by Jill Barnett
She exhaled a relieved sigh and shoved away from the door, then crossed the small room with its painted tile floors and gray stone walls. The iron shutters over the narrow window were still open, and next to them, in wall sconces, burned two fat, ivory beeswax candles that cast dim, wavering yellow light over that side of the room. The evening air was not cold, even though the sun had set and it was fast becoming night. The stars were beginning to flicker and the waxing half moon hung in the eastern sky, its corner peeking through the Gloriette window.
Here, near her bed, the air felt warm from a small coal fire that glowed brightly in the nearby fireplace. She flopped onto her feather-ticked bed with all the grace of a sack of grain. The bed ropes creaked loudly when she landed, but she cared not. She buried her face in her arms and tried to think.
A futile act. She could not think when her mind was racing over everything that had happened to her thisday, reliving it all with numb disbelief. So after a minute or so, she rolled over and flung her arms out from her sides, then stared up at the dark wooden beams on the ceiling as if the answers she needed were engraved there.
But there were no answers. Just huge wooden beams that had been darkened by age and smoke.
“What a fix I’m in!” She lay there, not knowing if she wanted to scream down the walls or cry out for joy.
God-in-heaven-above, she was betrothed to Tobin de Clare. Betrothed to him.
But why?
Nothing made sense. Why would Tobin de Clare want to marry her? Arrogant, pigheaded, domineering, over-mighty knight. She flung one arm over her eyes and sighed. Sofia de Clare. She had not thought of such since that night on the garden bench. She wished she had not thought of it now.
But she could not change what she felt inside. When she was with him, the sight of him made her burn with something so strong even her own pigheadedness could not will it away. Even her pride. Even her pain.
Tobin de Clare, who had eyes like heaven and a profile that made her think of the marble statues of the avenging angels carved into the cathedral in town. He had treated her so horridly two years before. And she had seen him only in her nightmares until the day before, when their paths had finally crossed again and she had taken advantage of the situation and purposely gave him the wrong direction. One did not ignore such a perfect opportunity for a little vengeance. Those times came so seldom.
In those two years she had thought of him often, usually with some strong tears of anger or humiliation. Over time, she had stopped crying tears over him and over what he had done. But she could never forgive him for making her feel those tears. She prided herself on her strength. Tears were a sign of weakness. She hated to cry. Tobin made her cry, like now, when she realized how very thin her skin was when it came to anything that had to do with him.
She had tried to feel nothing. When word came that he was in the north on some knight’s duty, she had prayed that it was a vile one, for even time could not dull the sting of what he had done to her.
He broke her heart.
She had a fierce need to hate him. He deserved nothing but her hatred. However, the longer she lay there, the more she could not hide from the truth. She did not hate him. Well, perhaps she did hate him, but not as much as she loved him, and that was her true dilemma. She loved a man she needed to hate.
There came a loud hammering on her chamber door.
She bolted upright.
“Sofia!”
Tobin’s voice. He pounded on the door again.
“Soooo-feeeee-ahhhh!”
That was the loudest whisper she had ever heard. “Go away!”
There was sudden silence. Too much silence. No footsteps retreating, just pure quiet. She watched the door as if she expected him to do something impossible, like walk through it.
She heard a slight thud against it, then it sounded as if he were sliding down the door. She heard something metal, like a chain or belt clink against the tile floor outside.
She waited, then when nothing happened she slowly slid from the bed and placed her feet softly on the floor and walked quietly across the room. She stood in front of the door for a moment, listening.
She heard no sound.
She took two more small and quiet steps and pressed her ear to the oak door, listening for something. The sound of his breath. The shuffle of his boots. A footfall.
There was nothing but utter silence.
She chewed her lip and waited. It seemed like forever. Had he left?
She bent down, then knelt and placed her cheek on the cold tiles so she could see under the door. There was a shadow, a small bit of blue, the color of his tunic. He was sitting on the floor with his back against the door.
A moment later she heard a loud belch.
She sat back on her heels and looked at the door with disgust. He was drunk. She had lost count of the times he had raised his cup to the room to honor some beautiful part of her, as if she were nothing but something to look at, a beauty made of fingers and toes, hands and cheeks, skin and hair. She had never in her life had so much of her person toasted. “Go drink and cavort with your men,” she said with disgust. “Leave me be.”
“Drink with my men? Why? I have been with my men for months.” He paused, then added in a lowered voice, “’Tis not their company I crave. I want you, sweet. Come, now, open the door. I have wine for us.”
As if wine were an enticement. Did he think her a man with nothing better to do than drink and belch and bellow to the world over some woman’s skin?
She said nothing.
“’Twill be just us. You and me, sweet. Come. Let me in.”
She could hear the clanking together of pewter cups, as if he were shifting or standing, then there was another short rap on the wooden door. “So-fi-a.”
“I will not let you in here. Do you think me that stupid?”
“I promise you will like it if you do.”
“I’ve had the bitter taste of your promises, Tobin de Clare. Now go away!”
“What promise is that?”
Well, now that she thought of it, there had been no promise between them two years ago, only a meeting in the garden, one he never intended to keep, one that was only made to prove he could make a fool of her and amuse the mean spirits of a group of cruel young men, all of her failed suitors.
She heard a slight scratching sound and looked down.
His finger slid under the gap in the door and was wiggling. “Come to me, my Sofia.”
She walked over and stood on his finger.
“Ouch! Dammit!” He snatched it back under the door and mumbled something indistinguishable. Then came that same deep voice again. “I shall wait here all night, Sweet Sofia.”
“Fine. Do as you wish. Enjoy the cold floor. I am going to bed.”
“’Tis too early for bed . . . alone.”
She unfastened the closures on her silk gown, which took her too long. Her fingers were fumbling and clumsy, which made her more frustrated. Finally the gown slid to the floor and she stepped out of it, then hung it on a metal hook near her old clothes chest and the small table with its cushioned stool where she would sit and comb out her hair every morn and night.
She removed the golden headpiece, the one she wanted to rip off her head the moment she found out it had been a gift from him, sent with the wily Poleaxes, those traitorous women who had implied it was from Eleanor when they had dressed her.
She sat down on the stool and grabbed a handful of her hair, then spent the next few tense moments jerking an ivory comb through it and muttering about men and life and love and the unfairness of it all.
It was the dead of night when something woke her. She lay there and listened, then glanced at the door and wondered if he could still be there. She had no idea how much time had passed. One of the two candles had gone out, but the other was too far away for her to see the calibration marks. She lay very still, listening for sounds.
Then she heard it again. A tinny, scraping sound, like iron against
stone. Frowning, she turned toward it; the sound was coming from outside.
She threw back the covers and slid her feet into her slippers and crossed the room to the open window. The guards on the castle walls were dark silhouettes moving across the eastern points, torches in hand. In the bailey below there was nothing but black night, no movement, no horses or people that she could see. But her eyes were still becoming accustomed to the darkness.
A second later something flew through the window at her and she jumped backward, thinking it was one of those nasty bats. She waved her hands in front of her face and jumped around for a moment, then realized there was no bat in the room. She rubbed her eyes, then looked again.
There on the floor was a three-pronged metal hook with a rope attached.
My God . . .
The hook suddenly skated across the floor and caught on the stone ledge; the rope went as taut as her nerves.
Sofia moved over to the window. She had to lean outside and hang onto the shutters to see directly below the Gloriette. The rope began to wiggle and pull, then a cloud that had been covering the moon drifted by and misty moonlight shone down on Tobin’s upturned face.
“What in the name of God and all the saints are you doing, you drunken fool?”
“Conquering my lady!” He hung there with one arm outstretched, about ten feet off the ground. “Vanquishing the siege! I am in the King’s favor, you know. Damsel mine! Did you not hear the toasts to my valor?”
Any moment she expected him to beat his chest like the Irish warriors. “I heard the toasts. But the man I know has no valor or honor.”
“Ah, So-fee-ah! I will soon be there to prove you wrong. Then you can squeeze me all night.”
“I hate you, Tobin de Clare! Stop this now.”
“I cannot. Since you will not let me inside through the door, I am climbing up there to you.” He swung out on the rope again, back and forth, and called out, “Oh, fair damsel in yon tower.”
“Shhh! Or I shall tower you.” She grasped the hook and tried to pull it loose. The thing would not budge, so she used both hands and pressed her foot against the wall for leverage. Still she could not move it. It was embedded securely into the stone of the ledge and with that huge oaf’s weight pulling taut on the rope, there was no way she had the strength or the power to loosen it.
She ran to the small table and pulled out the chain belt that held her small eating dagger, then ran back and began to saw on the fibers of the rope. “You had best lower yourself back to the ground or you will break your drunken neck! I am cutting the rope.”
“Cutting it?”
She peered over the edge as she sawed away.
He began to move more swiftly, climbing hand over hand. He had moved a good five feet upward before she had even cut one single thread.
“What are you cutting it with, your sewing clips?” He began to laugh as he hung there.
“A knife,” she said through gritted teeth. She dug into the rope and sawed faster. “My dagger!”
“Dagger? The one you use to cut your meat? Ha!” He began to laugh harder, which made her saw furiously.
Sofia glanced down and saw he was only a few feet from the window, scaling the rope all too easily. She sawed faster and faster.
“You can never cut this rope in time. ’Tis oiled and waxed.” There was irritating amusement in his voice. “Stand back, my lady, and await your betrothed!” He flung one arm out and dangled there with the rope clutched in one strong arm, his sword arm.
His free hand crawled over the ledge.
She grabbed the dagger and, in frustration, stabbed at his hand, but she missed.
“Jesu!” Tobin’s forearm and the top of his head popped up over the rim of the ledge. “Put that puny thing away before you hurt someone with it.”
“That’s the idea, you fool. Go away!” She slashed at him again, but he reached out and knocked the dagger from her hand with one swipe.
She spun and watched the closest thing she had to a weapon skitter across the floor and slide under her bed.
“Sofia.” He grunted and started to pull himself up onto the ledge. “You know you cannot fight me on this. I have won. Accept it and enjoy it.” A moment more and the pigheaded oaf would be inside her room.
She glanced at the shutters, leaned out and grabbed the handles, then slammed those iron shutters closed.
“Dammit, Sofia!” The rope went suddenly taut.
She had to use both her feet for leverage against the wall so she could pull the shutters together tightly enough to slide the iron latch over the bar catch. After she did, she stood there, her breath exerted, her heart beating drumlike in her chest.
“Sofia.”
“Go away, Tobin. Climb down, for you will not be coming in here this night! Or any night!” She started to turn away.
“Wait!”
“Why?”
“I cannot climb down.” He paused. “My clothes are caught.”
She turned back and saw it then, the dark blue strip of his tunic that was wedged between the closed shutters; it was the strip that had the two back closures on it.
He was caught, truly caught. In the shutters. Which were locked. And she was not going to unlock them. Ever.
She covered her mouth with one hand and began to laugh.
“Are you laughing?”
“Aye,” she said between breaths.
There was a long pause of silence, then came a deep command, “Open the shutters.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Sofia!”
“Pray tell?” She sauntered in a casual circle, waving one hand. “What is wrong, Sir Knight? Are you truly stuck?”
“Open . . . the . . . shutters.”
“I thought you knights were supposed to be trained in strategy. Are you not? It seems to me that you should have thought of this possibility before you took siege, oh great warrior.” Then she really laughed, bent, placed her palms flat on her knees and howled.
She could hear him swearing over her laughter.
“Was not that the exact same word you said would damn me to eternal hell?”
He repeated it.
“What if the Archbishop heard you? Oh, and please don’t teach that word to our daughters, sir. Perhaps our useless sons, but not our daughters.”
“I am not jesting with you anymore . . . ”
“Who is jesting? I am perfectly serious.”
“Open the blasted shutters.”
“Farewell, Sir Knight! I shall bid you good night . . . adieu.” She yawned loudly.
“Sofia!”
“Ho . . . hum! I’m yawning. All that celebrating just wore me out.”
“When I get down from here I shall wear you out.”
“Are you threatening me? Your own betrothed? And you, a gallant knight. Wherefore art thy chivalry, sir? Have you not heard of courtly love?”
She heard him mumble something, something that sounded like, “I’ll give you courtly love.”
“Tell me this,” Sofia said. “Was that another threat?”
“Open the shutters.”
“I cannot. Besides, there is not time. For you see, I’m off to bed.” She turned and danced across the room, humming sweetly because it drowned out his threats and curses and the pounding on the shutters.
He could pound all night.
She drew back the coverlet, kicked off her slippers, and crawled into bed.
After a minute she got up, because of his hissing her name and hammering so loudly even the dead could not sleep through it. At the foot of her bed, she opened the chest and took out her despised sewing box, filled with torturous items like steel pins and sharp needles. For the first time she could ever remember, she was glad to have that sewing box. She rummaged through and pulled out two small balls of silk tapestry yarn, cut some off, then wadded them up and stuck them in her ears.
She cocked her head and listened for a moment. The pounding was muted, not much louder than her own heartbeat.
The perfect solution! Humming, she put the sewing box away and crawled back into her soft and comfy bed. In a matter of moments she was fast asleep with a huge and satisfied smile on her face.
Chapter 10
There was an old Spanish proverb that Tobin had heard somewhere; it claimed water was for oxen and wine for kings. ’Twas most fitting when he’d had too much of the King’s wine the night before, and now it felt like there was a team of oxen stomping around inside his pounding head.
He sat in the Great Hall, waiting to break fast . . . or to die, whichever came first. His elbows were planted on the table, the heels of his hands pressed against his eye sockets to dull the throbbing pain there.
From the quiet in the room he figured that he was not the only one suffering. They said the King was not coming down. The Archbishop left the night before, teetering in his saddle. His father and most of the men-at-arms were in the same shape as he was, head down, waiting for food and uttering an occasional moan, but mostly, they were blessedly silent.
He was almost asleep, facedown on the table, when his father kicked him hard in the back of the calf. Tobin’s head shot up. He winced, then turned and scowled at his father. “What did you that for?”
“Lady Sofia.” His father gave a slight nod toward the arched entrance, where she stood, surveying the room with an unreadable look.
Tobin closed his eyes. A mighty effort.
She hummed loudly and out of pitch as she crossed in front of him, a strident sound that was as welcome to his ears as a cat fight.
Custom dictated that he rise as she approached. He tried to, but had to use two hands to push himself up, and then rested one palm down on the table so he wouldn’t wobble.
“Good morn!” she said in a tone as bright and intense as the sun, loud as the first bells of Prime. She stood by her heavily carved chair, paused a moment, then grabbed the chair arms and dragged the thing back across the floor tiles; it scraped and scratched and made a horrific sound like a knife on a dry whetstone.