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So knife Skald had thrown still buried in his back He came forward, his steps silent, his faceht blue to a glowing garnet red that spread over the whites and made it seem as if his eye sockets were filled with blood

The eyes of a warrior gone berserker

"What do you stare at, girl?" Skald asked

She answered him honestly "Death"

The Saracens had sharper ears, and one of thee hand crushed the guard’s throat as the other took his ax The guards around hian to shout, and then fell silent as the ax flashed through the air around the froan chopping his way through the Saracens, cutting them down as if they were little more than deadwood Some were able to raise their crescent-curved blades, but the ax severed their ar stopped a warrior in berserker, the battle rage

Byrne had told Jayr that nize friend, foe, or innocent on the battlefield Taken by berserker rage, the warriors knew only that what lived had to die by their hand Byrne would butcher everyone in his path until there was no one left to kill

Skald reacted to the hail of liht as he brought down the lance Jayr kicked out with her leg, s her boot into the seneschal’s ankle The lance scored the top of her shoulder but landed in the ground, pelting her face with dirt

"You worthless piss catcher," Skald shouted, reaching for the lance His head snapped back as his right eye sprouted an arrow, and he screa cry pulled it out of her shoulder She saw the seigneur lowering Locksley to the ground, and beyond hi an arrow to the bow he held

Skald tried to do the sarasped the long shaft "’Tis ht, not his It’ll be mine now, all of it, and I’ll burn it down before I let them take it away" He looked up into Byrne’s blood red eyes "I am the eldest son, the mac Byrne; it is all to beSkald’s head and cleaving through hi his blood and insides across the ground

Jayr saw Byrne walk over Skald’s reham Alexandra shouted for Michael, and the men of the Realm hauled back what Saracens still lived No one could stop Byrne, however, and anyone who tried would be slain

Jayr pressed her hand over the wound in her shoulder and took a deep breath before she flashed across the field, stopping in front of Nottingha herself up by force of will alone "The battle is over now You have won"

Blood and gore dripped from the ax Byrne held and spattered Jayr’s face as he raised it She did not flinch, but kept her gaze steady as she looked into the violence in his eyes and held out her hands

"I know you can hear me," she told him "I am here, my lord I need you with me I love you Coripping it slowly lowered it to the ground The bloodied shaft slipped free of Byrne’s fingers as he stared at her as though mesmerized

"Here," hein to grasp the hands lifting toward her "You saved e in his eyes faded, and Aedan ed from his personal hell to pull his woman into his ar the dead and the wounded from the field while Alexandra converted the infirmary and four other rooms next to it to a temporary hospital She inspected Jayr’s lance wound first, but found that lingering inflammation from the earlier dislocation had actually protected the bones of her shoulder fro anyone for a few days," Alexandra told her as she strapped her into a sling, "but leave it alone and rest, and it should heal without complications"

Byrne assured her that he would personally supervise Jayr’s recuperation before he carried his seneschal out of the infir Saracens refused to let Alexandra touch them until Michael explained in Italian what had happened The sight of Nottingham terrified the men, and Michael had to send him out of the infirmary before they would rest

Michael instructed Harlech to move the bodies of Skald and seventeen dead Saracens to an outbuilding for later burial

Alexandra worked tirelessly through the night, and Michael stayed with her, helping her treat the wounded and doing what he could to make them comfortable When the last patient had been seen, he took her back to their rooms and coaxed her into bed, where she fell asleep as soon as her eyes closed

For two hours Michael lay beside his woht of nothing in particular After the day of betrayals, carnage, and destruction, si with her felt like a miracle Skald could have easily killed either or both of theed He suspected the kindness Alex had shown to the deranged seneschal had saved their lives