‘Lucie, Emily, thank you, that looks lovely. You may remove the ladders.’
As the girls clattered out, Isobel resumed her review. A fresh coat of limewash hid the soot of decades. And thanks to a cartload of wood that had been properly stored, the fire had stopped hissing like a sackful of snakes. Gouts of black smoke no longer belched from the fireplace. Solène had supplied rushes and herbs for the floor and at each footfall, the scents of thyme and lavender were released into the air.
‘Elise, please stay,’ Isobel said, bending to pull cloths out of a coffer. The linen was yellow and creased—spotted with candle wax, gravy and spilled wine. She’d been so busy elsewhere, the table linen had had to wait. ‘This really lets us down. See how badly laundered these are. And so frayed! This is beyond even your darning skills.’
‘They do look old,’ Elise agreed.
‘There’s a day or two left of the Winter Fair. When my lord returns I shall ask him if he will take me into Troyes to buy linen.’
‘It will be too late for this year, my lady. We’ll never get the cloths hemmed by the Christmas revels.’
‘I shall see what might be done in the laundry. However, buying linen is in part an excuse. I’d like to see the Winter Fair before it closes.’ If Lucien agrees, it will give us time together. Time away from the bedchamber, time when we might talk without the intrusion of our baser desires...
The door from the bailey opened and the candle flames swayed. Lucien strode in. The man at his side looked vaguely familiar.
‘There’s the Countess, by the coffer,’ Lucien said.
Isobel let the threadbare cloth drop on to the table as they approached. Recognising Lucien’s companion as one of her father’s equerries, a pang of foreboding shot through her. The equerry bowed, tugged straight his tunic, and produced a beribboned scroll. As he passed it to her, the ribbons trembled. He is shaking. He will not meet my eyes.
‘Your name is Edouard, is it not?’
‘Yes, my lady.’
‘This is from my father?’
Edouard’s throat worked.
‘My apologies,’ Isobel said, moving to the sideboard. Setting down the scroll, she poured some ale. ‘You have ridden far. Please take this. Then you may give us your news.’
‘Thank you, my lady.’ Edouard took the cup and drained it.
‘More?’
‘No, thank you, my lady.’
Edouard took a deep breath. His eyes, as they met hers, were stricken. Whatever his message was, he was reluctant to deliver it. Icy fingers ran down her spine. My father!
‘My lady, I regret to tell you that Viscount Gautier has died.’
At a stroke, Isobel was looking at everything from a great distance. Father is dead. She heard Lucien’s sharp, indrawn breath; she heard his footsteps as he came to her side; she felt the warmth of his body. And she might have been in another world.
‘Viscount Gautier has died?’ Lucien’s voice shattered the silence. ‘When?’
‘The Viscount died a week since, mon seigneur.’
‘How did it happen?’ Isobel asked, forcing words past her teeth. It seemed so unreal. Father is dead.
‘It was a peaceful death, my lady. Lady Angelina found him; he had died in his sleep.’
* * *
Gripped by a sense of unreality, Isobel nodded as though she was taking in Edouard’s message. Father is dead. The words made sense, she understood them, but they seemed meaningless. Worthless. It couldn’t be true. Blindly, she reached for the jug of ale. ‘Please, you must still be thirsty.’
‘Thank you, my lady.’ Edouard jerked his head at the parchment on the side-table. ‘Lady Angelina has other news—it will be in the letter.’
‘The letter. Oh, yes. My thanks.’ Isobel picked up the letter and moved into a fall of light beneath a wall-sconce. Fingers on the seal, she added, ‘If you are hungry and cannot wait for supper, Elise will show you to the kitchens. Sir Gawain is the man to find about bedding and a space for the night.’
‘Thank you, my lady. Please accept my condolences.’
Isobel cracked the seal on her stepmother’s letter. Her father’s health had been poor of late, his death should not be a shock. Yet shock it was. Much of her life had been lived away from Turenne, away from her father. In the back of her mind she had cherished the hope that one day she would get to know her father better. That will not happen. She felt Lucien’s gaze burning into her as she bent over her stepmother’s letter and began to read.
My dear Isobel,
I greet you warmly, and send you God’s blessing. It is with much grief that I write to tell you this ill news. Your father the Viscount has gone to God. I know you will share my sorrow. It will relieve your mind to hear that he did not suffer. One day he was with us, and the next day God had taken him. I beg that you pray for your father’s soul. May he rest in peace.
Of my other news, you know already. And although I am grieved to lose your father after so short a time, you will be pleased to hear that I remain in good health. Daily I thank the Lord that your father knew about our baby. A child who will, I trust, act in some measure as a balm to the wound of your father’s death...
The baby Angelina carried was indeed balm for the pain of her father’s death. And since the child was expected in January, her stepmother had passed the time when miscarriage was most likely. Her eyes prickled.
Lucien took her hand. ‘Isobel? Do you need to sit down? You look very pale.’
Father is dead. She stiffened her spine. Lucien would have to learn about Angelina’s baby soon, such news couldn’t be kept from him for ever, but after learning about her father, she didn’t have the strength. I will tell Lucien about the child, later. In the meantime, she would teach him to open his heart to her.
I must because I love him. What I feel for him is far more than affection. Why did I not see this before? I love Lucien.
Grief for her father was a dull pain that pervaded every fibre of her being. She was full of regret. Because of her sex she had never had a chance to know her father. But love for Lucien overrode all that, even the hope that soon, Isobel of Turenne would have someone else to love.
I love Lucien. The baby will be born in January...I have until then to win him...
‘Isobel?’
Could Lucien read? Many noblemen could not. Had he seen what Angelina had written about the baby? Blinking away a blur of tears, Isobel rolled up the scroll and looked up at him. His gaze was enquiring. She did not think he had read the letter.
‘My lord, if you will excuse me, I should like to go to the chapel.’
‘You wish to pray for your father. Allow me to accompany you.’
‘That is kind, my lord, but I would prefer to pray on my own.’
Lucien kept pace with her until she reached the foot of the tower stair. ‘Isobel, a moment.’
‘My lord?’
‘You realise this will alter our plans for Christmas?’
The chilly fingers inched along Isobel’s back. She knew what he was about to say, and she had no wish to hear it. ‘Will it?’
He made an impatient movement. ‘Of course. We must visit Turenne to lay claim to your lands.’
No! If we go to Turenne, you will see that my stepmother is pregnant. You will realise that I may be disinherited...
That moment must be delayed as long as possible. Lucien had remained married to Morwenna because she had been unable to take care of herself. Isobel’s circumstances were entirely different—Lucien would be able to annul his marriage to her with a clear conscience. No matter that the marriage agreement had been drawn up between her father and his, if he wanted to divorce her, he could. Powerful men usually got their way.
My marriage is a house built on sand. She did not mind about her inheritance for herself, but Lucien surely would. The only way to make sure of him was to give him his heir. She was vaguely aware of Lucien’s voice washing over her.
‘Isobel, I shall send Joris to Count Henry with
a message. Someone else can train up the Guardian Knights; someone else can organise the Twelfth Night Joust.’
It was ironic that what she had feared most when she married him—giving birth—had become what she most longed for. If she gave Lucien a son, her marriage would be safe, whether or not she was an heiress. She could not rely on love, if she waited until she had won his love, she might be waiting until doomsday. For Lucien love was not just a feeling—Morwenna had taught him that. Morwenna had taught him that love was a decision. Lucien does have feelings for me. When his desire is strong so are his feelings—but he mistrusts them.
He had never said out loud that he felt anything for her other than desire. At the very least, Isobel had been hoping for affection from him, but even that would not be enough to banish the possibility of her being set aside as unsuitable.
Lucien mistrusts emotions. When listening to Bernez at their wedding feast, he had muttered something about the transitory nature of feelings. He had said that if love exists—if love exists—it was not a feeling, it was a decision. A decision. How cold that sounded. How mercenary. How convenient.
Lucien understood lust, and he understood marriage alliances made to benefit both parties. The only way I can secure him is to give him his heir. It is too soon to go to Turenne. I have to conceive before he sees Angelina.
Stepping up to him, she placed her hand on his arm. Surprise flared in his eyes, she was not in the habit of making public gestures of affection and he was uncertain how to respond. His gaze dropped briefly to her lips. He cleared his throat and a strong arm wound about her waist.
‘My lord, your tenants will be sorely disappointed if we leave Ravenshold before Christmas.’
‘They will?’
He opened his mouth to say more, but Isobel intervened. ‘I need time, my lord,’ she said quietly. ‘Time to absorb this loss. Surely we can discuss our plans in the morning?’
Lucien’s fingers moved in a small caress. ‘As you wish.’
Isobel did need time, and not just to grieve for her father. She needed time to prove to her husband that love was more than a decision made for cold-blooded political purposes, love was a feeling too. It was glorious, enchanting, overpowering—it would never die. She loved him.
She loved him in the cool, calculating way she had always tried to love him—as the man chosen for her by her father. But that was not the only way in which she loved him. She loved him in the poetic way too, in the pretty, mind-muddling way of the poets. Such love was not ephemeral. It was not untrustworthy.
It would be her quest to teach Lucien about love in all its guises. Finding out about Morwenna explained so much. Morwenna had all but ruined him. Isobel’s task would have been hard enough without Angelina being pregnant.
Father’s child will be born soon. She felt bad about misleading Lucien, but it would not be for long. She would not fail.
Lucien’s mouth softened as he looked at her. He raised her hand to his lips—a courtly gesture that squeezed her heart. ‘If you wish to celebrate Christmas here, I expect we could delay our visit to Turenne. I take it your father has a good steward?’
‘The best.’ He is concerned for my lands. The wastrel I at one time imagined I had married would not have been concerned. He is a diligent, responsible man.
‘Very well. We shall wait before planning our journey.’
‘Thank you, my lord.’ Picking up her skirts she started up the spiralling stairs. She had not actually lied about Angelina being with child, but she felt quite sick. And it was painfully clear that Lucien’s main concern was to secure her lands.
* * *
In the Great Hall later that evening, Lucien found himself sitting in his high-backed chair, breaking bread with Sir Raoul and Sir Gawain. ‘Where is my wife?’
‘The Countess is in the chapel, I believe,’ Gawain said.
Lucien tossed down his bread. ‘She can’t still be in the chapel?’
Gawain leaned across the table to spear a slice of pork from the platter and grunted. ‘Father Thomas is holding some sort of vigil for Viscount Gautier.’
‘I should imagine Lady Isobel feels badly that she missed her father’s funeral,’ Raoul said. ‘The rites will do her good.’
Lucien looked at the empty space beside him and pushed back his chair. ‘Did she eat at noon-tide?’
‘I couldn’t say.’ Raoul shrugged. ‘I was with you all afternoon.’
‘Hell.’ Stomach cramping with concern, Lucien shoved back his chair. ‘Girande?’
‘Count Lucien?’
‘Put bread, meat and wine for two on a tray and take it to my bedchamber, will you?’
‘At once, my lord.’
* * *
The chapel in Ravenshold was in the west tower, on the floor below their bedchamber. As Lucien rounded the last turn in the stairs, the priest’s chanting floated out to meet him. Isobel was standing in front of Father Thomas, blue gown bright against the dark priestly robes. Her palms were clasped at her breast, her head was bent. She looked pale, and her skin had a translucent quality Lucien had not seen before, like white marble. She looked like a statue of the Madonna. A Madonna who was swaying on her feet. Her eyes were shadowed—she had been crying.
She has been here too long.
‘Isobel?’ Lucien spoke softly. The candles on the altar were reflected in her eyes, eyes which held a world of sorrow.
‘My lord?’
Pain shaped her posture—she was holding herself with a kind of dogged stiffness. Lucien had not seen that in her before either. He had no remedy against grief like this. A wave of regret washed over him, rarely had he felt so useless.
‘Is your ceremony almost finished?’ he asked.
She shook her head. In the fitful light of the candles her lips were bloodless. ‘Father Thomas has promised to keep vigil with me all night.’
‘All night?’ Covering her clasped hands, he peeled them apart and interlaced his fingers with hers. She was ice-cold. ‘Isobel, you will make yourself ill.’
‘The loss of one night’s sleep cannot do much harm.’
Father Thomas was ignoring them—his chanting flowed on unabated. It was one of the psalms. ‘Put not your trust in princes, nor in any child of man: for there is no help in them.’ The verses of the psalm were uttered so softly there was no echo; the words simply fell into the mournful quiet and vanished, like stones dropped into a well.
‘Isobel, you must eat,’ Lucien said.
She bit her lip. ‘I broke my fast this morning.’
‘...then all his thoughts should perish,’ intoned the priest.
‘Have you eaten since then?’
She stared at the cross on the altar, lips moving as she joined in the psalm. ‘Blessed is he—’
Lucien shifted. ‘Isobel? Did you eat at noon?’
‘Truly, my lord, I am sure—’
‘You need to eat. You have been here long enough.’ He raised his voice. ‘Father Thomas?’
‘Who made heaven and...my lord?’
‘The Countess needs to retire. Is the vigil almost over?’
‘My lord, we have run through the office several times already. I can finish this round on my own, if you wish.’
‘Thank you, Father. That would be kind.’
Lucien placed Isobel’s cold fingers on his arm. ‘Come, Isobel, you must eat. And then you must rest.’
Chapter Seventeen
On the morning of the shortest day—it was the Winter solstice—Isobel woke alone under the blue coverlet. Wanting to make the most of what little light there was, Lucien had gone out on patrol.
Grief hung over her, like a pall. It was hard to accept that her gruff, bluff father was dead, and that his harsh voice would never again call her name. She must accept it.
She tugged the coverlet more firmly about her. Guilt was an uncomfortable bedfellow. She was deceiving Lucien, she should tell him that Father’s widow was with child. Lucien had neglected her for years—he was himself no
stranger to deception and she had harboured some resentment against him. No longer. Her innards felt as though they were in knots because she had not told him about Angelina. Why? She was merely paying him back in his own coin, she shouldn’t feel this bad.
When Isobel had arrived in Champagne, she had not expected the Comte d’Aveyron to be so personable. And she wasn’t simply thinking about his appearance; although who wouldn’t want to be married to a strong, long-limbed knight with thick glossy hair, a chiselled bone structure, and intelligent blue eyes? She had expected scars, and the one on Lucien’s face was prominent, but without it—well, he would simply be too beautiful. That scar showed his human side, Lucien had won it protecting Morwenna.
It was a side that Isobel had not thought to look for whilst nursing her anger at the endless delays forced upon her. Nine years! Since arriving in Troyes, Lucien’s unexpected thoughtfulness had, she supposed, disarmed her. Thoughtfulness which had begun with him ensuring her removal to Count Henry’s palace when he had realised how she disliked lodging at the Abbey. He had chastised her for her disobedience over the tourney, but that hadn’t stopped him giving her that brooch. Of course, he had given her the brooch to keep her sweet. He wanted her for her lands. Nevertheless...
Last night he had removed her from the chapel and had insisted that she ate.
Lucien looks after me because I am valuable to him. I bring him Turenne. Lucien might have a human side, but she must never forget there was determination as well as intelligence in those blue eyes. His gaze was that of a man who had fought—and won—many battles. A champion. It was hard to remember that in a sense, she was just another trophy. He did not love her.
The noise of hoofbeats filtered through the lancet, and a rook cawed. Someone tapped on the door.
‘Come in.’
Elise stepped in with a jug of steaming water. ‘Good morning, my lady. May I attend you?’
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