“Love potion?”Doraliceset her doe eyes wide.
“It’s responsible for twoscore or more marriages in over four provinces,” Berta said.“Including Patience and Willem’s, and Enid and herhusband’s.”
Doralice looked to Patience, whogrinned.“It only took Willem ten and four days after I gave himthe potion to propose.”
“How long?”Doralice’seyes grew even wider.
Patience laughed.“I knew he was madfor me, and I let him know I was mad for him by offering him thelove potion.”
“Which is the true secretto the potion,” Lara told Doralice.“I’ll make up a batch and giveyou a vial.Phillipe will know what it is and what it means, andwe’ll be having a wedding at the keep before the summer is out andsewing a quilt for your firstborn this time next year.”
Red crept across Doralice’s cheeks anddown her neck, and Lara thought it a good thing Phillipe was a kindman with enough experience to make their wedding nightspecial.
“Mama.”Isabeau toddledtoward Lara, a dandelion in full bloom clutched in her little hand.“Mama, ook.”She scrunched up her face and blew with all her mightat the feathery seed ball and missed.
“Here, Issy.”Wilric,almost a year older, took the dandelion stem in his pudgy hand.“Yike dis.”
He held the stalk still, making sureIsabeau watched as he blew.Next to their mamas and papas, theywere each other’s favorite people in the world: a preference soobvious that Willem had been teasing Talon about his daughter’sdowry since Wilric first laid eyes on Isabeau.Issy clapped as thedandelion puff blew into a hundred floating pods, and Wilric beamedand marched around in circles with the bare stalk brandished high.The women all laughed and clapped their approval, when Wolf, whowas lying in the cool grass next to Sophie’s grave, lifted his headand cocked his ears toward the river.
He stood, sniffing the air, and Larawent to stand beside him, shading her eyes with her hand to gazeacross the water at the far shore where shadows and light movedamidst the trees.The hairs on the back of her neck rose as Wolf’sbristled.
“What is it, Wolf?”sheasked.The women at the table had fallen quiet too, so she glancedover at the bench outside the barn where Tree had been sittingwhile whittling away at a piece of wood.He had stood and wassurveying the river’s edge.
“Ladies.”Lara kept hervoice calm and serious.“Take the children into the house.”Shepulled her waist knife and gripped it tight.
An arrow whistled and struck Wolf inthe haunch with a sickening thunk.
“Run,” she yelled over her shoulder as she dropped to the groundbeside Wolf, who snarled and chewed at the shaft sticking out ofhis thigh, a shaft with a cresting and fletching that she’d seensticking out of hundreds of dead men and horses at RoncesvallesPass.“Take the children and flee.Now.”
Tree came running toward her and Wolf,but arrows struck him down in his chest, arm, and leg.Loathe toleave Wolf, Lara broke off the shaft in his leg close to his woundso he couldn’t do as much damage to himself and stood to go toTree.
Before she’d gotten three strides, avolley of arrows pinned her to her spot, followed by a secondvolley pinning the women and children scrambling away from thetable.Doralice held Isabeau, who started crying, and Bertashielded a still-seated Marta.Patience had a hold of Wilric, andEnid glanced wildly about at the palisade of arrows circlingthem.
“Stay where you are,” aman called out from the river, his voice heavily accented, “and youwill not be harmed.”
Lara nodded to the other women,sheathed her knife, then held her hands up.Six men dressed inplain brown breeches and tunics with arrows notched to their bows,all aimed at the women, crossed the river.Tree lay unmoving asWolf pulled himself up and limped over to stand next to Lara, a lowgrowl rumbling in his throat.
As the men made the near shore, Wolf’sgrowl grew louder.One of the men lowered his arrow’s point at thehound’s chest.
“No.”Lara dropped to her knees and wrapped her arms aroundWolf’s neck.“You don’t need to shoot him.He’ll not attack if Itell him to stay.”
The man pointing the arrow at Wolflooked to a swarthy man with shoulder-length brown hair and a trimbeard, waiting, it seemed, for his decision.
“I swear to you,” Larasaid directly to the man she guessed to be their leader.“The dogwill do what I say.”
The man nodded.
“Down, Wolf.”She helpedhim lie down on his good side, then kissed his nose and laid herhand on his head.“Stay.”She stood to face the raiders as theystopped no more than three paces from her.
“Otsoa,” one of the men muttered.The Basque word forwolf.
“Bat datxakurra,” the leader snapped.It’s a dog.
Lara stared blankly at the men,pretending not to understand a word of what they’d said.Though shewas nowhere near fluent in the Basque language, she’d grown up onthe border knowing a little and had learned more from Talon.He’dalso taught her the value of letting your captive, or captor, thinkyou ignorant of their language until it was to your advantage notto.
“Your knives,” the leader,who obviously spoke and understood the Frank language, said,holding his hand out.Lara handed him her waist knife.“Leg knifetoo.”
How would he know she wore a daggertied to her thigh?