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She rode another hour, finally slowing her mare’s pace when she became winded. The salt air was harsh and wonderful against her face and the smells of the moss and the trees and the sea itself reminded her of Wales.
She saw a rough wooden sign to her left that was printed crudely: PERRANPORTH. She’d made good time. She decided to skirt the fishing village, just in case someone should try to stop her. She was a female alone, and she knew well enough what could happen to her.
She was hungry but ignored it.
She cut eastward away from the sea when the sun began to drift down in the distant west. She saw no one. It was as if she were the only one inhabiting this place. At first it comforted her, made her feel safe, but as time passed, she began to worry.
When she saw the smoke rising in the distance, she felt equal amounts of fear and hope. She slowed Henrietta to a walk, letting her pick her way over the rough, jagged-edged rocks. Finally she dismounted, tied her mare to a lone yew bush, and crept closer. It was a camp. She saw several women and about half a dozen men. The women were preparing the evening meal; the men were lounging about on the ground, some of them whittling, others sitting cross-legged, laughing with their comrades, others speaking to the women, their suggestions lewd in the extreme. Daria wondered if they were Gypsies. She’d never seen any, but it seemed possible. Then a large, well-garbed man came into her line of vision. He was fat and jolly-looking, his bald head shinning even in the twilight.
He spoke to one of the men, slapped one of the women on her bottom, then reached his hand around and slid his fingers down her tunic. The woman squealed and laughed and rubbed her bottom against him.
Daria drew back.
She would continue on around their camp. She wanted to take no chance that they would try to hurt her or hold her for ransom. She’d spent many months a prisoner and had no intention of spending another moment as one.
She got quietly to her feet and turned to walk back to Henrietta, when the mare, seeing her mistress, raised her head and whinnied loudly.
“Shush. Do be quiet, Henrietta.” Daria ran to her mare and scrambled onto her back.
She wasn’t fast enough. She heard shouts and calls and running boots. A man’s hands grabbed her ankles and yanked her back down to the ground, catching her around the waist before she fell.
Daria fought. She fought without thinking, without hesitating. She fought as she remembered Roland fighting, with her elbow in the man’s throat, her knee in his groin, twisting frantically to keep the man from getting a firm hold on her. The man bellowed with pain and rage as her fingers dug into his shoulder. Another man joined him and her arms were grabbed and pinned to her body.
15
Daria was panting, still wildly jerking and pulling, but the two men had a firm hold on her now. One of them whom she’d managed to gouge in the throat had raised his fist, blood in his eyes, when another man’s voice shouted, “Hold, Alan. Don’t strike her.”
“She nearly knocked my throat through my neck, the bitch. How could a little wench know how to do that?”
“Don’t hit her,” the man said again. It was the fat well-garbed man and he was walking as quickly as his bulk would allow toward them.
Daria quieted, trying to calm her heaving breath. She felt the roiling nausea in her belly, but managed to keep down her bile.
“Well, it is indeed a charming little pigeon,” the fat man said, coming to a halt in front of Daria. “Pretty she is, and young, very young. Who are you, little pigeon?”
Should she tell him? Would she endanger Roland? What to do? He no longer looked quite so jolly as she’d initially thought when
she first saw him.
“No words? I don’t think you’re a mute, are you?”
She shook her head, then said, “I’m afraid. Your men are hurting my arms.”
“True, but you nearly brought my poor Alan low. A man doesn’t like to have a woman do such things to him. It humiliates him to the point of violence. Release her, lads, but keep sharp.”
Alan cursed and gave her arm a vicious twist before releasing her.
“Who are you?” the fat man asked again.
“My name is Daria.”
“A lovely name, a very nice name withal, but by all the saints, it tells me little. Who is your family?”
“The Earl of Reymerstone is my uncle.”
“She made up that name. She’s a bitch and a liar.”
“Alan, please, my boy, calm yourself. If she’s a liar, then I will return her to your fond embrace. As for her also being a bitch—well, I don’t know if a woman’s talents could grant her all that. Just because you haven’t heard the name doesn’t mean it can’t exist. Where does your family live, my girl? Why are you here wandering about all alone? Ah, look at this very fine palfrey. Only fine oats and wheat in her fat belly, not swamp grass, I’ll wager. You’re not an impoverished little pigeon, are you?”
