Elizabeth Chadwick - The Wild Hunt

He gave a resigned shrug. 'At least I am testing your abilities to the full .' He managed a weak grin as she soaked a linen pad in a strong-smelling liquid decocted from pine needles.

'Just pray that they do not fail. It's a nasty wound. What happened?'

Guyon almost hit the rafters as she pressed the pad to his arm and began to clean away the dirt slashed into the wound by the boar's tush.

Alicia walked into the room to hear her daughter breathlessly apologising, a quiver in her voice.

'Get on with it!' Guyon gasped through clenched teeth. 'If you stop every time I flinch, we'll be here all day, and that really will set the fat into the fire!'

Judith bit her lip. Alicia looked down at the raw, still seeping wound. 'You will need the mouldy bread,' she said neutrally.

'I have it, mama.'

Alicia eyed Guyon thoughtfully. 'I have just heard from one of the beaters. He says the boar spear snapped and that you were lucky to escape with your life, let alone a few small scratches.'

'This is more than a small scratch, Mama!'

Judith protested, staring round.

'I can see that. I am only repeating what the beater said, and he had it from your uncle's squire.'

'They were both right,' said Guyon.

The women stared at him. After her first startled declaration, Judith's wits quickened. Plainly Guyon was not disclaiming this tear as a mere scratch just to be manly. He wanted the wound kept a secret, or at least reduced to nothing.

'Boar spears do not just snap,' she said. 'My father was always very strict about the state of the hunting equipment, particularly when it came to boar. He had the spears checked regularly.'

'By your senior huntsman?'

Alicia reached for a roll of bandage while Judith threaded a needle. 'Maurice never made any complaints against Rannulf's efficiency,' she said carefully. 'I cannot say that I know him well myself.

He came to us from Belleme on Robert's recommendation.'

'Would he be willing to commit murder for the right amount of silver?'

'Truly I do not know, my lord. Anything is possible if my brother-in-law has his hand in the pie.'

'Has someone then offered Rannulf silver to give you a weakened spear?' Judith asked to the point.

'Probably. De Lacey was talking to him most earnestly in the hall last night and he's not the kind to mingle with servants unless it be for a specific purpose. I will know more when I have had an opportunity to question Rannulf and ... ouch!'

'Hold still , my lord, and it will not hurt as much.'

'I think you are enjoying this,' he grumbled.

Judith wrinkled her nose at him. 'Tush, my lord.

So much complaint for such a "little scratch".'

'Insolent wench,' he growled, eyes laughing.

Baffled, Alicia watched the two of them as she prepared the poultice of mouldy bread. Here was no frightened child flickering nervous glances at the world through a haze of tears and, despite Guyon's obvious pain and preoccupation, he was handling Judith with the ease of a man accustomed to women, not one who would deflower her savagely in a fit of unbridled lust.

Guyon clenched his teeth and endured in stoical silence until Judith and Alicia had finished with him. Judith wiped her hands and brought him a cup. He sniffed the contents suspiciously.

'Valerian, yarrow and poppy in wine,' she told him. Guyon tasted, grimaced, put down the cup and began to ease his sleeve over the bandage.

'It will relieve the pain.'

'And dull my wits,' he retorted.

Judith sighed and went to find him a fresh pair of chausses and some salve for his grazed cheek and thigh.

'It seems that I have misjudged you,' Alicia said to him softly.

Guyon finished arranging his sleeve. 'I hope I have enough common sense to realise that rape is not the best way to begin a marriage. I haven't touched her and I won't until she's ready ...' He stopped and looked round as his father swept aside the curtain and strode into the room.

'Your huntsman's bolted,' he announced starkly.

'Snatched de Lacey's courser from a groom and was out over the drawbridge before anyone could stop him.'

Guyon's eyes darkened. 'God's teeth!'

'That is not the worst of it. De Lacey's gone after him and with every right to kill . Pembroke's with him and de Serigny. Chester's taken de Bec and some of the garrison and ridden after them.'

Guyon swore again and reached for his swordbelt.

'I'll meet you in the bailey,' Miles said.

Guyon struggled to tighten the belt with his injured left arm. Judith hastened to help him.

'Have a care, my lord,' she said anxiously. 'I fear that Rannulf may not be the only quarry.'

He looked down at her upturned face and with a humourless smile, tugged her braid. 'Forewarned is forearmed, so they say,' he replied. 'I promise you I'll do my best to stay alive.'

Riding hard they caught up with de Bec and Chester a little beyond the village and de Lacey upon the track that led eventually across the border into Wales.

'I thought I had him!' de Lacey growled, 'but the bastard's doubled back on me. Bones of Christ, when I catch him I'll string him up by the ball s. Do you know how much that stall ion is worth?'

'Nevertheless, I will have him alive,' Guyon said curtly.

'God knows why,' Arnulf de Montgomery snorted. 'First that "weak spear" and now Walter's best courser. The man's guilty, no doubt about it.'

'Yes,' Guyon said, 'and I want to talk to him about why.'

Pembroke flushed. Ralph de Serigny looked puzzled. De Lacey drew his sword and turned his horse, momentarily blocking the road.

Guyon and his father exchanged glances. Without a word Miles dismounted and disappeared into the woods bordering the road.

He had spent his boyhood among the Welsh hill s and, saving the supernatural, could track anything that trod the earth, including a rat that smelled so bad the stench of it was all pervading.

'Put up your sword,' Guyon said to de Lacey, 'Rannulf will meet his end in justice, not hot blood, when the time comes.'

De Lacey returned his stare for a long moment before breaking the contact. The sword flashed again as he shrugged and began sheathing it.

'This is justice,' he said.

Unease prickled down Guyon's spine. He began reining the chestnut about. Simultaneously there was a warning shout and the whirr of an arrow's flight. He flung himself flat on the courser's neck and the arrow sang over his spine and lodged in a beech sapling on the other side of the road.

De Lacey drew his sword again and spurred his stall ion into the forest. De Bec bellowed and kicked the dun after him while Hugh of Chester rammed his own mount into Montgomery's horse, preventing him from pursuit. Among the trees, someone screamed. Guyon hauled on his rein and urged the chestnut in pursuit of de Lacey and de Bec.

He was too late. The huntsman Rannulf sprawled in sightless regard of the bare winter branches. Walter de Lacey, his tunic splashed with blood, stood over him, his eyes blazing and his whole body trembling with the aftermath of violently expended effort and continuing rage.

Miles was leaning against a tree, face screwed up with pain and arms clutching his torso.

Ignoring his injured arm, Guyon flung himself down from the courser and hastened to him.

'I'm all right,' Miles said huskily. 'Just winded. I'm not as fast as I was ... more's the pity.' He flashed a dark look at de Lacey and pushed himself upright.

Guyon glanced him over and, reassured, swung to the other man. 'I said I wanted him alive!' he snapped.

De Lacey bared his teeth. 'Should I have let him knife your father and escape?'

'If you were close enough to kill him, you were close enough to stop him by other means, but then dead men don't talk, do they?'

De Lacey's sword twitched level and the red edge glinted at Guyon, who reached to draw from his own scabbard. Hugh of Chester, moving swiftly for a man so bulky, placed himself between the men, his back to Guyon, his formidable blue glare for de Lacey. 'My lord, you forget yourself,' he said coldly.