitifully thin foundling within the sling she had fashioned and wrestled it around to hang against her back. The burden had become a true comfort to Iana this past fortnight, a bit of warmth in her cold isolation.

The mother had died from a coughing sickness, pleading with her last breath that Iana take the child and help her survive. Little Tam had been near death herself, though from starvation rather than the illness that felled her mother.