Free Faerie by Delle Jacobs Page B

and hideous pain, she tumbled through the air.
    “Joceline!”
    His magic fetters vanished, yet he did not think of them, for his heart was tearing from his soul as he ran to the window. But it was too late. Her last screams faded in the rush of flames engulfing the corpse below.
    “Joceline!”
    Anguish wrenched through him and turned to murderous rage. With one fierce move, he drew his sword and slashed through the sorcerer’s neck. The head bounced and rolled across the chamber and came to a stop, sitting erect on the cleanly severed base of its neck.
    The eyes still moved. The mouth opened. Philippe froze in shock, gaping at the impossible.
    “I curse you!” said the head. “By my blood, I curse you, Philippe, spawn of Evraneaux. Never shall you love again, save she who you will slay by your own hand.”
    Rage turned his vision black. Philippe speared the head with his sword and flung it through the lancet window as far as it would go.
    “Joceline, Joceline, it is my fault. You died because of my failure.”
    When he returned to the tower, the sorcerer’s body was gone. And out in the bailey where he had flung the head, not even a drop of blood could be found.
    The Peregrine rode, endlessly searching for the sorcerer Clodomir, to free the world from his evil. All over the known worldhe rode for two years, pursuing the vanished sorcerer, seeking clues and finding none. Defeated, he returned to Evraneaux.
    The wandering Peregrine held the falcon seal of Evraneaux in his hand and passed it to his brother, Jean. His failure was bitter gall.
    “You should not do this, brother.”
    But Philippe knew he must. His shame that he had ruined family and manor in his quest was more than he could bear. Jean could save them. Philippe would only destroy them.
    “I must. Now I am the true Peregrine.”
    The seal of Evraneaux belonged to Jean now.
    Only Philippe knew his great guilt. Only he knew why he would remain landless and penniless and penitent to the end of his days.
    He rode and rode and rode, vowing never again to fail. Never again betray.
    “Joceline.”
    “Philippe?”
    Claire’s soft voice echoed in the damp air of the chapel, stirring Philippe where he lay on the stone floor. He rose to his knees, then stood, his body stiff and aching. Around him others stood in the chapel or prayed on their knees. Had he fallen asleep? Or had the old vision come upon him once again as it had so many times, waking or sleeping?
    “Aye,” he answered, his hushed words echoing off the stone walls. He rubbed a hand over his face, then crossed himself before leaving the altar and exiting the chapel.
    “I fear I failed in my vigil and fell asleep. How fares the lady?”
    “You slept, but you did not fail. God has answered your prayers. She has wakened, and the priest has left, for it is apparent she is not in so much danger now. She asked for Sigge, theboy who was with her, but we only told her he was safe. And she called your name.”
    “Odd,” he replied as they walked. “She was not conscious when I found her. She could not know it was I.”
    “But she might. If she has awakened since so easily, she might have stirred enough to know you were there. Now she is sleeping again. She is in much pain. I have left her with Ealga, who can manage my mother now. I shall take my turn to sleep.”
    “I must go soon. May I see her before I leave?”
    “Haps peek in, but you should not wake her.”
    “I would not. Only to reassure myself.”
    She nodded. Philippe followed her through the hall and up the worn stone stairs to the solar. Beyond was the open door of the ladies’ chamber and the bed. They slipped silently inside.
    Leonie lay on the bed, curled up in a ball like a small child. The ashen color that had so terrified him had only slightly warmed.
    Lady Beatrice glanced up at him and whimpered.
    Ealga’s grim smile folded into the wrinkles of her face as she beckoned him forward. “Lady,” she said to Leonie, “can you wake?