Page 143 of Come the Morning

Diversion, Mellyora thought.

And then, in the midst of the chaos, the horsemen came.

She heard a cry, a hoarse, terrible battle cry, and exhilarated, she lifted her head.

Waryk.

He was in the lead, riding Mercury over the natural stone barrier as if he were a winged horse. Behind him, Angus came, and Daro, and the others. Rider after rider, taking the enemy by surprise.

Renfrew swore. He turned to her, gripping the pole and staring at her with eyes of pure hatred and fury. He moved away from her, toward one of the fires lit in the dark, and he started kicking the kindling around her log. The heat rose instantly. She could feel the blaze. It would catch her clothing and the pole, and then consume her, in a matter of minutes.

“Burn in hell, lady. Burn in hell,” he told her, drawing his sword.

Mercury was flying across what was now becoming a battlefield littered with dead men, horses, and sheep. Renfrew stood before her. Mercury bore down on him.

Waryk was in full armor, his head helmeted, his surcoat covering his mail. He wielded his sword deftly.

And he cut down Renfrew where he stood. A single, lethal slash of his weapon cut across Renfrew’s side, where his mail was weakest. Waryk’s sword rose again, slammed down on Renfrew’s helmet. The man fell, blood spouting from his lips, his sightless eyes.

“Waryk!” Mellyora shrieked.

Ignoring the flames that were beginning to rise, Waryk urged Mercury up on the dais. With a slash of his sword, he broke the bonds tying her to the pole. She started to fall. Mercury’s hoofbeats clattered nervously over the kindling. Waryk quickly bent low from his horse’s back, slipped an arm around her, and swept her up.

Mercury leapt from the rising blaze. Clinging to Waryk with what strength she had, Mellyora was vaguely aware that her uncle fought to the one side, and Angus to the other. They covered Waryk’s ride as he raced hard toward the stone dividing enemy camps. Yet there, a rider challenged Waryk, and she ducked, screaming, as a sword slashed her way. Waryk’s blade rose to meet it. With her head down, she saw the Viking taking aim with his pike. She reached to her ankle for her knife and threw wildly.

She hit his arm. He screamed, his weapon fell. Waryk turned Mercury, ready to fight the man, but Daro had gone after him, and they were engaged in bloody combat. Spinning again, clinging to Waryk, Mellyora trembled, realizing that herhusband’s forces had taken these murderers completely by surprise.

He spurred Mercury, leading the horse into another flying leap over the stone, and they raced downhill.

He rode with her far from the battlefield, to where his camp had been. He moved through the tents and doused fires to a quiet copse by the stream. There, he dismounted with her in her arms. By the stream, he knelt, tearing off his helmet. His eyes touched hers, he searched her face anxiously.

“Waryk …”

“Lady …”

“M’laird!” she whispered.

She reached up, her arms no longer in such agony, now that she could touch him.

But he was anxious, so anxious. “Did they hurt you, Mellyora, you couldn’t stand, you can barely move …”

“Too long standing tied,” she said. She tried to smile. “You took your time!” she whispered.

“My apologies! I did my best, approaching without cover of artillery, and we might not have reached you.”

“Oh, Waryk, you came for me!”

“Aye, lady. I will always come. Mellyora, you are the prize,” he said very softly. “I have very definitely earned you.”

She smiled, caught his hand, kissed it.

He cradled her against him, then swore, realized that he drew her against mail. “Ah, my love, this is a most difficult time and place to express quite all that I’m feeling.”

She could hear the sound of the battle, and she closed her eyes, praying that her uncle would live, that the men who had come to her rescue would survive. Then she realized that she was hearing something closer. Movement, closer to them. She opened her eyes, and a cry of warning tore from her lips. “Waryk …”

He was up instantly, reaching for his sword. She had warned him in time.

He had killed Renfrew to rescue her from the fire. They had seen enough of the fighting to know who would prevail. But Ulric had not been killed, and he had followed them.