Bond of Blood

by Roberta Gellis

  "Tell half the men to prepare to ride out with me. You remain with the other half to guard her ladyship. Hold the house until dawn if you are attacked. If I come not again by dawn, try to escape and overtake Lord Hereford and Giles. I will tell her ladyship nothing of this because I do not wish to alarm her. You may have to remove her by force—do not hesitate to do so."

  He hurried up the stairs to say goodbye to Leah, only to be met by her high-pitched, querulous tones scolding at a maid. Cain gritted his teeth, gestured the maid out, and said gently, "I must go out, Leah."

  "Out, in this dark and rain? To where? For how long? May I not come?"

  "No, you may not," Radnor replied with an edge to his voice. "Pray give me no more trouble. I have had a message to go to a hospice near by. My father is here and needs a word with me."

  "You will not sleep away? Cain, I am afraid in the night."

  "I will do my best, Leah, but I know not what will be asked of me. I leave you in Beaufort's care. Do as he tells you to do. As to sleeping, take one of your maids to bed with you if you desire company, and try for some peace of mind. You must use yourself to my being away sometimes. I cannot carry you to battle with me."

  "You do not go to war tonight?" Leah cried, starting up.

  "No, no. I spoke of the future only. Do calm yourself. I can stay no longer."

  Perhaps he could have spared more time, but Cain was thoroughly annoyed with her. He had so much deeper trouble, and she clung so and whined so that he could not think. Even though he could feel his temper fraying, he did not want to fly out at her and leave her to cry herself to sleep or, worse, leave her with that as her last memory of him.

  Before Leah could say another word, he had kissed her with a flare of passion that was frightening in its controlled brevity, and flung himself out the door. She was surprised at his abruptness, but her major feeling was one of irritation with his inconsistency and, when Beaufort came to the door to ask if she wanted anything, Leah smiled and bade him come in to amuse her.

  "You have recovered well, Cain," Gaunt's voice was indifferent but his eyes raked his son from foot to head and down again.

  "What do you here?" Cain asked furiously. "Why did you send that messenger without any word except that I was to come? Why did you not write? I have been sick with worry."

  "Over me?" came the caustic question.

  "Our plans may well have gone awry because of your ill-considered silence. I knew not whether to dare send Hereford out with the prisoners, and now because of this crazy demand that I come to you I know not—"

  "Are you telling me my duty?" the old man snarled.

  Cain choked, his face flaming, then answered childishly from long habit, "No, sir."

  "Hereford is safe away, I met him on the road. So now you know that and it saved the danger of a messenger direct from him. I returned hither instead of going home because I had something to tell you that I did not wish to commit to writing just yet. Pembroke is dead."

  Lord Radnor closed his eyes to stop the room from whirling and swallowed to still his heaving stomach. In many ways he and his father disagreed, but he had always believed the earl to be a man of honor. That cursed bond of blood. It had made him the slave of a woman and his father an assassin.

  "How did you kill him?"

  Gaunt had walked restlessly away, as if he did not wish to meet Cain's eyes. Now he whirled about to face him. "Has your mind and heart gone as rotten as your body? What filth is this you spew? Faugh! You are as foul as you look."

  "You mean he simply died?" Cain had the oddest impulse to kiss the old man, at this moment being better pleased with curses than blessings. At least his father had not committed murder. He sighed with relief. "Let your horn-hoofed devil of a son sit down and ease his pain," he said almost gaily, "and give him a chance to get used to the change of company. The months at court have corrupted my mind."

  The earl of Gaunt stared at his son with blank astonishment. "What did you say?" he roared.

  "That Pembroke died—you said that. By the by, of what did he die?"

  "Not that." Gaunt shook his head angrily.

  Cain was puzzled. "That my mind has been corrupted by the court? Why should that surprise you? I am grown so sour and suspicious that I listen for nothing but plots and think of nothing but such filth."

  "No, not that either. What did you say before that?"

  The eyes which could be so softly, liquidly dark were suddenly as opaque and black as coal. "Before? Oh, that I was a horn-hoofed devil? That my foot hurt?" Lord Radnor raised his brows and met his father's eyes squarely. "Why? Is it not true? Are you ashamed of it, you who told me what I was? I have been thirty years your son. It is time you grew used to my imperfections." The expression on his father's face showed Radnor that the old man remembered the scene to which he referred as clearly as he did himself. "Nay," he said, quivering with nerves and striking out bitterly again, "I know what I am. Do you want to look again to be sure? Shall I strip and show you what a devil looks like?"

  "Pah! You idiot! You can exhibit your beauties to me some other time if you desire it so earnestly, but there are matters of more note to deal with now. Those pains Pembroke complained of on the ride were doubtless real. By the time we reached Pevensey, he could not sit in the saddle. He was too weak to move and I dared not leave him lest he recover. Whether he ran back to Stephen to sell him our heads or ran to his own lands to stir trouble made little difference, so I had decided that Pembroke needed a keeper. When I saw how sick he was … I will not lie to you, I did not kill him … but I did not help him grow better either. Now we must move quickly."

  The calm disdainful tone, the harsh voice, were soothing. Cain sank into a seat beside the fire and said wearily, "Ay, but why?"

  "Because it has come to me that Maud may be more afraid of us with Pembroke in our hands than with him dead. She will think that we could make him speak for us as she made him speak for her. As soon as may be you must go to the queen."

  The Earl of Gaunt's face was perfectly expressionless, his voice perfectly steady and normally harsh, but Radnor who was on edge and bitterly ashamed of what he had said, shifted uneasily in his chair because of the tension he felt. "Very well, but why are you here in secret? From what are you hiding?"

  "So that when you go to the queen, you will have more than your tongue with which to defend yourself. Probably she will be constrained by knowing you have those men to speak against her, but what if she has discovered some way out in these months and she fears them no longer? When you go to her—tomorrow night will be best, I believe—I with my men will lie in wait watching the doors of the tower. If you come not out by dawn, we will go in and ask for you."

  Cain stared at the scarred hands in his lap. Why had his father come instead of returning to his estates when the Welsh were still restless? To tell him Pembroke was dead? To watch the gates of the White Tower? Why had he come from Wales at all? He came at the time of the tourney to save me from Pembroke's plot. The revelation was a stunner to Radnor. And now he comes again to protect me from the queen and to see me because on the road with Pembroke I had so much pain and was far from well. Cain recalled the other time he had been so near death. Then his father had hung over him and struggled with him for his own good. To preserve the heir to his lands? Perhaps. Or had he made his own sorrow all these years through blindness? Had he dwelt so long on things past that he had not seen the present?

  "What ails you, you dolt?"

  The sharp question startled Cain into speech. "Nothing … Only I am so tired of threats and half-truths and half-oaths."

  "And I too am tired, my son." Gaunt put up a hand and let it drop. "If that wife of yours brings forth a man-child—" He stopped suddenly, chilled by the flash of fear in Cain's eyes. "The task must be done," he began again more briskly. "Chester and Fitz Richard must be freed and you must wrest sufficient gold from Maud to pay off the men Henry brought and to pay for ships to carry him home. Bah, you are yawning fit to
split your head. If you used your bed to sleep in once in a while, you might be able to attend to business better. Go, get you to the bed you covet so much."

  Always the bitter gibe. Radnor's raw nerves jumped and twitched. "To say these few words you have dragged me three miles in the dark and rain?"

  "No," Gaunt snarled, "it was to see you wet and discomforted!"

  A fool's question justly received a fool's answer, Radnor thought, as the old man walked down the hall towards the cell he would sleep in. His father did value him. Perhaps only as the heir to his lands, but it was still pleasant to know that he was of value. The sensation of pleasure, however, was mixed with resentment. Why could Gaunt not say he had summoned him to see with his own eyes how he had recovered from his wounds? Why for that matter could he not have come to the house to see him? A slow smile curved Cain's lips in spite of his irritation. Gaunt's pride would never stoop so far.

  By the time Cain arrived at home, he was not only soaked but bruised and muddy. His horse had stumbled in the total blackness of a moonless and starless night, throwing him into the muddy street. It was a great relief to him that Leah was asleep, curled up in a corner on the side of the bed that was usually his. Radnor shrugged and began to remove his clothes as quietly as possible. He would not disturb her for that. It was an unpleasant shock to him, as he sat in the dark idly rubbing his hair dry, to be grasped in a passionate embrace. First, he wanted nothing but to be left alone to digest his thoughts. Second, the boldness was not womanly, to his mind. He enjoyed Leah's response, but he wanted to be allowed to make the advances.

  "Just a moment, Leah. I have news for you. I hope you will not be distressed, but I must tell you anyway. Your father is dead. It was of an illness—not any doing of mine."

  "God is merciful to the just," Leah replied, but to Cain's intense surprise she did not release him.

  It was all very well to dislike so unnatural a parent. Pembroke certainly did not deserve love, but to seek so avidly for a sexual embrace after receiving such news was somehow wrong. There was a note of distaste in his voice when he spoke even though he had already decided that a bout of lovemaking was a small price to pay for peace.

  "Let me take off my clothes. I will come to you quickly enough." To strip and lie down was the work of a minute. Radnor slid a hand automatically up Leah's thigh.

  "Oh, do not. Please, do not."

  "What?"

  "Please, please. Do not be angry, but do not do that."

  "Has the devil got into you? First you grab me as if you could not get at me quickly enough despite the news I have given you, and then you deny me. Is this a new game you have discovered to torment me with?"

  "I only wanted you to hold me. I will deny you nothing, my lord, only give me a little time."

  Merciful Christ, Radnor thought, may I not have one night's peace to think? He could feel that Leah was trembling, however, and he made a last effort at control, saying gently, "What is it, Leah? Why do you weep? Is it for your father after all?"

  "I am afraid," she sobbed.

  "Of what are you afraid, dear heart?"

  "I will tell you, my lord, but, please, in my own way."

  "Of course, love. Wait, let me open the bedcurtain so we have light from the nightlight. I do not like to talk in the dark."

  And he thought wryly, if we talk in the dark I am like to fall asleep over it. Why did everyone always want to discuss things in the middle of the night? Did no one need to sleep except himself?

  "Well?" he asked.

  Leah's eyes were red and her lids swollen, and she snuggled into her husband's arms before replying. "When do we return home to Painscastle?"

  "I have told you some hundred times," he began sharply, and then as she began to shake again, more softly, "soon, love, soon. Do not be afraid. Very soon now we will go. Tomorrow I will go to the queen. Then we need only wait for her to deliver up the gold and free Chester. A few days or, perhaps, two weeks. Not long. Soon." He stroked her long hair and her smooth skin comfortingly.

  "When I am there, may I have someone with me?"

  "Who? If it be reasonable, my darling, you may have anything you want, anything I can get for you."

  "I care not who, so long as it be a noblewoman of good character, or two perhaps, older than I." Leah began to cry again softly.

  "You are lonely, my sweet. You miss your mother." A pang of jealousy passed through him, and he smothered it. "Poor child. You are so wise so often that I forget you are but a child. Do not cry, love. I will take you home, to your own keep, if you desire it, to see your mother." He did not remind her that Pembroke was dead. "Perhaps she will visit Painscastle for a while until you are comfortable there."

  "I do not wish to go home. I would like to see my mother, but it is not that I miss her. I am happy with you alone."

  "Then what do you weep for, Leah? You know I could not refuse so reasonable a desire as for womenfolk of your own class around you."

  "When we return to Painscastle, will Beaufort still live with us? Did you not say you needed a castellan for Radnor Keep? Can he be trusted with such a task?"

  There was a moment's stunned silence as Radnor's weary mind tried to take in the jump from one subject to another. "Of course he— Why should you ask such a question about my man?"

  "Let me get up for a moment." Leah bent down by the bed, then walked out of the light of the candle into the darkness. When she returned, she took a deep, shuddering breath and stood looking down at her husband. "Because he cannot be trusted, with me." She threw herself down upon Radnor knocking him flat as he started up, gasping, "No, my lord, you cannot rise up and kill him. I have taken away your shoes. Be still. He did me no harm. There was nothing but words. He did not even kiss my hand."

  This last was not true, for Sir Harry had forced her so far as to kiss her lips before she fought free of him. That she would never tell because it would have been the man's death warrant. On one pretext or another, Radnor would destroy anyone who meddled with his property. Leah wanted to protect Beaufort because she felt, guiltily, that she had encouraged him. She thought her husband would be paralyzed without his special boot, but she had underestimated his determination and ability. Enraged as he was, he did not even feel the pain as he flung her off him and started across the room. Leah leapt at him again, clinging like a limpet and trying to trip him. At first he only thrust her away, but her insistence in keeping him from his objective finally pierced his fury.

  "What did he want? What did he say?" Radnor snarled at his wife, gripping her arm brutally.

  "Cain, he is very young. He is very unhappy. He—"

  "You would like an exchange, perhaps?"

  "Ohhhh!" Leah shuddered.

  "He is years younger than I and not so marked. Thus he is even more—beautiful. Why do you protect him? Why?" He shook her until her teeth rattled, the pressure of his hands leaving red welts on her shoulders. "Nay, I need no answer. Your eyes go there and elsewhere too, I hear. You are only too lily-livered to take what you want like all the other sluts so you come sniveling to me. Damn you! Curse you and rot you and damn you!"

  He lifted one hand to strike her, and she wrenched herself out of his grip, ran across the room, and threw his shoes at him out of the dark. "Go, go kill him if you will. I tried to protect him because I know if you slay him you will bear the burden of regret all your life. He did you no wrong. A man cannot help loving, no more than a woman can." Perhaps he did not even hear her. He was dressing, his back coldly turned. "Love is a thing that comes unaware, against the will," she sobbed. "So did I love you from the first time you kissed me in the tower room at Eardisley, though I knew that my love must bring me pain and grief. I did not will it; I could not help it. Cain, do not give credit to the name you bear. Do not destroy a man who saved your life three times. Send him away. Give him a castle. Find him a wife. What could give me greater pain than that if I did desire him," she cried despairingly as her husband straightened up and dragged his mail shirt ov
er his head.

  Leah moistened her lips at the sight of his face, but she could not make another sound, not even cry out with terror. Her husband groped behind him and his fingers closed on the broad belt that fastened his surcoat together.

  "Beaufort's fate is for me to decide, justly or unjustly, but I will teach you once and for all that your will must not cross mine. I will teach you to protect those who have sought to shame me. I will teach you to look with lust upon another man. I will teach you to make my life a misery to me with your complaints and your clinging. Afraid, were you! I will teach you where to fear truly."

  The belt cracked and Leah winced. It cracked again, curling around her shoulders. Her lips parted stickily, but she still could find no voice. A harder blow made her stagger and fall against a chair. A still harder one made her reel towards the bed.

  "Stop, oh stop! Have mercy, do not beat me." Leah sank to her knees. Radnor's belt came down again. The pain was dreadful, but it was one with which Leah was very familiar. She might even have endured it to the end without protest, knowing that once his wrath was spent on her Beaufort would be saved, but she was afraid that if he beat her until he was tired she would be sick, sick enough to miscarry.

  "Stop, my lord," she shrieked, "in the name of God, stop. I am with child."

  The raised belt sank slowly. Leah watched the rage drain out of her husband's face and an expression of overwhelming terror take its place. She knew what was coming and slid flat on the cold floor, panting like an animal. The rain had stopped and the sound of a rushing wind filled the room. That, and Leah's panting breath, were the only sound for several long minutes.

  "Whose?"

  There was nothing more calculatedly cruel he could have said. Lord Radnor did not doubt that the child was his. She would never have mentioned Beaufort's attack if she had such a guilty secret. Cain would have killed Leah, not beaten her, if he had the slightest real doubt of her physical fidelity. It was that with her confirmation of the rumors and smiling hints of pregnancy he had so long ignored, his own smoldering fear had been ignited and he was driven by his terror to inflict pain in return.