by Darci Hannah
Still pressed like an oatcake against Lord Kilwylie’s heaving body, and realizing that unless something happened soon, this absurd little standoff could go on indefinitely, I untied the heavy purse dangling from Sir George’s belt; after all, it was what Julius had come for. Thankfully the knight was entirely unaware of my roving hands, his thoughts and focus being elsewhere. I could feel how Julius’s mirth unnerved him, and he was desperately trying to land another blow as, prancing ever out of sword thrust, Julius guffawed like a drunken halfwit. The laughter stopped, however, when the coin-laden sack hit his tender, bloodstained stomach.
“There,” I said, thoroughly disgusted with the lot of them. “Take that and leave. All of you!”
His golden brow rose as appreciation lit his bright blue eyes. And then Julius looked at Sir George. An ironic grin touched his lips as he opened the fine leather pouch. Sir George, still holding me tightly, watched in deathlike stillness. After a mocking glance at the contents of the purse, Julius finally pulled from its depths a folded piece of paper. The broken red seal was familiar. “Here,” he said, walking over to Hendrick. “This, I believe, belongs to you.”
Hendrick took the note as Julius winked again at Marion.
“I sleep with my windows open,” she remarked, as if a simpleton.
“A fine habit indeed,” replied my brother with a simpleton’s smile. His gaze lingered over her in a bold disregard for propriety. He swayed slightly, from alcohol or the cut across his stomach, I didn’t know—likely both—and then, abruptly, he turned and called out to the Great Hall: “Gentlemen, the secret of being a good guest is to know when you have overstayed your welcome, and I believe we have reached the very limit of ours. Thank you, sister dear, for the entertainment. ’Tis been an age; we should really get together more often.”
“Once every four years is more than enough,” I said. But to this he just smiled and signaled for his men to retreat.
It was neatly done, a maneuver of swift military efficiency that swept through the hall with austere silence. Julius, his men, and all our silver were gone.
“There.” I let out a breath. “Now, if you’re quite finished, perhaps you would release me.” It was not a question but a request. Yet Sir George, and his arms, remained steadfast.
“My dear angel, not just yet. Not until I’ve explained.” It was then that I noticed he was looking not at me but at Hendrick, whose pale eyes, hard as pond ice, were shooting daggers at him.
Chapter 4
NOCTURNAL BLUNDERS
IF MARION HAD BEEN HUNGRY FOR ENTERTAINMENT, then she had gotten plenty of it. The enjoyable pastimes of music, poetry, dancing, and flirting seemed rather dull compared with being robbed by a notorious outlaw—right under my own roof—and with the King’s Guard and the highly trained army of a nobleman helpless to do anything but watch. Unfortunately, the notorious outlaw was my brother, my own flesh and blood. That he had been drunk was small comfort; that he had chosen to rob his ancestral home was an insult too deep to comprehend. And dear Marion. Where once she had been excited by the notion of an encounter with Julius, even she could not have been prepared for the debasing assault suffered in the Great Hall this evening. She had been rendered speechless, her thoughts distant, and she had even given up her attempt to seduce the noble Sir Matthew. Noticing this change in her demeanor, I had put her to bed myself, in my old room, and made her drink a mug of spiced wine while a hot brick traveled her cold sheets. Seeing to all the comforts I could, I then left her in the care of her servant, although hesitantly, and with the promise of kinder pursuits on the morrow. Traveling the dimly lit corridors back to my own chambers, I silently prayed she would not send word of this to her father, or wish to return home sooner than planned.
Although I was disturbed by this change in Marion, I was, on some level, grateful for her awestruck silence. Because tonight at Blythe Hall the gates of hell had been thrown open and Lucifer’s favorite son had come to call on me, illustrating quite thoroughly that even with the protection of the greatest knight in Scotland, Blythe Hall was still vulnerable. Poor Sir George. His armour proper had taken quite a blow, and because of it he was still here—a somewhat humbled, self-imposed guard before my bedchamber door.
“Will that be all, my lady?” Seraphina asked, finishing her nighttime ministrations and gently setting down the brush. Her round face with its high, rosy cheeks smiled at me through the large gilded mirror that had once belonged to my mother. Mme. Seraphina, bless her, was a short, plump, stalwart, no-nonsense kind of woman who had come from France many years ago to accompany another young noblewoman to this same desolate castle. Then, when Julius was born, she had been his nurse, and after five years with him—after all her nerves had been frayed and her hair turned white—I was born. Mme. Seraphina, possessing a mother’s love yet knowing her own limitations, claimed that my birth, however devastating it had been for the rest of the family, had been a godsend for her. This, I knew, was a sad untruth. I had taken the life of my mother, something I believed Julius and my father had never fully forgiven me for. Yet Julius had been kind to me when I was a child, and I remembered the kindness of my father as well, until he built his little chapel in the tower room.
It was Mme. Seraphina who held our family together. She was the one who had given us our love of music. And she had been in the Great Hall this evening when I had played the little harp. She had also witnessed the sad debacle that took place afterward. That she still loved Julius there could be no doubt; he was my mother’s son, and it was clear on her stoic face that he had broken her heart too.
I smiled softly back at her. “Thank you. And I think that will be all … unless you can persuade our large friend outside the door that he’s not needed.”
“I’ve already tried, my dear, but to no avail. If he were a smaller man, I’d persuade him with a firedog or the poker,” replied my wary governess, her jovial face now grim and bristling with indignation. Bless her, but Seraphina was a diligent guardian, and she could never pretend to like a man of Sir George’s reputation. “But I’m afraid,” she continued, “that with that thick hide of his, it would only serve to make him testy. And I’ve enough experience to know that it would never do to get a man that size testy. I count it a blessing he’s been humbled; he’d be a fool to step beyond the threshold this night. But we’ll bolt the door all the same.” And her full, ruddy cheeks dimpled in consternation as she marched to the doorway, her heavy skirts swishing around her plump ankles.
“Do as ye please. I’m not budging,” came a deep, plaintive voice from the other side of the door. Seraphina stopped mid-stride and looked askance at me. The voice continued. “I have laid myself at your feet, Isabeau, my love. I have offered my body for your protection, the very gesture of which I believe has escaped you. And how many times will you have me say that I am truly sorry?”
Still seated, I turned to the door and replied to the stout oaken slab: “I understand your fear of my brother, and I believe I’ve already accepted your apology. However, what I haven’t fully accepted is the fact that you used my body for your protection! Please explain to me again, if you can, where in your Chivalric Code—your rules of Knightly Honor—it is written to use the woman you proclaim to love as a human shield.” I rolled my eyes as much in exasperation as in disgust; Seraphina shook her head slowly in conspiratorial deprecation.
We were no sooner finished with our silent disparagement when the door burst open, startling us both. There, filling the immense door frame, stood the magnificent Sir George Douglas, every dark, brooding, bedraggled inch of him. The sight of such a man reduced to a self-chastised wretch caused a measure of pity to wash through me. I was not without feelings for this man, but neither was I pleased with his actions. He had professed that he did not fear Julius, but it could only be fear that had caused him to act so irrationally. As it was, I was not in the mood to argue. It had been late even before I went to see to the comforts of all my guests. One would think that the offer of
a private room and the promise of a warm bed would be welcomed, but Sir George had chosen instead to sleep on the hard floor outside my door. The ostensible reason was his noble concern for my protection; the real reason, I believed, was guilt. I had tried to explain that I was safer in Blythe Hall at this moment than I had ever been at Haddington. Besides our own men, we had two small armies: Sir Matthew’s men, who were now billeted in the Great Hall, and his own, who were given the entire second floor of the tower. Guards had been doubled in the gatehouse, thanks to Julius, and sentries walked the battlements as well as the courtyards. No one was getting into Blythe Hall this night. And Sir George, try as he might, was not going to linger in my bedchamber.
In contrast to the afternoon, his eyes were soft and pleading, his brown curls, now dry, tousled endearingly about his head as he implored, “Must you cling to that one horrible little instance? ’Tis as I told you before, Isabeau; you were never in any real danger.”
I was overtired, and this statement, delivered so glibly, caused my blood to boil. “Never in any real danger?” I sprang to my feet. “Are you so gravely depleted of common sense? Have you suffered one too many blows to the head? Forgive me for my concern, but you were conducting a sword fight with my brother while pressing me to your body like a fleshy, ill-fitting breastplate! Unless my eyes deceived me, you were using real swords. How was I not in any real danger?”
“You were not ill-fitting at all, my dear,” he said, attempting to diffuse my anger. “In fact, I think you’ll agree that you fit rather nicely.” I was incredulous. He was making light of the situation, and my jaw went slack at the remark. I looked at Seraphina for guidance, and bless her, she motioned to the fireplace across the room, asking with her eyes, Shall I grab the firedog now? I gave a small shake of my head and brought my focus back to Sir George.
“I hope, for your sake, that you’re not trying to tell me you used a deadly confrontation with my brother as an excuse to get me into your arms … again.”
His green eyes looked entirely guileless as he said, “I have been trying for quite some time now, Isabeau. After our first intoxicating encounter in that dark little corner of Linlithgow, I cannot get you out of my mind. Forgive me, but I am like a man possessed.”
His mention of that night in Linlithgow Palace evoked the memory, and suddenly, quite against my will, I was there, a young woman fresh from the priory at the king’s request. I had engaged Sir George in conversation earlier that day, but I had not expected him to be waiting for me in the corridor, or to have taken my hand and pulled me into the darkened corner as he had, where his soft and eager lips felt free to explore my own. I was appalled by his boldness, but I never expected that his musky, leather-and-ale scent would have affected me so, or that I would so thoroughly respond to his kisses. It had taken nearly all my resolve, and the fortuitous arrival of Tam, my dear groom, to pry him off me. I shook my head to expel the memory. “I was on my way to bed,” I stated tersely. “You surprised me and took advantage of my sleep-addled mind.”
“If you’ll remember correctly, I believe you were quite thoroughly awakened,” he offered in a tone that implied what we both already knew. Anger and shame welled within me, and I struggled mightily to keep it in check. Yet Sir George was a perceptive man, and he added softly, “Some call me an impulsive man, and that night I was. Impulse, not intelligence, drove me to wait in the darkness by your chamber door. Had I been thinking correctly, I would have never done it, but I was not thinking correctly. What I was thinking, if it makes any difference, was that I could not let the night end without tasting you. And taste you I did, but instead of satiating a need, it only ignited my hunger, and ever since that night I have been driven to want more. Don’t look at me like that, Isabeau! Don’t pretend you don’t feel it too. I have come here to make amends for my past behavior, yes. And although I have ached to have you in my arms again, what happened tonight—holding you in the manner I had—was not just another drunken attempt to fondle you but a very real attempt to protect you as well as Blythe Hall.”
The notion was absurd, yet nonetheless the thought of his recent affront to my person—the desperate embrace, the masculine scent that clouded my thoughts, the heat of his body and the hardness of it against my own—had elicited a rush of such hot-blooded emotion, I was quite disturbed by it. I looked at him again and knew, without question, that Sir George Douglas had a powerful hold over me. To my knowledge he had never had any trouble convincing any woman of his undeniable charms before, and in fact, as I recalled he had quite a list of conquests already attached to his name. It was part of the reason I had resisted him so thoroughly, not wanting to be another; the other part was too entangled in the painful memories of my brother to understand. But he was compelling …
A cough, overly loud and obviously forced, coming from the direction of the diligent Seraphina pulled me back to my senses. I was still looking at Sir George, but the smile had gone from my lips, and they tightened still more as I proclaimed: “You drew your sword!”
He smiled in response and spoke gently, if not a little condescendingly. “My dear, gentle lamb, you forget: I knew your brother very well at one time. In spite of what you might think—regardless of the steel slashing about—Julius would never harm a hair on your head, especially in a room full of witnesses.”
“You knew my brother once, but you certainly don’t know him now. Nobody does. It’s been four years, Sir George. I wanted the chance to talk with him … to make him see the foolishness of what he was about. But I never got that chance because you grabbed me and drew your sword, encouraging him to shred me to ribbons.”
He shook his head slowly, his face fraught with concern. “Is that really what you think? Then again, I must beg your forgiveness. I knew you would never understand my motives, but that was the risk I had to take. I knew he was coming here, Isabeau. I knew when the first rumors of his arrival were whispered in the corners of the most disreputable of places that he would eventually seek you out—you who are so good and gentle, who are so kind that you are blinded by your own endearing naïveté. And that is exactly the reason you should not be here alone. One cannot bargain with the insane. One does not reason with the devil. Your brother is a dangerous, unprincipled man. Holding you in the manner that I had was not chivalrous, but it was the only way I could gain leverage … to wrest the grasp of power from him, and it worked.”
He was right, it had worked. Yet his actions had unnerved me. I crossed my arms and glared. “You should have at least let me speak with him.”
“And what?” he replied softly. “Risk kidnapping? Did it ever cross your mind that you are, without doubt, the most valuable object in this old ruin?” And then Sir George started forward.
“Valuable?” I uttered, my eyes never leaving his. I was feeling suddenly flushed and a little ill. Mme. Seraphina, aware of my unease, jumped to her duty.
“You’ll stay right there, young man.” Her cheerful, round face darkened impressively; add to that her girth and implacable stance, and she would have put a mastiff to shame. Sir George, thankfully, had the presence of mind to obey, yet he continued to address me.
“You do understand that with King James as your guardian Julius could demand the world and he’d pay it? Did you think it would be prudent to risk that? If you won’t think of yourself, Isabeau, if you won’t acknowledge that Julius is a lost cause, a murderous outlaw, a man whose very life was forfeit the moment he stepped onto these shores, then at least think of your country.”
“My country?” I uttered. “But I love my country.”
“I know you do. Why else would you risk so much to come here? I know you do, my dear lass,” he repeated softly, mesmerizingly, and began walking toward me again, sidestepping Seraphina and keeping her at arm’s length while perfectly ignoring the warning in her eyes. “And that is why I had to take you in hand before Julius did. Do you understand?” He was standing directly before me, his splendid green eyes imploring my face, my lips, my hea
ving bosom, before finally settling back on my eyes. His large, battle-calloused hands took hold of mine, and I felt again his undeniable power.
“I know you don’t want to believe it, but your brother is the worst kind of enemy to have.” His gentle voice softened the harsh words he wished me to hear. “Julius is at once brilliant and charming; he draws you in like a moth to a flame—a dance of seduction so alluring you’ll risk anything just to bask in his aura. I know. I was one of those who fell under his spell. But his heart, Isabeau, is as twisted and cold as the devil’s own, and he’d as soon as cut out your heart and eat it as he would kiss your hand. How cunning he is; how quick his men are to follow him. He has a natural gift for leadership but an unnatural hunger to wield his influence over those he leads. Any one of those poor wretches who now follow him would gladly lay down his life if he but asked it. And he will ask it, Isabeau. Mark my words; he will ask it before he is done here. And he will win many souls for Satan. Time has not healed Julius, my poor, dear little angel; it has only made his hunger greater.”
As Sir George spoke—as his eyes held mine—I realized I was shaking. Like an oncoming storm, the shaking began with subtle tremors, stirring my body with a gentle, enlivening wave, yet as I held the knight’s huge hands the tremors grew in strength, until my teeth rattled in my head. It was Seraphina who finally broke his powerful hold by yanking me away.
Clutching me firmly in her protective arms, she chided the knight with more passion than I had seen her display in a long while. “You are frightening the child! You speak of my lady’s brother, and the other soul she prays for nightly. She has witnessed for herself already what kind of man Julius is without hearing stories from you. Can you not see how it weighs heavy on her heart? And before you malign Master Julius,” she said, still using my brother’s hereditary title, “you might wish to explain how it was he found you in possession of the king’s message.”