Time Scout by Robert Asprin & Linda Evans

They had to get free only long enough to gain the gate.

Kynan caught a ragged breath.

Then quietly surrendered

Kit and Malcolm gained the gates in time to see the search party return with a bloodied, bruised prisoner. Vines secured his wrists behind his back. The Welsh soldier was ash-pale but he stood erect, facing his doom with all the bravery in him.

One of the soldiers still inside the fort called out, “Looks like he put up a fight!”

Kynan’s captors grinned “Naw Looked like he might for a minute, but he surrendered quiet as a lamb.”

Kit narrowed his eyes. They’d beaten him afterward, then, badly, from the look of it. Why had he surrendered? That didn’t fit the image of the Kynan Rhys Gower who’d attacked both Kit and Margo with single-minded, near-unstoppable fury. Kynan kept his gaze stonily on the ground, clearly aware that he faced his doom.

The Portuguese were gloating.

”Put him in the stocks,’ the governor crowed.

”No,” Kit countered, allowing weariness to color his voice. “Put him in the cell with the woman. Father Xabat and I must examine him for Satan’s mark.”

Kynan flinched visibly at the word “Satan.” He didn’t quite struggle when the Portuguese shoved him toward the stockade, but he cursed them under his breath in Welsh. One of the soldiers struck him across the mouth, splitting a barely scabbed-over lip. Kynan stumbled and glared at his captors, but made no further sound. Kit and Malcolm exchanged glances.

”Brave man,” Malcolm’s look said

Kit just nodded, then followed. Malcolm fell into step behind him. Their heavy cassocks dragged in the mud. Sergeant Braz unlocked the cell and shoved Kynan inside, then stepped aside for Kit and Malcolm. Once again, Malcolm shut the door. Margo sat in the corner, alert and silent. She took one look at Kynan and swallowed hard, but her eyes had begun to shine with hope. Kynan swayed, clearly at the end of his strength, but he said in broken English to Margo, “I … I look you. Portuguese,” he snarled, spitting blood onto the dirt floor, “find me. I-I come, no fight. We run gate. I help, yes?”