by Traci E Hall
Celestia smiled fondly. “Impervious to Gali? The man is dead.”
Her grandmother laughed but then sobered abruptly. “Do you think you could love Sir Nicholas?”
“How can you ask me that?” Celestia’s stomach fluttered and she held out her life-healing hands. “The risk is too great. All of my abilities will disappear,” she snapped her fingers, “and I will be as nothing.”
“Nothing? Even without your powers you know more about herbal remedies than most wise women. But if you can love him, and earn his love in return, the rewards are tenfold.”
Celestia looked around the dungeon space that she’d turned into an infirmary. It had taken hard work, but she had earned the trust of the serfs. Her jars and pots were neatly labeled, her cloths folded and clean, her instruments sterile. “I am safe here.”
“Safe?” Her grandmother slapped her knee as if she’d heard a joke. “Nobody is safe, ‘Tia. And you cannot hide in this manor for all of your life. You are beautiful.”
“I am not.” Suddenly the unfairness of it all came to a boil, and she had to bite her lip to keep from crying. “I am not like the rest of you! I am a dwarf in a family of giants. I am a ghost in the presence of vibrant color. I, oh, Saint Brigid, my hands and my healing gifts are the only thing that tie me to the rest of you. By marrying, I lose everything.”
Her chest ached with tears she wouldn’t shed.
Instead of empathizing, her grandmother scoffed, “Is this about Lord Riddleton? For certes, that man was odious. I do not understand what your father was thinking, letting that toad court you.”
That odious toad was the only man who had chosen plain Celestia over breathtakingly beautiful Galiana. Hence the appeal, she thought with a shameful pang.
Since her mother, Galiana, and Ela all looked like younger versions of her grandmother, she didn’t expect for the Grand Lady Evianne to understand.
Head lowered, she murmured, “I will go to bed, as soon as I finish crushing this last bit of lavender.”
“You don’t want to discuss this anymore?”
Celestia gave her grandmother a hug. “What else is there to say?”
Nicholas heard the thrum of soft, feminine, English voices and struggled toward awareness. Inky black clouds of despair threatened him as he escaped the binding ties of sleep. Leah’s voice taunted him, teased him, and made him feel like the scum of the earth. His bones ached, ach, he hated sleeping, yet he was so damnably tired. He heard the sound of feet climbing stairs, the rustle of a kirtle, the closing of the door at the top of the stairway.
Yet Nicholas sensed that he was not alone.
The light jingle of bells told him that Celestia was still with him in the room. A sharp floral smell permeated the air, and he detected the scrape of a mortar and pestle. Turning on his side, he opened his eyes and watched her work.
She’d removed the headdress she’d worn earlier. Her hair was the exact shade of dried wheat. Hanging down her back in a long sloppy braid, the tail danced at hip level as she worked the pestle round and round. He sniffed, wondering what she was grinding. Nicholas noticed, how could he not, how her simple dress hugged her curves. For all her petite stature, her figure was shapely.
Uncomfortable, he shifted, making certain that all his body parts were covered.
She whirled, tipping the mortar over. “You are awake!”
He sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the table and pausing until he knew if he had the strength to stand. “Aye. Did you not expect me to?”
Her lips twitched as she fought a smile. “Oh, aye, but not until the morn. How do you feel?” She wiped her fingers on the apron she wore around her waist and came toward him, one hand outstretched.
Drawing back, he avoided her touch and stood. He would not accept any more kindness than need be. “Better.”
She had a tiny vee of wrinkles in her brow when she frowned as she was doing now. Nicholas had the ridiculous urge to smooth the lines away with his thumb. “I was only seeing if you had a fever,” she explained, dropping her hand.
“I’m fine.” He remembered more of the circumstances of why he was here and swallowed, his throat sore. “I owe you about a hundred apologies.”
Tilting her head to the side, she did smile, just a little. “So many?”
His stomach tightened, but it wasn’t with nausea. “I vaguely remember being ill, violently ill, in your presence. And then, correct me if I am mistaken, I was again sick.”
She cleared her face of all laughter, though he imagined it was difficult. “Tis true, you were not well. But you have been resting for three days. The fact that you are awake is apology enough for me.”
“Did you heal me with magic?” He felt incredible, cleaner and more clearheaded than he had in years.
“Not magic. I told you once already that I am not a witch. Please, won’t you sit down?”
“Before I fall down.”
“Aye,” she stepped forward to wrap her arm around his waist, easing him back onto the table. “Let me get you a cool cloth.” She turned and pierced him with a look. “Stay?”
Clutching the edge of the wooden table, his legs dangling over the side like a child in his father’s chair, he nodded.
Her braid swung out behind her as she turned. A bundle of energy, he finally placed the scent coming from her work area.
“Lavender?”
“Yes,” she said with surprise. “Do you like it? It soothes headaches and allows for a calm sleep. I tried an opiate for you, but it didn’t work as well.”
She’d given him opium? Lord Jesus. His skin heated from the inside out, and sweat dotted his upper lip. Had he yelled aloud in his night terrors? Some secrets needed to stay buried. He could not trust himself to sleep too deeply, not unless he was alone.
“I hope I didn’t scare you,” he attempted a jest.
“Oh, no, you were simply restless. From the fever, no doubt.”
Let her think that, he thought. The truth would send her running for her father. And being as her sire was a big man, that was not a good idea.
Sire. Hellfire. He gasped, unable to take in air as he remembered the last thing he’d heard before crashing. It felt as if someone was squeezing him hard enough to break his ribs. He was choking, strangling, and then suddenly, he could breathe again. Celestia had one hand on the back of his neck, and a cool cloth pressed against his forehead. “Is it true?” he croaked.
Her touch was light, yet warm, and her tone compassionate when she answered simply, “Aye.”
Sitting there together for a few minutes, absorbing a truth so large it was suffocating, he finally asked, “Did you always know about me?”
She dipped the cloth in a dish of water, wrung it out, and placed it against his wrists. They both ignored the thick ropy scars that marred his skin. “No. We thought that the baron was childless. All his bairns seem to die as infants.”
“I had heard that, as well. Not that I gave it much attention,” he laughed dryly. “Why should I have?” Celestia’s silence prodded him to speak, even as he longed to find a safe place to rest and think. Did this knowledge change his vow to kill the baron? So what if the man was his father? He was still an arse-wipe. “Men do not care about such things.”
Celestia lifted one brow, the right one, over the blue eye. “Like family?”
He stiffened. “I was brought up an orphan at Crispin Monastery. My entire life I worked outdoors and said prayers, and when I was offered to serve allegiance to Baron Peregrine and train to become a Crusader for God and King Richard—I thought that I was the luckiest bastard ever born.”
“Hmm.” She walked, jingled actually, to the black pot over the fire. She took two bowls from the side cupboard, and dished something fragrant and meaty from the pot into the dishes.
Nicholas’s stomach growled, and his mouth watered.
She came back and handed him a bowl with a chunk of bread. “‘Tis beef soup,” she said. “Eat slowly. You look like you have not been
well for some time.” Sitting on a stool opposite him, she lifted the bowl to her lips and blew into it before taking a small sip.
“You must think me the lowliest man you’ve ever met,” he said, staring at her smooth face. Why should it matter what she thought?
“That’s not true. I know some worse than you.”
“Lord Riddleton?”
She looked up. “You heard the conversation between my grandmother and me?” Her pale cheeks turned scarlet.
“Some of it. I was not eavesdropping on purpose. It’s not often that a man is referred to as an odious toad.”
Celestia smiled and Nicholas noticed the flash of a dimple in her left cheek. “Well. Did you hear anything else?”
“No. I probably missed some very interesting gossip, too.” How could he banter like this, when not long ago he’d been pounding on death’s door? He shook off the feelings of camaraderie.
“You have no idea,” she agreed, soaking a bread crust in the warm liquid before popping the piece in her mouth.
He held her gaze, thinking that a man would never get bored looking at such a beautiful woman. “Does it bother you, having one green eye and one blue?” Nicholas finished his soup, hoping that he hadn’t just offended her. “Never mind.”
“Besides having to overcome the fact that people want to know if I am a witch, you mean?”
“You are mocking me.”
“Of course.” She stood and collected their bowls, setting them on the counter next to a bunch of dried herbs, and sending him a shy smile over her shoulder.
Lord Riddleton must have been a dunce. “I have been too long from polite company.”
“‘Tis no matter. It is time for another tisane, lavender and—”
“I don’t want to sleep.”
She put a hand on her hip. He was learning she did that when she wanted her way. “I do. ‘Tis late.”
God’s bones, he was an inconsiderate oaf. She had been playing nurse to him, his chest tightened, for three days.
She looked at the covers on the table. “Let me shake them out. Oh! My grandmother took in one of my father’s tunics for you.” She quickly grabbed a folded garment and handed it to him.
“You did not do it?”
“I can mend bones, but clothing is beyond me. Unless you want a ragged hem?” Celestia piled the dishes into a bucket of water, quickly cleaning them and then setting them to dry. Next, she mixed the tisane.
Raised in a monastery, he was hardly a judge on womanly character. He knew nuns, and he knew whores. Celestia was neither. Was that why she fascinated him?
Nicholas slipped the fine fabric over his head, noting the way she deliberately kept her back turned, granting him privacy, despite the fact that she had seen him naked already. His heart warmed. She made him feel … a dangerous thing for a man with revenge on his mind.
“Before you go to bed, my lady, could you tell me what you know about the baron?”
She paused before nodding. “But I do not know much.”
It was important that he know his enemy, Nicholas thought. “Please.”
“He is our liege lord.”
“I also swore fealty to him,” Nicholas interrupted gruffly.
“How is it you never met him?”
“I promised a blood oath through his head knight. Not Petyr, but another Montgomery. He was killed.” In Tripoli. “Enough about that—do I really have his looks?” Nicholas rubbed the scars on his wrists bitterly.
“Very much in the face. Your body,” she blushed, “is slimmer.”
While he’d been starving and nauseous, the baron most likely dined on creamed trout and fruit pies. Nicholas tightened his jaw.
“I have twin brothers. They are being fostered at his estate on the Scottish border. Peregrine Castle. It is a fine opportunity for them.” She folded her hands in her lap, and he sensed that she was being overly careful with her words.
Why? she wondered.
“Is he a cruel man?”
She sucked her lower lip between her teeth, and Nicholas’s belly clenched with a sensual hunger.
“My brothers do not complain, not much. But they are not the best of writers. They’re only twelve, and they’ve been with the baron for less than a year.”
“How many siblings do you have?”
“I am the oldest, then next is Galiana, and then the twins, and then Ela.”
He remembered the youngest girl on the stairs. “They all have red hair? Except you.”
Sighing, she twiddled her thumbs. She wondered if he would find Galiana more to his taste; most men did, especially when comparing the two. “Aye, ‘tis the truth. Well, except the boys, they have blond hair, like our father. And they are tall—everybody is, except for me.”
He realized that this bothered her. “There is nothing wrong with being short.”
Her lower lip trembled.
“Is there? Something I do not know about. Can you not ride a horse? Or climb a tree—well, you are a young lady and probably don’t climb trees, so are you upset because,” he looked around the room and noticed all of the footstools, “you have to use a footstool to reach the highest shelves?”
Covering her mouth with her hand, she teased back, “I challenge you to a horse race, sir. And as for climbing trees? How else do you get the choicest apples? I am not afraid of heights, as Gali is. It simply would be nice to be tall.”
“You must admit it, though,” he pressured. “There is nothing wrong with being short.”
She rolled her eyes. “I will admit to nothing, except that we have gotten quite off topic.” Feigning a yawn, she stood and said, “I have to sleep. May I trust that you will not try to sneak off before morn? We have guards around the perimeter, and you might accidentally get shot by an archer.” Smiling, she added, “You’ve no breeches, and your legs are as white as milk. They’d think you a ghost.”
“You were looking at my legs?” Nicholas pretended to be shocked. She’d seen all of him, including his scars, and hadn’t run away. Lady Celestia was made of stern stuff. “You would protect me?” His body tensed with an unidentifiable emotion.
“Sleep, Sir Nicholas,” she said with a giggle and a wave as she went up the stairs. “No one will harm you here.”
Setting the cup on the counter, he knew it was time to leave.
He got as far as the stables before getting caught.
It was her youngest sister’s snoring that woke her, and Celestia did not even mind. The three days of nursing Nicholas back to health had taken all her energies, but the solution to her problem had come to her in a dream.
She had to protect her family and marry Sir Nicholas so that her brothers would not come to harm. Running away would only cause her family worry, not to mention that if she was to directly disobey her liege lord, her family could lose their lands and be outcast. The needs of the many most definitely outweighed her own need to be happy.
Except …
What if she spoke to Sir Nicholas before he found out that they were to wed, and what if she assured him that they could get an annulment once they pleaded their case to the baron in person? The baron could not refuse his own son, not face to face. Could he?
For certes, she’d not stand in the way.
And if she could speak to Nicholas privately, he would not have the chance to reject her in public. Celestia shoved the covers back, setting her bare feet on the wooden floor.
“‘Tia? What ails ye? You look green.”
Shoving her arms through her robe, Celestia realized that green must be the color of remembered humiliation. “Go back to sleep, Ela. You can’t have slept well, since you kept me awake most of the night.”
Her sister sat up, her bright red hair exploding from her long braids in wispy curls. She rubbed her eyes. “Sir Nicholas has a gray aura, something I have not seen before. It is too dangerous for you to wed him. Tell Father you cannot do it, please, ‘Tia?”
Unsettled by her sister’s announcement, Celestia expelled a
loud breath. “You know that I have no choice.” She crossed her arms defensively. “Why are you in my bed, anyway? What is the matter with yours?”
“I am afraid for you,” Ela said, her lower lip trembling and her green eyes brimming with tears.
“Oh, shhh, now, don’t cry.” Celestia sat back on the edge of her bed, pulling her sister into a hug. “I am a powerful healer,” she said in a storyteller’s voice, “what is a gray aura to one such as me, eh?” She laughed, tickling Ela until the tears dried.
“I will miss you,” Ela said, climbing from the mussed covers.
“Miss me?” Celestia repeated, a shard of ice lodging in her chest.
Galiana threw open the door to Celestia’s room and marched inside, followed by a line of five serfs. One carried a bathing tub, one carried two pails of hot water, another carried two pails of cool water, one carried breakfast, and the last carried a huge basket of oils and lotions that Galiana had made.
“Quick, ‘Tia. Ye must bathe and dress, sleepyhead. We’ve all been up since dawn, except you two. Were you crying, Ela? No matter. Go to Gram, she has your dress laid out, you’ll carry the flowers.”
“Flowers?” Celestia asked, the cold traveling through her blood.
Galiana would not meet her eyes. “You’re getting married.”
Celestia’s knees gave out. “Now?” she squeaked, sinking to the floor in a puddle of boneless nerves. “But I … Nicholas doesn’t even know, and I was going …”
Clapping her hands, Gali dismissed everyone and shut the door behind them, Ela included.
Taking a seat on the floor next to her sister, Galiana said softly, “Nicholas knows.”
Heart beating rapidly, Celestia burned to ask how. “If I am to be married right now, he must have agreed to it.”
Gali covered Celestia’s hand with hers. “Aye.”
Apprehension was thick in the air, and Celestia bowed her head. “Tell me. The truth, please.”
“Nicholas tried to escape the manor last eve, but Sir Petyr caught him at the stables.”
“He is not well enough to travel!”