Martyr’s
Fire
Books by Sigmund Brouwer
Merlin’s Immortals
The Orphan King
Fortress of Mist
Fiction
Broken Angel
The Canary List
Flight of Shadows
Evening Star
Silver Moon
Sun Dance
Thunder Voice
Double Helix
Blood Ties
The Weeping Chamber
Pony Express Christmas
The Leper
Out of the Shadows
Crown of Thorns
Lies of Saints
The Last Disciple
The Last Sacrifice
The Last Temple
Fuse of Armageddon
Devil’s Pass
Dead Man’s Switch
Martyr’s Fire
Published by WaterBrook Press
12265 Oracle Boulevard, Suite 200
Colorado Springs, Colorado 80921
The characters and events in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual persons or
events is coincidental.
Trade Paperback ISBN: 978-1-4000-7156-2
eBook ISBN: 978-0-307-73209-5
Copyright © 2013 by Sigmund Brouwer
Cover design by Mark Ford
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or
by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any
information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Published in the United States by WaterBrook Multnomah, an imprint of the Crown
Publishing Group, a division of Random House Inc., New York.
WaterBrook and its deer colophon are registered trademarks of Random House Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
[to come]
Printed in the United States of America
2013—First Edition
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Spring, Northern England—AD 1313
One
The man that Isabelle faced was wealthy. And handsome, except for
the stub where his left ear had been, now half-covered by hair. She
could tell by the shift of his shoulders and the intensity of his gaze that he
was enthralled by her, as indeed were nearly all men. Yet he was not
Thomas. She spent hours dreaming that one day, Thomas, too, would be
enthralled.
The man before her now had been on his horse, crossing a pasture that
overlooked the town of York, clustered behind the high stone walls that
protected it. With occasional clouds throwing brief shadows as they crossed
overhead, she’d waited in sunshine, knowing that this was along his regular
path to York from hunting in the moors. She’d been sitting on a blanket like
a woman of leisure, dressed in fine silks, a basket beside her.
He was tall and slim, wearing the clothes of a nobleman. He’d dismounted
and looked around, as if wondering where her servants might be.
She had risen from the blanket and now lifted the basket with food.
“If you’ve been riding long,” she purred, “you must be hungry. And I’ve
been waiting for you.”
She set the basket on the ground and leaned down to lift out a piece of
thick buttered bread and pieces of rich cheese.
As she expected, he took it without hesitation. “You know who I am,
then?”
“Of course,” she answered.
He smiled with pride.
He was Michael of York, the son of the earl who had enlisted Thomas’s
10 Sigmund B rouwer
army to prevail against the Scots not so long ago. As he tore off a chunk of
bread and stuffed it into his mouth, he looked around again. Not with the
eye of a man wary of a trap, but with the sharp glance of a predator. She was
in front of him and so alone. And he was a rich and powerful man, accustomed
to being offered what he wanted—or to taking it whether it was offered
or not. Obvious on her neck was jewelry that was worth a year’s wages
for a working man. If he had the heart of a thief, and she knew he did, his
mind would have been on her apparent helplessness.
Since no noblewoman should be alone in a field because the dangers
were too great, the apparent helplessness should have made him suspicious.
But men were fools.
“Mead?” she asked, holding up a chalice.
He took it without a word, as if he were entitled to it. He rammed some
cheese into his mouth first, then washed it down with the honey wine.
“You’ve been waiting for me,” Michael said, with a grin that came too
close to a leer.
“With a message from those who watched you cut off your own ear.”
His smile froze, just for an instant. Then he laughed.
“From anyone but a lady as lovely as yourself, I would take that accusation
as an insult. And I would answer it accordingly.”
“It is a dangerous accusation,” she agreed. “If your father ever had proof
that you severed your own ear to force him to attack Magnus, you would be
thrown in prison and disinherited.”
“You are very alone here.” He gestured at the open pasture. “You would
be wise not to anger me.”
He placed his right hand on the hilt of his knife, hanging from a sheath
on a gold-studded belt.
“And you would be wise to listen to me,” she said. “After all, your father
already questions your loyalty, does he not? After the trial by ordeal, did he
Mar t y r’s F i re 11
not leave Magnus believing that Thomas is an ally and that you had deceived
him?”
Michael’s face pinched. He was beginning to suspect a trap. But his
next words suggested that he believed the trap came from the earl.
“I will speak to you as I have repeatedly spoken to my father: I do not
know the men who attacked me and cut off my ear. All I know is that I was
given a message to deliver and told it was from Thomas. Obviously, those
who cut off my ear were the ones deceitful about Thomas. Not me. Go back
to my father and tell him this.”
“Your father did not send me,” she said. She tossed him a heavy ring.
“Look closely at the symbol. Those of the symbol are the ones who sent me.”
He caught it in his left hand and studied it. He glanced at her and
closed his fist around the ring. He kept his right hand on the handle of his
knife.
“I don’t believe you.” His words were certain enough, but not the tone.
“Let me repeat what you were told by those of the symbol. You were
promised that if you delivered a letter to your father, along with your ear,
pretending it was a letter from Thomas, that your father would go to war
and take the castle of Magnus. And that Magnus would be yours.”
Isabelle knew this was truth. She’d been hidden behind trees, watching
the discussion, seeing greed cross this man’s face as he calculated what small
price it would cost for him to obtain a kingdom—his deception and his ear.
“Lies,” he said, smiling.
“The man who made you that promise,” she said, “was my father. Richard
Mewburn, who ruled Magnus until Thomas took it from him.”
She watched his smile fade as he thought through the implications.
This was not something that a person could guess—proof to him that she
knew for certain. And if she knew of that secret conversation, then she likely
knew much more.
12 Sigmund B rouwer
Michael lifted his hand away from his knife. “Please tell Lord Mewburn
that I had no intention of harming you.”
“Of course not,” she said. “We are just having a conversation. So tell
me. If my father were to deliver York to you, would you, in return, help him
secure Magnus?”
“York cannot be mine while my father is the earl,” he answered. It was
an oblique answer. Nothing in it openly suggested disloyalty. Yet it was an
invitation to continue.
“A man who is willing to cut off his own ear is a man hungry for
power,” Isabelle said. “This time, however, what we ask of you will be far
less painful.”
Michael’s face reflected obvious relief before once again contorting into
dismay. “But I was already promised that Magnus would fall. It did not.
The trial by ordeal that Thomas faced and survived—”
“Nothing will be asked of you until Magnus falls,” Isabelle said. “But
believe me, it will. Very soon.”
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