Edwyna nodded. “When King Edward died and the Woodvilles were scrambling for power, Tristan’s father was among those who believed that Richard had to step in for the good of the country. But then the young Princes were taken to the Tower, and Tristan made an open stand against Richard, demanding that the boys be saved. He could not support Richard as King if Richard had murdered his nephews. Anyway,” Edwyna murmured, “he and Jon and another rode homeward after this demand and found—total devastation. Farmhouses burned to the ground, the farmers’ wives raped and slaughtered, the men killed. And it became worse. His father, his brother, his brother’s wife—and his own, all slain. Jon—Jon told me that it was awful. That no dream of hell could be worse. Tristan and his wife were expecting their first child, and Tristan found the baby, miscarried in the events, beside his wife.” Edwyna hesitated. “With her throat slit.”
Genevieve felt suddenly and viciously ill. She sat down on the bed, cold and miserable.
“I am sorry,” she said. “I would be sorry for any man. Yet—I did not do this to him. I—”
“No, you beguiled him, invited him to your chamber—and attempted to murder him with a poker.”
“Edwyna, dammit! The deed was not all mine!”
“I know,” Edwyna murmured softly. She looked as if she were about to cry herself. She turned around quickly. “Look—I’ve brought you Chaucer and Aristotle and that Italian writer you’re so fond of. I’ve got to go before—before someone thinks that we’re plotting again.” She came to Genevieve and gave her a fierce hug. “Oh, Genevieve! You’ll receive your freedom. Just be patient, be silent, and it will come. And—”
“What?” Genevieve whispered. Edwyna was about to leave her again. Alone. With her thoughts, her memories, her nightmares—and the emotions that she did not want to feel.
“Ask him! Ask him if you cannot be there tomorrow, for me?”
Genevieve smiled, curving her lips into a bitter smile. “All right,” she promised. “If I am able, I will ask.”
Edwyna was gone. Tess had come and gone, and Genevieve immediately felt the oppression of being locked in and a panic that tore at her.
Edwyna was so lucky . . .
And she couldn’t understand at all. She was living in her own little paradise where love was the only answer. She couldn’t comprehend the darkness in a man’s soul, the twisting torment, nor did she know of the strange fire between them ...
Or of Genevieve’s very real and very simple fears.
To give in to him would be foolhardy and stupid. He would never care again—he was only capable of using now. Genevieve could not be anything to him, no more than the moment’s amusement he found with any woman.
And in time . . . she would be used up. If she could always remember that she was but a shell, she could survive it. She could begin again anew, in another life, far away.
He robbed me of everything. For that alone, I must always despise him, she told herself with irrevocable logic. And it was true. Perhaps he had not become a wild animal; perhaps he had remembered mercy, so that he did not plunder and butcher wantonly.
But he had forgotten the mercy of the heart.
Genevieve opened up a page of one her favorite books by Chaucer. Strange, Geoffrey Chaucer, long dead and buried and known for his writing, had been such a close part to all that was happening now! His beloved sister-in-law had been the great love of John of Gaunt, the woman who had lived with him for years and years and borne him his Beaufort bastards and then—in the last years of their lives—become his wife at last! It was a beautiful story, sad, and full of the greatest depths of love. And the Henry who now sat on the throne was a great-grandchild of that bittersweet affair . . .
She closed the book. There were tears in her eyes. In her younger years she had often cried over the wonderful romance of Chaucer. But she didn’t cry now for the words on the page.
She didn’t know if she cried for herself, or for Tristan, or the fate that had made them irredeemable enemies.
* * *
By the late afternoon she felt her solitude keenly, and she paced her small enclosure in panic. Again she feared that she would go mad—she hadn’t been here long at all, and if he chose he could keep her here for days, weeks, months . . .
Years.
Time passed so slowly.
She had bathed, she had spent long, patient minutes removing all the tangles from her hair. She had washed it and dried it and braided the long strands. She had sewn rents in her dresses, she had read, she had tried to draw out a pattern for a tapestry.
And still the day wore on.
She cast herself upon the bed, chin on her knuckles, and found herself rising in fury against Tristan anew, and wondering why. She expected nothing from him. But Tess-of-the-gargantuan-breasts had not made another appearance, and Genevieve could not help but agonize over the image of the two of them together. Tristan, wrath forgotten, laughing and teasing, with his eyes not dark but that fascinating indigo, his hair dark and tousled over his forehead. And Tess—gushing! So awed by everything great—guzzling down the wine that Genevieve had insisted that she take, and being the sweetest, most pliable little toy . . .
Making no demands. A farmer’s daughter—who had never raised a hand against him. Causing no discomfort in his soul. Oh, what a cute little plaything she would make! Tristan could turn from her to business without a thought. He would never marry her, of course, but Tess would know that from the onset and be content with the gifts received from easy service to such a noble lord. And he wasn’t even old and ugly; he was young and muscled and handsome and—
She rolled on the bed, pressing her hands to her temples in shame.
Take Tess, take her, have her, just leave me be!
He was leaving her be. She felt like laughing hysterically. She had enough pride not to beg the guard beyond her door to send for him. Maybe it wasn’t pride. Maybe it was the simple knowledge that he would not come.
But she had hoped against hope that he would come to her. If he had come, she would have taken the chance and asked if she might not attend her aunt’s wedding. She swallowed, promising herself that she wouldn’t beg. She would ask. If he refused, she would coolly accept it. She would he regal and poised and distant, and he would know that she didn’t give a tinker’s damn, that she had learned to wait with patience, await the freedom that had to come.
He wasn’t coming.
She flew to her feet again and thought of the endless days and nights ahead of her. Awakening each morning—awaiting nightfall just so that she could sleep again. The prisoner in the tower of Edenby Castle. Years could go by. Years and years. One day people would pass by and they would wonder, who was the ancient hag in the tower of Edenby ...
There was a soft tapping at the door. Genevieve flew to it, then composed herself. It might just be Tess, all flushed and happy and ...
She forced a calm expression and said softly, “Yes?”
The door opened. It was Jon. Genevieve flushed. She had made her peace with Edwyna, but she knew that Jon must still feel the deepest betrayal.
“Genevieve,” he bowed slightly to her.
She swallowed, wondering why she felt it necessary to apologize to this invader.
“Jon . . . I’m sorry.”
“Umm. I’m just sure that you are.”
“Jon, really, I’m sorry that I betrayed your trust. Oh, God, Jon, can’t you understand! Think of my life! Could you bear it? Wouldn’t you have done—anything?”
He grunted, yet she thought that he did understand.
“Let’s go,” he told her.
Her heart began to thump. “Where?”
“Tristan has asked to see you.”
A shivering sensation swept through her. She had no idea of what to expect. She had wanted to see him, but now . . .
Had he thought of some other form of punishment for all the misery she had caused him with her flight and her continual efforts to elude him?
“Now, please
, Genevieve.”
She fought the unease and fear that swept through her and followed him out to the winding staircase. She placed her hand against the cool stone so that she would not trip as she went down. She tried to talk, to break her terrible tension.
“Jon, I’m very happy for you. For you and Edwyna.”
“Are you really?” he asked coolly.
“Of course! She is my aunt and I love her.”
He didn’t respond and she fell silent. They reached the second floor landing and Jon gripped her arm and led her straight to the door. He opened it and pushed her inside. She heard the door close behind her.
She stood still there, barely daring to breathe.
It was dark now, but the room was bathed in soft light. Red glowing light from the fire, and a softer, white moonbeam light from the candles.
Tristan was by the mantel, his back to her. His hands were lightly clasped behind his back and one foot rested upon the stone step before the fire. He wore no mantle or tunic, just a white shirt, skin-fitting breeches, and his high leather boots.
Everything seemed gentle in the light. Gentle and soft and surreal.
But she trembled despite it. Trembled, and thought that time elapsed in slow, slow eons before he turned to see her there. The expression in his eyes, sheltered by the soft light and shadow was unfathomable, yet she saw that he surveyed her slowly from head to toe.
“Good evening,” he said.
She swallowed, startled that she could not speak, and nodded in acknowledgment of his words. But he said nothing more and his steady gaze unnerved her so thoroughly that she found her tongue at last.
“Why have you sent for me?”
A smile cut across his dark features, only slightly ironic, and one dark brow arched upward.
“Surely, you know.”
She flushed, there was such astounding insinuation and intimacy in his voice. And she lowered her eyes, not in horror at first, just warmed by his tone, and—to her complete self-reproach—anxious.
But then, unbidden, a picture of him with Tess rose before her eyes, and anger settled in. Did he play with one toy during the day and another at night? She couldn’t bear the thought; it seemed an absolute insult. It angered her, and it—
Hurt.
It is jealousy, she warned herself, then cried out inwardly that it was just the outrage . . .
He moved from the mantel, and she looked up quickly. They had never made . . . planned love. She had never stood there and awaited him. She had always . . . fought it.
He didn’t come straight to her. She saw that a meal had been set up before the hearth, small chafing dishes with silver covers awaited them, chairs drawn before each. And there were two of her mother’s gold rimmed crystal glasses with the long twilled stems there, each filled with something clear and white.
He had paused at the table, picking up the glasses. And when he approached her she felt everything inside of her go weak, as if she were composed of nothing but the lightly dancing water of a stream in spring.
He was smiling still, a small crooked smile, and his eyes were their deepest blue, a fascinating indigo with centers the warmth of dazzling fire. He had never appeared younger, never more handsome.
Never more dangerous.
He handed her a glass, and mechanically she took it. She sipped at the liquid and it soothed her hot, parched throat. It was sweet and dry all in one, and delicious.
“What is this?” she murmured.
“No poison, I assure you. Knowing your keen distaste for Bordeaux, I decided upon this. Wine, white wine, a German variety.”
She tensed at his reference to the Bordeaux and looking down quickly sipped more wine, then remembered with remorse the effects of doing so.
He lifted a hand, indicating that she should go to the table. Genevieve quickly sailed past him and sat. She swallowed more wine, but noted his smile and quickly set her glass down.
“Are you hungry?” he asked her.
“No, not really.”
He served her anyway, small portions of steaming fowl and sweet cooked apples in pastry and autumn greens.
“Strange. I would have thought you’d still be starving,” he murmured.
She had no reply and he found her eyes on him in a curious fashion he had never expected. She studied him. Not as the invader, but as the man. And suddenly he did not want to meet her gaze, mauve this night, like summer violets.
“And I wouldn’t have thought that you cared,” she said at last, and picked up her fork, her gaze lowering from his that she might push her food around on her plate rather than consume it.
He made an impatient sound, an angry sound, and she looked back to him, startled. She was instantly defensive and, he saw, ready to spring from her chair, for what good it might do her.
“You left me in a great deal of wrath,” she said nervously. “I did not expect you to . . .” Her voice trailed away to an uneasy silence.
“So I did,” he said after a moment.
Color flooded her cheeks, and he realized that she was thinking his call had little to do with temper or emotion, and everything to do with simple desire. He didn’t wish to tell her he was sorry because, in truth, he was not—he had, in his estimation, been merciful beyond bounds. But yet he’d felt something . . . and this was, in his way, the best he could do in the form of an apology.
“I’d have thought you might have enjoyed the idea of wine and a leisurely dinner and—”
She interrupted him with a bitter laugh. “Aye, surely!” she cried caustically. “Here I feel far more like the courtly courtesan than the peasant whore!”
He rose impatiently, nearly knocking his chair to the floor. He paced before the fire and cast out his hands, “What do you want from me, then?”
She inhaled sharply. “Freedom.”
And then she was startled, as always, that he could move so swiftly, for he was at her side, lifting her chin to bring her face upward to his. “Freedom! You fool, you’d have had your freedom, yet what you are given seems never enough, and you must strive to take more! Freedom! To run through the woods? To risk hunger and thirst and the attack of wild beasts, and aye, lady, the attack of the greatest beast, that who walks on two feet! Tell me, Genevieve, what of your freedom had you had stumbled upon one of these? Or perhaps it wouldn’t have mattered to you had you done so, perhaps you would have found a woodsman a fine companion! Perhaps you would have found yourself a prisoner again, lady, in far more difficult circumstances, my fastidious little love! Or would it have mattered? Tell me, I am anxious to know!”
“You hurt me!” she cried, trying to wrench her chin away.
She was not forced into a reply and he did release her, for there was a discreet tapping then on the door. Tristan exhaled with impatience.
“What is it?”
The door opened and Tess entered, bobbing a curtsy. “The trays, milord. Shall I take them away?”
“What? Oh, aye, the trays. Take them away.”
Tess came in and Genevieve felt herself growing rigid and watching the girl against her will.
Found herself wondering . . .
She lowered her eyes quickly, feeling ill. It was her room! Her chamber, her bed . . .
Tristan had turned, one foot planted upon the mantel step, an elbow leaned against it—his back to them both. Tess smiled radiantly at Genevieve and collected their dishes. Then she bowed again and hurried out.
Tristan spun back around. “Genevieve—”
She was on her feet, furious. “Aye! A thousand times over I’d have preferred the prison of a woodsman. Be he gray-haired and toothless and a hundred and ten years old! You fool! You rutting fool! What is this kindness, this mercy of yours! You offer me dinner in my own room—a dinner of my own food!”
To her astonishment, he gazed curiously at the door, then back at her. And he did not rail in turn. He laughed.
“Oh, you are insane!” Genevieve muttered.
He walked toward her, slowly
, still smiling. And not with malice, nor with sarcasm. She stopped suddenly, having come to the dais and knowing that if she walked farther, she would bring herself dangerously near the bed.
He stopped before her, drawing a intriguing line from her cheek to her lip with the tender touch of his thumb.
“What is this sudden temper?”
“Sudden? There is nothing sudden about it!”
“Aye, but there is! You came here tonight in a mellow mood. And you sat with me so gently! No silver sparks of fire lit your eyes, but rather something soft and most feminine. And understanding why I had sent for you, you knew no great alarm. Yet now again it has become the outrage. Has this to do with the girl?”
“What girl?”
“Tess.”
“If you bedded with Tess or a thousand such cows, it would have no import to me!”
He started to laugh again to her vast dismay and actually whirled away from her to leap upon the dais. Then he cast himself backward upon the bed and laughed again.
Genevieve spun to stare at him incredulously. He was upon his knees, leaning against the left post and laughing with still greater amusement at her stunned expression. Then he leapt downward again with the spring and agility of a youth, coming back to her and catching her shoulders.
“You do mind, milady. Terribly.”
“I mind that—that—”
“Ah, yes! That you were attainted, attacked, taken! Poor, my lady! You lie through your teeth! There are things in life we both know, milady—” He paused to bow extravagantly to her, and yet it was truth he spoke with that deep edge to his voice. “Milady, Richard III is dead and Henry rules England! My allegiance has paid and yours has not, and you fought a battle and lost. Edenby is mine—as you are mine. We both know this, and in your very strange way you do accept it!” “Never! And don’t be absurd! We both know that England teems with nobility with far more right to the throne!”
“You seek another insurrection? Nay—you know that would be a long time in coming, and with less hope of success than the sun would have to rise with the night! You mind, dear Genevieve, that you believe I chose that farm lass for her—assets!”
“Oh, how absurd.” Genevieve was very careful to sound bored and droll and uninterested. She slipped past him, fingers trembling, grateful that Tess had left the wine glasses. She grabbed hers quickly and nearly drained it, then started to cough, and to her annoyance, he began to laugh again.
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