The Wild Hunt by Elizabeth Chadwick Read Free Book Online Page A

returned to the bed. 'Not that she'll bite anyone, but she'll greet them with such enthusiasm that we'll have warning enough of eavesdroppers.'
    Judith smiled wanly. Her eyes flickered again to his crotch. Guyon sought out his indoor cloak, swept it around himself and handed Judith her chemise from an arm's length distance. She took it and struggled clumsily into the garment, feeling all fingers and thumbs.
    Guyon paced over to the narrow window and pulled back the hide covering to look out on a slit of whirling white darkness. 'I meant what I said, Cath fach, ' he murmured without turning round.
    'You need not fear me.'
    The logs in the hearth crackled and settled. 'I am not afraid,' Judith lied, clutching the bedrobe across her breasts.
    'No?' He glanced over his shoulder.
    'Well , only a little. I know mama and the others meant well , but they besieged me with their good advice.'
    'Such as pots of salve,' he said and, pinning back the hide, turned around. She was watching him anxiously, like a dog desiring desperately to please but afraid of being kicked. Her tawny hair tumbled over the coverlet taking on ruddy highlights from the fire, and was really quite attractive. Her eyes were mingled grey and brown like the muddy water churning beneath the battlements and equally full of turbulence. A veil of honey-gold freckles dappled her face and throat and, for an infinitesimal moment, she reminded Guyon of someone else. The impression, however, was too fleeting to be caught as she moved her head, changing the play of light on the angles of bone.
    'My mother is skilled in herb lore,' she said. 'So it would seem,' he said drily. 'Do you have the same competence?'
    'She has taught me what she knows.'
    He poured himself some wine from the flagon left on the chest and, returning to the bed with it, seated himself on the end and considered her.
    'So if I cut my arm with a blade, what would you do?'
     
    'Self-inflicted? I would dose you with valerian to rectify your disordered wits!' she answered with spirit and then, at his silence, sobered and looked down, thinking that she had gone too far.
    'No, inflicted by the blade of my wife's tongue!'
    he chuckled, 'which I hazard is as keen as a sword once unsheathed!'
    Judith eyed him warily, but saw nothing in his face to contradict the honesty of his amusement.
    'If it was a deep wound,' she said, 'I would sprinkle it with powdered comfrey root to ease the bleeding, then stitch it and bind it with a piece of mouldy bread.'
    'Mouldy bread!'
    'It is a remedy handed down from Grandma FitzOsbern and it usually works. Deep wounds heal cleanly without going proud or filling with pus.
    The main danger is from the stiffening sickness. If the wound was only a scratch, I would clean it with water in which pine needles had been steeped and then smear it with honey and bind as necessary.'
    Guyon studied her as she spoke so earnestly and fought a battle to keep his amusement from showing on his face. In itself, the information was interesting and her obviously detailed knowledge showed that Alicia was justified in commending her daughter's skill . It was just so incongruous that this slender willow-twig of a girl with all her innocence and uncertainty should hold forth like a grey-haired matron of sedentary years.
    The incongruity continued to deepen as he fur the r explored her knowledge of matters domestic. He learned the best way to salt pork and hang sausages, exactly how much madder was required to dye cloth a certain shade of red and which water to use, the correct ingredients to make a venison ragout, how to buy spices without being cheated. He almost choked on his wine when she began to explain to him the best way to go about honing a sword.
    'Your mother taught you that too!'
    'Of course not!' she retorted, tone indignant now that she had gained a spark of confidence. 'De Bec showed me last winter when we were snowed in. He showed me how to use a knife too... Are you all right my