LadyOfConquest:SaxonBride

by Tamara Leigh

  “We are to believe you, the same who led Maxen Pendery to our camp?” Aethel said. “Do you think us fools?”

  Heart sinking faster, she said, “’Tis true he followed me, but I did not knowingly lead him to you.”

  “Nor knowingly follow him back to Etcheverry after he murdered three of ours, eh?”

  His sarcasm cut deep. “I will defend myself no more,” she said, wishing Aethel’s gaze were the gentle one she had often beheld before the Normans. “But I would ask you not to sacrifice yourself for a cause long lost.”

  “You are weak,” he rebuked. “Keep your Norman company, but do not think to press us into the service of that devil. We stand with Edwin.”

  Though the agreement of the others sounded around her like the closing of a door, she said, “Pray, Aethel—”

  A voice raised in anger—Maxen’s—rumbled down the corridor, and was answered by the anxious voices of Theta and the guard.

  “He is come,” Rhiannyn gasped.

  “Then go to him,” Aethel said.

  “Aye, and tell yer lover there be no more Saxons bowin’ to him,” spat another.

  Rhiannyn turned and hurried down the corridor. Around the first bend, she realized she still carried the torch. She thrust it into the nearest sconce, then crept along the wall toward the voices coming from the guard’s station.

  “Just having a little fun, milord,” Theta drawled. “No harm.”

  “No harm?” Maxen said. “What of your duties, guard?”

  “I-I have kept them, my lord. There is none come or gone this eve. All is secure.”

  Believe him, Rhiannyn silently beseeched. Later she would find a way past the man.

  “What of Rhiannyn?” Maxen demanded.

  “Non,” the guard said. “Had she come, I would have seen her.”

  “Mayhap milord is jealous?” Theta’s words were softly vibrant like the purr of a cat. “I did warn if ’twas not you, it would be another. So it be your fault I sought elsewhere.”

  “As I do not wish you in my bed,” Maxen said, “I care not with whom you carry on so long as it does not take my men from their duties. Now be gone.”

  Rhiannyn caught her breath. Maxen had not lied when he denied having Theta in his bed.

  “When you grow tired of Rhiannyn,” the woman said, “you have but to call me to you.”

  Maxen gave no answer, and as Rhiannyn listened to the patter of Theta’s retreat, she imagined his glower.

  “The consequences will be dire if I find one here who does not belong,” Maxen warned.

  The guard cleared his throat. “Upon my word, you will not, my lord.”

  Heavier footfalls sounded. And they moved toward the cells.

  Rhiannyn swept her gaze around, searching for a place in which to conceal herself. The nearest refuge was no refuge, but the open cell where first she had encountered Maxen. Resigned to it, she hastened down the corridor and entered it just as she heard him round the corner.

  Heart beating hard, she slipped into the farthest corner, slid down the wall, and huddled on the floor. Over the arms she wrapped around her knees, she peered at the corridor that was coming to light with the torch Maxen carried before him. Then he was there, rolling back the shadows.

  Blessedly, hers held, though only because he had not fully brought the torch within. If he did, he would see her.

  He stood unmoving, perhaps also remembering the past—seeing her upon the stool with her hands bound, hearing her declaration she had murdered Thomas, feeling the rage he had not turned upon her.

  “Show yourself, Rhiannyn,” he commanded.

  She released her breath, pushed to standing, and walked into the light.

  His expression was grim, but she did not falter. Halting before him, she said, “I know what you think.”

  “What do I think?” he asked tightly.

  “That I deceived you again, and though you will not believe me, I tell you it is not so.”

  He narrowed his lids. “What was your purpose in coming here?”

  “To speak with Aethel.”

  “Which I forbade you to do.”

  “You did.”

  He lowered his eyes over her. “Did you speak with him?”

  “I did.”

  “What result?”

  “The same as yours. He and the others stand with Edwin.”

  He nodded slowly. “A pity.”

  So the end was near for men who were of no use to him locked away and who could not be trusted outside the cells. “What will you do?” she asked.

  “What would you have me do?”

  Certain he baited her, she said, “It hardly matters what I wish.”

  “Does it not?”

  She blinked. “Why do you ask me this?”

  After a long moment, he said, “I am not sure myself.”

  Might that be good?

  He shifted his gaze, and as he slid it over the walls and floors, his face darkened further, and she guessed he remembered the cell as she remembered it—rather, as the predator to her prey.

  Eager to be away, she said, “I am ready to return to the hall.”

  His eyes swung back to her. “I am not,” he said and took her arm and turned her back into the cell.

  As more of it came to light, she saw it was barren but for the stool in the center and chains fastened to the far wall.

  “Non, Maxen,” she beseeched as he secured the torch in a sconce. “Let us leave this place.”

  Wordlessly, he drew her across the cell.

  “Maxen—”

  He pulled her around to face him. “Sit.”

  She glanced at the stool behind. “I do not wish to.”

  “Trust me.”

  How could she when it seemed he meant her to relive that day? Might this be punishment for seeking Aethel?

  “It is not what you think,” he said so solemnly she looked nearer upon him. She could find no anger in his face. Something else was there, but it did not fit the Maxen Pendery who had last been here with her.

  Slowly, she lowered herself.

  “Close your eyes.”

  She startled. “Why?”

  “Trust me,” he repeated.

  Gripping the stool on either side of her, she let her lids fall. But the memories rushed at her—the foul guard who had brought her here, the figure of a man in deepest shadow, the rope and cloth with which her hands and eyes were bound, the tread of boots.

  She threw her eyes open. “I do not like it here. If you must punish me, do it another way.”

  “Punishment is not what I intend.” His reassurance was edged with impatience.

  “But I did what you forbade.”

  He bent close. Face inches above hers, breath warm on her chill cheeks, he said, “I understand your reason. Now close your eyes.”

  She blinked several times, and the last time did not raise her lids.

  “Do not think, Rhiannyn,” he murmured. “Just feel.”

  She did. Too much. “Maxen—”

  He touched his mouth to hers, and in a deeply soft voice far different from the one that had demanded Edwin’s whereabouts, said, “I am going to erase that memory. For both of us.”

  He also felt the ill of this place? Regretted the fear he had put through her?

  She opened her eyes and saw he had lowered to a knee before her. “How?” she asked, heart straining against her ribs.

  He pushed a tress out of her eyes, the brush of his fingers around the back of her ear making her tremble. “By putting another in its place. Are you willing?”

  What did he ask of her? Kisses? Caresses? More? That which she had bargained away, but he had returned to her? “I do not understand.”

  He set his hands to her arms, slid them downward and uncurled her fingers from the seat, placed her hands on his shoulders.

  Hardly able to breathe, she looked into the eyes of the man she feared might tempt her to do what she should not.

  And when next he spoke, it was in
her language, here in this place where he had said he did not embrace her vulgar tongue and had commanded her to speak Norman French. “Hold to me, leof.”

  Leof. Was she truly dear to him? Surely he would not speak it unless there was some truth to it, for sweet words were not needed to deliver her to his bed when he had but to collect on their bargain.

  “Leof?” she said.

  He leaned close, his mouth so near she tasted wine on his breath. “Leof.”

  In that moment, she knew what she felt for him. The door that had swung open to him when he had once more pardoned her people, allowing him to cross to the other side of her, was the one to her heart. This was love—not the love of a child for its parent, a sister for a brother, a friend for a friend. It was the love of a woman for a man who was not the enemy she had believed.

  I love him, she silently acknowledged, and met her hands at the back of his neck and held to him. “Love me,” she whispered.

  She felt his hesitation over words she had not meant to speak, but he closed the space between them.

  Rhiannyn thrilled to his mouth covering hers, fingers gripping her waist, hands moving to the small of her back, arms drawing her off the stool.

  You go too far, entreated the voice of all that was good and right.

  I love him, she excused herself.

  As he does not love you, who will ever remind him of his brother’s death. If you are truly dear, ’tis because he desires you the same as Thomas. That is not love.

  Perhaps in time, she ventured.

  You are weak, Rhiannyn of Etcheverry who deserves not the name. Better Rhiannyn the obsession of Thomas, Rhiannyn the betrayer of Edwin, Rhiannyn the downfall of Aethel, Rhiannyn the harlot of Maxen.

  “Ah, nay,” she breathed and pulled her hands from around Maxen's neck.

  He lifted his head, and when she met his questioning gaze, it was through tears.

  “I am weak,” she whispered.

  Desire-darkened eyes yielding to fiery blue, he said, “Weak?”

  She gave her head a shake. “I do not wish to be, but… Perhaps it is because I am so tired.”

  “Of what?”

  Words she had not known were in her tumbled forth. “Of paying for goods I did not purchase nor receive. Bearing guilt for things I can no more control than night can become day at dusk. Being pulled between two peoples such that I hardly know who I am.”

  He stared at her, and when her tears brimmed over, brushed them away. “I know these past years have been difficult for you.”

  “Difficult?” She laughed sharply. “Terrible is what they have been. I know life cannot be as it was, that Saxon rule is over despite all to which Edwin aspires, but it seems we cannot even begin anew—that we who are innocent of all but being Saxon, shall ever by constrained by our defeat and never again be who we were.” A small sob escaped her. “I want to be Rhiannyn. Just Rhiannyn—daughter, sister, friend.”

  Emotions shifting across Maxen’s face, he asked, “Betrothed as well?”

  She frowned.

  “Could you, would you be betrothed again, Rhiannyn? To Harwolfson?”

  Edwin, whom she had cared for, but not loved. She nearly rejected the thought, but it was selfishness. “I would, providing all those lost to me were also restored and it could be the way it was before the Normans.”

  “Then could you have only Harwolfson, you would not wish it? You would remain here with me?”

  Wife to Edwin. Or this…

  Silently, she asked the Lord to forgive her the sinful thing her answer would tell of her. “Here I would remain.”

  Tension easing, Maxen said, “I give you my word I will make it better for your people when I put them back to the land and under my protection.”

  She tried to smile, but the expression would not fit her lips. “I thank you.”

  He lowered his gaze to her mouth as if he meant to continue what was begun, and perhaps he did, but he said, “I thank you, Rhiannyn.”

  Before she could ask his meaning, he drew a hand up her back, pushed his fingers into her hair, and pressed her head under his chin. And held her.

  She stiffly accepted his embrace until she became aware of his heart beneath her ear. Closing her eyes, she thrilled to the thought she was somewhere there in its beat.

  One moment passed into another, lengthening like soft wool gently twisted and wound around a spindle. For the first time in what seemed never, she felt safe and dear, as if the years of heartbreak and hardship were at an end, as if something good and blessed might come of her love for this man.

  “This is how we should have started,” he said.

  If only they could have. But that did not mean they could not now. And was that not his intent—to replace memories of this place with better ones?

  Rhiannyn drew back. “We can begin anew. At least, in this.”

  He grazed a thumb across her lower lip. “So we can.”

  When he did not kiss her again, she slid her hands up his chest, over his shoulders, and pushed them into the hair at his nape. It was she who put her mouth to his so she might feel what no other made her feel.

  He gathered her closer, deepened the kiss, explored the curves of her neck and back.

  Rhiannyn the harlot, the voice once more condemned her.

  She pushed it behind, sighed when his hands moved to her waist and up her sides.

  Rhiannyn the wanton.

  She thrust the voice away, marveled that Maxen made her feel more than she had ever felt.

  Rhiannyn the whore.

  The ugliest of those things she was in his arms made her drop her chin to her chest. “I long to,” she said, “but though I would remain here with you, this is wrong.”

  Her words returning Maxen to the prison cell out of which he had ascended, he stared at the golden hair atop Rhiannyn’s head, felt the silken strands he had wound around a hand. And knew what must be done—even though his brother’s obsession with her had been the death of him, even though Maxen had said he never would, even though it meant defying a king.

  “We will make it right,” he said, “for your soul and mine.”

  She lifted her face, and the confusion there seemed genuine—as if she had not maneuvered him as Lucilla had advised her to do. “How?” she asked.

  “Speak vows with me.”

  Her lashes fluttered. “What?”

  “Unite our two peoples, fricwebba.”

  Peace-weaver, a Saxon woman wed to an enemy in the hope of establishing peace between two tribes.

  Rhiannyn frowned. “You wish to marry me?”

  “What say you?”

  She searched his face, and her quivering mouth curved. “I will wed thee, Maxen.”

  From some place grown distant these past weeks, he caught a whisper of dissent that sought to draw him back to the monastery and the anger and resentment bred by tidings of Thomas’s death. But he would not go there, certain where he dwelt now was more pleasing to God. As it was to him.

  He eased back, took up her hands, and enclosed them in his. Having witnessed informal wedding ceremonies amongst the Saxons of his father’s lands—much like the one he and Rhiannyn had observed the night in Andredeswald when he had played monk to her soul—he began, “I, Maxen of the Penderys, lord of Etcheverry, take thee—”

  She startled. “You would wed me here? This moment?”

  He inclined his head. “We will make what is wrong right, and no more will any name you what you are not.”

  Though she did not appear convinced, he said, “I take thee, Rhiannyn, to be my chosen one. Without sin or shame, I shall desire only thee that I might be desired by only thee. I shall possess only thee that I might be possessed by only thee.”

  Her wary eyes moistened, inviting torchlight to dance across them.

  “From this day forth, the first name upon my lips shall be thine, the first eyes I behold come morn shall be thine, the first sip of my wine shall be thine.”

  A soft sob escaping her, she p
ressed her teeth into her lower lip.

  Feeling his chest tighten with emotions that alarmed him for how vulnerable they made him feel, he stared into her lovely, hopeful face before continuing. “This day and all days to come, my sword and shield shall bear thy name above all others. I shall honor and cherish you through life, respecting thee, thy ways, and thy people.” He drew her hands to his mouth, kissed her fingers. “Hence, I take thee, Rhiannyn of Etcheverry, in sacred marriage, in the sight of God, to be my wife.”

  She shuddered, whispered, “Maxen.”

  “Your husband, do you wish it,” he said.

  Smile uncertain, she began, “I take thee, Maxen Pendery, to be my one.” She raised her eyebrows, and he nodded his approval.

  “Without sin, without shame, only thee shall I desire, only thee shall I possess that thee might desire and possess only me.”

  Reassuringly, he drew his thumbs across the backs of her hands.

  “Through day and night, through all of life, thine name shall be first upon my lips, thine eyes first upon mine. Ever shall I honor and cherish thee, ever shall I respect thee, thy ways, and…”

  It did not offend when she faltered over her vow to respect his people. If in this she was truthful, it gave credence to the vows that had not struggled off her tongue. Too, after all she had endured, only a fool would believe respect for the Norman she wed should extend to all his countrymen.

  “Hence,” Maxen prompted her to forego what need not be spoken.

  “Hence, I take thee, Maxen Pendery, in sacred marriage, in the sight of God, to be my husband.”

  Her voice trailed away, and he drew her near and sealed their vows with a kiss.

  Now they were one. Or nearly so, for consummation would fully validate their marriage. But ere the middling of night, in all ways they would join. No sin, no shame, no taint upon children born of their union.

  Maxen lifted his head, and the smile Rhiannyn shone upon him was more beautiful than any he had seen.

  “Hold to me,” he said, and this time when she put her arms around his neck, he rose and swung her into his arms. As he did so, he swept his gaze over the cell that, for a brief time, had known the light of this memory supplanting the dark one.

  Pressing Rhiannyn’s face into his chest so she would not look upon it, her last memory of it being of his face above hers as they knelt before each other exchanging vows, he carried her into the corridor.