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Danhoul raced to her side and saw the alarming amount of blood beneath her head. He also saw her gown was scarlet beneath. The coach had struck her soundly and knocked her down to the cobblestones, though he was relieved the wheel hadn’t rolled over her.
Conner came to look upon Alainn as well, and his face filled with dread as he stared down at her. Danhoul didn’t miss how Conner kept his head down low when noticing how many guards were gathering. He nodded to Conner to go back and wait with the clansmen. He gazed a regretful expression at Alainn, but did as Danhoul had instructed.
Danhoul placed his hand to Alainn’s head, but could not make her hear him as he spoke to her both verbally and telepathically. She appeared entirely unconscious and incapable of being revived. Several people had gathered around Alainn and many guards were now surrounding them as well. He saw one of the guards secure the crying child and he stared at her with noticeable disbelief in his eyes as he spoke aloud.
“This is the king’s daughter. Bloody hell, it is young Elizabeth. Did this injured young woman save the king’s daughter’s life?”
The man addressed Danhoul and any response he gave might be incriminating and have dire consequences.
Several people in the crowd offered their accounts of the happening and there was much noise and confusion.
“You’re correct, the brave woman saved her. She took no mind of her own preservation in order to save the life of a child!” a bystander offered.
“I saw it with my own eyes, as well.” Another person added. “She pushed the child from harm’s way with no regard for her own life. Pray the Lord will have mercy on her soul for her deed.”
The guard looked at Danhoul for affirmation. “Aye, ’tis true, she did protect the girl with no thought for her own safety,” Danhoul confirmed.
“She must be taken to the castle to be seen by the king’s physician then,” another guard suggested.
His voice grew louder in order to be heard though the men were not far from where he knelt on the cobblestones. By now several guards both on horseback and on foot filled the area and the crowd had grown considerably. They were pushing and shoving and now in an uproar clearly hoping to discern what had taken place and get a closer view of the calamity. The guards were now made to contend with the unruly bunch and it soon became almost impossible to hear.
“I must go with her as well, for I know the woman. I am her attendant as well as her physician.”
They eyed him suspiciously, but a wagon had arrived and a group of guards were now lifting Alainn. The amount of blood upon her gown had grown considerably and Danhoul’s heart constricted and his fears escalated.
“There’s no need of taking this woman to the king or his physician, she’ll not live much longer. Look at the blood that she’s lost.” One guard suggested. “She’ll die before she arrives at the castle. No one, not even the king’s esteemed physicians, can save someone so gravely wounded.”
Several guards nodded their agreement, while Danhoul held tight to her hand as he willed the bleeding to terminate and Alainn to be healed.
“Well, it’s certain the king will want to see her at any rate and discover who it is who has saved his child. If naught can be done, he can see she’s buried in a proper grave for her brave, unselfish deed. She is owed that at the very least.” The guard, apparently with the highest rank declared.
Danhoul listened, unwilling to believe their bleak pessimism.
They finally agreed to take Alainn to the king’s physician and Danhoul was much relieved when one of the guards gestured for him to get in the wagon with Alainn. He sat beside her, held his hand to the wound on her head, prudently employing his magic while the noisy wagon began the journey to the castle.
Danhoul watched and despairingly noted Alainn’s face grew alarmingly pale with the amount of blood she’d lost and continued to lose. He attempted to heal her and to keep her alive, but his instincts told him she would need to fight with all the strength she had to survive this injury and live beyond this day.
His thoughts went to Killian unfairly imprisoned in the dismal tower, and of how aggrieved he would be to know of this perilous turn of events. He must surely find a way to get to Killian. Danhoul believed, as always before in the many lives they’d lived together, Killian would be vital to Alainn’s recovery.
Danhoul stared up toward the sky and silently called to the Celtic gods and to Aine in particular. He prayed she would answer his plea and save her great-granddaughter before it was too late for all of them.
He would not see her dead, lain to rest in a lonely graveyard here in England, never again to see her beloved Ireland. There was still so much left undone, and whether to fulfill the gods’ purpose or her own, Alainn must endure this injury and live through this tragedy to pursue a witch’s quest.
The End
