I love the idea of creating a soundtrack album for Warrior’s Surrender. I often find that when listening to the radio a song will come on that really fits with what the characters are going through at a particular point in the story.
In Warrior’s Surrender we go through some incredible highs and lows of with heroine Lady Alfreya of Tyrswick and the hero, Baron Sebastian de la Croix.
So here are by six soundtrack songs with a snippet from Warrior’s Surrender to give it some context. I hope you enjoy it!
A young Frey and her family is discovered by squire Sebastian amidst the Harrying of the North
Love Is A Battlefield – Pat Benatar
Excerpt:
The girl turned the boy to her stomach, forbidding the child to see the scene foreshadowed by his call. She glanced at her father with concern, then turned her eyes to Sebastian, an expression of nervous expectation crossing her face before setting in determined resolution.Sebastian looked back at her. He had sisters and brothers. And he would fight to his last breath to protect them too. He could not fault a father for protecting his family.
The Saxon Earl’s sword dipped. Because of his injury, exertion had weakened him. A feverish sweat broke out over the man’s face and lingered on his graying beard.
He needed a physician, Sebastian realized. There were monks in an abbey a league away who would help.
The young Norman addressed his instructions to the girl. Her cornflower-blue eyes refused to show fear of him; her father and brother would need her bravery and strength if they were to survive this night.
“Go! Get out of here!” he hissed. “I will buy you as much time as I can. Do you understand me?”
Frey and Sebastian are forced to fight for their lives against a wolf pack
Hungry Like The Wolf – Duran Duran
Excerpt:
Some one hundred yards away, blocking a path made narrow by two massive boulders, she saw a pack of gray wolves, perhaps a dozen of them, with teeth bared and ears lying flat back. They surrounded Ebon.Beyond the narrow path, blocking the way forward, Frey observed, was a landslip. Fresh, too, from the color of it.
Sebastian, his face grim, remained in the saddle with his sword drawn, masterfully controlling an increasingly frightened mount as the wolves snapped and snarled, circling in one direction as the black horse circled in the other to protect his flank.
As the horse moved round, Sebastian swung his blade, slashing at the pack. The tip of his sword dripped with blood, but the wolves, accustomed to affray, held mostly just far enough from his reach and reacted not to the pain of his occasional strike.
Then Ebon reared, his front legs catching an unwary wolf, knocking it to the ground, whereupon the horse stamped his powerful hooves. The wolf offered up a series of distressed, high-pitched yelps before scrambling away from the fight, injured and surely dead by nightfall.
The horse kicked out behind in response to another attack.
Frey lined up her target, a gray wolf lining up to leap on Ebon’s hindquarters, as she heard Sebastian yell, “Leave here!”
She ignored him and let her arrow fly. It hit the wolf high in the side of its torso and the animal fell to the dirt, dead.
At that, some of the younger and more timid beasts fled into the surrounding forest, where numerous and densely packed trees offered an ideal hiding and regrouping place for the canines but offered little comfort to a rider on horseback.
Diera appears to Sebastian and Frey in their dreams
The Dead Come To Life – Jonathan Thulin (with Charmaine)
Excerpt:
Realization slid like a knife between her ribs.“Diera?”
The question came as a sob.
Sebastian’s shoulders slumped and Frey had her answer. She pressed her fingers to her lips to stop the cry in her throat. She swallowed it down.
“Tell me,” she asked hoarsely.
The answer was a curt shake of his head.
“Damn you! Tell me all!” Frey punctuated her demand with a closed-fist punch to his shoulder.
Before she could land another strike, Frey was held fast in Sebastian’s arms, and her frustrated remonstration manifested itself in body-shaking sobs.
“She was my friend,” Frey gasped.
Sebastian loosened his grip and looked at her for the first time since she entered the chapel. His expression was anguished. The fleeting brush of his fingers against her cheek as he straightened sent shivers through her.
“Her body was found just outside the village two months ago,” he said, his voice low and even, yet his focus again fixed on the stone on the floor.
“How did she die?”
Sebastian shook his head once more.
“I need to know.”
He turned his face to her, eyes bright with anger.
“You do not need to know! No one needs to know what evil is capable of!”
Frey blinked away tears. How could she convince him that it was not out of morbid or prurient interest she asked, but rather something that pulled at her very soul.
“Please…I dream of her.”
Frey and Sebastian’s first night together
A Night To Remember – Shonlock
Exhausted, Sebastian rode into the inner bailey and gave the order to close the gates.
Every step to the final story of the keep taxed his tired muscles, but the comfortable and familiar warmth of his chambers beckoned. The fireplace called to him like a siren and he gravitated toward the heat to melt the chill in his bones.
His steward, Beyard, had anticipated his master’s needs. Water heated on the fire for him to wash, but first some warm spiced wine would ease the chill from the inside.
“Allow me,” a soft, feminine voice offered.
He watched Frey step forward into the firelight and pour some of the heated water into a bowl. He waited for the frozen words in his head to melt and make their way to his lips.
“Frey…you shouldn’t be here.”
“Where else should I be?” she shrugged. “You are my husband, or at least nearly so.”
Sebastian allowed her to unclasp his cloak and closed his eyes. Despite the removal of its weight, he actually felt warmer without it. He started when he felt the tug of the strings at the neck of his tunic.
Slender fingers brushed against his bare skin, sending sensation straight to his groin. Sebastian opened his eyes and swiftly caught Frey’s hands in his.
He took in her face, her bright blue eyes dark with desire, moist lips slightly parted.
“Do you know what you’re about Frey?”
Her answer was to step closer.
“Make me forget him, Sebastian.”
Frey and Sebastian are reunited in Durham.
Army of Two – Olly Murs
Excerpt
Frey became conscious that her presence at the far end of the hall was causing a stir.
“When the bishop signals, walk toward him and do not look at Sebastian or Lord Drefan,” Dominic instructed softly at her ear. “Remember, ‘God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, of power and of a sound mind.’”
Frey gave a single nod of acknowledgment and promptly ignored Dominic’s instruction. She kept her eyes on Sebastian as she had done a summer ago. This time, instead of suspicion, his mesmerizing green eyes greeted her with love, encouragement, and pride.
This time, instead of in defeat, Frey walked toward him victoriously with an equal measure of love and pride.
Only when she traversed the hall did she stop before the bishop, where she curtsied and kissed the sacred gold signet ring engraved with a miter and the appointments of his office.
“You may arise, my dear,” the bishop told her kindly, and then, with a sidelong glance at Drefan, added, “I had been told you were too ill to be presented to court. I’m glad to see for myself the report is untrue.”
“I believe you’ll find there are many things you have been told which are untrue, Your Grace,” Frey responded.
Sebastian almost loses his life in the trial by combat
Holding You – Stan Walker & Ginny Blackmore
Excerpt:
“Sebastian!”
He turned to her, his face ashen.
Gaines stepped forward between them. “Listen to me, my lady,” he told her in urgent hushed tones. “This is not over yet. The bishop still has to pronounce the verdict.”
Frey studied Sebastian’s face thoroughly; beads of sweat that had nothing to do with the sun overhead poured down his face and dripped unchecked from his chin. She traced his beloved face with her fingers, and she could see pain found its expression around the corners of his eyes and in the taut line of his mouth.
“How seriously are you hurt?” she asked.
“Ribs,” he gasped before shaking his head.
“He needs a stretcher.”
“No, my lady,” Gaines told her firmly. “As the baron and Drefan were both plaintiffs, the bishop may hold off making judgment until he sees whether Lord Sebastian lives. You can be sure that is what Baldwin as Drefan’s second will demand. We press for settlement now.”
Gaines gave her a look of such compassion that she wanted to scratch it right off his face. If he was being kind to her, it meant Sebastian’s condition was grave.
Frey opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. She tried again and this time found her voice.
“Then what needs to be done?”