Warwolfe (de Wolfe Pack Book 0)(69)

Afraid he would see her illness in her face.

After several hours of travel, they stopped to rest the horses along a small creek in a thicket that was heavy with moisture. The water bubbled down the rocks as the horses drank. Wellesbourne and St. Hèver even went so far as to pull their horses into the water, splashing them to cool them off. Ghislaine, meanwhile, had wandered upstream a bit, kneeling down with her painful leg beside the crystal-clear water to splash some on her face. It was cool to her skin and felt wonderful. As she dried her face off with the sleeve of her cote, she heard footsteps next to her. Turning slightly, she caught sight of Gaetan’s boots.

“Is the weather always ridiculously hot in October?” he asked.

She kept her head down, pretending to still splash water on her face. “Nay,” she said. “A day like this is most unusual.”

Gaetan moved up beside her and crouched down as well, putting a big hand in the water and drinking from it. “How does your wound feel?”

She nodded. “It aches,” she said, an understatement. She paused a moment before continuing. “I… I have not had the opportunity to thank you for tending it so carefully. I do not think any physic could have done a better job.”

He wiped the cold water on his face. “It was the least I could do, considering you risked your lives for all of us.”

“I did what I believed needed to be done.”

“I know.”

A brief silence followed, but not uncomfortable. It was rather warm, in fact. Gaetan remained crouched next to her, now watching the stream bubble as water dripped from his hands. “We are near Worcester.”

“We are.”

“How far to your brother’s stronghold?”

Ghislaine cocked her head thoughtfully but, in doing so, she realized that she lifted her head and exposed her red cheeks to his scrutiny, so she quickly lowered her head again.

“Very close,” she said. “We will be there by tomorrow.”

He grunted. “I had not realized we were so close.”

She nodded. “We are quite close,” she said. Then, she sighed thoughtfully. “I have been thinking of my brother and of his travels. If he continued to travel as slowly as he was when we first began to follow him, then he would be at least three days behind us, mayhap more. Even with our delay in Evesham, I do not think he has caught up to us. On the road he is traveling, unless he has deviated, he will come through Kidderminster. The road our party is on will come up west of Kidderminster and it is my assumption that we will reach Tenebris before he does.”

Gaetan shifted so he was sitting on his buttocks now, resting his weary body. “I have been thinking the same thing,” he said. “We will be waiting for him when he arrives.”

“It would make for a perfect ambush if we can single out de Lohr and steal him away before my brother can hurt him.”

It was a bit of covert tactics and he looked at her, approval in his eyes. “You are a clever little mouse,” he said, grinning. “I have never met a woman who thought so logically. Mayhap, you should have been the one to command Harold’s army. On second thought, it was a good thing that you did not. We more than likely would have lost.”

Ghislaine fought off a modest grin. “I am not a pampered Saxon lady, as you well know. I think like a warrior. It is how I have been trained.”

Gaetan was looking at her, the way her dark hair draped over her shoulder, the shape of her body beneath the cote that clung to her in places. But he also noticed she was sitting oddly with her right leg favored. He knew, from experience, that injuries like that hurt a great deal to the point where even routine movement was excruciating. But she bore it stoically; not even a whimper.

A strong lady, indeed.

“Your training has been invaluable in our quest to find our comrade,” he said. “In fact, I cannot imagine having made this journey without you.”

It was close to a compliment from Gaetan, as far as compliments went. He wasn’t the kind to give an encouraging or positive word, or so he seemed. Ghislaine dared to glance over her shoulder at him, her red cheeks partially obscured by her hair. “I would say that it is unfortunate that we had to make it in the first place, but somehow… somehow I am not. I believe some understanding has come out of this. Understanding for Normans. Mayhap you even understand my people more as well.”

He shrugged. “I understand that they are proud,” he said. “I understand that they are skilled but not organized.”

Before she could reply, more than likely to dispute his comment, Camulos wandered up, tail wagging. Instead of going to Gaetan, he went straight to Ghislaine and licked her on the chin with a big wet tongue and wet fur around his mouth. She groaned, wiping the slobbery kiss away.

“And I understand that Normans have smelly dogs that they treat like children,” she said, trying to move away from Camulos as he sat down next to her. “Why does this dog like me so much? Does he not know that I despise him?”

Gaetan laughed softly as his dog leaned against her. “He has good taste in people,” he said. “If he likes you, take it as a compliment.”

“I want him to go away.”

“Do you really?”

She thought better of her initial reply, which had been an affirmative. The dog had been her only companion when the knights had taken to ignoring her. Making a face that suggested surrender, she shook her head.