Sir Giles’s dark blue eyes bulged, as they always did when he was crossed. “They are serfs, man! Mine to do with as I please! A few examples will see the rest fall into place.”
“As they did before,” said Mark.
“What was that?”
“Nothing, my lord. I was merely thinking aloud.”
Sir Giles pointed his riding whip at Mark. “I have not forgotten the other matter, and nor should you. Our leaving is only a putting-off. This is not a retreat, merely a regrouping.”
“I have eyes and sense, my lord.” He already knew that Giles had escorted Ranulf and his lady back to the camp and received only grudging praise and no invitations to stay for the evening. “I know you aim to gull the black knight into thinking that his damsel prize is safe.” He shrugged. “A similar scheme half worked before, did it not?”
Without deigning to reply, Sir Giles galloped away. When the dust had settled, Mark made a play of studying the chessboard again.
He had not thought of Warren Hemlet for months. They had killed the priest there, as well as the villagers.
Or had they?
He remembered the priest—calm, a good shepherd, a natural leader. None of the villagers had fought and all had given up their tools before entering the church, seemingly resigned to their fate. Sir Giles had scoffed at their cowardice, but had it been more than that? Had the priest planned more?
It was time for him to ride alone to Warren Hemlet to find out.
Chapter 29
Her former master still had not recognized her. Nor had he offered a ride to Maria—such fine manners clearly did not apply to a mere maid. He had ridden his horse close beside her, but he had not dismounted to walk with her—in Edith’s eyes a deliberate discourtesy.
She had scarcely cared. Glad of Ranulf’s cloak and shielding hood, she had walked beside Maria, offering her friend her arm as the slope through the wood increased. A dozen steps ahead, ahead of the plodding horses, Ranulf had been deep in conversation with Teodwin. Had she not been so anxious over his reaction to her confession, Edith would have giggled at the pair of them: one so tall and lean and muscled, rangy in dark green and gold—did Ranulf know his tunic picked up some of the colors in his dark, mostly brown eyes?—the other almost a head shorter, stocky, limping, dressed in faded purple. Through the crackle of dry grass and fallen leaves, Maria’s loud breathing and her baby’s snuffling, the rattle of the horse reins and creaking saddles, Edith had not been able to hear them—nor could Giles or his men—but she could read their lips. It was a skill she had acquired through working in the forge, and it was with her still.
“Can we not discover a better name than Many for the girl? She cannot have been christened with that.”
“Pardon me, my lord, I should have said. Her name is Lucy. I heard your page calling her that and she confirmed it.”
“Seems Gawain has flourished, taking care of others. He certainly learns more than the rest of us. Very well, Lucy she is.”
“She is a pleasant, biddable girl, my lord.”
Ranulf had given the shorter, older man a single, searching glance, nodded approval, and moved to other matters. “I think it time we were packing up and leaving.”
“I think so, too, my lord.” Teodwin pointed to the churchyard, where all was still quiet. “They are still for now, but who can say for how much longer?”
Ranulf frowned. “I think their desire for blood has been quenched for the moment, but I will set men to watch. And we should start to fill the wagons at once.”
“I agree.” Teodwin was a dutiful echo, far more acquiescent with Ranulf than he ever had been with her, Edith thought resentfully.
“Good! Shall we say that we move two days from now? The weather is good, the camps will be shifted quickly. We can even harvest on the way, if needs must.”
“I agree, my lord.”
Teodwin—her steward—had not even checked with her. Ranulf had begun to speak of the gifts he intended to leave with Lady Blanche. He had said something to Giles that she could not now recall and the two knights had exchanged a few terse words. Then the camp had been within sight and Giles had galloped off, with only the briefest farewell.
Edith was glad he was gone. She was glad to find her tent still standing. She was glad to greet her people. All the while, as Many—Lucy now—and Maria cooed over each other’s babies, she was aware of waiting.
Finally the summons she was expecting came. “Come, Princess. I must look to my own camp and I would have you with me.”
I am his prize again, she thought as she silently complied. But for how long can I be both prize and princess? She wished she had more time to think. She wished she knew what would happen this coming evening. She wished, if she and Ranulf were to be married, that he would say something of this to her people, to his people.
She looked at her ugly, bare hands and tried to imagine Ranulf’s betrothal ring on her finger. Would he give her a ring? He must have given Olwen a ring. Would she, too, have Ranulf’s ring?
Am I hoping for too much? Is it not enough that he is a strong protector?
“You are very quiet,” he remarked after a few steps.
Edith noted that his other men had dropped back so they would be private. So that he could praise or scold her?
“I am thinking, my lord.”
He clasped her hand in his. “I like ‘Ranulf’ better.”
Telling herself to be as bold as a princess, she raised his hand to her lips and kissed it. His skin felt as hot as a glowing forge.
He winked at her. “Soon, Princess.”
Feeling a little more confident, she deliberately did not ask, but changed the subject. “Do we go to the castle today? Do you not think we should?”
In answer—which was no reply at all—he lifted her hand to his lips and nibbled her fingers, catching her little finger in his mouth and sucking on it. A bolt of pleasure shot down her arm and glowed in her loins.
“I wager I can tease as well as you, now I know your weakness, little maid.” Tugging gently on her hand, he drew her close. “If you ever went to confession, and I were your priest, I would have you praying on your knees for your love of sensuality.”
“And we all know knights are no lovers of luxury,” she quipped in return, as her mind ran on. Ranulf as a priest would be as bright and strong as fire; all the womenfolk in his parish would be in love with him. She wanted to ignore him, dismiss his gloating. “I would give you a task, my knight.”
“Falling back to that, are we? Very well, my lady.” He stopped in the middle of the camp and bowed. “Say on.”
The way he smiled stripped away her wits. Telling herself she must not gawk like a fool, that she must launch a zesty, witty task, she could think only of herself and Ranulf together, in bed.
“A cuckoo has stolen my wits,” she responded weakly.
He chuckled, then his smile dropped away, faster than a stooping hawk. “One of your village sayings that you have passed off as Eastern wisdom, I presume?”
This was too near the mark. “Are you going to be ever watching my tongue, now, Ranulf?”
“For lies? Perhaps.”
She deliberately stepped on his foot. “That is unfair and unjust—”
He snaked an arm about her middle and squeezed, almost slamming the breath from her lungs, but she had worked through choking soot and fire in the forge and she kept talking. “You said before that it was no more than you have done in battle, so why the change? Are you so fickle?”
His face darkened. “Not I,” he growled. “And I will be no judge.”
Before she had time to make sense of that cryptic remark, he lifted her half off her feet and stalked with her to a wagon. One of his wagons, she realized, as he shooed out the carter and the carter’s woman—who had both been peacefully sitting in the back of the covered cart, sharing a bowl of cherries.
“Now—” He sat her hard on the edge of the cart and straddled her. “The mob in the church are lis
tening-quiet, my squire Edmund is still out hunting, and now so am I.” He leaned in close and nipped her ear between his teeth. “My hunt is for my lady. Do you know what my hunt is called?”
“A distraction for us both?” she hissed, determined that he should not think her simple, though she wondered at the wisdom of assuming those in the churchyard would remain so content. “Ranulf, should we not be moving now?”
“Not unless we must. Orders are now in place, and if our tents start coming down in too great a rush, that might cause too much notice. That could set off the very mob we are hoping to avoid.”
“Your experience of France again?” she demanded testily.
He looked startled, but this time his laughter was all-approving. “Clever maid! And you are right, I wager.” He tickled her bare feet and cupped her breasts, his face glazed with mounting desire. “To return to my hunt, I know there is one field where I can read you like a field of deer.”
He has turned out his people from their wagon to make love to me? She knew she should be aggrieved for the folk, and alarmed that they were delaying in taking their leave of Fitneyclare and the area, but instead she felt an absurd flattery. Still, he should not know that. “You think I cannot lie in bed?”
Too late she caught the double meaning in her words.
He brushed her blushing face, tugging back her cloak hood. “You lie hopelessly here, my dear,” he said, and he fed her a cherry the carter had dropped as he had left.
She was honest in his arms: trusting, hopeful, tender, generous. Out in the world he was wary of her devices, but at her core she was true; he was certain of it. He wanted to be sure of it, especially now, when she was looking so appealing, so desirable.
They had time, he decided. It would take hours for the camps to be dismantled, and he doubted that mob in the churchyard would choose to attack—however, God or preacher inspired, no peasants would willingly go after armed and trained soldiers. Sir Henry had fallen because he had been one and four against several score: the tourney camps were different and the folk in the churchyard knew that.
Meanwhile there was Edith, and they had time. He was determined that they had time.
“I love you, Edith-maid-and-mine.”
“I love you,” she murmured, running her fingers through his hair. “Would you wish me to cut this? I could shape it better.”
“If ever there was a question to break the inspiration of the moment,” he grumbled, tugging his head away from her busy hands and boosting himself by his arms into the cart. He rolled against her, pushing her farther into the wagon, and drew down the canvas flaps.
He turned in their dim “cave” and saw her sitting on her heels, hugging herself. “That is my task.” He gathered her tight, hearing her heart bang against his ear as he nuzzled her breasts with his mouth.
She buckled against him, undone by his caress, her hands shyly tracing across his back and lower. The wagon creaked and shifted slightly as he shoved back ropes and barrels and he sprawled on the boards, with her on top of him.
When, to his delighted surprise, she wriggled until she straddled astride him and then sat up, still on top of him, and began to unpin the cloak he had given her, and then that curious bodice. As her dark nipples came free he caressed them, feeling her dipping down into his hands.
She twisted, trying to imitate the movements of a dancer, he guessed, and suddenly she stopped, her eyes flying open.
“Do I do right?”
“Very right.” He kissed her swinging plait and wrinkled his nose at her to make her laugh. Truly she was a strange mix of shy and bold.
Her body knows what to do, but she worries over my reaction.
His sadness and anger at how she must have been kept down by the brutes Adam and Peter were lost in a mesh of throbbing desire. He was hard for her and ready, more than ready. He thrust his hips up, feeling her soft folds embrace his hardness. She parted her skirts, he ripped open his leggings, and then he was in.
It was like being glazed with the rarest, sweetest sugar-cone. She reared up, exultant, and he followed, driving them both higher. His hands found her jouncing breasts again as she hammered against him, her strong thighs pumping, her face reddening with effort and desire. Even as he prepared to flip her over, take her in the way she liked, she stiffened, her head flung back.
Her crisis peaked his. He rammed into her, faster and faster, his backside slamming against the boards as she drew him in more. She fell against him and he caught her, hugging her as he crested, triumphant, and they were truly one.
They were catching their breath, grinning like fools, when there came a loud scratching on the wagon canvas.
Edith shook her head wildly—she could not be seen thus. Ranulf grinned again but, understanding, put his finger to his lips.
“Sir?” It was Edmund, his squire. She heard him clear his throat. “Sir, if you are near, I would speak with you.” Another nervous throat-clearing. “I shall wait by the water barrel.”
Ranulf brushed her breasts and kissed her softly on the mouth. “For my squire to be here, away from his own chase, it must be important,” he whispered, giving her nipples a final, valedictory caress. “Not life and death, but important all the same. I regret having to leave, Princess, although I wager I have wood splinters in my backside. Shall I send a maid for you?”
“What do you think?”
He chuckled, deep in his throat. “Aye, you are right, I wager. No other could manage that costume of yours. Take care, then, my maid. Do what you must, collect a new veil-scrap, and then come to me at my camp when you think it seemly.”
He gave her a final, swift, sweet kiss, then kicked his way out of the canvas, calling to Edmund, “What is this?”
Chapter 30
Mark rode straight into the church at Warren Hemlet. He could do so because his horse was small and the church door hung open.
Inside, frowning at the stench of damp and fox droppings, he found no one. Giles’s men had stripped the place of ornament and plate, he recalled, but now there was nothing else: the church was as deserted as the village. If any had died here, they had been taken out and buried elsewhere.
So where were the villagers who had been thrust into this church? Had they broken out and died in their homes?
Mark turned his horse and rode carefully through the narrow door and out into the village. He called out several times, offering food, but only a single pigeon fluttered out from a thatched roof. The roof timbers of many houses were missing and the village paths were greened over with high, standing grass. His horse cropped it contentedly as he dismounted.
Again he shouted, but there was no response.
“No one but me has come back here to look,” he said aloud. He was amazed at Sir Giles’s carelessness, but then the surrounding lands had been turned over to sheep and a single shepherd lad would not dare to venture into this lonely place. Unlike Giles, he knew what peasants whispered, and to them, Warren Hemlet was an accursed name.
A rat burst from a hovel and scampered into the overgrown wheat field, followed by more squeaking vermin. Mark crossed himself and scrambled onto his horse.
The sun shone on the empty pens and the empty houses and the empty church, but the flesh on the back of his neck felt to be creeping down his spine. He yanked on his small bay’s reins and trotted off, afraid his horse’s hoofbeats would disturb something in those hovels, where every door was open and black, hard shadows crept out. . . .
He rode hard, low over his horse’s neck, galloping out of the valley, and he did not stop until he reached a wayside shrine, where he could drink the holy water and quench his parched mouth. Waiting for his heart to stop jumping in his chest and for his breathing to slow down, Mark wiped the last drops of water from his sparse beard and considered. Now that he felt safer again, no longer watched, his wits began to ask questions.
“My lord Giles does not know that the priest and his flock have flown their church coop. Does that matter? Should I tell him? I
do not think he will pay to know this. He does not like bad news.”
That was the real question: Should he tell?
Chapter 31
Ranulf stalked through the thronging camp, busy with women grinding bits of wheat on low querns, youngsters darting and chasing each other with half-filled pails of water, and men doing hasty repairs on wheel spokes and carts. Hardly any of these folk seemed to have heard the call of the preacher, way below in the churchyard, for which he was glad, but for the rest he was furious. A rooting pig heard his approach and burst through a pile of refuse, squealing as it fled.
Had he been five years younger he would have chucked a stone after the beast; now he merely clenched his fists and scowled.
Edith had sent him a message by way of one of those slim, dark-haired youngsters with garlands round her youthful neck and wrists: a swift-by-your-leave and then the rest.
She was not coming to find him. Maria and Lucy were anxious over their infants’ navel strings and she must see to those. Maids’ foolish notions, ahead of him!
“You grumble like Giles, man,” Ranulf whispered through clenched teeth, aware he was being unfair. But Edmund’s news was grim.
Why tell her, then? Why involve her?
He knew why, of course. His annoying, silver-tongued maid-princess would not panic. She would not look for demons or portents but stay back, question, probe, and use her wretched good sense. She had seen the pestilence more than him, she knew its dangerous workings.
“And she was going to find me, in my camp. She promised she would.”
He saw her, veiled and jeweled again, standing by her main tent with a tiny bundle in her arms and the adopted maid Lucy sitting on a low stool, tilting her face into the sun. Lucy was very slender still but pretty, he realized with a jolt, with young, firm flesh, a mass of fair hair, and a tip-tilted nose. For the first time since encountering her, he could see how she might have been “Many” to hungry men.
Hovering close, with a cup of something, and glancing at Lucy with a look of proud satisfaction was the steward Teodwin. He was wearing his purple tunic the right way round and had combed his hair and beard.
To Touch The Knight Page 20