The Silver Rose Page 7

  Plunking down on a three-legged stool, Simon struggled to work off his boots. It proved a difficult proposition, the leather slick with rain and mud. But the exertion allowed him time to recover from the wayward reaction of his body to the sight of hers. Matters between him and Miri Cheney were strained enough without the added complication of any carnal impulses.

  Lining his boots up neatly by the door, Simon wiped his hands clean on his breeches that were already a mess from his fall. He stepped hesitantly toward the hearth, feeling like some mongrel dog approaching a beckoning campfire and not at all sure what his reception would be.

  Wordlessly, Miri handed him a linen towel and retreated to the opposite corner of the room to finish combing her hair. Simon found himself in sole possession of the blazing fire. Well, him and the cat. Necromancer curled up on a braided rug before the hearth, lazily eyeing Simon through narrowed slits.

  Simon held out his hands to the welcome blaze of heat. A small cauldron of something steamed over the fire, emitting a fragrant spicy aroma. His back to Miri, Simon applied the towel first to his face, shifting aside his eye patch.

  His leather patch had gotten wet in the rain, but Simon seldom removed it except when he was alone, self-conscious about the extent of his injury, even after all these years. When he’d finished drying his face, he replaced the patch, wincing at the feel of the damp leather settling back against his cheek.

  As Simon worked to undo the laces of his doublet, he said, “You ought to have some sort of bar or lock on that door.”

  “Why?” Miri compressed her lips as she struggled with a particularly stubborn knot in her hair. “There is a reason I live way out here in the woods. My neighbors are ones I can trust, the four-legged kind.”

  “Unfortunately your address is also known to the sort that walk on two legs. If you insist upon the company of animals, at least you should surround yourself with useful ones. A pack of large fierce mastiffs would serve you far better than a basket of rabbits or this scrawny old cat.”

  In spite of his gruff words, Simon found the sleek softness of Necromancer’s dark coat irresistible. He hunkered down to stroke the dozing feline. Necromancer went from sleeping cat to hissing fury in the bat of an eye. Lashing out, he scratched Simon’s small finger, the same hand that already bore the claw marks from the witch who had tried to kill him two nights ago.

  Simon jerked back, swearing while Necromancer stalked off in high dudgeon. With amazing agility for such an old cat, he scrambled up the ladder, disappearing into the darkness of the loft.

  “Damn!” Simon muttered, sucking the streak of blood from his injured finger. “I’m glad he wasn’t the one wielding the knife earlier.”

  Miri’s lips twitched with the hint of a smile, but she was quick to suppress it. “Yes, you should be. That scrawny old cat was the one who lured you straight into my trap.”

  “Not a particularly effective trap. If you are going to rely on snares for protection, I can show you how to fashion a better one. A simple noose would have caught me around the ankle and left me hanging upside down and far more helpless. Or get an iron trap with the kind of teeth that can crush a man’s ankle.”

  “Such traps would be far too dangerous. What if I caught some fox or poor little rabbit by mistake? I don’t happen to like harming innocent creatures.”

  “Believe it or not, neither do I.”

  She clearly didn’t believe it. Turning away from him, Miri went back to combing her hair. Suppressing a tired sigh, Simon struggled out of his jerkin and draped it over the rope line Miri had fashioned. He spied a painting hanging on the wall, half-hidden by the drying clothes.

  Simon pushed Miri’s gown aside in order to obtain a better look, his face softening with recognition. Set in a gilt-edged frame was a unicorn cantering through the forest, a magnificent study in contrasts between the vivid details of the trees and the phantom aura of the unicorn. The longer one stared at it, the more one became unsure where myth ended and reality began.

  Her sister, Gabrielle, had done the painting for Miri. When Simon had last seen it, it had been incomplete and seemed destined to remain that way. But it had been Miri’s greatest treasure, so fixed had she been in her childlike belief in unicorns.

  Simon smiled in spite of himself, the memory bittersweet. He felt ridiculously pleased that Gabrielle had finally finished the painting and that Miri still had it. He’d lain awake for too many sleepless nights when he realized that his actions had cost Miri Belle Haven. He was glad she still had some small part of her childhood home.

  He heard the floorboard creak and realized Miri had crept up behind him. “So Gabrielle finally finished your unicorn?”

  “Yes,” she replied softly.

  “I remember how you always used to insist there was one that roamed Faire Isle. Of course, I being naught but a lowly boy could never hope to see the creature.”

  “And I recall how you tugged on my braid and teased me, telling me I was too old to believe such things.”

  “And you told me most indignantly, ‘The day I am too old to believe in unicorns is the day that I die, Simon Aristide.’ ”

  Once more, she almost smiled at him, biting down on her lip to still its quiver.

  “So do you still see the old boy in your rambles through the woods?”

  Miri shook her head.

  “Never tell me that you think I drove the unicorn away as well,” Simon half-jested, determined to provoke a real smile from her. “I swear I never touched a single hair of his mane.”

  “No, the unicorn is probably still there. I simply stopped looking for him.” Her face grew more pensive and sad, adding to the burden of guilt he already carried.

  No doubt she was recalling what he should have had the tact and wit to remember himself. He’d only ever seen the unicorn painting because Miri had trusted him enough to allow him inside her home. Simon had used the opportunity to gather evidence against her brother-in-law, to steal the ring that would lure the Comte de Renard to Paris, where he could be arrested. It was the first time Simon had betrayed Miri’s friendship in his zeal to bring the sorcerer to justice. Unfortunately, it had not been the last.

  That was the trouble with even the best of the memories that they shared, Simon reflected ruefully. They would always be tainted with his many betrayals, shadowed by their vastly differing views of the world.

  Miri twitched her gown back into place, blotting out the sight of the unicorn. She regarded him with a sudden frown. “You’re bleeding.”

  Simon lifted his hand to find the angry-looking scratch still oozing blood, his finger smeared with it. Impatiently, he started to wipe it on his shirt when Miri intervened.

  “Don’t do that.”

  He was surprised when she seized hold of his hand. Snatching up the towel, she dabbed brusquely at the scratch, causing it to sting. When Simon sucked in his breath, she said, “Necromancer clawed you pretty good. You should never presume to touch any creature unless you are invited to do so.”

  “I’ll try to remember that,” Simon replied dryly.

  As she finished cleaning his scratch, her hands grew gentler. It had been a long time since anyone had touched him with anything approaching kindness. Her gentleness was a far more dangerous seduction than the sight of her body had been. Simon’s urge to draw back was immediate and instinctive. But he felt strangely helpless to move, rather bemused to find himself being tended by the woman who should have wanted him dead.

  “So why didn’t you do it, Miri?” he demanded.

  “Do what?”

  “Kill me when you had the chance. It was what I would have done in your place.”

  Although she continued to tend his scratch, she appeared disturbed by his question, a tiny furrow creasing her brow. “I am a daughter of the earth. I am meant to heal, not harm.”

  “And is that the only thing that stayed your hand?”

  “N-no. I suppose it was also because I have endured enough grief over you. The thought o
f you dying, your blood spilling over my hands—” She shuddered.

  “Then you don’t completely despise me?”

  “It would seem not.” She glanced up at him and her smile broke free at last. The merest quirk of her lips but Simon felt as though a huge weight had been lifted from his heart.

  He had almost forgotten the power of those fey eyes of hers. Like a clear white light drawing him in with all the force of the moon’s pull upon the wayward sea, that inexplicable attraction that had always existed between him and Miri. What was more, he was certain she felt it, too.

  She flushed and released his hand. “T-there. The bleeding has stopped. It looks as though Necromancer’s attack won’t prove fatal, but—” She peered closer, for the first time noticing the gouge marks above his knuckles.

  “Good heavens, what happened there?” she teased. “Did you try to pet a bear?”

  Simon drew back, self-consciously covering the scratches with his other hand. “No, it is only a memento from a dispute I had with a witch two nights ago.”

  “Oh?” Miri’s light tone faltered. “And—and how did this wise woman fare from the encounter?”

  “The witch is dead.” When Miri paled, Simon silently cursed the bluntness of his own tongue.

  “Not by my hand,” he hastened to add, but Miri was already backing away from him.

  The eyes that had been so soft a moment ago now pierced him with reproach. “You once boasted to me that when you suspected someone of being a witch, you immediately put her to the sword.”

  “That is all that it was, the boast of a swaggering young dolt who was trying to appear as ruthless as possible. I have never behaved that arbitrarily.” Honesty compelled Simon to add. “At least I hope that I haven’t.

  “The woman plunged over the side of a cliff when she was trying to kill me. I actually tried to pull her up to safety, but she clawed my hand. She fell to the rocks below and was swept out to sea. I assure you she was no wise woman. She was most definitely a God-cursed witch, an agent of the Silver Rose.”

  “The Silver Rose?”

  “Yes, the enemy that I mentioned in the barn, the sorceress that I have ridden so far to tell you about.”

  Except he feared she might no longer be willing to listen to him. She shrank from him, regarding him with troubled eyes. Simon wished to hell he had never mentioned the dead witch, but he had promised himself he would be truthful with Miri this time.

  “Miri, please,” he reminded her. “You agreed you would hear me out.”

  He could clearly see her inner struggle mirrored in her face. At last she gave an unhappy nod and gestured toward one of the chairs pulled up to the table.

  “You had better sit down and tell me everything.”

  “I’m still rather wet.”

  “That’s all right.” She flicked a nervous glance at him. “I don’t have any dry clothes to offer you, so I would just as soon you didn’t take anything else off.”

  “I wasn’t going to. I am rather wary of exposing my more tender parts to a sorceress or her cat.” He attempted to smile, but met with no answering response.

  As Simon drew a chair closer to the fire and sat down, Miri bustled over to her cupboard. Fetching two earthenware mugs, she tried to blot out the image of some unfortunate woman’s body broken on the rocks. Not by my hand, Simon had insisted. How desperately Miri wanted to believe him.

  But his tale had jarred her, effectively reminding her of who and what he was—a witch-hunter. Perhaps that was just as well, considering how dangerously close she had come to forgetting it when she had attended to his wound, allowing herself to be pulled a little too deeply into the velvet darkness of his gaze.

  Simon leaned back in his chair, stretching his long legs across the hearth. When Miri approached, he drew them in to allow her access to the cauldron. His damp breeches and linen shirt clung to his frame, outlining the powerful contours of his body. The sight triggered in her a memory far different from the gentle sweetness of their first and only kiss. A memory of the time she had been alone with Simon in his bedchamber at the inn in Paris. He had prowled toward her, cornering her against the wall, leaning in so close, she could feel the heat of his breath. The hard barrier of his chest brushing up against the bodice of her gown, he had used his knife to ruthlessly claim a lock of hair, his voice a sensual purr, his gaze dark and predatory.

  His intent had been to warn her to stay away from him, to alarm and intimidate her. He had certainly succeeded in that. But he had succeeded in something else as well, causing her blood to race with a longing that was lustier, earthier than anything she had ever experienced before. Her first taste of desire . . .

  Her cheeks warmed with more than the heat from the fire. Miri fought to suppress the memory as she ladled the hot liquid into one of the mugs.

  “Here,” she said, extending the cup to Simon, determinedly keeping her gaze from roving any lower than the strong cords of his neck.

  “What is this?” Simon asked as he took the cup from her hands.

  “An herbal tea that Ariane taught me to brew. Very restorative and good for fending off the chill.”

  Simon held the mug beneath his nose and sniffed the rising steam with a wary look on his face.

  “It is not poisoned, if that is what you are afraid of.”

  Simon shrugged. “I wouldn’t much care if it was.”

  “Don’t say such a dreadful thing.”

  When he glanced up at her in surprise, she continued earnestly, “It is like spitting in the face of God and scorning all the good spirits of the earth to have so little regard for yourself. Life is a precious gift.”

  “Even if one makes a miserable use of it?”

  “It is never too late to change, Simon. Pursue a different path.”

  He made no reply. Blowing on his tea to cool it, he took a cautious sip. But as Miri filled her own mug from the cauldron, he admitted, “About two years ago, I did try something different. Back when I still enjoyed the king’s favor, he gifted me with a small holding of land. I attempted to settle there, built a house and barn. I had some notion I might try breeding horses.”

  Miri twisted her head to regard him with surprise. “What happened?”

  Simon cradled his mug in his large hands, staring pensively into his tea. “I was too used to being alone and when you spend your life fighting darkness, it finally gets inside of you. I have walked in the shadows for so long, I don’t remember how to dwell in the light. I—I just didn’t seem to fit, to belong anywhere.”

  Miri turned away quickly, his words striking in her a painful answering chord. Except for the part about the darkness, Simon might well have been speaking of her. She finished filling her mug and retreated to a seat near the table.

  Simon took a swallow of his tea and continued, “Besides, it is hardly a propitious time for a witch-hunter to go into retirement when there is great evil abroad and I seem to be the only one aware of it.”

  He leveled a searching look at Miri. “I take it you have heard nothing? Not one rumor of the existence of this new coven of witches?”

  “As I have told you so many times in the past, I know nothing of any witches,” Miri replied, warming her hands with the heat pouring through her cup. “My only acquaintance is with wise women, other daughters of the earth.”

  “These women are more like daughters of darkness. They call themselves the Sisterhood of the Silver Rose. They use that flower as their emblem.”

  “Roses grow in many colors, Simon. Silver isn’t one of them.”

  “These roses are like nothing you have ever seen. Leached of all color and scent, glittering as though encased in ice. If you ever find one, don’t touch it. They are permeated with some sort of poison. A farm lad in Dieppe came across one, presented it to his sweetheart. Both he and the poor girl were cursed to a slow, lingering death.”

  Some of Miri’s skepticism must have shown on her face, for Simon scowled at her over the rim of his mug. “What? You don’t
believe me?”

  Miri delayed answering by sipping from her cup, the bitter and sweet of the brew mingling on her tongue. “The rose was likely blasted by frost and the farmer and his sweetheart merely taken ill. There are many contagious fevers and ailments that can strike suddenly, unfortunately beyond many an ignorant doctor’s ability to cure. As for all this talk of a coven . . . That’s what you used to call Ariane’s council meetings and they were nothing more than gatherings to promote friendship and share learning of the healing arts.”

  “I may have been wrong about your sister,” Simon conceded tersely. “But I am not about the Sisterhood of the Silver Rose. These women are pure evil.”

  “So what exactly do these sisters do? That is, when they are not cultivating poisonous roses and trying to kill you.”

  “Spread fear and destruction. Recruit new members to her order.”

  “Her?”

  Simon waved one hand in an impatient gesture. “The Silver Rose. The sorceress. The leader of this sisterhood. I have never seen her or heard a whisper of what her true identity might be.

  “In the beginning I suspected the Dark Queen might have something to do with this coven. She is certainly capable of wielding such destructive power. But from what I have gleaned from the Silver Rose’s followers, they consider Catherine de Medici as much of an enemy as they do me.”

  Simon frowned and added, “What little I have gleaned. These witches will kill themselves before betraying any of the Rose’s secrets. They have this fixed belief that she can bring them back from the dead.”

  He shot Miri a troubled look. “Is such a thing possible?”

  “How would I know? I don’t practice black magic. Nor do any of my family,” Miri protested. After a pause, she added reluctantly, “I have heard tell that those skilled in necromancy can communicate with the dead, but to actually bring them back to life—no, that would be going against the will of God and the laws of nature.”