All's Fair in Love and War: Four Enemies-to-Lovers Medieval Romances

by Claire Delacroix

There was an echo of hoof beats and another party entered the bailey, a smaller group riding magnificent horses as black as night. Malcolm gave a cry of pleasure when he saw Rafael and the two of them shook hands and embraced.

  “Dame Fortune has smiled upon you,” Malcolm said with pride, admiring the party with a glance. “I did not realize matters went so well in France.”

  “Not for France, but for me,” Rafael admitted. “It seems my father was not the man I believed him to be, but a baron in the service of the French king.” He chose not to share his father’s name just yet. “He has granted me a holding on the frontier to defend, for he would see it in the hands of one he can trust.”

  Malcolm appeared to be as pleased in this as Rafael and shook his hand again heartily. “And I see that you have tempted more of our former comrades to leave the mercenary’s life behind.” He greeted the men in the party each in turn, as Alexander looked on.

  “Come into the hall and be warmed,” the laird said stiffly, and Rafael did not doubt that Elizabeth’s brother had guessed the reason for his arrival.

  His men dismounted and he offered his hand to Catriona, who smiled at him. She was indeed rounding with Malcolm’s son, just as in his dream, and Rafael bowed low after Malcolm lifted her from the saddle. The garrulous Vera was with them, chiding her new husband for some crime or another, then clucking over Avery who had grown much.

  “I should have brought the others, had I known you would be here,” Malcolm said. “You should have sent word.”

  “I preferred to ride in haste,” Rafael said, prompting Malcolm and Catriona to exchange a smile. Alexander’s manner remained grim.

  “You must come to Ravensmuir to visit, then,” Catriona said. “Before you depart.”

  “Do you mean to linger long?” Alexander asked politely.

  Rafael smiled. “The decision, sir, is not mine to make.”

  Then he stepped into the great hall of Kinfairlie. It was precisely as his vision, although it was crowded with nobles who must be kin, children and servants. His gaze flew immediately to Elizabeth and he was struck by her unfamiliarity.

  She did not look at all as she had in his vision.

  She laughed gaily at some comment another member of the family made, and her manner was animated. But her gaze slid past him when he bowed before her as if she knew not who he was. He made a point of speaking directly to her, but there was no recognition in her eyes.

  Elizabeth might have been a different woman altogether.

  Rafael could not truly believe he was as forgettable as that.

  The woman looked like Elizabeth. She sounded like Elizabeth, and she was dressed like Elizabeth, but there was something about her eyes and her manner that made Rafael think more of a doll than a woman.

  When she left the hall, insisting that she would fetch one of the children, he followed her, lending chase as silently as a shadow. He felt Malcolm watching him, but Catriona touched her husband’s arm.

  “My lady!” Rafael called after her and Elizabeth turned to face him.

  “Sir?” she said, as if she did not know his name.

  Impatient with her manner, Rafael strode to her side and took her hand. He was stunned by its coldness, but bent to brush his lips across it. “My lady. I am most gladdened to see you again,” he murmured, letting his lips linger on her flesh. She did not seem to notice and she certainly did not shiver with delight as he might have expected.

  “Again?” she asked, her gaze seeming to pass right through him. “Have we met?”

  “We have loved, my lady,” Rafael confessed in a low voice. “And you have stolen my heart away.”

  She laughed, as if the idea were absurd, and her voice was high enough to make him wince. “You have had too much of the ale, sir. Let me fetch my niece while you return to the merriment in the hall.” Her smile turned coy in a way that did not resemble Elizabeth in the least. “I will not tell my brother of your boldness, for we could not have a battle on this holy day.”

  Rafael frowned at this unexpected reply. “I will have a token from you first,” he murmured, still expecting Elizabeth to reveal herself. He lifted a finger to her cheek, stroked its chill and leaned closer. She looked up at him as if unable to comprehend what he did.

  “We stole away for a kiss, my lady,” he whispered. “So that others might not witness our embrace.”

  “Oh!” she said and smiled at him. There was no heat in her eyes, no memory of the passionate unions that had left them both simmering. She might need a reminder that there was blood in her veins.

  He kissed her, gently as if to coerce her participation. When she did not respond, he slanted his mouth across hers in a possessive kiss much like the ones they had shared before.

  The lady neither responded nor moved away.

  She seemed to endure his caress patiently.

  Nay, she might have been made of wood for all the fervor of her response.

  Rafael tried again to coax her reaction. He drew her closer, trailed kisses along her cheek and murmured in her ear, then captured her sweet mouth anew. When he lifted his head, she regarded him with disinterest, no flush on her cheeks or sparkle in her eyes.

  “Are we done, then?” she asked lightly. “Shall we return to the hall now?”

  “Of course,” Rafael agreed. It seemed impossible to him, yet she acted as if they had only just met.

  And as if she had no interest in him at all. The awareness that had snapped the two of them these past six months, the allure that had filled his dreams and the spark that had fairly leapt between them was dead and gone. She was not feigning disinterest. She truly was oblivious to him.

  If she had been angry with him for his departure, there still would have been fire in her touch, not this indifference.

  Rafael was more disappointed than he could have expressed. He had never thought Elizabeth fickle. Indeed, her determination to think well of him had been the one constant upon which he could rely.

  He escorted her to the high table, well aware of how keenly the Laird of Kinfairlie watched him, then retreated to his place at the back of the hall, with nary a kiss upon her fingers. The lady did not seem to notice.

  The laird, in contrast, was pleased.

  Rafael called to have his cup filled and flicked back his cloak, settling at the board with newfound impatience. It was only when he lifted the cup to his lips that he became aware of a wound upon his finger.

  It was the finger with which he had stroked Elizabeth’s cheek, just moments past.

  And there was a large sliver lodged within the flesh. He had touched nothing but the lady’s soft skin.

  How could he have gotten a sliver?

  Could his other vision have been true as well?

  If Elizabeth had been claimed by the dark king, then who was this woman?

  More importantly, how could Elizabeth be saved?

  Catriona’s head was spinning with the introductions to all of Malcolm’s gathered kin, although Vera had tried to prepare her in advance. Most of the siblings had returned to Kinfairlie this year, including Madeline and Rhys from Wales, with their three children, Dafydd, Rhiannon and Owain. Annelise and Garrett had traveled from the west of the Highlands with their three young children, the twins Aileen and Eva, and their youngest Gavin. En route, they had paused at Seton Manor, then carried on their journey with Isabella and Murdoch, along with their boys Duncan, Cameron and Murdoch. Alexander and Eleanor had four children of their own, Roland, Tynan, Eloise and Melissande, and the hall was noisy with children racing back and forth.

  Vivienne and Erik had not come south from the Highlands after their return home the previous summer, for Vivienne was close to her time with their newest arrival. Catriona hoped they would visit the following summer, for she would like to see the children she had tended while in Vivienne’s service. No doubt they had grown much taller and she hugged Avery close, wanting to savor every moment.

  Catriona was surprised when Rafael came to sit beside her, th
ough she was not displeased. She was glad to have an accord with the man who had been her husband’s closest comrade and most heartened by the change in Rafael since Midsummer. He was less angry than once he had been, and truly, showed himself to possess a dangerous charm. There was a lock of hair at his temple that had turned as white as snow, but she dared not ask for details on that. Injury and shock prompted such changes, and she wondered what had happened to Rafael in his absence.

  Other than his acquisition of a title and wealth.

  Catriona asked after his adventures and of his newfound holding, though she sensed that he wished to speak of more than this.

  His gaze strayed to Elizabeth time and again, his confusion echoing her own.

  Elizabeth, after all, looked more odd each time she and Catriona met. Though the rest of the family insisted that Elizabeth had returned to her nature from years before, Catriona could not reconcile this cold and giddy girl with the one she had met the previous summer. Elizabeth had been downcast after Rafael’s departure, to be sure, but Catriona had been able to understand that. This woman was so odd that Catriona could make no sense of such a large change in her nature at all.

  She often did not even like Elizabeth, when once she had thought her likely to become a good friend. Catriona was reassured in a way that Rafael was so disgruntled, for it appeared that he too saw a difference in Elizabeth.

  Catriona supposed it was because she was recalling the time that she, Rafael and Elizabeth had joined forces against a Fae king’s scheme that this tale rose in her thoughts.

  When Alexander called for a tale, Catriona was quick to raise her voice.

  “Once there was a maiden so beauteous that all exclaimed in wonder when they saw her,” she began. “Her hair was long and golden, and her eyes were the clearest hue of blue.” Malcolm squeezed Catriona’s hand and she realized she had described her own coloring. “Her name was Ethna and she lived in Ireland. She was sweet and helpful, as well as lovely, and so it was that when her father gave her hand to the man who had won her heart, all were merry in the land. The lord she wed was young and handsome and possessed of a fine holding, and he adored Ethna more than any might have believed possible. His holding was near Knockma, the hill that covered the court of the Fae king Finvarra. He routinely took offerings of wine to Knockma and his respect ensured that their relations were cordial, as affairs between neighboring lords should be.”

  Catriona saw Rafael straighten slightly in his place and realized he had caught the reference to Finvarra.

  “And so it was that the lord was so happy with his new bride, and his new bride so loved to dance, that the festivities celebrating the wedding lasted far longer than was typical. They went on, night after night, feasting and dancing, and Ethna wore a new dress each and every night of the celebration. On the night she wore her silver dress, the one that looked as if it had been wrought of moonbeams, she faltered in the dance then fell into a swoon and danced no more. All the company were distraught, her husband most of all, and she was carried to her chambers by the lord himself. He sat vigil beside her all the night long, but she did not stir until the sun had risen, and then she spoke only of the wondrous land she had visited the night before, and of her yearning to return.

  “Now, the lord had been raised at the keep he held, the one located close beside Knockma, so he knew something of the Fae and their ways. He assumed his bride had been dancing at Finvarra’s court, and he feared that she might have taken a sip of some golden wine or eaten a morsel from their feast. He set a watch upon her chambers when the sun began to sink low, and her old nurse sat beside Ethna and held her hand. One at a time, however, each person who sat vigil fell asleep, until the lord himself was the sole one awake. He was resolved to keep his eyes open until the dawn, but when the sun rose, he discovered that he, too, had slept. He saw immediately that Ethna was gone, and he guessed well enough where she was.

  “He had his horse saddled immediately and rode with all haste to Knockma, certain his friend Finvarra would have some counsel for him and provide some means to retrieve his bride from whichever Fae had stolen her away. To his relief, as he climbed the hill, he heard two Fae discussing the abduction of Ethna: to his dismay, he learned that Finvarra himself was responsible. One declared that Finvarra was happy, for the most beautiful mortal woman in all the world was his captive forever. Though the lord knew that Finvarra adored mortal women of beauty, he had thought their friendship would ensure his lady wife’s safety. He was sorrowful to learn that he had been mistaken and knew Finvarra would give him no good advice. But then he listened closely to the two Fae, for they might grant him some clue.

  “And so they did. The first one was confident that Ethna’s husband would never see her again. The other was not so, and the lord bent his ear close to the earth, that he not miss a word. ‘He could yet gain her return,’ declared the second. ‘If he dug down into the hill and exposed the Fae court to the sunlight, she would be his again.’ The lord did not need to be given this advice twice. He immediately summoned men from far and wide, and they dug with vigor into the hill that sheltered the Fae court. So great was their effort that when the sun set, they had dug a trench halfway to the Fae court. The lord was convinced that his bride would endure only one more night in Finvarra’s kingdom before she was home again.

  “But in the morning, he had a foul surprise. The hill was restored, the trench filled in and the green growth atop it looked as if it had never been disturbed. The men despaired but the lord was determined to save his lady love. He called for more men and he paid for them to dig faster, and by nightfall on the second day, they had dug two-thirds of the way to the Fae court.

  “And yet on the third morning, the hill was restored once again. The lord nigh wailed with despair, for he could not see how he could find more men much less have more men digging in the same place. He feared all would be lost, but he heard a voice in his ear. He could not see it, but a small Fae had landed upon his shoulder. He could hear its counsel, though, and it advised him to sprinkle salt upon their labor at the end of the day. And so the lord sent for salt, even as he set the men to digging the trench anew, and at nightfall, once again, they were three-quarters of the way to the Fae court. When he put his ear to the ground, he could even hear the music of the Fae beneath the hill and even that faint sound was enough to make his feet twitch. He knew better than to dance, or to let any of his men dance, and so he had the salt cast over the soil, then took the men back to his hall for the night.

  “To his delight, the sun rose to reveal the trench as it had been the night before. The men cheered as one, then took their shovels to work even before the sun had warmed the earth. The lord knew that the iron of their spades would destroy the Fae court if even one breached its ceiling, but Finvarra had played him false. And so it was that they were very close when Finvarra’s voice carried from inside the hill. ‘Cease your digging,’ he cried. ‘And Ethna will be returned at nightfall to her lord husband.’ The lord agreed, content with this compromise, for he truly had no desire to do ill to the Fae: he simply wished for the return of his wife. He paid the men and sent them on their way, and at sunset, he stood at Knockma waiting in the dusk. No sooner had the sun slipped below the horizon than his beloved Ethna came walking toward him in her silver dress, looking like a shaft of moonlight come back to him. He caught her up and rode back to his abode with her seated before him in the saddle, certain that all had come aright.

  “By the time he reached his own abode, though, the lord had begun to fear that Finvarra had tricked him. Once he had seized Ethna, she had fallen into a sleep. He had assumed on their ride home that she had not slept these three days and nights and was tired as a result, but when they arrived at his hall, she did not awaken. Nor did she ever awaken again. Days and nights passed and she slept, growing more pale. The old women whispered that she must have eaten of the Fae feast. They said that a log with a Fae glamour upon it had been returned by Finvarra and that the lady herself was sti
ll trapped in the hill. The lord did not know what to think or what to do. He went to Knockma, but Finvarra would not receive him, and the hill seemed both still and dark, even at night. He feared he would never be with his lady love in truth again.

  “He was mounting his horse at Knockma one night, after yet another failed appeal, when he once again heard a pair of Fae voices from beneath the hill. ‘It has been a year and a day that Finvarra has held Ethna’s soul and kept her from her husband,’ said the first, and the lord realized it had indeed been that long. ‘She is lost beneath the hill forever.’ ‘Nay, nay,’ said the second, once again more optimistic for the lord’s chances. ‘He could win her back in a night if he but unfastened the girdle around her waist and removed the golden pin from it. If he burned the girdle and cast the ashes around her bed, and buried the pin deep in the earth, she would be his again.’ The lord did not need to hear this counsel twice. He galloped home and did as the second Fae had advised. He unfastened the girdle around his wife’s waist, though it took no small effort to do so. He pulled out the pin, though he had to wrench it free with all his might. He burned the girdle and cast the ashes around her bed, then buried the pin deeply in the earth.”

  Catriona paused to take a sip of her ale, well aware of how avidly the children listened.

  “And?” prompted Madeline’s daughter Rhiannon.

  “And in the morning, Ethna awakened for the first time since he had brought her back to their abode. She smiled and embraced her lord husband, thanking him for freeing her from Finvarra’s spell. She remembered all that had happened to her, but believed she had been gone but a single night. So it was that they were happy together, and had many sons, and lived long and well. The trench in Knockma hill remains, and it is called the Fairy Glen, and Finvarra never cast his eye upon Ethna the bride again.”

  The company applauded and stamped their feet, well pleased with the tale, and Catriona inclined her head at their pleasure. Her gaze danced over the hall and she was struck by the thoughtfulness of Rafael’s expression.