by Tamara Leigh
“Then he was more a fool and even less a man of God,” Elias growled.
Her throat tightened. “I did not give him sufficient warning and, unlike you, he was not adept at bending his feelings out of their natural shape.”
“You think that is what I do? That is why I do not fumble for words and distance myself?”
She raised her eyebrows. “Does not Elias Cant know well his audience?”
“It is not the troubadour before you, Honore. It is Elias De Morville whom you wrongly judge. Hence, no reason to hide your face and no cause to fear my wrath.”
His wrath? Why did he think she—?
She nearly caught her breath at the realization he thought this the other thing she had kept from him besides Thomas’s identity. But then, as she had said it had little bearing on what they did in France, the covering of her lower face was a better fit than the reality of Finwyn’s claim on Hart.
“Believe me,” he prompted.
“If ’tis true my sneer does not trouble you, Elias, it is only because candlelight is far kinder than Uther’s light of day.”
“I would not have you judge me by another man’s feeble, childish behavior, Honore. But if you must, I think there a remedy for that which you name a sneer.”
“You think wrong. My defect was remedied as much as possible, for which I am grateful since it allows me to work with foundlings without cover that would otherwise make them fearful of me.”
“What I speak of is a smile, Honore. Surely you know how to do that, even if only for your little ones.”
She gasped. “That is your remedy? Simply smile and my scar will disappear?”
“As long I have known how beautiful your eyes”—
Long? She snatched hold of the word that made it sound as if years had passed since they met.
—“and now how pretty your teeth, methinks if you add a slightly imperfect smile even Bairnwood’s foul noblewoman would find naught amiss. So oui, simply smile.”
Feeling more heat than her new garments could impart, Honore said, “If you are right, and I do not think it, what am I to do when there is naught to smile about?” It was a silly, argumentative question, but more and more she feared what he did to her. If she frustrated or angered him, perhaps he would give her space to distance herself.
“There is almost always something to smile about,” Elias said, “even if but for the moment, even if that moment can be had only by casting into the past—or future.”
“If only for a moment, why bother?” she furthered the argument.
“The sweetest of life is made of moments—”
“As are the vilest.”
Were candlelight on him as much as her, she was certain she would see frustration. “Hence,” he said gruffly, “seek the moments you would have number themselves into years. If you are blessed, they will.”
Here the poet, seemingly without effort sliding words onto her emotions like beads on a string. And Elias was the clasp toward which her heart aspired—one that would never be strong enough to allow moments over which to smile and dream to number into years.
Infatuation, she told herself. From it you can recover, but do you not cease, ever you may carry the hurt of what cannot be.
For this she was grateful he would leave her at Clairmarais. For however long it took him to deliver tidings of his search for Hart, alongside prayer for the boy’s recovery she would pray away what she ought not feel for this man.
She moistened her upper lip, winced over the dip. “I require my gorget, Sir Elias.”
“You do not.”
“While I am out in your world, I do. Pray, step away so I may retrieve it.”
“You have naught to hide. As told, you are lovely. As not yet told, henceforth it is of benefit you not—”
“Lovely enough to kiss?” Scorn leapt from her even as regret over the impulsive response landed like a stone in her belly. If not an invitation, it sounded a challenge. If not a challenge, pleading.
“I-I did not mean that.”
His eyes lowered to her mouth, and she realized no air moved between them. Then he angled his head.
When she jerked back and her head struck the wall, Elias slid a hand into her hair and gently probed her scalp. More than ache there, she felt the warmth of his touch like embers that slowly, languorously drifted up through her. “Forgive me,” he said, “I did not mean to startle you. I believed you ready to be kissed.”
Then he had thought it an invitation.
The servant of Bairnwood wishing he would remove his person from her, the never-before-kissed woman hoping he would not, she said, “I know it sounded that, but they were only angry, thoughtless words.”
“Then you do not wish to be kissed?”
“Not by one who does not truly wish to kiss me.” More words she regretted.
“What of one who more than wishes to kiss you?”
The shake of her head was nearer a shudder. “I would be a fool to believe you so inclined.”
“And I would be a fool not to kiss you, Honore.”
Chapter 26
BE BY HIS SIDE
The hand cupping the back of Honore’s head drew her forward, and when their mouths met, she surely knew what so many before her knew—the lips were wonderfully sensitive, and what happened above affected all below, weakening her head to toe. But when she slid her hands around Elias’s neck, he groaned and lifted his head.
She felt his gaze but did not open her eyes, instead savored something she had thought never to experience that would not likely happen again.
Finally, Elias said, “Is this not something about which to smile?”
That too. And she did as she raised her lids.
His eyes moved from hers to her mouth. As the self-consciousness she deplored slunk back, he said, “A pretty smile. Still…”
She tensed.
“…it is more. It is beautiful.”
“Beautiful?” she exclaimed.
“Have you never looked in a mirror, Honore?”
“I have no access to such, but it is enough to catch my reflection in water, glass, upon a silver platter—and in eyes ere they scuttle away. Be assured, I know it well.”
“You do not. All those distort. Thus, if you will not take my word for how lovely your smile, I shall have to secure a mirror, else in the light of day you must dwell longer on your reflection in my eyes.”
She knew she should resist such talk, but he seemed so sincere she could not fight a bowing of lips and show of teeth only ever achieved when the weather was temperate enough to allow her foundlings to venture to the walled enclosure that had once been a neglected garden. The abbess having granted Honore’s request to transform a portion into a play area, there the children crawled, ran, jumped, sang, and laughed distant from those who might approve of Bairnwood’s commitment to saving unwanted children but did not wish to hear or see the fruits of those labors.
“Beautiful, indeed.” Elias returned her to this abbey where it was not her arms holding a contented child but his holding a woman who longed for contentment. “Granted, your smile has a mischievous slant, but it is all the more entrancing. Hence, do you unnecessarily concern yourself over this small scar…” His thumb brushed it. “…as told, you have but to smile, dear Honore.”
Dear. Might she be that to him? Or was he only being kind? Worse, what if he but sought to seduce her? Had she not overheard the young man at Gravelines complain Elias had stolen from him the favors of a serving woman she would not have considered such, but as he so soon sought intimacy following the loss of Lettice, perhaps he was even better at playing a part than believed.
Seeing he frowned, she realized she had lowered her smile. “For pity’s sake do you kiss me, Elias?”
“Had pity moved me to try your sweet lips, I would have resisted for both our sakes. Non, Honore, I wanted to kiss you—so much I put from my mind where we are and why we are here.”
Though she longed to believe him, she said, �
��Did you also put from your mind who we are?”
“Who?”
She drew a breath that caused her chest to brush his, quickly exhaled the excess. “You are fairly young. You are noble. You are legitimate. You are of the world. I am not young. If I am noble, likely I am just as common and illegitimate. Regardless, ever I shall remain unacknowledged because of this defect of birth. And I am of this world only insofar as I venture into it to pluck unwanted babes from dark places.”
What seemed discomfort passed over his face, and she knew he understood that whereas it had been but a kiss to him, it had moved her to expectations to which such intimacy ought not give rise to one such as she.
“Thus,” she said, “as we have no godly future and never would I be to you the same as the woman in Gravelines, I shall be glad for your one kiss and naught else.”
He released her. “The woman in Gravelines?”
She leaned back, let the wall become the support he had been. “I speak of the grumblings of a young man who, also seeking a bed in the stables, resented losing the favors of a woman to a knight. And there was only one knight in that inn, Elias.”
“You think…” A curt laugh bounded from him. “Though I told I remained behind to gain information—and I did—you believe I lay with a woman.”
“It is that over which the man complained.”
“Upon my honor, I was with her at the bar and only there. And when I gleaned from her all I could, she became cover to learn more from others. Afterward, I gave her coin, sent her away, and feigned sleeping off drunkenness so I could aid the archbishop did any disturb his sleep.”
Though she feared believing him, she was moved to do so. Determining she would, she said, “Forgive me. It was difficult to conceive you could be intimate with a woman so soon after what happened to Lettice, but…”
His face tightened.
Wishing she had not reminded him of his lost love, she said, “My only excuse is I know so little of you.”
Now eyes that had looked so kindly upon her pierced. “Do you? Then you ought not allow me to kiss you, especially as you yourself tell only forbidden intimacy is possible between us. In yielding, you risk making lie of your claim to never become that which drops coin into the palm of women like the one who kept company with me at Gravelines.”
“I would never—”
“You think she knew what desperation would make of her ere it ruined her?” His voice having risen, he snapped his teeth and momentarily closed his eyes. “I am more at fault. Though as told it was not pity or kindness that made me kiss you, nor the hope of seducing you, I know better than to yield to desire that ruins women and makes fatherless children.”
Only desire. But better that than mere pity or kindness, since it was as near she would come to what went between married men and women.
She pushed off the wall, and as she smoothed her skirts was reminded of the finery that had surely aided in tempting Elias. Come morn, she would seek the laundering of her soiled garments the sooner to return her to a semblance of one whose life was devoted to foundlings.
Remembering the lost gorget, she moved her gaze over the floor, a moment later swept it up. “As I know you must rise early to be away from Clairmarais ere those from Sandwich resume their search, I wish you Godspeed, Sir Elias.”
“For that,” he said as she turned aside, “I approached you this eve.”
She came back around. “Plans have changed?”
“Perhaps, though now…” Emotions shifted across his face, and she guessed what had led to their kiss was being reconsidered.
Hope leapt through her, and she sounded almost a girl when she said, “You will take me with you?”
“I had thought to, but only were you willing to forego the gorget and clothe yourself as I find you now.”
“Why?”
“The manner in which you wear the gorget is too memorable, as well as the simple clothes worn by one whose pretense of being a knight’s wife was made believable only by the presence of a ring. If you accompany me, you must further transform lest we are unable to avoid those from Sandwich or others who could connect our party with Thomas’s at Gravelines or on the road to Clairmarais. A fine, unwed lady you will look—”
“Unwed?”
He inclined his head. “We shall be traversing lands in which my family and I are known. Thus, better you play my English cousin whom I escort to my home to take up residence for a time.”
It made sense, but she hesitated. Mostly she believed Elias viewed the scar as of little consequence, but not all would. Many would stare and talk out the sides of their mouths. Some would cross themselves and hasten away—though perhaps not as many were she clothed in the finery of a lady. Such offense was more easily dealt a commoner than a noble.
“I know it is a fearful thing, Honore.” Elias stepped near again. “But do you eschew your cover, I believe you will be safer with me.”
Once anger had moved her to refuse to conceal her lower face, and it had been freeing. Thus, when it had been required to ensure Lady Yolande remained generous with her donations, she had resented it. She ought to be glad to accommodate Elias, especially as it would allow her to be with him when he recovered Hart, but the thought of baring her face was almost as disturbing as she imagined it would be were she to bare her body.
Ridiculous, she scorned. She was thinking not much different from wild animals of which she had heard tale that, following years of captivity, might be inclined to slay their captor given the opportunity but when provided a chance to escape their cages did not take it—either so in the habit of living inside the bars or grown fearful of what lay on the other side. She had thought it exaggeration, but here she was longing to remain behind the gorget.
She did not know how she came by a smile, but she felt it when she looked up. “I shall forego the gorget.”
Keeping his gaze from a mouth whose smile moved him, Elias stared into her blue eyes. But they were more devastating. “You are certain?”
“Gladly I shall abandon it.”
He admired her determination. “Then you shall require rest as much as I.” He strode toward the corridor, traversed it, and halted alongside her door.
She paused on the threshold and tilted up her face—one that, though not of a young woman, was far from aged as she made herself sound in listing the reasons there could be no future for them.
How old was she? He would guess one or two years younger than he, meaning at least ten years older than his father would have him wed to ensure plenty of childbearing years, but to Elias a more acceptable age than a woman hardly out of girlhood.
“You need not reconsider permitting me to remain with you, Sir Elias. Be assured, I will not seek further kisses. And henceforth, I shall not forget ours is a relationship of necessity.”
Brave words, but he sensed the hurt behind them. And hated he was responsible. “Fear not, I shall awaken you well ere dawn.”
She stepped inside.
“Honore, how many years have you?”
She slowly turned, gripped the door’s edge. “Thirty and two.”
Unable to keep surprise from his face, he said, “I believed you less than my twenty and eight.”
A small smile. “You are kind, but as told, that is a mark against me—too few years in which to give a man many children. Quite impossible, Sir Elias.” She stepped back, closed the door, and bolted it.
He eased out his breath. A mess he had made of the night. He had chosen the wrong means by which to assure her she need not hide behind the gorget. He had fallen to temptation as if unaware of the attraction between them. And when she reminded him of the impossibility of pursuing a relationship beyond forbidden intimacy, he had been offended by her assumption he had sinned with the woman at the inn. And guilt over kissing Honore so soon after Lettice’s passing had turned him cruel in placing blame on her for their kiss, warning she risked becoming a harlot and confirming they could have no future beyond sin.
His only defense—a poor one—was his response ought to discourage her from gifting him more of her heart than already she did.
And what of your heart, Elias De Morville?
He shook his head. Given more time and too little consideration, he might have been in danger of losing it, but it remained his. A good thing. Once the boy was found, Elias had amends to make and promises to keep.
The obligation owed his sire was coming due.
Chapter 27
AND BREATHE THE AIR HE BREATHES
Saint-Omer
France
Gone. And no great feat to learn it. Though two days had passed since the troupe’s departure, many were the tales of performances that for five days and nights enthralled the castle folk and inhabitants of the town outside the fortress. But it was not enough to return Elias’s party to the road.
He needed to discover the troupe’s destination, if possible confirm it was the same expelled from England for its sideshow, and seek the name of Finwyn amidst their ranks. Thus, he sent Theo and Cynuit among the town folk and mounted Honore on their horse as much for show when they entered the castle walls as to ease his discomfort over the morning’s ride, throughout which her curves fit against him.
As agreed, she did not wear the gorget, and Elias was pleased with both his squire and the lad when their greatest show of surprise was the boy’s exclamation over how pretty she was.
Elias had seen her tension ease and the beginning of a smile, then she had undone the bow of her lips and said low, “You were kind to prepare them.”
He could not naysay her without coloring it a lie. He had told the two the only way she might accompany them was to drastically change her appearance, then said to prepare themselves for the whole of a pretty face from which not even a small scar could detract. But he was not certain he had done her a disservice. So offended had she been she had raised her chin higher and, excepting when the road was theirs alone, kept it up as if daring any who gazed on her to unman himself with a show of fear.