Uilleam curled up in a ball in the corner and fell asleep in record time while Tahir fidgeted about pretending to be attentive to her as he waited for the old Rafiq to arrive and tend to Maria's wounds. "You can go to her you know, I'm quite capable of sitting here alone for a few moments."
He looked hopefully over his shoulder unsure if she was being sincere, "Maria I want to make sure you are well."
"I know you do dear but you also want to check on your Gwen and that is perfectly natural, go see her now I'll still be here when you are done."
She caught a fleeting glimpse of the brilliant smile he flashed her before he spun around and flew out the door like Beelzebub himself was at his heels. "Shit!" Cradling her tender side with her arm as she paid the price for chuckling at the novice's exit she leaned forward and growled, "Oh good Lord shall I never learn?"
"I have my doubts but remain ever hopeful."
Her head flew up and she smiled happily as the sight of the old man greeted her. True he had not taken to her but Maria knew he was the man with all the best herbs and potions and her delight at his appearance was wholly genuine. "Jabal my good man what an absolute blessing your visage is to my tired eyes."
He grunted as he knelt beside her and placed a box at her legs "What trouble have you gotten into this time?"
"Stabbed in the side my friend I'm afraid I'm not as fast as I used to be."
"None of us are." He shifted closer to her and placed a hand on her shoulder pushing her gently to a prone position, "I'm afraid it would be impossible to bring a female healer here you will have to suffer my rough old hands."
She smiled as she complied with his guidance and lay flat on her back fully aware he was referring to his gender and not the texture of his flesh. "Jabal, I would let a hoary faced ape tend my wound if he had the right balms and herbs." The hoary faced old man tilted an eyebrow at her and scowled but she was undaunted, "Fear not stout fellow I have suffered far worse humiliations in my pursuit of adventure."
Rolling up the outsized Templar tunic as delicately as he could to expose only the flesh he had to in order to access her wound. "You know you were lucky this could have been a lot worse." Remarking on her paler than usual complexion he explained, "You will have to eat a lot of red meat to replace the blood you lost but other than cleaning this up and dressing it properly the Mentor did all that could be done."
Nodding she winced as his cloth brushed along her cut "He was, as always, incredibly thorough."
He worked in silence for a time before leaning back on his knees and stretching his back. She opened her eyes and saw him looking at her with a curious expression. "What's wrong Jabal are you afraid to lecture me because I am an invalid? Let me assure you that your disapproval would not hurt me anymore or less than it usually does."
He regarded her a moment longer but his usual mealy expression was absent. "Tell me why you did it Maria. Why you left your husband and your life as a woman behind."
Returning his gaze she saw he was likely not striking the first blow in a war of words and she replied as honestly and as tactfully as she could. "He chose where we lived, what we ate. He paid for everything I owned from my clothes to my fork. Had I stayed I would have been utterly reliant on him and his fortune in life. My Father lost everything and his wife had to suffer the hardships his incompetence brought upon them. I wanted to be master of my own fate. If I suffer I suffer because I erred." She sighed as she let her eyes close again, "I craved adventure and travel and I confess had Peter been of a like mind I would likely have accompanied him but my husband had no interest in life out with the borders of his estate."
"So you wanted to be your own master and answer to no man?"
Maria puckered her lips and blew out a slow puff of air, "No, that's not really true since I joined the army and was commanded by every man above me but I suppose I wanted to be able to decide for myself what happened in my life." Leaning up on one elbow her face lit up and Jabal knew she had found the words she was searching for. "I am not the prettiest woman or the best dancer or the best anything but I am or at least was the most senior if not the only woman in the English army. Jabal would you understand if I said I just didn't want to be ordinary? To live out a meaningless existence bearing children who would leave me and entertaining people who would plot to steal my husband's land out from under him."
Thinking of the sick girl in a room only a few feet away the old man nodded. Gwen's father had abandoned her and she now lay in bed waiting for a young man to restore what she believed to be the purpose in her life. Then there was his own daughter, she had never voiced any worries about the path her parents had chosen for her but since meeting Maria the Rafiq did wonder if she would have done things differently had she had the option. "Yes I think I understand Maria. Thank you for being honest with me."
Tahir gently pushed open the door and tried to peek inside but the cot she was on was still out of sight and he had to stick his head around the door to see her. For a split second he saw fear on her face and realised he hadn't knocked but when it dawned on her who had come in her face lit up like the brightest star in the night sky. She watched him move towards and in her excited state moved to meet him forgetting how weak she was. No sooner had she moved from the straw when her full weight had her legs collapsing beneath her. He was with her immediately, his hands on her shoulders his face inches from hers. "Are you hurt?"
"Not at all, I jumped up too quickly. I can't believe it's you I had started to fear I had only imagined you."
His hands moved from her shoulders to cup her face, still red but not near as fevered as it had been hours before. "Gwen, I -" He realised he had no idea how to say what he was thinking. His head was swimming with words and his chest so full of emotion he felt like he could burst open but how to put that into words? Taking her in his arms he lifted her onto the soft straw and pulled the blankets back up around her body. His face hovered over hers as he tucked the covers beneath her arms and she smiled. Not as bright as her original greeting but somehow even more beautiful and he realised her next smile would always be the most precious thing to him.
The feelings he couldn't find the confidence to share shone from his face and the girl who had risked death to wait where she believed he would find her knew her heart had found a home. She felt giddy but would never be able to say if it was him being close or her illness, either way she was relieved not to be upright. Her fingers clung to the fabric of his tunic when she felt him move but he smiled and lay on the cot beside her. "You are so very weak I am afraid to touch you."
"I'm more afraid of what will happen if you don't."
As they lay side by side facing each other his hand moved to her face and he traced his finger along her jaw before brushing strands of sweat soaked hair from her cheek. "We can never again part Gwen. I know it is a lot to ask but will you come with me to my home in the mountains?"
Her body was still frail and her eyes looked so tired but what he saw in those eyes was invincible – pure love. She nodded, smiled and cried all at once. "I would go anywhere with you."
His brown eyes moved over her face as his thumb stroked at her tears. His biggest fear was that in time she would come to see the clumsy youth who really existed inside the man she saw as a hero and he decided to admit to it now rather than suffer her disappointment later. "You think me something I'm not Gwen. When we first met circumstances conspired to show me as a hero but the truth is I fail far more often than I succeed and I fall over my own feet when there is nothing else around to trip on but if you would be willing to have me I would share my life with you."
Her dry lips stuck together when she tried to reply and when her tongue proved equally lacking in moisture he reached to the small table and brought the chalice to her mouth. She drank gratefully and when he eased her head back onto the pillow she gave him his answer. "You tricked the guards and got me away and you helped me when that horrible man attacked me but those things are no reason to fall in love. With me you are gentle and attentive. You treated me with respect even though you knew me to be the lowliest of beggars. Tahir I love you for the things you are when you are with me not because I believe you to be a warrior."
"Then you will be my wife?"
She nodded once more and smiled albeit more tired than before and they lay there side by side happy to be together. Two souls whose lives had been bereft of love but now certain they had found their mate, no longer the lonely boy who lost his family or the beggar who was too shy to beg.
Maria heard muffed voices followed by panicked feet rushing around coming from the outer room. The small room she was in was absolutely dark apart from the thin shaft of light which filtered in through the small ornate window high in the wall. Despite Jabal's earlier friendly attitude with her she was still a stranger in this place and the idea of wandering around poking her nose into assassin business felt wrong. Climbing gingerly from the bed she shuffled across the floor and tugged the door open uncertain of her welcome outside until she heard his voice.
"I tried to pull it out myself but it was unreachable."
Altaïr's presence was all the encouragement she needed to leave her room and investigate the disturbance. She moved past the opening in the book case and found him lying face down with the old Rafiq looking at his back. His upper robes were discarded on the floor behind him and she could see there was a significant amount of blood on them. Forgetting how out of place she had felt moments before she rushed to his side. "What happened are you alright?"
"An arrow in my back but I'm fine now."
He sounded breathless and his lips had a slight blue tint she glanced at Jabal asking him how bad it was with her eyes.
The arrow lay discarded on the floor at his side and he was pressing hard onto Altaïr's flesh with cloth. "He is far from fine but with luck he will recover."
His chest was rattling and she could see he was struggling to stay conscious, "Altaïr where is Stephen?" She felt his fingers brush against hers and she helped him to entwine their hands. He opened his eyes and she watched him battle with his body for control. "Rest now you are safe with your brothers. God alone knows how you made it here in one piece but you did and now you can close your eyes."
He groaned and fought for a few more seconds before blood loss and lack of oxygen won the day and once unconscious his hand dropped from hers to the floor.
"Was it in deep enough to reach his lung?"
Nodding he lifted the bloody cloth from his back and picked another from the chest beside him, "Hold this on the wound, press down hard." She heard his bones crack as he got to his feet. "If we are lucky only the tip pierced his lung but I cannot say for certain, only time will tell."
Maria Thorpe was not one to panic but the sight of him so helpless had that unwelcome feeling rising from the pit of her stomach and she had to battle hard to keep it out of her voice and her thoughts. "Jabal how on earth did he manage to get here from the docks in this condition, did Stephen bring him?"
Had she been calmer she wouldn't have bothered with the question she knew the knight had no idea of the bureau's location but she was as far from calm as she had been in a long time. "Okay no he didn't but someone must know something. Can you send out informants to see what they can learn?"
"We have already dispatched a man to the docks and one to each of the strongholds if there is anything to learn we will know it soon enough Maria." The old man moved to the counter and began fiddling with one of the quills. "How likely is it that Stephen is responsible for the Master's injury?"
Her hand flinched but kept the cloth pressed to his wound, "Not likely at all Jabal. You don't know him and I can't blame you for suggesting it but I whole heartedly reject your idea. I'm worried about where he is not what he has or hasn't done."
Jabal seemed to ponder her words before he shrugged and dipped the quill into the inkwell.
Just before dawn they moved him to the bed Maria had left earlier and she lay beside him in much the same way the couple in the next room lay but where those two slept wrapped in the warmth of both body and soul Maria stayed awake watching the rise of his chest and reacting to every pause before it fell again. At some point she too fell into a restless sleep but her dreams were troubled and her mind was relieved to awaken when she heard someone enter the room.
Tahir stood in the doorway and waited for her to bid him enter fully which she did as she got to her feet. "Have the informants learned anything of Stephen?"
He was clasping and unclasping his hands in front of his body and he moved closer to her, "He was injured Maria and we have had conflicting reports about his condition but what we know for certain is that he and the Master went to the fortress to confront William. At first light this morning William was seen boarding a ship bound for Limassol and Stephen was carried on board. He was not seen to be moving but his face was uncovered."
She moved without thought towards the door, "I have to go to the fortress and find out for sure what happened."
Tahir reached cautiously for her arm and stopped her, "Uilleam has gone to do that Maria. He has done it many times when his friends and he were looking to cause trouble. All he needs to do is carry a crate and he can enter unquestioned but you on the other hand would be taken on sight."
Her body stilled but he could see her mind was still fighting with the idea of inaction. "Please stay with the Master Maria what good could you do either him or Stephen if you are captured needlessly?"
Her face stiffened and Tahir saw her resolve return "If I am to stay then I may as well be useful. Can you help me gather up things to wash him?"
She was still covering her side with her arm and moving slowly but he knew it would be useless to suggest she rest. She had to feel like she was doing something and at least this way she was staying where they could protect her.
"You should eat first and while you do that I will collect the water and towels."
Maria picked at her food and sat in the main room with Jabal and the other men as they waited for any of the others to arrive with news. She would go back and forward between them and the man asleep in the small room afraid to miss anything from any side. Almost two hours later she heard another English voice and sprang back into the main room. Uilleam stood panting for breath with his back to the door and Maria had to bite her tongue to stop herself screaming at him to spit it out.
"I met with a fellow whose brother was on duty last night. According to him our men arrived late and got into a sword fight. Most of the enemy lay dead but Master Stephen was severely injured and his father took his sword to his own men to protect him. Stephen is in bad shape Maria with the healers doing all they could his father took him to Cyrus believing the kings own doctors will fare better with him."
He went into more detail answering every question Jabal threw at him but at some point Maria stopped listening and left them to return to Altaïr. Tahir had been as good as his word and there was a bowl of clean water and linen on the table beside his bed. It took her a good ten minutes to get the tunic off of him but her actions were intentionally slow and steady, she was in no rush and he needed a soft hand.
She rubbed the cloth along the length of his arms and spoke to him in a low voice. In the beginning she had spoken to cover up the horrible wheezing coming from his chest but as her task progressed she became less self conscious and spoke from the heart.
"You left William alive and for the life of me I can't figure out why but I'm sure you had your reasons. I'll stay here with you until I'm sure you are going to recover then I must leave. Stephen is on board a ship bound for Cyprus and dead or alive I will go to him. He is the closest thing I have in the world to family, in every sense of the word that matters he is my brother and I will be there for him in his hour of need." Dipping the cloth back into the water she stood and began wiping his chest. "You were right not be jealous of Robert because what I felt for him and what I feel for you are worlds apart. I loved him and still do but he saved me and gave my life direction so it was easy to feel love and gratitude for him, you on the other hand... well you know how we met and what you did for months after and truth be told I should despise you but I never did. Respect initially for your courage and your bloody mindedness but that grew to become something more. From the bitterest of beginnings you planted a seed and the love that sprang from that is unlike anything I have ever felt in my life."
Jabal stood in the open doorway and watched the woman move and speak in a way he would never have believed possible. Sure that she would hate it if she knew he had witnessed her in one of her softer moments he backed quietly away from the door and approached the room again this time making enough noise to be sure he had heard her. "I wondered if there was anything you needed."
He looked more tired than he felt and for the first time she considered how he probably hadn't had a wink of sleep. "I'm fine, thank you what about you?"
He grinned and rubbed his forehead "For a man my age this level of activity is never good but soon the bureau will quieten down and I can rest."
He left her alone with Altaïr again but the mood was broken and she set about the task of cleaning him in a far more professional fashion.
By the following evening the signs were looking good. The colour of his lips was once more normal and his breathing sounded no worse than someone with a bad chest. Maria had spent the entire day in the room with him and only left to eat and wash. The others would come and go trying to offer her comfort but the gradual return to health of the man she was nursing was all the comfort she needed. Tahir came to her last thing and she decided it would be best to tell him of her plans.
"You are leaving?"
"Yes I will make my way to the docks at dawn and find passage to Limassol."
His brows furrowed and his mouth turned down in the most comical expression of disapproval she had ever seen, "I don't understand why you would leave."
"I have to find out what happened to Stephen and let's be perfectly frank Tahir he has life and I have mine. There is no real reason to delay my departure."
"What will I tell the Master when he wakes up?"
"Just what I told you to say. He is going to make a full recovery and now I must see to my duties."
He couldn't deny the logic of her words but the lack of emotion was something he struggled with. "Are you only leaving for Stephen?"
She thought of her friend and the conversation they had shared the last time she had been with him and grimaced. "Stephen is the most important of my errands but there are others." He had told her of the artefact his father had shown him and of his fears for the far more powerful piece in the possession of the assassins and her duty seemed clear. Her brothers had brought this death and misery upon them and even if in her heart she had blamed Altaïr for a long time she knew the truth of it. The Templars had simply reaped what they had sown and now it had cost her everything she valued it was only right that she end it. The assassin may have felt sparing William Marshal's life was the right thing to do but Maria thought otherwise.
"Tell him I stayed until we knew he would be safe and then left to return to my former life."