Enchanted

by Elizabeth Lowell

  “Lie still, dress,” Ariane hissed.

  Serena’s cloth will lie calmly around you. It responds only to dreams, and without hope there are no dreams.

  The echo of Cassandra’s words in Ariane’s mind nearly shattered what small measure of self-control remained to her. With a curse that would have shocked anyone who overheard it, Ariane grabbed her mantle and flung it around her shoulders, blocking out the sight of the uncanny dress.

  But not its caressing warmth. That Ariane needed as she needed to breathe fresh air.

  Moving as though pursued by demons, Ariane stuffed her harp into its traveling case and slung it over her shoulder. On the way out of the room, she grabbed a basket that held her embroidery. Without regard for the delicate stitches and fragile silk floss, she dumped the contents of the basket onto a table.

  Looking neither right nor left Ariane walked swiftly down the stairs and through the keep to the forebuilding. There the guard looked at her in surprise, but said nothing as he opened the door for her.

  The wind in the bailey was like a drink of cold, clear water. As heady as wine, as wild as Ariane’s thoughts, the wind was a welcome companion. She let it rush her across the cobblestones and to the sally port in the heavy, wide gate that guarded the keep’s security.

  There the man known as Harry the Lame gave Ariane an odd look and a smile. His eyes saw both the white lines of tension around her lips and the tightness of the fingers clutching the handle of the basket.

  “’Tis a cold afternoon to be collecting herbs, Lady Ariane.”

  “I like the chill. And some herbs are best collected in late afternoon.”

  “Aye, madam. So Lady Margaret tells me.”

  “Is she in the herb garden now?”

  “I believe so.”

  “Thank you.”

  Harry touched his fingers to his forehead in brief salute before he opened the sally port and allowed Ariane through.

  She walked out with strides as crisp as the wind. When the path forked, she took the branch that led to the herb gardens. Not until she was out of sight of the sally port did she turn sharply aside, taking a narrow lane that led to the banks of the River Blackthorne. She had no desire to confront the Glendruid green eyes of Blackthorne Keep’s lady.

  Ariane wasn’t the first person at the keep to be drawn to the river’s edge. A path wound irresistibly through bracken turned gold by the wild, chill kiss of autumn gone to winter. The rocky point where the path ended was home to a handful of birch and rowan trees whose toughness was equaled only by their elegance of line.

  In the most protected places, the trees still clung to a few of their leaves, but the rest lay underfoot like coins flung carelessly to the ground. More leaves floated on the small river and caught among the cobbles that lined the banks.

  Ariane walked through the golden landscape until she discovered a natural rocky bench that hadn’t been visible from the upper lane. The faint polish of the stone’s surface suggested that people had been coming to this place and staying to watch the water flow for as long as the River Blackthorne had run down to the sea.

  With a ragged sigh, Ariane settled onto the time-smoothed stone. The empty basket dropped from her fingers. For a while there was only the sound of the river swirling gracefully over stones and the wind combing through branches naked of leaves.

  Slowly Ariane removed her harp from its case and began to play. The sounds she made harmonized with wind and river and season, beautiful and yet bleak with the certainty of winter’s killing embrace.

  Gradually Ariane’s thoughts turned to the nightmare that did not end with the coming of the day. The nightmare that had no end she could see. The nightmare that she still struggled to understand…what had happened and why and how she could weave that terrible thread into the pattern of the rest of her life.

  Eyes closed, Ariane let the harp sing of unspeakable betrayal begetting more betrayal, of grief both savage and unrelenting short of the grave.

  And perhaps, not even there.

  “I thought it must be your fingers making the harp sing. But by Christ’s blue eyes, you play dire notes. Have you been pining for me, my little cabbage?”

  The music ended as though cut off by a sword.

  Geoffrey. Dear God, it can’t be!

  Ariane’s eyes snapped open. Her nightmare was indeed standing in front of her, his mantle thrown back to reveal the armor beneath.

  Geoffrey the Fair.

  Tall, brawny, good-looking to the point of beauty, beloved by girls and noblemen alike, and a deadly fighter who loved to battle three to his one.

  The sight of Geoffrey standing proud and powerful in his armor made Ariane’s stomach turn over. Nausea climbed her throat as icy sweat broke on her skin.

  “I thought myself rid of you,” she said starkly.

  Geoffrey smiled as though Ariane had called him her dearest heart. Eyes as blue and opaque as robins’ eggs looked slowly at her, taking in the sleek black of her hair, the matchless beauty of her eyes, and the deep curve of her lips.

  “By the saints, I long to bite that mouth again,” Geoffrey said. “I have dreamed of hearing you moan and bleed while I lick it up like a starving hound.”

  Ariane fought nausea’s tightening coils. She knew she must control her body enough to speak in her own defense, for no one else would.

  No matter what happened, this time she would scream and curse and claw blood from Geoffrey’s smiling face.

  “What do you want,” Ariane said.

  There was no question in her tone, simply a demand that Geoffrey state his business.

  “You.”

  “I do not want you.”

  Geoffrey laughed. “Still the coy maiden, I see.”

  “I am married.”

  “So?”

  Geoffrey’s shrug made the chain mail of his hauberk shift and gleam in the rich autumn sunlight.

  “Unlike you,” Ariane said, “I am honorable.”

  “Truly? Then why did you go to your husband deflowered?”

  “Because you raped me!”

  The smile Geoffrey gave her was the boyish one Ariane had once found charming. But no more. It revolted her that a man could look as innocent as one of God’s angels and yet have the soul and the sensibilities of a pig.

  “Rape? Nay,” Geoffrey said, rubbing his gauntleted hands together. “Rather it was I who was ravished by your beauty. I lay slack-witted from wine and awakened to find your hands in my breeches.”

  “You are lying!”

  “Nay, little cabbage. There is no need to pretend innocence. We are alone.”

  “Then why do you bother to lie?” Ariane asked scathingly.

  “Lie? I but tell the truth. I am the one who awoke to find my rod in your mouth and then in your hungry wet—”

  “Liar.”

  “Ah, I bring color to your little cheeks.”

  “You bring vomit to my throat.”

  Geoffrey laughed. “I shall stop it with my rod.”

  Abruptly Ariane realized that baiting her both amused and aroused Geoffrey.

  Nausea coiled again, more urgently. Knowing that Geoffrey took pleasure in her feeble struggles had been one of the worst parts of Ariane’s nightmare.

  “What? No more adorable protests?” Geoffrey asked. “Does that mean you long—”

  “—to see the last of you, aye. Most fervently. Are you afoot? If so, I will give you a horse if you promise to ride it from my sight.”

  There was no emotion in Ariane’s voice. Nor was there any in her face, save that which throttled rage streaked in red across her cheekbones.

  “My horse is waiting in yonder woodland while I investigate the sound of harp music I had thought never to hear again.”

  “Then be gone. I promise I won’t follow.”

  “I am wounded,” Geoffrey said, holding his hand over his heart. “No sooner do I heal from that foul sickness and come to claim you than you spurn me.”

  “I am already clai
med by Simon.”

  “That coward,” Geoffrey said, dismissing Simon with a curl of his lip.

  Ariane’s breath came in with disbelief at the contempt in Geoffrey’s voice and expression.

  “Simon is the bravest knight I have ever known,” she said, remembering her husband standing alone and outnumbered so that she could flee to safety.

  “Is he? Then why doesn’t he kill his faithless wife and throw her into the sea?”

  “I am not faithless!”

  “Truly? You came to him well-used by another man.”

  “Ill used.”

  “So well-used,” Geoffrey continued, ignoring Ariane, “that you refuse to give your body to your husband because you long for the body of your first lover.”

  “I long to watch vultures feast on your bones!”

  “Knowing that you are not a virgin, and that you refuse your husband, who will believe that you don’t put your heels behind your ears for a knight such as Geoffrey the Fair?” he asked, smiling like an angel.

  If Ariane had been pale before, Geoffrey’s words leached the last hint of color from her. With unnatural calm she put away her harp, slung the carrying bag over her shoulder and stood up. At every heartbeat she regretted leaving her dagger behind.

  ’Tis a pity the weaver of Learned cloth didn’t foresee the need to wear a weapon with this clever dress, Ariane thought bleakly. I would trade my harp for my girdle and its dagger sheath.

  Ariane stepped toward the path. Geoffrey remained unmoving, blocking her way.

  “You are standing across the path,” she said evenly.

  “Aye. Lift your skirts high, little girl. I have come a long way to see your thighs open to me again.”

  “You will have to kill me first.”

  Geoffrey started to laugh. Then his laughter faded as he saw the certainty in Ariane’s savage amethyst eyes.

  “Have you told your husband?” Geoffrey asked harshly.

  “That you raped me?”

  “That I lay between your thighs until I was too weak to rise again.”

  “If my drugged memory serves, you sweated like a pig to rise even once. Your manhood was more like beached seaweed than the ‘rod’ you speak of so proudly.”

  A flush stained Geoffrey’s unblemished skin. His smiling lips curled into something more like a snarl.

  “But then, what would one expect of a craven who first drugs and then rapes a virgin?” Ariane continued softly. “No man would have to stoop so low.”

  Geoffrey lifted his mailed fist.

  Ariane smiled like the witch she once had been.

  “You try my patience,” he said between his teeth.

  “You try my stomach.”

  “Do you ache to feel my fists again?”

  “I ache to see you in hell.”

  Spine straight, eyes unflinching, Ariane waited for Geoffrey to lose his temper as he always had when thwarted.

  But somewhere between Normandy and the Disputed Lands, Geoffrey had learned caution. He considered Ariane curiously, as though he had expected to find something quite different.

  And indeed he had. The weeping, ravaged girl of his memories had all but crawled beneath her saddle to avoid being noticed by Geoffrey during the trip from Normandy to England. She had spoken so rarely that the knights had taken to placing wagers on when she would say a word.

  “What a pity that you have recovered your wits,” Geoffrey said. “They were always the least appealing part of you.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Is your father here?” Geoffrey demanded. “Is that why you’re so brave?”

  Ariane blinked, puzzled by the direction of the conversation. Geoffrey had always been better informed about the baron’s movements than Ariane had.

  “Why do you ask me?” she said.

  “Just answer me,” Geoffrey said, “or I will go to Blackthorne Keep and tell your cowardly husband that you came to me today and begged me to give you the thorough plowing that he cannot!”

  “Simon won’t—”

  “Believe me?” Geoffrey interrupted mockingly. “You tried that on your father, the man who knew you best. Did he believe you?”

  Ariane closed her eyes and swayed as though she had been struck. Geoffrey’s voice was resonant with sincerity and concern. It made others believe that he had those emotions.

  But he used emotions rather than having them.

  “Nay,” Geoffrey continued smoothly. “Your father believed me, for I was but the poor victim of your wanton lechery. The bottle with the hellish love potion, the very witch brew you poured into my wine, was still tangled in your bloody sheets. It was all there for your father and the priest to see. And they did see it, didn’t they?”

  Then Geoffrey laughed with the malice he revealed only to whores and serfs.

  Ariane wanted to put her hands over her ears, but would not give Geoffrey the satisfaction. Both of them knew all too well who had been believed and who had been betrayed.

  Would you believe my innocence, Simon? You, who hate witches? You, who speak so savagely of being in thrall to any woman?

  Especially a witch.

  And even if you did believe me, what then? Mortal combat with Geoffrey to determine who is truthful and who is not?

  The thought made another cold sweat break over Ariane’s body. Once she would have relished the chance to be vindicated by seeing Geoffrey die. But she no longer believed that truth was a useful shield against lies, particularly lies spoken by a knight such as Geoffrey the Fair. He had killed too many men, bandits and knights alike.

  He enjoyed the sight of blood spilling over his sword. He yearned for it with an eagerness that was chilling.

  No matter how quick Simon was, no matter how skilled, he was shorter and at least two stone lighter than Geoffrey. More telling than mere size, Simon lacked Geoffrey’s bloodlust.

  “Rumor says that Baron Deguerre is in England,” Ariane said tonelessly.

  “Then he comes to Blackthorne Keep.”

  “No word has come directly to me.”

  “Why should it? You are not beloved by your father.”

  Ariane made no argument with the truth. If her father had ever loved her, he no longer did. The last words he had spoken to her had made that very clear.

  Whore. If I dared kill you, I would.

  “’Tis certain he hasn’t come all this way to see the wanton daughter who dishonored him,” Geoffrey said as though following Ariane’s thoughts.

  “Perhaps he seeks an alliance with the English king instead of with the king of the Scots.”

  “More likely your father scents weakness somewhere,” Geoffrey said.

  A slow smile crossed Geoffrey’s lips. The smile was as cruel as Ariane’s memories, but Geoffrey kept whatever he was thinking to himself.

  Sensing that she was no longer the center of his attention, Ariane began edging beyond Geoffrey’s reach.

  “Of course,” Geoffrey said, focusing on Ariane once more. “You.”

  “You think he finally believes me?” Ariane asked, startled.

  “He believes the truth, which is that in the grip of an evil witch’s potion, I plowed you as thoroughly as any oxen ever plowed a field.”

  Biting the inside of her mouth against the rage that threatened to overrun her control, Ariane eased farther from Geoffrey’s reach.

  “You are the weakness he scents,” Geoffrey said. “You are the Norman fox set among the Saxon chickens.”

  “You are mad.”

  “No, simply more clever than other men,” Geoffrey said casually. “The baron knows you came deflowered to your marriage, yet no hue and cry has gone up.”

  Geoffrey pulled his lower lip between his thumb and forefinger. Then he laughed as cruelly as he had smiled.

  “The Glendruid Wolf and his loyal pup must be weaker than they seem,” Geoffrey said in a low voice. “Trust that shrewd old carrion eater to know it and hurry in to pick clean the bones.”

  Ariane looked a
t the ground, afraid that Geoffrey would see the truth confirmed in her eyes. The Glendruid Wolf was indeed worried about his hold upon the Disputed Lands, or he would not have given his loyal brother over to a marriage that neither had sought.

  You deserve a better wife than this cold Norman heiress.

  But Simon’s response to Dominic had been swift and painfully pragmatic.

  Blackthorne deserves better than war. And so do you. Surely marriage can be no worse than the sultan’s hell you endured to ransom me.

  Too late Ariane caught the movement of Geoffrey’s hand from the corner of her downcast eyes. Before she could jerk away, she was yanked so hard against Geoffrey’s hauberk that the breath was driven from her body.

  The smell of stale wine and something worse washed over Ariane, making her swallow roughly. At close range, she could see that drink—and whatever passed for Geoffrey’s soul—was slowly eroding the angelic purity of his face. The skin was becoming coarse. Burst blood vessels had left red traceries on his nose. His breath was as vile as his deeds.

  “England hasn’t been kind to you,” Ariane said through her teeth. “Go back to Normandy, where people still believe your lies.”

  “I have my heart set on a noble widow.”

  “Then leave me and get to courting.”

  Geoffrey smiled. “The courting is done. ’Tis the widowing that remains. It won’t take long. Then Carlysle will be mine, and you with it. It shall be as your father meant it to be.”

  “If you challenge Simon—and survive—the Glendruid Wolf will kill you.”

  “I shall survive, but it will be Simon who challenges me. No blood feud can come from that!”

  “Go back to Normandy,” Ariane said. “Simon won’t challenge you. The Glendruid Wolf won’t allow it.”

  “I think not, little cabbage. There will be no choice. You will see to it.”

  “I? Never!”

  “Truly? Have I finally heard the last of your whining about rape?”

  Smiling, Geoffrey shook off one gauntlet, plunged his hand inside Ariane’s mantle and jammed his fingers between her thighs. The smile on his lips instantly became a snarl of surprise and outrage. He yanked back his hand and released Ariane so swiftly that she staggered.

  “Jesus and Mary!” Geoffrey rubbed his fingers harshly over the chain mail of his hauberk. “Since when have you taken to wearing hair shirt and nettles? You misbegotten slut, you have blistered my fingers with your tricks!”