So Speaks the Heart by Johanna Lindsey Read Free Book Online Page B

think you can take over here, you will end as the others did—dead.”
    Too shaken to reply, Brigitte stumbled away fromher. They soon left Wilhelm’s house, and Brigitte stammered her good-byes through a blur of tears.
    Tears still blurred her vision as they rode off toward home. Brigitte’s guards were close by. How could she ride to Count Arnulf if they would not let her out of their sight? she wondered.
    But what really did she have to lose if she made a desperate attempt to reach Arnulf? Suddenly she wiped at her eyes angrily and dug her heels into her horse. For several moments, she and her mare flew from the others. But her guards had been expecting this, and they caught up with her quickly, before she passed the last cobbled hut in Wilhelm’s village.
    They brought her back to where Druoda waited, and Brigitte was met by a blow that took her unawares and knocked her off her horse. She fell into the mud, the breath knocked from her. It brought her rage to the point of explosion, but she did not vent her anger on Druoda. She kept it under control, and as far as Druoda could see, Brigitte was beaten. She wiped at the mud on her face and allowed herself to be handed roughly back up onto her mare.
    Brigitte simmered silently. She waited patiently for her companions to relax their guard, careful always to ride slumped in her saddle and give every impression of submissiveness. But Brigitte was feeling far from submissive.
    So engrossed in thought was she that she was not aware it had grown dark until the chill of night stung her cheeks. She quickly raised the hood of her mantle and pulled it closer over her head. While doing so, she studied her companions furtively and saw that only Druoda was riding close to her. The guards hadgone a short way ahead of the women in order to protect them from night raiders.
    This was her chance. With night upon them, she could hide in the dark. She would never be as close to Count Arnulf as she was now. Gathering her reins in a tight fist and moving closer to Druoda, she used them to whip Druoda’s mare, sending the horse charging into the guards, while Brigitte spun about and galloped off in the opposite direction.
    This time she was able to put a good distance between herself and the guards before they gave pursuit. A half mile down the road she slowed and turned off into the woods, the shadows there black as pitch and perfect for concealment. She quickly slid off her mare and began walking her horse slowly through the dark maze. A few moments later she heard the guards race past her on the old track road.
    She knew the forest, for she had traveled it often with her parents when they visited Count Arnulf. On the other side of the woods there was a wider road, the old road between Orleans and Bourges, and that route would take her to Arnulf. She had only to get through the forest. However, that was no small feat.
    As her fear of Druoda’s guards lessened, the frightening sounds of the forest began to assault her, and Brigitte remembered Leandor’s dire warnings about thieves and murderers, groups of brigands who lived in forests. She quickened her pace till she was nearly running, and suddenly she burst through the woods into a clearing. Panic seized her. She looked around frantically, expecting to see a fire with men surrounding it. She gasped with relief, for it was nota clearing she stood in but the road—she had made it to the road!
    She drew back into the shadows and hastily shed her gown and tunic, all but an old woolen tunic next to her skin. She then wrapped her other gowns around her waist. Thin as they were, they were not too bulky. She put her mantle back on but did not clasp it, so that if she came upon anyone she could remove it quickly and be left in peasant’s garb.
    She mounted again and rode south, exhilarated, feeling free. There would be no wedding to Wilhelm. And there would be no more Druoda, for Arnulf would not take kindly to her