Otto skipped back and thrust almost at once. Again, Alan parried the blow, but this thrust when he met it sent him reeling. The Norseman’s greater bulk gave tremendous force to his blows.
Alan’s sword flashed, Otto bounced backwards, grinning, and the stroke went wide. Otto lunged, Alan’s wine-soused feet were slow to respond, and Viking steel streaked silver fire across his chest.
‘Shit!’ There was a diagonal slash across Alan’s tunic. His skin stung, but the wound was not serious. An inch closer, however... If he got out of this in one piece, he’d never drink again.
Warily, he edged round, trying to keep Gwenn at his back and Otto before him. He heard her moan, and closed his ears to her distress. He must keep his mind on his opponent.
‘What’s amiss, le Bret, afraid I’ll disembowel your wench?’ Otto made a half-hearted pass which Alan deflected with ease. The Norseman struck again with more determination. Steel crashed, and a moment later Alan’s sword flew out and nicked a lock from the Norseman’s straggling beard.
Dancing backwards, the pale eyes fired. ‘Waking up at last? Good. You were fighting like a woman.’ Otto began his attack in earnest, and Alan had no thought for anything but his own survival.
Consciousness came back to Gwenn in uneasy stages. Her first thought was that the Viking had screwed her head from her shoulders. Her next was that her neck must be black with bruises, for the air burned hot as molten lead as it flowed down her crushed throat. Her starved lungs ached; and though she was greedy for air, pain dictated that she must ration it and breathe slowly. She was lying on dew-damp grass. As her battered senses rallied, her ears sharpened. Someone was panting. There was a crash, a grunt. More hard breathing. A groan.
She lifted leaden eyelids and pushed herself to her elbows. Dizzyingly, the meadow rolled and dipped, a great green sea of grass. A wave of nausea rushed to meet her. Pushing it aside, she saw two men. The blond one made her heart sink, but on seeing the dark, slighter form, it bounded in her breast. Alan! Her voice was disconnected, which was a blessing, she might have distracted him, and she could see he was fighting for his life. She tried to sit up. The meadow heaved and rocked. She didn’t want to watch, but her eyes were drawn as though by a string to the deadly duel. They had sprung apart for a few moments to draw breath.
Alan looked like death. His face had a bruised, exhausted look to it, his eyes were strained, his skin drawn tight across his cheekbones. He looked... ill. Sweat was pouring down his forehead, impatiently, he lifted his arm and sleeved it away. Where was Alan’s gambeson? He was not dressed for combat, being clad in a simple blue tunic she had not seen before.
The Viking, though breathing hard, was flushed with the thrill of the fight. His eyes looked ready to pop from their sockets. His chest was protected with a sleeveless mail tunic. He was ready for battle and relishing every moment. Alan was neither ready, nor relishing it.
While she steadied her rocking senses, Gwenn wondered what Alan was fighting for. For her? Or was he risking himself for the diamond? Alan’s woollen tunic had a slash across it – sight of the red tinge on the cut edges made her blood run cold. Either way, it made no difference, she wanted him to live. ‘God protect him,’ she murmured, climbing shakily to her knees. With no conscious stratagem in mind, she hauled herself upright and staggered towards the horses.
‘Yes, Gwenn!’ Alan wasted precious time to shout at her. ‘Ride! Ride for the abbey!’
Seeing his opponent momentarily diverted, Otto closed in, slashing wildly. The two men fell together. Swords cut and hacked. One of them cried out. Gwenn’s breath froze, but it was the Viking who broke away, blood streaking from under his arm. She breathed again.
‘The horses, Gwenn! Move!’
Alan’s shriek of desperation set her legs moving like a puppet’s. She reached the Norseman’s bony stallion first. Grazing, with his head down, the horse had lost the power to terrify. Taking the reins, she looked up at the high warrior’s saddle. The Viking’s dreadful axe hung on a thong from the pommel. Gwenn hesitated. Alan had his back to her. He was keeping the Viking from reaching her, hair tumbled about his head and dark with sweat. She set her foot in the stirrup. She took it out again. She couldn’t go. It wasn’t possible.
‘Go!’
He wasn’t looking at her, but she shook her head. It was no good. She couldn’t leave him facing that brute.
‘For God’s sake, Gwenn! I can’t hold him much longer.’
And then the worst happened. While sending her an anguished look, Alan slipped on the meadow grass and went down at her feet. His skull hit the ground with a sickening thud. After a moment when time seemed to stand still, he opened his eyes, and looked an unmistakable apology at her. Gwenn’s heart turned over. Blindly she moved towards him. His lips framed one word. ‘Gwenn.’ And then his eyes closed and his head lolled to one side.
The Viking hugged his wounded arm close to his chest, blood dripped down his sleeve. Glancing disinterestedly at Gwenn, he kicked Alan’s sword well out of his reach. He stooped over Alan and his sword lifted...
Gwenn retreated, backing up against the stallion. Her breath was coming in short, jerky gasps. Sliding her fingers along the saddle horn, she grabbed the handle of the barbaric axe and wrenched it towards her. The thong snapped. She had to act quickly. She needed two hands to lift the axe, but lift it she did, raising it above her head. A strand of fine blond hair waved in the breeze as the Viking bowed over Alan, and she wished she had not noticed it. It made the monster human, made it impossible for her to kill him. But she must kill him, she must, and swiftly. The axe-head glinted in the sunlight. Gwenn quivered to her core. She had never killed a man, she couldn’t kill a man, but she had to kill this one, because if she didn’t he would butcher Alan, and then he would turn on her, though that last scarcely mattered.
The Norseman’s neck was white and glistening with sweat. She raised the axe. She sent it chopping down, but with a disgusted moan she twisted it at the last second, so the flat of the blade and not the edge cracked against his skull. He grunted softly and dropped like a stone, right over Alan.
The axe fell to the grass. She hadn’t been able to bring herself to kill him, but God grant she had knocked him into the next century. She had bought a little time.
Her knees softened. She fell to the ground, heaved the Viking off Alan, and shook Alan. ‘Alan?’ Alan’s head rolled. Keeping it steady, she gripped his arm. ‘Alan? Wake up!’ His cheeks were grey, and his lips pale. ‘Alan.’ Not a movement. She shook him less gently. ‘Alan! Oh, God, not Alan too. Please, God, not Alan.’
She drew his head onto her knees. Blood. Her pulse pounded. His blood was everywhere. Tenderly parting the sweat-streaked hair, she found its source, a great gash in his skull. He had cracked his head on a stone when he fell. Glancing at the rich turf, she found the culprit at once. The Stone Rose smiled innocently up at her from the spot where a moment ago Alan’s head had lain. The pink granite bore telltale traces of blood.
Cold as ice, she scrabbled for his pulse and failed to find it. She was seized with the most hideous conviction. The statue had killed Alan, as it killed everyone she ever loved. The Stone Rose had killed Alan. In a moment she became a madwoman. ‘No! No! You shall not have him! You shall not. Wake up, Alan. I need you! You can’t die, you’re a devil, and devils don’t die!’
Frenzied, raging, she pushed him off her knees, pressing her head to the torn tunic to hear his heartbeat. But her ears were filled with the frantic drumming of her own racing heart. Wildly, she clutched his shoulders, but he lay on the meadow like a corpse. ‘Alan? Alan?’ She pressed her face against the bloody tunic. ‘Alan,’ she murmured into the warmth of his chest, ‘I need you. Don’t leave me.’
Alan coughed, and drew in a convulsive lungful of air.
Gwenn flew upright. The grey eyes were open and focused on her. Shuddering, she touched his cheek. His sinful mouth drew up at one side. He started, shot up, glanced at the prone figure and groped for his sword. ‘Malait?’