A journey that ended at the point of a knife.
The blade was plainer than hers but made up for its lack of beauty with a keen sharpness. One nick would mortally wound her.
“State your business or prepare to meet your Maker, lad,” the guard said by way of greeting.
“Lord Spur of Nettlewood sent me with a message for Lord Talon.” She dug the token out from under her tunic. “See? His signet ring.”
The emblazoned image of a devil on the stone glittered in the sun.
“Come with me, lad.”
The sentry scooped her out of the reed boat and herded her over the drawbridge and into the walled settlement. Inside the keep’s Great Hall, the taciturn guard said, “Wait here, lad,” and departed.
In the presence of the waiting sentry, Lord Talon gave her an audience almost immediately.
The overlord of Ironguard came right to the point. “The guard says you have my brother’s ring. Show it to me.”
Once again, she popped the emblazoned stone out from its hiding place.
So like his brother, he grunted. “What is my brother’s message, demoiselle?”
“You knew?”
“That you are female?”
“Aye.”
“’Tis readily apparent, I assure you.” After sending her hood to her shoulders, revealing her loose hair, the overlord wiggled his brows outrageously. Then smiled a carefree smile, a warm and charming smile that reached his merry and changeably hued eyes, a smile not at all similar to his brother’s, which rarely appeared and, when it did, could hardly be construed as charming. This man, on the other hand, seemed comfortable with a smile on his face and touched a note of familiarity with her straightaway.
His light kiss, bestowed on her cheek, helped that familiarity along.
Ordinarily a roguishly attractive warrior of immense size would have sent her fleeing in the opposite direction. But after coupling with a devil, she no longer feared ordinary men.
She spoke right up. “Nettlewood is under attack. Your brother is outnumbered as the majority of his troops are here helping you with planting season.”
His smile vanished, and he became just at serious and somber as his brother. “I see. Very well. We leave at once. Guard!” he called to the sentinel posted at the portal. “Have the herald alert the troops. We march within the hour.”
He turned back to her and bowed, a courtier’s knightly courtesy. “That my brother entrusted you with the message and the signet ring means a great deal. During his recent stay, he never mentioned having a confidante…”
“We only recently became acquainted. And I am his whore, not his confidante.”
“Whore. Confidante. Same difference. The question is—can you sit a steed on your own?”
“Peasants do not own mounts, my lord, so I had no occasion to learn.”
“You will ride back with me, then.” He sent her another smile—this one as bedazzling as a cathedral’s glass window letting in the light—and presented his arm. “Come along, my dear. And have no fear. I will mount you.”
“Mount me? I beg your pardon?”
“Nay, I beg yours. A slip of the tongue only. I meant I will mount you before me on the saddle, naturally. Now come this way.”
Lord Talon lifted aside a large tapestry that hung from the ceiling against a rear wall. Upon doing so, he revealed a hidden portal of some sort.
He bowed. “After you.”
She hung back. “What is this?”
“A secret passageway. One of the many here at Ironguard. You were seen entering the keep, but I promise you, no one will see you leave.”
“Why is that of any import?”
“Simply put—alarming my people of trouble ahead does them no good. They are already fearful of what each day might bring.”
“But, my lord, peasants are not children to be sheltered from bad news.”
He shrugged. “Best they not know about the siege at Nettlewood. Plus, this route is faster than the one you took here.”
Lord Talon was correct on both scores—no one saw her leave, and her return on steed was far quicker. They arrived at Nettlewood long before nightfall. And happy to say, a burned edifice did not stand crumbled before them. Somehow Lord Devil and his diminished troops had managed to hold off the sortie.
The soldiers marched ahead whilst she and Lord Talon took up the rear flank, also on foot. ’Twas too dangerous for their steeds now; those they left with a guard in the reserve outside the main gate.
Save for a small portion where they had dismounted, the entire forest was ablaze. Whichever direction she looked, there was smoke. Covering her face, she trod on.
When a broadsword-wielding mercenary jumped out from behind a smoking knot of thorny vines, she reacted. No thought, without compunction, she pulled the borrowed dagger out from her sleeve and cut the ambusher’s throat.
“Bloody well played!” Lord Talon declared.
“’Twas either him or you, my lord.”
“I commend your choice,” he said with a wink.
And then they had arrived.
Her master greeted them warmly. “Talon! Your arrival is not a moment too soon.” To his troops, he said, “Men, take up your positions on the battlement.” To her he said, “I knew you could do it! You may just have saved us all.”
Under his praise, she glowed, her face warming with pleasure.
As the soldiers pushed on, Lord Spur introduced her formally to his brother. Though, he need not have done so, considering her lowly position in his life.
“Talon, this comely lad is Lambkin. Henceforth, I shall officially call her so.”
“And what was she called before,” inquired Lord Talon.
“Completely irrelevant,” Lord Spur replied.
“With that mouthful of a name, I can hardly blame you for calling her Lambkin.”
A “christening”, she mused, chortling at Lord Talon’s wit. To honor the occasion, for ’twas not every day a woman received a new name, she bobbed a curtsy.
“Your consort…er…Lambkin saved my fool neck. She killed a mercenary as the sod was about to end me.”
“My eternal gratitude,” said her owner and kissed her bloodstained hand. “Now off you go to my solar.”
“I would stay here and defend this keep. I can throw a lance.”
“Indeed. The question is—can you hit the target?”
She smiled wanly. “I forgot that part.”
“I will vouchsafe her aim, brother,” Lord Talon said and kissed her lips, a hot and seeking plunder.
She thought—make that, hoped—the kiss would enrage her master. But nay. He beamed. “You two—hold the mutual admiration for later,” he said. “We have a siege to fight now.”
“Just so,” Talon replied.
Off the brothers went, arms slung around each other, leaving her to trail behind, her thoughts on that hot kiss that stung her mouth still.
Chapter Nineteen
Five days had passed since the initial attack on his keep. After finishing the inspection of his earldom, Spur wiped a filthy hand over his weary face and blew out a gusty breath of relief.
Despite the fierce battling, Nettlewood remained intact—for the most part. The wooden gate would need to be repaired, but the stone walls had held firm. True, the thorns surrounding the barricades were all but gone, the vines torched repeatedly until there was naught left of them save ashes, but the briars would grow back thicker and stronger than before. What mattered was, thanks to his brother’s timely arrival, they had put the mercenaries down and the sortie against his keep was over, with minimal loss of life amongst his men-at-arms and no casualties at all amongst his populace.
Spur raised a muscled arm and sniffed the air. “Lord, but I stink.”
Talon, walking along beside him, fell back on his heels and waved a gauntlet before his nose. “Phew. An understatement if ever I did hear one. With body aroma as pungent as that, I am surprised no flies follow you.”
“You are not as fragrant as a rose yourself, brother.”
Talon thumbed his handsome jaw. “We best bathe in that hot pool of yours before celebrating with Lambkin, eh? Better yet, bring that courageous demoiselle with you and we shall begin the festivities early.”
The suggestion took Spur aback. Not the context of the statement—after a military victory, they always reveled together with a woman or two—but the assumption that the celebration would include his whore. True, he had told Lambkin he would share her with his brother, but that was mostly talk, to gauge her reaction.
After witnessing the searing kiss between those two, Spur castigated himself. Never should he have brought up the whole sharing issue. He deeply regretted now that he had made mention of sharing at all, as the bad idea might just come back to bite him on the posterior.
Disappointed, Spur examined his boots. “Lambkin? You mean to include her in our victory celebration?”
“I have thought of little else. I swear, I fought harder during the siege knowing your consort awaited us at the end. Your taste in females has certainly improved. Lambkin is not only comely, but lionhearted as well.”
Was that envy in his Talon’s voice? Did his brother actually covet Spur’s whore?
’Twas. After all these years of competing with one another, with Spur always getting the short end of the stick, Talon wanted something Spur possessed. Talon actually envied him.
A first. Jealousy of any sort was not his brother’s way. There was never any need. What his brother desired, his brother took. As to women—no need for him to take there. Females threw themselves at Talon’s feet.
“Where did you meet her?” his charming elder brother asked.
“Wandering around Lord Harold’s manor. Initially I mistook her for a traitor to the crown, the murderess whore of the mercenary who torched the settlement.”
Talon looked at him askance. “That woman is honorable to the bone. How could you have thought something like that of her?”
“Certain circumstances led me to believe she had some involvement. Only later, I learned of my mistake.”
“That demoiselle is true. Such is her honor, I was surprised to learn she whored for you.”
“Well, she does,” Spur replied, his back going up at his brother’s barely cloaked accusation. “And is a good one too.” Regret was out of place. He had done naught wrong! Lambkin had set the terms of their agreement herself. He had merely agreed.
But why?
Why had she set the terms that she had? Why had she given her body to him in exchange for so little?
Her sister. She had been driven to do what she had done because of her sister.
Still, she might have explained. To this day, he did not quite grasp why she had feared for her sister’s well-being…
And if she had explained back then, would he have listened, understood?
Nay. He had been looking for someone to retaliate against that day, and he only had Lambkin.
Too late now to undo the damage he had done. She was a whore. He had made her so. And as it turned out, she was a most obliging one. Where was the reason for guilt? She’d had a choice and the means to leave. ’Twas her own decision to stay. He would not have detained her had she elected to go. Her hot nature kept her with him. She liked what he did to her. And she would like what Talon did to her too.
Spur frowned. But would he?
Territoriality when it came to land was rooted in his gut, taught to him at his father’s knee and reinforced through each kill done by his sword. But territoriality toward females was new to him. He had never kept one before, not even briefly. His possessiveness of Lambkin took him aback. But, he supposed, ’twas only natural to want to keep that which had belonged to him first.
But from his own brother?
Spur shook his head in exasperation. This was unlike him. He would give Talon his finest steed, his best suit of armor. He would divide up his holdings with him, all his wealth as well. Why this sudden reluctance of his to share a cunt?
Talon stopped walking. “You seem hesitant about us celebrating together. Have you feelings for Lambkin?”
“Aye. Feelings aplenty, all of them lustful. The wench can do things with her mouth you would not believe. And her shapely arse is the stuff of nocturnal dreams.”
“Ejaculate into your tick at night for her, do you?”
“You would know more about that than would I.”
“’Tis true. During periods of abstinence, I have been known to spurt into the furs for want of a woman.” Talon grabbed his stones and roared with laughter. “Right now, I have a hankering for some merrymaking, and one comely face monopolizes all my visions.”
Spur swallowed hard. “What is mine is yours, brother.”
“Then we agree—we share her, same as we have always done.”
But what if Lambkin enjoyed Talon more than she enjoyed him?
Spur dismissed the notion. What of it if she did?
This was only slaking of lust. ’Twas not as though he loved her. ’Twas not as though he would ever make her his wife. Mirti was a hot-blooded peasant wench good for a rough tumble, and that was all she was to him.
Everything decided, Spur playfully punched his brother’s muscled arm. “Naturally we share her. I would have it no other way.”
*
Since the mercenary attack on the stronghold, Mitri had not lain in the solar’s sumptuous bed, her limbs entwined with those of her master. Sporadic fighting had provided little enough opportunity to sleep, never mind couple. And now that the mercenary attack had been suppressed, she had returned to the small storage chamber assigned to her when the overlord had considered her his prisoner, not his whore. Though the accommodations were nowhere as luxurious as the overlord’s suite, she would make do.
What choice did she have but to make do?
She might be a worthless nobody, but she had pride. And her pride prevented her from going anywhere she had not been invited. Assuming her master would welcome her return to his private solar would have been presumptuous, a transgression he had already chided her on once already. That was one mistake she would not repeat.
She understood his thoughts. Whores, like slaves, must not get beyond themselves. The overlord was a stickler for such details. A person’s station in life mattered very much to him. She could easily forget the difference between them, but he never would. That difference prevented him from holding her in high esteem, from valuing and respecting her—despite his glowing words to the contrary.
As there was naught she could do about his narrow-mindedness, she just got on with it. Life marched ahead, and she marched with it. Looking beyond today was the only way to survive.
At a dented metal basin, she bathed away the soot and ash of her participation in the battle and then gowned herself in another gift from her master—a gold bliaut that laced up the front. Afterward she took a long nap in her narrow cot, atop the lumpy straw mattress. Despite the harrowing warfare of the days prior, she awakened so refreshed she immediately began to straighten the spartan chamber. Though she was only a mere peasant and a common whore, neatness was a quality she prized.
When the portal opened without benefit of a knock—slaves and whores must expect such intrusions upon their privacy—and then slammed just as abruptly shut, Mitri looked up from the chore.
Her master came to stand before her.
And it struck her all over again how handsome and strong and virile he was, and how much she longed to be with him again, to stay with him for as long as he would have her.
Virgin Mary, but she was weak!
“I thought to find you where last I left you,” he said. “I went to my solar first. Upon finding the bed empty, I came immediately here.”
She let that go without comment. “Are you fit?”
“Like my keep, I am no worse for the fight we waged.” He cupped her jaw. “You are a sight for sore eyes.”
The overlord’s tone, though robust, contained something
else, something raw and tight and strained. Carnal want, perchance?
Her want mimicked his. When her master dropped his hand from her face, she felt the loss in her loins.
Virgin Mary! Weak. And lusty. She answered to both.
“Come join us in the hot pool,” he said.
Her brows arched to the rafters. “Us?”
“Me, naturally. And Talon.”
“I have bathed already,” she replied and quickly returned to her straightening—lest he read longing in her expression.
A frolic in the communal baths sounded like the very thing she needed. But self-preservation prevented her from accepting the invitation. Nudity before two extremely handsome warriors like the royal brothers would put her at a distinct disadvantage. At best, she was plain. At worst, she was homely. Their male beauty would only show up her brown-wren ordinariness. Why voluntarily remind her master that she was a simple peasant, not the sort of highborn lady he would eventually wed?
Damn him anyway.
She was dimwitted. His offer was about more than some innocent play in the water. He had decided to share her with Lord Talon, a decision that showed her once again that he could not possibly love her, would never love her. A man in love does not share the object of his affections with another man, not even a brother.
“Soak then,” he offered at her refusal. “You fought hard. The healing properties of the hot waters will do you good. Then we celebrate.”
Although she already suspected the manner that celebration would take, still, she needed to hear him speak the words that would break her heart. “What form will this celebration take?”
A wickedly attractive gleam came into his silvery eyes, and her loins moistened at the sight.
Weak. Lusty. And wholly susceptible to the devil’s unquestionable allure. Verily she found both brothers appealing. Though she only loved one.
The Devil of Nettlewood (The Anarchy Tales) Page 17