Raymond sighed, feeling a burden slip from his shoulders. “No, I did not.”
She smiled a moment, then frowned. “Yet I also think his hate springs from the way he envies you, and I would guess he has envied you for a very long time.”
How did she guess all that? “Are you a seer?”
“No. I could tell from the way he looked at Donhallow, and you.”
And you, Raymond added inwardly, suddenly remembering Montross’s eyes as he had stared at Elizabeth. At the time, he had been too perplexed, and then pleased, to really take note.
God knew they had wenched together enough in their youth that he should have remembered the expression in Montross’s eyes when he found a woman pleasing.
Would Elizabeth betray him, too? She could. What man who saw her would not desire her?
What if another man took her from him?
A shaft of pure terror struck his heart.
She could hurt him, deeply.
No woman must ever hurt him again. He would be strong, not weak.
“I do not want you to be angry with me, my lord.”
“Then do not give me cause.”
“I shall try not to,” she said in a small voice.
A vulnerable voice. The voice of a woman who wanted to please him, and instead had been rebuffed.
Her disappointment and dismay could not be helped, he told himself. He could lust after her and love her often, but fall in love and lose his heart to her he dare not.
He took her by the shoulders. She looked up at him questioningly, her bright eyes shining, just before his mouth swooped down upon hers in a passionate, heated kiss.
Despite his resolution, Elizabeth summoned up such desire and need and yearning….
Sweet heaven, he had not kissed a woman like this in years and years. Had not wanted to. Had not needed to.
She responded with equal fervor. Parting her lips, she relaxed into his embrace while his tongue penetrated the moist warmth of her mouth.
He had been a fool not to kiss her last night, or caress her curvaceous body. He should have used his hands and lips to make her ready for him.
Now his hands moved slowly over her, exploring her. As his arm wrapped tightly about her, he pressed his fingers between her legs and rubbed gently. She moaned softly, the sound arousing him even more.
Still kissing her, he slid his hands under her skirt and beneath her buttocks, then lifted her. Her skirt bunched around her waist, she wrapped her bare legs about him as he carried her to the table. Slowly he lowered her, so that she sat upon the top.
He broke the kiss only long enough to hike up his tunic and free himself. Panting, she watched hungrily, her eyes gleaming like a cat’s in the dark.
Then he was between her knees. She clutched his shoulders and her eyes closed in ecstasy as he entered her. “Oh, my lord!” she whispered when he started to thrust faster. “Oh, yes, please…do…that…”
And then she groaned and the sudden throbbing of her soft, hot honor sent him over the brink, too.
He collapsed against her, his breathing hoarse and his body damp with sweat.
She laid her head against his shoulder. “I hope this means I am forgiven for my impertinence in the courtyard.”
“Yes,” he whispered.
The warm breath of her sigh caressed his cheek. “I am glad, my lord, although if this were your idea of a punishment, I confess I would want to be impertinent all the time.”
Trying not to smile, he drew back and straightened his clothes.
Elizabeth looked down and gingerly got off the table. “My gown! It is so wrinkled! Oh, no! I’ve ruined it,” she said as she began to press it with her hands, running them over her thighs in a way that was incredibly exciting.
“I ruined it.”
Relief dawned in her eyes. “You are not angry about this, either?”
He shook his head. God’s wounds, he would ruin a dress every hour if he could do it this way.
She stopped trying to press out the wrinkles with her hand and swallowed hard, then straightened her slender shoulders. “I think I had better confess something else,” she said, her whole body tense as if she expected him to curse her, or worse. “A peddler and his wife and child are in the kitchen, eating. Rual said you do not approve of peddlers. I did not buy anything,” she hastened to add.
“I am not the Church,” he growled, “to dispense charity.”
“The woman looked so thin and tired, I feared she would fall ill—”
“You let them bring sickness here?” he demanded, another kind of dread knotting his stomach. He should have asked who those people were and what they were doing in the courtyard instead of paying heed only to Elizabeth.
“I think all she needs is a few good meals, and the baby is not sick, nor—”
“The baby you held?” The baby that had looked so natural in her arms.
“Yes, my lord, he is a fine, healthy—”
Raymond didn’t wait to hear more. He marched from the solar and headed straight to the kitchen, ignoring the stares of the servants, as well as Elizabeth trotting to keep up with him.
His father had died of a sickness brought to Donhallow by a peddler, and he nearly. And now Elizabeth had let a peddler and sick wife into his castle. She had held their child.
He strode into the kitchen and his gaze swept the room, passing quickly over his servants and the food being prepared to settle on the man, woman and child huddled in the corner.
“Out!” he commanded, glaring at them, wishing he could bellow his rage. “Out of Donhallow.”
The man jumped to his feet and pulled the woman’s arm. She was thin, as Elizabeth had said. The child she held to her shoulder started to cry.
“My lord, please do not be angry with them,” Elizabeth pleaded as they scurried out. “It is my fault. Rual warned me.”
As the servants cowered, he turned to glower at her.
“They are here now, so a little mercy—”
“Who is overlord here?”
“You, my lord.
“Remember that.”
She nodded. “And I will remember what I said if you would marry me,” she said quietly, regarding him with all the steadfastness of a battle-hardened warrior. “You rule here, my lord, and I was wrong to disobey your will. I shall not make that mistake again.”
In light of her resolute expression, he wished he had not reacted so passionately.
Yet he would not have peddlers and beggars bringing their sicknesses, as well as chicanery and tricks, into his castle. He glanced sharply at the cook. “The meal is ready?”
“Aye, my lord,” Lud stammered.
“Serve it.”
He marched past Elizabeth toward the hall. Servants hurried to the hall after him, and in a moment, she heard the familiar banging of the trestle tables being set up in the hall.
The cook and his helpers, with several glances both pitying and wary, went back to their work.
Elizabeth grabbed a small loaf of coarse brown bread and hurried from the kitchen. She continued across the courtyard, the soft soles of her shoes slapping briskly against the cobblestones.
How could things have gone so wrong so quickly? This morning she had been so happy and sure she had made a wise decision leaving the convent. But now, after learning about her husband and seeing his fierce temper…witnessing his lack of generosity…knowing there was nothing she could do or say to criticize him because she had assured him she would be subservient to him…what a desperate fool she had been!
She swiped at the tear running down her cheek and swallowed hard as she approached the imposing gate. She didn’t want the guards, or anybody else, to see her crying.
Nor should she cry. After all, she had chosen this path. Now she must walk it, come what may.
Chapter Eight
Tapping his foot, Raymond waited. And waited. The others gathered in the hall also waited, as silent as he as they surreptitiously eyed one another, and their overlord.
Ask where his wife had gone, he would not. That would mean he cared, and if he cared about that, they might believe he cared about her feelings. And if he cared about her feelings, that would give her power over him.
Where the devil was she? She had eaten like a starving woman last night. It didn’t seem likely that she would care to miss a meal.
On the other hand, she was used to deprivation. If he had angered her enough, missing a meal in a display of childish pique would probably not trouble her overmuch—but if she thought such behavior was going to make him regret what he had done, she was very wrong.
“Rual,” he growled at last, glancing sharply at the maidservant standing close by.
The startled woman jumped. “My lord?”
“Serve the food.”
“But your lady—”
“Now.”
Rual nodded rapidly and disappeared into the corridor leading into the kitchen. In a few short moments, she and the other serving maids dutifully appeared with the bread and butter.
Perhaps Elizabeth would return before the noon meal was over. If so, he would banish her from the hall until it was concluded. If she could not trouble herself to be here for the beginning, she could miss it entirely.
However, Elizabeth did not arrive during that course, or the next. Or the one after that.
What in God’s name was she playing at? Surely she couldn’t have been so foolish as to wander away from the castle? She knew that he had enemies.
Fane Montross would do anything to hurt him, if he had half a chance.
Fane Montross had looked at her with lust in his blue eyes.
If Fane Montross found her alone and unprotected—
Raymond’s chair scraped over the stone floor as he abruptly rose. Without a word to his men, he strode out of the hall toward the gatehouse, Cadmus loping dutifully behind.
The two guards swiftly straightened when they saw him marching toward them.
“Aye, my lord,” the more senior answered briskly when he halted in front of them.
“My wife?”
“She went past here, my lord.”
“When?”
“Some time ago, my lord.”
“Where was she going?”
“She didn’t say, my lord.”
The other man’s gaze flickered and Raymond transfixed him with a glare.
“I saw her go to the village, my lord,” the young man stammered.
“Alone?”
“Aye, my lord, alone.”
“She never leaves Donhallow unescorted again.”
“Yes, my lord,” the guards replied in unison.
The commander of the garrison appeared at the door of the barracks and hurried toward them. “Is something amiss, my lord?” Barden asked.
“My wife is never to leave Donhallow alone again.”
Barden’s brows rose.
“If I am not back with her by the time the sun is below the west wall, begin to organize search parties.”
“Aye, my lord,” Barden replied.
There was no need to explain to him what Raymond dreaded; Barden had been a foot soldier in Donhallow when Raymond was at his father’s knee, and knew well the enmity between his overlord and Montross.
He was also the one who had found Raymond choking on his own blood as he knelt, horror-stricken, beside Allicia’s dead body. It had been Barden’s testimony to the earl of Chesney, as well as the wound to Raymond’s throat, that had insured that Raymond was not brought before the king’s justice, charged with his wife’s murder.
“You think we should wait?” Barden asked.
“Yes.”
Raymond continued toward the village. It could be that she was safely there, and he was worried for nothing.
The first few villagers who saw him march past stared, for their overlord never simply walked into the town. He was always with a troop of men, and usually mounted.
What would they make of him traipsing after his wayward wife? Raymond thought with growing frustration. They would think him ridiculous.
Nevertheless, he continued his search, ignoring the shock and surprise on the villagers’ faces. More than one who caught sight of his grim visage turned and fled as he approached.
Where in the name of God had Elizabeth gone? It was as if the earth had opened up and swallowed her.
Or somebody had taken her.
Maybe Barden was right, and he was wrong to wait. Wiping the perspiration from his forehead, Raymond was about to turn back when he heard her voice.
She was singing.
He knew the song, too. It was a ballad about ill-fated lovers. He had liked to sing it in his youth, especially when he had courted Allicia, in the days when his voice was fine and strong.
Who was Elizabeth singing to? Who was accompanying her honey-smooth voice on a harp, as he had played for Allicia?
He followed the music to the end of a deserted lane. She was in the last wattle and daub building near the village wall. The shutter was off the window closest to him, and the door past it stood open.
The music stopped and she laughed, the sound a lovely light trill.
Raymond cautiously peered around the side of the window into a barren workroom that housed pieces of wood and partially completed instruments. A man so old he looked as if he might have apprenticed for Noah sat at a workbench covered in tools, bits of wood and sawdust.
He didn’t even know there was an instrument maker in the village.
Near the old man, on a low stool, sat Elizabeth, holding a harp made of pale blond wood. A shaft of sunlight came in through an upper window, encompassing her in its brilliance.
“You play well, my lady,” the elderly man wheezed.
“You are too kind, Johannes. It is very obvious I have not played the harp in a long time. I could barely remember the words to the song.”
“Your voice is like the angels’, my lady.”
She not only sang like an angel, Raymond thought. She looked like one.
What was he doing, acting like some kind of spy, creeping down lanes and peering through windows? This was his wife, in his village protected by his castle.
He marched into the room. With a gasp, Elizabeth jumped to her feet, dropping the harp, which hit the hard dirt floor.
Meanwhile, the old man, breathing hard, struggled to stand.
“This is my husband, Lord Kirkheathe,” Elizabeth said after she had collected herself, and as if this old instrument maker were a noble of the court. “My lord, this is Johannes. He makes harps.”
“Come,” was all the response Raymond made as he reached out to take her by the arm.
She moved out of the way with an alacrity that would have done credit to a master swordsman. “Thank you for letting me play, Johannes,” she said as she picked up the fallen instrument and put it in his hands. “I am glad the harp didn’t break.”
The man held out the instrument as if he meant her to take it, but before she could, Raymond stepped between them, glowering at her. “Come.”
He discovered his bride had quite a glower herself. However, she said not a word, just turned on her heel and went out the door.
He hurried after her and pulled her to a stop in the lane. “Don’t ever leave Donhallow alone again,” he growled.
She met his gaze boldly. “Am I a prisoner?”
He had never met such a defiant woman. “You know you are not.”
“Then why am I to be treated like one?”
She must have utterly confounded the Reverend Mother at that convent, who was no doubt used to unfailing obedience, as he was.
He could sympathize with the woman’s frustration, but even so, he suddenly realized, he admired Elizabeth’s mettle more. “You need a guard.”
“Even here?”
He nodded once.
“I did not think I would be in danger in our own village.”
“Did you think?” he countered.
Her passionate gaze faltered at last. “Perhaps
I thought my noble husband was so angry and upset with me, I would give him indigestion if I broke bread with him.”
He gave her a skeptical look.
“Or perhaps not. Perhaps I thought, I do not care to eat with him when he is in such a mood. Therefore, I will go to the village.”
“Without permission.”
“Yes, my lord, without permission.”
He came closer to her, and as he did, the sight of a tendril of her hair on her soft, flushed cheek nearly made him forget what he was about to say, and why he had been so angry. “Remember I have enemies, Elizabeth, ones who are as bold as you.”
She lifted her brilliant eyes to meet his gaze. “I am not your enemy, my lord.”
Not yet.
The words leaped into his mind unbidden.
Not yet, as Allicia had not yet been his enemy when they married. He was certain of that, and always had been.
Without another word, he placed Elizabeth’s hand on his arm and silently escorted her back to Donhallow.
That night, Elizabeth stood by the window in the bedchamber, toying with a loose bit of thread from the edge of her sleeve as she looked at the pale moon hanging in the sky over the castle walls. Stars, gleaming little points of light, twinkled in the blackness. Were they each of them alone, or were the constellations families of stars, banded together in love and harmony? It pleased her to think they were.
Would she ever be a part of a family again? Maybe if she could learn to hold her tongue and be an obedient, docile wife, as she had promised she would.
What if she couldn’t? So far, she had not had much success. Perhaps Lord Kirkheathe was already planning to annul the marriage and send her back. Even though the marriage had been consummated, there were ways to do that. Five of the women at the convent had been sent there because their dissatisfied husbands had found some obscure blood tie that rendered their unions illegal.
She mustn’t go back. As bad as it was before, it would be a thousand times worse after this taste of freedom…and other things.
She should have listened to Rual when she told her how Lord Kirkheathe felt about peddlers. Nevertheless, she was only trying to be charitable.
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