“But you do not understand, my lord,” she said, her voice quivering. “It is impossible for me to wed.”
“Why?”
Her face, even in the dark, flamed a deep, dull red. She knew she must tell him but it was a labor of the greatest strain to bring forth the words.
“Because I have been living in a convent since I was eleven years of age,” she replied. “I am meant for the cloister.”
“Those plans have now changed.”
“But they cannot!” she snapped, banking swiftly when she saw the look on his face. She had a healthy fear of this knight whom she did not know. “Please believe me, my lord, it is nothing against marriage in general. I have never been meant for any marriage.”
Stephen inhaled deeply, wearily, and rested his enormous hands on his slender hips. “I understand your commitment to the cloister,” he moved towards her slowly. “I, too, was committed to a monastic order but that is no longer the case. Sometimes the needs of country and king overshadow even those of the Church. Surely you understand that.”
She moved away from him as he came closer, the tartan falling away from her head. She had cascades of luscious dark hair, slightly curly, giving her an ethereal loveliness in the weak light. For as much turmoil going on inside of him, even Stephen noticed it. With her pale blue eyes, nearly black hair and finely sculpted features, she was an exquisite creature.
“I suspect my reasons for committing myself to the cloister are different from yours,” she inched away from him as he drew close. “Perhaps you recanted your vows, but I will not recant mine. My reasons are firm enough that I cannot ever marry.”
“Have you actually taken your vows yet?”
She almost lied to him but her truthful nature had her shaking her head before she could think. “Nay,” she murmured. “Not yet. I am due to take them after the New Year.”
“How old are you?”
“I have seen twenty-two years.”
He lifted a dark eyebrow and halted his advance; he could see that she was moving away from him. “If you have been in the cloister eleven years, why have you not taken your vows before now? If you were serious about becoming a nun, then you should have taken those years ago.”
She lowered her gaze with uncertainty. “I… that is, the sisters would not let me. Not yet. They said that I still had penitence to do.”
“Penitence for what?”
Her eyes flew to him and her breathing began to grow faster and faster. She swallowed, hard, endeavoring to retain her courage to say what she must. But she found she couldn’t look him in the eye as she spoke, praying he would understand her words and rush to the king to demand the betrothal be broken. In her deepest humiliation was her only hope that he, too, would be humiliated enough to fight it. Spit it out, foolish lass!
“When I was eleven years old, my father took me and one of my brothers on a trip to Carlisle,” she spoke barely above a whisper as she sank onto a stool against the wall. “My father went into Carlisle quite a bit on business but it was the first time I had ever gone with him. I remember that my brother and I were so very excited to go to the big city; it was an enormous place with soldiers and people. My father took us to a street with vendors who had goods from all over the world. While my father was attending to business, somehow I wandered away. I remember smelling something sweet and delicious, and I went in search of it. The next thing I realized, someone grabbed me and took me to a grove of trees that was just beyond the border of the street. I tried to scream and to fight, but he was simply too strong. I was only eleven years old, mind you, and no match for the man. He had been one of the many English soldiers I had seen throughout the city. When he finally took me to a place where no one could hear my cries for help, he.…”
She suddenly trailed off, unable to continue. Stephen, however, was riveted to her dark head, suspecting with some certainty what she was about to tell him. There was a table in the room and he lowered his big body onto the corner of the table, his eyes fixed on her with sharp intensity.
“Go on.”
She was staring at her feet. Her head started wagging back and forth. “Please….”
“Tell me the rest.”
She kept her head lowered for the longest time. One big tear fell to the dusty floor, followed by a second. “He… he compromised me.”
“He raped you?”
She nodded, once. “My family committed me to the cloister because I was not a suitable marriage prospect being that I was no longer a virgin. I have been there ever since.”
“Yet you are here at Berwick with your family during the event of a siege. Why is that?”
She cleared her throat softly as she struggled for composure. “My mother needed me,” she said softly. “She has not been well for some time and my father called me home almost a year ago. With the loss of her sons, the madness has only gotten worse.”
“After eleven years away, he calls you home?”
“He did.”
“Do you not have a sister that could have attended to her also?”
“Maggie is already married and living in York. Her husband would not let her come.”
Stephen drew in a slow, steady breath, his eyes still riveted to her lowered head. The story, such as it was, had grown by leaps and bounds. He would not be made a fool of.
“You will forgive me if I do not believe you,” he said quietly.
Her head snapped up, her pale blue eyes wide with shock and outrage. “You do not…?” she could hardly grasp what he had just said. “You do not believe me?”
“I do not.”
She was beside herself. “Must I prove to you that my mother is not well? How would you expect me to do that?”
“I did not mean the story about your mother, although it does ring strange. I mean the story about the English soldier raping you at eleven years of age.”
Her mouth flew open with outrage. “Do you think I tell you this horrific story simply to gain your sympathies?”
He was unemotional. “Women will say or do most anything to gain their way. No matter what you tell me, you and I shall be married as soon as the priest arrives.”
Joselyn was beyond shocked; it never occurred to her that the man would not believe her. Her shock turned to rage such as she had never known and the fire of the Scots, so inherent to her soul, bubbled up like a great raging beast.
“Perhaps shallow English wenches tell stories that are meant to bleed the heart of sympathy, but I do not lie and I do not weave elaborate fabrications,” she seethed. “What I told you was the truth. I should have expected no sympathy from a dishonorable English hound that would hang a young boy and call it justice.”
Stephen merely lifted an eyebrow. “I did not hang a young boy. And he would not have been hanged had your father possessed any honor and stuck to his bargain.”
“He tried to keep his promise but his men would not listen,” she fired back passionately. “Do you not understand this? He wanted to honor the deal struck with the English, to surrender the city on the appointed date, but his men refused to do his bidding. So my father watched as you hanged my little brother, a sweet young lad who had never caused harm to anyone. He watched, weeping, as Thomas was hanged beyond the city walls. He cried his name as my brother breathed his last. Don’t you dare accuse my father of a lack of honor; you are hardly worthy to speak the man’s name much less judge him.”
Stephen still sat perched on the edge of the table, his arms crossed as she fired her speech at him with all the subtlety of an exploding trebuchet. He was, in fact, mildly impressed with her courage. And the more he watched her, the more intrigued he was with her unearthly beauty and inherent strength.
“Then your father is a poor commander,” his manner was cool. “Had he been a capable leader, his men would have done his bidding without question. It simply proves my point that the Scots are savages without honor, your father included. He is a weakling to have allowed his son to be hanged because he was unable t
o control his men.”
She stared at him, so much rage and disbelief in her mind that she could no longer verbalize it. Unable to stomach the sight of him any longer, she turned away from him.
“You contemptible bastard,” she hissed.
Stephen didn’t take offense one way or the other; he had no regard for what she thought of him. She was intelligent and well spoken, and she was undeniably beautiful. But the fact of the matter was that she was a stranger, and an enemy at that, now destined to be his wife. He was more displeased with the prospect than he had been when he had first entered the room.
There was no more point in conversation; they had said all that needed saying and anything more might see them start a physical battle. There was bitterness between them and a good deal of animosity, and with nothing more to do but wait, Stephen remained perched on the end of the table, watching the weak fire in the hearth and wondering what his future held for him with an enemy wife. He suspected he was going to have to be on his guard every hour of every day so she would not slit his throat while he slept. He suspected separate bowers would be in order, his with a big fat lock.
The night dragged on as the acrimonious mood settled. By his estimate, Stephen had been staring into the flames for almost an hour when there was a soft knock at the door. Rising, he went to the panel and unbolted it. De Lara was on the other side.
“The priest has arrived,” he told him. “Are you ready?”
Stephen didn’t say a word; he moved to grab his betrothed from her seat against the wall only to realize that she had fallen asleep sitting up. He paused, his hand on her arm, refraining from yanking her awake. For some reason, he didn’t feel like being overly cruel to the woman in spite of the harsh words between them; he watched her as she slept, the gentle curve of her face and the way her perfect little nose twitched now and again. It was rather fascinating. The longer he watched her, the more entranced he became.
“Stephen,” de Lara had come in to the room and was standing behind him. “Hurry up! There is no time to waste.”
Snapping out of his trance, Stephen grasped her arm and shook it gently. “My lady?” he said quietly. “’Tis time to awaken. We have an appointment to make.”
Startled, Joselyn awoke to two strange knights gazing down at her. Half asleep and forgetting where she was, she suddenly threw her fists up and caught Stephen in the mouth. His head snapped back but he maintained his grip on her as she screamed and fought. Tate came up beside him and, between the two of them, managed to get her on her feet. But she was still fighting.
“Lady Joselyn,” Stephen wiped the trickle of blood from his split lip, understanding she was not fully awake yet. “Calm yourself. You are not in danger and you will not come to harm. You are at Berwick Castle, remember?”
Hair askew, Joselyn blinked unsteadily at the two enormous knights as they tried to lead her out of the solar. She brushed the hair from her face as her wits returned, the familiar bailey of Berwick coming into view.
The moon had risen fully in the time that she and Stephen had been sequestered in the solar, giving the landscape an eerie white glow. Being that it was July, she could smell the night blossoms upon the air, mingling with the smoke and stench of death. It was an odd smell. Taking a couple of deep breaths to clear her sleepy mind, she removed herself indelicately from Stephen and Tate’s grasp.
“I am quite capable of walking unassisted,” she informed them.
They allowed her to yank herself free. Neither man said a word as they continued to escort her across the bailey and into the great hall. It was still a crowded place, filled with English knights and lords, and somewhere near the hearth her family still hovered. The moment she entered the hall with a massive English knight on either side, however, her mother began to wail.
It was a chaotic sound that the husband tried to quiet and Edward tried to ignore. The priest was a fat man in dirty robes that smelled strongly of alcohol. The mother’s wailing grew louder as Stephen took Joselyn by the elbow and guided her in the direction of the priest. Edward barked at the priest to begin the wedding mass and Stephen firmly pushed Joselyn to her knees. He knelt beside her, seemingly unaffected by the entire thing. There was strength and dignity to his posture while Joselyn seemed dazed.
Lady Seton’s wailing grew to titanic proportions and she began lamenting her daughter’s future loudly, almost drowning out the droning of the priest. Edward kept shooting the woman baleful looks, hoping Sir Alexander would take the hint and shove a fist into the woman’s mouth to shut her up. But Seton was actually paying attention to the wedding ceremony, murmuring prayers in response to the priest’s intonations. Infuriated with a new round of cries from Lady Seton, Edward picked up the nearest cup and threw it at her.
The woman screamed as it sailed past her head and into the wall behind her. Jolted, Joselyn almost bolted to her feet but Stephen held her firm as the priest made the sign of the cross in holy oil on their foreheads. But the woman’s screaming continued and the priest was forced to speak louder and louder until he was almost shouting to be heard above the wailing. Edward would have thrown more cups had he been able to find them, cursing and muttering even as the priest prayed. Through the chaos, de Lara was the only one, other than Stephen, who kept his composure. Truth be told, however, had he possessed any less control, Tate would have been laughing his head off.
The priest finished with the final blessing and Stephen abruptly pulled Joselyn to her feet. Before she could draw another breath, he grabbed her upper arms and kissed her chastely on the cheek. As she opened her mouth to speak, her mother suddenly broke free and, with a piercing scream, hurled herself into the massively blazing fire.
Hysteria erupted as Joselyn and the other Seton woman, a grandmother, screamed in horror. Without hesitation, Stephen grabbed his new wife and swept her swiftly from the hall. She was hysterical, beating on him and crying for her mother. But Stephen was resolute that she be removed from the bedlam. There was nothing either of them could do for the crazed mother and he had little doubt that it would have done Joselyn more harm than good to watch her mother burn to death.
As they crossed the bailey, they could hear the screams and shouts coming from the hall. Stephen was focused on the keep in front of him, thinking of the night ahead and the duty he must perform. It would undoubtedly be made more difficult by the events of the night. But his instincts to remove her from the hall had been correct; what they did not see was Edward preventing Seton from pulling his wife from the blaze as de Lara took his broadsword and gored the burning woman through the chest to end her agony.
Death was almost instantaneous and only then did de Lara pull the body from the hearth and extinguish it. The woman was barely recognizable. As Seton threw himself across his wife’s scorched corpse, de Lara and Edward fell away to regroup, watching the Seton clan deal with their catastrophic loss. It had been a harrowing end to a harrowing day. They hoped, just between the two of them, that Stephen fared better.
*
Stephen had taken Joselyn into the keep, kicking down doors until he came to a room on the third level that had a small bed in it. It was a dirty room with an odd smell, but it didn’t matter. It was private for his needs. He entered the room, slamming the door and bolting it.
He put Joselyn on her feet, watching as she tried to push past him and open the door. He grasped her around the waist and easily pulled her away from the panel. She struggled against him, trying to smack his hands away. He directed her over towards the bed but she was struggling so much that he ended up tripping over his own feet just so he would not step on her. Together, they tumbled onto the stiff, dirty pile of straw that constituted the crude mattress.
Joselyn was buried underneath him, sobbing her heart out. Stephen shifted so he would not smash her but he didn’t get up entirely; she was still quite volatile.
“Relax, lady,” he murmured with his mouth against the back of her head.
She twisted and heaved underneath him. �
�Let me go,” she wept. “I must see to my mother.”
Stephen thought on his last vision of Joselyn’s mother as they had left the hall. The woman had been completely engulfed in flames and he knew there was no point to try and save her. Being a healer, and a very good one at that, he should have gone back into the hall to see if something could be done. But he also knew that, in his experience, serious burns were almost always fatal. And the woman had been consumed by the blaze, leaving little doubt that if she was not dead already, she very soon would be. He sighed faintly.
“There is no need,” he rumbled softly. “If she is not yet with God, she very shortly will be.”
Joselyn’s weeping came to an abrupt halt as if shocked by his words. When she resumed her tears a few moments later, it was with great anguish. Stephen pushed himself off of the bed, pulling her up with him. As he knelt beside the frame, he grasped her by the arms and forced her to look at him.
“You have my sympathies on what has happened to your mother,” he said with more emotion than he had exhibited since they had met. “But I can tell you with certainty that the moment she entered the flame, there was nothing anyone could do for her. It is a tragic thing to have witnessed and for that, I am deeply sorry. But you and I have a duty to fulfill and we must move forward with it.”
Joselyn stared at him, her tears rapidly fading and a look of complete disbelief on her face. “Are you truly so unfeeling?” she half-demanded, half-pleaded. “You speak of my mother, not some unknown, unloved woman.”
His blue eyes were intense. “I realize that,” he said. “But I also know that there is nothing to be done for her. You must not dwell on it.”
She tried to yank free of his grasp. “You are the coldest, most heartless man I have ever had the misfortune to come across,” she hissed, managing to pull an arm free. She began climbing across the bed, away from him, leaving her tartan in his grip. “How can you show such callousness? If you are a Hospitaller as you said you were, then surely there is some compassion buried deep within your warring soul.”
Lasses, Lords, and Lovers: A Medieval Romance Bundle Page 3