split second before he was struck on the back of the head from behind. And her face was the last thing he remembered before he lost consciousness.
He would realize only later that it had been the shot that awakened him. At the time, he was aware of little beyond the warmth of the rock beneath his cheek and the ache at the back of his skull. He tried to open his eyes, but the sunlight reflected off the water dazzled them, creating dancing spots that obscured his vision.
When it began to clear, the first thing he saw was a pair of boots, directly in front of his nose. Their fine-grained leather was polished to a high gloss that rivaled that reflected off the surface of the water.
Too disoriented at first to understand what was going on, Sebastian gradually became aware that he was lying on the ground, his hands bound together at the wrists. The leather thong with which they had been tied was tight enough that his fingers were growing numb.
A number of men and horses seemed to be milling around him. He watched with disinterest as one of the men crossed his limited field of vision carrying a smoking musket. It was only then that Sebastian realized what had awakened him.
They had killed the horse he’d shot, putting the animal out of its agony. The noise the dying stallion had been making seemed to echo still off the rocky slopes. Although Sebastian had not been conscious of what had caused those sounds as he came awake, the resulting silence was a relief.
Before he had time to relish it, the point of his own sword was again pressed against his throat. This time the tip had been placed just beneath his chin, the point exerting an upward pressure.
“Look at me, you English bastard.”
More in obedience to the urging of the blade than to the command, Sebastian turned his head, looking up into the eyes of the man standing over him. The man whose boots he’d been facing when he’d awakened. The man who’d ridden the stallion down that rocky incline and then jumped agilely from the dying animal’s back.
Sebastian had thought before how soulless these eyes were. Now they were filled with a hatred that was palpable, and for the first time he was truly afraid.
Not to die. He had never really been afraid of dying. Not if the death were clean and honorable. In the two long years he had spent at war, however, he had become aware that there were many things worse than dying. All of them were reflected in this man’s eyes.
“You killed my stallion,” the Spaniard said.
If Sebastian had believed an apology might make a difference, he would willingly have framed one. He had never intended to harm the horse, of course. This bastard, on the other hand—
“With my own hands, I pulled him from his mother and blew into his nostrils,” the horseman continued, his voice low, each word intense. “And you, you worthless piece of offal, have slaughtered him.”
The milling men and their horses had stilled. Only the rush of the river and the malice of the horseman’s voice disturbed the afternoon heat. And the same ominous quiet that settles over the countryside before a storm seemed to surround them.
“You gave me your word,” the girl reminded.
Pilar.
She had been the one who had knocked his hand aside. With that gesture, she had delivered him into the hands of his enemy.
The black eyes of the horseman lifted from their focus on his face to find that of the girl, and Sebastian realized she was standing on the other side of him. Despite the threat of the sword, he turned his head far enough that he could see her. Her eyes were on the man who held the sword against his throat—and with it, held his life.
“My word?” the Spaniard questioned, mocking the soft determination of her reminder. “And what do you suppose that is worth now, considering what he has done?”
“Your word was once worth a great deal. Is it no longer?”
“The situation has changed.”
“And so your word is no longer your word?”
“He killed El Cid.”
“That was not his intent. If you wish to blame someone for the death of the stallion, then you must blame me,” she said.
Sebastian opened his mouth to protest and a sudden pressure of the sword against the thin skin under his chin pushed it closed. The eyes of the horseman had never moved from the girl’s face.
As it had been from the first, the real struggle of will was between the two of them. Sebastian had simply gotten in the way. He was someone who had no part in this quarrel, but who might very well pay the price of it with his blood.
“I wonder why you are so interested in saving the life of an English soldier. A man you profess not to know.”
“I don’t know him. I never saw him before today. I needed his clothing, and so I tried to steal it.”
“His clothing?”
The sword moved away from his chin, but before Sebastian could react to its release, the point lowered again, this time to score quickly down his breastbone. The pressure was enough to split the skin, leaving a thin line of welling blood from his collarbone to his navel.
The shock of what the horseman had just done was enough that he didn’t feel the sting from the shallow cut. Not immediately.
“He doesn’t seem to be wearing any,” his captor gibed.
“Exactly,” said the girl, her voice perfectly calm. “Making that which he’d taken off in order to bathe available.”
“Clothing,” the horseman mused as if he were considering the possibility. “Your only interest was in his clothing. You had none in the man himself, I take it?”
The sword had moved again. The point rested now on the most vulnerable part of Sebastian’s masculinity. The threat was as effective as when the tip had been placed at his throat. Furious—and helpless—he tried to express his rage with his eyes, but neither of them was looking at him.
“I had no use for the man,” she said.
The thin lips of the Spaniard curved, the expression more sneer than smile. “Then I take it you would have no objection if he were…no longer a man,” he suggested.
Sebastian’s blood ran cold through his veins, but he fought to control any outward revelation of that. He had known men like this, men who enjoyed inflicting pain, either mentally or physically. Their cruelty always fed on their victim’s terror.
“You gave me your word that he would be unharmed,” Pilar said again.
Her voice had not changed, despite the nature of that threat. Sebastian found himself clinging to the hope represented by her calmness. She knew this man, far better than he could. It was evident that she believed this argument would have some weight on his decision.
“I promised you his life,” the man said.
“That was not the promise I sought.”
“It was the one you were given.”
There
