Perhaps they had more in common than Rafael had initially believed.
Perhaps she was not even so innocent as he had expected.
As Rafael reflected upon this intriguing possibility, Malcolm escorted Catriona to the earl, bowing low before that man. “I am delighted to introduce my wife, Catriona, to you, sir.”
The blood left Jeanne’s face and her eyes flashed with fury. Rafael watched Elizabeth, though, and savored her impish smile.
And he had thought her enticing before. The look of her now, eyes dancing with devilry, fired his blood and tempted him to taste her.
He would know then the state of her innocence. A kiss would reveal all.
“Welcome, sir, to Ravensmuir,” Catriona said, curtseying in her turn.
The earl was clearly surprised and struggled to hide his reaction; Jeanne made no such effort. His considerations about Elizabeth came to a halt then, for Rafael did not trust the earl, not with an army at his back. He eased his dagger from its scabbard, anticipating trouble, and straightened in readiness.
“She was supposed to be dead!” Jeanne cried, just before she jabbed her uncle in the shoulder. “You promised me that she would be removed!”
The earl looked as if he would have preferred to be anywhere else in Christendom than standing before his silent host and hostess.
“Jeanne, I do not understand your meaning,” the earl said, his tone making it clear that he lied.
“I fear I do,” Malcolm said. “For an intruder tried to kill my wife last night.”
The earl took a step back. “How trying for you. I thought Ravensmuir better defended than this.” He forced a laugh. “Should I fear for my niece’s future within these walls?”
“I think not, for I suspect you know the man in question.” Malcolm’s voice dropped low. “Perhaps you dispatched him on that errand.”
“Nonsense!” The earl was dismissive.
“My wife saw you look upon his corpse and believes you recognized him.”
Elizabeth, Rafael noted with a quick glance, was both outraged and fascinated by these tidings. There was much advantage, in Rafael’s opinion in a woman showing her thoughts so readily as this.
He liked that she was passionate, as well as loyal to her brother.
The earl glared at Catriona. “Nonsense, and nonsense to serve her own ends, to be sure.”
Malcolm shook his head, and Rafael anticipated that he would provoke the earl. “Then he is as anonymous as I feared.” He raised his voice to give a command. “There will be no decent burial for that villain, then. Cast his corpse into the sea and let his soul be damned forever.” Several of the men in the Sable League nodded and moved, as if to do Malcolm’s bidding.
Rafael swallowed a chuckle at the tactic and felt Elizabeth’s gaze flick to him.
“You would not do that to Stephen!” Jeanne protested then turned her anger upon her uncle. “You would not let that happen to him, not after all he has done in service to you!”
And so, the truth was out, and it was precisely as Malcolm had believed. Rafael exchanged quick glances with their fellows, for they could not anticipate the earl’s reaction. It would not be good, to be sure.
“Jeanne, hold your tongue. You do not help the matter,” the earl chided.
“Nor do you, uncle!” Jeanne advanced on Malcolm, flicking a dismissive hand at Catriona. “Will you put her aside to keep your pledge?”
“That I might wed into a family who embraces murder to see their ends achieved?” Malcolm shook his head. “I think not.”
Jeanne was livid, and Rafael suspected that this tantrum in having her desire denied revealed her true nature. Malcolm had evaded a dire fate, to be sure, and he appreciated Catriona’s serene nature and good sense more than he had thus far.
“You promised me!” Jeanne spat at her uncle. Her face turned crimson in her anger and her voice rose shrewishly, making her even more unattractive. “You said I would be Lady of Ravensmuir. You said this keep would be mine to manage. You said I would be wedded this very day! I rose from bed when it was still dark to do your will. I rode all this way, but it was for naught!” She punctuated this last with a stamp of her foot and a covetous glare around the hall. “I want it,” she insisted, as if sheer will could make it so, and folded her arms across her chest.
“Yet it shall not be yours,” Malcolm said.
Jeanne exhaled, then marched to confront Elizabeth so abruptly that the maiden jumped. She did not recoil, though, her eyes narrowing as she faced Jeanne.
Rafael took no chances. He slipped around the perimeter of the hall, his grip tight on the hilt of his blade. No one would injure Malcolm’s sister while he was present.
“Give it to me,” Jeanne demanded, her hand outstretched.
Rafael was only a few feet behind Elizabeth, and he guessed by the way her shoulders straightened that she knew it. All of the people he admired most were observant, so he was glad she proved herself to be so as well.
“I do not understand your meaning,” she said.
“Give me the herb that will let me see the Fae,” Jeanne demanded, her manner far from what one might expect of one asking a favor. “I will drink sweet mead from a golden cup and live in finery and wealth. If my family cannot ensure that it will be so, then I have no qualms in abandoning them for a better life.”
Elizabeth immediately pulled a dried herb from her purse, prepared to comply. Did she believe in the same whimsy as Malcolm and Catriona, that the demons he and Malcolm had faced six months before were benign beings called the Fae? Rafael could not believe it.
But her reaction told him that he must.
“Might I have a glass of mulled wine?” Elizabeth asked, as if there was naught unusual in desiring to see these creatures. The wine was brought from the kitchens and poured into a cup, which Catriona heated over the fire. Elizabeth put the herb into it, and the aroma changed, becoming more savory than it had been.
Rafael winced, for it seemed to him to be a waste of good wine. He would not have spoiled it to see the demons again, no matter how affluent they appeared to be.
“Wild thyme,” Catriona said, glancing up at Elizabeth.
“Aye. It is said to give mortals the gift of seeing the Fae, for a short time at least.”
Catriona shook her head slightly. “That is not a property of it that I know.”
“Give it to me!” Jeanne demanded and seized the cup greedily. She drained the cup, then looked about herself warily.
Rafael had not believed that the herb would have any effect, but Jeanne’s eyes widened with horror as she stared about herself.
A person could either see the demons in Malcolm’s hall as Rafael did, or not. Rafael ignored them routinely, for he sensed that they would be prompted to torment him even more if they knew he could see them. There were dozens in the hall, if not hundreds, of every shape and size, twisted and dark and exuding malice. He would never have imagined that a potion could change what a person could see, but evidently he was mistaken.
There could be no doubt that the scales had been lifted from Jeanne’s eyes, not when she squealed with disgust.
“They are everywhere!” she cried with disgust. “It is as if the hall is full of vermin!” It was no consolation to Rafael to be proven right, not when every ghoul in the hall targeted Jeanne after she acknowledged her ability to see them. They surrounded her, pinching and biting and striking her on all sides. Indeed, there were so many of them that she could scarcely be seen. Jeanne tried to evade them, to no avail, and he saw half a dozen of them dive under the hem of her skirts. Then she screamed in pain. “It bit me!”
Yet his angel chuckled, savoring the other woman’s discomfort.
Rafael moved to one side, the better to see Elizabeth’s reaction, and found her eyes sparkling merrily.
She was not so angelic at all.
And that realization made her objective clear. She came to save Malcolm from his wager with the Fae, not by dissuading her brother from
keeping to the terms, but by seeing Rafael sacrificed in Malcolm’s stead. Rafael had no intent of dying on Midsummer’s Eve not even to please a fetching maiden.
Rafael found it both disappointing and reassuring that Elizabeth was not different from him in the least. She had an agenda and she would see it fulfilled, regardless of the price to others.
He wondered if she, like he, was amenable to making a bargain to see such ends realized.
As Jeanne screamed and fled to the bailey, followed by her uncle, Rafael wondered what Elizabeth might surrender to see her objective achieved.
’Twas time he found out.
“Your justice is cruel, mi piqueño ángel,” Rafael murmured from behind Elizabeth and she jumped, unaware that he stood so close. She spun to find his gaze fixed upon her so intently that her heart skipped a beat.
“I do not understand.” She managed to smile, even though she thought she might drown in Rafael’s steady gaze. Could he truly read her very thoughts? She could not dispel the notion.
“Do not pretend that is so. You wanted to see Jeanne surprised by the tidings that Malcolm was wedded.” That smile curved his lips, giving him a lazy and seductive look. Elizabeth thought of entire days spent abed and knew Rafael would know how to fill those hours well. “You could have warned her on your ride to Ravensmuir.”
Elizabeth felt her color rise. “If the reaction of the Fae means Jeanne will never return, I cannot find fault with it,” she said, her voice sounding more husky than she knew it to be. “I meant the other part you said, the part I did not understand.”
Rafael considered her, his gaze slipping over her features and lingering upon her lips. His smile turned mysterious and he leaned so close that she could not fully draw a breath. “I thought you to be an angel,” he murmured, his deep voice making her shiver.
“An angel?” Elizabeth laughed, knowing her voice was higher than usual. “Surely not!”
“Surely so.” Rafael held her gaze with conviction.
Elizabeth had no idea what to say, but she could not bear the prospect of him turning away. Again she felt out of her depth, and said the first question that came into her thoughts. “Have you seen many angels in your time?”
Rafael’s lazy smile warmed her to her very toes. “Never a one until this day.”
It would have been tempting to explore that notion, but Elizabeth tried to return the subject at hand to her quest to see Malcolm saved. “As would be fitting, for a man who had pledged his soul to pay a tithe to Hell.”
He shrugged, untroubled. “I thought an angel intervened on my behalf, as unlikely as that might be.”
“Unlikely?” she retorted. “Why?”
Rafael lifted a brow, which made him look all the more wicked and alluring. Elizabeth stared at him, her entire body thrumming beneath his attention, and she felt a conviction that they two shared a secret. He dropped his voice to a whisper that made the goose flesh rise on her skin. “Because you are no angel of mercy, it is clear,” he murmured.
“Jeanne deserves no mercy! I am glad to see her denied of something she desires.”
Rafael feigned astonishment so well that Elizabeth could only laugh. He chuckled in his turn and braced a foot on the dais beside her. His thigh was so close that she could feel the warmth emanating from his skin and stifled the urge to touch him. “A vengeful angel, then.”
Elizabeth felt her manner turn mischievous, and she said aloud the words she should have kept to herself. There was something about Rafael that tempted her to do and say what she should not. “Truly, I am more glad that we shall never be kin.”
Rafael’s eyes sparkled and he seemed to fight a smile. “Perhaps you are an angel of judgment? Or an avenging angel?”
Elizabeth realized that Rafael was teasing her, completely against her expectation, but his manner was seductive as well. Her heart was thundering, and she felt aglow in his attention. This man possessed a dangerous power, to be sure. “It is you who would call me an angel or not. I made no such claim.”
“Indeed.” His gaze swept over her as surely as a touch. “You would simply tempt me—” this last lingered on his tongue, sounding sinful and wondrous at the same time “—to surrender my own life for that of your brother.” Rafael shook his head, apparently rueful. His dancing eyes made her doubt that he was truly so. “So you prove to be mortal, after all, and not so different from all others I have known.”
“Because I tempt you?” Elizabeth asked, then flushed furiously at the boldness of the words she had uttered without thinking.
Rafael’s smile flashed. “Because you would see your goal achieved, with no care for the price paid by others.” He pretended to be disappointed. “I had hoped an angel might intervene on principle alone.”
“It is principle to pay your own debts and keep your word!”
“But not stand by your sworn word?” Rafael leaned closer, his manner so intent that Elizabeth could scarce draw a breath. She could smell his skin. When his gaze locked with hers and he smiled slowly, she was certain she blushed to her very toes. Her toes certainly curled in her shoes. “Would you not miss me, my lady Elizabeth,” he whispered, and she could not avert her gaze “were I dead and gone by Midsummer morn?”
“Not so much as I would miss my brother,” Elizabeth replied, though she was not entirely sure that was true. It was invigorating to talk with Rafael, for it made her feel reckless, as if she flirted with danger, even while she sat in her brother’s hall.
“I hear doubt in your voice.”
How could he be so perceptive? Elizabeth tried to change the subject slightly. “Have you no remorse? No sense of honor?”
Rafael grinned. “None. Why should I?”
“Because it is a mark of a man of merit, to give his word and keep it, to stand by his friends and do what is right.”
“Truly.” Rafael yawned. “I am glad that I have known so few of them, then. They sound most tedious.” He caught her gaze again, a glimmer of humor in the depths of his eyes.
He was teasing her.
“I do not believe you,” Elizabeth said, just as she might have argued with one of her brothers—though truly there was a charge to their exchange that she had never felt with one of her siblings. “You would have me think you more wicked than you are.”
Rafael eyed her with new interest. Elizabeth sensed that she had said precisely what he wished her to say, though she could not understand his intent. “And how would you know for certain how wicked I am?”
“I cannot, but you would not be my brother’s comrade if you were not trustworthy in some matters. I will guess that you speak to me now because you consider my challenge to be a better friend to Malcolm.”
“And you would be wrong.”
“Yet I am not convinced.”
Rafael leaned close and Elizabeth could not catch her breath when he watched her so avidly. “Are all the maidens in this land so bold as this?” he murmured. There was an intimacy in his tone, as if they shared a secret, which made her think of confessions whispered abed. She flushed to an even deeper hue, but kept her chin high.
He would see it as weakness if she backed down now and Elizabeth wanted very much to surprise this cursedly confident man. “I do not understand.”
“Catriona was quick to speak her mind to Malcolm when she arrived, though she was but a serving maid at that time. And now I find myself dared by a maiden to die in her brother’s stead.” His smile broadened so that he looked more hungry and his gaze lingered on her lips. “I thought maidens were to be chaste, sheltered and occupied with embroidery until their wedding day.”
Elizabeth could not help but scoff. “I have spent sufficient hours at embroidery to find it as tedious as you say you find men of honor, and there is no wedding day in my near future.”
“Whyever not?” Now he looked to be so scandalized that Elizabeth was tempted to laugh. His next words eliminated that reaction, though, as did the daring look in his eye. “Have you been too bold in sharin
g your favors? How naughty that would be, mi piqueño ángel!”
Elizabeth gasped that he would make such a suggestion. “Nay!”
Rather than being affronted by her response, Rafael seemed to be amused. His eyes danced at her reaction, and she knew he would have loved her to slap his face.
Elizabeth straightened, feeling dutiful and disliking it more than usual. “My brother Alexander granted me the right to choose the man I would wed, and I find none fitting.”
If anything, that confession seemed to please Rafael even more.
Indeed, he laughed. “Perhaps we share the view that men of honor are tedious.”
Elizabeth stammered at that, for there was merit to his argument. She did like how unpredictable Rafael was, and how he matched wits with her so well. It was irksome to realize that she found this dangerous mercenary far more intriguing than any solid and reliable suitor presented to her thus far.
Rafael laughed at her discomfiture. “So, being the bold maiden that you are, you came to Malcolm’s hall to assess the mercenaries gathered there, to see if another manner of man would suit you better.” He leaned down again, his expression making her heart skip. “Should you care to sample one to be certain, I would volunteer.”
Elizabeth was shocked. “You dare too much! I came to Malcolm’s hall to try to save his soul!” When Rafael did not reply, she continued, daring to scold him. “Surely you could take your rightful place and finish what you alone began.”
“Surely I would be churlish to decline Malcolm’s offer and to restore the debt between us. It is clear that it troubled him to owe me a boon, and in this, his debt will be repaid.”
Elizabeth frowned at this detail she had not known. “How so?”
“I saved Malcolm’s life when first we met.” Rafael appeared to be insouciant but he watched her reaction so closely that Elizabeth suspected he was not. “Now he has vowed to save mine and all will be even again. The fact is that I would rather be living than dead.”
That smile toyed on his lips as he eyed Elizabeth. “But should you wish to try to change my mind, mi piqueño ángel, and try to revive my forgotten sense of honor, or even if you should like to assess the merits of a man devoid of merit, I should be delighted to indulge your whim.”
All's Fair in Love and War: Four Enemies-to-Lovers Medieval Romances Page 103