Had Aristide finally despaired of seeking the king’s assistance or had the witch-hunter given up his pursuit altogether? No, that was unlikely, Catherine thought as she carefully bundled up the dispatches, wincing at the twinges of pain in her hands. Aristide was a true hunter, shrewd and relentless.
Catherine had recognized those qualities in Le Balafre when he was a mere boy, apprenticed to the witch-hunter Vachel Le Vis. Unlike his master, Simon was not easily fooled. Catherine had made use of Le Vis in her battles with the wise women of Faire Isle. Le Vis had never suspected that the queen might also be a sorceress until it was too late, but young Simon had. More than suspected, the boy had known. And the clever, perceptive lad had grown up to become a formidable man. He had already accomplished what Catherine had begun to think no man ever could, vanquishing the wise women of Faire Isle, forcing the Lady herself into exile.
Yes, a truly dangerous man and one Catherine would as soon keep at a healthy distance. But the advent of this Silver Rose left the queen little choice. Stepping to the door of her study, she sent one of the pages to summon Ambroise Gautier, the most trustworthy and reliable member of her private guard.
“Find Simon Aristide and fetch that accursed witch-hunter to me,” she commanded. Lest there be any mistakes about what she desired, she added softly,
“Alive.”
Chapter Seven
SIMON HUNKERED DOWN, PULLING WEEDS AWAY FROM THE stone he’d left to mark the grave. He paused to wipe away a trickle of sweat that threatened to seep beneath his eye patch. The sun inched below the horizon as though reluctant to yield its power over the scorched land. The air was heavy and unmoving, even here at the crest of this hill in the Loire Valley. The countryside that stretched out below him should have been lush and green, but bore the scars of the drought, the meadow grass dry as straw, the leaves in the vineyard wilted.
But it was not the heat of the day that had bothered Simon so much as the brightness of it. The sun had blazed without mercy, or perhaps it only seemed that way to him because he was unused to it. He feared that he had become a creature of darkness as much as the women he hunted.
He had traveled many weary miles during the fortnight since he’d journeyed to Faire Isle to find Miri Cheney. A completely futile journey, but he didn’t blame Miri for that, for refusing to help him. He could hardly have expected any different answer, given their history, yet the depth of his disappointment had surprised him.
Still, he had kept his promise, ridden away and left her in peace. No doubt she was glad to see the back of him, especially after the ruthless way he had dragged her into his arms and kissed her. What devil had possessed him? He’d been stewing over that question for days and still had no satisfactory answer.
Perhaps it was merely because he’d gone without a woman for so long or that he’d been feeling tired, lonely, frustrated. Or because the path beyond her cottage had been dark and storm-ridden, and she was all that was warmth, all that was light and gentleness. Whatever madness had seized him, it was over and done with. He’d never see Miri again. The thought brought a heaviness to his heart that was stupid. They had been parted for years. But at least there had always been the possibility that—
No, he was a damned fool. There had never been any possibilities between him and Miri. A witch-hunter and a woman bred amongst witches. He needed to forget her, figure out what the blazes he was going to do next.
But as he doggedly stripped the weeds away from the grave, never had his wits felt so dull and leaden. He couldn’t seem to form any sort of coherent thought let alone a plan of action. Since his trip to Faire Isle, he had lost the trail of the Silver Rose and her agents of darkness.
Of course, all he had to do was wait and no doubt the witches would find him. He was surprised they hadn’t already. Perhaps the Silver Rose still didn’t know her last assassin had failed. As soon as she did, it would only be a matter of time before she sent someone else to kill him. But he couldn’t summon the energy to care about watching his own back or continuing to track this she-devil.
All Simon’s urgent dispatches to the king about the Silver Rose and her coven had met with no response. Miri had only half-believed him. Simon wondered why he persisted in grinding himself into the dust trying to battle this evil alone when no one else noticed or cared.
The answer to that rested at his fingertips. Simon brushed aside the dirt that had accumulated on the grave marker and traced the single word he had carved in the stone, the letters a little crooked and crude.
Luc.
Simon compressed his lips at the memory of the infant who had been the first of the Silver Rose’s victims. Or at least the first that he knew of. He had found the infant not far from this spot on a frigid winter night over a year ago. At a time when the rest of the world was celebrating the memory of another male child born in a stable.
Luc had not even known that much comfort or the warmth of a mother’s touch. His mother had left him exposed on a barren hillside to freeze to death. Simon had heard tell that freezing was not such a terrible way to die, that one slipped into a state of false warmth as one’s limbs went numb. He wondered if it had been that way for Luc.
A hard lump formed in Simon’s throat that both embarrassed and annoyed him. He’d seen so much of death and cruelty, the brutal murder of other innocents just as helpless as this babe had been. He had thought himself completely toughened, immune to any feelings of compassion.
He had no idea why he had been so moved by Luc’s death or those of the other abandoned babes he’d found. But he had grieved over each of them as though they had been his own sons, the children he might have had.
The children he should have had if his life had unfolded like that of his grandfather and his great-grandfather before him. A good, simple existence lived out in a small village, a tidy cottage, an honest day’s toil in the fields, a loving wife to cheer him, strong sons and daughters to be a comfort in his old age.
Simon felt bemused by how damned sentimental he was becoming. It was a sign of the years creeping by, he supposed, this tendency to look back, not forward. But it was not as though he had anything much to look forward to, only the dark cold of a grave, one not even marked as well as Luc’s.
Simon regarded the marker he’d carved pensively, recalling what his old master Le Vis had taught him of the fate of unshriven babes like Luc. Condemned to an existence in limbo, forever denied the joys of heaven.
Simon wasn’t sure how much he believed that or anything else anymore. It had been a long time since he’d set foot in a church, longer still since he’d truly prayed. He felt cursed awkward, his fingers wooden as he made the sign of the cross. As he folded his hands, he was not even certain which lost soul he was praying for, the babe’s or his own. He fumbled for words that didn’t come, his thoughts as heavy and earthbound as the rock that marked Luc’s grave.
The dried grass whispered behind him. As he knelt, his head bowed, he felt a hand come to rest on his shoulder.
“Simon . . .” The voice was as soft as the touch, but Simon’s heart slammed against his ribs.
He leapt up and spun around, seizing the wrist of the person who had crept up on his blind side. He had his knife unsheathed and started to raise it when his captive cried out.
“No, Simon. Don’t!”
Simon froze, all movement, even his breath suspended as he stared in disbelief.
“It—it’s me, Miri,” she faltered, trying to shrink away from the blade he held aloft.
Simon expelled a long breath, slowly lowering his weapon as her words registered. Her reassurance was unnecessary once he was able to make out her form, squinting at her past the last blaze of brilliance from a dying sun.
He would have recognized Miri anywhere despite the fact that she was garbed in loose peasant breeches and tunic. Her long fall of white-blond hair was braided tightly, wound about her head. She’d had it tucked beneath a wide-brimmed felt hat that had fallen off when he’d grabbed her. Or mayb
e she had been carrying the hat when she had stolen up behind him so silently.
He might have believed she truly was some sort of fairy, the Lady of the Wood who could materialize at will, a spirit born on the winds of his imagination. Except that the throb of her pulse beneath his fingers felt warm and human, her soft skin definitely that of a woman, delicate flesh, blood, and bone. A woman he had never thought to see again.
He didn’t realize how hard he was gripping her until she murmured, “Simon, please, you are hurting me.”
He released her and sheathed his knife. Finding his voice at last, he demanded hoarsely, “Miri, what—what the devil are you doing here?”
She rubbed her reddened wrist, looking remarkably calm and dignified for a woman who’d just been threatened with a foot-long hunting blade. Instead of answering his question, she stepped past Simon to peer down at the grave marker.
“Who is Luc?”
“It is the name of an apostle.”
Miri tipped her head, leveling at him one of those clear, piercing looks. “I don’t think it is any apostle buried in that grave, Simon.”
Simon was annoyed to feel himself flush, embarrassed that Miri should have found him here, caught him in such a foolish, vulnerable moment.
“It—it is just the grave of one of those abandoned infants I told you about,” he muttered.
“Why is he buried up here alone? So far from the village?”
Simon’s jaw knotted. “Because the damned priest would not let Luc be laid to rest in hallowed ground. A bastard, never baptized, and the son of a girl believed to have consorted with the devil to boot. I had no choice but to bring his body up here and—”
“You buried him?” Miri interrupted, her eyes wide.
Simon felt his flush deepen. “No one else would. Even his own grandparents feared to touch him. So what the hell was I supposed to do? Leave his corpse lying about for wild animals to drag off and devour?”
“No, of course not.” Miri rested her hand on his sleeve. “You did right by him, Simon. The earth is his mother. No matter how cold, how cruel the world above, she would welcome Luc back into her gentle embrace.”
Simon had always been disquieted by some of Miri’s more pagan notions. She seemed to sense this because she said, “I am sorry. Have I offended your Catholic sensibilities?”
“No.” Actually the image that Miri painted was oddly comforting, the idea that instead of shoving Luc into cold, unfeeling ground, he had returned him to a mother’s arms. Certainly the earth was a better mother than the one he’d had.
Simon surprised himself by confessing, “I am not much of a Catholic anymore. I haven’t attended mass in years.”
“And yet you chose to name this little boy after an apostle.”
“I thought it might help if he was named for one of the saints. Maybe it would gain him some sort of concession or pardon, if the laws of heaven really are that harsh.” Simon shuffled his boots, feeling incredibly foolish for explaining all this. “As you can probably tell from what I call my horse, I’m not good at coming up with names.”
“You did very well.” She smiled at him although she continued to search his face with that look of hers he always found so uncomfortable. As though looking for something in him that Simon was damned certain wasn’t there.
He found it easier to direct his gaze to the hand that still rested on his arm. He was dismayed to see that the red imprint left by his fingers had not faded. Covering her hand with his own, he massaged her wrist, experiencing a mad urge to carry it to his lips, try to kiss the bruise away. And an even more insane urge to draw her into his arms, hold her close, taste her mouth just to be certain she truly was real and not some dream born of heat and exhaustion.
He released her hand, taking a wary step back from her.
“You still haven’t answered my question,” he said. “What are you doing here?”
“Looking for you.” Miri bent down to retrieve the hat she had lost. “You came to Faire Isle seeking help, didn’t you? And now I need yours.” She lowered her gaze, fingering the brim of her hat, a slight tremor in her voice as she added, “You see, I—I found a Luc of my own.”
Simon inhaled sharply. He recalled too vividly his own shock when he had stumbled across those scenes of infant sacrifice, pulled back the edge of the blanket to gaze at those small wizened faces. But to think of such a horror visited upon Miri’s gentle spirit. She was the kind of woman capable of absorbing another’s pain with but a look and bearing the wound of it thereafter.
Forgetting the wisdom of keeping his distance, Simon closed the space between them, cupping his hands about her upper arms. “Miri . . .”
“It’s all right,” she said quickly, looking up at him, attempting to smile. “I mean, he’s going to be all right . . . I hope. The babe I found was more fortunate than Luc. This one was still alive. I took him to Port Corsair to—to a kindly woman who was able to nurse him.
“Unlike you, I didn’t think to give the little boy a name. I was just so—so stunned by it all.” She pursed her mouth tightly for a moment before continuing. “I am sorry that I didn’t entirely believe all the things you told me that night. I am not so naïve that I don’t know that such ignorance exists, that there are those cruel enough to sacrifice a small, helpless babe. I just never expected to find such wickedness on my island. Not my Faire Isle.”
Simon squeezed her arms gently, resisting the urge to draw her closer, cradle her against him. How often in the past had he been exasperated with Miri, frustrated by her stubborn refusal to recognize the existence of evil, especially among those she called wise women? Gazing down at her pale face, the bruised look in her eyes, he wished he could spare her this hurt, urge her to forget. But the witch-hunter in him needed her to remember, to give him all the details she could.
“Tell me what happened,” he commanded. “Tell me everything.”
———
MIRI TRUDGED down the hill beside Simon, winding her way down the rows of a small vineyard. It was the time of year when there should have been laborers busy, trimming and binding the vines. But perhaps the owner of this field had already despaired of this year’s crop because the hillside was deserted. The small farmhouse appeared equally sullen and silent in the heat. A mastiff dozing in the yard lifted its head as Simon and Miri passed, but could only summon enough energy to emit a half-hearted woof.
Miri’s voice was so low Simon had to stoop to hear her as she relived that terrible moment when she’d found the abandoned child and believed him dead. She hesitated only when she revealed whose babe it was, the identity of the proud and truculent girl who had left Faire Isle, either enticed or forced to join the coven of the Silver Rose.
Perhaps Miri should have questioned the wisdom of speaking so freely, offering up Carole Moreau’s name to a witch-hunter. She had promised both Marie Claire and herself that she would be cautious with Simon. Ally with him to defeat the Silver Rose, yes, but hold him at as much distance as possible.
Unfortunately, her resolve had weakened from the moment she had found him kneeling at the grave of a child only he had cared enough to name or bury. Looking so vulnerable as he had quietly grieved, fumbling to remember his prayers.
He had been harsh in his dismissal of what he had done for this unknown child, trying to behave as if it were nothing. And yet she suspected that he had also performed this same tender rite for all those other abandoned babes he’d found, although she was sure he’d fiercely deny it. God forbid anyone discover the dread Le Balafre might still possess a heart.
“. . . and as soon as I made sure my cottage and animals would be well looked after, I left Faire Isle to come in search of you,” Miri concluded.
Simon had listened gravely to her recital, his hands locked behind his back. Making no interruptions, asking no questions, he allowed her to unfold her story after her own fashion. But by the end of her tale, his jaw flexed in a hard line.
“Damnation,” he said. “I shou
ld never have come to Faire Isle. The Silver Rose’s cursed witches must have followed me. I led them straight to your doorstep.” He lashed out, stripping off withered grape leaves as he stalked down the hill.
“If you will take a moment to reflect, Simon, you know that can’t be true. Before you ever arrived, Carole was already boasting about these powerful new friends of hers. The women had to have been lurking on Faire Isle for some time, enticing Carole to join them.” Feeling that the poor beleaguered vines had already suffered enough damage, Miri caught Simon’s arm to stop him. “Your warning was all that prevented me from touching that poisonous rose. You actually saved me.”
“I am glad of that much then. Rest assured I will do my best to apprehend these evil women and see that this Moreau girl is punished along with the rest.”
Dismayed, Miri drew her hand away. “No, that is the last thing I want. Carole is not like those other women. She is only frightened and confused.”
“Sweet Jesu, Miri—” Simon began, but Miri cut him off, insisting, “She never meant to hurt her babe. I am sure of it.”
“Then the girl has some damned peculiar notions about mothering.”
“Don’t you see? There are many remote and inaccessible places on Faire Isle and Carole would have known of them. But she wrapped her child tenderly in her best shawl and left him near the stream not far from my cottage. She must have guessed that that is where I go to draw water. She placed her little boy where she was certain I would find him.”
“And find that cursed rose. Rather than hoping you’d rescue the babe, she might have been trying to kill you. Did you ever think of that?” he demanded.
Miri sucked in her breath, momentarily daunted. Such a dreadful thought had never occurred to her. She was quick to reject it. “Carole does not possess that kind of evil. Whatever happened, her companions were to blame. If she was the one who left the rose, they forced her or—or tricked her. I am convinced of it.”