Page 87 of The Champion

“I know the boy you broke your promise to in Outremer. Ganymede.”

Stryder went cold at the news. “How do you know that name?” A sick feeling went through him. “You?”

Damien laughed at his question. “I should have been so lucky. Nay, I was never he, but I knew much about him. I could hear his screams on the nights when they tortured him after you and your Brotherhood left him behind. I heard his curses and his prayers for death.”

Stryder couldn’t breathe as pain consumed him. “He was dead when I left.”

“Nay,” Damien said with an evil note of glee in his voice, “he was not. He lived. In fact, he lives still and he hates you and all your Brotherhood who left him behind to suffer. He hates you even more than I do. Every time they beat him, he cursed you and swore he would see you dead.”

“You’re lying to me.”

Damien shook his head and Stryder held the distinct feeling that his former friend took a great deal of pleasure from the pain he gave him. “If you doubt me, ask your brother for the truth.”

Stryder frowned. “Kit? What has he to do with this?”

“Kit is Ganymede, you fool.”

So stunned by the news, Stryder barely saw the stab wound coming. He moved to the side, but not fast enough to keep the blade from gashing his ribs.

Bellowing in rage, he rolled away from Damien and seized his sword.

Rowena rose to her feet as she saw Stryder wounded. The crowd around her all held a collective breath.

No one had ever wounded the earl before.

No one.

Unlike the others, she knew why Stryder didn’t fight with all his strength or skill, but when he seized his sword and turned on Damien, she realized something had changed.

There was no sympathy on Stryder’s face. Only a rage so potent that even from her distance, it scared her.

Stryder attacked Damien like a man possessed.

Damien fought back, but it was useless. With one sweeping attack, Stryder unbalanced his opponent and had Damien flat on his back in the dirt.

Rowena drew in a sharp breath as Stryder made to kill the prince.

Then, just as she was certain the blade would pierce his heart, Stryder deflected it and buried it in the ground.

He kept his foot soundly on Damien’s chest, pinning him to the ground.

“Sire?” Stryder’s voice rang out in the early morning mist. “I have defeated your champion. I have no desire to kill a man to prove my innocence. I have never taken a life coldly and I’ve no wish to begin doing so now.”

Henry nodded his head in approval. “Indeed, Lord Stryder. You have proven yourself merciful. Let no one else question your guilt in the murders. Release Our cousin and let Us see him tended.”

There was no need. The instant Stryder removed his foot, Damien came to his feet and charged the earl.

Henry ordered his men to break them apart.

“This isn’t over!” Damien snarled as Henry’s men pulled him away.

Stryder took a ragged breath as Rowena rushed toward him. Her heart racing, she wanted to throw herself into his arms and kiss him all over his face until they both fell on the ground. Only the knowledge that the entire crowd of nobles watched them prevented it. “You needs be tended, my lord.”

His own men and Kit quickly joined them.

“Thank God you came to your senses.” Christian embraced Stryder briefly and pounded him on the back. “I was afraid you were about to let him kill you.”

Stryder held a strange look on his face as he turned toward Kit. He searched Kit’s gaze as if he were meeting a stranger.