Medieval 01 - Untamed

my squire. Not yours. Not even the master of the hounds. What is done today will go no further than us.”
    â€œYou don’t really believe—”
    â€œI am a tactician, Simon. Treachery from within is the best way to take a keep. If I know it, surely the Scots Hammer does.”
    Simon looked into his brother’s eyes and felt a chill of foreboding.
    God help the maid if she is with Duncan when Dominic finds her , Simon thought uneasily.
    God help us all .
    A few minutes later Dominic strode out of the keep wearing chausses and hauberk, helm and sword. In one mailed fist was a crossbow. In the other was the nightshirt Meg had worn and then cast aside in her haste to leave.
    The hounds danced and whined their impatience to be off the leash. Long-legged, lean-bodied, narrow-tongued, moving like fanged ghosts, the dogs seethed with eagerness as they waited to be given the scent they would course that day.
    Dominic’s squire held Crusader’s bridle, quieting the restive stallion. Simon waited nearby, mounted on his own charger. If he had been in any doubt as to his brother’s lethal temper, it vanished when Dominic literally leaped into the saddle, scorning the stirrup. The maneuver was one every well-trained knight could manage in full battle gear, but few did so when a squire stood nearby ready to give a hand up.
    The dark stallion half reared, ears flat to his skull as he caught his rider’s mood. Dominic rode thecharger effortlessly, seeming not to notice the stallion’s fiery temperament.
    â€œHarry is at the gatehouse,” Simon said.
    Dominic nodded curtly and set off for the gatehouse across the bailey. The huge, muscular stallion crabbed sideways, snorting and prancing, caught between the vise of Dominic’s mood and the iron bit restraining him. Huge hooves beat out a rhythm of throttled urgency as the chargers minced across the bailey’s cobblestones.
    Harry was waiting in front of the gatehouse. He touched his forehead and waited.
    â€œWhen did you last see your lady?” Dominic asked bluntly.
    â€œBefore the sun broke over Blackthorne Crag.”
    â€œDid she speak to you?”
    â€œAye. She seemed to be heading for her herb gardens.”
    â€œ Seemed? ” Dominic asked sharply.
    â€œAye. But when the path split, she took the right-hand fork.”
    â€œThe gardens are to the left,” Simon said in a low voice.
    Dominic grunted. “Why did you think she was going to her herb gardens?”
    Harry looked uncomfortable.
    â€œSpeak to your lord,” Simon said curtly. “Your lady might be in danger.”
    â€œMeg—Lady Margaret—often goes to her gardens when she is troubled.”
    The look Dominic gave the gatekeeper wasn’t likely to make the man feel any more at ease.
    â€œTroubled?” Dominic asked smoothly. “How so?”
    Harry looked even more uncomfortable. Before he could choose words to speak, an old woman walked out of the gatehouse. In the late morning sunlight her hair was so white it was nearly transparent.
    Dominic turned to Gwyn. For the first time he noticed that the woman’s eyes, though faded by age, were of the same pure, spring green as Meg’s.
    â€œJohn,” Gwyn said without preamble, “had a heavy hand when he was in his cups. Meg learned to stay out of his way.”
    â€œFrom the filthy state of the keep,” Dominic said, “I would hazard that he was in his cups much of the time.”
    â€œAye.”
    â€œI am not John.”
    â€œAye,” she agreed. “If you were, your horse’s flanks would be scarred from your spurs and his mouth hardened by a cruel bit brutally used.”
    â€œYou have a keen eye.”
    â€œSo do you, Dominic le Sabre, Lord of Blackthorne Keep. Use it when you ride out. You will see that Meg is but collecting herbs as is her custom.”
    â€œWithout her handmaiden?”
    Gwyn sighed. “Eadith can be tiresome.”
    â€œIs Lady Margaret accustomed to running about the countryside without a companion?” Dominic asked in a sharp voice.
    â€œNay,” Gwyn said grudgingly. “Eadith goes with her, or I do, or one of the men-at-arms.”
    Dominic looked at Harry. The gateman shook his head unhappily.
    â€œShe was alone,” Harry said.
    â€œTake the dogs to the fork in the trail,” Dominic said to the handler.
    The man went quickly across the bridge, towed by a rowdy turmoil of