Now it was his turn to ambush them.

Prayers surged through her mind as she scanned the darkness, trying to pick him out. Please, G.o.d, keep him safe. Make him win. Don't take him from me...

Where did he go?

Once more he had dissolved into the darkness. Then she caught a glimpse of movement across the grove. He had turned back into a terrible figment, a shadow. As she watched, wide-eyed in the darkness, she saw the shape of him separate from the trunk of a tree and then jump up onto a lower branch, climbing with easy agility.

He disappeared up into one of the great pine trees.

Sophia petted the horse with one hand to keep the animal calm, but the other she pressed to her mouth to silence herself as Kemal and two of his men came prowling down from the path. Barely making a sound, they stole into the grove, their muskets at the ready.

Sophia waited as they crossed some twenty yards away from her, moving in a triangular formation, Kemal ahead and in the center.

She held her breath. Her heart pounded so loud in sheer terror that she feared they would hear it. Her horse stood in uneasy silence, his ears swiveling toward the smallest sounds the men made.

Her nerves stretched thin, she squeezed her eyes shut for a second, unable to bear it as Gabriel waited for them to come closer, to come right to him.

With barely a snapping twig under their feet, the Janissaries progressed through the grove, their heads turning as they scanned the woods in all directions while still moving forward.

The only way they did not look was...up.

Even if they had looked, she doubted they'd have seen Gabriel. For such a large man, he had an uncanny ability to make himself all but invisible.

Shoot them! her mind screamed to him as Kemal stalked under the very tree where he waited, but still nothing happened.

Two steps, three...

He waited until the two men flanking Kemal were right underneath the tree. A flare of orange exploded up among the branches as he fired his carbine downward, killing one man instantly; almost simultaneously, he dropped to the ground and knifed the second man before the latter was quite sure what was going on.

At once, Kemal spun around and brought up his rifle, but Gabriel stopped the second man from falling, and used his meaty body for a shield.

The man let out a garbled cry as Gabriel tossed him aside and went toward Kemal, drawing his cavalry saber, the one that she had found back at the farmhouse, notched with its wicked tally of deaths.

No mercy.

Kemal answered in kind. With no time to reload, he slid his curved Turkish scimitar out of its sheath and brandished it as he retreated a few steps, getting into position.

The terrible, arced swords that both men wielded were made for slashing. The points were sharp, but the cruel curve of both terrible blades was really designed for severing limbs and heads from bodies.

Sophia was rather glad of the darkness and the branches shielding from her a full view of the proceedings. How she kept from screaming, she simply did not know.

The two were still for a moment, sizing each other up.

Sophia felt sick to her stomach, knowing that this would be a duel to the death, and chilled, as well, to realize that the sounds of the distant fight up by the cave's mouth had subsided. Were they the only ones left alive?

She stared, her heart in her throat.

Without warning, the battle erupted.

She heard the clash and ring of metal, saw the whirl of furious motion through the trees as they slashed and swung and flew at each other, their swords like a churning metal wheel.

They parted, circled, lunged again, trying to hack each other apart with brutal speed and force in every blow. Metallic clangs reverberated through the pines. She could feel each man's intense concentration.

Time seemed to have stopped.

They fought their way out into the clearing from among the trees. Gabriel was giving ground; Sophia watched with her heart in her throat. Seeing him back up like that terrified her. Was he weakening, pained by his scar-or was he simply moving the fight to more open terrain?

He ducked with lightning agility as Kemal's blade swooped in a vicious arc above his head, then Gabriel struck back from below, delivering a backhanded blow that slammed the edge of his blade deep into Kemal's right ribs.

It went into the center of him, only stopped by his spine.

Sophia jumped and stifled a cry as the Tunisian staggered backward, hunching over what was surely a terrible wound.

But her violent flinch startled her horse, in turn, which moved just a little, causing a few twigs to crackle.

Clutching his side, Kemal looked straight over at where Sophia was hurrying to steady the horse. Seeing her outline through the underbrush, he reached inside his vest and pulled out a pistol, aiming it at her.

Before he could pull the trigger, Gabriel let out a roar and brought down his saber with such force that the hand holding the pistol fell to the ground separately from its owner.

Kemal screamed and toppled to earth, writhing briefly; Gabriel loomed over him, keeping the tip of his sword against the Tunisian's throat until he was certain the man was dead.

Sophia knew the moment this occurred because Gabriel's entire posture changed.

His ma.s.sive shoulders slowly loosened, he lowered his head, his chin dropped toward his heaving chest, and he placed his left hand vaguely on his scar.

She watched him in welling tenderness, part of her wanting to jump off the horse and run to him. But another part, instinctively, didn't dare.

He would come to her when he was ready.

Having steadied the horse again from its skittishness, she sat in the saddle, barely able to wrap her mind around all that had just occurred. With a shudder, she closed her eyes and thanked G.o.d for keeping Gabriel safe.

Just then, from across the grove, a familiar voice called hesitantly to Gabriel. "Colonel?"

Yannis.

Sophia opened her eyes and turned to look. It was he!

"Yannis!" She leapt off the horse and grabbed the reins, pulling the animal toward the men.

"Sophia?" Gabriel barked, sounding slightly shaken.

"I'm all right!" she a.s.sured him, pulling the horse out into the clearing. "I'm here. Gabriel. Yannis!"

Gabriel turned around with an air of weariness as her easygoing bodyguard came running toward them. "Your Highness!"

She held her arms out to him, and though he had long been in her employment, like all the rest, she considered him closer to family in her heart. She hugged her old friend like a brother while Gabriel took a moment to collect himself.

"Thank G.o.d you're safe." When Yannis pulled back and looked at her, there were tears in his eyes.

"What of the others?" she whispered.

"I'm sorry-Demetrius is dead."

Sophia squeezed her eyes shut, but she had already known this. She had seen it. "The rest?"

"All alive."

Her eyes widened. "Really?"

"n.o.body's hurt too badly except Markos. d.a.m.ned fool broke his leg falling out of the tree where Colonel Knight posted him for a sniper."

"Let me go and check on him," she said.

"No," Gabriel murmured, joining them. "I don't want you going up there."

Sophia looked at him dismay, but when he shook his head with grim finality, she knew he only wished to spare her from the sight of all the bloodshed.

Perhaps she'd had enough of that for now, in truth.

"Don't worry, Your Highness. I've already seen to Markos," Yannis a.s.sured her. "But he'll be traveling slowly. You two are going to have to go ahead of us. I will stay behind to help him. And I will bury Demetrius. And Alexa," he added with a glance at Gabriel.

"Alexa is dead?" Sophia breathed. "I thought she escaped! The last I saw her, she had just cleared the cave. Was she struck by a bullet? What happened?"

Yannis dropped his gaze. "I'm sorry to have to tell you this. Markos saw her pa.s.s from his vantage up in the tree. She bolted straight on through the woods and in the darkness, must not have seen the ledge in front of her until it was too late. When Markos told me what happened, I ran down to see if she survived the fall, but she was dead. Her neck was broken."

"Oh, G.o.d," Sophia whispered, lowering her head.

Gabriel glanced at Yannis. "Did the injured man among them flee as we expected?"

"Yes, sir. Timo and Niko went after him, just as you commanded."

"Excellent. You all fought well."

Coming from him, this was quite a compliment, Sophia thought, but she eyed each man dubiously. "You all are getting along now?"

Both men favored her with jaded smiles.

"I think we've learned our lesson," Yannis admitted.

"And that, not a moment too soon," Gabriel agreed. "Come, Gypsy girl. Let's get you out of here."

"Gypsy girl?" Yannis murmured.

"Don't listen to him," Sophia answered with a blush.

She gave Yannis another hug with words of praise and comfort to pa.s.s along to Markos.

Then she and Gabriel both got on the horse and started down the mountain.

CHAPTER.

NINETEEN.

T hey rode the few miles down the mountain in silence, then crossed the little bridge over the cold swift stream, and turned off the road. They plunged into the dark forest again, but with Gabriel riding behind her, his big, warm body so solid at her back, Sophia was no longer afraid.

He urged the horse onward through the dense trees, but when they came to a quiet meander of the stream, he reined in, took a quick, wary glance behind them and in all directions, and then dismounted.

She watched him in silence as he walked over to the bubbling creek and crouched down beside it. Sophia's expression turned somber as she realized he was washing the blood off his hands from the vicious battle.

His words from that night at the farmhouse haunted her. "I could not possibly kill another human being again...I'm quite sure it would cost me my immortal soul."

Now he had had to do so for her. Was this brooding silence of his...anger? Anger at her?

Did he believe that he had d.a.m.ned his soul for her? The thought made her tremble. Warily, Sophia got down off the horse and left the animal there, joining Gabriel quietly by the water's edge.

Upstream of him, she knelt down and lowered her fingertips into the cold current.

He finished cleaning his hands. Staring straight ahead, he took a deep breath and let it out.

She eyed him askance, worried by his silence.

"You all right?" he asked her evenly, aware of her watching him, even as he avoided her gaze.

"Yes," Sophia murmured. "You?"

"Hm." The short, vague syllable was neither confirmation nor denial, but it was all he offered for the moment, scooping water up into his cupped hands and splashing his face. "That's cold," he said.

"Yes." She shivered a bit as he pushed up to a stand once more, set his hands wearily on his waist, and walked off to get the horse.

They went up toward the cave he had prepared earlier for her, but first, he led the horse to its hiding place among the trees. Sophia followed on foot, stepping carefully over the uneven ground.

"Our shelter's right there." He pointed toward a small cave a few yards away through the pines. "Should be warm in there. You can go and make yourself comfortable."

She shook her head. "I'll wait for you." After the events of this evening, she was not about to wander off from her protector. All too happy to stay close to him, she leaned against a tree while he unsaddled the horse.

When he was finished, they walked up to the cave together. He a.s.sisted her over the boulders while an owl hooted in the distance.

Ahead, silver moonlight illumined the rock face with the cave's pitch-black opening. Behind them, the wind whispered through the pines. Gabriel moved ahead, bending under the cave's arched mouth as he went in. Right behind him, Sophia did not have to bend down at all; she kept her hand on his back in the darkness, but then he reached ahead and brushed aside a large, black blanket that he had hung previously like a curtain to conceal their camp.

Behind the curtain, the little cave was downright cozy, dimly lit by a pair of lanterns, warmed by glowing coals in a circle of rocks, with waiting bedrolls and a few fur throws, water and food, basic medical supplies, and more weapons leaning here and there around the walls if he should need them. He held the curtain back, letting her go in first, and as she stepped inside, Sophia's heart lifted, for this small, primal shelter seemed more welcoming and safe than any palace she had ever lived in.