Medieval 02 - Forbidden

fool.”
    “That ‘fat old fool’ laid hands on me.”
    Erik turned toward Amber so quickly that his horse started in alarm.
    “What are you saying?” he demanded.
    “The priest sought an alliance with the devil through carnal knowledge of me,” Amber said. “When I refused him, he tried to take by force what I wouldn’t give.”
    “God’s teeth,” Duncan hissed.
    Erik was too shocked to speak. Abruptly his features flattened beneath his beard, pulling his mouth into a thin line.
    “I will hang that cursed priest where I find him,” Erik vowed softly.
    Amber’s smile was chilling. “You won’t find him this side of Judgement Day.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Several years past, the priest went to the Stone Ring with darkness in his mind. Lightning came. When it left, it took the priest to the very hell that so fascinated him. Or so Cassandra tells me…”
    “Ah. Cassandra. A very wise woman indeed,” Erik said, smiling like a wolf.
    “The priest,” Duncan said harshly to Amber. “He didn’t harm you?”
    “I used the dagger Erik gave me.”
    Duncan remembered the silver dagger she had used to cut his own bonds.
    “I wasn’t wrong to be wary of you, was I?” he asked dryly.
    Amber smiled at Duncan, a smile as warm as her other one had been cold.
    “I would never harm you, Duncan. It would be like harming myself.”
    “But I,” Erik cut in, “have no such problem. I will most certainly ‘harm’ any man who forces himself on Amber.”
    Duncan looked past Amber to the cold wolf’s eyes of the young lord.
    “You will note, Sir Erik, who is holding and who is being held,” Duncan said flatly.
    Amber looked at her own hand, her fingers clenched on Duncan’s wrist, her nails biting into his hard flesh.
    “I’m sorry,” she said, snatching her hand back.
    “Precious Amber,” Duncan murmured.
    He held out his hand, smiling. Without hesitation, she put her fingers in his.
    “You could stick silver daggers into me,” Duncan said, “and I would ask only for more of your sweet touch.”
    Amber laughed and colored, ignoring Erik’s look of concern and the disbelief on the faces of three of the four knights whose horses were trotting closer.
    “Do you understand, now?” Duncan asked Erik.
    There was a challenge in Duncan’s voice that Erik could not mistake.
    “You have no claims of family or clan or duty on Amber, nor any intent other than to see that she is protected,” Duncan continued. “When my memory returns, I will claim the right to woo Amber for my wife.”
    “What if your memory doesn’t return?” Erik asked.
    “It must.”
    “Really? Why?”
    “Until I know what obligations I carry from my past, I can’t make new vows. And I find that I must.”
    “Why?”
    “Amber,” Duncan said simply. “I must have her. Yet I should not offer marriage until I know myself.”
    “Amber?” Erik asked, turning toward her.
    “I have always been Duncan’s. I always will be.”
    Erik closed his eyes for an instant. When they opened, they were clear and cold.
    “What of Cassandra’s warning?” he asked gently.
    “There are three conditions. Only one has been met. Only one will be met.”
    “You sound very certain.”
    “I am.”
    Amber smiled with a bittersweet beauty that was haunting. She knew that Duncan wouldn’t take her unless he remembered his past.
    And if he did remember, she was afraid he wouldn’t have her at all.
    Enemy and soul mate .
    “I wonder if prophecies can be so neatly divided and thereby neutralized,” Erik muttered. “Or if it even matters.”
    “You speak in circles,” Amber said.
    “Both of you,” said Duncan.
    The other two ignored him.
    “Death always flows,” Erik said. “Rich life is always a possibility. Remember that, Amber, when you are offered a choice between a rock and a hard place.”
    With that enigmatic advice, Erik turned away to face the knights who were riding up alongside him.
    Silently Duncan watched while greetings were exchanged among Sir Erik’s knights. Three of themen he looked at briefly but without great curiosity.
    The fourth man was different. Duncan stared at him intently, feeling almost certain that he had met the knight before. Almost certain, but not quite.
    He would have questioned the knight, but a stark sense of danger sealed Duncan’s lips. It was the second time since the Holy Land that Duncan had felt such a warning deep within himself.
    Duncan couldn’t remember what the other time had been,