by Tamara Leigh
Something like alarm flashed in his gaze, but he covered it with scorn. “You refer to my use of the sword,” he said, though with question in his voice.
Deciding to let him ponder whether it was the letting of blood she referred to or responsibility for the attack—or both—she did not answer.
“Dire circumstances dictate unusual measures,” he said in an obvious attempt to prod more from her.
“As they do now,” Joslyn said. “And since we understand each other better, I bid you good day.”
She returned to her chamber, and only when the door closed behind her did she ease her stiffly held shoulders. Though time would tell whether or not Ivo regarded her threat as real, one thing was certain—she had gathered to her a powerful enemy.
Thornemede.
Liam stood on the threshold looking into a hall that might once have been preceded by the word great but was now so decrepit it was little more than a hovel.
“This I am made lord of,” he murmured.
“It does not get any better, does it?” John referred to all else they had seen of Thornemede this past hour.
All else but the impressive number of sheep grazing the fields, Liam silently amended. The barony had wool that could be exported, and whose profits might begin to fill the barony’s coffers. As for the rest of Thornemede, the two villages they had paused at on their way to the castle were sparsely peopled, and those who had come out of their homes to receive them had seemed dejected. Most of the fields were long without the turning of a plow, the roads were in disrepair, and the rest of the castle was no better than this hall.
With its stinking moat, crumbling outer wall, inner buildings that looked near to collapsing, and the waste of humans and animals everywhere, Thornemede was worse than imagined. Too, though it was occupied by the servants and retainers of the departed baron, it appeared that as many as half had left in search of another lord to pledge their services to.
Had they gone from the barony before the young knight delivered the message that had revealed the identity of their new lord? Liam wondered. But then he chastised himself for so foolish a question. As no attempt had been made to put order to Thornemede in anticipation of his arrival, it could not have been more clear he was unwelcome. Not that it mattered. He would bring Thornemede’s people back.
Still, he was angered, and he silently cursed himself for allowing vengeance to sway him to accept the king’s proposal—to permit another to dictate his destiny as he had vowed would not happen again. The heir of Montgomery Fawke was Baron of Thornemede, lord of the thorn and little else.
Liam slapped his palm to the keep’s outwork. “Ah, but as King Edward attested, ’tis of stone and sturdy.”
John arched an eyebrow.
Looking to the dozen Ashlingford men he had chosen to accompany him, he saw concern in their eyes. Likely, they thought the Irish in him was on the rise and steeled themselves for an eruption. But he was in control. Or nearly so.
As the men must soon return to Ashlingford—and John to Duns Castle—it was time to put them to use. But first, the children.
He looked to where the three stood at the bottom of the steps and forced a smile, then motioned to his squire who stood nearby. “Take them into the garden—providing there is one.”
“If there is not, my lord?”
“Occupy them. Just do not bring them into the hall until I am finished there.”
The squire gestured for the children to follow him.
Had he made a mistake in bringing them? Liam wondered. Though they had only known village life, Thornemede was not much better than the wattle-and-daub house in which they had been fostered these past years, and certainly less hospitable. But the need to be certain they were cared for as they deserved to be had made him bring them.
He expelled a harsh sigh. “Let us be done with it,” he said and strode into the hall.
Ignoring the servants who peered at him from the far end of the great room, Liam headed for the tables and benches strewn with knights and men-at-arms. A few had dragged themselves awake amid the commotion of bustling servants, but the others remained in the bowels of drunken sleep.
Liam seized a man’s shoulder and thrust him off his bench. With a thud that shuddered the floorboards, the man dropped onto mildewed rushes. Whether he was a knight or man-at-arms it was impossible to tell, the usual distinction between the classes lacking.
The man groaned amid the complaints of his companions, who were similarly being awakened, and demanded on a drunken slur, “Whaddya want?”
“On your feet. Now!”
“Who might ye be?”
“Lord Liam Fawke.” How strange the title felt on his tongue. “Baron of Thornemede.”
The man snorted. “Ah, the misbegotten Irish.”
Though tempted to put a fist in the man’s mouth, Liam ordered, “Rise!”
The man heaved upright and stood to a height that bettered Liam by half a hand.
“What is your name?” Liam asked.
As the great man folded his arms over his chest, the movement caused him to sway. “Gunter Welling.” He braced his legs farther apart. “Captain of the guard of Thornemede, Irish.”
“You will address me as Lord Fawke.”
“I will, eh?”
“Else suffer the consequences.”
Gunter arched a bushy eyebrow. “That so?”
Terribly drunk, Liam reminded himself. “Do you challenge me, Welling?”
The man smiled. “I know my place, Fawke. What I’m wonderin’ is…do you know yours?”
A murmur went around the hall as Thornemede’s retainers speculated on the price the soldier would pay for his belligerence.
Knowing how he handled this man would set expectations for his rule, Liam stepped nearer. “I am your lord, Welling. That is my place. But if you wish to challenge me, I am quite capable of teaching you a lesson in humility.” He set a hand on his sword hilt.
Gunter followed the movement, and his jaw shifted, but he said no more.
“I will give you a quarter hour to gather what remains of your guard in the outer bailey, and for every man who does not appear, a coin will be deducted from your pay. Am I understood?”
Gunter’s eyebrows descended, but he remained silent.
A beginning, Liam thought as he strode past him. The captain of the guard did not have to like him, but he would come to respect the new lord of Thornemede.
And now for the knights.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
How much longer would Liam stay away? Joslyn mulled as she stepped out of a warm day into the great hall, Oliver asleep on her shoulder.
For a fortnight, the new lord of Thornemede had managed Ashlingford by way of a messenger sent daily between the baronies, and though it was hard to admit to herself, there was emptiness in her that widened with each day of his absence.
“Oh, foolish me,” she breathed.
“My lady?”
She looked to the one who approached from the direction of the kitchen. “Emma?”
The woman came alongside her. “Shall we sit and talk, my lady?”
Might this be the promised discussion they had yet to have regarding the Fawke side of Oliver?
“I would like that.” Joslyn followed Emma across the hall to a padded bench before the hearth. Seating herself, she slid Oliver off her shoulder into the crook of her arm where he settled without rousing.
Emma smiled. “Wore you thin, did he?”
“And himself.” For three hours, they had explored every building, corner, and crack of the outer bailey. “My father says he is much like I was at his age.”
“I was thinking he reminded me of Liam, though Baron Fawke’s firstborn was a bit older than Oliver when I came to Ashlingford.”
“Oliver does not remind you of his father?”
“A bit. But as a child, Maynard was quiet—more inside himself, though not in a bad way, mind you. He but lacked Liam’s confidence.”
�
�Why do you think that?” Joslyn asked, though she guessed it was because their father had preferred his eldest son over Maynard, as Liam had confided.
Emma sighed. “Ah, lady, there is much you do not know.”
Joslyn leaned toward her. “I have waited patiently for you to speak of the Fawkes. I hardly knew the man I married, and now much of what I thought I knew has been proved lies. Will you not help me understand who fathered Oliver?”
“Of course you need to know.” Emma patted Joslyn’s hand that curved around her son’s sturdy body. “But just as important as understanding the man who sired your son, I will tell you so that when the castle folk wag their tongues about Maynard you will know what made him so.”
“I thank you.”
The woman gathered breath. “He was a sweet child—in that, very like Oliver. But from the day of his birth, his father did all but ignore him. It was Liam whom Montgomery Fawke loved, and it was as if in loving his eldest son he had no love for another. Not even his wife, Anya.”
Joslyn sensed personal pain in Emma’s words.
“Maynard felt it, even when he was too young to understand. Hence, he turned to Liam for affection.” She nodded. “I wager you did not know there was a time the brothers cared for each other, when the innocence of childhood was theirs.”
That wager she would lose.
Emma shifted her gaze to the fire. “Anya strove to keep Maynard from Liam—to draw a distinction between her son and the half-common son she claimed was ill-gotten. But though she forbade Maynard to go near his older brother, that did not stop him, nor punishment when she caught them playing together. Maynard’s need for love was that strong.”
“What of his mother’s love? And Ivo’s? He seems to have cared for Maynard.”
With a brittle smile, Emma said, “Anya did not love Maynard. To her, he was mostly a means of taking Ashlingford from Liam. And Ivo…” She shrugged. “He was affectionate toward Maynard, but neither did he know how to love him. And like Anya, he was more concerned with Maynard bettering and supplanting Liam.”
“It must have hurt him deeply.”
Emma bent her head as if to hide the tears rising to her eyes.
Joslyn laid a hand over the woman’s. “You loved him.”
In a quavering voice, Emma said, “At my own breast I nursed him to walking. My days were his days, my nights his. Hardly was he out of my sight except when I allowed him to steal away with Liam. He was my boy, and I did love him.” A tear slid off her lashes and dropped to her lap. “I thought my love would be enough, that he would not miss his mother’s or father’s, but…” She pulled her hand from beneath Joslyn’s, with the back of it wiped her eyes.
“Had Anya and Ivo let him be,” she continued, “’tis possible he would have been content to remain in his brother’s shadow. But after Liam left Ashlingford for his knighthood training, Maynard spent much of his time with Ivo, and not a day passed that he did not hear from his uncle and mother what Liam would steal from him once their father died. By the summer of his eighth year, I had lost much of him. By his ninth, I was reduced to little more than a woman who served him. By his tenth, Liam was but an obstacle in his path to the barony.” She covered her face with her hands. “I could not bring him back.”
Joslyn scooted nearer and put her free arm around the woman’s shoulders. “Some things only God can undo, and he does not always choose to.”
Emma looked up. “’Tis true many were the terrible things Maynard did, but he was not evil. Not my boy.”
“I believe you.”
Emma eased against her, while Oliver remained oblivious where he softly snored upon his mother’s chest.
“I understand Maynard promised Ashlingford to Liam in exchange for his management of the estates,” Joslyn said.
“He did—in my presence and before all his knights.”
Joslyn peered into her son’s face. He was beautiful, his round cheeks rosy, lashes sweeping. So utterly innocent of the treachery that had won him what belonged to another. What would he say if he were old enough to understand? To himself decide whether or not to take up the barony?
“I know Ashlingford should be Liam’s,” she said softly.
“Aye. King Edward should not have bestowed it on Maynard. ’Twas more a mistake than you can know, my lady.”
“My husband nearly laid Ashlingford to ruin.”
“He did. If not for Liam’s tournament winnings and his management, the barony would likely have been lost.”
Joslyn frowned. “Liam put his own money into Ashlingford?”
“Why would he not? He had the promise it would one day be his.”
Then the money Maynard had taken from Ashlingford had not belonged to him. Liam could have refused him—perhaps should have.
“I have not lied to you, lady. I spoke true when I said Liam and Maynard were once close. Though the affection died in Maynard, never did Liam stop caring for his brother.”
It made sense. Though Liam expressed little more than contempt for Maynard, pain shone from him when he spoke of his brother’s death. “He takes upon himself much of the blame for who Maynard became, and for his death.”
A smile drifted onto Emma’s lips. “You two have been talking, eh?”
Joslyn’s defenses started to rise, but she reminded herself this was not Ivo. “We have.”
“That is good, though it surprises me he spoke of these things to you—to anyone. With the exception of that anger of his, Liam is not one to reveal his feelings.”
Yet he had revealed them to her…
“Though methinks he would not tell you he likes you well, my lady, he does.”
A liking, but surely more of the flesh than the heart. Still, why had he exposed himself?
“And certes, he has taken a liking to the little one here.” Emma nodded at Oliver.
“It gives me pause to remember how I feared Liam, that I thought he would murder my son to gain Ashlingford.”
“As Maynard warned, aye?”
“He did.”
“Ah, well. What is important is you now know different—that you have naught to fear at Ashlingford.”
Joslyn started to agree, but there was one who had replaced Liam in her fears. “Naught but Ivo.”
Emma sat straighter. “Has he done something?”
“He accused me of lying with Liam.”
“How did you answer him?”
Though ashamed to admit it, Joslyn said, “With a threat of my own, but I do not know that it will deter him. I have no proof.”
“As he has no proof of what he accuses you of, aye?”
“I have not lain with Liam.”
Emma stood. “Worry not on it, my lady. I shall speak with the priest.”
“But what can you do?”
The woman smoothed her skirts. “I have known him since he was a young man stumbling over his faith. Over the years, we have come to understand each other well.”
Guessing that was all the explanation she would get, Joslyn said, “I thank you.”
Emma bent and pecked a kiss on Oliver’s head. “This child will make everything right.” She turned and tossed over her shoulder, “You will see.”
Joslyn sighed. With so much wrong, was it possible?
“I could kill you.” Ivo dug his fingers into her upper arm.
Emma did not flinch. “You have tried before,” she said in an infuriatingly level voice. “But ’twas not me who died, was it?”
He squeezed her arm harder, longed for it to be her neck beneath his fingers. “You thankless, hedge-born harpy.”
She arched an eyebrow. “Hardly the priest today, dear Ivo. What would the good bishop think if he came upon us now?”
He considered his dagger hung from the silken girdle of his vestments. Before the termagant could make a sound of protest, he could plant it in her chest. But though that would be the end of her, it would not be the end of the writings he had searched for and never found. And he might never see the
money due him.
“Where is the coin?” he demanded.
She frowned, gasped, “Ah, that.”
“That! Where is it?”
She took a step back, reached inside her gown’s bodice, and pulled out a small pouch.
“That is not all of it,” he growled.
She dropped it to the floor. “I may be lowborn, but I have learned the price of my existence. Bit by bit, you will have all the coin, but not before I have lived a good, long life.”
With a curse that, were God listening, would have brought down the walls around them, Ivo thrust her away. “You have served your usefulness, woman. Why can you not die?”
She snorted. “I am hardly of an age, Ivo. And now that there is Oliver… I have much to live long for.”
Head aching with every blasphemous word and curse inside him, he swung away. “Go!”
“You will leave Lady Joslyn be? And Liam?”
“What choice have I?”
“None, but I would have your word.”
As if that would make it true, Ivo mused. There was no difficulty in giving one’s word, and it was nearly as easy to break it.
Facing her again, he backhanded the air. “You have my word. Now leave!”
She dipped her chin. “As always, Father, I am grateful.”
Clinging to his frayed control, he watched her pass down the aisle between rows of benches.
When the chapel door closed behind her, he clasped his hands before his face and prayed until he was certain Emma was distant enough not to hear what followed unanswered prayer.
He tore the cloth from the altar and savored the crash of the chalice against the far wall and the lesser clamor of relics. “Lord, Lord!” He swung back to the bare altar, lifted his fists high, and prostrated himself on the floor. “Smite my enemies. Free me of every one of them. Give me what is mine!”
When light surged in the chapel as if a wind had blown through it and breathed on the candles, Ivo lifted his head and glanced left and right, but he did not see God as he was sure he would one day see Him.
“Patience,” he murmured. Soon enough the way would be made clear, then never again must he yield to Emma, his brother’s common whelp, or Oliver’s whore of a mother.