To Kiss in the Shadows

by Lynn Kurland

  “Lady Lianna?”

  The voice startled her so badly she almost fell from her chair. She turned around to find Linet of Byford standing beside her, shifting uncomfortably.

  “The lady of H-Harrow asks if you w-w-would not be more comfortable in our ... c-c-circle,” Linet said, stumbling badly over her words, “when the entertainments begin.” She looked behind her to where Maud had already begun to set up her own little court. As if Maud had arranged it, the king stood and the tables began to be set aside to clear spaces for whatever amusements had been arranged.

  Lianna was surprised by the invitation, and she couldn’t help but wonder if Kendrick’s arrival hadn’t heralded more than just an afternoon’s freedom from the prison of her visage. If these ladies were deigning to include her as well, who knew what might happen in the ensuing days?

  The thought was truly staggering.

  “Well,” Lianna said, rising, “aye, I daresay I would. Thank you.”

  Linet looked as miserable as if she’d been banished to the kitchens, and that made Lianna pause. Did that bode ill for her? Was Linet dreading having to spend any more time than necessary in Lianna’s company? Then why invite her for the remainder of the eve?

  When she reached the circle, the others who waited only wore friendly expressions. A chair was placed on Maud’s right, and Lianna was welcomed into it. When she was seated, she was handed a goblet of wine and offered a plate of sweets.

  “You must forgive us,” Maud said. “We have been less than friendly to you, and for that we are truly sorry. Aren’t we, ladies?”

  The others bobbed their heads obediently.

  Maud looked back at Lianna. “Come, eat,” she said, indicating the plate. “Drink. Take your ease with us. There will be fine minstrels to sing to us of heroic deeds. Will that please you?”

  Maud smiled and Lianna tried to smile back. But something about Maud’s smile disturbed her greatly, for it seemed to fashion itself about her mouth only. No vestige of warmth reached the woman’s eyes.

  Lianna wished quite suddenly that she’d refused the invitation, but ’twas far too late to leave at present. She looked about her desperately for a place to hide, but found only a wooden plate in one of her hands and a goblet of drink in the other.

  So she buried her face in her cup to escape. When she found the brew to be quite nasty, she occupied her hands and her mouth with the sweets until they tasted just as noxious as the other, forcing her to drink more to get them down her throat.

  Just as she thought she could bear no more, she looked up to find Kendrick of Artane standing there, frowning down at her thoughtfully.

  And behind him, looking as harmless as a clutch of nettles, scowled his younger brother. He glanced at her, then suddenly and quite violently sneezed all over his brother’s back.

  Kendrick’s curse was formidable.

  “I need to speak with you,” Jason said pointedly. “Turn yourself about.”

  “Why, so you can drench the front of me? I’ll speak with you later. I’ve more important things to do at present.” He made Maud and her companions a bow. “Ladies. My lady,” he said, bowing to Lianna as well.

  “The dancing begins,” Maud said, jumping to her feet as if she’d been launched there. “My lord, if you will allow me to be so bold?”

  Kendrick inclined his head and led Maud off without so much as a murmur of protest, though he exchanged a brief, unpleasant look with his brother on the way by. Jason cursed, swept the women before him with a disgruntled glance, then sat down in Maud’s vacated chair. He dragged his sleeve across his watering eyes, then looked with faint interest at Lianna’s cup and plate.

  “Finished?” he asked.

  She had scarce managed an aye before he took the cup and tasted the last drop.

  Then he suddenly went very still.

  “I’ll take that, my lord,” said Adela, reaching forward.

  Jason did not move. “Will you? I think not. Indeed, I might want some of this myself. Have you any more of this brew?”

  “The king’s finest,” squeaked Linet. “Lady Harrow obtained it for us.”

  Lianna could not fathom why Jason looked suddenly so angry or why the women about her looked suddenly quite so pale.

  Then she realized who sat with them, and his reputation gave her all the answer she needed. He was the Dragon’s man, likely something of a dragon himself, and a fit of foul temper had overcome him. No wonder the women about her were so terrified. Indeed, Lianna suspected that she as well should be just as terrified, but somehow she wasn’t. She put the plate on the floor and gave Jason her most dazzling smile, only realizing as she looked him full in the face that she shouldn’t be doing the like, not with her visage.

  But somehow she couldn’t find the energy to hide. So she spoke boldly and wondered at her boldness, for it was certainly newfound.

  “ ’Tis but wine, my lord,” she said, then she stopped, for she found that her tongue wasn’t working properly. Indeed, all of the sudden, she felt heartily and thoroughly sick.

  “Too much wine,” offered Linet.

  “I daresay,” Jason said darkly.

  Lianna pushed herself to her feet, wondering desperately if she might make either the outside or a garderobe before she was violently ill.

  “She’s going to sick up her supper on my feet,” Adela said with distaste. “Go elsewhere, Lianna. These are new slippers I’m wearing.”

  Lianna felt Jason’s hands suddenly on her arms, but she pushed him away. She turned and stumbled toward the stairs, praying she could make the passageway. She could be sick there. But please, just not here in front of the king’s company. Not here where she would be fodder for mockery.

  She stumbled up the stairs, gained the garderobe by sheer willpower, then hung her head over the hole and wretched until she could scarce stand.

  It took a lifetime to retreat to the passageway and several more to walk a handful of paces.

  Her head felt as if someone had taken an axe to it, and her poor form no better. And then, quite suddenly, a blessed darkness began to descend.

  “Lianna!” a deep voice called urgently from behind her.

  But she could not turn, nor could she answer. She closed her eyes and slid happily down the slope toward blackness. The last thing she heard was a mighty sneeze, followed by a equally mighty curse.

  She did not feel the arms that broke her fall.

  Four

  Jason knelt in the passageway with the lady Lianna of somewhere-yet-to-be-discovered in his arms and wondered why in the bloody hell she found herself at court with women who had likely poisoned her.

  Perhaps she had no choice, and for that he pitied her. He’d been at Henry’s court less than a day, and already he couldn’t wait to escape. He couldn’t stomach the thought of much more conversation that revolved around the perfect cut of a man’s tunic, the proper color for hose, or how one might dress to best grace the latest of the king’s building projects. What he wanted was a simple conversation about the feeding of swine, or whether the barley and hops might grow well in the north fields, or a discussion of the virtues of the keep’s blacksmith.

  Aye, he could scarce wait to take his leave. He would have, and that night, too, had it not been for the woman in his arms.

  He’d seen her at supper, hiding in the shadows. He’d watched her be drawn into the ladies’ circle after supper and felt alarm sweep through him. Surely they would have no kindness for such a one as she. He’d followed Kendrick willingly, not only to hound his brother, but also to see what mischief the women were combining.

  After his brother had made his nimble escape, Jason had decided to wait him out and keep watch over Lianna whilst he was doing it. Besides, it gave him somewhere to sit where the conversation might revolve around something besides men’s garments.

  He’d noticed almost immediately that Lianna had looked flushed, and he’d wondered what she’d been drinking. Tasting her wine had assured him ’twas more than s
imply the brew that had worked such a foul business on her.

  And now, as he stared down into her poor, ravaged face, he could only hope she didn’t pay the ultimate price for having trusted those who had given it to her.

  Women Jason would see repaid for their misdeed, in time.

  He dragged his arm across his running nose then swung Lianna up into his arms. He kicked at the first door he saw. It was opened none too quickly by a sleepy servant.

  “Let me in,” Jason growled.

  “But, my lord,” the woman squeaked, “this is the ladies’ chamber. You cannot—”

  “I can and I will,” Jason said. He pushed past her, strode across the chamber, and jerked back the bedcurtains. He laid Lianna down and wondered if he shouldn’t undress her as well. Her gown was soiled and would likely be better off in some pile of rags destined for the beggars.

  He looked at the servants huddled behind him and chose the one who looked the least likely to harm Lianna further.

  “Strip her,” he commanded, “and dress her in clothing she can wear abed comfortably. I will wait without.” He looked at the other two servants. “Leave.”

  “But, my lord,” protested one.

  He merely gestured curtly toward the door, and the women quit the chamber without further comment. Jason followed them out, then pulled the door shut behind him. He leaned back against it and stared grimly at the wall facing him. Now that he had peace for thinking, he would have to decide on a course of action. He could only hope that Lianna had managed to vomit up all but the quickest of the poison.

  He had just begun to consider what he might give her to aid her when he noticed a commotion to his left. There coming toward him were the women responsible for Lianna’s distress, trailed by the servants he had tossed from the chamber. Jason simply could not believe they had innocently given her drink laced with death. Worse still was how they walked about so freely, as if they thought no one would think to question their actions.

  “Move yourself,” one woman said briskly. “And take that foolish girl inside with you. I’m certain her illness is but a ruse.”

  “What was in her wine?” Jason asked.

  One of the other women made a sound of misery and slumped back against the wall. That was telling enough, he supposed.

  “Something in her wine, my lord?” the first woman said evenly. “How could you think such a thing of us?”

  Jason looked at the woman who faced him with such apparent lack of fear, and suddenly a name attached itself to the face. Maud of Harrow, who possessed a tongue more poisonous than an adder’s. He should have known she would have been behind this.

  “I have eyes,” he said, “and I recognize the signs.”

  “Having brewed several unwholesome things yourself,” the lady of Harrow said with a cold smile. “Along with casting spells and other such activities particular to your kind.”

  “Or so it is rumored,” one of the other women agreed.

  “Silence, Adela,” Maud commanded. She turned back to Jason and smiled unpleasantly at him.

  “I have many skills,” he said with a shrug, silently marveling that she would so boldly accuse him of sorcery. “I daresay you wouldn’t want to acquaint yourself with too many of them.”

  “You don’t frighten me,” Maud said, puffing herself up.

  But it would seem that he frightened the rest of her rabbits, for the other three were near to collapse in the passageway.

  “Perhaps I don’t,” Jason conceded. “But you don’t know the extent of what I can do. Especially my talent for carrying tales to the king to ruin the lives of foolish, spiteful wenches possessing sharp tongues and few wits. Do you care for a performance of that one?”

  Maud considered, then turned and, one by one, slapped three whimpering women smartly across their faces.

  “On your feet, Linet. Come, Adela. Stand up, Janet, you fool! Let us be away. We’ll sleep in the solar.”

  Jason waited, faintly satisfied, until they had stomped away before he turned and went back inside the chamber. The serving girl was covering Lianna with blankets.

  But Lianna wasn’t moving.

  Jason hastened to the side of the bed. The servant looked up as he approached.

  “I did as ye bid me, milord,” she said. “But she’s powerful ill.”

  “Aye,” Jason said absently. “I daresay ’twas poison.”

  “Mayhap ’tis mostly gone from her.”

  “Let us pray that ’tis so,” he said. “Fetch my brother, will you? I’ve an errand for him. I’ll need several things from the healer, if the man can provide them.”

  “Aye, milord, as ye will.”

  Jason sent the woman on her way, then looked about him for something to sit on. Finding a small stool, he pulled it near the bed, sat, and searched back through his own lessons at a healer’s knee for what he should do at present. His lessons had been thorough, and most unusual, given from whom he’d had them. He smiled to himself at the thought. Perhaps the lady of Harrow had not spoken amiss after all. He could brew a love potion, cure warts and other afflictions, and slather on quite a salve of beauty, should circumstances require.

  As well as spew out a variety of quite potent curses, which was enormously tempting at the moment.

  But the saints pity him should he not be able to remember the simple herbs to aid the woman before him in ridding her body of what foul brew she’d ingested.

  He contemplated that list of herbs for what seemed to him an inordinately long amount of time. He was on the verge of going to seek out Kendrick himself when the door opened and a torch entered the chamber, carried by none other than his yawning brother.

  “Lianna, where are you? I know that to have called me to you as I was about to retire can only mean that you’ve one desire of me—”

  Kendrick’s yawn ceased abruptly when he saw who was laid out on the bed.

  “What happened to her?” he said, coming to stand next to Jason.

  “To Lianna?” Jason asked, looking up at his brother sourly. “To the woman you couldn’t see fit to introduce to me?”

  Kendrick looked at him blankly. “I was tormenting you. ’Tis my sworn duty as your elder brother to do so. Now, what happened to her? She was seemingly happy enough with the ladies. When I was summoned here, I thought perhaps she had a tryst in mind.”

  “With you? Poor girl, I should hope not,” Jason said.

  “Why not? Many women—”

  “Aye, exactly. Perhaps this one has more sense than the others.”

  Kendrick flicked him smartly on the ear, then peered over his shoulder. “Why are you here then? And see you how she sleeps. What have you done, Jason? Bored her so deeply that she must sleep to escape you?”

  “Kendrick, you fool, she was poisoned!”

  Kendrick gasped. “Nay! By whom?”

  “By those who would have you, likely.”

  “Stupid wenches. Surely no man is worth this—not even I.”

  At least in that his brother was showing some sense. Jason reached for Lianna’s hand and held it between his own. Her flesh felt as if it were on fire. Jason looked up at his brother.

  “Go fetch me herbs,” he said.

  Kendrick blinked. “Are you brewing love potions for her now?”

  “Healing ones, dolt.”

  “One never knows, what with your teachers.”

  “Berengaria is a fine healer.”

  “Oh, aye,” Kendrick agreed, “she is that. I daresay her two accomplices might have a different tale to tell about her varied talents and whether or not she is of the witchly ilk. Though I must admit Phillip was no worse for the wear for his time spent in their company.”

  Phillip, their older brother, had followed his bride on a merry chase, accompanied by none other than Berengaria of Artane, lately of Blackmour, and her two apprentices, one of whom had willingly gone north in search for—of course—the thumb-bone of a wizard.

  Whether she had found it or not was something of
a family secret.

  Jason smiled faintly. “They were all that aided him in taming his bride, so I daresay he has no complaints. And now that you’ve convinced yourself my skills aren’t dark ones, go fetch me what I need.”

  “I’m not at all sure your skills aren’t dark ones,” Kendrick said with half a laugh, “but I will fetch you what you require, then I will return and make certain that our lady’s honor isn’t compromised by having you loitering about her chamber alone with your own sour self.”

  Jason spat out his list at his brother, then rose and gave him a healthy shove toward the door.

  “Shall I bring you anything else?” Kendrick asked from the doorway. “Something for your sneezes? Or can you spell yourself into good health?”

  “Horehound,” Jason said shortly. “It will serve me as well as the lady here. But be swift, for I would waste no more time in seeing to the rest of this poison.”

  “As you will,” Kendrick said, turning to leave.

  “And a lute,” Jason added.

  “Lute?” Kendrick echoed. “And where am I to find—”

  “There are musicians aplenty. Filch one of theirs.”

  Kendrick sighed and left without further comment.

  Jason stared after him and spared a fleeting thought for how he really should be following his brother out that door, down the stairs, and out the castle gates. He had a crusade to make, kings to woo, and a noble cause to righteously pursue.

  None of which had anything to do with where he was at present or what poor service he felt compelled to render here.

  Jason sat, bowed his head over Lianna’s hand, and offered up the most humble prayer his black soul could muster. His other life would have to wait while he fought for this life here. He could only hope he had enough skill to save that life.

  With the way she was breathing so unevenly, he wasn’t sure he would manage it.

  Five

  Lianna was sure she had died.

  And by the sound of things, she was certain, though somewhat surprised, that she had actually been admitted straight to Heaven without having to spend any time doing penance in Purgatory.