Read Online Knight and the Witch 02 - A Summer Bewitchment by Lindsay Townsend - Free Book Online

why has she come? What news is she bringing?

Chapter 8
    Magnus was kissing her, murmuring in the old speech. Safe in his arms, making him safe and beloved in hers, Elfrida sank into his embrace. She knew without his saying that he had been rejected, shrieked at again, and only for his surface appearance, the least thing of him. The girl had not heard the sympathy in his voice, nor seen the kindness in his eyes. She had not noticed when he wrapped her in his cloak. She had judged him on his scars.
    “Glad you came, sweeting.”
    “I gathered that.” She drew back to look at him, so he could see her admiring.
    “Baldwin has melted away very quickly.”
    “I told him to.”
    “And how did you persuade him to ride you over? No, I do not think I want to know that. But how you ride! You must have tumbled off close to a dozen times.”
    “I did not want to ride in front of him as I do with you.” She saw his eyes glow at that. “Who is the sleeper?”
    A dart of sorrow, so fast that any who did not know him as she did would have missed it, crossed his handsome-ugly face. “Ah, now that is the puzzle.”
    The girl screamed at him when she saw him and was too horrified to answer questions. Poor Magnus. How vile it is for him.
    Still with her locked in his embrace he turned on the road. “Now you are here, do you remember that charm you laid on the necromancer’s servant last winter? The one you said soothed and comforted?”
    To comfort him, Elfrida stroked a hand down his back. “That may not be needed.” The girl could not help her terror any more than her husband could help his looks. But I can help them both, and I will .
     

     
    Having Elfrida by him was more than balm. He was fully alive again, feeling as young as Tancred and bursting with hope. His clever witch-wife understood his need for contact, too. Taking his huge paw in her delicate hand, she led him to the slumbering maid. Then, being Elfrida, she did an unexpected thing.
    She knelt by the girl and leaned close but did not touch her. She sniffed the lass’s breath, her hair, and sat back on her heels.
    “This child has been drugged, very lightly, with a sleeping draught.”
    Slowly, she drew apart his cloak and placed the tips of her fingers on the sleeping girl’s palm. “Cool but not cold. Skin softened lately by unguents.”
    She glanced down the length of the tiny body. “Bare feet. Clean bare feet. She rode here, or came in a cart or carriage.”
    Magnus thought of the fresh cart track and nodded. “How did she escape?”
    “Or was she let go? Or is she another altogether? Let us—”
    She stopped, turning her head on one side. “The Lady Astrid comes. You will hear and see her soon. Can you keep her back for a moment? It need not be for long.”
    Magnus snapped his fingers at the hovering guard and sent him off to gather others and delay the coming Norman storm.
    Elfrida sat by the head of the sleeping girl. Blushing a little, she patted the grass beside her.
    Still shy of commanding me, sweet, after six months of marriage? No matter, you will not be shy tonight. Grinning at the thought, Magnus crouched beside her. His wife shifted slightly so he could see her, the girl, and the road.
    “Where are the lady’s people, the ones who rode out with you this morning?” she asked in a low voice. “Where is Father Jerome?”
    “The priest is ministering to a dying villager, a plowman who broke his back and who cannot be saved.” Anticipating her sympathy, he added quickly, “The man lingers but he has no pain.”
    He watched her close her eyes and say a brief prayer. “As you say,” she remarked, opening her eyes. “He will go in peace, with the sunset.”
    How does she know this? She is a witch and knows many things, some I wish she did not know. Magnus crossed himself and returned to more earthly, political matters. “As for the others, I sent them on with Tancred to the hamlets.”
    “They did not try to wake this child?”
    “After