“The way Sia and Avice are said to go on, you’d think they’d have themselves a bed here,” Joliffe told the shadows. Besides that, he had always found hay made for prickly lying. But he’d also found that if the prick of the body’s desire was strong enough, the hay’s prick hardly mattered, and hay was better for lying on than bare boards or ground, that was certain. The hay was new enough, too, that it still smelled sweetly of summer and sun. There were worse places for lusting, and Joliffe sat himself down on the floor, his back against the wall, content to wait.
Unfortunately, his mind was not content. For preference, he would have kept himself happily occupied with thoughts of pleasures to come, but what came instead was thought of why he was here at Deneby at all. Sorting through what he had found out so far, there seemed little to go with Lord Lovell’s vague doubts and worry. John Harcourt had fallen ill and then been dead. That was common enough, with little to be made of it. It didn’t mean the same couldn’t happen to Amyas, but neither did it mean that it would. But what of Will? He’d had a fall on stairs lately, a thing that could happen to anyone, but today’s fall would have been far worse than it had been if it had come a few yards sooner. And lately he’d twice been ill. That was much misfortune for one boy in a short time.
Still, such things happened, just like John Harcourt’s sudden death.
But if they weren’t happenstance, who might have reason to want Will dead?
Amyas Breche for one. With Will dead, Mariena would be her father’s sole heir.
Or Amyas’ uncle could want it on his nephew’s behalf. A wealthy, landed nephew could be of use to a merchant.
But could either of them have had anything to do with John Harcourt’s death? From what he’d heard, Joliffe didn’t think they’d even known of Mariena then. They might have, though, by way of Harry Wyot, and found some way to bribe someone here to poison Harcourt . . . The likelihood of that seemed thin. They couldn’t have been certain Sir Edmund would turn to Amyas for Mariena’s next betrothed, and there were surely other valuable marriages to be had for far less trouble. Nor did Amyas seem so besotted with Mariena that he’d kill for the chance to have her. And while it would be to Amyas’ profit to have Will dead and Mariena sole heir of Deneby, why start trying to have him dead before being certain of Mariena?
There was still Harry Wyot to consider. He’d gain nothing by Will’s death, any more than he was going to gain by Mariena’s marriage, and Joliffe couldn’t make it likely that he’d do it for Amyas’ gain, however good friends they were. Revenge against Sir Edmund was possible, of course. There must have been quarrel between them when Harry Wyot refused Mariena. Had it been bad enough—or was his present marriage bad enough—that he wanted revenge on Sir Edmund, even if it meant bettering Mariena, whom he must not like or he would have married her?
But Will’s fall today had been by way of a loosened girth. If it wasn’t the stableman’s fault, then someone had pulled the buckle loose while riding and hoped for Will’s fall on the rocks. But today Harry Wyot and his wife had been riding together. If he had loosened that girth, she had to know of it and their marriage would have to be a sound one if he trusted her with a secret about him like that, and that took away revenge for a bad marriage as reason to harm Will. Damn.
Who else was there to consider? Mariena for one, Joliffe supposed. Head tilted back against the post, he frowned up at the underside of the thatch-covered roof. She would gain by her brother’s death, most assuredly, and have better chances at hurting him than Amyas or Harry Wyot did. But murder? Lust was one thing, murder was another. He might as well consider Lady Benedicta while he was at it. And why not? Her affection for Will seemed thin. Even though she was presently out of humour with her daughter, she might prefer Mariena’s betterment to that of a son favored by a husband for whom she didn’t care, if the servant-talk was right—and servant-talk was usually right about things like that. Forced into one childing after another by a husband wanting more sons, she might be seeking now to hurt that husband in one of the few ways left to her—by taking his one son away from him.
But surely she could find better ways than falls on stairs and loosened saddle-girths, and other times than now, with so many people around. Mariena would benefit whenever Will died. Later would do as well as now.
It was Harry Wyot who couldn’t count on having other chances at the boy.
Except Joliffe didn’t see that he had a reason to want Will dead.
Come to that, Joliffe couldn’t see any sufficient reason for anyone to take the risk to have Will dead. Being caught at murder and risking danger of damning one’s soul to Hell were large chances to take for any reason, whether for revenge or gain, and he couldn’t see there was that much to gain here. Not set against the risk involved.
So there was no reason anyone would want John Harcourt dead and no one was trying to kill Will and he was wasting his time trying to find answers to pointless questions, he thought disgustedly. If he was going to go making twists and turns, why not take up the possibility that a whole array of people, unbeknownst to each other, wanted Will dead for a whole array of different reasons, and one after another were trying for him. That worked as well as anything else he had come up with. No. The simplest way to see things was that John Harcourt had died of a sickness and that Will was having a run of bad fortune. There. No more problems. Everything settled and taken care of. No more need to think about the matter anymore at all. Or of anything else except of Sia now softly calling up the ladder, asking if he were there. About her, he was very ready and more than willing to think.
Chapter 10
Knowing what was expected of him as well as what he expected, Joliffe stood up and went to meet her as she came up the ladder. With her skirts to hold, the climbing was not easy, and he took her arm to help her the last way, steadying her as she stepped from the ladder. Her smile rewarded him for that as she slid a folded blanket off her shoulder, where she had been carrying it, saying as she handed it to him, “I brought this to make us the more comfortable.”
“Wise as well as lovely,” Joliffe said, bending to take a quick kiss from her ready lips. She stretched toward him, plainly willing for others, but those would come. He was never in favor of hurrying these things if it could be helped, and he turned his back on her, leaving her wanting more as much as he did while he made show of shaking out the blanket and throwing it across the low-mounded hay nearest to them. As he bent to pull it more even, Sia came close behind him, stroked her hands down his sides to his hips, and then pulled him against her. As he straightened up, she pushed her breasts against his back and slid her hands around him and upward, under his doublet’s lower edge.
Her boldness was enough to raise any man’s . . . lust, and Joliffe’s very certainly rose. He turned, took her in his arms, and gave the long kiss they both wanted. When they had to pause for breath, Sia began to unfasten his doublet. While she did, he explored her body with his hands, until she had finished and he drew back a little from her, gazing into her flushed face, ready for her lips again but holding back while he shrugged out of his doublet. Then, with it off and tossed aside, he took his turn, beginning to unlace the long opening down the front of her gown to come at her breasts. Sia’s hands in return slid under his shirt and up, warm over his bare flesh.
With her gown undone enough for him to come at the drawstring of her undergown, he loosened that and pulled her gown open and her undergown down, baring one of her breasts. Cupping it with his hand, he bent to kiss it. Sia moaned with pleasure, her head bending back, opening her throat to more kisses. Her legs giving way, she began to sink down. He caught her and lowered her onto the blanket and himself on top of her. But one part of his mind was still detached from what they were doing and he slid aside, onto his side beside her. She made a wordless sound of protest and rolled onto her side, too, holding on to him. He did not resist. His own hands were too busy pulling up her skirts. But he asked, forcing the question past his lust, hard though the wor
ds came, “Have you done aught against childing?” Because whatever his other desires, he had no desire to leave bastard children behind him.
Sia gasped, somewhere between her passion and unexpected laughter, and pulled back from him, not away but only enough to look into his face. “There’s none ever asked me that before.”
“And doesn’t the unexpected add to pleasure,” Joliffe said. He had no fear of losing what they were doing, enjoyed prolonging their sport. Finding her bare thigh under her skirts, he stroked his hand along it. Sia sighed, her eyes closing, her hips moving with the pleasure of his touch. “You haven’t answered,” he whispered.
She whispered back, “There’s no fear. We all know what to do. Ummm. That’s good. Don’t stop.”
He stopped. “You do what?”
Sia twisted in protest and opened her eyes. “What?”
“What do you do?”
On the edge of laughter, she said, “We’ve pennyroyal and rue and one thing and another, not to fear.” She stretched, wiggled a little to settle herself deeper into the hay, and—not by chance, Joliffe was sure—let her gown fall more away from her breasts, which she lifted toward him with an arching of her back while she added, “The trouble is keeping enough for us, what with my lady wanting so much for herself.”
Even as he leaned forward to take the invitation of her breasts, Joliffe wished she had not said that. He kissed where she wanted him to, but his mind was going somewhere else, and regretting his curiosity even as he gave way to it, he began to work his way up her throat with more kisses, asking between them, “Does . . . Sir Edmund . . . know . . . she . . . wants . . . no more . . . children?”
Sia bent her head back to take his kisses as she breathed, “Who knows what Sir Edmund knows.”
“He doesn’t take his pleasures elsewhere?” Joliffe whispered back, making it plain with his hand under her skirts where he meant to take his own pleasure.
Sia writhed, and answered on a gasp, “He doesn’t.” She found her hand’s way into Joliffe’s short braies. It was his turn to gasp as she whispered, “More’s the pity for Lady Benedicta.”
Holding to a last shred of curiosity, Joliffe forced out, “There’s no love lost between them, then?”
“None . . .” Sia’s hand was making use of all it was discovering and Joliffe groaned. “. . . that I’ve ever noted.” Without warning, she pulled her hand out of his braies, instead slid it up under his shirt again, making a small torture of pausing his pleasure even as she moved against him, urging him onward to her own. He caught her hand and tried to force it back where he wanted it to be. She brought his hand, instead, to where she wanted it, saying into his ear, her breath cool over his heated flesh, “I won’t get with child if you have me. I promise. With all the men whose longings I’ve eased and no child yet . . .” Satisfied as Joliffe began to pull her skirts altogether up, out of his way, she began to work at loosening the drawstring of his braies, finishing, “. . . I do know what to do.”
He had no doubt she knew what to do, in several senses. She was too excellent at her chosen sport for him to doubt that, and he asked, to add to their sport along with his pressing need to have their clothing out of his way, “How many men has it been? So I know who I have to rival to keep your favor.”
“You don’t want to hear about my other men.”
“Believe me, it won’t cool my desire in the least.” He began to kiss his way from her throat to between her breasts to prove it. She writhed most satisfactorily, her back arching with pleasure even as she made wordless moan, demanding more. Returning the small torment she’d given him, he withheld that more while he asked, “Is Master Amyas someone whose ‘longings’ you’ve eased?”
Hand behind his head, drawing him toward her, Sia said, “No. He’s Avice’s.” And went on, between kisses set hard on Joliffe’s lips, “Except . . . he hasn’t . . . been . . . interested . . . in her.”
Joliffe drove his own kiss against her mouth, pressing her down into the hay; but when he finally relinquished her lips and drew back, leaving her gasping for breath, he had another question, come from his not-quite-extinguished curiosity. “What about Mariena’s other betrothed? The one who died?”
Sia moaned, whether with memory or with pleasure at what Joliffe’s hand was presently doing to her, he couldn’t tell, but he went on doing it, asking in her ear, “What about him?”
“Him,” Sia gasped. “Yes. He was . . . so . . . ready . . . we shared him . . . Avice and I . . .”
A drawn-out moan and a great writhe of pleasure took her body. She twisted, first toward him, then away, and at last with a long, satisfied sigh went slack, eyes closed, lips parted, one arm thrown out to the side, her other hand holding to Joliffe’s shoulder as if to make sure he was still in her reach.
Joliffe’s need was far from slacked or satisfied, but knowing it would take time to bring her back so he could go on, he curbed his need, settled himself as best he could beside her, began to stroke her thigh, and said softly, “So. About Mariena’s late betrothed. Did she know what he was doing?”
Sia giggled—at him as much as at the question, he thought. Not opening her eyes, her voice still slow with satisfaction, she said, “She couldn’t have or we’d have heard about it. Or he would have, surely. What’s hers is hers and nobody else better try to have it, too.”
Joliffe slipped his hand to a warmer place than Sia’s thigh. She was quickening to his touch already, her hips beginning to move in response to his touch, proving she was fully a wanton in the most delightful sense of the word. Her hand on his manhood was returning the favor, almost distracting him from asking, “She wanted him, then?”
“Or wanted him to want her, anyway. Always touching his hand and leaning herself toward him so he could see a little down her dress to what he’d be getting.” Sia shifted her own breasts, letting Joliffe know they were still on offer. As he obligingly began to kiss them, she murmured, “She likes being desired, does Mariena.”
And so did Sia. She slid her hand from his shoulder to take hold on his hair and pull his head gently up so they were face to face. Softly she asked, “Did you come here only to talk?”
Joliffe widened his eyes in wholly feigned innocence. “Could I dare hope for more?”
Sia laughed at him, slipped her hand around to the back of his hips, rolled onto her side, and pulled him toward her. “There’s no dare about a certainty.”
And certainly no more wish for words by either of them. Taking her mouth in another long kiss, Joliffe pushed her to her back again and himself on top of her. But only for half of a completely insufficient moment, before someone called up the ladder with a desperate need different than their own, “Sia! You’re wanted! You have to come!”
They both went still. Then Sia went limp under him and called back with irk and disappointment, “Avice, go away!”
“You have to come! Mariena is sick and vomiting and we’re needed!”
Joliffe tried to say something about Sia being needed here, too, but she was already wiggling to be out from underneath him and he rolled off her. She sat up, muttering against Mariena and saying there’d be another time between them, not to worry.
“Sia!” Avice called again, impatiently.
“I have to lace my gown again, don’t I?” Sia yelled back.
“I’m coming up.”
“You’re not! I’m coming down.”
Sia bid him farewell with a quick kiss that landed vaguely near his mouth. He kept his hands to himself and let her go, much though he wanted to seize her and finish the business. Going down the ladder, she waved once and blew a kiss at him. He waved back, then she was gone, and when her voice and Avice’s had faded as they hurried from the cow byre, he rolled over and buried his face in the blanket, his sorry certainty of loss made the worse by knowing his own curiosity had helped to spoil it. If he hadn’t taken time with question-asking . . .
Mariena had seemed well enough at supper. How did she come to be suddenly so
sick?
Another question without likelihood of any easy answer.
Thwarted of body and curiosity both, he gathered himself up, dressed again, hung the blanket on the peg when he’d taken the lantern in hand, and went down the ladder, to return through the wet dark to the cartshed.
There, he was grateful to find no one awake to make jibes or question him and that Rose had left his blanket hanging over the frame beside the fire, to go warm to his bed with him. It wasn’t so warm as Sia would have been but it was better than no comfort at all, he told himself, uncomforted.
Chapter 11
In the morning, once Basset had been helped up and some of the stiffness rubbed from his joints, he and Ellis were ready with the jibes there had not been last night, the two of them taking turns asking if Joliffe had had enough “sleep” last night, had he slept “warm” enough, had he . . .
Joliffe cut them off by telling of Mariena’s sickness.
In the instant pall thrown by that, Basset explained to Gil, “There’s never need for players at a funeral.” He pointed at the water buckets and added, “You and Piers fetch those full and see what you can hear from any servants at the well.”
Both boys went, and with them out of hearing, Basset asked of Joliffe, “Did you learn aught else?”
Joliffe paused over his answer, considering what he had learned. Other than about Sia. Slowly he answered, “There’s either layers of secrets here or else there’s none.”
“Thank you,” Basset said dryly. “But if you think I’m looking for a scholastic debate about the nature of Truth, you’re wrong. Certainties, my fellow, certainties.”
“I’m thinking,” Joliffe protested.
“Don’t. Just report,” Basset said.
Obeying, but aware that Ellis and Rose were watching them strangely, Joliffe said, “Lady Benedicta is seeing to it she bears no more children. It’s uncertain Sir Edmund knows that or if he thinks he still has chance at more sons. The servants say there’s no love lost between him and his wife but that he doesn’t take his pleasure elsewhere, so far as they know.”
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