Rhiana

After an incident with sickness last summer all of Paul’s hair had fallen out. Now, recovered and healthy thanks to Odette’s infamous comfrey poultice, he continued to shave off the new growth. Rhiana liked his shiny bald pate. It was soft and round, like his giving heart. The man embodied integrity in his simple manner and devotion to his family.

He flashed her a brilliant smile, and with a shrug, worked his shoulders against the rounding hours leaning over the anvil forged into his muscles. A nod of his head summoned Rhiana to his side.

The glowing curve of iron he held with tongs could not be left unattended, so he divided his attention between it and her. A forceful pound of the hammer clanged the molten metal and sparks danced out like fire sprites.

“Come from the caves?”

Rhiana nodded as she reached behind her waist to itch at the leather points securing her tunic to the mail chausses.

“Was it as you suspected?” he asked.

“Yes, and no. There may be more than one of them,” Rhiana explained. “I didn’t have a chance to focus and count, but certainly there could be another.”

“Another?”

“Yes, I sensed another heartbeat after—Oh, Paul! I took out a female rampant.”

“You did?” He winked and smiled broadly. So much pride in that look. Another pound. Sparks glittered in the air between them. “So the armor is good?”

Rhiana dropped the wool cloak to a puddle around her feet. The entire armored tunic glittered with the mystique of the beasts. Fashioned from dragon scales, the iridescent disks changed from indigo to violet beneath the sun. Paul had smoothed the sharp edges and pierced holes in each scale with such care. After much trial and error, he’d discovered the only tool capable of piercing the scale was an actual dragon’s talon or tooth. He’d designed a small inner tooth, which the beast used for ripping its prey apart, as a punch.

“It’s remarkable.”

Rhiana felt no embarrassment standing before Paul in the flesh-baring costume. But the backs of her arms and a narrow slit down each side of her torso showed. Paul had worked with her to fit the scales to her body to provide maximum movement along with minimal weight and excess attire. It was he who had suggested she wear a thin tunic beneath, for her modesty, but they both knew Rhiana would be sewing many a tunic should her slaying skills ever be called upon.

“Change in the closet,” he said, turning the curve of molten iron, held with a pincers, to begin working the opposite side. The dry metallic scent of heated iron was most pleasant to Rhiana’s senses. “The gown you keep stashed in there waits. Did no one see you reenter the village?”

“Rudolph is most discreet,” Rhiana called as she slipped into the tool closet and closed the creaky wood door.

“Only because you have cowed him over the years,” Paul said. With a laugh, he again hammered at the supple metal.

They both felt it important to keep Rhiana’s slaying discreet. Certainly the threat to the village must be dispatched. But so many had difficulty accepting a female as a powerful and strong force.

It dumbfounded Rhiana. Why should she not be allowed to perform the same tasks as men?

Inside the closet, her eyes strayed across the items on the many supply shelves. Splaying her fingers across a tray of wire rings she’d fashioned a few days earlier made her smile. Crafting mail, she enjoyed. Almost as much as slaying.

She unfastened the leather straps placed from armpit to hip neatly concealed with overlapping dragon scales. The leather tunic slipped from her body, baring her breasts. Tugging out the slips of burnt tunic from around her neck and at her waist, she tossed them into the waste barrel.

Exhaling deeply, Rhiana thrust back her shoulders and lifted her arms over her head in a languorous stretch. So alive, she felt. Vigorous and strong. A flex of her arm bulged the muscle above her elbow. Like a man’s muscles, she mused. Constant training with the sword and working with Paul kept her muscles hard. And that hard work had paid off.

The moment she had stood before the dragon, defiant, had truly been a pinnacle. For her only other kill had been assisted. This one was all her own.

“I’m a real slayer,” she murmured. “Finally.”

A folded blue-gray gown waited on the shelf. For emergencies, which is why she hadn’t left one of her two pairs of braies—she used those daily. Bits of dried lavender fell from between the folds as she shook it out.

Slipping the ells of soft damask over her head, Rhiana shimmied into the plain gown. Once silver vair had rimmed the hems of her sleeves, but the fur tickled overmuch, so she’d stripped it and gave it to Odette to sew onto a pair of house slippers. Rich as the village was, traders rarely visited, so fur of any sort was highly valued.

She stroked the gold coin suspended around her neck on a thin leather strip. Barter was the only form of purchase; coin had little value.

Shucking the mail chausses in a chinking pool about her bare feet, she then peeled down the wool hose, which were still connected to the points of her tattered tunic, fried to a crisp as they were. The softness of the damask fluttering about her legs felt ridiculous. So light, not at all protective. The gown was…not her. Many were accustomed to seeing her wear braies and tunic, but on occasion she did wear a gown. Only a gown caressed her waist and bosom and revealed to a man that, indeed, she was a woman. Look at me, she felt the gown called when she wore one.

And what be wrong with seeking a man’s attentions?

Still, many whispered as she strode by, defying propriety in her comfortable male costume. And to even consider her ambition? A female who dons armor and wields a crossbow? Insanity.

Carefully, she placed the armor upon the wooden stand and covered it with a tarp of boiled leather. While every man in the village was aware of her passion, they had not seen this latest armor made by Paul. Even those who looked to her with hope for their safety would be horrified. Women simply did not tromp about in mail and armor, acting powerful and flexing their muscles as a man.

Tossing her hair over her shoulder, Rhiana stepped back from the armor. Thick, loose curls tumbled across her back and swept about her waist. Ever teased as a child for her red hair and freckles—surely a witch, be she—Rhiana had come to accept her differences, but only after being assured by the village hag that she was not a witch.

Something so much more…

The hag, known to all as the Nose, after reading Rhiana’s future in the flames of a hearth fire, had flashed her a frightened grimace and shuffled her out from her cottage.

So much more?

Indeed.

CHAPTER THREE

As opposed to setting up a small bake shop in her own home, Rhiana’s mother worked in the castle kitchen. Lydia rose before the sun and wandered home late in the evening. It was a labor of love, for Lydia was the castle’s pastry chef, and delighted many with her designs fashioned from sugar, nuts and honey. Holidays such as Lent and Midsummer, were made all the more festive with Lydia’s creations gracing the high table.

Odette, Rhiana’s half-sister, would be either at home fretting over some bits of lace to attach to her sleeves or in the castle kitchen sampling Lydia’s wares. Odette strove for little in life, save a plump waistline to attract a fine and fruitful husband. Though she did favor the medical arts—stitching up wounded knights landed high on her list of activities.

None in St. Rénan strove for much more than a simple life filled with all the luxury that could be managed. Thanks to the hoard, the village thrived. Where most cities and villages paid the taille to their lord, St. Rénan had developed its own form of reverse-taille, paying to each citizen a yearly stipend. One would think the entire city lazy and roustabouts, but that was not so. Every able body worked hard, and in return celebrated the fruits of their labors with fine furnishings, elegant clothing and always food on the table. Starvation was not something the people of St. Rénan understood, for should the crops be poor one summer, a trek to a neighboring village, or even a sojourn to the debauched city of Paris, to purchase food was undertaken. Anything could be had for a price.

The Hoard Council, formed by Pascal Guiscard three decades earlier, monitored the disbursements and insured none in the village became slackards. If you did not pull your weight, you did not receive the stipend. Very few were thrown into the dungeons for shirking their duties. The village was small, working as a companionable hive. All guarded the secret with a blood oath taken before Lord Guiscard upon their sixteenth birthday.

Bi-yearly hoard-raids were celebrated with a fête and great bonfire (which, Rhiana mused, was lit in defiance of the dragons). Though, not many had been venturing beyond the curtain walls the past few days.

So Rhiana’s trip through the city this morn was met with little but the stray pig from Dame Gemma’s stables snorting in the onions and cress planted outside the woman’s three-story manor. Children were kept safe behind closed door, or close in sight splashing in a nearby puddle or playing stones with a neighboring child.

Rhiana gave no regard to the half-dozen knights who marched purposefully toward her—in full armor, as usual. Though Lord Guiscard’s knights were called to little warfare, and even less martial exercise, Rhiana had decided they wore the full armor to look opposing. And to attract the opposite sex. There were many marriageable young women in St. Rénan; wenching was one of the knights’ favorite exercises.

Champrey, Guiscard’s seneschal, strode in the lead. He was hounded by a rank of hulking shoulders and rugged, dirty glares.

The men in the village were so desperately primal. Baths were rare, for the claim of little physical exertion kept them clean. Yet, much as Odette was always complaining of the knights’ awkwardly amorous attempts to seduce her, Rhiana had never fielded an unwarranted touch from any. She knew what the men thought of her. Not right, mayhap a witch. Certainly not feminine. She did try, when she thought of it. But emulating Lady Anne’s walk always saw Rhiana tripping over her own feet.

But did the men in the village, at the very least, see her as a woman?

Obviously not. It was only when Rhiana had developed breasts that Rudolph’s father had admonished him not to play with her. She was a girl, not the boy his father had thought her. Fortunately, Rudolph had never cared one way or the other. Their friendship remained strong; like siblings, they continued to taunt, torment, and love one another.

Rhiana craved a kind look from a man—any man who was not Rudolph or Paul. And, perhaps, not so kind a look as a promising one. Something that said to her, I favor you. Your strength does not frighten me. I can accept without fear or jealousy.

For those were the reasons no man approached her. They feared her independence. They were jealous of her strength.

Sighing, and striding onward, Rhiana realized the band of knights had stopped before her. Armor clattered and gauntlets clinked about sword hilts. Not a one would make a move to allow her passage.