She couldn’t deny the Sighting, but she had misdirected her cousin’s men toward Rome instead, while she made plans to visit Pictland, and the father she’d never met. When Childebert traced her escape—and he would—to a fishing vessel that left from Calais, he’d assume she had gone to the closest port in Londinium. He’d not, she hoped, look for her this far north.
But what to tell the darkly brooding Eros standing in front of her?
“I come from Armorica, across the sea.”
He frowned. “Ye’re a long way from home, then. How came ye here?”
How should she answer? Twenty to thirty red-cloaked cavalry, looking for all the world like a turma from the old Roman legions, had surrounded her small escort and taken them away last night. Dion, the sturdy captain of her loyal guard, had rallied their defense, but he had been wounded badly, slung over a horse, and taken, along with the rest of the men. If Deidre hadn’t wandered a little too far into the cover of the trees to insure privacy for her personal ministrations, she would have been abducted, too.
She clutched her satchel with The Book inside; thank goodness it had contained items she’d needed to use and she’d taken it with her. It was all she had. She hated having to lie, but she had no idea whose troops those were…perhaps even her hero’s. Until she reached her father’s lands, her identity would have to remain a secret.
“I…uh…was traveling and our coach was accosted by highwaymen. I just barely managed to escape.”
He raised a dark eyebrow. “My da willna be pleased to hear that. Were ye coming to Culross? Do ye have family near?”
Culross on the Firth of Forth was close to her destination. Or, at least, where she thought Caw’s lands would be. “Yes.”
Gilead stopped and was apparently waiting for her to continue. “My mother is dead.” No need to tell him how long ago or that she thought her father’s holdings would be a good place to search from. “I am kin to Caw of Pictland,” she said. “I was hoping he’d take me in. Do you know him?”
“Aye. His wife is a distant relative of my mother’s.” His face softened momentarily. “But, lass, Caw was long banished to the West. He was killed in battle not long ago.”
Deidre drew her breath in sharply. Since her visions of the Stone had begun again, her goal had been to reach Caw. Childebert did not know who her father was, and she would have been safe. She swallowed hard to keep the threat of panic from bubbling up. She’d need food and lodging now that she was on her own, and somewhere to start finding out what happened to her escort. “I will need to find employment, then.”
He looked skeptical as he turned back to the path. They continued to walk even more briskly. Deidre hiked her skirts up farther in order to match his stride, and again, his glance swooped down. A small smile flitted briefly across his face. Enough to get that delicious tingle started again.
His voice was gentler when he spoke. “My mother will find ye something. Mayhap as a lady’s maid.”
“A maid?” Deidre nearly bumped into him as they turned a sharp corner and he abruptly stopped. They had left the trees behind and the path they were on converged with a wider road that led up a steep hill to a stone castle. Well, perhaps more of a fort, she realized as she studied it. She saw how earthwork banks were laid out defensively as they climbed the incline. It was steeper than she thought, and she saved her breath for exertion, since Gilead had quickened the pace instead of slowing it. Did that devastating bulk of muscle never get winded? Apparently not.
Metal ratcheted wheels clacked, and chains rattled as the massive, heavy oak gates slowly opened at their approach. Gilead looked down at her as they waited and a corner of his full mouth quirked up, giving him more the look of a fallen angel.
“Ye might be putting yer skirts down now. It’d be best if the men dinna think ye a wanton.”
She felt herself flush crimson. She knew that. Modesty had been drilled into her at the Frankish court under the strict tutelage of her prudish aunt Clotilde. Most of it hadn’t stuck, to her aunt’s frustration, but it was his fault she’d had to hike her skirt to her knees, anyway. Furiously, she shook it out, only to have the hem in back tangle itself. “If you’d adjusted your pace to meet mine like a proper courtier…”
The quirk widened to a slow, lopsided grin as he bent over to smooth the lower folds, his fingers just barely brushing her calf. The touch had been so light, Deidre wasn’t sure if he’d done it intentionally or it was an accident. Either way, the unfamiliar warmth zapped right up her leg to pulse at the juncture of her thighs, setting her active imagination into spirals. What would a real caress from him feel like? His face was passive, though, as he straightened and gestured her through the arch.
Deidre stared up at the bowmen standing on the battlements as they passed through the thick curtain wall. The palisade had to be at least fifty feet high. Armed warriors stood five paces apart on the battlements. The place was impressively fortified. Ahead of them, across the bailey, sat the Great Hall.
“What does your mother do here?” she asked tentatively as Gilead stopped at the solid wooden door and knocked.
For a moment, he looked puzzled. “She’s the lairdess,” he answered, “of Cenel Oengus.” When Deidre frowned, he sighed. “Cenel—a clan—my father is Angus Mac Oengus. Ye Bretons would call him a king. We refer to him as a laird.”
“You’re a king’s son?” Deidre began and then stopped when the door swung open and a maid bobbed a greeting. She didn’t have time to ask any more questions, for Gilead quickly explained that she was to be given a room for the night and his mother would see her in the morning. He gave her a slight bow and turned away.
Deidre stared after his broad, retreating back. Was he still so eager to meet his liaison? Her shoulders drooped. She had just met her knight—rightly a prince he was—and he thought she was a servant. Even worse, she couldn’t tell him that she, too, had royal blood, her lineage going back through the Merovingians to the Sicambrians and Arcadians and eventually to the Magdalen herself. Still another reason Childebert discouraged suitors. He didn’t want her to bear an heir more royal than himself.
Gilead dripped sensuality in that charming, unaffected way of acting honorably and seemingly not knowing he was the most erotic fantasy that ever trod through her fertile mind, thanks in part to the escapades The Book described of Lancelot and Gwenhwyfar. Had Gilead shown any interest at all? Her emerging libido conjured up the image of her sensual god in a kilt. Those strong, well-muscled thighs exposed… she wondered what a “mon” wore under a kilt, anyway. Clotilde would need more than smelling salts if she ever knew that all her Bible-thumping chastity served was to whet Deidre’s appetite for the forbidden pleasures a man might give. Now that she had broken loose from her aunt and cousin’s restraints, Deidre was more than ready to find out exactly what those pleasures were.
Deidre giggled and then sobered. She’d have to show some decorum and act like a lady, or she’d end up as a scullery maid instead. As she had seen this evening, those women were commonly tumbled. Somewhere on this side of the Channel was a land where knights abided by a code of honor and respected women. They were supposed to pledge themselves to a lady.
Did Gilead already have a lady? She panicked a moment, and then released her breath in a whoosh. Probably not, if he were out rutting like everyone else. How could she get him to notice her without behaving like a wanton he would not respect? She sighed. Judging from Gilead’s hasty departure, she doubted she’d impressed the laird’s son at all.
****
Gilead cursed softly as he quickly made his way down the road from the fort. For certes, his father’s trail would be cold now. He’d lost him taking the lass back to the Hall, but what else could he have done? Clearly, Niall MacDouglas was bent on raping her. Gilead gritted his teeth. Their neighbor was a ruthless laird, but his lands were strategically located between Culross and the infernal, warmongering Fergus of Cenel Loairn to the northwest. His father needed Niall as an ally, not an enemy
.
By the Dagda! His father courted more than enough trouble by being besotted with the Briton King Turius’s wife. Ever since Gilead had come of age, nigh five years ago, he’d tried to keep them apart when the king and queen visited. It wasn’t easy though, for Angus and Queen Formorian were like two long-drawn notes blending on a bagpipe.
He groaned as he left the road and ducked into the forest, following a deer path that led to a secluded clearing near the Firth. Why did King Turius and that siren queen of his have to arrive on Beltane? If they had waited just one more day, Angus would have had to host a proper feast for them, and Gilead could have made sure there was no opportunity for his father to slip away with the vixen. But no. On Beltane, men got drunk and whorishness ran rampant. And Angus had made sure Turius had plenty to drink, as well as the company of several curvaceous wenches.
Gilead cursed again when he found the clearing empty. What other niche could his father have taken her to? It would be dawn soon, and he wasn’t sure either of them had enough sense to be back in their own beds by then. It was why he had tried to follow them. He shook his head. He would never allow himself to become besotted over any woman—look what it did to his otherwise intelligent father. Even though Turius had fathered a son on a pagan priestess years ago, Gilead doubted that he’d appreciate being cuckolded by his Scotti friend and ally.
As he stepped out on the road, a hearty voice slurred at him.
“Aye, Gil. Huntin’ yer Da again?”
He turned to see his friend Drustan walking toward him, an arm casually draped across the shoulders of a girl Gilead recognized from the kitchen staff. She giggled drunkenly as Drustan nuzzled her neck.
Gilead frowned. Did everyone know of his father’s indiscretion? “Certes not. I was checking the grounds.”
Drustan lifted an eyebrow and grinned. “Well, then. There’re still plenty of lassies yonder that won’t mind a wee bit of wooing from ye. Might even be a fresh one if ye look hard.”
The thought of a woman with another man’s juices inside her was not exactly arousing. Now the bonny lass he’d escorted to the Hall and the sight of her well-turned, slender ankle… He pushed the thought away. Unbelieving as he was of her story, she was dressed as a high-born lady and she needed to be protected, just like his poor mother, who pretended not to know what was going on. Still, he hadn’t been able to resist that one brief brush against the lassie’s flesh as he smoothed her skirt. Even now, he remembered how the heat of that touch had pricked his hand. Better not to think about it.
“Not tonight, Drus.”
His friend shook his head as he pulled his willing wench toward some gorse. “Beltane. Even ye’re allowed to lower the barriers ye keep erected so high about ye.”
Gilead turned to make his way up the incline. Those walls were in place for a reason. Relationships with women were trouble. If they cared too much, like his mother, they got hurt, and he had no wish to bring misery to a woman. What was worse, though, women used their wiles to befuddle a mon’s brain and made him throw caution to the winds. Like his Da.
War with the powerful Briton king they didn’t need. Not when the Saxons were raiding the northeasterly shores, much too close for comfort. Turius had managed to hold them to the fens of eastern Britain and was here now to help Angus develop strategy for the North. Formorian could very well ignite something more explosive than scrimmaging with Saxon invaders. Bah. Better to stick to women who willingly took silver coin for their services. Certes, he’d never let a woman addle his wits.
Unbidden, Deidre drifted into his mind again. Dee. The lass with the odd accent was most comely, with her pert nose, aquamarine eyes, and long, moonlight-colored hair. He had to admit, he liked the way her chin came up defiantly when he’d pressured her to keep up the pace. Not to mention having a glimpse of shapely legs…wee thing that she was, he could easily lift her and wrap those legs around his waist as he pressed her against a wall…With some surprise, he felt his member thicken and harden, jutting itself against his trews. He had no right to be thinking such lecherous thoughts about the poor lass. She was orphaned and alone and—if her story was true—had been waylaid by bandits, not to mention nearly raped this eve. After what she’d been through, the last thing she’d want was for yet another mon to make unwelcome advances. No. He would not become his father. His duty as the laird’s son was to be sure she was safe from such things.
He sighed as he headed home. The thought of her lush lips softly pressing against his, did nothing to diminish the bulge straining to be released.
◊♦◊
“I think ye’ll find everything ye need,” the young maid said as they climbed the stairs and she opened the door to a small corner room off the main hallway. “There’s peat laid in the brazier and the flint’s there.” She pointed to a tinderbox. “Chamber pot’s behind the screen.” She paused, looking curiously at Deidre, as though she was not sure if the young woman was a real guest or not.
Deidre smiled pleasantly and nodded. The girl sighed, apparently not ready to take the chance of insulting someone who might be important. She picked up the earthenware pitcher. “I’ll fetch ye some hot water for washing, then.”
When she had gone, Deidre looked around the room. Heavy tapestries hung along the walls, blocking some of the damp that seeped through the thick, grey stone. A small window was shuttered against the chilling breeze that came off the water she could hear rushing over stones far below. Next to the chest that held the Samian-ware chamber set stood an intricately carved wardrobe. A polished wooden table and two chairs were along the opposite wall.
Deidre went over to the tinderbox tentatively. She had no clue how to strike enough sparks to get the fire going, since her thin, waspish aunt was always cold and servants kept the fires burning at the Frankish court.
The little maid returned with the water and a bar of scented soap. Good. Maybe the maid would think she was an invited guest. Deidre smiled at the girl.
“Would you mind lighting the fire, please? I’m afraid I’ve never had to learn…” The maid bobbed her head and hurried to do her bidding. Deidre’s smile faded as she remembered that Gilead thought she was a maid, too, and she’d probably be lighting these very same fires herself soon. Mayhap it would behoove her to pay attention.
“I know Gilead didn’t tell you this…” She stopped at the way the maid’s eyes had widened. “What is it?”
“Well, mum, ye’re to call him Master Gilead…that is, unless ye’re…ye’re…”
“I’m what?”
The girl colored deeply and looked away. “Unless ye’re his leman.”
Leman? Mistress? The idea of Gilead coming to her chamber, baring those massive shoulders and chest as he ripped off his tunic before taking her down on the bed, his weight pinning her beneath him… “Yes, yes, yes,” the eager rescued damsel whispered. “No, no, no,” her aunt’s cold, authoritative voice rebuked her. The reluctant virgin pouted as her practical side took over.
“Ah. Forgive me,” Deidre said to the maid. “Master Gilead saved me from a boorish man this evening. My name is Deidre. I was waylaid by bandits a day ago and have gotten quite a bump on my head.” She forced a light laugh. “I seem to have forgotten my manners.”
The maid looked her over, more curiously than before. “I’m Anna. If it’s a bad bump ye have, ye should be seein’ our healer in the morning.”
“I’m sure I’ll be fine by morning. I’m looking forward to the pleasure of meeting the laird and his wife.”
A closed expression crossed the young girl’s face as she walked to the door. “The pleasure?” she muttered as she closed the door behind her.
Deidre stared at the door. What did that mean? She was too tired to worry about it. She sat down on the coverlet, sinking into surprisingly soft feather down. The bed swayed slightly on its leather webbing.
She rubbed her temples, aware suddenly of how truly weary she was. With the news that her father was dead, she needed to find her escort and
she needed to find the Stone before her cousin did. But part of her tension came from the fact that every nerve ending tingled in anticipation—of what, exactly, she wasn’t sure—whenever she was near Gilead. The air around them vibrated with the sharp, clear tang that she had smelled once just as a bolt of lightning split a mighty oak tree near her. Her hair had stood on end that time, too.
She quivered with excitement, her energy suddenly renewed. She was on the other side of the Narrow Channel now, where Camelot should be. She pulled The Book from her satchel and soothed herself with fingering the rich texture of the soft, worn leather. Did Camelot exist? Was it here? Tomorrow, would she find an idyllic place of peace and prosperity, of courtly feasts complete with bards and jesters? Unlike the drab dreariness and stark, cold walls of the Frankish court, would there be colorful pageantry and chivalrous knights sallying forth in tournaments to win favors from their ladies? She had always thought her own knight would be as noble and peerless as the legendary Lancelot, and love her as fiercely as Lancelot did Gwenhwyfar. She wanted that with all her heart.
And she’d found him. The Sight had led her here. Gilead was her knight. The only problem was how to convince him.
Chapter Two
THE HANDFAST
Deidre was awakened the next morning by a brisk rapping on the door. Sleepily, she struggled to sit up in bed. The fire in the brazier had burned out, leaving the room chilly and nearly dark. By the saints, it was hardly light outside! What time was it? Was this not a civilized household?
She had no more time for thinking, for the door swung open and one of the largest women she had ever seen strutted through. The woman wasn’t fat; she was just huge. Nearly six feet she must be, and solid. Deidre blinked as she came to a stop beside the bed, hands on her broad hips.
My Noble Knight Page 2