by Claudia Dain
"Nay, I think very well of women. It is only that I understand men most clearly. But come, Elsbeth, I will not hound you to this. Come of your own will. I only ask for what you can easily give. Come, bathe your husband. 'Tis lawful and right, and you will do a goodly service to a knight of the Levant."
Put thus, how could she say nay? She could not and still be the wife of docile submission she must be, and so, with a bent head and a heavy sigh, she knelt by the tub and rubbed his shoulders with some soap wrapped in a piece of linen.
Shoulders, aye, he had them and to spare. No man could have need for such an expanse of bone and muscle and tendon. He was wide and hard, yet without great bulk, more a stag than an ox, if she had to make comparison. Which she did not. She did not need to think at all; she only had to wash.
But as her hands slid over his skin, her eyes soaked up the sight of him. Eyes were cursed things, leading thoughts where they did not need to go. No wonder the Scriptures warned that if thine eye offended, pluck it out. Would that she had the strength of heart for that. Her eyes were all of offense because they would not turn from Hugh. It would have been like turning from the sun when all was shrouded in mist. He was a radiance that lit the stone chamber like a fire, pulsing with laughter and warmth and beckoning beauty.
In the darkness of the world, in the dim shadows of stone and dirt and wood, he was light. She could not turn away. She had not the will to dwell in shadows when sunlight and firelight called to her.
If not for her courses, she would have been lost. 'Twas most humbling. She had thought herself more resolute, more stalwart, less of feminine weakness and more of prayerful might. She did not like what having Hugh in her life showed her of herself; he was a most unyielding mirror. Still, she would not lie to herself, no matter how unflattering the mirror's reflection. She found him compelling, beautiful, mayhap even irresistible. All the more reason to escape this marriage quickly. This temptation was too great; she would surely stumble. She must fly out of this marriage with all speed, before her courses ended and left her vulnerable.
"You are quiet, little one," he said. "Have I frightened you?"
He said it well. He did frighten her, though not in the way he supposed.
"Nay," she said, hiding behind him, trying not to see the tangled golden strands of his hair. "You are a most gentle husband, my lord."
He grabbed her hand and pulled it to his mouth, kissing her wrist softly. "For that I am glad. I would not frighten you for all the world, Elsbeth. Let us find our footing gently on this marriage path. There is no harm to be found in slow startings. Step by step, we shall find our way."
"Aye, that we shall," she said, pulling her hand free with care.
Step by step, she had to find her way out of this. If he had his way, he would devour her.
* * *
She seemed frightened unto death. He could feel the fear in her; it was like a mist that shrouded her, closing her in and shutting her off behind gray walls. He wanted to reach in behind the mist, pulling her into the sunlight, but ever she eluded him. No matter how he reached out his hand or gave her his smile, still Elsbeth stood a pace off. Wary. Shuttered. Untouchable.
That was the fault of her courses. When her flow ceased, all would change between them. He would take her as a man took a woman, marking her and making her his, and then she would have no cause to be wary.
It was all he wanted.
It was better said that it was the first of what he wanted. From their bonding all would proceed, all that he desired, all that he had come to England to find. All began with her. He had understood that from the start, and he had accepted it. The terms were well understood, and he was well set to meet them. All that hindered him was this untimely flux. Yet it was what marked her as a woman, and it was a woman he had come to England to claim.
He could not begrudge her the mark of her fecundity and the stain of her femininity. Nay, he would not. He wanted her and he needed her, 'twas much to be said of a woman. Elsbeth was a woman who would hold that crown of value well. She deserved the value set on her. He could see that now, knowing her.
Perhaps it was best that she had never seen Jerusalem and Jerusalem never seen her. If she were a woman of the Levant, all men would have flocked to her dark beauty, and the engaging humility which shrouded her would never have taken root in her heart. He was much engaged by that humility coming from a woman of such rare beauty, piety, and riches. 'Twas a rare thing.
And she was his. At least for now.
For now. A man could find delight living in an eternal present, his past forgotten and his future locked in God's hands. Some man could, perhaps. He was not such a man, though this present with Elsbeth as his wife pleased him very well.
He only wished that she could be as pleased by him. Oh, she liked his look well enough, but she was still wary of the man. He could not fathom it, but perhaps he did not need to try. He had only to win her, not understand her. He knew how to win a woman. He would win Elsbeth of Sunnandune. It was only a question of when.
Now would suit him very well.
"Will you kiss me, Elsbeth?" he asked, running his hand up her arm to lay a wet hand on her breast. "Will you bend down to me and give me a willing kiss? I will not hold you as I did last night."
"My lord, you hold me now," she said, staring into his eyes, her bliaut stained wet with the mark of his hand upon her.
"Against your will? Do I hold you against your will, Elsbeth?" he asked, pressing his hand against the soft weight of her bosom. He felt her nipple rise up against his palm, answering his question.
"What will I have is in submission to your own," she said softly, not moving. Her eyes were dark and deep, the eyes of a woman falling into temptation. Aye, he knew how to win a woman.
"Well said, Elsbeth. Words to please any husband, even one from far Jerusalem," he said, squeezing her nipple gently. She surged toward his hand and pressed her lips together, swallowing a moan. "Kiss me, Elsbeth," he commanded softly.
She leaned down to him, her hair falling forward into the water, curling as it lay in black swirls, twisting, moving like lazy snakes in the sun. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, somnolent, exotic. He was for an instant caught, trapped by the look of her before he shook free. It was her will which was to be subjected, not his own. No woman was worth that price.
He felt her breath, soft and light, on his mouth and then her lips. Her kiss was tentative, shy, yet she touched something within him; some chord was struck, some note ringing clearly in his heart, before he escaped. Many traps had Elsbeth to catch a man unwary. He was wary. He would not be caught.
With a sigh, she escaped him, lifting her mouth from his.
"You are kissed, my lord," she said, backing away from him and his touch upon her breast.
"Aye, I am kissed," he said. "Will I need to ask for every kiss I want from you? Will you never come to me and kiss me of your own will and wish?" he asked, searching her face.
"Is not my answer to be 'your will is mine'? What else is left for a wife to say?" She took another step away from him and then turned to face the fire, avoiding his eyes. He took it to be a good sign, a sign of her weakness and the strength of a desire she did not wish to feel. Aye, he understood her very well.
"It is the answer I would hear, but only if it be from your heart. Do not deceive me, Elsbeth. Your submission does not please me if it is deception."
She turned at that, her wet hair flying heavily against her breasts. "I do as you ask and I am called a deceiver? That charge is unjust. I have never deceived you; you know what I want very well, my lord, is that not so?"
"My pardon, little wife. I meant no insult," he said and then he smiled. "Do you then mean to say that you wanted to kiss me, to feel my hand upon your breast?"
She crossed her arms over her breasts again and turned back to the fire. "I have said what I meant to say. There was no mystery in it," she said.
"Well said," he replied, chuckling, then ducking to rinse himself. "And well washed. Thank
you, wife, I feel as clean as fresh linen. Now, may I attend you?"
She turned again to face him at his words, shock upon her strong-boned features. "Did I not say that it was not my time for bathing? It cannot be done, my lord."
"It can always be done," he said. "And should be. Have you not noted the strange, sour, odorous fog that hovers over England? You may think it is only fog, but it is not. It is the smell of the unwashed. The skies of Jerusalem are clear and clean, I can assure you. It is not coincidence, I think."
He rose from the water and stood, his hand out for the length of linen which would dry him. She reached blindly for the cloth, her eyes on him. Let her look on; the sight of him pleased her, he knew, though she would choke before she would admit as much. He was steady and hard, and had been since awaking in the night with her head nestled against his shoulder, her body warm and soft against his side.
How long did a woman's courses run? How long was he to wait?
Elsbeth was a temptress in her own right, giving a man a glimpse of what he could not possess.
She handed him the cloth, her arm fully extended, her eyes lowered and her breathing quick. She would not avoid him that easily.
"Will you assist? Wrap the cloth about me, if you would. I welcome any reason to feel your arms about me," he said, lifting her chin with his hand and looking into her bottomless eyes.
"You say it most plain," she said, looking at his mouth and not his eyes. "Why do you taunt me? I would be no man's amusement."
"Nay, you are not my amusement, Elsbeth," he said, touching her lip with his fingertip. Her lips were the pale coral pink of shell, as smooth and as flawless. "You are my torment," he breathed. "Come, torment me again."
He heard the catch in her breathing and watched her eyes close against the sight of him. But he was still before her and they both knew it; she could not push him from her by the simple closing of her eyes. She dropped her head and wrapped the cloth about his shoulders like a cloak and stepped away from him.
"Nay, nay," he said. "Come, do it well if you will do it. Wrap it about my hips, low and tight so that it will not fall."
"I cannot," she said.
"Why can you not?"
"I... cannot."
"Then do not," he said, wrapping the cloth about his hips himself and stepping from the tub. "I will never ask of you what you cannot do nor demand what you cannot give. Rest in that, little one. Find your rest where you may," he said almost to himself.
She looked up at him, her face as solemn as ever, yet also curious. She did not know what to think of him; he did not meet her expectations of husbands or of men. Having spent even a short time in England, he could understand it. The men of the north were closer to barbarians than they would ever admit. The best of them had gone south to the holy land two generations ago; the worst of them had stayed behind, hiding behind wooden palisades and smelly moats, unwilling to risk their blood to save the land of their very Savior. They were hardly knights as he knew knights to be. Yet they were the only knights Elsbeth had ever known.
"You are gentle," she said, giving proof to his observations. "I did not think it in a man to be gentle."
"Do not tell your father he has given you to a gentle knight. He may regret our bargaining and take you back unto himself," he said lightly. "Now lift your skirts and I will wash you."
She backed up, catching her foot on loose kindling laid near the fire, her hands pressed to her skirts, holding them down. As if that would stop him.
"Nay!"
"Aye," he said, grinning. "Come closer, Elsbeth. 'Tis time for you to be bathed, as well you may while your courses run. Or must I come and catch you? That would be fine play. I am willing, if you are."
"My lord, this is wrong. You must keep away. You will defile yourself."
"My lady, there is nothing wrong about it. I will not keep away. You have not the power to defile me. I am not to be put off by a trace of blood."
"'Tis more than a trace!"
"Then change your dressing yet again. I will wait. Yet I will wash you. My lord Christ did so to his followers; can I do less for you, my wife?"
"His disciples did not bleed."
"Well, perhaps they should have for deserting Him as they did. They were vassals to His holy will and they abandoned Him. A little bloodletting would not have been amiss."
"Do we now talk of Christ and His twelve or of me? I am lost."
"Then be found, Elsbeth. All words lead to Christ, Lord of all under heaven. Can He be far from any discourse man can speak? I think not."
"I never did hear verse where Christ spoke of a woman's flux," she said, her anger and confusion barely hidden.
Hugh smiled and shrugged. "Did not the apostle John say that all the books of all the world could not hold the words and deeds of Christ? I must then believe that He did speak of it, yet it was not recorded into Holy Writ."
"This is blasphemy, my lord. The Word of God is complete."
"Aye, it is. I do not argue it. Now lift your skirts, Elsbeth, so that I may do what I will do."
"Do not ask this of me, my lord," she said, her eyes panicked. "You said you would not ask of me what I cannot give. I cannot give this."
He smiled at her and dipped the cloth into the water, now holding the chill of autumn and stone. "You can. I will show you that you can." When she only looked at him with eyes gone wide in shocked embarrassment, he said, "I want to touch you. I want you to lift your skirts for me. I want to see what no man has seen. I want the most intimate part of you, Elsbeth. Give yourself to me. I will not abuse. I will not harm. I will deal gently, always and only. Trust me. Please."
She could not. She could not lift her skirts for any man. 'Twas too much. Too much of sensual bonding. Too much of intimacy. Too much of desire. Only women who took men into their bodies lifted their skirts. She would not be such a woman. She would not even act the part.
And yet, she felt the thrill even now of what it would be like to lift her skirts and watch his face as her legs were revealed to him, inch by inch. She would tempt him with the act. Aye, he would be tempted, and she would revel in holding him in thrall for that little while.
She could not. Not because she feared him. In that moment, she only feared herself and what he roused in her. Had not Ardeth and even Isabel spoken of this? This desire to tempt a man, this was to be avoided as it was the first step on the path to destruction. She had known that truth all her life.
"I cannot," she said. "Do not ask it of me, I pray you."
"You fear," he said, his green eyes soft and smiling. "Let me tell you then what will be, so that you will not fear."
He stood in his linen, his hair dark with water and brushing the tops of his shoulders. He stood, his masculinity an assault she could feel in her very bones, turning her heart to water, melting her joints to wax. The sight of him was a battering ram to her defenses; his words were arrows that pierced her heart and her resolve. Yet she stood and prayed for deliverance. God would answer. God was true.
"I will kneel at your feet. I will lift the hems of your very pretty green pelisse and your fine rose bliaut, tangling them in my grasp. I will grasp the hem in my hands, lifting it softly. You will feel the slightest brush of air, first on your ankles and then on your calves as I raise it, raise it, raise it to your knees. When I see your knees, I will be overcome and I will lean forward to kiss one perfect knee. You will tremble and you will shift your weight from foot to foot. You will duck your head and sigh, yet I will hear you and I will smile. You make me smile, did you know that, Elsbeth? You have the rare ability to make me smile."
"You laugh at me," she said, her voice a croak. The images he painted were too strong. He was too adept with words; it was his gravest fault.
He took a step toward her, the linen moving about his feet "I do not," he said. "Believe that. If you believe nothing else, believe that. I would not wound you even with a misplaced laugh. You simply ease my heart, that is all. And yet it is so much."
"Your words... you have too many words," she said.
"You are right. I use words because you have stopped my deeds. I would show you what I want for both of us, yet my hands are stopped against your iron will. Only my words are left. Will you take those from me, too, and leave me stripped of all the ways a man may win a woman's heart?"
"You have my body, my lands, my riches. What need have you for my heart?"
"I want all of you, Elsbeth," he said, his face suddenly intent. "Without your heart, all else is dross."
She saw another side of him then, another besides the grinning, pleasant face he wore for all the world and his wife to see. He was capable of much more than smiles, this man from Jerusalem, but what that meant for her, she did not know. His smiles had all but undone her.
"Let me touch you," he said, dropping to his knees at her feet. The fire was behind her, yet it was cold and dark compared to the heat and light of Hugh.
"You ask my leave?"
"Nay, I beg it," he said, his voice a throaty murmur.
Too many words, and all of them perfectly designed to cast her into a fall from which there was no rescue. She had no weapons against such temptation. When her courses stopped, she would fall. She was walking to her very death and could not seem to turn aside.
"Touch me, then," she said and did not recognize the voice as hers.
He lifted her skirts as he had predicted. The air touched her ankles, her calves, her knees, yet she felt no cool draft; all was heat and fire and longing. Her very blood pulsed out of her, pushed by her desire. She was defiled, disgraced, and still he lifted her skirts and still she let him, gasping her longing. Lost in smothered desire.
Lost.
"Is it not as I said?" he asked her, his breath on her legs, his head near her thighs.
It was all as he said. Every word beat against her mind as his eyes devoured her, his hands caressed her. Where was her sanctuary from such an assault?
"No higher," she said, trying to back away from his hands. The fire was behind her; she had nowhere to go.
"Nay?" he said, looking up at her as he held her skirts bunched in his hands. His eyes were shaded by the spikes of his lashes. He looked as wild as any cat "Then I will wash what I have revealed."