by Kris Kennedy
The smile Pagan sent down was slow and terrifying. “Henri did not.”
He lifted his hand and in a heartbeat two servants stood at his side. A low conference ensued. Gwyn’s only participation in it was as the recipient of a number of significant looks. When the servants retreated, she glared at him.
“They come quicker to you than they have to me in ten years,” she admitted grudgingly.
He shrugged.
“Mayhap I ought to have been sterner,” she reflected.
“You think I have been stern with your kitchen staff?”
“God’s truth, Pagan, you’ve scared them witless.”
He looked at the screens separating the corridor to the kitchens from the great hall. “They do not appear witless to me. They seem obedient.”
“Quite. That is my point. I should have used more of your tactics,” she mused. He looked at her. “You know, unsheathe a sword about supper time and bellow ‘This is my castle!’”
And bellow she did. The hall ground to a halt. It was nothing compared to the silence before. This was a full-on, drop-dead stoppage of all breath and movement throughout the cavernous hall. Every stricken eye flashed to the dais. The music faltered.
“Careful, Gwyn,” he murmured by her ear.
If he had curled his fingers around her throat and begun squeezing, she couldn’t have been more frightened. Indeed, this low restraint set her teeth clattering. He lifted his hand and ran his thumb along the underside of her jaw. Her swallow had to edge by his threatening caress, and he surely felt it.
“Had only I known, my lord,” she whispered. “Your tactics are far superior.”
“You did that, Gwyn, not I.” His thigh brushed against hers, a slight contact that sent an entirely different kind of chill through her body. “Go upstairs. Now.”
He lifted his hand and three servants appeared at his side, one with a tray of aromatic spices designed—she could tell by her nose—to have a sobering effect. She rose unsteadily.
“Show Lady Guinevere to our chambers,” he instructed the servant at his side, who nodded briskly.
Then he raised his cup, occasioning a likewise and immediate response in every castle dweller in sight. She sent a dagger-like look around the hall in general, but no one was watching her anyway. All eyes were on Sauvage. “To the Lady Guinevere, my betrothed.”
A hum of “Huzzah’s” and the thumping of fists followed her out of the hall, accompanied by three servants who hadn’t taken so much care with her since she’d been swaddled in cloths and burped on her mother’s chest.
“I’m not a child, John,” she snapped to one, a man she’d known for fifteen years.
“But he’s said to treat you like you were, my lady.”
She stopped so quickly the servants carried on a few steps before realising their cargo was left behind. John hurried back to her side. “He said to treat me like a child?” Her voice was high-pitched, incredulous, and aghast.
“Nay, nay, my lady,” he stammered, realising his error. The last thing he needed was two nobles angry with him. “He only said to treat you as we would a precious jewel and we decided, didn’t we?” he asked, sending an imploring look at his compatriots, who all nodded like sheep being led to slaughter. “We decided that meant like a child.”
“Well,” she snapped, picking up her skirts and walking again. “I am not a child, nor witless, nor drunk,” she added emphatically, then tripped on her skirt hem.
“Oh, no, milady,” he huffed, helping her regain her footing, then wiping a sheen of sweat from his brow. “Not a child.” Oh Lord, to truckle with two such fiercesome masters was too much to bear. Mayhap Wales held an easier lifestyle, with its bloody wars of succession and stern-eyed princes.
Chapter Eleven
She stood in the lord’s chambers with her arms wrapped around her waist, her eyes full of wonder. All traces of drunkenness had left; it must have been Pagan who was intoxicating her.
He had been wandering for many years by his own admission, but the sight before her did not bespeak the lifestyle of a nomadic warrior. The candles flickered, blown by small gusts of breeze through the open window as she walked around the perimeter of the room. A life of campaigns in the service of an itinerant lord was not the way to create what she saw in front of her. For that, one needed a home. He’d said that was Everoot. And it looked as though he’d been coming home for a long, long time.
She suddenly and quite unwillingly understood why he had come to the Nest with a sword in his hand and revolt on his mind.
A glance at the window ledge made her smile. Crossing over, she ran her hand over the orange-eared cat, ferociously-furred and purring, and continued her examination of a room that had been hers only a day ago.
It had been transformed from the cold, military-like chamber—which she’d had neither the time nor money to change—to a place of indulgence and refinement. Well-wrought iron sconces were affixed to the wall and beeswax—beeswax!—candles burned from them, leaving none of the smokey mess tallow did. Pelts of fur were scattered across the floor, the extravagance staggering. She bent over and touched one, then straightened.
A series of finely stitched tapestries rippled like floating velvet against the walls, coaxing the dreary room to practically undulate with warmth. A finely carved wooden table abutted the doorframe and burned with more fat, squat candles.
Against the opposite walls stood a pair of oak wardrobes, polished to a reflecting shine. The one Gwyn shyly edged open held such a tumbleful of silk and fine fabrics her mouth dropped open. Why, this was silk and samite and…Her hands delved greedily into the luxurious pile. Here was velvet…and…
“Merciful heavens,” she exclaimed aloud, backing up, “those are women’s clothes!”
He had brought her clothes.
Some were her own, she realised, moving forward again. Here was a samite overtunic, so worn and old it could barely hold stiff against her body, but most of them were not hers. She had no silk, not anymore, and had never so much as touched velvet. But here were textile riches, some already cut and sewn. She held one up to her body—it would fit—then hurriedly shoved them all back inside, grimacing as she wrinkled the lush fabric. Griffyn had been planning for her.
The notion was very disturbing.
A reflecting mirror rested on the large table set against a third wall. Backing away from the wardrobe, she wandered over, confused by the clarity of the reflection bouncing back to her. Polished metal never shone like that.
She stretched out her hand hesitantly and ran her fingertips over the smoothest, coolest piece of alloy she had ever touched. What was it? She bent closer, until her nose touched the surface and her eyes stared back at her.
A sound outside the door her made her jerk back and spin, but no one was there. The rumble of masculine voices and footsteps faded away. All was quiet again. Some miscreants from the feast, no doubt, stumbling around for a privy. She turned back to the glistening surface. What on earth would motivate a warrior in the midst of a war to lug all these treasures to a far-flung northern province?
Gwyn stared back at her unmarred reflection. Was that what she looked like? Two eyes, a freckled nose, and a crooked mouth? Simple enough, she thought, turning away. Thank goodness she hadn’t looked into a still pond of water since she was twelve.
Griffyn Sauvage may have estates in Normandy, but ’twas Everoot that had held his heart all these years, by the evidence of her eyes. And by that same stick, she measured his intent: he had been planning to make the Nest home for some long time.
The luxurious masculinity of the room was hypnotic. For a moment she could pretend there was no more pressing task than to relax, that no one wanted her to do anything, that she could stretch out on the bed and gaze at the ceiling and…what on earth was that?
A shelf had been bracketed to the wall. On it, flush with the wood, lay a pile of vellum and parchment manuscripts. Her head began to spin as she approached. She put out a finger and brus
hed it down the side of the bindings, then abruptly lifted one from its resting place.
Sitting on the bed with her feet tucked beneath her, she opened the massive volume of pages that was Historia Regum Britanniae. She recognised it; it was like the one at the abbey the de l’Amis patronised, where as a child she’d convinced the monks to at least tell her the tales, if not incur her father’s wrath by actually teaching her to read them herself.
She traced her fingers over the beautifully etched lines on the pages. The blues and reds and greens were so brilliant they still looked wet. She touched an illustration that ran along the margin of one page, a bemused-looking monk holding a stylus, drawing a line to insert a missing A in its proper place in one of the words. Such whimsy and talent. She smiled and carefully turned another page.
“What do you think?”
She jerked her head up. Griffyn stood in front of the brazier, warming his hands. She hadn’t heard him come in. He tossed her a casual glance before turning back to the flames. She got to her feet, book in hand.
“I think I am surprised,” she admitted.
“By Monmouth?”
“By you.” She indicated the shelves with a pointed finger.
He looked over his shoulder and smiled. “And what do you think of Geoffrey Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain?”
It was impossible not to return the grin. “I daresay I don’t know, but have heard ’tis pure invention.”
“Ah, but well for we Welsh, who came out of it with King Arthur.”
She peered at him curiously. “And where in your blood are you Welsh? ’Twas certainly not your father. ‘Sauvage’ is Norman through and through.”
He nodded. “My father was many things. He liked to be thought of as Norman to the bone, and he surely did not disdain the title and lands he had here in England. But ’twas my mother who was a Welsh princess.”
She lifted her brows and depressed the corners of her mouth briefly, playfully impressed. “What else is there?” she asked, nodding towards the shelves.
“The Ecclesiastical History of England and Normandy, Vitalis’s work, of course. And Bebe’s Lives of the Abbots,” he went on, warming his hands over the brazier thoughtfully. “Let’s see, there is the Gesta Pontificum Anglorum that Malmesbury wrote, which is more of an informal chronicle of the lives of the bishops than a full history. But ’tis sound. And useful.”
She stared with a dropped jaw. Warrior, aye, she knew that. Seductor, fine, she could struggle against that. But well-read nobleman with a library to rival that of an affluent monastery? What defence had she there? She sat back down on the bed, its plump mattress giving under her weight.
“What do you think of the others, Guinevere?” he prompted.
“I can’t read.” Her words poked out from her mouth like they were lashed on sticks: stiff, clipped.
“A situation we’ll see remedied, if you wish.”
“Papa did not think much of reading, as it were,” she informed him, eyeing her fingernails.
“But you did.”
“I still do.”
Griffyn watched her examine her fingertips so carefully, her slim shoulders rounded. It reminded him of that night a year ago, riding through the forest, when they’d shared a raging kiss, and after, she’d braced herself against a tree like an abandoned marionette, in all her brave, delicate beauty. Totally unexpected.
He set down the poker and crossed the room. Taking up her hand, he inspected the ragged nubs of her nails, the work-hardened edges of her slender fingers. “You’ve been working hard.”
“As have we all.” She tried to pull her hand away but he held tight. “’Tis nothing. Some of the chores I like.”
He shifted just his eyes up. “You like cleaning privies?”
That made her smile. It was brief, though, and he wanted more of it. “I don’t clean privies, actually,” she said. “You find it hard to believe, that I would enjoy the work?”
“For certes. Most high-born women wish to do as little of it as possible.”
The smile faded. “I am not most women,” she murmured.
He watched the strange quiet descend on her, and had a sudden image of the weight of her burden over the past year. Alone, in the middle of a war, governing a vast estate with too little money and too much need. In their interviews of the household, everyone had a praiseful word to say of the lady, words given more force by the affection clinging to them.
“Have you ever seen my flowers?”
He looked up. A smile nudged at the faint dimple beside her mouth. Her flowers? He shook his head.
She smiled wider and it felt like the room expanded, like the breeze blew fresher through the shutters. “As I said, I like some of the chores I do.”
Comprehension dawned. “Your flowers.”
She nodded happily. Her black curls bobbed over her shoulders.
“Well then,” he mused, looking at the small fingers held in his grasp. He stroked each between two of his own, feeling the slender, fragile bone within, delicately arching into his. “You must keep on doing the things you like. The rest, we’ll find others to manage.”
Her expansive face suddenly closed up again. When she pulled on her hand this time, he released her. She walked to the window and pushed the shutters open. The night was inky black and windy. A scent of rain was in the air.
“We so desperately need rain,” she murmured, as if they were in idle chat about the weather. “I can’t stop doing any of them,” she went on, in the same neutral tone. “The fields still need to be ploughed, even when the men have staged a war. When my Welsh stewards run off or die, I must find someone to take their place, even when there is no one.”
“Powys,” he murmured, the sudden recollection shocking in its clarity. He could almost smell the leather of their damp saddles as they rode over the wild Welsh hills, almost hear his father complaining of the problem of keeping stewards alive in the Welsh marcher lands. Such a swift, clear memory.
She seemed to not have heard him. She was running her hand over the silken tapestry hanging beside the window. “When men and boys die in battle, their women are left to tend those fields, which leaves the castle short-staffed, and weeds know nothing of wars, laundry nothing of defeat.” Her voice had grown hard and swift and bitter, and she turned her back to him. “They just need to be taken care of.”
By me. Alone.
The words fairly thrust themselves into the suddenly quiet between them, but she did not speak them, and he did not ask. The silence grew longer.
A feeling of kinship swept through him. He felt his heart shift, which he definitely did not want. Dominance, lordship, lust: these things were known and acceptable. Affection and understanding: they were distinctly unwelcome.
So why was he walking across the room to stand at her curving back? And bending his head by her ear to speak in a gentle murmur?
“You need not take care of it all alone anymore, my lady.” He began unlacing the silk wrap that coiled her hair in a thick rope down her back. He combed his fingers through the unbound tresses, his callouses catching. Her breathing quickened ever so slightly, so he bent nearer her ear and murmured, “You’ve a husband now, who can help with whatever needs to be taken care of.”
“The laundry?”
He heard the catch in her voice, and decided this was why he’d crossed the room. To make her resistance crumble, to weaken her will. To get her into his bed, a willing, wanton partner as she’d been an autumn ago. She turned her head the slightest bit. Her words were incredulous. “You’ll help with the laundry?”
“I will, if ’tis needed in some way.” He pressed his lips to the nape of her neck. Her breath trembled out in a rush. “Although I cannot believe there isn’t someone other than my self to plunge linens into that foul-smelling concoction that bubbles and burps in vast cauldrons.”
Her body leaned backwards into him, just the slightest bit. “’Tis indeed a most wretched reek, my lord,” she admitted, a s
mile in her voice. “And they are ever-large tubs.”
“Did I ever tell you?” he mused, inhaling the faint scent of rose clinging to her hair. “I once was in Scotland when a small pony found its unfortunate way into such a vat.” He could feel her listening; her cheek was almost pressed against his jaw, her hair tickled his nose as she inched her head towards his voice ever so slightly.
“And?”
“Gone. Never to be seen again.” His ran his hands down the outside of her arms. “He was a fat little pony too. Utterly vanished.” He clucked his tongue.
She chuckled, faint and girlish. Her head notched up another inch. “And what about the weeds?”
“Well, now,” he murmured. “Let’s not lose our heads, Guinevere. I thought you said you liked doing that.”
She laughed freely this time, a very fine sound. “And so, what now?” She turned around to face him, so his hands now rested in the curve of her spine. “I’ve lost my head, Griffyn, and you’re scared of the laundry.”
He smiled. “We’ll have to find a way through. You can tend your roses and mix the cauldrons.”
She laughed again. “And you can rescue the ponies and help me find a seneschal for the Everoot town of Ipsile-upon-Tyne. I’ll have to tell you about it.”
His hands fell away from her waist. Something sharp-edged clicked its teeth together inside his heart. A little gnashing. “I know about Ipsile-upon-Tyne,” he said tightly. “On the Welsh Marches.”
“How do you know about Ipsile?” she asked, smiling faintly. “Or that it borders Wales? Did William mention it?”
And like that, full-blown and dangerous, anger snapped back into the forefront, thick and undeniable. How could it ride up on him so swiftly, without warning or wishing it to be?
How did he know? How did he know about Ipsile or Wales, an entire borderland along the frontiers of his birthright?