Free Dragon Tree by Marsha Canham

his
clothes looked like a butcher’s apron and he knew from his
reflection in the pond that there were streaks of it splattered
across his face and hair. He cupped his hands in the water again
and started to scoop some out to rinse it off... but stopped. The
blood made him feel strong. It made him feel powerful.
Invincible.
    Pushing to his
feet, he turned and glared around the camp site. He was a handsome
man, broadly built, with shoulders and legs bulging with muscle.
The color of his hair combined with the quantity that grew across
his shoulders and back had earned him the byname Red Boar, and he
had incorporated a depiction of the snarling beast into his coat of
arms. He had run the lists many a time and never been unhorsed,
never been defeated. At twenty and six, he was in his prime and had
no fear of an aging, disgraced, banished, and defrocked warrior
monk.
    His brother
was leaning against a tree a few feet away, and when Odo caught his
eye, Rolf de Langois limped over.
    “Your leg
troubles you?”
    Rolf shrugged.
He was leaner than his brother, with chiselled features that verged
on beautiful. His hair was dark, his eyes long-lashed and
almond-shaped. He had a sweet singing voice, a deceptively stunning
contrast to the lethal, coldblooded instincts of the killer that he
possessed. “The wound is healing and tolerable.”
    “Good. For I
was wondering if we should pay our respects to this so-called
Dragonslayer.”
    “You think he
may have Elizabeth?”
    “I think she
did not get up and walk out of the forest on her own.”
    Rolf nodded.
“We cannot be sure it was even her.”
    “It was her,”
Odo said through a snarl. “And if she thinks to hide from me at
Taniere Castle, I will know. I will know and I will have her
out.”
    “Tamberlane is
still the king’s man. What if she speaks out of turn?”
    “She will say
nothing, she will do nothing. She gives her trust as readily as a
fox to a hound.”
    “She
apparently trusted the friar.”
    “Yes.” Odo’s
eyes narrowed and he glanced across the clearing to where a slender
figure in the brown robes of a mendicant sat slumped at the base of
a tree. Several loops of rope were circled around his chest binding
him to the trunk. His hands and feet were bound as well though it
was more for the pain and discomfort the ropes inflicted than an
additional safeguard against escape.
    They had
caught Friar Guilford walking alone, out on the open road, not far
from a broken cart they had found hidden in the forest. He had
pleaded ignorance, of course, declaring he knew nothing about Odo’s
missing wife, denying he had helped her escape Belmane. But the
purse he wore at his waist contained too many coins for a priest to
explain away on happenstance. And his eyes, when questioned about
his destination, had flicked away from Odo’s and betrayed the lies
for what they were.
    “How many men
have we in camp?”
    “Thirty-eight.
Six of them mounted.”
    Odo pursed his
lips. “When we approach Taniere Castle, we would do well to do so
without showing our full strength. As a knight as well as a monk,
Tamberlane cannot refuse hospitality to a brother knight...
especially one who fears for his safety in a greenwood filled with
outlaws.”
    “And if your
wife has, indeed, begged sanctuary inside the castle walls?”
    Odo smiled
wanly. “It breaks the laws of both God and man to keep a wife from
her husband, especially one who has already attempted murder once
and might well kill again."
    Rolf pursed
his lips. "She is a beautiful woman. She might beguile this warrior
monk with her body and her lies. She might persuade him to keep her
hidden."
    Odo’s smile
thinned. “If she is there, I will feel her presence and smell the
odor of treachery between her thighs.”
    “Nevertheless,
perhaps we should have some bait with us to draw her out?”
    Odo followed
the tilt of his brother’s head to where Friar Guilford was slumped
against the tree. “He is almost dead now. As bait, he