and did so at such inopportune timing—Narcisse reluctantly pulled from Anne and sat back in his chair. “What is it, Champrey?”
“There’s been an—” he eyed Anne cautiously “—er, altercation.”
“Let me guess,” Narcisse drawled. Hooking a knee over the arm of the chair and lazily sulking back against Anne’s shoulder, he tapped a pinkie ring noisily against the gold-plated arm. “Cecil, the falcon master has been found soused and naked, draped over the well, yet again.”
“Not quite, my lord.” Champrey winced. “A dragon has been slain. Again. Here, in the very courtyard of our village.”
CHAPTER SIX
After checking that Odette had not a clue about the attack in the bailey, Rhiana then sought Lydia. Her mother had heard of the attack, but only afterward—when the fires were blazing in the kitchen, little else could be heard outside her small interior world.
Now Lydia shivered in a way that always made Rhiana want to draw her mother into her arms for a hug. But she never did. How to touch an enigma? ’Twas blasphemous, yet at the same time, so tempting. Would she find the answers to her questions wrapped in her mother’s arms?
Yes.
But not right now.
Instead, Rhiana explained, should the dragons again come, Lydia and Odette must remain in the castle for their safety. Should they be on the streets, they must enter the first house possible. They mustn’t risk trying to run home, for the dragons were swift and seeming hungry for the first human close enough to snatch.
Lydia nodded and agreed, her focus averted by rolling the fine flour and sugar pastry out on the cool stone table. An excuse she must return to her baking was taken with an accepting nod from Rhiana. Her mother did never face adversity, but instead, looked away. If she could not see it, then it could not harm her.
They two were so different. Where had she gotten her mind to chase dragons? Certainly not from Lydia.
“You are off then?” Lydia wondered.
“Yes.” For a few moments Rhiana stood there, sensing the tension, the unspoken words. Of late Lydia had been even more distant, almost as if she wished that by not looking at Rhiana she could make her disappear. “Good day to you, mother.”
The fire in the armory was low; Paul never doused it unless he was to be away from the shop for more than a day. The curved walls of stone were lined with half-finished swords, plates of armor for every portion of the body, and spurs twisted in ruin and in need of repair. Paul did all the metalwork for the village’s knights. A quality product—once requested by King Charles VII himself—kept him busy. Though he was not so busy as an armourer who furnished an active garrison, which suited Paul just fine.
Paul wasn’t in the shop. Rhiana recalled his offer to go to the castle and speak to the baron with a few others on the Hoard Council. She must assume he would return without the news she so wished for. Guiscard would not put forth a single knight to aid her. She knew it as she breathed the air.
Sitting before the worktable, Rhiana propped a foot on the highest rung of the stool. The heat of the fire warmed her ankle.
Most unladylike! she could imagine Odette admonishing. Your skirt rides to your knee!
With a smile, Rhiana straightened and put down her foot. She assumed a vain pose, hand to her hip and lips pursed. That was how Odette and Lady Anne did it. For some reason, the feminine always felt wrong on Rhiana. But just because it felt wrong did not mean she could not strive for it.
For all purposes, she was well beyond the marrying age. Yet, many in St. Rénan married in their later twenties. Rhiana figured this was because the pickings were so slim. She had no intention living life alone and unhappy. Sure, there was room in her family’s home, should she wish to remain with mother and Paul. But she did not wish it. Independence tempted.
You have independence. Would you give it up for a man?
“Never. The man I marry must accept me as a partner, not chattel.” It wasn’t very likely she would find such in this village.
Sighing, she turned to prop an elbow on the table and splayed out a scatter of mail rings. She traced a fingertip around a close-to-perfect circle of wire. She fashioned the rings herself, hammering and drawing to first form the wire. Wrap that length about a steel dowel and cut the rings. A hole punched in one end of the delicate ring was then riveted to the opposite end, but not until actually weaving the mail. Tedious, but fulfilling work.
Years ago, Paul had decided that if Rhiana were to linger about the armory so often then she may very well learn the trade. Much as she’d wanted to learn the real work, pounding out metal over a hot flame, Paul’s generosity had not allowed him comfort in teaching her that dangerous task. A man’s labor, he’d say, ’tis sweaty and hard on the muscles. No work for a female, no matter her mettle. So small, less strenuous mail-work it was. But no less satisfying to see the finished product.
Drawing one ring out from a scatter of hundreds of rings, Rhiana tapped it impatiently. There was at least one other dragon out there. It had snatched up a man from the bailey this afternoon. One rampant should prove little trouble to take down, whether or not any of Guiscard’s knights came to aid her.
Yet, who was she to endanger the village should she fail?
And why was Guiscard so adamant she not attempt the task?
“Why am I thinking failure?” she asked herself.
Would it not be better to at least try, than to not try at all? To wait for a slayer—a man—could prove too long.
Indeed. She was not the person to toe the line, then step back and wait for another to push out ahead of her. A dragon must be slain!
Lifting her head and clasping her hands about her shoulders, Rhiana closed her eyes. Summoning deep within those tendrils of the unknown that ever challenged her, she found the well of ambition, of honor and valiance that brewed.
Ambition she had been born with. It had kept her skirt hems dirty and her eyes focused to adventure. Honor she had witnessed in the skill and grace of Amandine Fleche, and in Paul Tassot’s heart.
Valiance is something she would ever strive for. To stand boldly in the face of danger, no matter the consequences.
Rhiana murmured the phrase Amandine had taught her two summers earlier, “Memento mori.”
’Twas Latin, and meant: Remember that you must die.
It wasn’t so much a morbid statement as a reminder that all life eventually comes to an end. Live it, before it is stolen from you. Seize it! “Meet all challenges,” Amandine had said to her. “For in the end, you will then look back and know you did truly live before death.”
Rhiana liked the phrase and thought of it as her motto. In fact, Paul had engraved it into the twisting dragon design that graced the stock of her crossbow. It served a reminder to her—and an epitaph to those dragons that fell courtesy of her crossbow bolt.
Hooking her foot upon the high stool rung and nodding to herself, Rhiana’s smile grew.
“No dragon is invulnerable. They all have a kill
