“Aye. Have you seen aught that would serve?”
Adam remembered the ring turned palm to that Mathilda wore. “Only on the lady. And she’s an unlikely candidate. She already possesses the castle. If the ring was given her to hold, however, by someone… Nay, it does not make sense that she would hold a king’s seal. What would it serve? And why wear it for everyone to see?”
“Is there aught else I should find out in Winchester?” Christopher stood up and looked cautiously about.
“I want to know why Francis’ father has sent his lady here. Francis is naught but a boy and the mother a harpy. What is the man thinking?”
“Consider the question asked. Where shall we meet?”
“How about the village well, after dawn on the day after tomorrow?”
Christopher agreed and Adam watched the minstrel fade into the foliage before heading down to the river.
The sun had not yet fallen behind the treetops, but he saw Mathilda and a servant walking along the bank. The man’s back bowed under the weight of a huge pack. They were early. “How very flattering,” he mused.
Adam sat on a flat rock, one knee raised, an elbow thrown around it as if he’d been waiting there for hours. He watched her progress. She had the air of making an entrance though there were no doors or arches to pass through.
He jumped to his feet and swept her a bow when she drew near. “Welcome, my lady, I’m pleased you chose to sup with me.”
She curtsied. “It is I who am pleased to grant your small wish. Would that each desire presented to me were so easily met.”
The servant set out a blanket and cushions for the lady and unpacked cold meat and cheese, wine and fruit.
“Heron,” Mathilda said, offering him a meaty leg of fowl. “I’m particularly fond of it.”
“A noble bird.” Adam accepted the offering.
She took a leg for herself. Adam hid a smile over the way she nibbled up and down the bone. If Hugh saw this, he would have many quips and jests to make about cocks and feasts.
The servant removed himself a few paces and sat with his back to them.
Mathilda had garbed herself in a rich cream from head to toe. Pearls graced her throat, wrists, and breast. She looked ready for a king’s banquet, not a riverside supper. A flash of movement over her shoulder caught his eye.
Mon Dieu. Joan walked across the distant field with her dogs. He forced himself to look at Mathilda’s sparkling splendor.
Silence fell. Adam searched for something to say. “I thank you for handling Roger this morning.”
“Do not thank me. I put a penny in each place for just such an eventuality.”
“It was well thought out, then.”
Mathilda arched her back and leaned on her hands. The posture thrust her bosom at him. The offering did little for Adam save make him think that she must be very uncomfortable.
“I cannot take the credit,” she said. “It is what Joan used to do when Brian and my brother competed. They argued so that she finally settled it one day. A penny in each toss. The penny the marker. She’s clever.”
“Aye.” Adam drank from his goblet of wine. He would not discuss Joan.
Over Mathilda’s shoulder, Joan’s hounds sat in a neat row like students before a master. Suddenly the dogs burst past her, circled, returned, and seated themselves.
It was magical.
Mathilda offered him an apple. “I’m glad Joan attended the competition. She spends too much time with the dogs or Nat. He’s not her father, you know.”
“Brian told me.”
Mathilda patted his thigh. “She’s terribly afraid of mercenaries. You should watch your men around her.”
“I shall.” He must watch Mathilda’s hand as well.
“I believe Joan has been cheated in this life. I don’t know what she’ll do when Nat dies. No one would accept a female Master of the Hunt and she’s almost too old to marry. There are many younger women about who need a husband.”
“Perhaps she is content as she is.”
“Nonsense. She needs to put ribbons in her hair and wear pretty gowns, amuse herself.”
He bit into the apple.
“Do you not agree?” she asked.
“All women like to wear pretty clothes and deck themselves with ribbons and jewels. Why would she be any different?”
“Because she has been denied. My brother professed to love her. It infuriated my father—her so low, and Richard so high. My father ordered her from the hall. She was to hide herself away lest he see her and spend his anger on her.”
“So, she cowered in the kennels. Not very admirable.”
Joan’s dogs slunk low on their bellies, disappeared in the grass, then bounded up to return to their mistress. She lifted her hands and turned. The dogs swirled around her, then ran in all directions. He imagined the joy of her laughter at the animals’ antics.
Mathilda sat up straight and pointed a beringed finger at him. “Joan never cowered. She merely donned hunting clothes and went about her work. She never once complained or wept. I would have wept to be treated so.”
“And what did you do to alleviate the woman’s suffering?”
“I am sorry to say I did naught. I’m the coward. I had not courage to question my father’s decisions or orders.” She brought her arms forward and clasped her hands in her lap. Every finger bore a ring.
“I questioned mine all the time.” Adam held out his goblet to be filled. The servant withdrew again to a discreet distance.
“Tell me of your father.” Her face was as smooth as fine marble in the late afternoon sunlight. She looked like an angel carved for some cathedral monument.
“My father is ruled by his heart, not his head.”
“Ah. And you hold contempt for such beliefs.”
Adam stood up. “My father gave all he had to the woman he loves. He took off the mantle of his authority and stepped to her level.”
It occurred to him that Richard had been willing to do just that for Joan. “My father and my stepmother care for naught but my brother and a quintet of sisters I barely know.”
“A quintet. An omen. Five sisters.”
“Four of the girls are orphans my father and my stepmother gathered in over the years. Imps all, I understand from my brother.”
Mathilda rose and stood by his side. She asked the servant to go to the river and remain there until she called him.
“You must make a point of seeing your sisters,” she said, linking her arm through his. “They may need you one day, and you will be a stranger to them. They may hesitate to call upon you when they might desperately need your help.”
“Is that how you feel? You’ve no one to ask for help?”
She nodded and looked off across the fields where the dogs ran about with wild abandon. “Aye. My brother is gone. My father, too. Would that I had another brother.”
“What of Bishop Gravant?”
“He’ll do what’s best for the church. If I had a brother, I’d ask him to chose my husband.”
Under the guise of comforting her, Adam took her hand. “If you cannot choose, my lady, then all hell will reign here. The country and the king cannot have it so. You must know your mind. It will take courage. Look not to the man who can toss a stone the farthest. Look for a man who can hold this place and serve it with honor.”
“And are you that man of honor?”
“I believe I am. Tell me how I may succeed with you.”
She smiled. “Begin by paying less attention to Joan Swan.” She swept out her hand to the fields.
He bent his head, his skin as hot as if she’d held a brand to it. He raised her hand, turned it, and gently kissed the soft skin of her palm, noting again the ring turned palm in. “This is an interesting ring,” he said.
“This?” She plucked the ring off. It was bound with thread to fit her finger. It had been lodged beneath a cabochon ruby much like the one the bishop wore. The ruby swung toward her palm when she drew the other from
beneath it.
Adam’s fingers almost trembled when he took the seal ring and slid it on his hand. Without the thread it might fit his smallest finger. “Where did you get it?”
“I found it. Is the marking French?” Her head was very close to his as he examined the fleur-de-lis.
“Aye. French. May I keep it?”
“Throw it in the river, if you like.”
Chapter Twelve
Joan fussed for over an hour on her hair, cursing its wild ripples and sun-tainted streaks. She scrubbed her face until it hurt, then put on a bronze colored gown she’d not worn in over two years.
Nat entered the cottage as she picked up her mantle. “Where are you off to?”
“The same place as you—the hall. I was just coming to fetch you. Mathilda ordered us to sup with the company. Now wash your face and hands and put on a clean tunic.”
He put his fingers under her chin. “I’ll not see you unhappy. Isn’t de Harcourt here? Didn’t Lord Guy banish you from the hall?”
“Lord Guy is dead, Papa. This is Mathilda’s wish and we must obey.”
“Dead?” He shook his head. “I’d forgotten. Do you remember the time he set the hounds on Richard and Brian’s trail and found them in the forest lodge with those two strumpets—”
“I do not need to hear that tale, Papa. It is not for my ears. Now, no more stories. Wash up.”
When Joan entered the hall on Nat’s arm, she was pleased to see it crowded with strangers. No one would note their presence. They sat with many of Nat’s men and their wives, one with whom she shared a trencher of rich venison stew spiced with pepper and cloves.
Joan kept her mantle on until the hall grew so warm she had to shed it. Nat helped her lay it across the bench before she sat on it.
“I remember that gown,” he said. “Did you not stitch it for…” He frowned. “The last time you wore it, I had to go to the tavern, did I not?”
The rich sauce bubbled in Joan’s belly. She pressed a finger to her lips and nodded to the high table and Mathilda in hope of distracting him, though he often could not be deflected from a course by a simple gesture.
Mathilda tapped gently on her goblet.
Nat subsided but continued to watch Joan. She tried to distract him by linking her arm through his and whispering. “Mathilda is very lovely tonight. See, she wears her mother’s rubies. They match her gown.”
Nat swung his attention to the lady and Joan took a deep breath. Why had she worn this particular gown? To draw someone’s attention? What folly.
“We have reached that happy time for the giving of tokens. Adam Quintin?” Mathilda said.
Adam wore a blue tunic trimmed in black fur. He walked toward Mathilda without looking right or left, though several ladies and men snatched at his hem as he went by.
On the dais, Mathilda clipped a ribbon from her sleeve. A scarlet ribbon. He knotted it alongside the one already on his dagger hilt.
A hush fell over the hall. The air felt as heavy as it did before a storm broke. She knew what would happen, tried to look away, but failed.
Mathilda placed her hand flat on Adam’s chest. She rose on tiptoe at the same time he bent his dark head.
A fiery pain coursed Joan’s middle as their lips met. It was a longer kiss this time, less a touch of lips to lips and more a joining or pledge of some kind. Every moment of it hurt Joan’s skin, her throat, her middle. And worst of all, she didn’t know why.
The minstrel company beat on drums and the crowd cheered.
Not everyone. She did not. Nor Roger, or Francis de Coucy.
“Come, Nat. ‘Tis time for bed. You’ll want to be out early and look for another stag,” she said.
“Nay. Stay. See, the bishop is going to speak. To leave now may offend him.”
Joan subsided to her seat, folded her hands in her lap and admitted defeat.
The bishop smiled and bowed to Adam and Mathilda. “I believe we should make room for Quintin here at our table to save him this lengthy walk.”
Laughter broke out across the hall and Adam bowed, his fingers now linked in Mathilda’s. She smiled as a servant rushed forward to slide a stool next to her chair.
The bishop waited for the noise to abate before speaking.
“As everyone knows, we will hold a fair on the morrow—a special fair to honor our suitors and please the ladies who accompany their men. But beware, suitors, even the market will be a test.”
* * * * *
Adam shifted uncomfortably on his stool despite its thick, embroidered cushion. A test at a fair? Mon Dieu. What could that encompass? What did he know about the price of goods?
Mathilda joined the minstrels and took up one of their lyres. She strummed along while Christopher sang about Adam’s boar kill.
Hugh topped off Adam’s cup of wine.
“Did you drink sour milk?” Adam asked his friend.
Hugh’s scowl deepened. “Worse. I’ve been asked to escort Lady Mathilda to the fair on the morrow. I’m not even vying for her hand, yet cannot refuse her.”
“Why would she ask you? I should be insulted.”
“I think Mathilda needs a respite from those who curry her favor. You must help me slip the duty. Why don’t you deliver my excuses and offer to act in my place?”
Hugh’s face flushed a bright red. Blotches of color stained his neck.
“Let me see…an excuse… How about, you become ill when asked to bargain for ribbons and thread?”
Hugh grunted and frowned.
“Or, you could say you injured yourself falling off your horse and cannot ride or walk.”
“But then I could not attend the hunting. And that would deprive me of the huntress.”
Adam shot to his feet. “Think up your own damned excuse. I’ll offer myself as escort in your place, but I’ll not be party to your lies.”
* * * * *
Joan saw Nat settled for the night. She paced in front of the cottage, waiting for Adam Quintin to return to his quarters in the bailey. When she saw him, alone fortunately, she said a small prayer for strength, then headed for his tent. She knew the color was meant to intimidate his opponents, but she found it worked on her senses just as it would on any man. Her heart began to beat faster, her palms broke out in sweat.
The guard was not the amiable Douglas. This man stared at her from beneath a ridge of bushy, brown eyebrows. She asked him if Adam would see her. The man disappeared into the tent, then returned, and held the entry way open for her.
Adam’s tent was divided into two parts, the fore of which he used for conducting business or entertaining. It held a folding table and several camp chairs. Everything looked worthy of a king, from the wax candles to the chair carved with Adam’s V. She was glad she’d not changed her gown to something more serviceable.
He sat at the table, a brace of candles near his hand. Beside the candle lay a whetstone and a long dagger decorated with topaz. He stood up, one eyebrow raised in question.
She curtsied but turned her gaze to her toes. “I have made a most unfortunate discovery.”
He brought one of the chairs forward. When she remained standing he said, “Please. I’m too weary to stare up at you. Sit. Now, what is this unfortunate discovery?”
She sat on the edge of the chair, still unable to meet his gaze. She cleared her throat. “I’ve been trying all day to find a way to solve my problem without involving you, but I fear it cannot be done.”
“This sounds ominous.”
His tone was light, and she looked up to see if he mocked her. His gaze was steady and even…kind?
“Nat wagered far more than I thought,” she said.
“How do you know?”
“Oswald, Lord Roger’s hunt master, informed me of the misfortune this morning.”
Adam went to a coffer. He opened it and pulled out a small cask. He picked up a key from the table, inserted it into the lock, and the lid fell back. It was full of pennies. “How much do you need?”
“Nay. I did not come here to ask you for more money. It is just I have discovered…that is…I do not know how I can ever repay you what you have already lent me.”
Her fingers hurt from gripping them together. He reached forward and took her hands in his. He ran his thumbs over her knuckles.
“You have no need to repay me. It was not a loan, but recompense. As I told you, I thought Roger and Oswald had cheated Nat. And as you can see, I can spare the money, so please, forget ‘twas I who gave it.”
“I wish I could.”
Her eyes gleamed in the candles’ glow. They were wide and as dark as the water in a mountain tarn. He could drown in them. Her bronze gown shimmered with each movement of her body. He cleared his throat. “I suspect Oswald’s claim is but another cheat. Do not worry about returning my money. It was a gift, not a loan, do you understand?”
She shook her head.
He stared up at the peak of the tent for a moment, then took up her hands again. He rubbed his thumb across the back, enjoyed the softness of her skin, the heat of it, the sprinkling of tawny freckles there.
“If it would make you more comfortable, let us make our own bargain. You shall repay me one penny at a time, to be given whenever you are able.”
Her gown shimmered almost gold as she bobbed her head in agreement.
“And for every penny you repay, I shall kiss you once in the center of the bailey before whomever might chance to be there. Agreed?”
Her mouth dropped open. He placed his fingertips under her chin and closed her mouth. “Is that a bargain you can make? Every penny you give me, I shall give you a kiss in the center of the bailey.”
She licked her lips. He felt a sharp punch of desire. In truth, he wanted to kiss her now, draw her to his bed, slide his hands across the shimmery fabric over her breasts, kiss them as well.
Abruptly, she leapt to her feet. “I-I, that is—”
He stood up slowly and closed the small distance between them. A kind of hot madness possessed him and his throat felt tight. “I want you to understand the kind of kiss you will get for your penny.”
He wrapped his arms around her and brought his mouth to hers. It took her a moment to kiss him back, a few more moments to bring up her hand and rest it on his thundering heart. He covered her hand, drew her even closer, and in doing so, felt the press of her soft breast on the back of his fingers.
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