John untied the armguard and set it gently to the side before removing his breastplate. He pulled the tie on his shirt just as a steady thump sounded on the wood of his door. With a sigh he walked the stone floor to the door and tugged it from the snug hold of the doorframe.
The sight before him took his breath a moment. Lady Winter stood in the doorway, a dressing gown tied about her waist with her hair twisted into a braid that rested on her shoulder like a rope of gold. He coughed, recovering himself, and nodded his head, "Lady Winter, how can I be of assistance?"
"Oh," She held up the hand not wrapped around the holder keeping her candle aloft. "I'm sorry to have disturbed you during your evening ritual. I've caught you quite off guard, General."
"I'm afraid you have." He shifted in the doorway, noting how her eyes seemed taken with the open portion of his shirt. "Whatever are you doing up at this hour, alone?"
"It's my home, General, and I don't fear the dark." She nodded toward his room, "Is your room to your liking?"
"It's more than satisfactory, milady."
"If not, my room is available." Lady Winter blushed when she realized what she said. With a nervous laugh she tried to recover, "What I meant to say is, if your room is not good enough then you may exchange for mine. It's the best room in the Keep."
"Then it belongs to you, milady, not to me."
"Well, should you change your mind General, it's available to you." She curtsied to him in her nightgown. "Good night."
"Good night Lady Winter." John shut the door, grumbling to himself. "Women, always worrying about comfort when there are bigger concerns."
A louder slam on the wood drew him back to the door and he opened it in a rush. Lady Winter stood there, her face stone. Her mouth thinned to a line before she opened it.
"I heard you, through the door, because it's not as thick as you might imagine. Further, in response to your comment, I'll have you know that my invitation was as a hostess. It is the duty of every woman responsible for the comfort of those in her house to ensure they are taken care of. As such, and being raised a lady, I take it very seriously. To continue, should you disapprove of your accommodations I can make others in the stables for you."
John grunted, clearing his throat. "I can see I offended you."
"Was that not your intention?"
"If it was I accomplished it rather poorly."
"That you did General." She stood as tall as her smaller frame could manage. "This is my home and I protect it, General. Comfort is not something I've known intimately in my life. Despite your beliefs to the contrary I'm hard enough for this Keep and its environs. Are you?"
Before he could answer she nodded curtly at him. "Good night."
She reached forward and pulled the door closed with a snap. John stared at it, blinking to himself before smiling slightly. He removed his shirt, so occupied in his thoughts that he barely noticed the knocking on his door until it sounded like something slapping the flat of their hand against it.
"Good gods above!" John wrenched the door open, staring at the surprised face of Captain Green. "Have you a god reason for being here at this moment Captain?"
"I was reporting that all entrances are guarded and the Keep is secured for the night."
"I should hope so." John noted Green's eyes tracing the scar that corded around his chest to stop just above where the line of his armor and uniform usually rested. "Have you something else to say, Captain?"
"No sir." Green snapped a salute and John returned it before dismissing the man down the hall.
John closed the door, moving to the fireplace to add another log to the crackling flames there. He lowered his candle to the fire and lit it before tucking it into the candleholder to bring it to the sill where the large window looked at the turn in the Keep. Out of the corner of his eye he noticed a glow through the window and squinted to find what it could be.
It was as if the air left the room. John gritted his teeth to control his reaction as he caught sight of Lady Winter in the room across the Keep. Her candle glowed in the window and John could see her form outlined as she removed her dressing gown, exposing her nightdress to his view.
She climbed into her bed, blowing out the candle but not before he saw how she looked up toward his window. John backed away, chest rising and falling with the speedy thump of his heart. With his fingers he extinguished his candle, peeking around the edge of the window to see the dark window in the distance.
He finished pulling off his trousers, climbing into bed to the awful creak of the mattress. Silence reigned through the room, the whistle and howl of the wind through the Keep the only companion to the night. John tried to ease himself to sleep, hoping to ignore the feeling creeping up his spine, and closed his eyes.
A thud opened his eyes faster than lightning. He sat up, squinting in the dark at his door but the sound echoed from deeper in the Keep. The blankets came off him in a flash and he closed his eyes to better hear the origins of the sound.
Flashing through the window caught his attention and John ducked down to see Lady Winter holding a stick to a candle and then it in the air. John ran to his door, opening it but an examination of the hall proved it would take far too long to reach the other side of the Keep through the corridors. He turned back to his room and lifted a log.
With a strong throw he broke the window. Wrapping a sheet he tore from the bed around his hand, John knocked shards from the frame before ducking out. His bare feet hit the snow-covered ledge and he hissed at the feeling.
Gritting his teeth John eased himself along the ledge, sliding in the wet snow. He held to the wall, seeking any chink in the rock for his fingers. Closer to the window he slipped, his heart stopping a moment. The drop below him echoed in the darkness.
John clung to the wall, the snow dribbling around him as he regained his footing. The echo of the same continued booming sound grew louder the closer he came to Lady Winter's room. He grasped the edges of the window frame, knuckles white and extremities tinged blue, as he knocked his forehead against the glass.
Lady Winter jumped slightly, holding the candle high enough to paint the surprise on her face in an orange hue. John nodded at the window and knocked his cloth-wrapped hand against the glass to demonstrate where to strike the glass. She grabbed one of the fire irons, motioning him away from the glass, and stabbed at the panes.
They cracked, eventually falling to her onslaught, and John slipped into the room. His whole body shivered, feet numb from the assault on the snow, and removed the sheet from his hand to take the iron from her fingers. He suppressed a shudder, dancing a bit on his toes while rubbing his arms to restore feeling in them, and nodded at Lady Winter's door.
"How strong is that wood?"
"Not strong enough for whatever's beating loudly enough to break the hinges." She pointed to the bending metal.
"Let me handle this milady." John tried to push her back but Lady Winter pushed forward.
"You, General, came here woefully unprepared with a weapon and stand in a lady's room wearing nothing but your insufficient underthings. I hardly think you're in a state to handle anything."
"I've fought in worse conditions with far less and more often then you have. Stand aside where I can defend you."
"I can defend myself." She argued, taking the discarded sheet and scraping burning pieces from the fire into it.
"I wouldn't be here if that were the case, milady." John argued, blood sluggishly returning sensation to his limbs and appendages. "I'm here to protect you."
"I think it's within my rights to defend my room if I cannot defend my Keep, General." She knotted the ends of the sheet together, the fabric already blackening. "If you don't agree then your exit is behind you."
John gripped the iron tighter in his hand. "Our only way is forward."
"I agree."
They took position as the door burst toward them. Lady Winter swung the coal-laden sheet at the man nearest her and it broke over his face, spray hot ash and burning wood over him. He dropped their makeshift battering ram, brushing over his clothes as they smoked, and successfully distracted himself long enough for John to bring the iron around and break his face.
John ducked the swing from the man's companion, launching up high enough to indent his elbow in the man's throat. Choking the man fell back against the groaning door and John ran the iron through his stomach and into the wood. It squealed back on the snapped hinges, dragging the man's legs over the floor with it.
A blow to John's shoulder had him doubling over, holding his arm close to his chest. He dodged the down stroke of a sword and stepped close enough to the man to bring his forehead to a satisfying crunch on the bridge of the man's nose. In the spurt of blood that distracted the man, John disarmed him and shoved the sword through the fourth and fifth rib.
He dropped the man to the floor and noted, breathing heavily, how Lady Winter pulled tight at the frayed end of a sheet he had wrapped around the last man's neck. John stepped forward, lending his strength to hers and held until the man collapsed.
"I think we'll want this one alive." He went to check the man but a sword shoved through the man's throat. John looked up to see Green, with ten soldiers, filling the doorway. "We needed him for questioning."
"I apologize General but my first prerogative is the Lady Winter's safety."
"Then you should've done a better job seeing to it." John grabbed Green, throwing him to the wall with his forearm pressing on the man's throat. "I thought you said all exits were secure and the Keep was safe for the night? Was that not the report you gave me before you turned in?"
Green batted at John's arm, trying to remove it but John pressed upward, sliding Green up the wall and off the floor. He choked a moment more before John dropped him, gasping and coughing to his knees on the floor. "Report your dereliction of duty, sir!"
"They must've got in before our sweep sir." Green's voice croaked, his hand massaging his neck. "My soldiers found no sign of forced entry."
"Then it would've been helpful to question our intruder as to his method of entry and ascertain if it truly was as you believe instead of, as I believe, your negligence." John hauled Green to his feet. "Sweep this Keep from top to bottom until you find out how they got in here and do not return until you have an answer for me. Is that understood?"
Green nodded, "Yes General."
"Good. Get out of my sight." John threw Green toward the door and the man stumbled, barely catching himself on the frame before hurrying into the corridor.
Over the thunder of his breathing and his blood John barely heard Lady Winter. He turned to her, frowning. "Milady?"
"I said, 'it would seem my earlier offer is now no longer a concern'." She motioned to the four bodies bleeding out on the stones of her room. "Given the destruction of my window and those now dead on my floor it seems a poor location to seek sleep now."
"I don't suppose you have a room less exposed to others where I might keep you better defended?"
Lady Winter thought for a moment before pointing toward the door. "This way."
They walked through the halls, Lady Winter instructing a few servants they passed to manage the mess in their rooms as John told his soldiers to dispose of the bodies. Weaving toward a smaller room Lady Winter opened the door. John entered first, checking its defensibility, and then motioned for Lady Winter to follow.
"This should be adequate for the night. We'll find something else in the morning."
"I only need a bed for the night, General."
John turned to her and noticed how her hands trembled. He went to her, enclosing her hands in his, and guided her to look at him. "You're safe now, milady. You do not need to be strong any longer."
She collapsed her weight against him, shuddering breaths releasing the tension in her body as the nervous energy of their exertions drained her. John dipped to lift her from the floor and carried her over to the bed. Laying her on it as carefully as he could, John went to take post back near the door.
She sat up, calling to him. "Please, I could not bear being alone at the moment."
John returned to her side, sitting close to her as he dared, and held her hand. "It's perfectly natural to feel as you do. Many men, after they've fought for the first time, are riled with emotions they do not rightly understand either."
Her nervous giggle pierced his heart. "You must think me rather weak then, given what you have seen and endured to watch me crumble before you now."
"I find you rather a strong exemplar, milady." John settled closer to her, shivering. "I'm honored to have fought beside you."
"And I'd be honored if you would wrap yourself in a blanket before you freeze to death." She pushed a blanket at him and John obediently wrapped himself in it. "It does not justice to your service or your scar if you die in this room now."
"My scar?"
"It was hard to miss the wrapping scar when you had no shirt to cover it." Lady Winter moved slightly, to give him more room on the bed. "And, if you don't find it too improper, you may share the space here with me."
John moved over as much as he dared, shifting farther away when the door opened and servants entered to light a fire. Lady Winter caught sight it and motioned the servants over.
"Please find a cot for the General. I'll need the protection for the evening and he needs a place to sleep."
They bowed and scraped away, returning quickly with a cot. John dragged it toward the bed as the door closed, and settled on it with the blanket. He smiled at Lady Winter, the concern easing almost immediately off her face.
"To keep you safe, milady."
She smiled, sliding down to rest on the pillows. "I feel safe, General."
"Then I've done my duty, milady."