Page 3 of The Bodyguard Who Came in from the Cold
Side by side, they knelt at the edge of the brook and cleaned the fish smell from their hands. Something suddenly glittered beneath the surface. Gareth grasped the object and rose to his feet for the best light. It was just a gray stone, but imbedded in the center was a cloudy piece of crystal that caught the rays of the sun. Margery reached for it in delight, laughing.
In her haste, she knocked it from his hand, and it bounced along the rocky edge of the brook. As Margery picked up the two pieces of the broken stone, her breath caught on a muffled sob. Gareth knew that her grief had little to do with the stone.
“Margery, look, ’tis just as shiny as ever. And now there’s a piece for each of us, so we can remember today.”
She looked at the two stones, then gave one to him. When she lifted her face, he felt his heart give a painful lurch at the redness of her nose and eyes.
“I shall keep this always,” he said.
A smile tugged at one corner of her lips, and she clenched the shining stone tightly in her fist.
His gaze rose over her head in the direction of Wellespring Castle and he tried to mask his worry. If he could keep Margery busy, she wouldn’t have time to be afraid.
For three days, they waited for word from Lord Welles. They slept in a bed of leaves in the tunnel by night, and played games of survival by day. He taught her to snare rabbits, then how to cook them. They played hiding games in the forest, moving from tree to tree in an attempt to outwit each other. He made two pouches, so they could each carry their crystal stone on their belts. She was his first friend, and he pretended that someday when she found out about the Beaumont Curse, she wouldn’t care.
On the fourth day, they heard soldiers riding through the forest. Gareth retreated to a little fort they’d built high in the trees and held Margery close. Hoarse voices called her name.
“ ’Tis my brothers!” she said in relief.
He found himself rubbing the crystal stone in its pouch at his waist and waited for her to climb down to her family, leaving him alone once more.
She took his hand. “Will you still be my friend when we go back?”
“Forever.” The word reverberated through his soul like a blood vow. He had discovered what it was like to be a man, to take care of someone.
She descended from their perch and into the waiting arms of her brother Reynold, only three years older than Gareth. James Markham, Earl of Bolton, not yet twenty, watched Gareth closely as he reached the ground.
“My lords,” Gareth said, bowing his head stiffly. “I hope all is well at the castle.”
They hesitated, and he knew in that moment that his visions, though unclear, had not betrayed him.
Margery pulled away from Reynold. “Father?”
Her brothers looked grim.
“Not Father!” she cried. “But where is Edmund?”
“He is fine,” Reynold said as she buried her face in his tunic and sobbed. “He is with Father’s body.”
Gareth’s chest felt tight as he watched her tears. Reynold guided his horse out of the clearing, taking Margery away.
James looked Gareth over. “When we arrived home, we searched the castle for Margery and found the tunnel open. How did you know to escape?”
He could hardly say that strange visions haunted him. “Your stepfather told me about the tunnel, Lord Bolton. He asked me to keep her safe.”
“My thanks to you,” James said grudgingly.
“How did your stepfather die?”
“An arrow. We lost five soldiers, and others are wounded—but Hunter will never bother us again. I shall go to the king with this treachery.”
Gareth soon came to realize that Margery’s brothers did not quite believe his story. Within a week he was sent to another household to finish his fostering. Surely Margery would tell her brothers that it was all a mistake, that Gareth was her friend, that his knowledge had not been gained by betraying them to their enemies.
But Margery’s brothers never came back for him.
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JUNE, 1487
