Ironheart
Ironheart
Emily French
Destiny Wore Many Disguisesbut Lady Brenna, pledged as bride in a match more alliance than love affair, saw true when Caer Llion rode up to her castle gates. This valiant knight was surely her mysterious betrothed, for he was her past–and Fate decreed he be her future…!An elfin girl upon the high battlements had once given him her favor–and eased his aching soul. Now Leon FitzWarren, famed as Caer Llion–the Ironheart, had returned to Wales, to those very battlements, and faced again the bewitching Brenna–the elfin sprite become woman–and holder of his heart…!
This was her betrothed! He was the man of her dreams! In truth, he was here!
She’d heard him laugh, a black-velvet ripple, sweet as the honey of the southlands, and felt something deep within her move, open. She’d looked wildly about, and her heart was like an arrow hurtling through space. Then eye met eye. A spark leaped in the meeting, and the newcomer had laughed no more. He gazed at her with…recognition, it might be, for she had felt it, too.
This is the one!
Brenna swallowed hard. There had never been any other like this man. She could not suppress a heated sensation welling deep inside. His hand, heavy on her shoulder, seemed to have the strength of iron. She wanted to tuck herself closer against that strength…and yet she did not know why…!
Ironheart
Harlequin Historical #580
Praise for Emily French’s previous works
Bogus Bride
“An exciting, realistic, steamy romantic adventure.”
—Rendezvous
The Wedding Bargain
“The story is packed with continuous excitement and such marvelous characters, you’ll be sorry to reach the end.”
—Rendezvous
Illusion
“…witty and fast paced…just enough mystery to keep you guessing.”
—Affaire de Coeur
#579 A WESTERN FAMILY CHRISTMAS
Millie Criswell, Mary McBride & Liz Ireland
#581 WHITEFEATHER’S WOMAN
Deborah Hale
#582 AUTUMN’S BRIDE
Catherine Archer
Ironheart
Emily French
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Available from Harlequin Historicals and EMILY FRENCH
Capture #214
Illusion #306
The Wedding Bargain #336
Bogus Bride #361
Ironheart #580
To Emily Ninnis, travel agent par excellence.
“He, who the sword of heaven will bear Should be as holy as severe.”
—William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure
Contents
Prologue (#ua0be4086-d97c-5ad9-ae87-0f63df2ee69f)
Chapter One (#u4734d6c3-b301-5a8c-b4b6-bd7c401a3420)
Chapter Two (#u8bcb802c-3136-5ff8-8860-ceb268fa2430)
Chapter Three (#uf3942d2c-5b69-5aff-87d3-6995ac5b4b11)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Prologue
Northern Marches, Wales, 1188
The night was dark and full of menace. Leon shivered, struggling to stay awake. It was the joining point of the night. The hour of beginnings and endings. It was an unholy hour to be out of bed; the black watch before cockcrow when men most often died, and demons walked.
“Are you a knight?”
A thin little reedy sound it was, echoing somewhere from the right. At first Leon thought he had imagined it, for there was something about old piles of stone like this that accumulated shadows and odd sounds, creaks and sighs of wind.
Then it came again, eerie, alien, disembodied, drifting across the battlement, a voice soft as reeds twisting in the wind.
“Are you a knight?”
The point of his sword lifted a little.
It was an intrigue. It must be. Soon it would be dawn—the hour for murder and mayhem. He exhaled softly. It was comforting that the gray of his cowl and cloak bled into the gray of the battlements, leaving no shape for the eye to catch. There was only the shine of captured light from his naked blade as he waited, listening.
Glancing over his shoulder, Leon saw no movement, suspicious or otherwise, but his back prickled as if several thousand insects crawled up and down it. He swallowed hard.
It took courage to ask calmly, “Who is this?”
Silence.
It was some rotten trick. None had played such since he was nine years old and he’d dared the raven in the hayloft that the other pages refused to face. It had known better than to meddle with him, and fled with a great rustling of straw and a clap of wings.
“Is anyone there?” he asked the shadowed air and held his breath waiting for an answer.
Nothing changed. No voice responded. No figure appeared from the doorway. He swallowed loudly. No harm was near. A very little light came up from below, not enough to light the steps. If any spirits dream-danced there, none spoke.
He gave that some thought, then cleared his throat. He had been speaking French; he shifted to Latin. Nothing. “Who?” he demanded in Anglo-Saxon, and last of all, with fading hope, the old Gaelic of his childhood.
“I am here.”
That rocked him on his heels. The voice came from behind him now, the same voice, as if it were stalking him. He spun around, hands out, at hearing a light skipping step from the direction of the parapet. Closer, came the high piping tone of a child.
“I said, Are you a knight?”
Leon stared a moment, heart thumping. Shadows shifted and took substance. A glimmer. It was a girl, a highborn little girl in a white night rail, but lace dragged about one ankle and her lips and hands were muddied. She tilted her head to one side, studying him.
“No,” he said, to humor her while he tried to think. The girl had a pixie face, and the dark, shining hair that bounced about her shoulders was black as only an elf’s can be. But she looked real, a babe scarce weaned. There was no magic. There was nothing to fear. Her gaze remained steady. He felt heat flare in his ears, so he added, “When I am a man I will be.”
A frown touched her brow, as if he had said something curious. “Is that not the way of things?” she said, edging closer, as though they already shared one secret, and might share another, in time.
Leon blinked. How could a little girl speak with such knowledge? Except for the druids, adults were jealous of their secrets and did not share them with children. Was she a druid’s daughter?
Had he been enchanted? He clenched his hand to drive the thought away and touched the rough stonework. It felt real enough, down to the grit of old mortar.
I won’t let her see she has me uneasy, he told himself firmly. I won’t let her trick me. He took the chance. It took real effort, but he kept his voice steady.
“Are you a witch?”
“Do I look like one?”
“I’ve only seen one, face-to-face. At least I think it was a witch. You don’t look like her. But how should I know?”
“Well, now that I see you close up, you don’t look like a knight, either. You’re tall, but you look like a boy.”
The small doubt held him still, but that was only his good sense that said girls were not safe wandering at cockcrow alone. There were all manner of unwholesome things that haunted the night. And this one feared no harm from them—that seemed evident, whatever her reason.
He thrust his sword in its scabbard. “You’re distracting me from my duty. What are you doing here?”
“I’ve come to watch.”
“To watch what?”
Her shoulders jerked slightly. “I wanted to see Father—they told me he’s going away with the prince,” she said fiercely, a dimpled dragon flashing fire and smoke. Her little jaw set. Her eyes were alive with thoughts. “I had to get up early and run away from Nurse, ’n’ here I am.”
He started to walk. She pranced along beside him.
“The battlements are out of bounds. How did you get here?” he asked, with deep notes of iron grating on one another in his voice. “And more to the point, why?”
“I couldn’t go downstairs because of the guards, and I didn’t want to climb out a garderobe shaft ’cause they smell so awful, ’n’ I came up here instead.” She moved closer, scowling. “I tried to get up there.” She pointed into space out a crenel. “But I’m not big enough. But you’re here, so you can—”
Leon flinched, and said, between closed teeth, “Forget it.”
He paused at a buttressed arch and turned to look into the vast hollow before them. From this angle, no lights shone, not even faint ones. It was black as a cave. Only the immensity of air, palpable as a beast, betrayed the cavernous gulf beyond.
Fear clenched his heart with an icy grip. How had he gotten into this? He grasped the merlon with one hand, to keep from shaking, and felt sandstone crumble under his fingers. He pulled back by instinct.
“Flamed rotted-out pile of—” He caught back a swear-word.
She turned her head and looked at him. Then slowly she began to smile, her eyes anxious, but her grin growing wider. She was contemplating mischief, he was sure of it.
“Are you afraid?”
“Of course not! I have an arm of steel and a heart of iron!”
“Oo-oh, how wonderful. Are heroes always so strong?”
“Of course.”
Leon sweated. Heroes are always strong, and they never run away, he told himself. And that was a worry. He was scared and breathless.
“You’re bigger than me.” A sudden pale glance, starlit. She smiled. “Can you see over the top?”
He nodded foolishly, and again she laughed. He thought that perhaps he had never heard a lovelier sound. “Of course.”
“Well?”
He was more than a little unnerved. Breath came short, in shameful panic. At the same time, his heart leaped into his throat and stayed there. Does she know? He cast her a sideways glance. A dimple winked in her cheek, but she stood there, dark eyes wide, full of faith and innocence; real, and not an illusion. It was surely the weakness that was the illusion—
Leon snapped into focus with a shudder. “Disabuse yourself of such notions. ’Tis not yet dawn.” He was arguing with himself more than with her. He turned to face her, feeling his face flush. “There will be naught to see,” he said, surprising himself with his vehemence.
“Oh,” she said wistfully, as if dashed in her expectations. However, she was not demolished, for she stared at him with bright blackberry eyes, and went on. “I was rather looking forward to—well, this grand occasion…the wonder and excitement…it’s dull in the nursery…I have to make up my own adventures—” she talked rapidly as if to ward off his saying anything “—being a boy, of course, you don’t have to make up little pictures in your head of what it’ll be like when you’re all grow’d up.”
“I never said I didn’t dream, but the future is clouded, and there’s no way to foretell or change it.”
“Nonsense! Close your eyes. Tight. Imagine for yourself what it’ll be like when you’re a knight.”
Leon shrugged, stunned by this abrupt assault and uneasy about its possible consequences, but did as he was bid, his hand resting lightly, prudently, on the sword hilt.
A searing flash burned his eyes. The sharp crack of lightning—or deadly magic—barked beyond the castle walls, then bugles blared and he felt the pounding of heavy hooves through the ground.
It was a trap! Nay, it was sorcery, and everyone knew sorcery was an evil used by heathens of old. For all he knew, it was a trick to distract him from his watch. It wouldn’t have been the first time a child was used as bait in a trap. What can I do? he asked himself. His brain recoiled from the prospect of being the agent of assault, or worse, by failing his duty…
“No!” he protested with more determination than he felt. But the enchantment held him fast. There was no choice but to go with it.
Combat surrounded him, fire and smoke and the clamor of battle in all directions as far as he could see and hear. His helmet was gone and he could feel the gashes in his steel chain mail. His skin was torn in many places and blood covered his body. Flames spouted from the siege wagons, and some tents had caught fire. Rain kept the wagons from becoming an inferno, but the unburned canvas kept the rain from extinguishing the fire.
Then he saw the banner, the rampant lions outlined in gold against the bright red field, now trampled in the earth, torn by sword and dyed almost black in the blood of the young soldiers who followed it. He couldn’t tell whether it was rain or blood running into his eyes, but his vision blurred to nothing.
Caer Llion! Where are you?
He flinched suddenly at the touch of a slender hand and turned to see a small figure standing before him. This one was not armored like the knights, nor tall nor broad enough to be a soldier. This was no manly fighter, but a woman!
“You are hurt,” she said. A deep cowled hood shaded her face, and her elfin features seemed to glow and fade in the reflected light of the flames.
“The battle is lost,” he whispered fiercely, straining to control his disbelief. He gasped for breath.
“You and your men fought well.”
“And died well. I must claim vengeance.”
“You’ll get no vengeance riding alone into that nest.” The girl-woman took his arm and began to lead him away, though there was no way to tell which way to go. “And you, my golden knight, you have a destiny to fulfil. Hold on to me and you will live to fight again. I will protect you.”
He nodded his head, confused. How did this woman think she could do such a thing? He peered into the shadows of her still-raised hood. She let the hood slip back far enough for their eyes to meet clearly. Her eyes were brown, soft and deep, and he felt lost in them, lost in wondering what he had not seen.
The question seemed quite unimportant as his eyes saw more and more shadowy forms appearing, only to flee in all directions and be followed by great waves of horsemen and their riders. There were no individuals—only bodies, armed and unarmed, eager to slay and keep on slaying.
He squinted, not quite seeing their faces, and always the riders passed the two figures without seeing them. He heard the screams of men caught by lance or mace or hoof, but he felt the soft protection of magic, invisibility created by the girl-woman that now cloaked him.
A damp wind swirled around him, and he felt a slight chill. The air smelled of masonry. His reason told him he was on the battlements, but his irrational self said he must have tripped for a minute, then leaped forward a full decade or more.
“What is it? What did you see?”
Leon opened his eyes. He blinked and the vision was gone. The inky blackness of the night was giving way to a softer gray. Had the vision been an image of reality?
“Nothing much, and nothing certain,” he answered, turning on his heels, but the muscles in his legs trembled despite his determination to stand firm. “Except the prince is coming, and so is bad weather.”
“That’s important!”
“If my knowledge of ritual is accurate, at your age, you should still be abed, and not wandering around the battlements. These are not the most friendly of parts,” Leon replied, the edge of his voice as sharp as his sword.
“You try to frighten me,” the girl said in a voice that sounded like music tinkling on his ears. “But I am not afraid.”
He rounded on her angrily. “Are you questioning my courage?”
“Not your courage, never that. You can finish anything you start.” She looked Leon squarely in the eyes as she spoke. He sought some hidden message there, some gleam of witchcraft, but instead the raven-black depths showed him she was even more uneasy than he was himself. Now all those images seemed ridiculous and absurd. Some of the tension left his body.
There was a long silence. For a long moment Leon listened to the silence that had sprung up between them because it was an unquiet silence, one rife with sizzling tension, almost a contest of wills.
Then an urgent whisper, combined with a tug of his coat, quietly, shyly, tentatively, hopefully, and smiling that innocent smile. “I want only to see Father and the others.”
Leon laughed out loud. “Are you certain?”
“That’s all,” she affirmed, still smiling sweetly.
“How can I refuse to do a good deed?” he asked, hoping there was no tremor in his voice.
That angelic smile. “Would you…?”
He was a fool to do what a girl-child wanted him to do! Yet, her invitation was the only option he saw. Strange thing! He could see no honorable way to deny her. He dared not back out now. He did not want to go to that place—but what else might he do when he was the only one here to help her? he asked himself. It was almost as if he were no longer in command of his own body, that even had he wished to halt and turn back he could not have done so. This was where he was destined to be, what he was fated to do.
And that was magic, surely?
Rush into it and through, it’s the only way to face what you fear, he thought. Tightening his gut, he braced both hands against the wide tooth of a merlon and leaned out a crenel to see past an intervening wall buttress.
The side of the castle dropped sheer. Far down showed the footings of solid granite. Below that…
The earth and river and dark forest far, far below.
He groaned involuntarily. His palms on the merlon were slick with sweat, trembling. An icy ball of fear turned his insides to water. He wanted to go back, but forced himself to stand firm. Far away a cock crowed, calling forth the dawn. The air hung cold and wet about his face as he looked down.
It was no good. His breath rasped. His teeth danced. His sight hazed. His legs shook so violently his kneecaps drummed the stone wall. Stand here too long, and he’d pitch over the parapet like dice rattling out of a cup. Slowly, shuffling his leather boots, he crept away from the gaping space.
“What did you see? Lift me up so’s I can see it, too!” Her mouth open, her face all delighted smile, she danced for the battlements rising on the western end of the parapet.
Already spooked, Leon jumped at the girl’s blithe command. Deep shuddering twitched his body. Backing against the inner wall, he willed his heart to stop pounding. Surely it could only beat so fast before bursting. He blinked the night as clear as it would come. There was color in the world. It was dawn. He took deep breaths of clean, cold air.
“You’ll fall,” was all he could say.
She gazed solemnly up at him. Unafraid. She gave a furious shake of her head. “No I won’t, ’sides, you’re here to stop me.”
He opened his mouth to refute but his jaw trembled. His breathing had slowed, and he mopped his brow with his sleeve. He hated being up in the battlements. He still remembered falling off the tower at Whittington. Even now, he screamed in his sleep when he recalled that day. He had been seven then. He had cried in his foster father’s arms, which had embarrassed him, but his foster father had patted him on the back and hugged him the way he hugged Fulk Riven, called him his other son and assured him even grown men made mistakes and wept.
“The other end will give the best view.” Indignation, combined with the fear that she might actually leap onto the crenel, made Leon stride out ahead. But she only laughed and followed him.
Walking east, he asked, elaborately casual, “Do you get giddy on heights?”
“Not the times I try,” she said, skipping beside him.
He shifted his posture, suspecting mockery. He regretted bringing up the matter, but he refused to care what the witchling thought. She seemed absolutely fearless. So young to have such courage, he thought. He saw scratches on her arm and large muddy rips in the gown at her knees. The girl’s nurse would be searching for her by now, and he almost felt sorry for the woman. She would suffer if the mother saw the child now.
“Lift me up, so’s I can see over.” She lifted up slender, fragile-looking arms.
The morning breeze stirred his hair and softly cooled his overheated cheeks. He became calm, and out of calmness came determination. He would not abandon his first damsel in distress. He picked her up, and set her bare feet on the seat of an arrow loop built into a buttress in the parapet.
She stood up on tiptoe, craning forward. She was mad, he was sure of it. He brought a firm hand around her waist to keep her safe, but he didn’t stop her looking.
“Lean on my shoulder if you get dizzy. I’ll catch you.”
“I know, silly!” Steady as a rock on her perch, she rested a small hand on his shoulder and, moth-light, touched his hair. “You talk funny, but you have nice hair. Shiny.”
Her voice sparkled with hints of laughter. She smelled of soap and girl and honey powder. He blinked and wriggled his leather-clad toes. “Thank you.”
Leon stood perfectly still and glanced over his outstretched arm. It was just dawn; the air hung cold and foggy around him, obscured the towers, cut off the tops of gates, pooled and eddied along the courtyard outside the siege walls, and collected wood smoke in long, flat, sooty sheets.
Troops marched out of the gatehouse. He watched the glittering armor-clad company file through the dimming patches of fog, buckles clanking, pennants snapping on poles, accoutrements jumping and tingling regularly at every step in a mass musical note, muffled strangely in the sea of fog.
“Can you see the prince leading them all?”
The girl-child tossed her head to get an unruly lock of dark hair out of her eyes. “There he is! There he is!” She squealed in delight and clapped her hands.
“He must. He is the commander,” Leon said briskly. He glared out the embrasure at the troops still marching past, and fretted to himself. Keith, who would be sixteen years old next Midsummer’s Day, had been chosen to squire the prince. Keith, who in spite of his new length of leg and width of shoulder, could not best Leon either at mock battle or in a wrestling match.
“Aren’t they grand? Where do they go?”
“Men gather here. To ride with Richard. To Palestine. To fight the Saracens.”
As soon as he spoke, he regretted it, for the look on the child’s face turned from joy to fear. She frowned, a little knitting of the brow. Small hands clutched at him.
“Oh. Bad men,” she muttered. Her face crumpled. She looked so young—not a witchling now, but a frightened child.
He was quick to mend his error. “Cheer up, little girl. Your father will be home soon enough,” he said lightly.
A frown. She was not to be distracted. “What if the bad men attack us while Father is away?” she said faintly. “Should we all run away very fast?”
Leon looked up at the white, frozen face. Loosing a rare and splendid smile, the one his arms-master said in a few years would melt women like wax in a furnace, he said softly, “No. My lord would stop them before they reach here.”
Brave though she was, she was still a girl, and that smile held a mighty magic. She laid her hand upon his arm and squinted through black curls at him, a swift bright glance.
“I can throw rocks at them! Big rocks.”
“Oh—” Leon struggled to keep from laughing. He brushed back the dark hair. “That would be most helpful.”
Men marched into the fog and vanished. The air seemed unnaturally still and heavy. As an omen it made his spine turn cold. The day seemed perilous, full of portents; yet there was nothing he could put a thought around. As if—
As if he were on the brink of his own forever after—or maybe only of growing up. He had twelve summers and, with Keith’s departure, was newly promoted to squire, but tall and muscular as he was, and good as he was with either sword or bow, he hadn’t grown into his hands or feet yet.
The girl-child shaded her eyes, shaking her head. “I don’t see them anymore.”
Leon took a deep breath, drew her back from the crenel edge, tender in his grip. She studied him with grave bright eyes. “Don’t you wish you could follow the prince?”
“I wish I was with him. I wish it more than you know,” he told her fiercely, angry with her for asking. His voice echoing loudly in the dawn sky.
“It is not too late. If you run fast, you could catch them.”
He knew that. He was also not accustomed to being made light of. “My lord isn’t happy with things along the border. He wishes me to stay, be a shield-brother to his heir.”
“How will you win your spurs?” she asked with just the hint of a smile.
Leon did not rise to the bait. He was a squire, past childhood, and he had seen the lordlings come and go. He thought of Keith all bruised and bloody, crying foul, and the demands of his own stubborn honor. Then he thought of make-believe things, set in the future. Images of the girl-child, now a woman, a prisoner in the place where crows gather, where the woods grow strange and twisted. Himself, helmed and mounted, sword in hand overwhelming a dragon.
No, that was too exotic.
He rebuilt the image and tried to make it something real; the girl-woman up on the battlements, dark hair aflying in the wind, laughing and holding out her arms; himself, just walking into them, and not noticing the precipice.
No, that was too incredible.
The picture changed. The name of Caer Llion had been added to those famed few that were bywords to both friend and foe, whom men would follow into the jaws of death at the wave of an arm. Iron-helmed, he sat astride a huge destrier, sword held aloft and gleaming in the bright morning sun, thundering over the desert sands, leading a band of knights, an iron-clad avalanche of destruction.
“I haven’t got it all worked out yet, but one day I’ll be a knight. I have to. I must.” He used the blunt mode for conviction, for absolute duty—for oath swearing.
“You could run away and become a commoner if you wanted it enough. Father says the common women have more fun than the highborn.”
“He talks too much. Knights are shields against evil. They are the only hope for pig farmers and little girls—saints preserve their stubborn necks. Nobody else will take pity on them.”
“How proper. They will sing songs in your honor.” A small hand crept into his, the other touched his jaw with her thumb.
“Sounds good to me.”
She wound her tiny fingers through his hair. “Why not? You are brave and noble and strong. You will make a great knight.”
Leon’s nerves jumped, his pulse fluttered and a flush came over his skin, confusing all his thinking. She was curious. She thought he was very brave. It puzzled rather than delighted him, but it was very hard to go on being mad at someone who really believed that. He searched his mind for something clever to say in response. When nothing came to him, he settled for attempting to endow his silence with a knowing air.
She smiled prettily. Her breath was in his face, warm as a spring sunbeam. “Will you marry me when I grow up?”
Leon couldn’t help feeling embarrassed. The girl was so foolish she was a woman already! He was not certain what he was supposed to say, but it wouldn’t hurt to put her straight.
“You must marry a man with estates and title.”
“I could never marry a man I didn’t love!” she said with all the blithe confidence of a four-year-old girl.
“One day a knight will come and steal your heart.” He swung her down to the parapet.
“Will you be my own special knight?” she asked straightway.
“Of course,” he said grandly, flourishing a salute.
She blinked rapidly. Then she glanced upward, a piercing, anxious look. “For ever and ever?”
Leon smiled his sudden smile. His voice changed, deepened. “Henceforth, I am your forever knight.” Bowing low he kissed her hand.
She slid her hand free and detached a knot of ribbon from her night rail and held it out to him. “Then I will wait, ’n’ when you are all grown up, you shall come back and marry me.”
“Just like that?”
She nodded her head emphatically.
Leon took the token and tousled her hair. If she were not careful, this rare blossom would grow into a thorn bush! He glanced at the dawn sky, pretending disinterest.
“All right,” he conceded.
She planted her hands on her hips. There was witchcraft in her eyes. “Will you swear on it?”
Leon ground his teeth. Aggravating girl! Really, she tried his patience to distraction! He inclined his head and turned away. “I vow by sun and moon, earth and water, fire and air. Does that satisfy you?” he said to the free air beyond the walls.
Behind him he heard a whisper of slippers. His back muscles went rigid.
“Nurse!” She ran off gaily, muddy hands outstretched. “Oh, Nurse, I could see far and far. I saw the prince ride out!”
Leon looked around. The waiting woman lowered tight-clenched hands and spread them, and hugged the draggled child to her. In a deliberate, careful tone she told the child, “You must never climb up there alone, you know.”
“Oh, I didn’t. My own true knight was with me.”
“This running about has got to stop, my girl.”
“But why?” The light voice lilted.
The nurse brushed her off mercilessly, then wrenched her away, scolding loudly, “It’s unnatural to want to be adventuring out of doors.”
“But, Nurse, I have found my knight—only he’s not a knight yet—and he’s got hair like gold!”
“One day a fine man with golden hair will ask for your hand, then marry you, get you with strong children, a round half dozen. But until then, little mistress, you’d best be learning the ways of a lady.”
When she reached the doorway, the girl turned. “Until we meet again, may every road be smooth to your feet,” she called in her bell-chime voice, the traditional Celtic farewell.
“And may you be safe from every harm,” Leon managed to reply, with more feeling than the customary response usually carried. He had forgotten to ask who her father was. Not that he would ever see her again. The FitzWarren entourage was returning to Whittington on the morrow.
Unable to stop himself, he reached out a hand, wanting to ask her name. She did look at him, a pale, distracted glance, but the nurse waved him off when he’d have followed her.
He closed his eyes, just for a heartbeat. When he opened them, they had been swallowed up in the darkness.
Chapter One
Northern Marches, Wales, 1204
“The priest is here. All we lack is the groom.” Brenna heard the words as if from a great distance. They hung in the air above her head like flaming arrows, separate and solid, one after another, shooting from some unseen bow…
“He will come.”
“I fear the worst.” The voice drew nearer, a high sweet voice like a bird’s. ’Twas her great-aunt Alice, all aflutter. “If no evil has befallen him, surely he would have arrived by now.”
A creeping chill went down Brenna’s back. The wind whipped her hair and her gown. But her eyes never blinked, her face never flinched, though her heart was hammering against her ribs. She said nothing, only stared fixedly over the merlon, gazing beyond the southward sweep of the battlements.
The walls fell sheer below her, stone set on stone, castle and crag set high above the green valley, field and forest rolling into the mountain bastions in the distance. In the world below, children shouted, a stallion screamed and a tuneless voice bawled a snatch from a drinking song.
The wind sighed upon the stones.
Marry. Marriage. Husband. Wife. Bed.
Children.
A great churning dread welled in her heart. She knew nothing beyond the valley and its inhabitants and the limited knowledge and experience acquired as a healer. The secret tales told by the village women baffled her and yet beckoned with promises more provocative and lurid than the vague tutoring her aunts had imparted on the duties of a wife. She was not certain now whether she wholly welcomed the idea of marriage, of a husband, but it was still, all things considered, a good way to preserve the peace on the border.
He had to come! Her anxious glance went back to the valley. The priest had come trailing in, complaining of heavy rain, and confessing that he had mistaken an intersection of roads and ridden an hour or more along a road before discovering his error. She hoped that her groom was late for as silly a reason, but it was making her increasingly concerned. The only other alternatives were either that he had met foul play or that he had changed his mind.
Why? was the next obvious question, but she only frowned for even thinking of it. Come the Sabbath she would be wed, and she had never even met her betrothed! The feeling of doubt and confusion at the news of her future husband’s impending arrival came laced with a dread that she couldn’t shake, a dread made up of fear for what he might have learned…what he might have already reasoned…
She was being foolish. Don’t think maybe he’ll come today and maybe he won’t, she told herself. Don’t believe that it’s not worth keeping a lookout.
He is coming. She knew it. Yet the shadow of the gray stone walls joined the shadow of the tower and grew long across the courtyard. Not an hour of daylight left.
“Brenna!” Slowly she became aware of a plucking at her sleeve. Her aunt was talking again. What was she saying? “What of the wedding? The feast is being prepared even now.”
Brenna swallowed hard and as close to invisibly as she could. “I am not ready to abandon all hope.”
“Should the preparations be halted?”
“No!” Brenna’s fingers clutched the unyielding stone. Her breath left her slowly. She had not known that she was holding it. “No. Grandfather is the most indulgent of guardians, but I fear his patience is exhausted, and to halt all the preparations now would cripple his purse.”
“What will you do?”
Brenna wrinkled her nose. Since childhood, she had dreamed of her perfect knight. She had built her own romance about him as she grew older. Her experience as a healer had given her a knowledge of the male anatomy, so she could even visualize in vivid detail the fascinating play of muscles across his shoulders, the rippling sinews along his broad ribs, and the taut, flat belly with its tracing of hair that she knew led downward to the manly part of him. It was at this point that her mind games always stopped for she could not totally catch the import of what lay beyond. When she thought of the future, it was of some romantic meeting with her hero.
But it had not come true…
How ridiculous, to waste time on such thoughts. Her knight was but a dream, a memory. It was no use indulging in romantic fantasies, for marriage was not a romantic business. Marriage was a shackle and no pleasure, however you looked at it. Romance belonged to the troubadours, an elaborate conceit made of flowery language, poetry and lute-twanging.
“I am forsworn, surely and irrevocably. I am betrothed to Aubrey of Leeds.”
“Who has not come!”
“Have you ever asked yourself why I agreed to marry a man I have never met?”
“You don’t really expect me to answer that?” her aunt replied.
Brenna shook her head.
“When I was as old as you, I had been two years a wife and nigh three seasons a mother.”
“And you didn’t mind?”
“Aye, but I had not so doting a father, nor so lax a grandfather. With the coming of my woman’s courses, I had perforce to put on a gown and bind up my hair and accept the husband my family had found for me. From all accounts, Aubrey is an admirable fellow…and…according to my brother, who is your guardian, I remind you, your marriage will prevent persistent suitors raiding the marches to gain an advantage over each other.”
The way Lady Alice spoke told Brenna her great-aunt considered marriage but a trifle. She shuddered. Her entire life had been spent following the dictates of authority. She was naught but a female and consequently all decisions were made for her and around her. It was unfair.
And it hurt.
It was all so terribly matter-of-fact. Chattel of one man to be chattel of another. No choice. No argument. It was as the man dictated, as the man ordered. She, the woman, meant nothing to any of them. As her grandfather, Grandy wanted a great-grandson. As Sir Edmund, he also wanted someone willing and able to keep the border barons from each other’s throats, so he could spend his time plotting the stars. Aubrey was only going to marry her because of the political advantage a stronghold such as Dinas Bran would bring. The aunts wanted security in their old age, and the villagers were pleased their healer would not be leaving them.
With diminished hope, she scanned the valley once more. The road was clear enough even in the gloom. Nothing.
She drew a long sigh. She was dallying, and the day was running on. A storm was brewing. The clouds were darkening and thickening. She had to work fast. There was much to do before supper. So she controlled herself as well as she could, and twisted ’round to face her great-aunt.
“What profits me to object? I am constrained and cannot stray from Grandy’s decree.”
“How long can we wait?”
“Wait for what? Grandy sees his lordship of the northern marches foundering. If the knight does not fulfil his promise by the morrow, then Grandy will find another willing to wed me.”
“I can understand how sweet freedom is, Brenna, but you must wed sometime. My brother would not insist on your marrying someone who displeases you, and you must have a life of your own.”
“I have a life…in my thoughts, and in my dreams. That will have to suffice.”
“You were never so credulous before.”
“The bride-price has been paid. The wedding feast is prepared. The priest is here. Most surely, there will be a marriage.”
Follow the road, the leper said.
Trouble was, the road appeared and disappeared by turns in the uneven light of the forest. At a lichen-mottled outcrop of rock, Leon reined in and dismounted. Deso tugged at the rein, impatient, and leaves stirred and rustled under his massive hooves.
Leon walked, leading his big creamy-pale destrier along the brown, wet depths of the drifting leaves, following the ancient stonework until the trees grew so close he could no longer find the next white stone to guide him. It was like a ghost road; the only other soul he’d seen in five hours was a leper.
Shadows enveloped him. Even on a sunny day the massive trees in this region were dense enough to filter light, but this had not been a sunny day. The last hours plodding through rainy mist and mud had scarcely discomforted him, for he was already beyond weariness, his flesh chilled by the wind.
I am lost… he thought. He wished he could lie down and rest. His head throbbed, his mouth was dry and his throat burned. He kept walking, light-headed with hunger. He had given the last of his bread to the leper squatting beside an empty alms bowl at the crossroads in exchange for directions to Valle Crucis.
That had been midmorning. Now it was near nightfall. Wrong way, something said to him. He was certain of it. This was not at all where he’d intended to go. He looked back. Already the trees had closed in upon the path. He could see no more than a few lengths behind, a few lengths ahead.
I have done a foolish thing, he thought, wishing he and his escort had never been parted; and then he shook off the feeling as too much caution. Within a day of his meeting with the king’s chamberlain, he’d taken his leave, gathered his men and headed for Wales, though the frosts were still too bitter for any greening of the land.
Six weeks later, appalling storm rains swelled the rivers and brooks, drowned the upland bogs and rendered the hillsides treacherous. The company had wrapped their weapons in oiled leather and themselves in heavy hooded cloaks and pressed on without pausing. Wagons bogged in roads turned to quagmires, sumpter mules sank to their haunches in mud and tempers became frayed.
Lodgings had been small and scant. His men grumbled under their breaths, laying wagers on whether Ironheart would command them to harden themselves yet further by camping in the open. It was cruelly hard, but then had come the worst blow of all. Wet fever struck down half his company. Rather than delay further, and only after much argument with his sergeant, he’d left his men at Crewe under the command of Rodney of Leyburn, while he continued on with only his squire, Thomas, to attend him.
It had seemed a good idea at the time. Now, though, he wondered if he’d been too rash. He desperately needed food and shelter for the night, for by now it was painfully obvious that the leper had not had the faintest notion of Valle Crucis.
A chill convulsed him. His brain was whirling with half-formed thoughts. Was this a fool’s mission, riding for Wales? It was a long way to go on a hunch.
Still, he had a duty. He would deliver the relic of the Holy Cross entrusted to him by the monks at Cluny, a perfectly natural reason to visit the abbey—and to discover whether the informant’s reports were true or false. After that, he was not certain. He was tired of political intrigue. Mayhap he could resign as the king’s judiciar and so buy some time, a chance to decide what he should do next.
He could go to Dinas Bran. His heart slammed against his ribs. It was not sane. It was, if one was a fool. And no one could accuse him of that. Intemperate, perhaps. But not a fool.
Or he could take another fork in the road. He could go to Whittington, claim it as was his legal right. Then perhaps he could move forward and not constantly think back toward the lost things he remembered. Making peace with that, he could perhaps begin to see things as vividly ahead of him, instead of the gray space that seemed to occupy all his future…
“I think we’re a long way from nowhere, don’t you?” The destrier twitched its ears at the sound of his voice, and a rising wind whispered assent through the wet branches.
The road bent around an out-thrust knee of rock. It was the solid ground ahead that beckoned him, and his feet were very glad to feel that solidity under them as he left the forest behind. He was onto a well-worn path. He glanced up the slope, saw stones and vines through the trees, saw stone walls and turrets, saw…
A truly wondrous sight.
Dinas Bran!
The castle enjoyed a vantage over all the valley and perhaps the plains and hills beyond, to all the distance a clear day would afford. Like a great hog’s back on top of the hill it stood, a brooding stone pile with thick gnarled walls and an air of neglect. Not as fine as some, but a sturdy, well-built fortification for all that, with narrow openings in it here and there through which it might be defended.
A bell began to toll from the walls, waking echoes across the hills. Following these echoes other sounds began to reverberate from within the keep itself: dogs barking, the calling of voices one to the other, the jingling of horses. Birds rose from the tower, wheeled and drove, chattering, black specks against the lowering sky. Ravens, which gave rise to all manner of lore and legend.
Deso’s nose met his shoulders and shoved. Leon gathered the reins, which he had let go slack, and remounted. “Hear that, Deso? Do they wait to pick our bones?”
A dry, distant crack of thunder cut through the gloominess of his thoughts. Ravens were not the only things threatening, it seemed. There was a bank of dark clouds piling up in the north; the kind of clouds that were laden with rain and indiscriminate in their dropping of it. A flicker of lightning ran along the edges of their contours, making them for an instant as sharp and clear as outlines cut from blackened copper.
Leon urged his mount up the steep incline, black shadow against the sullen light, for the motte and the stronghold above, a swift striding that lost not a pace. The tearing thunder-crash repeated itself a few seconds later, and just a little longer than before. The stallion snorted and shied, setting the equipment jingling and creaking. He put them to a quicker pace, and they went pell-mell up a chancy turn, over ground buried in leaves, a stretching and gathering of sinew, a flutter of mane, a streak of mire, as if that could make them safe, get them behind gates and walls.
A vast somber sound boomed out, brazen and measured, the rattle and groan of chains as the portcullis was lowered. It was not an auspicious hour to arrive unheralded and alone. Gates were secured at sundown and reopened with the dawn. Many a traveler who misjudged the timing of his arrival spent an uncomfortable night outside the walls at the mercy of robbers and worse.
“The lower gate should be open still.”
The stallion shifted its weight, bowed its head, and made a quiet, disturbed sound. No doubt Deso was thinking of a warm stable, a good rubdown and some sweet oats. He himself wished desperately for a cup of ale, for a place to lie down and rest. But first he had to discover whether the postern gate remained open. He would know soon enough.
The road bent to follow a curve in the curtain wall where standing stones made an aisle leading to the gate. Here, by the towering arch of stone, a small table had been set up, in front of which stood a motley-dressed collection of beggars.
With a certain disquiet, he noted there was no watch on duty. Doubtless they kept a burly fellow or two on hand to deal with possible emergencies, but there ought to be guards posted in a hold as large this and with constant threat along the border.
Leon slid from the saddle. The stallion stood braced, head high, eyes and nostrils wide. Leon looped the reins and gave the beast a pat on the neck. It shuddered once and was still. He looked about, taking nothing for granted. With a soldier’s practiced eye, he searched for irregularities.
Some distance away, four churls huddled together, talking in low voices and casting uneasy glances around. Shadows lurked and flickered about them. His brows drew hard together. No doubt he was imagining things, but he gained the impression that these ruffians were plotting some villainy. The idea intrigued him, and his spirit lightened at the prospect of a bit of action.
There was the sound of some commotion coming from the vicinity of the courtyard. A woman hurried through the postern gate. She looked about her, letting her glance rest briefly on the beggars. Despite the plain cut and drab color of her gown, he knew she was no peasant wench or waiting woman.
“Tudur?” Her voice was low and musical, with a distinctive husky tone. There was something about it that made him want to hear it again. What folly! He laughed out loud, and surprised himself for it was not a usual thing for him. The woman must have heard him because she swung around and stared at him so intently that he felt both rude and careless. Her eyes held him where he was.
Leon felt his heart skipping. He wished he had come with the clarion of trumpets, the rattle of armor and the gleam of sword instead of by the back door and in the company of beggars. He wanted to leap back onto Deso and race away. He laughed again. Why he thought such foolishness was beyond him.
A tall boy, almost as thin and angular as a spider, came clumping out of the postern with a wooden pail that sloshed with liquid. A flutter of murmurs rippled through the crowd. The woman watched while the boy set the pail on the table, then turned her gaze back to Leon, but her face was in shadow, her features hidden. A swirl of skirts and she withdrew.
The four ragged fellows inched their way toward the open doorway, their shadows following them like cringing dogs. There was a pause in voices. A murmur. A tensing of the air. A deep voice. A sudden exclamation.
A small shadow thrust forward. “Get away from there!”
“Says who?” asked a hoarse, harsh voice.
“Guards!” The sharp quick shout came from the boy Tudur. A hairy hand wrenched the boy’s head to one side.
Abruptly Leon became every inch the soldier. His heart sped up and his hand reached for his sword hilt. Fingers clenched and unclenched on empty air. He had let Deso carry his sword, which he had stowed behind the saddle, though he carried a dagger in his belt. Beneath his brown wool cloak and leather tunic, he wore no mail, not even a padded gambeson, naught but a linen shirt.
He’d been a fool to leave his shield and armor, even to his helmet, at Chirk with his squire this morning, and he was beginning to regret it. He might be strapped with ropy muscle, tough as an oak tree and as hard to kill, for he’d been to hell and beyond and survived. In all truth, most men would rather not face him with or without his sword. Even so, he regretted the sacrifice of his mail. Linen and wool were poor protection against edged steel.
He had, he thought, taken a great deal on himself. He’d seen that much in his squire’s eyes when they’d parted; a cool kind of reckoning he had gotten in the drill yard. Now it seemed mad to have done, and a light sweat lay on his limbs, for all that the wind was chill.
Wrenching himself free, Tudur dodged a fist, scurried past the ring of people gathered by the table, scampered across the road, and stopped, panting, in midsprint in front of Leon. The young face came up, the mouth opened and the eyes widened. The boy flinched visibly, caught himself, and drew back, the look on his face changing in an instant from surprise to confusion.
Leon sighed. His forehead ached. He realized he was scowling. He stretched his mouth into a smile.
“Are you a knight?” The boy looked afraid—not greatly so, but uneasy all the same.
Leon inclined his head to him.
A peculiar animation had come to the boy’s face, a keen anticipation. “The sort that saves maidens in distress?”
No, Leon began to say. But…
“So ’tis said,” were the words that tripped off his foolish tongue.
“Yes. Yes! I knew it! Some say I am daft, but I could tell straightway you were Brenna’s knight!”
“I’ve no notion what you mean.”
The boy’s eyes darted from Leon’s face to the postern opening, back again. “Of course. My mistake. Being daft, I get confused, so I don’t—” His eyes flicked back to the postern. “You are most needed here, sir.” There was tremulous expectation, as if Leon would act now, at once, in a breath.
Leon inwardly cursed. He was not usually a man given to rash acts of compassion, and, though the boy’s pluck touched him, he saw no obligation to have his throat cut. Or to die for nothing because some self-righteous slip of a girl was too cocksure stupid to take heed of the curfew. He stared down his nose at the boy, who went beet-red.
“If you would give aid, good sir!” Tudur said, blinking wildly. “There may be trouble—at the gate.”
Well, what the hell. Nobody else was going to play the hero, and Deso needed hay and a warm stable. Condemned now to simple workaday practicalities, Leon cast common sense to the winds. He handed the reins to Tudur, pointed silently to the open gate and stepped into the shadow of the wall, drawing his hood over his head. This action had the added benefit of concealing the greater part of his features.
He held still while Tudur led the destrier through the gate. Deso went with his ears laid flat and pricked up by turns, dancing and skipping through imagined obstacles, iron-shod hooves ringing on the gray cobbles. Ravens still circled aloft, dropped lower, as if urging him forward.
The girl came running out of the postern once more, her dark braids whipping loose from under the confining net, each with a mind of its own, her skirts aflurry, her slippered feet hardly touching the stones. This time she carried a large basket piled high with bread and meat.
“Hurry, Telyn, we are already past the hour!”
A smooth-faced youth clad in a vivid green tunic and bright yellow hose followed her, also bearing a basket. “This is foolishness. Curfew has rung. The gates should be locked!”
She gave a laugh, easy and merry. Leon caught his breath at the sweet, open sound. “Shall these poor folk go hungry because the hour grows late?” The laugh died. “Come, good people…here is some bread for you…and for you.”
A vague fluting of tones rose among the group, and a voice said, “It is unsafe, Brenna. The air is charged with danger!”
The woman lifted her face, and a sudden flash of lightning bathed her features in light. There was something about the expression on her face that struck a cord within Leon; and he found himself ensnared by her face, he who did not generally pay attention to women.
His throat went tight. She reminded him of the angel in his dreams. He had never seen such perfect milky skin or such large dark eyes. She could not be considered beautiful in the strictest sense of the word, for her mouth was too large, her chin too pointed, her cheekbones too wide. But the result was somehow magical. The notion dazed him. He lost his breath and his clarity of thought both at once and stood shaking like a leaf.
She showed a smile of pearly teeth, and held out her hand, palm up. “Come, sir, there is enough for all,” she said; and snared him twice over.
He hesitated. She waited.
“Come,” she reiterated. Her voice was music.
Leon was thrown into a turmoil of self-awareness, caught for a moment in two flashing, dark eyes. Eyes that sat far apart above a fine, straight nose. Eyes that understood, accepted. His face burned. He could feel the cords standing out along his neck. His body knotted from throat to thigh. He must look a fool, he thought, the greenest of country bumpkins, undone by a woman.
Every part of him was drawn to her. Never had his limbs seemed so beyond his control. Every step he took seemed fraught with the potential for calamity. What if his overlong legs betrayed him? What if he tripped and fell?
Unsettled by such strange thoughts, he drew his cloak close. His feet beat out a grim refrain.
Brenna. Brenna. Brenna.
Until, finally, he stood very still, towering over her, staring down at her, sharing a look with her. For a moment there seemed a confusion in her dark eyes. Gradually he began to comprehend what he saw there: it was a reflection of his own emotions. She was shocked and trying to hide it.
Then came the thunder, rumbling, the intervals shortening between claps. Brenna shook herself, as if awakening from a trance, and held out a cup filled with milk. The smile faded to gravity. The eyes stayed upon his, dark as river water.
Fingers touched fingers. Oh, very gladly would he have touched more. He longed for a thousand things, all of them dangerous.
“My good fellow, you have enough scars to stitch a tapestry. Stand aside and I’ll find some salve that lets the skin stretch—” a frown formed on her brow and she bent her head to an ailing urchin, while her cheeks suffused with color “—and that cough, child, needs an herbal tisane…that sore on your hand needs a poultice—”
Leon felt another flush heat his ears, as if he were a grass-green stripling undone by his first glimpse of a trim female ankle. He buried his nose in the offered cup, thanked her in a low voice, drank deeply, put the cup on the table and retreated a short distance.
The shadows above his head stirred, as if a gentle wind was blowing. He slitted his eyes and looked up at the sky. The ravens screamed, swirling, and vanished into the tower.
He picked up a movement out of the corner of his eye. Instantly alert, he did nothing out of the ordinary, simply allowed his eyes to track the beggars once more. One of the churls eased himself away from the wall and slid toward the postern, his hand resting lightly on his hip. But he turned back to his original position when he noticed Leon watching him.
There was trouble afoot. Deep inside Leon’s mind he could feel a subtle unease. It was as if he felt, not heard, the echoes of the alarm bell clamoring across the desert air from the furtherest outpost long before the enemy has reached the gate.
The girl gave a cry of protest, which brought his head jerking up. The beggars! It seemed she was refusing their demand for a bed for the night.
“No,” she said, stepping back.
The beggar scowled. “There is shelter for women and children, but not for men?”
The girl did not rise to the bait. A woman and her two children had been ushered through the postern gate into the bailey, but now the girl barred the door to the beggars with her own person. “They want herbs and potions. You have no such need. Be off with you and seek a bed at the inn in the village.”
Leon stood calmly for all that his heart was racing. Four assailants or nine didn’t matter to him, as long as he had his trusty dagger in his hand. That, and his own wits, skill and strength, sufficed, and he’d killed more than that in one skirmish. Armorless and alone, he was still more than a match for these churls.
Lightning flashed and edged everything in fire; the beggars, the edges of the buildings, the woman. For an instant their eyes met. Her head tilted to one side, her lips parting. He narrowed his eyes to deeper slits. She met his gaze unblinkingly, her eyes dark, staring at him strangely sharp, then she drew a long, uneven breath, as if to say, I am the one you have been seeking, and you are the one I have sought.
Leon had time to wonder whether his mind was going. Time to wonder about the question, but no time to find an answer. The churls inched closer, regaining his attention. Not now, Leon cautioned himself. Be still a little longer.
Five paces more.
“Give us alms and we will go in peace,” said one, edging toward her. His eyes were on the purse that swung from her girdle as he rested his hand upon his hip—a subtle threat.
She was not so easily intimidated. “Do you threaten me, sir? Are you so bold? Food you have had in plenty. No more can I give you!” Her eyes were blazing hot as coals and her small hands formed tight fists at her sides.
A humming. Leon heard metal hiss and knew the sound. He cursed under his breath. Mutters rose behind him.
“He’s got a sword!” somebody yelled.
People scattered, running in every direction, screaming. The rest of those who had sought food and alms moved back and away, or fled, leaving a clear space.
Now.
“I’ll get help.” The motley-clad youth ran past Leon, blocking his thrust. The churl made a mad lunge across the table. A lance of pain struck Leon’s temple. Spots swirled in front of his eyes. His fist came down. The milk pail burst apart, sending its contents showering in all directions. The girl was sent reeling.
“One against four and I have her purse already!”
This time, Leon didn’t hesitate. His hand lashed out in a blur of motion, of bone-jarring impact to wrist and elbow as his fist slammed into the assailant just below the ear. The man’s eyes bulged and his head danced like that of a puppet. Leon had a momentary glimpse of the other’s eyes, open wide, terror burning in them like an uncontrollable fire, before the man doubled over.
He kicked the weapon out of the man’s hand as another of the churls advanced, his cudgel raised to smite him. He lunged and caught the uplifted hand. His free hand crunched across the elbow. Then he grabbed another man plunging past him, spun him around, and felt armor beneath the brown robes.
It was a poor sort of a fight. Gripping the man’s arm, Leon twisted it and snapped it like a twig, grasped another attacker by the throat and flung him with contemptuous ease into the wall behind him. He planned none of his moves. They had all been drilled into him for so many years that they came automatically.
Time seemed to leap forward. There came the sound of many footsteps, all running toward them. A half dozen assorted servants and men-at-arms erupted from the postern. Hands went to swords, steel rising to the light. A roar went up.
“Get them, get them, get them!”
The four churls fled. Telyn chased after them, leading the detachment of men in full pursuit.
It was over. Done.
Leon stood with hand on hip, breathing easily. He had not even drawn his dagger. “Are you all right?” She nodded and he said, “In the name of all devils—why?” He jerked his head to the baying throng. “A sentry on watch would prevent such incident, lady.”
Brenna did not move, save that her head came up. He saw a sheen on her cheek as of light on polished, shining stone, or firelight on water.
“I am sorry. It was mine own folly that brought it about,” she faltered in a voice that was scarcely audible. “I should have called for help earlier.”
Leon kept his eyes on her. He had great confidence in his wit and skill, but when it came to women, he had no confidence at all. The flick of temper faded into something else: curiosity. She looked bedraggled, her veil askew, her thick black braids in disarray. Her eyes were burning bright. She was, perhaps, more shaken by the incident than she cared to acknowledge.
“It shouldn’t have happened.” Memory put violent pressure on his voice. What a different ending this day could have had! He could hardly think, his heart was hammering so in his chest, and his insides twisted in his belly.
She drew back a little. Her lips quivered, and she shook her head. “No one has ever threatened me before.”
Leon looked levelly into her eyes and did not move. “Such idiocy can prove fatal. Did you never think what might be the probable result? Did you never think that you might endanger others?” Driven by bitter memories, his voice was still hard and unconvinced.
A wild shake of the head. “No! I am unhurt.” Another space for breath. “I suppose it was a lucky coincidence you were on hand when those churls attacked,” she said with just the hint of a smile.
Leon felt the tightness around his mouth as his lip curled. He had spent too many years in action, and he was not accustomed to being made light of. Yet it was more than that. Under the bravado, he could sense something else in the girl. He could taste it; a nervous tension that came perilously close to fear.
“Coincidence, chance, luck. I don’t believe in any of them. I keep a sharp sword.” In spite of all his efforts, it was hard not to sound cynical.
She looked at him sharply. Her head was high now, her expression haughty. “You are very brave, sir. I would that all knights showed such courage. If they did, the Crusaders would have taken the Holy Land.”
“Devil take that! I am one man, not the Crusader army, lady,” he exclaimed.
“You were bold and confident!”
“A man of my trade lives every day of his life under threat of death,” he replied with a pragmatic shrug.
“But you are valiant! With neither armor nor weapon, you sent the dogs running. You felt no fear!”
“I have nothing to lose, therefore nothing to fear,” he said, too bluntly, perhaps, for she bit her lip a moment, frowning as if it were a challenge and she were searching for a proper response.
“A man who fears nothing loves nothing and, if he loves nothing, what joy is there in his life?” she asked with passionate urgency.
All his senses seemed foggy of a sudden, and his head on the edge of hurting. “I’ve never met a woman who speaks to me as you do,” he told her.
“Even your wife?” She fixed that direct look of hers on him, challenging him.
“I have no wife.”
Her scrutiny was both leisurely and thorough, taking him in as if he had been a bullock at market. Swift anger flooded through him. He felt his jaw clenching. Years of living by the sword had wrecked any comeliness he had ever possessed and any chance of winning a woman’s heart.
Something changed, lifted, in the set of her mouth and eyes. Tiny facial muscles relaxed. He caught a momentary expression as she stood before him, watching him intently—something intense and satisfied, as if it were enough to know.
“And I have no husband. Yet.”
“If you did, you would be more circumspect.”
Slowly the proud head bowed. She spread her hands. “It’s not like that here.”
“No doubt it is different in the marches,” Leon agreed with a touch of irony. “I do not think it is that. You knew I would intervene, if necessary.”
Her cheeks flamed, but she did not evade the charge. “Yes,” she said with a directness that he guessed was characteristic of her.
There were footsteps, the ringing of swords in scabbards. The men-at-arms were returning with two of the churls, and the girl’s purse. There were shouts and cheers from a tangle of servants and hangers-on. The youth had collected the baskets and was urging her within, saying it would rain soon and that Sir Edmund would be angry.
Brenna grinned up at him, her eyes bright. “Here I was wishing you away, but there was nothing I wanted more to see than you coming up that hill.” She laid a slender hand on his arm. “Welcome to Dinas Bran.”
Chapter Two
Could it be…was it…? Yes! He was here! He had come!
Flanked by the knight and Telyn, Brenna walked straight-backed and resolute into the courtyard, around the well and across the crowded bailey, taking no notice of the flurry of guards and flickering torchlight, the mass of shadowed faces and shocked voices. She offered not a word.
This was no time for argument or explanation. The gracious and civilized thing to do was to get her betrothed upstairs where he could bathe and prepare for the festivities. Her eyes did not even follow the guards as they bore the assailants away. She had not meant to cause any trouble by breaking the curfew, but it was done. They’d soon be in a cell for questioning, if anyone had any sense. It was up to the men now. She was too consumed by strange feelings she couldn’t comprehend. Feelings that made her reel with their intensity.
This was her betrothed! He was the man of her dreams! In truth, he was here!
She’d heard him laugh, a black-velvet ripple, sweet as the honey of the southlands, and felt something deep within her move, open. She’d looked wildly about, and her heart was like an arrow hurtling through space. Then eye met eye. A spark leaped in the meeting, and the newcomer had laughed no more. He gazed at her with—recognition, it might be, for she had felt it, too.
This is the one!
It was odd, really. She’d prayed that he wouldn’t let her down, that he would come. But she had an uneasiness now, about his late arrival, the peculiar look of him. There was some strangeness about him. He’d stood there, on the edge of the crowd, his hand seeming to rest on a sword hilt in the shadows, his whole aspect grim and dangerous.
Brenna swallowed hard. There had never been any other like this man. She could not suppress a heated sensation welling deep inside. His hand, heavy on her shoulder, seemed to have the strength of iron. She wanted to tuck herself closer against that strength…and yet she did not know why.
This man might be her betrothed, but he was a stranger. It just seemed impossible that he was truly the man of her dreams, she thought. And how could he so easily, so appallingly easily, become the one?
She had turned away so many suitors that her aunts despaired, but still her knight had not come. She had held to her dream until her grandfather had become impatient and commanded she wed. She had only consented because, with constant skirmishes to defend the border, Grandy’s coffers were empty and he needed the bride-price. Besides, the amiable Aubrey of Leeds sounded more congenial a match than Keith Kil Coed!
Be honest, Brenna. This incomparable knight is something you have conjured up out of an overactive imagination—or a mad notion, brought on by the tensions of the day. She must not allow her emotions to dominate her reason.
They came up the stairs and into the keep. Light spilled over them from the torches that burned all along the wall. From the kitchens the sweet smell of roasting venison floated on the air, and there was a stir in the hall, the coming and going of servants carrying trays of cider and ale through a door to the great hall where tapestries fluttered and torches flared in drafts.
Brenna stopped and sent a page scurrying with orders to fetch her maidservant. Fingertips tapped her arm. She became aware of Telyn, hovering at her side, still clutching the baskets.
“Thank you, Telyn. You served me well this day.”
The squire made a clicking with his tongue. “My lady, it would be wiser not to disturb Sir Edmund with news of this…he is at table already. Surely he will blame me for allowing you to go out unattended. No harm was done. Your purse has been recovered, and if I…”
“It is all right, Telyn. I accept full responsibility. You go eat. I will escort the knight to his chamber.”
“But surely—” Telyn stopped.
“I’ll be down soon. Will you please tell Grandy that Sir Aubrey has arrived and has retired to refresh himself?”
A polite murmuring. No objections. She supposed he didn’t know what to say. She didn’t, either, except, “Thank you, Telyn.”
As she dismissed the squire, the knight swung about, swirling his gray cloak. “Deso!” he exclaimed, his voice breaking hoarse. He had said nothing up to that point, had let Brenna lead him where she willed. “Deso!”
“Is that the name of your horse? Tudur has taken the animal to the stables. The grooms will see to it.” Brenna tilted her head up, regarding him sidelong. “Is it a real battle charger?”
Her tone must have betrayed something. His glance sharpened. His face was cold and still. For a heartbeat he looked like a great red stag at bay. Then his shoulders and the line of his neck relaxed.
“Yes, it is a warhorse, and a fine one, too,” he said in the most ordinary of tones, but his eyes were as clear as water, with a brightness in the heart of them.
Brenna’s breath shortened. His hood had flown back long since, revealing hair like hot gold. His jaw was square and rugged, his mouth bluntly carved below the jutting blade of his nose. The pale smooth marks traced across half his face like the limbs of a lightning-blasted tree bespoke of courage and mettle and the reflexes of a warrior. And the mantle of wool that swept across his shoulders emphasized their width and suggested great strength.
She swallowed hard. Her heart was thudding against her ribs. Oh, yes, he was a pleasing man, younger than she had imagined—no more than eight-and-twenty. She could do far worse than he.
So why this uneasiness?
It appeared Aubrey was no ordinary knight. For, though her betrothed knew how to defend himself, and his linen shirt was of the finest weave, and the supple leather of his tunic and boots were fastened with ornate metal toggles, he came without armor or shield. Somehow, somewhere, he had lost his armor and weapons. Understanding came. Did not a knight, unhorsed in the lists, forfeit his gear?
Did that matter? He is here!
“Come.” Back stiff, braids swinging, she led him past the inner door that opened on the hall, up the narrow curving timber steps to the bedchambers set high in the tower of the castle, and down the corridor. At the very end, she stopped and pushed aside a beaded leather curtain.
“You may sleep here.”
Her companion stumbled. His fingers tightened. The grip hurt. She drew a long, long breath and let it go. Slowly, the pressure was removed. Her muscles went slack with relief.
The room they entered was circular, with tall narrow windows all about it. A fire blazed in the hearth, and the chamber glowed in the wastefulness of an oil lamp, which shed a low, even light over a crowded table covered with sheaves of parchment and scrolls.
Brenna made her way across a floor carpeted with sweet-smelling rushes, bent, adjusted the lamp wick, and stood uncertainly, looking at him, surprised by the pounding of her heart. She pressed one hand to her chest for a moment and it eased. Why was she so nervous? This was her betrothed!
He lingered, a shadow in the doorway. But the rugged features were devoid of emotion. He might have been carved from stone. And he avoided her gaze, staunchly refusing to glance her way.
For once, the forms of hospitality deserted her. She had kept herself from hoping. As far as she could, as far into her childhood as she might. She’d pondered what to say to him. She wanted to talk to him, to chatter idly, to say something to fill the silence. But now that he was here, her heart beat with a thud of self-conscious dread, and she could only blurt, “Are you tired?”
He shrugged. She went to him, took his arm and steered him toward a chair as if he were a child, never mind that he was a head taller and thrice her weight.
“A bath and a glass of mulled wine and you’ll soon feel more the thing. There are soap and herbs and clean towels in the chest, and this is a fine feather bed.”
Why had she said that? Brenna felt the heat rush to her face. He would think her most unmaidenly, or that she could not wait to be bedded! But he seemed not to notice her confusion. He shrugged out of his sodden cloak, threw it over a chair and gave a curt wave of his hand.
“It’s very fancy.”
In truth the chamber was plain enough, all bare wood and aged stone. It was spacious and the furnishings were comfortable, with a faint scent of flowers. On the table beside a pot of ink and a heap of quills lay a bowlful of rose petals, sending up sweet fragrance like a silent blessing.
Brenna knelt and poked at the fire with an iron rod. She looked up and up. He looked down and down. The eyes that met hers were the shifting color of the forest. Her breath quickened; her heart was beating so hard it hurt her throat.
“It was my father’s chamber. The bed came from France.”
By which answer Brenna knew she had hit a raw nerve. Two deep grooves appeared on his face, running from the flare of his nostrils to the corners of his suddenly grim mouth.
“I can assure you, lady, that this sacrifice is quite unnecessary. I have traveled far and am weary. A cot in a corner will suffice.”
There was a sharpness in his tone that startled Brenna. He looked horrified. Her heart stilled. Had she offended him? Or did he find her unattractive? That stung her vanity a little, but not enough to cause this pain that clenched her heart.
No, it is not that, she said to herself.
It was true that men always reacted to her with admiration. It was also true it had never concerned her whether they had or not. This time she cared. For the first time in her life she felt a frank stirring of curiosity in a man, an honest awareness of him. This man reacted to the notion of using the marriage bed as if just told he had to share it with a leper.
She rose to her feet, and clutched her hands together, finding them shaking. She kept her back straight and her chin up, but she was all too painfully aware of the figure she cut. Her gown had been her mother’s; it was shabby, threadbare, and covered with mud. In short, she was unkempt.
She had never believed it would come to this. How badly she wanted to make a good impression. The hospitality of Dinas Bran was well known. A visitor was sure of shelter, refreshment and ale, with meat for his hounds and oats for his horse without stint. Would she offer her betrothed any less?
Knights, it was said in the codes, had a common trait. It was honor. Privately, Brenna thought it was pride. Of which this man had an excess. If only he would catch her eye, reassure her with a curve of those generous lips, bring a glimmer of certainty surging into her heart. But no, he would only look straight ahead, his bearing contained, aloof. What was she supposed to do?
“Sir Edmund dislikes having the customs upset. He’ll ask me why. What will I say?”
“That ’tis most kind, but—”
“Be not mistaken. My father no longer has use for this room. He is dead. Killed at Acre.”
“Your pardon, lady. I am not at my best.”
He looked feverish, but then that was to be expected; God alone knew how far he’d traveled in that damp cloak.
“In that case, I insist,” she said firmly. “Besides, ’tis the custom here to give the best accommodation to our noble guests. I would not have it said that Dinas Bran lodged you meanly,” she snapped, the sharper for that her cheeks had caught fire.
Leon wrapped his arms about him against the sudden coolness and looked at her. Simply looked. He had thought her magical at first sight. Now he was sure. She was indeed quite the most exquisite woman he had ever seen. Her smooth pale skin was rose-blushed. Her eyes were dark and enchantingly tilted, their brilliance set off by their fringe of long black lashes. Her fine dark brows slanted across her forehead like a raven’s wing, and her hair beneath its drift of veil was black as night. Her one flaw, the chin that was a shade too pronounced, a shade too obstinate, only strengthened her beauty. Without it she would have been lovely; with it, she was breathtaking.
He leaned on the wall, scrubbing at his sweaty cheeks and chin. The chamber felt unaccountably hot. It was hard to breathe, let alone think.
What good were these doubts? he asked himself. If he were enchanted, there was little he could do. If it were naught but the fever, then a bath would cool his overheated senses. After so many days in the saddle, his clothes were so dusty, muddy and sweaty that they would probably be able to walk back to France all by themselves, and despite his attempts at washing them and himself in rivers so cold they made the teeth ache in his head, the body inside the garments wasn’t much better.
All he knew for sure was that he’d never find out standing still, and the thought of hot water and soap and razors, was a pleasant one. He felt suddenly very weary. The energy that had driven him during his rescue mission was now taking its toll. In short, he felt rather disheveled and somewhat shaken. His head hurt in savage counterpoint to his heartbeat. He pressed his fingers hard into his forehead, pushed away fatigue.
“Is it also the custom here, as it is on the Continent, for the lady of the house to offer guests assistance in their bathing?” he asked, fearing to know.
Brenna was taken aback. For a moment, breath and sense failed her. She lost her thread of thought, everything unraveling. Was he actually suggesting she attend him? Or was he simply making conversation? A feeling of embarrassment arose in her, and then resentment. Why were things so contrary? Her wits rallied; she gathered her forces.
“If you so desire,” she said in a voice that she tried to make sound calm. Dared she do such a thing? Her grandfather did not ever allow her to help bathe their guests. It was a chore left to the maidservants. But this was her future husband!
“I must trust your judgment, and hope that you do not come to regret your decision.”
Brenna stared, puzzled. Filled with uncertainty, her mind went ’round and ’round, struggled with the meaning of his words. What was he talking about? He had paid the bride-price. The wedding was prepared. He had come. Why was he hesitating now? Or was he talking about what was to happen afterward in the marriage bed? The bed he had so summarily rejected?
“It is the least I can do, my lord.”
Leon felt like a man hit by a pole-ax, still on his feet, but reeling. He searched her face, looking for duplicity, but finding something else, something he couldn’t put his finger on. His mind screamed, Beware! But his body shrieked even louder. A chill grew in his limbs, a slight giddiness like too much ale. Like too much heat and too much cold. Like love. What had put that thought into his mind?
“I fear you flatter me too much, lady. I am only a soldier, not a great lord,” he found the strength to say.
Brenna’s assurance foundered as she realized the significance of what he’d just said. She drew a slow breath; her first sign of temper.
“You dissemble well, sir knight. I think you are more than a simple soldier.” When he opened his mouth to argue, she shook her head. “I will not bandy words with you—if you wish me to believe you only a modest soldier then so be it. I care not what your rank may be, but there is nothing common about you.”
“I am glad you think so.”
“What reasonable person would not?” Brenna changed tacks abruptly, fixing him with her most disconcerting stare. “I heard you were a great knight, all amiable and devout. Were the rumors wrong?”
A curl of stirred air touched Leon’s cheek. The lines of his face turned icy as hill granite. A small shiver trickled down his spine like a drop of ice water, and for the merest instant the chamber seemed somehow darker than it had any reason to be. He could hear his pulse pounding in his ears. Shutters rattled, one after another. The wind howled, roared and stirred the shadows in the corners. Outside the night was alive with the hammering of rain, streaks of bouncing energy, silvered where the lightning hit it. All of it utterly foolish, of course, and just to be laughed at later, with a glass of good wine in one hand. And yet…
“How could you have heard such things?” Grabbing her wrist, as if by this gesture he could wrench the knowledge out of her. “You didn’t know me at all, before this evening.”
Brenna was startled at the bite in his voice. Were the rumors wrong? Her eyes looked up involuntarily into the chips of ice that were his eyes. Hers wavered the merest fraction. She rallied with a flare of Brenig temper.
“It’s surprising what news comes from the court, but now I am beginning to think it was all just exaggeration. You are wound so tight, I don’t think you are amiable at all!”
He stood there, unmoving, unperturbed. A little silence passed, barely endurable, before he released her wrist and said mildly, lazily, “You’re probably right.”
Brenna felt her cheeks turn warm. This wasn’t going as planned at all. Caution and guilt warred with vague, half-formed desires until, finally, duty dictated a more sensible attitude. But the itch of curiosity assailed her. More than an itch, her curiosity was a torment.
“Some said that you would not come to us, that you were bound in close friendship with the king, and that the court has need of you there. We both know that to be a falsehood…do we not?”
“You have been misinformed, my lady. The road but took some crooked turns.”
She tilted her head to one side, studying him. “So you can be devious, too. When a man of your stature travels without his servant, one would suppose him to be—shall we say…in disguise?”
Leon thought how quick of understanding is this girl! He knew the rules of hospitality. Never ask the visitor “From where?” or “Where to?” Never ask them “How many?” or “For how long?” And most of all, never ever ask them “When?” In another minute she would surely guess that he was a king’s man…
“Forgive my rudeness. I meant no disrespect.”
“None taken.”
“I did not realize. I thought…perhaps…” Brenna tried to think of something to say, but no words would come. Her fluency failed her when it was her moment to speak. She could not frame a single sentence. Her cheeks blazed with the shame of it. “You look a little the worse for wear. Were you beset upon the road?”
Leon bit down on a frown. He was certain he detected trepidation in her voice. The sparkle in her gaze, however, made him decidedly suspicious. She stood there, cool, proud, running those dark eyes over his disheveled and travel-worn figure. She wanted a bold, brave answer. He gave her one; though not perhaps the one she had expected.
“Lady,” he said very softly, “I was beset by a breaker of hearts.”
She looked at him, as if not understanding, or not wanting to understand. “Are you a pawn, then?” Raising a brow the merest suggestion of a degree.
“My lady,” he said, and could not resist a bow, ironic mockery of her clear hesitation, “that depends upon your own intent.”
This one could break your bones or your heart, Brenna warned herself. Her pulse began to quicken. Blood rushed up in her ears. Suddenly she was trembling, shivering. She bit her lip. She had to fight off the urge to touch him, to casually brush her hand against his. She had never experienced anything that made her feel like this. Her heart was beating so she felt that she could hardly be sure of controlling her voice. Surely all her senses had flown?
“Sir! I—” Brenna struggled mightily to keep her expression bland, though she was sure a spark of delight lit up her eyes. “I will feel better if you let me make sure you’re cared for.”
“Whatever the lady requests. I cannot deny her. I am resolved to please her.”
That was a refuge. She snatched at it. Closer and closer then, at a careful pace. Her hand rose to his cheek. He caught it.
“No,” he said.
A little silence passed, barely endurable. His eyelids flickered a fraction. A shiver traced her spine, a sensation like a touch brushing her, moth-soft.
“This offense to your person, did it go unpunished?”
“I am alive, aren’t I?” His irises snapped light-sparks briefly, just a glint of cold, then control. He did not like that memory, nor the reminder.
I do not believe in coincidence.
She looked up at him from under her eyelids. All honor was in that bladed curve of nose, in those cheekbones carved fierce and high, in those brows set level over the deep eyes.
“Then that answers the question.”
Her smile won free, startling as the sun at midnight, and more miraculous. Deep down inside Leon a strange feeling, almost of elation, surged—but why? Surely not because this slip of a girl showed neither sympathy nor revulsion of his ruined face? This fact alone couldn’t possibly account for the new emotion ebbing and flowing within him. On the other hand—
His spare hand involuntarily went to the breast of his leather tunic, in an inner pouch of which he kept a stained knot of ribbon. It had become a treasured charm to him through the years, and he had grown almost to believe that it was a safeguard to him from the constant assaults of temptations to thoughts and deeds unworthy of a Christian knight.
He tested his courage by it. He tested it further. He released her wrist. Risked shame that a girl should trust him.
“I give you leave,” he said, a little breathless.
“How generous of you.”
Wordlessly, she reached out and touched his cheek softly. He felt something come alive within him, something that made him feel warm and cherished. He suddenly became aware of the delicious tension tightening his whole body. His heart jumped and started hammering. A fearful thrill ran from his chest to his groin. He had not known he could have so many needs all at once, amid such a nightmare.
Brenna touched him, because she wanted to, because she could not help herself; a brush of fingertips from his cheek to his chin, tracing the path of his scars. It was great daring. He quivered under her hand, but did not pull away. She looked up and caught his eye. A quick smile framed her lips.
“Am I transgressing?” she asked him.
In more ways than one!
“A little.” Meeting her gaze, Leon struggled mightily to keep his expression bland. You must face that which you fear most. Confront and conquer. Know yourself first and you will overcome a legion of adversaries. His arms-master’s words, spoken to him at Whittington. A boy of twelve summers, unaware of the fate that awaited him.
Ever so slowly, her fingers progressed along their tortuous route. He kept still, hardly daring to breathe. She was close, so dizzyingly close! A painful stiffening was pressing against the confining leather of his pants, but he dared not shift to ease his position for fear his actions would be noticed.
Leon closed his eyes and inhaled sharply, allowing himself this rare moment of self-indulgence. Then, with the ease of long practice, he forced the emotional temptation back into a corner of his mind. He’d learned a long time ago that the only way to exist was to keep his feelings under rigid control, his heart hard and unyielding as iron. It was a kind of armor. After everything that had happened years ago, there was nothing left to be afraid of.
They were very close. Brenna could feel the living warmth of him, and catch the scent he bore, faint yet distinct. Musk and saddle leather and wet wool. His face was so close that she could feel his breath, so warm and soft. She hoped he would kiss her—yes, she wanted him to kiss her—and her heart beat faster as she swayed toward him, her soft breasts touching his chest. How would it feel to kiss a man?
Their lips touched. He was very beautiful and very strong, and his kiss was sweet. Swift and startling. Warm and warming. He tasted of spices. She felt his long, lean body pressed against hers, and in her secret places, unfamiliar longings began to stir.
He drew back.
Brenna only stared at him, not moving. His eyes had darkened to emerald, and he was frowning, if only slightly; his gaze gone almost to coldness. He bowed again.
“I am honored, and I hope my presence will cause you no more hardship than is necessary.”
Her throat was locked. She swallowed to open a way for her voice. “It is we who are honored—no, pleased by your presence here, and all will see to your comfort. I will have a servant fetch some wine and a trencher from the kitchen—and some clean clothes.”
And fled.
Two steps outside the door she came to an abrupt stop. Elen, her old nurse and present maidservant, stood there, arms akimbo, blocking the corridor.
“Merciful Mary, what means this, Brenna?”
Brenna did a little jig though she wanted to throw up her arms and yell, to leap and hop and twirl and imitate the merry dance of the minstrels, and burst into the hall shouting the glad tidings to everyone.
“Elen, the inconceivable has occurred! My knight…he has come! He’s a darling, and I shall love him, I know.”
Elen’s face expressed disapproval of so much exuberance. “Telyn made no mention of a knight. He said it was one of the beggars who came to your aid.”
“Whoever heard of a beggar with a horse? A fine horse, at that—and Elen, Aubrey’s magnificent. He’s exactly as I’ve always imagined my knight to look. Fair, powerful, self-assured. I’ve never seen such fearlessness, such absolute recklessness, such wild valor. I’ve no doubt he’s all heroic virtue and unmatched goodness.”
Elen narrowed her eyes. “You sound utterly smitten.”
Besotted, more like, Brenna thought. Every part of her had been drawn to him. Her shoulder still prickled where his hand rested. Her lips tingled from the cool fire of his touch. She laughed lightly.
“He has all the traits of a hero—and his face is that of a warrior—such lovely eyes—all silvery-green and shining like a pigeon’s breast. And his shoulders are the broadest I’ve ever seen. Then again, mayhap ’tis his golden hair. You don’t see much hair that color around here.”
“Upon my soul, Brenna, you are wit-wandering.”
“Not so.”
“No one ought to indulge in passion, it distorts everything.”
“There are passions—and passions.”
“You might as well know that Kil Coed has sent word that he comes not only to propose a new and strong alliance with Dinas Bran, but that it would be his great pleasure to seal that covenant by wedding with you.”
Brenna stared at Elen grimly and let out an impatient breath. “The arrival of my betrothed and our marriage on the Sabbath should halt any ambitions held by another suitor! Assuming, of course, that this isn’t all a joke…?”
“I wish I had told you sooner, but I did not want to burden you until I was sure.”
A wild resentment filled Brenna. “We have taken Aubrey’s coin. I am honor-bound to wed him.”
“Keith Kil Coed is magnificent—and he’s Welsh.”
“I will not marry him!” It was a whisper, lest she scream it.
“You may have no choice. Since winter loosed its hold, he has begun to gather an army. The Lady Agnita says Sir Edmund suspects he will move against us, thinking to forge an alliance, and use our strength to advance west to Gwynedd.”
“I am betrothed to Aubrey of Leeds!”
“Betrothals can be nullified.”
“Not on the very eve of the nuptials!”
“No more dispute now. Sir Edmund has the right to decide your fate. He is in a foul mood because of this latest folly. He will be angrier if you are not at table. Go and put on your blue gown, and be nice to him, and you may find his anger only hot air.”
“Even if Grandy is about to renege on the deal and have me wed that upstart Keith Kil Coed, my knight has come, as if conjured here by magic. It is a good omen.”
“Don’t say that! The walls have ears,” Elen whispered, making the sign of the cross on brow and chest. “And there are always servants and menials of some sort to carry tales of witchcraft and druidry.”
“Old lies and old spite. How can anyone credit a word of it?”
“Be careful! I can’t prevent hostile ears from attending to some ill-spoken words—I would not have you skinned for a witch or burnt at the stake.”
A flood of fondness washed through Brenna. Elen’s hair might be mostly gray, and she might be moving a bit stiffly on winter mornings, but she was always so indulgent, so tolerant, not at all stiff and proper. She was also very superstitious.
“You are trying to make my blood run cold, Elen. Well, I am not so easily frightened.”
“Nevertheless, such talk is dangerous,” Elen said in a low voice. “I’ve seen you grow up, Brenna. You run, jump, indulge in all manner of masculine pursuits, speak four tongues and even read. ’Tis not expected of a woman, and disturbs the natural order of things.”
Brenna bit her lip to keep from laughing. “I can also sew a fine stitch, spin wool, bake bread, grow herbs, tend the sick and sing to the bees.”
“It is magic. Which is why they call you a she-devil.”
“Nonsense. The bees like my singing and make honey in appreciation. I use no magic, else I would make that upstart Kil Coed weak, turn his muscles to pudding. Instead he bends an iron axle over his knee as if it were wet bread dough.”
Low and thick, Elen said, “Don’t give them any more substance to talk about!”
“What does it matter?”
“It matters,” Elen said harshly. “I’m just trying to protect your reputation. I know you say I gossip too much, but I worry—”
“Dear Elen, you have always been worried about me, haven’t you? I remember when I was a child you were always in a flutter for fear I should fall down and hurt myself. Well, sometimes there have been reason in your fears, but no more. My knight’s presence is enough, and his strength and golden voice. I need no more.”
From now on her whole life would be dedicated to him. Yes, that’s what they’d do—walk through the years together. As if provoked a little by this resolve, thunder boomed out above the towers, making her jump. A door shut downstairs, echoing.
“It seems unreal, but I will wed Aubrey of Leeds on the Sabbath, Elen. From that moment, I will behave like a saint, that I promise you.”
Chapter Three
Leon set his weapon belt on the bench nearest the bed, thinking how unexpected this all was, lodging in the room that had been Brenig’s own in his youth. He hoped he was wrong, but he did not take for granted all that he could.
Wales was a savage and rebellious place, with great mountains and strange customs. Odd things happened, and law was a matter of local option. Beyond the Dee the land turned primitive, towns and villages growing fewer, hill and forest rising toward the western mountains. The rumors were dark here, tales of marauders upon the roads, villages sacked and burned.
He sat down on the edge of the bed and tugged off his boots. Suspicions had begun to move about inside his mind, causing swirls and ripples of unease like the movements of something large and ominous lurking beneath the surface of deep water. Had not the king but lately revoked the title of Lord of the Northern Marches, throwing this western realm into turmoil and confusion? Had not the same king dug up old grudges from his childhood days and found reasons to heckle and harass that obliged Lord Fulk to flee from Whittington?
Why? The answer was as simple as it was distressing. The king had deliberately unleashed a potentially explosive power struggle to distract his increasingly antagonist parliament from what was happening in his provinces on the other side of the English Channel.
Leon knew what would happen. The plots would multiply until those who sought to take Fulk FitzWarren’s place would be overwhelmed. He also knew that the Brenigs were political animals. Intrigue was second nature to them.
He was no novice in deceit, but mayhap he was suspicious and uncharitable even to suspect Brenig treachery in housing him in this grand chamber—without ascertaining who he was—as he was suspicious and uncharitable to suspect Brenig treachery in permitting the heiress, with no guards, risking danger—
Only Brenna had faced no danger of alleged outlaws. The rescue, if rescue it could be called, was so easy as to be ridiculous.
Too easy.
There had been guards within call, and the boys Telyn and Tudur ready to call the alarm. He liked that stroke; he truly did. A fine jest, if it were not so reckless. Respectful. Convincing, if less in the province were amiss.
A brief flash of lightning chased the shadows. Thunder cracked close. Rain thumped down as if scattered by an enormous hand. The wind battered against the shutters, making the timber slats dance to its rhythm. He crossed the room, unlacing cuffs, collar, and side laces and hauled off shirt and tunic together, before throwing open the shutters. The wind gusted in through the slitted window, setting the candles fluttering wildly.
Too much, he thought, beginning to sway. Too much. The feeling of falling clung to him like a shroud. His head throbbed. He was having trouble focusing his eyes. He put his hand to his head. Abruptly the realization came that he had a lump on his skull the size of an egg.
Disposing his clothes on the peg against the wall, he stripped off his filthy breeches and reached out again for his shirt. He retrieved the amulet from its hiding place, and took it in his hand, feeling a warmth where it touched his palm, a sweet, sad warmth.
Memory, swift and involuntary: a dark night, a pale face out of which two eyes stared like living cinder, a vow. It was nostalgia, but he held it fast, and it sang to him of elvish dreams and memories. It took him back so vividly.
He’d had a dream of changing the world in his golden youth, when such things were possible…
And he’d gone all the way to the Holy Land.
But that was not far enough for his troubles, not far enough for safety from falsehood and deceit, his foster father’s scheming, his own damnable stupidity—
He shook his head, and laughed angrily, giddily, to himself. He tucked the amulet into his weapon belt and stood in front of the slitted window, shivering in the wind that blew in out of the dark, in the hope that the damp air would clear his wits.
Brenna hurried along the corridor ahead of the servants, and wondered why she had left Aubrey so suddenly. Why was she so beset by doubts? Surely there was no harm in kissing her betrothed on the very eve of their marriage? She thought of the ceremony to take place on the Sabbath, and of how this storm would not be viewed as a particularly good omen…
There was an air of chill in the chamber as she entered, despite the cheerful fire burning on the hearth. His bulky shape was outlined by lightning from without and the contours of him shone where they caught the light.
She stood, stone-still. The light burnished his hair and accentuated the planes of his handsome face, transforming it for her into something splendid, something awesome. The perfect tapestry of one half of his face was a splendid foil to the tracery of livid white scars on the other cheek. The contrast was absolute.
It was not the face of a scholar or a seer; it was the battle-hardened face of a warrior, a man who had faced death and would not allow its dark promise to control him.
The face was dauntless—but the eyes were striking. Shielded by thick sable lashes, they were his best feature, eagle-keen and very clear. She’d liked their singular silvery color, so translucent they took color from lake or moss or stone.
The light shone, too, on the rest of him, bathing him in a nimbus of flame and making his bared skin gleam ruddy. He had removed his outer garments, and was wearing only his linen loincloth. She found it impossible not to stare, transfixed, listening to the wild beating of her heart.
He appeared incredibly beautiful, his shoulders wide, the skin of his chest stretched taut across his squared muscles. His abdomen was flat and without superfluous flesh. In the pulsing light, his massive torso looked as though it had bathed in iron dust. Even the down on his chest had a peculiar metal sheen. But his whole body was a map of injuries and hurts, old and new, and his arms were laced with myriad scars that served further proof he kept his livelihood by the sword. This was not, she thought, a man to cross.
The thunder grew louder. A gust of wind sent the lamps and candles flickering. It also restored her senses.
“You’ll catch the death of cold with that damp wind!”
She went to the doorway and clapped her hands. A clutch of servants came in bearing a huge wooden tub, which they set in a corner behind a screen, away from the draught, and filled with successive pails of steaming water. Others appeared, carrying towels and fresh clothing, which they placed on a low table that stood close to the tub.
Leon went and stood by the fireside, warming the shivers and the aches of travel from his bones as he waited for the servants to finish their business and leave. With eyes that burned from exhaustion, he watched them all gather by the tub, and Brenna told them she would help him with his bath. She breezed past them to his side.
“If you’ll just allow me—”
“Desist, woman!” Servants scattered. He barely noticed. “Stop that at once!” He brushed in vain at her helpful hands.
“What is wrong?”
A gasp sounded behind. Brenna clapped her hands, stifled the servants somewhat, and shooed them out.
“I’ll not have a husband who scares the maids witless with all that grumpiness. Now if you’ll be so kind—” She flung up her hands.
That brought him to a halt. His ears were going. Had he heard that? “Husband?”
She turned back and stood very close to him, but this time standing rigid, with her arms folded under her breasts. Fine tremors moved the tendrils of her hair, as if a qualm of fear shook her courage. “That is what I said.” Her face was calm and as still as a brushed porcelain mask. Bland as if it were a foregone conclusion. As if none of it were uncertain.
“What brought that to mind?”
“You are always answering a question with another question!”
“Just a peculiar topic to bring up now,” he said.
“Not at all. With all the political talk going on, ’tis natural to be thinking of the future, but we can discuss it later.”
“You’re crazy!”
“My father’s word was reckless.”
“Perhaps he was sparing in his praise.”
She spoiled the exquisite mask by squinting through a dark waterfall of hair at him. “You are merely evil-tempered because you cannot bear the fact that you, my stalwart rescuer, have mislaid your armor.” Her voice sparkled with hints of laughter.
“You carry on like a raucous crow.”
Brenna flushed, but her eyes were steady. “And you have a temper like soured wine.” A firm hand planted itself on his chest. “You will get a fever if you stand there naked much longer.”
Leon stiffened, but her hand did not move. Her eyes touched his chest, his flat stomach and hips and his…
He glanced down. His eyes grew very wide and still. His heart jumped and started hammering. While he’d glowered at her, she had industriously peeled off the linen undergarment.
Brenna standing there dressed and he—
He felt his groin grow heavy as thick blood pooled in his lower belly. His reaction must be blindingly obvious, he thought. A cold feeling spread all down his back into his legs. If a seasoned warrior reacted in this way, pity help her poor silly young suitors. His teeth gritted. His lips peeled back from his teeth.
“You need not stay.”
“Do you want the maids to see you like this?” Her tone was blank, void of cues, but her breast rose with each breath and the way she avoided looking at him, as if her interest in him were all his fault, was highly amusing. She gestured to the water invitingly.
Leon bit back a retort. It would do no good. He could think of nothing to say that would not make matters worse. His body betrayed him. Surrender, for now, was the only strategy.
Still frowning, he climbed in, yielding to the temptation of a hot bath in a tub that was big enough to hold a man of his great stature. The water was so hot his toes tingled. Gingerly, he sat, glad of the debilitating heat of the water. He let go a long breath and looked up from under his brows.
“Well, lady, for what do you wait?”
She slapped a big bar of brown soap into his hand. “Wash yourself with this. I’ll get some oil.”
Brenna hurried to the carved chest, as if suddenly appalled at her boldness. There was an awkward silence while she unstopped a bottle and added a few drops of sweet-smelling oil to the water.
Leon suspected she was rarely so tongue-tied; any girl who looked like this one did would have learned at an early age how to make the most of her assets. He rubbed his chin with both hands, feeling the stubble from several days’ growth scratch the skin of his palms. No doubt he stank of sweat and grime and horse. He truly needed to bathe, and he could not deny it would be pleasant to have the woman tend him.
He held out the bar of soap. “Come, wash my back.”
Her blush deepened. She pressed her hands together quickly, nervously. Bending over, she took the soap from his hand and rubbed it against a linen cloth. She touched him hesitantly, as if not sure of where she should begin or exactly what she should do. The hands were soft and gentle and the hot soapy water against his skin felt delicious. Her fingers traced the steel tendon that ran down the back of his neck to his spine. He felt the thick muscles of his back bunch at her touch.
“It’s not too hot, is it?”
“No.”
She moved her foot. Her knee was not far from his shoulder. The out-flung length of one leg. Her slender ankle and the pointed toe of her shoe. The innocence of her pose created the eroticism of the moment. Intensifying so that he felt the stirring inside himself. Not merely his groin. All over. He was suffused with longing. His manhood was stiff and quivering. As if it were his whole body.
“May I?” Her hands massaged his neck and the back of his head and the massive muscle that joined his head to his shoulders. She stroked his hair. Pain rushed up his temple, rang like hooves drumming clay. He could not help the small shudder that ran through him. She jerked her hand back. “You’ve got a lump on the side of your head the size of an egg!”
“I was a trifle careless,” he said, keeping his voice light.
She pursed her lips, as if she wished she could say otherwise. “That may be true, but your hair still needs a wash,” she said, her voice holding mild reproof.
He ducked down under the surface long enough to count to twenty, and to want air. He broke surface again. For a heartbeat his eyes locked with hers.
“Do what you want. I won’t stop you.”
Brenna gnawed her lip, edged closer and let go a breath. “I will try not to hurt you.”
He tipped his head back while she washed out his hair, combing through the snarls with gentle fingers, trying not to feel anything, remember anything, wonder anything.
“Close your eyes,” she ordered, running a soapy finger over each eyelid. Her hands were light, moth-delicate, on his forehead. “Why do you shave your beard?”
“It makes me remember who I am, what I’m for. It keeps me from growing too proud.”
“What a load of nonsense!”
“Then the truth it must be. It’s hot. It’s red. It itches,” he mumbled.
Her laughter was sudden and heart-deep, a ripple of pure notes. “With golden hair and red beard, you’d look like a great marmalade cat.”
“Another reason to shave!”
Brenna followed the contours of his wide shoulders down his arms, where the water glistened among red-gold hairs. He sighed and felt the tension ebbing out of him. He melted back against the rim of the tub. Steam rose, hanging in the air a moment before drifting upward. She added a few more drops of scent to the water, and the oil floated toward him in little round drops, coating his chest and belly. His muscles soaked in it, reveled in the heat.
Soft lips half parted, she lathered the thick mat on his chest vigorously, her hands small and light against the hard flesh. She slid her hands down his belly, through crisp tangles of gold. Her soapy hands circled lower and lower. Though he sighed with pleasure, Leon didn’t think that was a good idea. Hot male need surged through his veins at her maddening touch. He asked himself if he was being seduced, or if she was…taking a stupid chance, if that was what was happening. He slid deeper into the tub, shielding his arousal slightly.
Slowly, gracefully as the fall of a feather, she moved to the end of the tub and motioned for a leg to come out. Ignoring his muffled protest, she leaned against the tub and began lathering it, sliding one finger along a deep scar hollow above the knee. His thigh shot jagged stabs and convulsed into shivering. He tried to relax his body, to go limp.
Brenna looked down, leaned back against her heels, shoving a lock of her black hair back over one shoulder. “Won’t you even talk to me?” she said in a small voice.
“There is nothing to talk about.”
“You mean, you have nothing to say to me.”
Leon knew he had missed something there. She would not meet his eyes. She seemed strangely tense: a coiled spring. He thought that she was angry; but why should she be? She was female. There was no accounting for her moods.
“That is not at all what I meant.”
“But it is!”
Leon frowned at her, wishing he knew what had happened. One moment she had been open and friendly; the next she exuded all the fire of a woman scorned. He rolled his eyes and sat up, sighing with exasperation.
“I will not play this game.”
“I will not let you turn this back on me.” There was an edge to her voice now. “You’re the one who—”
“This is not the time—”
“Not the time? You must be joking! There is nothing more important for us to do.”
For a moment things stayed as they were, balanced on a knife’s edge of Brenna’s temper and his nerves. Then he felt the anger unwind, slowly, into a quieter disturbance. A few more breaths. “Isn’t there?”
Without warning, she poured a dipper of herb-scented water over his head. He swallowed hard, half choking, gulped air and outrage, blinked water from his eyes, and snapped two pungent words.
“Oh—you are annoyed—you have a tongue like an ox whip!” His first impulse was to upend her and apply a hand to her derriere. Then she grinned at him with disarming candor. “Forgive me, but I get carried away sometimes!”
Leon snorted and blew water from his mouth. “How dare you—” It came as a half shriek, so disgraceful that it shattered all his anger. Laughter rose to fill the void: breathless, helpless laughter that loosened all his bones and left him half choking.
Her own laughter died with his, but a smile lingered; her eyes danced. “’Tis a ritual to drown the fleas!”
“Blast your impudence!” He surged to his feet and flung hair out of his eyes in a spray of water. A shower of droplets flew in a great arc to land on her gown, the sodden fabric outlining her bosom, leaving little to his imagination. He reached for the linen she was holding, and snatched it ’round himself, splashing the floor as he stepped out.
“Perhaps it was rash—”
“Perhaps!”
“’Twas an outrageous liberty. Most men would be foaming at the mouth by now.”
Leon didn’t care. For one thing, a ragged spike of agony lanced through his skull. There was a buzzing like a swarm of bees inside his head. His vision was blurring again. He stood there, totally overwhelmed by it all.
“Oh, mercy! You are not well!” she said, and put a quick hand under his elbow to steady him as he swayed. Leon shook her off, steadying with an effort.
“It’s nothing.”
He stood there, not daring to move. Now his entire body convulsed. His flesh burned. He felt chills even in the midst of all this heat. His legs were turning to water. He tottered.
“Dizzy,” he mumbled, his voice half drowned by a peal of thunder.
Brenna caught his arm, forcefully, this time. “Don’t tax yourself! You’re wasting energy arguing.”
This time he let her lay hands on him, allowing her to draw him across the room, into the alcove that held the bed, though he would not sit. “God’s breath, woman. ’Tis but a touch of wet fever, nothing more.”
“Stuff and nonsense. That lump on your head has addled your brains.”
He let out all his breath in one huff. “Don’t fuss, woman. I’ve suffered worse blows than that charging at quintains.”
“I trust you are correct, but hardly prudent. My good sense tells me that such a blow can be fatal if there is brain damage.”
“’Tis but a bump.”
“Even a bump can be fatal.” Her voice was low, steady, unyielding.
“Would you have me dead?”
“Don’t talk so! That lump on your head has addled your wits,” Brenna blurted, then winced, as if regretting her words as soon as she had spoken them. “I—I am sorry. It is not my place to…”
“You need not apologize. I’m not offended, just tired.”
The bed was in front of him. It looked vast and inviting. And perhaps it was imprudent and tempting his own ironclad resolve to test himself against that wide-eyed expression, the full lips, the midnight cloud of curls and swell of bosom so boldly designed to entice a man. What had the scriptures said about Eve tempting Adam with forbidden fruit? But then came a bewildering thought. If Adam had been in Eden with Brenna instead of Eve, he would not have minded being cast out of Paradise, not as long as she went with him!
“I can see that you are ill, very ill.” Her reply rang out and yet was muted by the howl of the wind. “You belong in bed.”
Why not? Why not? He rubbed his forehead, and gave up any notion he might have of resistance.
“I am not well, yes—” he managed finally. The last of his coherence was fleeing. “The heat…my head—”
“Sit,” she told him now. “Easy now, take it easy.”
She let him slide from her arm to sit on the bed. Cradling his head in her hands as if it were an egg, she lowered it onto the pillow. A grunt this time from him. He sprawled on his back, squinched his eyes shut, and he was only too glad to do so, weary as he was, his body racked by violent shivers. A dry towel was placed discreetly across his loins. A hand tangled in his hair, one finger stroking across his forehead repetitiously.
“Don’t try to get up. You’ll do yourself a lasting harm.”
“Go away! Leave me alone!” he raged at her.
She did; and then he was sorry for the silence.
The hall thrummed with sound, for everyone in the hold ate in the great chamber. Fire crackled in the hearth and they all were gathered, young and old, with the warm air smelling as the hall always smelled, of wood chips and resins and leathers and furs and good cooking.
Brenna spared no glances for those who sat at the narrow trestle tables. Her attention was on the dais at the far end. Facing them all, Sir Edmund sat at the center of the high table, his sister the widowed Lady Alice at his left, his other sister the indomitable Lady Agnita at his right, thin and upright. The gray-clad priest sat elbow-to-elbow with the Lady Alice, and the harper sat with them. But many seats at the great table stayed vacant, the hall of a hold long at war, its male heirs decimated.
“Your pardon for my lateness, Grandfather.”
Sated and drowsy from rich food and drink, Sir Edmund nodded over his cup. “We will forgive your lateness, Brenna, now that you grace our table with your beauty.”
Brenna walked around the dais to settle beside her great-aunt. Lady Agnita flicked her gaze up from her trencher. “It seems your fine knight has declined to break bread with us.”
“He rests. He has traveled hard.”
“In my day, a knight could travel far and little notice it.”
“Aye, but ’tis oft times said that things are not what they were.”
Brenna looked away from her aunt and flicked a glance around the hall. Despite the weather, guests had arrived from near and far for the week-long marriage celebrations that were to include combat contests, sword fights, horse shows and displays by artisans and master craftsmen from every guild.
Sir Edmund called for more jugs of beer and cordial, and waved expansively to the gathered company. A gust whipped at the tapestries and sent the lamps and candles flickering, casting illusory warmth on gray stone walls. For a moment tapestries and banners blazed out above the tables. High in the sooty rafters, smoke from the great hearth eddied about like a manmade mist.
“So,” Agnita said, turning to her. “Why do you look so forlorn, child?”
Brenna seized the moment to speak up. “Aunt, what is all this nonsense Elen tells me about Keith Kil Coed?”
Agnita shrugged. “Not much more than you already know.” She lowered her voice. “Edmund’s been set thoroughly on edge. He says that Keith will be arriving at Dinas Bran on the morrow. He hopes to convince you that he is a better proposition than Aubrey of Leeds.”
Brenna gasped. If Grandy saw some seriousness in the matter…the complications were threatening to overwhelm her. “I cannot believe anyone would expect me to abandon my betrothed at the altar!”
“I realize that, child,” Agnita replied, her expression serious. “But don’t despair. Edmund is a wily old rooster.”
“And Keith is overreaching his ambitions! Can’t we stop him?”
“’Tis too late to stop him. He has already left Craignant and begun his journey here. We do not know what route he travels, so we must do as best we can.” Was there a hint of warning in the soft, smooth tones?
Brenna had taken a wedge of cheese and begun to break it. It crumbled in her tensed fingers, falling unheeded to her trencher. “I pray that there is no trouble.”
“Speaking of which,” Sir Edmund said, leaning toward Brenna. “What is this I hear about the near mishap at the postern?”
Brenna shrugged. “Naught but a minor scuffle, Grandy. My knight did his duty well. The villains were caught.”
“You try me sorely, Brenna, with your recklessness!”
“It is raining again,” Lady Alice said unnecessarily: the sound of it on the horn windowpanes behind them was audible over the conversation in the hall.
“Maybe there’s a reason.” The priest bent and looked straight into Brenna’s eyes, so that her heart beat a little faster. “Mayhap—someone—is responsible for the storms?”
A few audible murmurs traveled around the tables. She heard people mutter—sorcery…
“That is impossible, and I believe you may have the wit to realize that—” Brenna started to protest, but frowned and thought on it, on the rain, the unrelenting winds. Surely no one could control the weather? She stared down at her trencher of thick wheaten bread. “Mortals have no governance over the weather.”
The priest frowned, hearing that. “A jest, if you please. Though this rain is most unseasonable and despite the Holy Father’s decree, the hedge wizards sell their charms in the market and practice sinful acts in private.”
“They need not be sorcerous.”
“That is blasphemous.”
This was a priest, Brenna told herself. A simple district priest. Why were folk so fearful of what they did not understand or what was different?
“Mayhap, Our Lord sends a second flood to show us His displeasure,” she murmured.
The priest nodded piously. “In truth, ’tis a very great possibility.”
Brenna gathered up a thick wedge of sheep-milk cheese and some bread. “Well, ’tis a pleasant conversation, but I fear it must end, or I shall never get to bed this night. I must be off. I will see you all on the morrow.”
“Where to in such haste?” asked Sir Edmund.
A lie tempted Brenna. She rejected it and looked her grandfather in the eye. “For whatever it’s worth, I’m off to prepare a potion and wish the rain on another region.”
Sir Edmund scowled. “Wish a littler harder then.”
Brenna tiptoed closer to the embroidered bed hangings.
“Aubrey!” she whispered under her breath. He made no sign. A prickly aura of awareness breathed over her skin, crisp and distinct as cold air.
Suddenly she was very much afraid…
She shivered and shook her head as thoughts uncalled-for ran like ice melt through her brain. Was he…was he unconscious? Was he…dead? Her doubt turned to sudden, over-mastering dread that urged her forward.
“Aubrey!” she said again, and finding herself close to him she bent and very lightly touched his shoulder. He moved then, and she almost gasped with relief.
“What—?” he said, lifting his head. He blinked, frowned, his nose a handspan from hers. His face was flushed and his lips a set line. Shadows slipped across his eyes as if things moved, troubled, in his memory.
“Drink this. ’Tis but a simple tisane to take away the headache and ease the fever.” She cradled his head in her arms, feeling inside her a warmth that bordered on love. He made a sound between a sigh and a grunt, and obediently swallowed sips of the mixture. Carefully she relaxed her forearm, laying his head upon the pillow. “Now listen to me, I don’t want you out of this bed except to use the chamber pot. Do you understand?”
His eyes closed. “Aye.”
“Good.” Raindrops spattered through the window slit, a sudden gust of storm. She went to close the shutters. “I’m going back downstairs. I have chores to do. You stay in bed, hear?”
“Aye.” Faintly.
She forced a smile to her lips. “See that you do.”
Darkness, and a scent of herbs, and a deep sense of peace pervaded the workshop. Brenna carefully set the lamp on a stand. Its feeble glow barely reached the walls of the herbarium. Neatly arranged on wooden shelves that ran up the wall, sat her herbs and powders and whatnots, each resting in small pottery jars. A large white dog rose from its place by the fireplace and ambled toward her, its tail swinging side to side.
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Emily French
Destiny Wore Many Disguisesbut Lady Brenna, pledged as bride in a match more alliance than love affair, saw true when Caer Llion rode up to her castle gates. This valiant knight was surely her mysterious betrothed, for he was her past–and Fate decreed he be her future…!An elfin girl upon the high battlements had once given him her favor–and eased his aching soul. Now Leon FitzWarren, famed as Caer Llion–the Ironheart, had returned to Wales, to those very battlements, and faced again the bewitching Brenna–the elfin sprite become woman–and holder of his heart…!
This was her betrothed! He was the man of her dreams! In truth, he was here!
She’d heard him laugh, a black-velvet ripple, sweet as the honey of the southlands, and felt something deep within her move, open. She’d looked wildly about, and her heart was like an arrow hurtling through space. Then eye met eye. A spark leaped in the meeting, and the newcomer had laughed no more. He gazed at her with…recognition, it might be, for she had felt it, too.
This is the one!
Brenna swallowed hard. There had never been any other like this man. She could not suppress a heated sensation welling deep inside. His hand, heavy on her shoulder, seemed to have the strength of iron. She wanted to tuck herself closer against that strength…and yet she did not know why…!
Ironheart
Harlequin Historical #580
Praise for Emily French’s previous works
Bogus Bride
“An exciting, realistic, steamy romantic adventure.”
—Rendezvous
The Wedding Bargain
“The story is packed with continuous excitement and such marvelous characters, you’ll be sorry to reach the end.”
—Rendezvous
Illusion
“…witty and fast paced…just enough mystery to keep you guessing.”
—Affaire de Coeur
#579 A WESTERN FAMILY CHRISTMAS
Millie Criswell, Mary McBride & Liz Ireland
#581 WHITEFEATHER’S WOMAN
Deborah Hale
#582 AUTUMN’S BRIDE
Catherine Archer
Ironheart
Emily French
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Available from Harlequin Historicals and EMILY FRENCH
Capture #214
Illusion #306
The Wedding Bargain #336
Bogus Bride #361
Ironheart #580
To Emily Ninnis, travel agent par excellence.
“He, who the sword of heaven will bear Should be as holy as severe.”
—William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure
Contents
Prologue (#ua0be4086-d97c-5ad9-ae87-0f63df2ee69f)
Chapter One (#u4734d6c3-b301-5a8c-b4b6-bd7c401a3420)
Chapter Two (#u8bcb802c-3136-5ff8-8860-ceb268fa2430)
Chapter Three (#uf3942d2c-5b69-5aff-87d3-6995ac5b4b11)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Prologue
Northern Marches, Wales, 1188
The night was dark and full of menace. Leon shivered, struggling to stay awake. It was the joining point of the night. The hour of beginnings and endings. It was an unholy hour to be out of bed; the black watch before cockcrow when men most often died, and demons walked.
“Are you a knight?”
A thin little reedy sound it was, echoing somewhere from the right. At first Leon thought he had imagined it, for there was something about old piles of stone like this that accumulated shadows and odd sounds, creaks and sighs of wind.
Then it came again, eerie, alien, disembodied, drifting across the battlement, a voice soft as reeds twisting in the wind.
“Are you a knight?”
The point of his sword lifted a little.
It was an intrigue. It must be. Soon it would be dawn—the hour for murder and mayhem. He exhaled softly. It was comforting that the gray of his cowl and cloak bled into the gray of the battlements, leaving no shape for the eye to catch. There was only the shine of captured light from his naked blade as he waited, listening.
Glancing over his shoulder, Leon saw no movement, suspicious or otherwise, but his back prickled as if several thousand insects crawled up and down it. He swallowed hard.
It took courage to ask calmly, “Who is this?”
Silence.
It was some rotten trick. None had played such since he was nine years old and he’d dared the raven in the hayloft that the other pages refused to face. It had known better than to meddle with him, and fled with a great rustling of straw and a clap of wings.
“Is anyone there?” he asked the shadowed air and held his breath waiting for an answer.
Nothing changed. No voice responded. No figure appeared from the doorway. He swallowed loudly. No harm was near. A very little light came up from below, not enough to light the steps. If any spirits dream-danced there, none spoke.
He gave that some thought, then cleared his throat. He had been speaking French; he shifted to Latin. Nothing. “Who?” he demanded in Anglo-Saxon, and last of all, with fading hope, the old Gaelic of his childhood.
“I am here.”
That rocked him on his heels. The voice came from behind him now, the same voice, as if it were stalking him. He spun around, hands out, at hearing a light skipping step from the direction of the parapet. Closer, came the high piping tone of a child.
“I said, Are you a knight?”
Leon stared a moment, heart thumping. Shadows shifted and took substance. A glimmer. It was a girl, a highborn little girl in a white night rail, but lace dragged about one ankle and her lips and hands were muddied. She tilted her head to one side, studying him.
“No,” he said, to humor her while he tried to think. The girl had a pixie face, and the dark, shining hair that bounced about her shoulders was black as only an elf’s can be. But she looked real, a babe scarce weaned. There was no magic. There was nothing to fear. Her gaze remained steady. He felt heat flare in his ears, so he added, “When I am a man I will be.”
A frown touched her brow, as if he had said something curious. “Is that not the way of things?” she said, edging closer, as though they already shared one secret, and might share another, in time.
Leon blinked. How could a little girl speak with such knowledge? Except for the druids, adults were jealous of their secrets and did not share them with children. Was she a druid’s daughter?
Had he been enchanted? He clenched his hand to drive the thought away and touched the rough stonework. It felt real enough, down to the grit of old mortar.
I won’t let her see she has me uneasy, he told himself firmly. I won’t let her trick me. He took the chance. It took real effort, but he kept his voice steady.
“Are you a witch?”
“Do I look like one?”
“I’ve only seen one, face-to-face. At least I think it was a witch. You don’t look like her. But how should I know?”
“Well, now that I see you close up, you don’t look like a knight, either. You’re tall, but you look like a boy.”
The small doubt held him still, but that was only his good sense that said girls were not safe wandering at cockcrow alone. There were all manner of unwholesome things that haunted the night. And this one feared no harm from them—that seemed evident, whatever her reason.
He thrust his sword in its scabbard. “You’re distracting me from my duty. What are you doing here?”
“I’ve come to watch.”
“To watch what?”
Her shoulders jerked slightly. “I wanted to see Father—they told me he’s going away with the prince,” she said fiercely, a dimpled dragon flashing fire and smoke. Her little jaw set. Her eyes were alive with thoughts. “I had to get up early and run away from Nurse, ’n’ here I am.”
He started to walk. She pranced along beside him.
“The battlements are out of bounds. How did you get here?” he asked, with deep notes of iron grating on one another in his voice. “And more to the point, why?”
“I couldn’t go downstairs because of the guards, and I didn’t want to climb out a garderobe shaft ’cause they smell so awful, ’n’ I came up here instead.” She moved closer, scowling. “I tried to get up there.” She pointed into space out a crenel. “But I’m not big enough. But you’re here, so you can—”
Leon flinched, and said, between closed teeth, “Forget it.”
He paused at a buttressed arch and turned to look into the vast hollow before them. From this angle, no lights shone, not even faint ones. It was black as a cave. Only the immensity of air, palpable as a beast, betrayed the cavernous gulf beyond.
Fear clenched his heart with an icy grip. How had he gotten into this? He grasped the merlon with one hand, to keep from shaking, and felt sandstone crumble under his fingers. He pulled back by instinct.
“Flamed rotted-out pile of—” He caught back a swear-word.
She turned her head and looked at him. Then slowly she began to smile, her eyes anxious, but her grin growing wider. She was contemplating mischief, he was sure of it.
“Are you afraid?”
“Of course not! I have an arm of steel and a heart of iron!”
“Oo-oh, how wonderful. Are heroes always so strong?”
“Of course.”
Leon sweated. Heroes are always strong, and they never run away, he told himself. And that was a worry. He was scared and breathless.
“You’re bigger than me.” A sudden pale glance, starlit. She smiled. “Can you see over the top?”
He nodded foolishly, and again she laughed. He thought that perhaps he had never heard a lovelier sound. “Of course.”
“Well?”
He was more than a little unnerved. Breath came short, in shameful panic. At the same time, his heart leaped into his throat and stayed there. Does she know? He cast her a sideways glance. A dimple winked in her cheek, but she stood there, dark eyes wide, full of faith and innocence; real, and not an illusion. It was surely the weakness that was the illusion—
Leon snapped into focus with a shudder. “Disabuse yourself of such notions. ’Tis not yet dawn.” He was arguing with himself more than with her. He turned to face her, feeling his face flush. “There will be naught to see,” he said, surprising himself with his vehemence.
“Oh,” she said wistfully, as if dashed in her expectations. However, she was not demolished, for she stared at him with bright blackberry eyes, and went on. “I was rather looking forward to—well, this grand occasion…the wonder and excitement…it’s dull in the nursery…I have to make up my own adventures—” she talked rapidly as if to ward off his saying anything “—being a boy, of course, you don’t have to make up little pictures in your head of what it’ll be like when you’re all grow’d up.”
“I never said I didn’t dream, but the future is clouded, and there’s no way to foretell or change it.”
“Nonsense! Close your eyes. Tight. Imagine for yourself what it’ll be like when you’re a knight.”
Leon shrugged, stunned by this abrupt assault and uneasy about its possible consequences, but did as he was bid, his hand resting lightly, prudently, on the sword hilt.
A searing flash burned his eyes. The sharp crack of lightning—or deadly magic—barked beyond the castle walls, then bugles blared and he felt the pounding of heavy hooves through the ground.
It was a trap! Nay, it was sorcery, and everyone knew sorcery was an evil used by heathens of old. For all he knew, it was a trick to distract him from his watch. It wouldn’t have been the first time a child was used as bait in a trap. What can I do? he asked himself. His brain recoiled from the prospect of being the agent of assault, or worse, by failing his duty…
“No!” he protested with more determination than he felt. But the enchantment held him fast. There was no choice but to go with it.
Combat surrounded him, fire and smoke and the clamor of battle in all directions as far as he could see and hear. His helmet was gone and he could feel the gashes in his steel chain mail. His skin was torn in many places and blood covered his body. Flames spouted from the siege wagons, and some tents had caught fire. Rain kept the wagons from becoming an inferno, but the unburned canvas kept the rain from extinguishing the fire.
Then he saw the banner, the rampant lions outlined in gold against the bright red field, now trampled in the earth, torn by sword and dyed almost black in the blood of the young soldiers who followed it. He couldn’t tell whether it was rain or blood running into his eyes, but his vision blurred to nothing.
Caer Llion! Where are you?
He flinched suddenly at the touch of a slender hand and turned to see a small figure standing before him. This one was not armored like the knights, nor tall nor broad enough to be a soldier. This was no manly fighter, but a woman!
“You are hurt,” she said. A deep cowled hood shaded her face, and her elfin features seemed to glow and fade in the reflected light of the flames.
“The battle is lost,” he whispered fiercely, straining to control his disbelief. He gasped for breath.
“You and your men fought well.”
“And died well. I must claim vengeance.”
“You’ll get no vengeance riding alone into that nest.” The girl-woman took his arm and began to lead him away, though there was no way to tell which way to go. “And you, my golden knight, you have a destiny to fulfil. Hold on to me and you will live to fight again. I will protect you.”
He nodded his head, confused. How did this woman think she could do such a thing? He peered into the shadows of her still-raised hood. She let the hood slip back far enough for their eyes to meet clearly. Her eyes were brown, soft and deep, and he felt lost in them, lost in wondering what he had not seen.
The question seemed quite unimportant as his eyes saw more and more shadowy forms appearing, only to flee in all directions and be followed by great waves of horsemen and their riders. There were no individuals—only bodies, armed and unarmed, eager to slay and keep on slaying.
He squinted, not quite seeing their faces, and always the riders passed the two figures without seeing them. He heard the screams of men caught by lance or mace or hoof, but he felt the soft protection of magic, invisibility created by the girl-woman that now cloaked him.
A damp wind swirled around him, and he felt a slight chill. The air smelled of masonry. His reason told him he was on the battlements, but his irrational self said he must have tripped for a minute, then leaped forward a full decade or more.
“What is it? What did you see?”
Leon opened his eyes. He blinked and the vision was gone. The inky blackness of the night was giving way to a softer gray. Had the vision been an image of reality?
“Nothing much, and nothing certain,” he answered, turning on his heels, but the muscles in his legs trembled despite his determination to stand firm. “Except the prince is coming, and so is bad weather.”
“That’s important!”
“If my knowledge of ritual is accurate, at your age, you should still be abed, and not wandering around the battlements. These are not the most friendly of parts,” Leon replied, the edge of his voice as sharp as his sword.
“You try to frighten me,” the girl said in a voice that sounded like music tinkling on his ears. “But I am not afraid.”
He rounded on her angrily. “Are you questioning my courage?”
“Not your courage, never that. You can finish anything you start.” She looked Leon squarely in the eyes as she spoke. He sought some hidden message there, some gleam of witchcraft, but instead the raven-black depths showed him she was even more uneasy than he was himself. Now all those images seemed ridiculous and absurd. Some of the tension left his body.
There was a long silence. For a long moment Leon listened to the silence that had sprung up between them because it was an unquiet silence, one rife with sizzling tension, almost a contest of wills.
Then an urgent whisper, combined with a tug of his coat, quietly, shyly, tentatively, hopefully, and smiling that innocent smile. “I want only to see Father and the others.”
Leon laughed out loud. “Are you certain?”
“That’s all,” she affirmed, still smiling sweetly.
“How can I refuse to do a good deed?” he asked, hoping there was no tremor in his voice.
That angelic smile. “Would you…?”
He was a fool to do what a girl-child wanted him to do! Yet, her invitation was the only option he saw. Strange thing! He could see no honorable way to deny her. He dared not back out now. He did not want to go to that place—but what else might he do when he was the only one here to help her? he asked himself. It was almost as if he were no longer in command of his own body, that even had he wished to halt and turn back he could not have done so. This was where he was destined to be, what he was fated to do.
And that was magic, surely?
Rush into it and through, it’s the only way to face what you fear, he thought. Tightening his gut, he braced both hands against the wide tooth of a merlon and leaned out a crenel to see past an intervening wall buttress.
The side of the castle dropped sheer. Far down showed the footings of solid granite. Below that…
The earth and river and dark forest far, far below.
He groaned involuntarily. His palms on the merlon were slick with sweat, trembling. An icy ball of fear turned his insides to water. He wanted to go back, but forced himself to stand firm. Far away a cock crowed, calling forth the dawn. The air hung cold and wet about his face as he looked down.
It was no good. His breath rasped. His teeth danced. His sight hazed. His legs shook so violently his kneecaps drummed the stone wall. Stand here too long, and he’d pitch over the parapet like dice rattling out of a cup. Slowly, shuffling his leather boots, he crept away from the gaping space.
“What did you see? Lift me up so’s I can see it, too!” Her mouth open, her face all delighted smile, she danced for the battlements rising on the western end of the parapet.
Already spooked, Leon jumped at the girl’s blithe command. Deep shuddering twitched his body. Backing against the inner wall, he willed his heart to stop pounding. Surely it could only beat so fast before bursting. He blinked the night as clear as it would come. There was color in the world. It was dawn. He took deep breaths of clean, cold air.
“You’ll fall,” was all he could say.
She gazed solemnly up at him. Unafraid. She gave a furious shake of her head. “No I won’t, ’sides, you’re here to stop me.”
He opened his mouth to refute but his jaw trembled. His breathing had slowed, and he mopped his brow with his sleeve. He hated being up in the battlements. He still remembered falling off the tower at Whittington. Even now, he screamed in his sleep when he recalled that day. He had been seven then. He had cried in his foster father’s arms, which had embarrassed him, but his foster father had patted him on the back and hugged him the way he hugged Fulk Riven, called him his other son and assured him even grown men made mistakes and wept.
“The other end will give the best view.” Indignation, combined with the fear that she might actually leap onto the crenel, made Leon stride out ahead. But she only laughed and followed him.
Walking east, he asked, elaborately casual, “Do you get giddy on heights?”
“Not the times I try,” she said, skipping beside him.
He shifted his posture, suspecting mockery. He regretted bringing up the matter, but he refused to care what the witchling thought. She seemed absolutely fearless. So young to have such courage, he thought. He saw scratches on her arm and large muddy rips in the gown at her knees. The girl’s nurse would be searching for her by now, and he almost felt sorry for the woman. She would suffer if the mother saw the child now.
“Lift me up, so’s I can see over.” She lifted up slender, fragile-looking arms.
The morning breeze stirred his hair and softly cooled his overheated cheeks. He became calm, and out of calmness came determination. He would not abandon his first damsel in distress. He picked her up, and set her bare feet on the seat of an arrow loop built into a buttress in the parapet.
She stood up on tiptoe, craning forward. She was mad, he was sure of it. He brought a firm hand around her waist to keep her safe, but he didn’t stop her looking.
“Lean on my shoulder if you get dizzy. I’ll catch you.”
“I know, silly!” Steady as a rock on her perch, she rested a small hand on his shoulder and, moth-light, touched his hair. “You talk funny, but you have nice hair. Shiny.”
Her voice sparkled with hints of laughter. She smelled of soap and girl and honey powder. He blinked and wriggled his leather-clad toes. “Thank you.”
Leon stood perfectly still and glanced over his outstretched arm. It was just dawn; the air hung cold and foggy around him, obscured the towers, cut off the tops of gates, pooled and eddied along the courtyard outside the siege walls, and collected wood smoke in long, flat, sooty sheets.
Troops marched out of the gatehouse. He watched the glittering armor-clad company file through the dimming patches of fog, buckles clanking, pennants snapping on poles, accoutrements jumping and tingling regularly at every step in a mass musical note, muffled strangely in the sea of fog.
“Can you see the prince leading them all?”
The girl-child tossed her head to get an unruly lock of dark hair out of her eyes. “There he is! There he is!” She squealed in delight and clapped her hands.
“He must. He is the commander,” Leon said briskly. He glared out the embrasure at the troops still marching past, and fretted to himself. Keith, who would be sixteen years old next Midsummer’s Day, had been chosen to squire the prince. Keith, who in spite of his new length of leg and width of shoulder, could not best Leon either at mock battle or in a wrestling match.
“Aren’t they grand? Where do they go?”
“Men gather here. To ride with Richard. To Palestine. To fight the Saracens.”
As soon as he spoke, he regretted it, for the look on the child’s face turned from joy to fear. She frowned, a little knitting of the brow. Small hands clutched at him.
“Oh. Bad men,” she muttered. Her face crumpled. She looked so young—not a witchling now, but a frightened child.
He was quick to mend his error. “Cheer up, little girl. Your father will be home soon enough,” he said lightly.
A frown. She was not to be distracted. “What if the bad men attack us while Father is away?” she said faintly. “Should we all run away very fast?”
Leon looked up at the white, frozen face. Loosing a rare and splendid smile, the one his arms-master said in a few years would melt women like wax in a furnace, he said softly, “No. My lord would stop them before they reach here.”
Brave though she was, she was still a girl, and that smile held a mighty magic. She laid her hand upon his arm and squinted through black curls at him, a swift bright glance.
“I can throw rocks at them! Big rocks.”
“Oh—” Leon struggled to keep from laughing. He brushed back the dark hair. “That would be most helpful.”
Men marched into the fog and vanished. The air seemed unnaturally still and heavy. As an omen it made his spine turn cold. The day seemed perilous, full of portents; yet there was nothing he could put a thought around. As if—
As if he were on the brink of his own forever after—or maybe only of growing up. He had twelve summers and, with Keith’s departure, was newly promoted to squire, but tall and muscular as he was, and good as he was with either sword or bow, he hadn’t grown into his hands or feet yet.
The girl-child shaded her eyes, shaking her head. “I don’t see them anymore.”
Leon took a deep breath, drew her back from the crenel edge, tender in his grip. She studied him with grave bright eyes. “Don’t you wish you could follow the prince?”
“I wish I was with him. I wish it more than you know,” he told her fiercely, angry with her for asking. His voice echoing loudly in the dawn sky.
“It is not too late. If you run fast, you could catch them.”
He knew that. He was also not accustomed to being made light of. “My lord isn’t happy with things along the border. He wishes me to stay, be a shield-brother to his heir.”
“How will you win your spurs?” she asked with just the hint of a smile.
Leon did not rise to the bait. He was a squire, past childhood, and he had seen the lordlings come and go. He thought of Keith all bruised and bloody, crying foul, and the demands of his own stubborn honor. Then he thought of make-believe things, set in the future. Images of the girl-child, now a woman, a prisoner in the place where crows gather, where the woods grow strange and twisted. Himself, helmed and mounted, sword in hand overwhelming a dragon.
No, that was too exotic.
He rebuilt the image and tried to make it something real; the girl-woman up on the battlements, dark hair aflying in the wind, laughing and holding out her arms; himself, just walking into them, and not noticing the precipice.
No, that was too incredible.
The picture changed. The name of Caer Llion had been added to those famed few that were bywords to both friend and foe, whom men would follow into the jaws of death at the wave of an arm. Iron-helmed, he sat astride a huge destrier, sword held aloft and gleaming in the bright morning sun, thundering over the desert sands, leading a band of knights, an iron-clad avalanche of destruction.
“I haven’t got it all worked out yet, but one day I’ll be a knight. I have to. I must.” He used the blunt mode for conviction, for absolute duty—for oath swearing.
“You could run away and become a commoner if you wanted it enough. Father says the common women have more fun than the highborn.”
“He talks too much. Knights are shields against evil. They are the only hope for pig farmers and little girls—saints preserve their stubborn necks. Nobody else will take pity on them.”
“How proper. They will sing songs in your honor.” A small hand crept into his, the other touched his jaw with her thumb.
“Sounds good to me.”
She wound her tiny fingers through his hair. “Why not? You are brave and noble and strong. You will make a great knight.”
Leon’s nerves jumped, his pulse fluttered and a flush came over his skin, confusing all his thinking. She was curious. She thought he was very brave. It puzzled rather than delighted him, but it was very hard to go on being mad at someone who really believed that. He searched his mind for something clever to say in response. When nothing came to him, he settled for attempting to endow his silence with a knowing air.
She smiled prettily. Her breath was in his face, warm as a spring sunbeam. “Will you marry me when I grow up?”
Leon couldn’t help feeling embarrassed. The girl was so foolish she was a woman already! He was not certain what he was supposed to say, but it wouldn’t hurt to put her straight.
“You must marry a man with estates and title.”
“I could never marry a man I didn’t love!” she said with all the blithe confidence of a four-year-old girl.
“One day a knight will come and steal your heart.” He swung her down to the parapet.
“Will you be my own special knight?” she asked straightway.
“Of course,” he said grandly, flourishing a salute.
She blinked rapidly. Then she glanced upward, a piercing, anxious look. “For ever and ever?”
Leon smiled his sudden smile. His voice changed, deepened. “Henceforth, I am your forever knight.” Bowing low he kissed her hand.
She slid her hand free and detached a knot of ribbon from her night rail and held it out to him. “Then I will wait, ’n’ when you are all grown up, you shall come back and marry me.”
“Just like that?”
She nodded her head emphatically.
Leon took the token and tousled her hair. If she were not careful, this rare blossom would grow into a thorn bush! He glanced at the dawn sky, pretending disinterest.
“All right,” he conceded.
She planted her hands on her hips. There was witchcraft in her eyes. “Will you swear on it?”
Leon ground his teeth. Aggravating girl! Really, she tried his patience to distraction! He inclined his head and turned away. “I vow by sun and moon, earth and water, fire and air. Does that satisfy you?” he said to the free air beyond the walls.
Behind him he heard a whisper of slippers. His back muscles went rigid.
“Nurse!” She ran off gaily, muddy hands outstretched. “Oh, Nurse, I could see far and far. I saw the prince ride out!”
Leon looked around. The waiting woman lowered tight-clenched hands and spread them, and hugged the draggled child to her. In a deliberate, careful tone she told the child, “You must never climb up there alone, you know.”
“Oh, I didn’t. My own true knight was with me.”
“This running about has got to stop, my girl.”
“But why?” The light voice lilted.
The nurse brushed her off mercilessly, then wrenched her away, scolding loudly, “It’s unnatural to want to be adventuring out of doors.”
“But, Nurse, I have found my knight—only he’s not a knight yet—and he’s got hair like gold!”
“One day a fine man with golden hair will ask for your hand, then marry you, get you with strong children, a round half dozen. But until then, little mistress, you’d best be learning the ways of a lady.”
When she reached the doorway, the girl turned. “Until we meet again, may every road be smooth to your feet,” she called in her bell-chime voice, the traditional Celtic farewell.
“And may you be safe from every harm,” Leon managed to reply, with more feeling than the customary response usually carried. He had forgotten to ask who her father was. Not that he would ever see her again. The FitzWarren entourage was returning to Whittington on the morrow.
Unable to stop himself, he reached out a hand, wanting to ask her name. She did look at him, a pale, distracted glance, but the nurse waved him off when he’d have followed her.
He closed his eyes, just for a heartbeat. When he opened them, they had been swallowed up in the darkness.
Chapter One
Northern Marches, Wales, 1204
“The priest is here. All we lack is the groom.” Brenna heard the words as if from a great distance. They hung in the air above her head like flaming arrows, separate and solid, one after another, shooting from some unseen bow…
“He will come.”
“I fear the worst.” The voice drew nearer, a high sweet voice like a bird’s. ’Twas her great-aunt Alice, all aflutter. “If no evil has befallen him, surely he would have arrived by now.”
A creeping chill went down Brenna’s back. The wind whipped her hair and her gown. But her eyes never blinked, her face never flinched, though her heart was hammering against her ribs. She said nothing, only stared fixedly over the merlon, gazing beyond the southward sweep of the battlements.
The walls fell sheer below her, stone set on stone, castle and crag set high above the green valley, field and forest rolling into the mountain bastions in the distance. In the world below, children shouted, a stallion screamed and a tuneless voice bawled a snatch from a drinking song.
The wind sighed upon the stones.
Marry. Marriage. Husband. Wife. Bed.
Children.
A great churning dread welled in her heart. She knew nothing beyond the valley and its inhabitants and the limited knowledge and experience acquired as a healer. The secret tales told by the village women baffled her and yet beckoned with promises more provocative and lurid than the vague tutoring her aunts had imparted on the duties of a wife. She was not certain now whether she wholly welcomed the idea of marriage, of a husband, but it was still, all things considered, a good way to preserve the peace on the border.
He had to come! Her anxious glance went back to the valley. The priest had come trailing in, complaining of heavy rain, and confessing that he had mistaken an intersection of roads and ridden an hour or more along a road before discovering his error. She hoped that her groom was late for as silly a reason, but it was making her increasingly concerned. The only other alternatives were either that he had met foul play or that he had changed his mind.
Why? was the next obvious question, but she only frowned for even thinking of it. Come the Sabbath she would be wed, and she had never even met her betrothed! The feeling of doubt and confusion at the news of her future husband’s impending arrival came laced with a dread that she couldn’t shake, a dread made up of fear for what he might have learned…what he might have already reasoned…
She was being foolish. Don’t think maybe he’ll come today and maybe he won’t, she told herself. Don’t believe that it’s not worth keeping a lookout.
He is coming. She knew it. Yet the shadow of the gray stone walls joined the shadow of the tower and grew long across the courtyard. Not an hour of daylight left.
“Brenna!” Slowly she became aware of a plucking at her sleeve. Her aunt was talking again. What was she saying? “What of the wedding? The feast is being prepared even now.”
Brenna swallowed hard and as close to invisibly as she could. “I am not ready to abandon all hope.”
“Should the preparations be halted?”
“No!” Brenna’s fingers clutched the unyielding stone. Her breath left her slowly. She had not known that she was holding it. “No. Grandfather is the most indulgent of guardians, but I fear his patience is exhausted, and to halt all the preparations now would cripple his purse.”
“What will you do?”
Brenna wrinkled her nose. Since childhood, she had dreamed of her perfect knight. She had built her own romance about him as she grew older. Her experience as a healer had given her a knowledge of the male anatomy, so she could even visualize in vivid detail the fascinating play of muscles across his shoulders, the rippling sinews along his broad ribs, and the taut, flat belly with its tracing of hair that she knew led downward to the manly part of him. It was at this point that her mind games always stopped for she could not totally catch the import of what lay beyond. When she thought of the future, it was of some romantic meeting with her hero.
But it had not come true…
How ridiculous, to waste time on such thoughts. Her knight was but a dream, a memory. It was no use indulging in romantic fantasies, for marriage was not a romantic business. Marriage was a shackle and no pleasure, however you looked at it. Romance belonged to the troubadours, an elaborate conceit made of flowery language, poetry and lute-twanging.
“I am forsworn, surely and irrevocably. I am betrothed to Aubrey of Leeds.”
“Who has not come!”
“Have you ever asked yourself why I agreed to marry a man I have never met?”
“You don’t really expect me to answer that?” her aunt replied.
Brenna shook her head.
“When I was as old as you, I had been two years a wife and nigh three seasons a mother.”
“And you didn’t mind?”
“Aye, but I had not so doting a father, nor so lax a grandfather. With the coming of my woman’s courses, I had perforce to put on a gown and bind up my hair and accept the husband my family had found for me. From all accounts, Aubrey is an admirable fellow…and…according to my brother, who is your guardian, I remind you, your marriage will prevent persistent suitors raiding the marches to gain an advantage over each other.”
The way Lady Alice spoke told Brenna her great-aunt considered marriage but a trifle. She shuddered. Her entire life had been spent following the dictates of authority. She was naught but a female and consequently all decisions were made for her and around her. It was unfair.
And it hurt.
It was all so terribly matter-of-fact. Chattel of one man to be chattel of another. No choice. No argument. It was as the man dictated, as the man ordered. She, the woman, meant nothing to any of them. As her grandfather, Grandy wanted a great-grandson. As Sir Edmund, he also wanted someone willing and able to keep the border barons from each other’s throats, so he could spend his time plotting the stars. Aubrey was only going to marry her because of the political advantage a stronghold such as Dinas Bran would bring. The aunts wanted security in their old age, and the villagers were pleased their healer would not be leaving them.
With diminished hope, she scanned the valley once more. The road was clear enough even in the gloom. Nothing.
She drew a long sigh. She was dallying, and the day was running on. A storm was brewing. The clouds were darkening and thickening. She had to work fast. There was much to do before supper. So she controlled herself as well as she could, and twisted ’round to face her great-aunt.
“What profits me to object? I am constrained and cannot stray from Grandy’s decree.”
“How long can we wait?”
“Wait for what? Grandy sees his lordship of the northern marches foundering. If the knight does not fulfil his promise by the morrow, then Grandy will find another willing to wed me.”
“I can understand how sweet freedom is, Brenna, but you must wed sometime. My brother would not insist on your marrying someone who displeases you, and you must have a life of your own.”
“I have a life…in my thoughts, and in my dreams. That will have to suffice.”
“You were never so credulous before.”
“The bride-price has been paid. The wedding feast is prepared. The priest is here. Most surely, there will be a marriage.”
Follow the road, the leper said.
Trouble was, the road appeared and disappeared by turns in the uneven light of the forest. At a lichen-mottled outcrop of rock, Leon reined in and dismounted. Deso tugged at the rein, impatient, and leaves stirred and rustled under his massive hooves.
Leon walked, leading his big creamy-pale destrier along the brown, wet depths of the drifting leaves, following the ancient stonework until the trees grew so close he could no longer find the next white stone to guide him. It was like a ghost road; the only other soul he’d seen in five hours was a leper.
Shadows enveloped him. Even on a sunny day the massive trees in this region were dense enough to filter light, but this had not been a sunny day. The last hours plodding through rainy mist and mud had scarcely discomforted him, for he was already beyond weariness, his flesh chilled by the wind.
I am lost… he thought. He wished he could lie down and rest. His head throbbed, his mouth was dry and his throat burned. He kept walking, light-headed with hunger. He had given the last of his bread to the leper squatting beside an empty alms bowl at the crossroads in exchange for directions to Valle Crucis.
That had been midmorning. Now it was near nightfall. Wrong way, something said to him. He was certain of it. This was not at all where he’d intended to go. He looked back. Already the trees had closed in upon the path. He could see no more than a few lengths behind, a few lengths ahead.
I have done a foolish thing, he thought, wishing he and his escort had never been parted; and then he shook off the feeling as too much caution. Within a day of his meeting with the king’s chamberlain, he’d taken his leave, gathered his men and headed for Wales, though the frosts were still too bitter for any greening of the land.
Six weeks later, appalling storm rains swelled the rivers and brooks, drowned the upland bogs and rendered the hillsides treacherous. The company had wrapped their weapons in oiled leather and themselves in heavy hooded cloaks and pressed on without pausing. Wagons bogged in roads turned to quagmires, sumpter mules sank to their haunches in mud and tempers became frayed.
Lodgings had been small and scant. His men grumbled under their breaths, laying wagers on whether Ironheart would command them to harden themselves yet further by camping in the open. It was cruelly hard, but then had come the worst blow of all. Wet fever struck down half his company. Rather than delay further, and only after much argument with his sergeant, he’d left his men at Crewe under the command of Rodney of Leyburn, while he continued on with only his squire, Thomas, to attend him.
It had seemed a good idea at the time. Now, though, he wondered if he’d been too rash. He desperately needed food and shelter for the night, for by now it was painfully obvious that the leper had not had the faintest notion of Valle Crucis.
A chill convulsed him. His brain was whirling with half-formed thoughts. Was this a fool’s mission, riding for Wales? It was a long way to go on a hunch.
Still, he had a duty. He would deliver the relic of the Holy Cross entrusted to him by the monks at Cluny, a perfectly natural reason to visit the abbey—and to discover whether the informant’s reports were true or false. After that, he was not certain. He was tired of political intrigue. Mayhap he could resign as the king’s judiciar and so buy some time, a chance to decide what he should do next.
He could go to Dinas Bran. His heart slammed against his ribs. It was not sane. It was, if one was a fool. And no one could accuse him of that. Intemperate, perhaps. But not a fool.
Or he could take another fork in the road. He could go to Whittington, claim it as was his legal right. Then perhaps he could move forward and not constantly think back toward the lost things he remembered. Making peace with that, he could perhaps begin to see things as vividly ahead of him, instead of the gray space that seemed to occupy all his future…
“I think we’re a long way from nowhere, don’t you?” The destrier twitched its ears at the sound of his voice, and a rising wind whispered assent through the wet branches.
The road bent around an out-thrust knee of rock. It was the solid ground ahead that beckoned him, and his feet were very glad to feel that solidity under them as he left the forest behind. He was onto a well-worn path. He glanced up the slope, saw stones and vines through the trees, saw stone walls and turrets, saw…
A truly wondrous sight.
Dinas Bran!
The castle enjoyed a vantage over all the valley and perhaps the plains and hills beyond, to all the distance a clear day would afford. Like a great hog’s back on top of the hill it stood, a brooding stone pile with thick gnarled walls and an air of neglect. Not as fine as some, but a sturdy, well-built fortification for all that, with narrow openings in it here and there through which it might be defended.
A bell began to toll from the walls, waking echoes across the hills. Following these echoes other sounds began to reverberate from within the keep itself: dogs barking, the calling of voices one to the other, the jingling of horses. Birds rose from the tower, wheeled and drove, chattering, black specks against the lowering sky. Ravens, which gave rise to all manner of lore and legend.
Deso’s nose met his shoulders and shoved. Leon gathered the reins, which he had let go slack, and remounted. “Hear that, Deso? Do they wait to pick our bones?”
A dry, distant crack of thunder cut through the gloominess of his thoughts. Ravens were not the only things threatening, it seemed. There was a bank of dark clouds piling up in the north; the kind of clouds that were laden with rain and indiscriminate in their dropping of it. A flicker of lightning ran along the edges of their contours, making them for an instant as sharp and clear as outlines cut from blackened copper.
Leon urged his mount up the steep incline, black shadow against the sullen light, for the motte and the stronghold above, a swift striding that lost not a pace. The tearing thunder-crash repeated itself a few seconds later, and just a little longer than before. The stallion snorted and shied, setting the equipment jingling and creaking. He put them to a quicker pace, and they went pell-mell up a chancy turn, over ground buried in leaves, a stretching and gathering of sinew, a flutter of mane, a streak of mire, as if that could make them safe, get them behind gates and walls.
A vast somber sound boomed out, brazen and measured, the rattle and groan of chains as the portcullis was lowered. It was not an auspicious hour to arrive unheralded and alone. Gates were secured at sundown and reopened with the dawn. Many a traveler who misjudged the timing of his arrival spent an uncomfortable night outside the walls at the mercy of robbers and worse.
“The lower gate should be open still.”
The stallion shifted its weight, bowed its head, and made a quiet, disturbed sound. No doubt Deso was thinking of a warm stable, a good rubdown and some sweet oats. He himself wished desperately for a cup of ale, for a place to lie down and rest. But first he had to discover whether the postern gate remained open. He would know soon enough.
The road bent to follow a curve in the curtain wall where standing stones made an aisle leading to the gate. Here, by the towering arch of stone, a small table had been set up, in front of which stood a motley-dressed collection of beggars.
With a certain disquiet, he noted there was no watch on duty. Doubtless they kept a burly fellow or two on hand to deal with possible emergencies, but there ought to be guards posted in a hold as large this and with constant threat along the border.
Leon slid from the saddle. The stallion stood braced, head high, eyes and nostrils wide. Leon looped the reins and gave the beast a pat on the neck. It shuddered once and was still. He looked about, taking nothing for granted. With a soldier’s practiced eye, he searched for irregularities.
Some distance away, four churls huddled together, talking in low voices and casting uneasy glances around. Shadows lurked and flickered about them. His brows drew hard together. No doubt he was imagining things, but he gained the impression that these ruffians were plotting some villainy. The idea intrigued him, and his spirit lightened at the prospect of a bit of action.
There was the sound of some commotion coming from the vicinity of the courtyard. A woman hurried through the postern gate. She looked about her, letting her glance rest briefly on the beggars. Despite the plain cut and drab color of her gown, he knew she was no peasant wench or waiting woman.
“Tudur?” Her voice was low and musical, with a distinctive husky tone. There was something about it that made him want to hear it again. What folly! He laughed out loud, and surprised himself for it was not a usual thing for him. The woman must have heard him because she swung around and stared at him so intently that he felt both rude and careless. Her eyes held him where he was.
Leon felt his heart skipping. He wished he had come with the clarion of trumpets, the rattle of armor and the gleam of sword instead of by the back door and in the company of beggars. He wanted to leap back onto Deso and race away. He laughed again. Why he thought such foolishness was beyond him.
A tall boy, almost as thin and angular as a spider, came clumping out of the postern with a wooden pail that sloshed with liquid. A flutter of murmurs rippled through the crowd. The woman watched while the boy set the pail on the table, then turned her gaze back to Leon, but her face was in shadow, her features hidden. A swirl of skirts and she withdrew.
The four ragged fellows inched their way toward the open doorway, their shadows following them like cringing dogs. There was a pause in voices. A murmur. A tensing of the air. A deep voice. A sudden exclamation.
A small shadow thrust forward. “Get away from there!”
“Says who?” asked a hoarse, harsh voice.
“Guards!” The sharp quick shout came from the boy Tudur. A hairy hand wrenched the boy’s head to one side.
Abruptly Leon became every inch the soldier. His heart sped up and his hand reached for his sword hilt. Fingers clenched and unclenched on empty air. He had let Deso carry his sword, which he had stowed behind the saddle, though he carried a dagger in his belt. Beneath his brown wool cloak and leather tunic, he wore no mail, not even a padded gambeson, naught but a linen shirt.
He’d been a fool to leave his shield and armor, even to his helmet, at Chirk with his squire this morning, and he was beginning to regret it. He might be strapped with ropy muscle, tough as an oak tree and as hard to kill, for he’d been to hell and beyond and survived. In all truth, most men would rather not face him with or without his sword. Even so, he regretted the sacrifice of his mail. Linen and wool were poor protection against edged steel.
He had, he thought, taken a great deal on himself. He’d seen that much in his squire’s eyes when they’d parted; a cool kind of reckoning he had gotten in the drill yard. Now it seemed mad to have done, and a light sweat lay on his limbs, for all that the wind was chill.
Wrenching himself free, Tudur dodged a fist, scurried past the ring of people gathered by the table, scampered across the road, and stopped, panting, in midsprint in front of Leon. The young face came up, the mouth opened and the eyes widened. The boy flinched visibly, caught himself, and drew back, the look on his face changing in an instant from surprise to confusion.
Leon sighed. His forehead ached. He realized he was scowling. He stretched his mouth into a smile.
“Are you a knight?” The boy looked afraid—not greatly so, but uneasy all the same.
Leon inclined his head to him.
A peculiar animation had come to the boy’s face, a keen anticipation. “The sort that saves maidens in distress?”
No, Leon began to say. But…
“So ’tis said,” were the words that tripped off his foolish tongue.
“Yes. Yes! I knew it! Some say I am daft, but I could tell straightway you were Brenna’s knight!”
“I’ve no notion what you mean.”
The boy’s eyes darted from Leon’s face to the postern opening, back again. “Of course. My mistake. Being daft, I get confused, so I don’t—” His eyes flicked back to the postern. “You are most needed here, sir.” There was tremulous expectation, as if Leon would act now, at once, in a breath.
Leon inwardly cursed. He was not usually a man given to rash acts of compassion, and, though the boy’s pluck touched him, he saw no obligation to have his throat cut. Or to die for nothing because some self-righteous slip of a girl was too cocksure stupid to take heed of the curfew. He stared down his nose at the boy, who went beet-red.
“If you would give aid, good sir!” Tudur said, blinking wildly. “There may be trouble—at the gate.”
Well, what the hell. Nobody else was going to play the hero, and Deso needed hay and a warm stable. Condemned now to simple workaday practicalities, Leon cast common sense to the winds. He handed the reins to Tudur, pointed silently to the open gate and stepped into the shadow of the wall, drawing his hood over his head. This action had the added benefit of concealing the greater part of his features.
He held still while Tudur led the destrier through the gate. Deso went with his ears laid flat and pricked up by turns, dancing and skipping through imagined obstacles, iron-shod hooves ringing on the gray cobbles. Ravens still circled aloft, dropped lower, as if urging him forward.
The girl came running out of the postern once more, her dark braids whipping loose from under the confining net, each with a mind of its own, her skirts aflurry, her slippered feet hardly touching the stones. This time she carried a large basket piled high with bread and meat.
“Hurry, Telyn, we are already past the hour!”
A smooth-faced youth clad in a vivid green tunic and bright yellow hose followed her, also bearing a basket. “This is foolishness. Curfew has rung. The gates should be locked!”
She gave a laugh, easy and merry. Leon caught his breath at the sweet, open sound. “Shall these poor folk go hungry because the hour grows late?” The laugh died. “Come, good people…here is some bread for you…and for you.”
A vague fluting of tones rose among the group, and a voice said, “It is unsafe, Brenna. The air is charged with danger!”
The woman lifted her face, and a sudden flash of lightning bathed her features in light. There was something about the expression on her face that struck a cord within Leon; and he found himself ensnared by her face, he who did not generally pay attention to women.
His throat went tight. She reminded him of the angel in his dreams. He had never seen such perfect milky skin or such large dark eyes. She could not be considered beautiful in the strictest sense of the word, for her mouth was too large, her chin too pointed, her cheekbones too wide. But the result was somehow magical. The notion dazed him. He lost his breath and his clarity of thought both at once and stood shaking like a leaf.
She showed a smile of pearly teeth, and held out her hand, palm up. “Come, sir, there is enough for all,” she said; and snared him twice over.
He hesitated. She waited.
“Come,” she reiterated. Her voice was music.
Leon was thrown into a turmoil of self-awareness, caught for a moment in two flashing, dark eyes. Eyes that sat far apart above a fine, straight nose. Eyes that understood, accepted. His face burned. He could feel the cords standing out along his neck. His body knotted from throat to thigh. He must look a fool, he thought, the greenest of country bumpkins, undone by a woman.
Every part of him was drawn to her. Never had his limbs seemed so beyond his control. Every step he took seemed fraught with the potential for calamity. What if his overlong legs betrayed him? What if he tripped and fell?
Unsettled by such strange thoughts, he drew his cloak close. His feet beat out a grim refrain.
Brenna. Brenna. Brenna.
Until, finally, he stood very still, towering over her, staring down at her, sharing a look with her. For a moment there seemed a confusion in her dark eyes. Gradually he began to comprehend what he saw there: it was a reflection of his own emotions. She was shocked and trying to hide it.
Then came the thunder, rumbling, the intervals shortening between claps. Brenna shook herself, as if awakening from a trance, and held out a cup filled with milk. The smile faded to gravity. The eyes stayed upon his, dark as river water.
Fingers touched fingers. Oh, very gladly would he have touched more. He longed for a thousand things, all of them dangerous.
“My good fellow, you have enough scars to stitch a tapestry. Stand aside and I’ll find some salve that lets the skin stretch—” a frown formed on her brow and she bent her head to an ailing urchin, while her cheeks suffused with color “—and that cough, child, needs an herbal tisane…that sore on your hand needs a poultice—”
Leon felt another flush heat his ears, as if he were a grass-green stripling undone by his first glimpse of a trim female ankle. He buried his nose in the offered cup, thanked her in a low voice, drank deeply, put the cup on the table and retreated a short distance.
The shadows above his head stirred, as if a gentle wind was blowing. He slitted his eyes and looked up at the sky. The ravens screamed, swirling, and vanished into the tower.
He picked up a movement out of the corner of his eye. Instantly alert, he did nothing out of the ordinary, simply allowed his eyes to track the beggars once more. One of the churls eased himself away from the wall and slid toward the postern, his hand resting lightly on his hip. But he turned back to his original position when he noticed Leon watching him.
There was trouble afoot. Deep inside Leon’s mind he could feel a subtle unease. It was as if he felt, not heard, the echoes of the alarm bell clamoring across the desert air from the furtherest outpost long before the enemy has reached the gate.
The girl gave a cry of protest, which brought his head jerking up. The beggars! It seemed she was refusing their demand for a bed for the night.
“No,” she said, stepping back.
The beggar scowled. “There is shelter for women and children, but not for men?”
The girl did not rise to the bait. A woman and her two children had been ushered through the postern gate into the bailey, but now the girl barred the door to the beggars with her own person. “They want herbs and potions. You have no such need. Be off with you and seek a bed at the inn in the village.”
Leon stood calmly for all that his heart was racing. Four assailants or nine didn’t matter to him, as long as he had his trusty dagger in his hand. That, and his own wits, skill and strength, sufficed, and he’d killed more than that in one skirmish. Armorless and alone, he was still more than a match for these churls.
Lightning flashed and edged everything in fire; the beggars, the edges of the buildings, the woman. For an instant their eyes met. Her head tilted to one side, her lips parting. He narrowed his eyes to deeper slits. She met his gaze unblinkingly, her eyes dark, staring at him strangely sharp, then she drew a long, uneven breath, as if to say, I am the one you have been seeking, and you are the one I have sought.
Leon had time to wonder whether his mind was going. Time to wonder about the question, but no time to find an answer. The churls inched closer, regaining his attention. Not now, Leon cautioned himself. Be still a little longer.
Five paces more.
“Give us alms and we will go in peace,” said one, edging toward her. His eyes were on the purse that swung from her girdle as he rested his hand upon his hip—a subtle threat.
She was not so easily intimidated. “Do you threaten me, sir? Are you so bold? Food you have had in plenty. No more can I give you!” Her eyes were blazing hot as coals and her small hands formed tight fists at her sides.
A humming. Leon heard metal hiss and knew the sound. He cursed under his breath. Mutters rose behind him.
“He’s got a sword!” somebody yelled.
People scattered, running in every direction, screaming. The rest of those who had sought food and alms moved back and away, or fled, leaving a clear space.
Now.
“I’ll get help.” The motley-clad youth ran past Leon, blocking his thrust. The churl made a mad lunge across the table. A lance of pain struck Leon’s temple. Spots swirled in front of his eyes. His fist came down. The milk pail burst apart, sending its contents showering in all directions. The girl was sent reeling.
“One against four and I have her purse already!”
This time, Leon didn’t hesitate. His hand lashed out in a blur of motion, of bone-jarring impact to wrist and elbow as his fist slammed into the assailant just below the ear. The man’s eyes bulged and his head danced like that of a puppet. Leon had a momentary glimpse of the other’s eyes, open wide, terror burning in them like an uncontrollable fire, before the man doubled over.
He kicked the weapon out of the man’s hand as another of the churls advanced, his cudgel raised to smite him. He lunged and caught the uplifted hand. His free hand crunched across the elbow. Then he grabbed another man plunging past him, spun him around, and felt armor beneath the brown robes.
It was a poor sort of a fight. Gripping the man’s arm, Leon twisted it and snapped it like a twig, grasped another attacker by the throat and flung him with contemptuous ease into the wall behind him. He planned none of his moves. They had all been drilled into him for so many years that they came automatically.
Time seemed to leap forward. There came the sound of many footsteps, all running toward them. A half dozen assorted servants and men-at-arms erupted from the postern. Hands went to swords, steel rising to the light. A roar went up.
“Get them, get them, get them!”
The four churls fled. Telyn chased after them, leading the detachment of men in full pursuit.
It was over. Done.
Leon stood with hand on hip, breathing easily. He had not even drawn his dagger. “Are you all right?” She nodded and he said, “In the name of all devils—why?” He jerked his head to the baying throng. “A sentry on watch would prevent such incident, lady.”
Brenna did not move, save that her head came up. He saw a sheen on her cheek as of light on polished, shining stone, or firelight on water.
“I am sorry. It was mine own folly that brought it about,” she faltered in a voice that was scarcely audible. “I should have called for help earlier.”
Leon kept his eyes on her. He had great confidence in his wit and skill, but when it came to women, he had no confidence at all. The flick of temper faded into something else: curiosity. She looked bedraggled, her veil askew, her thick black braids in disarray. Her eyes were burning bright. She was, perhaps, more shaken by the incident than she cared to acknowledge.
“It shouldn’t have happened.” Memory put violent pressure on his voice. What a different ending this day could have had! He could hardly think, his heart was hammering so in his chest, and his insides twisted in his belly.
She drew back a little. Her lips quivered, and she shook her head. “No one has ever threatened me before.”
Leon looked levelly into her eyes and did not move. “Such idiocy can prove fatal. Did you never think what might be the probable result? Did you never think that you might endanger others?” Driven by bitter memories, his voice was still hard and unconvinced.
A wild shake of the head. “No! I am unhurt.” Another space for breath. “I suppose it was a lucky coincidence you were on hand when those churls attacked,” she said with just the hint of a smile.
Leon felt the tightness around his mouth as his lip curled. He had spent too many years in action, and he was not accustomed to being made light of. Yet it was more than that. Under the bravado, he could sense something else in the girl. He could taste it; a nervous tension that came perilously close to fear.
“Coincidence, chance, luck. I don’t believe in any of them. I keep a sharp sword.” In spite of all his efforts, it was hard not to sound cynical.
She looked at him sharply. Her head was high now, her expression haughty. “You are very brave, sir. I would that all knights showed such courage. If they did, the Crusaders would have taken the Holy Land.”
“Devil take that! I am one man, not the Crusader army, lady,” he exclaimed.
“You were bold and confident!”
“A man of my trade lives every day of his life under threat of death,” he replied with a pragmatic shrug.
“But you are valiant! With neither armor nor weapon, you sent the dogs running. You felt no fear!”
“I have nothing to lose, therefore nothing to fear,” he said, too bluntly, perhaps, for she bit her lip a moment, frowning as if it were a challenge and she were searching for a proper response.
“A man who fears nothing loves nothing and, if he loves nothing, what joy is there in his life?” she asked with passionate urgency.
All his senses seemed foggy of a sudden, and his head on the edge of hurting. “I’ve never met a woman who speaks to me as you do,” he told her.
“Even your wife?” She fixed that direct look of hers on him, challenging him.
“I have no wife.”
Her scrutiny was both leisurely and thorough, taking him in as if he had been a bullock at market. Swift anger flooded through him. He felt his jaw clenching. Years of living by the sword had wrecked any comeliness he had ever possessed and any chance of winning a woman’s heart.
Something changed, lifted, in the set of her mouth and eyes. Tiny facial muscles relaxed. He caught a momentary expression as she stood before him, watching him intently—something intense and satisfied, as if it were enough to know.
“And I have no husband. Yet.”
“If you did, you would be more circumspect.”
Slowly the proud head bowed. She spread her hands. “It’s not like that here.”
“No doubt it is different in the marches,” Leon agreed with a touch of irony. “I do not think it is that. You knew I would intervene, if necessary.”
Her cheeks flamed, but she did not evade the charge. “Yes,” she said with a directness that he guessed was characteristic of her.
There were footsteps, the ringing of swords in scabbards. The men-at-arms were returning with two of the churls, and the girl’s purse. There were shouts and cheers from a tangle of servants and hangers-on. The youth had collected the baskets and was urging her within, saying it would rain soon and that Sir Edmund would be angry.
Brenna grinned up at him, her eyes bright. “Here I was wishing you away, but there was nothing I wanted more to see than you coming up that hill.” She laid a slender hand on his arm. “Welcome to Dinas Bran.”
Chapter Two
Could it be…was it…? Yes! He was here! He had come!
Flanked by the knight and Telyn, Brenna walked straight-backed and resolute into the courtyard, around the well and across the crowded bailey, taking no notice of the flurry of guards and flickering torchlight, the mass of shadowed faces and shocked voices. She offered not a word.
This was no time for argument or explanation. The gracious and civilized thing to do was to get her betrothed upstairs where he could bathe and prepare for the festivities. Her eyes did not even follow the guards as they bore the assailants away. She had not meant to cause any trouble by breaking the curfew, but it was done. They’d soon be in a cell for questioning, if anyone had any sense. It was up to the men now. She was too consumed by strange feelings she couldn’t comprehend. Feelings that made her reel with their intensity.
This was her betrothed! He was the man of her dreams! In truth, he was here!
She’d heard him laugh, a black-velvet ripple, sweet as the honey of the southlands, and felt something deep within her move, open. She’d looked wildly about, and her heart was like an arrow hurtling through space. Then eye met eye. A spark leaped in the meeting, and the newcomer had laughed no more. He gazed at her with—recognition, it might be, for she had felt it, too.
This is the one!
It was odd, really. She’d prayed that he wouldn’t let her down, that he would come. But she had an uneasiness now, about his late arrival, the peculiar look of him. There was some strangeness about him. He’d stood there, on the edge of the crowd, his hand seeming to rest on a sword hilt in the shadows, his whole aspect grim and dangerous.
Brenna swallowed hard. There had never been any other like this man. She could not suppress a heated sensation welling deep inside. His hand, heavy on her shoulder, seemed to have the strength of iron. She wanted to tuck herself closer against that strength…and yet she did not know why.
This man might be her betrothed, but he was a stranger. It just seemed impossible that he was truly the man of her dreams, she thought. And how could he so easily, so appallingly easily, become the one?
She had turned away so many suitors that her aunts despaired, but still her knight had not come. She had held to her dream until her grandfather had become impatient and commanded she wed. She had only consented because, with constant skirmishes to defend the border, Grandy’s coffers were empty and he needed the bride-price. Besides, the amiable Aubrey of Leeds sounded more congenial a match than Keith Kil Coed!
Be honest, Brenna. This incomparable knight is something you have conjured up out of an overactive imagination—or a mad notion, brought on by the tensions of the day. She must not allow her emotions to dominate her reason.
They came up the stairs and into the keep. Light spilled over them from the torches that burned all along the wall. From the kitchens the sweet smell of roasting venison floated on the air, and there was a stir in the hall, the coming and going of servants carrying trays of cider and ale through a door to the great hall where tapestries fluttered and torches flared in drafts.
Brenna stopped and sent a page scurrying with orders to fetch her maidservant. Fingertips tapped her arm. She became aware of Telyn, hovering at her side, still clutching the baskets.
“Thank you, Telyn. You served me well this day.”
The squire made a clicking with his tongue. “My lady, it would be wiser not to disturb Sir Edmund with news of this…he is at table already. Surely he will blame me for allowing you to go out unattended. No harm was done. Your purse has been recovered, and if I…”
“It is all right, Telyn. I accept full responsibility. You go eat. I will escort the knight to his chamber.”
“But surely—” Telyn stopped.
“I’ll be down soon. Will you please tell Grandy that Sir Aubrey has arrived and has retired to refresh himself?”
A polite murmuring. No objections. She supposed he didn’t know what to say. She didn’t, either, except, “Thank you, Telyn.”
As she dismissed the squire, the knight swung about, swirling his gray cloak. “Deso!” he exclaimed, his voice breaking hoarse. He had said nothing up to that point, had let Brenna lead him where she willed. “Deso!”
“Is that the name of your horse? Tudur has taken the animal to the stables. The grooms will see to it.” Brenna tilted her head up, regarding him sidelong. “Is it a real battle charger?”
Her tone must have betrayed something. His glance sharpened. His face was cold and still. For a heartbeat he looked like a great red stag at bay. Then his shoulders and the line of his neck relaxed.
“Yes, it is a warhorse, and a fine one, too,” he said in the most ordinary of tones, but his eyes were as clear as water, with a brightness in the heart of them.
Brenna’s breath shortened. His hood had flown back long since, revealing hair like hot gold. His jaw was square and rugged, his mouth bluntly carved below the jutting blade of his nose. The pale smooth marks traced across half his face like the limbs of a lightning-blasted tree bespoke of courage and mettle and the reflexes of a warrior. And the mantle of wool that swept across his shoulders emphasized their width and suggested great strength.
She swallowed hard. Her heart was thudding against her ribs. Oh, yes, he was a pleasing man, younger than she had imagined—no more than eight-and-twenty. She could do far worse than he.
So why this uneasiness?
It appeared Aubrey was no ordinary knight. For, though her betrothed knew how to defend himself, and his linen shirt was of the finest weave, and the supple leather of his tunic and boots were fastened with ornate metal toggles, he came without armor or shield. Somehow, somewhere, he had lost his armor and weapons. Understanding came. Did not a knight, unhorsed in the lists, forfeit his gear?
Did that matter? He is here!
“Come.” Back stiff, braids swinging, she led him past the inner door that opened on the hall, up the narrow curving timber steps to the bedchambers set high in the tower of the castle, and down the corridor. At the very end, she stopped and pushed aside a beaded leather curtain.
“You may sleep here.”
Her companion stumbled. His fingers tightened. The grip hurt. She drew a long, long breath and let it go. Slowly, the pressure was removed. Her muscles went slack with relief.
The room they entered was circular, with tall narrow windows all about it. A fire blazed in the hearth, and the chamber glowed in the wastefulness of an oil lamp, which shed a low, even light over a crowded table covered with sheaves of parchment and scrolls.
Brenna made her way across a floor carpeted with sweet-smelling rushes, bent, adjusted the lamp wick, and stood uncertainly, looking at him, surprised by the pounding of her heart. She pressed one hand to her chest for a moment and it eased. Why was she so nervous? This was her betrothed!
He lingered, a shadow in the doorway. But the rugged features were devoid of emotion. He might have been carved from stone. And he avoided her gaze, staunchly refusing to glance her way.
For once, the forms of hospitality deserted her. She had kept herself from hoping. As far as she could, as far into her childhood as she might. She’d pondered what to say to him. She wanted to talk to him, to chatter idly, to say something to fill the silence. But now that he was here, her heart beat with a thud of self-conscious dread, and she could only blurt, “Are you tired?”
He shrugged. She went to him, took his arm and steered him toward a chair as if he were a child, never mind that he was a head taller and thrice her weight.
“A bath and a glass of mulled wine and you’ll soon feel more the thing. There are soap and herbs and clean towels in the chest, and this is a fine feather bed.”
Why had she said that? Brenna felt the heat rush to her face. He would think her most unmaidenly, or that she could not wait to be bedded! But he seemed not to notice her confusion. He shrugged out of his sodden cloak, threw it over a chair and gave a curt wave of his hand.
“It’s very fancy.”
In truth the chamber was plain enough, all bare wood and aged stone. It was spacious and the furnishings were comfortable, with a faint scent of flowers. On the table beside a pot of ink and a heap of quills lay a bowlful of rose petals, sending up sweet fragrance like a silent blessing.
Brenna knelt and poked at the fire with an iron rod. She looked up and up. He looked down and down. The eyes that met hers were the shifting color of the forest. Her breath quickened; her heart was beating so hard it hurt her throat.
“It was my father’s chamber. The bed came from France.”
By which answer Brenna knew she had hit a raw nerve. Two deep grooves appeared on his face, running from the flare of his nostrils to the corners of his suddenly grim mouth.
“I can assure you, lady, that this sacrifice is quite unnecessary. I have traveled far and am weary. A cot in a corner will suffice.”
There was a sharpness in his tone that startled Brenna. He looked horrified. Her heart stilled. Had she offended him? Or did he find her unattractive? That stung her vanity a little, but not enough to cause this pain that clenched her heart.
No, it is not that, she said to herself.
It was true that men always reacted to her with admiration. It was also true it had never concerned her whether they had or not. This time she cared. For the first time in her life she felt a frank stirring of curiosity in a man, an honest awareness of him. This man reacted to the notion of using the marriage bed as if just told he had to share it with a leper.
She rose to her feet, and clutched her hands together, finding them shaking. She kept her back straight and her chin up, but she was all too painfully aware of the figure she cut. Her gown had been her mother’s; it was shabby, threadbare, and covered with mud. In short, she was unkempt.
She had never believed it would come to this. How badly she wanted to make a good impression. The hospitality of Dinas Bran was well known. A visitor was sure of shelter, refreshment and ale, with meat for his hounds and oats for his horse without stint. Would she offer her betrothed any less?
Knights, it was said in the codes, had a common trait. It was honor. Privately, Brenna thought it was pride. Of which this man had an excess. If only he would catch her eye, reassure her with a curve of those generous lips, bring a glimmer of certainty surging into her heart. But no, he would only look straight ahead, his bearing contained, aloof. What was she supposed to do?
“Sir Edmund dislikes having the customs upset. He’ll ask me why. What will I say?”
“That ’tis most kind, but—”
“Be not mistaken. My father no longer has use for this room. He is dead. Killed at Acre.”
“Your pardon, lady. I am not at my best.”
He looked feverish, but then that was to be expected; God alone knew how far he’d traveled in that damp cloak.
“In that case, I insist,” she said firmly. “Besides, ’tis the custom here to give the best accommodation to our noble guests. I would not have it said that Dinas Bran lodged you meanly,” she snapped, the sharper for that her cheeks had caught fire.
Leon wrapped his arms about him against the sudden coolness and looked at her. Simply looked. He had thought her magical at first sight. Now he was sure. She was indeed quite the most exquisite woman he had ever seen. Her smooth pale skin was rose-blushed. Her eyes were dark and enchantingly tilted, their brilliance set off by their fringe of long black lashes. Her fine dark brows slanted across her forehead like a raven’s wing, and her hair beneath its drift of veil was black as night. Her one flaw, the chin that was a shade too pronounced, a shade too obstinate, only strengthened her beauty. Without it she would have been lovely; with it, she was breathtaking.
He leaned on the wall, scrubbing at his sweaty cheeks and chin. The chamber felt unaccountably hot. It was hard to breathe, let alone think.
What good were these doubts? he asked himself. If he were enchanted, there was little he could do. If it were naught but the fever, then a bath would cool his overheated senses. After so many days in the saddle, his clothes were so dusty, muddy and sweaty that they would probably be able to walk back to France all by themselves, and despite his attempts at washing them and himself in rivers so cold they made the teeth ache in his head, the body inside the garments wasn’t much better.
All he knew for sure was that he’d never find out standing still, and the thought of hot water and soap and razors, was a pleasant one. He felt suddenly very weary. The energy that had driven him during his rescue mission was now taking its toll. In short, he felt rather disheveled and somewhat shaken. His head hurt in savage counterpoint to his heartbeat. He pressed his fingers hard into his forehead, pushed away fatigue.
“Is it also the custom here, as it is on the Continent, for the lady of the house to offer guests assistance in their bathing?” he asked, fearing to know.
Brenna was taken aback. For a moment, breath and sense failed her. She lost her thread of thought, everything unraveling. Was he actually suggesting she attend him? Or was he simply making conversation? A feeling of embarrassment arose in her, and then resentment. Why were things so contrary? Her wits rallied; she gathered her forces.
“If you so desire,” she said in a voice that she tried to make sound calm. Dared she do such a thing? Her grandfather did not ever allow her to help bathe their guests. It was a chore left to the maidservants. But this was her future husband!
“I must trust your judgment, and hope that you do not come to regret your decision.”
Brenna stared, puzzled. Filled with uncertainty, her mind went ’round and ’round, struggled with the meaning of his words. What was he talking about? He had paid the bride-price. The wedding was prepared. He had come. Why was he hesitating now? Or was he talking about what was to happen afterward in the marriage bed? The bed he had so summarily rejected?
“It is the least I can do, my lord.”
Leon felt like a man hit by a pole-ax, still on his feet, but reeling. He searched her face, looking for duplicity, but finding something else, something he couldn’t put his finger on. His mind screamed, Beware! But his body shrieked even louder. A chill grew in his limbs, a slight giddiness like too much ale. Like too much heat and too much cold. Like love. What had put that thought into his mind?
“I fear you flatter me too much, lady. I am only a soldier, not a great lord,” he found the strength to say.
Brenna’s assurance foundered as she realized the significance of what he’d just said. She drew a slow breath; her first sign of temper.
“You dissemble well, sir knight. I think you are more than a simple soldier.” When he opened his mouth to argue, she shook her head. “I will not bandy words with you—if you wish me to believe you only a modest soldier then so be it. I care not what your rank may be, but there is nothing common about you.”
“I am glad you think so.”
“What reasonable person would not?” Brenna changed tacks abruptly, fixing him with her most disconcerting stare. “I heard you were a great knight, all amiable and devout. Were the rumors wrong?”
A curl of stirred air touched Leon’s cheek. The lines of his face turned icy as hill granite. A small shiver trickled down his spine like a drop of ice water, and for the merest instant the chamber seemed somehow darker than it had any reason to be. He could hear his pulse pounding in his ears. Shutters rattled, one after another. The wind howled, roared and stirred the shadows in the corners. Outside the night was alive with the hammering of rain, streaks of bouncing energy, silvered where the lightning hit it. All of it utterly foolish, of course, and just to be laughed at later, with a glass of good wine in one hand. And yet…
“How could you have heard such things?” Grabbing her wrist, as if by this gesture he could wrench the knowledge out of her. “You didn’t know me at all, before this evening.”
Brenna was startled at the bite in his voice. Were the rumors wrong? Her eyes looked up involuntarily into the chips of ice that were his eyes. Hers wavered the merest fraction. She rallied with a flare of Brenig temper.
“It’s surprising what news comes from the court, but now I am beginning to think it was all just exaggeration. You are wound so tight, I don’t think you are amiable at all!”
He stood there, unmoving, unperturbed. A little silence passed, barely endurable, before he released her wrist and said mildly, lazily, “You’re probably right.”
Brenna felt her cheeks turn warm. This wasn’t going as planned at all. Caution and guilt warred with vague, half-formed desires until, finally, duty dictated a more sensible attitude. But the itch of curiosity assailed her. More than an itch, her curiosity was a torment.
“Some said that you would not come to us, that you were bound in close friendship with the king, and that the court has need of you there. We both know that to be a falsehood…do we not?”
“You have been misinformed, my lady. The road but took some crooked turns.”
She tilted her head to one side, studying him. “So you can be devious, too. When a man of your stature travels without his servant, one would suppose him to be—shall we say…in disguise?”
Leon thought how quick of understanding is this girl! He knew the rules of hospitality. Never ask the visitor “From where?” or “Where to?” Never ask them “How many?” or “For how long?” And most of all, never ever ask them “When?” In another minute she would surely guess that he was a king’s man…
“Forgive my rudeness. I meant no disrespect.”
“None taken.”
“I did not realize. I thought…perhaps…” Brenna tried to think of something to say, but no words would come. Her fluency failed her when it was her moment to speak. She could not frame a single sentence. Her cheeks blazed with the shame of it. “You look a little the worse for wear. Were you beset upon the road?”
Leon bit down on a frown. He was certain he detected trepidation in her voice. The sparkle in her gaze, however, made him decidedly suspicious. She stood there, cool, proud, running those dark eyes over his disheveled and travel-worn figure. She wanted a bold, brave answer. He gave her one; though not perhaps the one she had expected.
“Lady,” he said very softly, “I was beset by a breaker of hearts.”
She looked at him, as if not understanding, or not wanting to understand. “Are you a pawn, then?” Raising a brow the merest suggestion of a degree.
“My lady,” he said, and could not resist a bow, ironic mockery of her clear hesitation, “that depends upon your own intent.”
This one could break your bones or your heart, Brenna warned herself. Her pulse began to quicken. Blood rushed up in her ears. Suddenly she was trembling, shivering. She bit her lip. She had to fight off the urge to touch him, to casually brush her hand against his. She had never experienced anything that made her feel like this. Her heart was beating so she felt that she could hardly be sure of controlling her voice. Surely all her senses had flown?
“Sir! I—” Brenna struggled mightily to keep her expression bland, though she was sure a spark of delight lit up her eyes. “I will feel better if you let me make sure you’re cared for.”
“Whatever the lady requests. I cannot deny her. I am resolved to please her.”
That was a refuge. She snatched at it. Closer and closer then, at a careful pace. Her hand rose to his cheek. He caught it.
“No,” he said.
A little silence passed, barely endurable. His eyelids flickered a fraction. A shiver traced her spine, a sensation like a touch brushing her, moth-soft.
“This offense to your person, did it go unpunished?”
“I am alive, aren’t I?” His irises snapped light-sparks briefly, just a glint of cold, then control. He did not like that memory, nor the reminder.
I do not believe in coincidence.
She looked up at him from under her eyelids. All honor was in that bladed curve of nose, in those cheekbones carved fierce and high, in those brows set level over the deep eyes.
“Then that answers the question.”
Her smile won free, startling as the sun at midnight, and more miraculous. Deep down inside Leon a strange feeling, almost of elation, surged—but why? Surely not because this slip of a girl showed neither sympathy nor revulsion of his ruined face? This fact alone couldn’t possibly account for the new emotion ebbing and flowing within him. On the other hand—
His spare hand involuntarily went to the breast of his leather tunic, in an inner pouch of which he kept a stained knot of ribbon. It had become a treasured charm to him through the years, and he had grown almost to believe that it was a safeguard to him from the constant assaults of temptations to thoughts and deeds unworthy of a Christian knight.
He tested his courage by it. He tested it further. He released her wrist. Risked shame that a girl should trust him.
“I give you leave,” he said, a little breathless.
“How generous of you.”
Wordlessly, she reached out and touched his cheek softly. He felt something come alive within him, something that made him feel warm and cherished. He suddenly became aware of the delicious tension tightening his whole body. His heart jumped and started hammering. A fearful thrill ran from his chest to his groin. He had not known he could have so many needs all at once, amid such a nightmare.
Brenna touched him, because she wanted to, because she could not help herself; a brush of fingertips from his cheek to his chin, tracing the path of his scars. It was great daring. He quivered under her hand, but did not pull away. She looked up and caught his eye. A quick smile framed her lips.
“Am I transgressing?” she asked him.
In more ways than one!
“A little.” Meeting her gaze, Leon struggled mightily to keep his expression bland. You must face that which you fear most. Confront and conquer. Know yourself first and you will overcome a legion of adversaries. His arms-master’s words, spoken to him at Whittington. A boy of twelve summers, unaware of the fate that awaited him.
Ever so slowly, her fingers progressed along their tortuous route. He kept still, hardly daring to breathe. She was close, so dizzyingly close! A painful stiffening was pressing against the confining leather of his pants, but he dared not shift to ease his position for fear his actions would be noticed.
Leon closed his eyes and inhaled sharply, allowing himself this rare moment of self-indulgence. Then, with the ease of long practice, he forced the emotional temptation back into a corner of his mind. He’d learned a long time ago that the only way to exist was to keep his feelings under rigid control, his heart hard and unyielding as iron. It was a kind of armor. After everything that had happened years ago, there was nothing left to be afraid of.
They were very close. Brenna could feel the living warmth of him, and catch the scent he bore, faint yet distinct. Musk and saddle leather and wet wool. His face was so close that she could feel his breath, so warm and soft. She hoped he would kiss her—yes, she wanted him to kiss her—and her heart beat faster as she swayed toward him, her soft breasts touching his chest. How would it feel to kiss a man?
Their lips touched. He was very beautiful and very strong, and his kiss was sweet. Swift and startling. Warm and warming. He tasted of spices. She felt his long, lean body pressed against hers, and in her secret places, unfamiliar longings began to stir.
He drew back.
Brenna only stared at him, not moving. His eyes had darkened to emerald, and he was frowning, if only slightly; his gaze gone almost to coldness. He bowed again.
“I am honored, and I hope my presence will cause you no more hardship than is necessary.”
Her throat was locked. She swallowed to open a way for her voice. “It is we who are honored—no, pleased by your presence here, and all will see to your comfort. I will have a servant fetch some wine and a trencher from the kitchen—and some clean clothes.”
And fled.
Two steps outside the door she came to an abrupt stop. Elen, her old nurse and present maidservant, stood there, arms akimbo, blocking the corridor.
“Merciful Mary, what means this, Brenna?”
Brenna did a little jig though she wanted to throw up her arms and yell, to leap and hop and twirl and imitate the merry dance of the minstrels, and burst into the hall shouting the glad tidings to everyone.
“Elen, the inconceivable has occurred! My knight…he has come! He’s a darling, and I shall love him, I know.”
Elen’s face expressed disapproval of so much exuberance. “Telyn made no mention of a knight. He said it was one of the beggars who came to your aid.”
“Whoever heard of a beggar with a horse? A fine horse, at that—and Elen, Aubrey’s magnificent. He’s exactly as I’ve always imagined my knight to look. Fair, powerful, self-assured. I’ve never seen such fearlessness, such absolute recklessness, such wild valor. I’ve no doubt he’s all heroic virtue and unmatched goodness.”
Elen narrowed her eyes. “You sound utterly smitten.”
Besotted, more like, Brenna thought. Every part of her had been drawn to him. Her shoulder still prickled where his hand rested. Her lips tingled from the cool fire of his touch. She laughed lightly.
“He has all the traits of a hero—and his face is that of a warrior—such lovely eyes—all silvery-green and shining like a pigeon’s breast. And his shoulders are the broadest I’ve ever seen. Then again, mayhap ’tis his golden hair. You don’t see much hair that color around here.”
“Upon my soul, Brenna, you are wit-wandering.”
“Not so.”
“No one ought to indulge in passion, it distorts everything.”
“There are passions—and passions.”
“You might as well know that Kil Coed has sent word that he comes not only to propose a new and strong alliance with Dinas Bran, but that it would be his great pleasure to seal that covenant by wedding with you.”
Brenna stared at Elen grimly and let out an impatient breath. “The arrival of my betrothed and our marriage on the Sabbath should halt any ambitions held by another suitor! Assuming, of course, that this isn’t all a joke…?”
“I wish I had told you sooner, but I did not want to burden you until I was sure.”
A wild resentment filled Brenna. “We have taken Aubrey’s coin. I am honor-bound to wed him.”
“Keith Kil Coed is magnificent—and he’s Welsh.”
“I will not marry him!” It was a whisper, lest she scream it.
“You may have no choice. Since winter loosed its hold, he has begun to gather an army. The Lady Agnita says Sir Edmund suspects he will move against us, thinking to forge an alliance, and use our strength to advance west to Gwynedd.”
“I am betrothed to Aubrey of Leeds!”
“Betrothals can be nullified.”
“Not on the very eve of the nuptials!”
“No more dispute now. Sir Edmund has the right to decide your fate. He is in a foul mood because of this latest folly. He will be angrier if you are not at table. Go and put on your blue gown, and be nice to him, and you may find his anger only hot air.”
“Even if Grandy is about to renege on the deal and have me wed that upstart Keith Kil Coed, my knight has come, as if conjured here by magic. It is a good omen.”
“Don’t say that! The walls have ears,” Elen whispered, making the sign of the cross on brow and chest. “And there are always servants and menials of some sort to carry tales of witchcraft and druidry.”
“Old lies and old spite. How can anyone credit a word of it?”
“Be careful! I can’t prevent hostile ears from attending to some ill-spoken words—I would not have you skinned for a witch or burnt at the stake.”
A flood of fondness washed through Brenna. Elen’s hair might be mostly gray, and she might be moving a bit stiffly on winter mornings, but she was always so indulgent, so tolerant, not at all stiff and proper. She was also very superstitious.
“You are trying to make my blood run cold, Elen. Well, I am not so easily frightened.”
“Nevertheless, such talk is dangerous,” Elen said in a low voice. “I’ve seen you grow up, Brenna. You run, jump, indulge in all manner of masculine pursuits, speak four tongues and even read. ’Tis not expected of a woman, and disturbs the natural order of things.”
Brenna bit her lip to keep from laughing. “I can also sew a fine stitch, spin wool, bake bread, grow herbs, tend the sick and sing to the bees.”
“It is magic. Which is why they call you a she-devil.”
“Nonsense. The bees like my singing and make honey in appreciation. I use no magic, else I would make that upstart Kil Coed weak, turn his muscles to pudding. Instead he bends an iron axle over his knee as if it were wet bread dough.”
Low and thick, Elen said, “Don’t give them any more substance to talk about!”
“What does it matter?”
“It matters,” Elen said harshly. “I’m just trying to protect your reputation. I know you say I gossip too much, but I worry—”
“Dear Elen, you have always been worried about me, haven’t you? I remember when I was a child you were always in a flutter for fear I should fall down and hurt myself. Well, sometimes there have been reason in your fears, but no more. My knight’s presence is enough, and his strength and golden voice. I need no more.”
From now on her whole life would be dedicated to him. Yes, that’s what they’d do—walk through the years together. As if provoked a little by this resolve, thunder boomed out above the towers, making her jump. A door shut downstairs, echoing.
“It seems unreal, but I will wed Aubrey of Leeds on the Sabbath, Elen. From that moment, I will behave like a saint, that I promise you.”
Chapter Three
Leon set his weapon belt on the bench nearest the bed, thinking how unexpected this all was, lodging in the room that had been Brenig’s own in his youth. He hoped he was wrong, but he did not take for granted all that he could.
Wales was a savage and rebellious place, with great mountains and strange customs. Odd things happened, and law was a matter of local option. Beyond the Dee the land turned primitive, towns and villages growing fewer, hill and forest rising toward the western mountains. The rumors were dark here, tales of marauders upon the roads, villages sacked and burned.
He sat down on the edge of the bed and tugged off his boots. Suspicions had begun to move about inside his mind, causing swirls and ripples of unease like the movements of something large and ominous lurking beneath the surface of deep water. Had not the king but lately revoked the title of Lord of the Northern Marches, throwing this western realm into turmoil and confusion? Had not the same king dug up old grudges from his childhood days and found reasons to heckle and harass that obliged Lord Fulk to flee from Whittington?
Why? The answer was as simple as it was distressing. The king had deliberately unleashed a potentially explosive power struggle to distract his increasingly antagonist parliament from what was happening in his provinces on the other side of the English Channel.
Leon knew what would happen. The plots would multiply until those who sought to take Fulk FitzWarren’s place would be overwhelmed. He also knew that the Brenigs were political animals. Intrigue was second nature to them.
He was no novice in deceit, but mayhap he was suspicious and uncharitable even to suspect Brenig treachery in housing him in this grand chamber—without ascertaining who he was—as he was suspicious and uncharitable to suspect Brenig treachery in permitting the heiress, with no guards, risking danger—
Only Brenna had faced no danger of alleged outlaws. The rescue, if rescue it could be called, was so easy as to be ridiculous.
Too easy.
There had been guards within call, and the boys Telyn and Tudur ready to call the alarm. He liked that stroke; he truly did. A fine jest, if it were not so reckless. Respectful. Convincing, if less in the province were amiss.
A brief flash of lightning chased the shadows. Thunder cracked close. Rain thumped down as if scattered by an enormous hand. The wind battered against the shutters, making the timber slats dance to its rhythm. He crossed the room, unlacing cuffs, collar, and side laces and hauled off shirt and tunic together, before throwing open the shutters. The wind gusted in through the slitted window, setting the candles fluttering wildly.
Too much, he thought, beginning to sway. Too much. The feeling of falling clung to him like a shroud. His head throbbed. He was having trouble focusing his eyes. He put his hand to his head. Abruptly the realization came that he had a lump on his skull the size of an egg.
Disposing his clothes on the peg against the wall, he stripped off his filthy breeches and reached out again for his shirt. He retrieved the amulet from its hiding place, and took it in his hand, feeling a warmth where it touched his palm, a sweet, sad warmth.
Memory, swift and involuntary: a dark night, a pale face out of which two eyes stared like living cinder, a vow. It was nostalgia, but he held it fast, and it sang to him of elvish dreams and memories. It took him back so vividly.
He’d had a dream of changing the world in his golden youth, when such things were possible…
And he’d gone all the way to the Holy Land.
But that was not far enough for his troubles, not far enough for safety from falsehood and deceit, his foster father’s scheming, his own damnable stupidity—
He shook his head, and laughed angrily, giddily, to himself. He tucked the amulet into his weapon belt and stood in front of the slitted window, shivering in the wind that blew in out of the dark, in the hope that the damp air would clear his wits.
Brenna hurried along the corridor ahead of the servants, and wondered why she had left Aubrey so suddenly. Why was she so beset by doubts? Surely there was no harm in kissing her betrothed on the very eve of their marriage? She thought of the ceremony to take place on the Sabbath, and of how this storm would not be viewed as a particularly good omen…
There was an air of chill in the chamber as she entered, despite the cheerful fire burning on the hearth. His bulky shape was outlined by lightning from without and the contours of him shone where they caught the light.
She stood, stone-still. The light burnished his hair and accentuated the planes of his handsome face, transforming it for her into something splendid, something awesome. The perfect tapestry of one half of his face was a splendid foil to the tracery of livid white scars on the other cheek. The contrast was absolute.
It was not the face of a scholar or a seer; it was the battle-hardened face of a warrior, a man who had faced death and would not allow its dark promise to control him.
The face was dauntless—but the eyes were striking. Shielded by thick sable lashes, they were his best feature, eagle-keen and very clear. She’d liked their singular silvery color, so translucent they took color from lake or moss or stone.
The light shone, too, on the rest of him, bathing him in a nimbus of flame and making his bared skin gleam ruddy. He had removed his outer garments, and was wearing only his linen loincloth. She found it impossible not to stare, transfixed, listening to the wild beating of her heart.
He appeared incredibly beautiful, his shoulders wide, the skin of his chest stretched taut across his squared muscles. His abdomen was flat and without superfluous flesh. In the pulsing light, his massive torso looked as though it had bathed in iron dust. Even the down on his chest had a peculiar metal sheen. But his whole body was a map of injuries and hurts, old and new, and his arms were laced with myriad scars that served further proof he kept his livelihood by the sword. This was not, she thought, a man to cross.
The thunder grew louder. A gust of wind sent the lamps and candles flickering. It also restored her senses.
“You’ll catch the death of cold with that damp wind!”
She went to the doorway and clapped her hands. A clutch of servants came in bearing a huge wooden tub, which they set in a corner behind a screen, away from the draught, and filled with successive pails of steaming water. Others appeared, carrying towels and fresh clothing, which they placed on a low table that stood close to the tub.
Leon went and stood by the fireside, warming the shivers and the aches of travel from his bones as he waited for the servants to finish their business and leave. With eyes that burned from exhaustion, he watched them all gather by the tub, and Brenna told them she would help him with his bath. She breezed past them to his side.
“If you’ll just allow me—”
“Desist, woman!” Servants scattered. He barely noticed. “Stop that at once!” He brushed in vain at her helpful hands.
“What is wrong?”
A gasp sounded behind. Brenna clapped her hands, stifled the servants somewhat, and shooed them out.
“I’ll not have a husband who scares the maids witless with all that grumpiness. Now if you’ll be so kind—” She flung up her hands.
That brought him to a halt. His ears were going. Had he heard that? “Husband?”
She turned back and stood very close to him, but this time standing rigid, with her arms folded under her breasts. Fine tremors moved the tendrils of her hair, as if a qualm of fear shook her courage. “That is what I said.” Her face was calm and as still as a brushed porcelain mask. Bland as if it were a foregone conclusion. As if none of it were uncertain.
“What brought that to mind?”
“You are always answering a question with another question!”
“Just a peculiar topic to bring up now,” he said.
“Not at all. With all the political talk going on, ’tis natural to be thinking of the future, but we can discuss it later.”
“You’re crazy!”
“My father’s word was reckless.”
“Perhaps he was sparing in his praise.”
She spoiled the exquisite mask by squinting through a dark waterfall of hair at him. “You are merely evil-tempered because you cannot bear the fact that you, my stalwart rescuer, have mislaid your armor.” Her voice sparkled with hints of laughter.
“You carry on like a raucous crow.”
Brenna flushed, but her eyes were steady. “And you have a temper like soured wine.” A firm hand planted itself on his chest. “You will get a fever if you stand there naked much longer.”
Leon stiffened, but her hand did not move. Her eyes touched his chest, his flat stomach and hips and his…
He glanced down. His eyes grew very wide and still. His heart jumped and started hammering. While he’d glowered at her, she had industriously peeled off the linen undergarment.
Brenna standing there dressed and he—
He felt his groin grow heavy as thick blood pooled in his lower belly. His reaction must be blindingly obvious, he thought. A cold feeling spread all down his back into his legs. If a seasoned warrior reacted in this way, pity help her poor silly young suitors. His teeth gritted. His lips peeled back from his teeth.
“You need not stay.”
“Do you want the maids to see you like this?” Her tone was blank, void of cues, but her breast rose with each breath and the way she avoided looking at him, as if her interest in him were all his fault, was highly amusing. She gestured to the water invitingly.
Leon bit back a retort. It would do no good. He could think of nothing to say that would not make matters worse. His body betrayed him. Surrender, for now, was the only strategy.
Still frowning, he climbed in, yielding to the temptation of a hot bath in a tub that was big enough to hold a man of his great stature. The water was so hot his toes tingled. Gingerly, he sat, glad of the debilitating heat of the water. He let go a long breath and looked up from under his brows.
“Well, lady, for what do you wait?”
She slapped a big bar of brown soap into his hand. “Wash yourself with this. I’ll get some oil.”
Brenna hurried to the carved chest, as if suddenly appalled at her boldness. There was an awkward silence while she unstopped a bottle and added a few drops of sweet-smelling oil to the water.
Leon suspected she was rarely so tongue-tied; any girl who looked like this one did would have learned at an early age how to make the most of her assets. He rubbed his chin with both hands, feeling the stubble from several days’ growth scratch the skin of his palms. No doubt he stank of sweat and grime and horse. He truly needed to bathe, and he could not deny it would be pleasant to have the woman tend him.
He held out the bar of soap. “Come, wash my back.”
Her blush deepened. She pressed her hands together quickly, nervously. Bending over, she took the soap from his hand and rubbed it against a linen cloth. She touched him hesitantly, as if not sure of where she should begin or exactly what she should do. The hands were soft and gentle and the hot soapy water against his skin felt delicious. Her fingers traced the steel tendon that ran down the back of his neck to his spine. He felt the thick muscles of his back bunch at her touch.
“It’s not too hot, is it?”
“No.”
She moved her foot. Her knee was not far from his shoulder. The out-flung length of one leg. Her slender ankle and the pointed toe of her shoe. The innocence of her pose created the eroticism of the moment. Intensifying so that he felt the stirring inside himself. Not merely his groin. All over. He was suffused with longing. His manhood was stiff and quivering. As if it were his whole body.
“May I?” Her hands massaged his neck and the back of his head and the massive muscle that joined his head to his shoulders. She stroked his hair. Pain rushed up his temple, rang like hooves drumming clay. He could not help the small shudder that ran through him. She jerked her hand back. “You’ve got a lump on the side of your head the size of an egg!”
“I was a trifle careless,” he said, keeping his voice light.
She pursed her lips, as if she wished she could say otherwise. “That may be true, but your hair still needs a wash,” she said, her voice holding mild reproof.
He ducked down under the surface long enough to count to twenty, and to want air. He broke surface again. For a heartbeat his eyes locked with hers.
“Do what you want. I won’t stop you.”
Brenna gnawed her lip, edged closer and let go a breath. “I will try not to hurt you.”
He tipped his head back while she washed out his hair, combing through the snarls with gentle fingers, trying not to feel anything, remember anything, wonder anything.
“Close your eyes,” she ordered, running a soapy finger over each eyelid. Her hands were light, moth-delicate, on his forehead. “Why do you shave your beard?”
“It makes me remember who I am, what I’m for. It keeps me from growing too proud.”
“What a load of nonsense!”
“Then the truth it must be. It’s hot. It’s red. It itches,” he mumbled.
Her laughter was sudden and heart-deep, a ripple of pure notes. “With golden hair and red beard, you’d look like a great marmalade cat.”
“Another reason to shave!”
Brenna followed the contours of his wide shoulders down his arms, where the water glistened among red-gold hairs. He sighed and felt the tension ebbing out of him. He melted back against the rim of the tub. Steam rose, hanging in the air a moment before drifting upward. She added a few more drops of scent to the water, and the oil floated toward him in little round drops, coating his chest and belly. His muscles soaked in it, reveled in the heat.
Soft lips half parted, she lathered the thick mat on his chest vigorously, her hands small and light against the hard flesh. She slid her hands down his belly, through crisp tangles of gold. Her soapy hands circled lower and lower. Though he sighed with pleasure, Leon didn’t think that was a good idea. Hot male need surged through his veins at her maddening touch. He asked himself if he was being seduced, or if she was…taking a stupid chance, if that was what was happening. He slid deeper into the tub, shielding his arousal slightly.
Slowly, gracefully as the fall of a feather, she moved to the end of the tub and motioned for a leg to come out. Ignoring his muffled protest, she leaned against the tub and began lathering it, sliding one finger along a deep scar hollow above the knee. His thigh shot jagged stabs and convulsed into shivering. He tried to relax his body, to go limp.
Brenna looked down, leaned back against her heels, shoving a lock of her black hair back over one shoulder. “Won’t you even talk to me?” she said in a small voice.
“There is nothing to talk about.”
“You mean, you have nothing to say to me.”
Leon knew he had missed something there. She would not meet his eyes. She seemed strangely tense: a coiled spring. He thought that she was angry; but why should she be? She was female. There was no accounting for her moods.
“That is not at all what I meant.”
“But it is!”
Leon frowned at her, wishing he knew what had happened. One moment she had been open and friendly; the next she exuded all the fire of a woman scorned. He rolled his eyes and sat up, sighing with exasperation.
“I will not play this game.”
“I will not let you turn this back on me.” There was an edge to her voice now. “You’re the one who—”
“This is not the time—”
“Not the time? You must be joking! There is nothing more important for us to do.”
For a moment things stayed as they were, balanced on a knife’s edge of Brenna’s temper and his nerves. Then he felt the anger unwind, slowly, into a quieter disturbance. A few more breaths. “Isn’t there?”
Without warning, she poured a dipper of herb-scented water over his head. He swallowed hard, half choking, gulped air and outrage, blinked water from his eyes, and snapped two pungent words.
“Oh—you are annoyed—you have a tongue like an ox whip!” His first impulse was to upend her and apply a hand to her derriere. Then she grinned at him with disarming candor. “Forgive me, but I get carried away sometimes!”
Leon snorted and blew water from his mouth. “How dare you—” It came as a half shriek, so disgraceful that it shattered all his anger. Laughter rose to fill the void: breathless, helpless laughter that loosened all his bones and left him half choking.
Her own laughter died with his, but a smile lingered; her eyes danced. “’Tis a ritual to drown the fleas!”
“Blast your impudence!” He surged to his feet and flung hair out of his eyes in a spray of water. A shower of droplets flew in a great arc to land on her gown, the sodden fabric outlining her bosom, leaving little to his imagination. He reached for the linen she was holding, and snatched it ’round himself, splashing the floor as he stepped out.
“Perhaps it was rash—”
“Perhaps!”
“’Twas an outrageous liberty. Most men would be foaming at the mouth by now.”
Leon didn’t care. For one thing, a ragged spike of agony lanced through his skull. There was a buzzing like a swarm of bees inside his head. His vision was blurring again. He stood there, totally overwhelmed by it all.
“Oh, mercy! You are not well!” she said, and put a quick hand under his elbow to steady him as he swayed. Leon shook her off, steadying with an effort.
“It’s nothing.”
He stood there, not daring to move. Now his entire body convulsed. His flesh burned. He felt chills even in the midst of all this heat. His legs were turning to water. He tottered.
“Dizzy,” he mumbled, his voice half drowned by a peal of thunder.
Brenna caught his arm, forcefully, this time. “Don’t tax yourself! You’re wasting energy arguing.”
This time he let her lay hands on him, allowing her to draw him across the room, into the alcove that held the bed, though he would not sit. “God’s breath, woman. ’Tis but a touch of wet fever, nothing more.”
“Stuff and nonsense. That lump on your head has addled your brains.”
He let out all his breath in one huff. “Don’t fuss, woman. I’ve suffered worse blows than that charging at quintains.”
“I trust you are correct, but hardly prudent. My good sense tells me that such a blow can be fatal if there is brain damage.”
“’Tis but a bump.”
“Even a bump can be fatal.” Her voice was low, steady, unyielding.
“Would you have me dead?”
“Don’t talk so! That lump on your head has addled your wits,” Brenna blurted, then winced, as if regretting her words as soon as she had spoken them. “I—I am sorry. It is not my place to…”
“You need not apologize. I’m not offended, just tired.”
The bed was in front of him. It looked vast and inviting. And perhaps it was imprudent and tempting his own ironclad resolve to test himself against that wide-eyed expression, the full lips, the midnight cloud of curls and swell of bosom so boldly designed to entice a man. What had the scriptures said about Eve tempting Adam with forbidden fruit? But then came a bewildering thought. If Adam had been in Eden with Brenna instead of Eve, he would not have minded being cast out of Paradise, not as long as she went with him!
“I can see that you are ill, very ill.” Her reply rang out and yet was muted by the howl of the wind. “You belong in bed.”
Why not? Why not? He rubbed his forehead, and gave up any notion he might have of resistance.
“I am not well, yes—” he managed finally. The last of his coherence was fleeing. “The heat…my head—”
“Sit,” she told him now. “Easy now, take it easy.”
She let him slide from her arm to sit on the bed. Cradling his head in her hands as if it were an egg, she lowered it onto the pillow. A grunt this time from him. He sprawled on his back, squinched his eyes shut, and he was only too glad to do so, weary as he was, his body racked by violent shivers. A dry towel was placed discreetly across his loins. A hand tangled in his hair, one finger stroking across his forehead repetitiously.
“Don’t try to get up. You’ll do yourself a lasting harm.”
“Go away! Leave me alone!” he raged at her.
She did; and then he was sorry for the silence.
The hall thrummed with sound, for everyone in the hold ate in the great chamber. Fire crackled in the hearth and they all were gathered, young and old, with the warm air smelling as the hall always smelled, of wood chips and resins and leathers and furs and good cooking.
Brenna spared no glances for those who sat at the narrow trestle tables. Her attention was on the dais at the far end. Facing them all, Sir Edmund sat at the center of the high table, his sister the widowed Lady Alice at his left, his other sister the indomitable Lady Agnita at his right, thin and upright. The gray-clad priest sat elbow-to-elbow with the Lady Alice, and the harper sat with them. But many seats at the great table stayed vacant, the hall of a hold long at war, its male heirs decimated.
“Your pardon for my lateness, Grandfather.”
Sated and drowsy from rich food and drink, Sir Edmund nodded over his cup. “We will forgive your lateness, Brenna, now that you grace our table with your beauty.”
Brenna walked around the dais to settle beside her great-aunt. Lady Agnita flicked her gaze up from her trencher. “It seems your fine knight has declined to break bread with us.”
“He rests. He has traveled hard.”
“In my day, a knight could travel far and little notice it.”
“Aye, but ’tis oft times said that things are not what they were.”
Brenna looked away from her aunt and flicked a glance around the hall. Despite the weather, guests had arrived from near and far for the week-long marriage celebrations that were to include combat contests, sword fights, horse shows and displays by artisans and master craftsmen from every guild.
Sir Edmund called for more jugs of beer and cordial, and waved expansively to the gathered company. A gust whipped at the tapestries and sent the lamps and candles flickering, casting illusory warmth on gray stone walls. For a moment tapestries and banners blazed out above the tables. High in the sooty rafters, smoke from the great hearth eddied about like a manmade mist.
“So,” Agnita said, turning to her. “Why do you look so forlorn, child?”
Brenna seized the moment to speak up. “Aunt, what is all this nonsense Elen tells me about Keith Kil Coed?”
Agnita shrugged. “Not much more than you already know.” She lowered her voice. “Edmund’s been set thoroughly on edge. He says that Keith will be arriving at Dinas Bran on the morrow. He hopes to convince you that he is a better proposition than Aubrey of Leeds.”
Brenna gasped. If Grandy saw some seriousness in the matter…the complications were threatening to overwhelm her. “I cannot believe anyone would expect me to abandon my betrothed at the altar!”
“I realize that, child,” Agnita replied, her expression serious. “But don’t despair. Edmund is a wily old rooster.”
“And Keith is overreaching his ambitions! Can’t we stop him?”
“’Tis too late to stop him. He has already left Craignant and begun his journey here. We do not know what route he travels, so we must do as best we can.” Was there a hint of warning in the soft, smooth tones?
Brenna had taken a wedge of cheese and begun to break it. It crumbled in her tensed fingers, falling unheeded to her trencher. “I pray that there is no trouble.”
“Speaking of which,” Sir Edmund said, leaning toward Brenna. “What is this I hear about the near mishap at the postern?”
Brenna shrugged. “Naught but a minor scuffle, Grandy. My knight did his duty well. The villains were caught.”
“You try me sorely, Brenna, with your recklessness!”
“It is raining again,” Lady Alice said unnecessarily: the sound of it on the horn windowpanes behind them was audible over the conversation in the hall.
“Maybe there’s a reason.” The priest bent and looked straight into Brenna’s eyes, so that her heart beat a little faster. “Mayhap—someone—is responsible for the storms?”
A few audible murmurs traveled around the tables. She heard people mutter—sorcery…
“That is impossible, and I believe you may have the wit to realize that—” Brenna started to protest, but frowned and thought on it, on the rain, the unrelenting winds. Surely no one could control the weather? She stared down at her trencher of thick wheaten bread. “Mortals have no governance over the weather.”
The priest frowned, hearing that. “A jest, if you please. Though this rain is most unseasonable and despite the Holy Father’s decree, the hedge wizards sell their charms in the market and practice sinful acts in private.”
“They need not be sorcerous.”
“That is blasphemous.”
This was a priest, Brenna told herself. A simple district priest. Why were folk so fearful of what they did not understand or what was different?
“Mayhap, Our Lord sends a second flood to show us His displeasure,” she murmured.
The priest nodded piously. “In truth, ’tis a very great possibility.”
Brenna gathered up a thick wedge of sheep-milk cheese and some bread. “Well, ’tis a pleasant conversation, but I fear it must end, or I shall never get to bed this night. I must be off. I will see you all on the morrow.”
“Where to in such haste?” asked Sir Edmund.
A lie tempted Brenna. She rejected it and looked her grandfather in the eye. “For whatever it’s worth, I’m off to prepare a potion and wish the rain on another region.”
Sir Edmund scowled. “Wish a littler harder then.”
Brenna tiptoed closer to the embroidered bed hangings.
“Aubrey!” she whispered under her breath. He made no sign. A prickly aura of awareness breathed over her skin, crisp and distinct as cold air.
Suddenly she was very much afraid…
She shivered and shook her head as thoughts uncalled-for ran like ice melt through her brain. Was he…was he unconscious? Was he…dead? Her doubt turned to sudden, over-mastering dread that urged her forward.
“Aubrey!” she said again, and finding herself close to him she bent and very lightly touched his shoulder. He moved then, and she almost gasped with relief.
“What—?” he said, lifting his head. He blinked, frowned, his nose a handspan from hers. His face was flushed and his lips a set line. Shadows slipped across his eyes as if things moved, troubled, in his memory.
“Drink this. ’Tis but a simple tisane to take away the headache and ease the fever.” She cradled his head in her arms, feeling inside her a warmth that bordered on love. He made a sound between a sigh and a grunt, and obediently swallowed sips of the mixture. Carefully she relaxed her forearm, laying his head upon the pillow. “Now listen to me, I don’t want you out of this bed except to use the chamber pot. Do you understand?”
His eyes closed. “Aye.”
“Good.” Raindrops spattered through the window slit, a sudden gust of storm. She went to close the shutters. “I’m going back downstairs. I have chores to do. You stay in bed, hear?”
“Aye.” Faintly.
She forced a smile to her lips. “See that you do.”
Darkness, and a scent of herbs, and a deep sense of peace pervaded the workshop. Brenna carefully set the lamp on a stand. Its feeble glow barely reached the walls of the herbarium. Neatly arranged on wooden shelves that ran up the wall, sat her herbs and powders and whatnots, each resting in small pottery jars. A large white dog rose from its place by the fireplace and ambled toward her, its tail swinging side to side.
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Emily French
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: Destiny Wore Many Disguisesbut Lady Brenna, pledged as bride in a match more alliance than love affair, saw true when Caer Llion rode up to her castle gates. This valiant knight was surely her mysterious betrothed, for he was her past–and Fate decreed he be her future…!An elfin girl upon the high battlements had once given him her favor–and eased his aching soul. Now Leon FitzWarren, famed as Caer Llion–the Ironheart, had returned to Wales, to those very battlements, and faced again the bewitching Brenna–the elfin sprite become woman–and holder of his heart…!