The Warrior Knight and the Widow

by Ella Matthews

  She hadn’t done that in years.

  After her marriage her hair had been another way in which her husband could hurt her, using its thickness to pull her about whenever she displeased him. Before illness had taken over his life she’d displeased him almost every day. Her failure to get pregnant had been the worst of her transgressions, and his increasingly violent efforts to make her so had given her a desperate fear of the marriage bed.

  Using her hair to drag her to his bedchamber had been one of his most humiliating punishments. After his death she’d tried hard to find joy in its thick length again, but the urge to cut it all off still pulled at her every now and again.

  The horses squelched through rivers of mud as they followed Braedan through a densely packed forest. Ellena frowned at his broad back, the hard muscles encased in chain mail. Since he’d barged in and out of her room three nights ago they’d barely exchanged a word. She’d heard him yelling at his man Merrick and at Aldith before Aldith had slunk back into the chamber they’d shared, but apart from some sullenness on Aldith’s part the incident might never have happened.

  After an interminably long time they finally reached a patch of land, surrounded by trees on all sides, that appeared to meet Braedan’s satisfaction and the horses pulled to a stop. Ellena allowed her body to slide off Awen, rejoicing when her feet hit the floor with a thud. For a long moment she clung to the side of her horse, allowing the animal to keep her upright.

  She closed her eyes and tried to imagine the hot bath that would be awaiting her at her father’s castle in only five days’ time, but ice-cold rain dripped down her face and seeped beneath her clothes, chasing the fantasy away and making her shiver.

  The sounds of men moving about gradually penetrated her musings and she opened her eyes to see everyone busy at work. Everyone, that was, apart from herself and Aldith. Aldith was still sitting atop her horse, surveying the scene before her, her lips twisted into a grimace of horror.

  Ellena looked around. They were sheltered by the trees but the ground was still a boggy mess. It was not going to be a comfortable night’s sleep.

  Aldith had barely spoken to her apart from the occasional, ‘Yes, my lady,’ since the unfortunate incident of Merrick and the stable, so she didn’t bother to address the maid. She wouldn’t be a great deal of help in this situation anyway—it was an experience outside their usually comfortable living standards—but at least Ellena was willing to try and improve their situation. Aldith would wait until somebody helped her.

  It wasn’t Ellena’s fault that Braedan had been so monumentally angry at her being left alone for a brief period. She’d heard the row he’d given the two lovers through her shuttered window—although why he hadn’t yelled at them before he came to check her room was beyond her. Surely he could have sent Aldith up to her and spared them both that embarrassing scene? She’d practically discussed her sexual relationship with Lord Swein and for the life of her she couldn’t fathom why she’d done it.

  There was something about Braedan’s dark eyes that drew her in and made her say things she wouldn’t say to another person. But really—what had made her talk to him about intimate relations with her late husband when that was something she was very keen to avoid thinking about at all costs? The humiliation and the pain were things she never wanted to revisit.

  She wished she could take back the comment she’d made about sex not being worth the effort. He’d probably thought her ridiculous.

  She gave herself a little shake. It didn’t matter right now. All that concerned her was getting out of the relentless deluge of water. She led Awen over to the rough shelter where the other horses were gathering. She made sure the mare had her share of oats before leaving her in the capable hands of Nilson, one of Braedan’s men, who seemed to have a gifted touch when it came to horses.

  All around the clearing shelters were being erected with a speed that suggested they’d done this many times before. Very little was being said as the men concentrated hard on their tasks.

  Out of the corner of her eye she could see Aldith sliding off her horse, and she wondered whether she would expect someone to deal with it for her. She snorted. Aldith sometimes acted as if she was royalty.

  ‘Your tent has been erected, my lady,’ said Braedan from behind her.

  She turned towards him. He was pointing to a circular structure in the centre of the enclosure but he was looking directly at her. Rain ran down his face and dripped off the end of his nose. She smiled at the sight and for a second he smiled back at her. Her heart stuttered strangely at the sight.

  ‘Where’s the food tent?’ she asked, pulling her gaze away from his face and focusing instead on a point just behind his head.

  With that, his smile vanished and his customary scowl appeared.

  ‘Eluard is dealing with the food, my lady, but it will be awhile before it is ready.’

  He stalked away from her, his boots making large prints in the mud.

  ‘I guess I’ll have to find the food tent by myself, then,’ she muttered under her breath.

  She squelched around the clearing until she found Eluard attempting to light a fire under a sheet of canvas, its sides held up by thick wooden poles. The youngest of Braedan’s men, Eluard seemed to be given less physical jobs than the others, and she found it quite sweet that the men, for all their gruff exteriors, seemed to treat him like the son of the group.

  He jumped up when he saw her approach and a deep blush spread across his ruddy complexion.

  ‘I’m...sorry. It...it’s not ready yet, my lady,’ he stuttered.

  Ellena glanced at the bag by Eluard’s feet, which appeared to hold a lump of unidentifiable red meat.

  ‘I can see that.’ She smiled. ‘I’ve come to help.’

  She couldn’t have startled him more if she’d told him she’d grown an extra arm.

  She suppressed an amused smile; she didn’t want to upset him by laughing at his expression. She sensed it would hurt his feelings.

  ‘You see to that fire,’ she said, ‘and I’ll see what other provisions we have.’

  They might be far away from anywhere, but she wasn’t about to eat a lump of meat with nothing to go with it. She’d been riding all day and she was starving.

  She rummaged around in a large canvas bag and found a few sad-looking carrots and a couple of leeks. She set about chopping them into a large stewing pot.

  ‘I don’t suppose there’s any wine?’ she asked as she neared the end of the vegetables.

  ‘No, my lady.’

  ‘That’s a pity. This is going to be very dry otherwise.’

  ‘There is some ale...’

  ‘You fetch that, then, and we’ll add it to the pot.’

  ‘I’m not sure Sir Leofric will like—’

  ‘Let’s not tell Sir Leofric,’ said Ellena, and was rewarded with a shy smile.

  ‘Don’t tell me what?’ demanded a deep voice from the edge of the shelter.

  Eluard’s face flooded with colour again and he immediately turned his attention back to the carcass he was attempting to chop.

  Braedan looked curious rather than angry, so Ellena said, ‘We’re attempting to make this stew edible. I thought a slug of ale might improve the flavour. That is all.’

  * * *

  Braedan couldn’t move. Of all the things he’d been expecting to see when he’d found that Ellena wasn’t in her tent, the sight of her chopping carrots into a stewing pot hadn’t featured once.

  He’d thought when she’d asked where the food tent was that she was demanding to be fed, but he should have known better. Over the last three days she’d ridden long hours and not complained once. He’d known men who couldn’t last as long as she could in the saddle.

  Instead of hiding away in her tent, like her irritating maid, she had made herself useful. How many other highly born ladies would know
what to do with a bag of uncooked vegetables past their best?

  ‘I don’t mind a drop of ale going in,’ he commented.

  Anything to make the food more edible was good in his eyes, although he did wince when he saw how much ale she was pouring into the pot. He hoped she knew what she was doing and was not wasting precious drink.

  Eventually the rest of the men were trudging in, and helping themselves to ladles of the rich-looking stew. Ellena sat on an overturned log and spooned food into her mouth. Her maid stayed on the other side of the food tent—relations between them seemed strained—but young Eluard sat near her, speaking shyly to her now and then.

  Braedan was pleased she’d found someone to keep her company, because her maid wasn’t much good, and of course he was pleased it was Eluard. It wasn’t as if Braedan could keep her company himself...

  It was essential he maintained a certain distance, because he was the one in charge and all his men looked to him to set an example. If he appeared to be over-familiar with her then the rest of them would follow, and the Earl of Ogmore would not be pleased.

  It was annoying, though, the way his gaze kept seeking her out, and how a hard knot of jealousy seemed to be forming in his stomach because he wanted to be the one to make her smile.

  He threw another log on the fire. ‘Move closer to the warmth, Lady Swein,’ he said. ‘It will help to dry your clothes.’

  She raised one of her arched eyebrows at him.

  ‘Please,’ he added.

  She smiled then—the first proper smile that had been directed solely at him.

  His heart stumbled and he took a quick step backwards. She was beautiful, but her smile made her breathtaking, lighting up her blue eyes and making him want things he would never get from her.

  He strode quickly from the tent and back out into the rain. Breathing heavily, he made his way to the edge of the camp and leaned against a tree.

  She was forbidden. He knew that. In fact it was probably because she was denied to him that he was finding her so damn attractive and muddling his mind. He’d always wanted things he couldn’t have, and she was no exception.

  But if she didn’t hate him now then she definitely would when she found out about his reward for returning her to her father.

  He rubbed his eyes and pulled himself upright. Enough of this distraction—he would find his men on watch and see if they had anything to report.

  The woods were silent, apart from the rustling of creatures in the undergrowth and the cawing of a bird overhead. He trod softly around the encampment but found nothing untoward. He returned to find that Ellena and her maid had retired to their tent.

  His mind once more turned to her unbound hair and the way her chemise had clung to her body. She’d be sleeping in all her clothes tonight, but that didn’t stop his thoughts from taking a turn he was desperate to avoid.

  He stalked away from her tent before he did anything foolish.

  ‘What is it about this journey that has you so jumpy?’ asked Merrick when Braedan joined him by the fire.

  ‘I’m no different from normal,’ said Braedan as he stretched his fingers out to the warmth.

  Merrick snorted, but didn’t comment any further. Their usual camaraderie had been strained since Braedan had yelled at his friend for enjoying Aldith’s company. He didn’t regret it. Ellena must be kept safe at all costs.

  He hadn’t told Merrick that this mission was different from every other one he’d ever taken. That this time there was so much at stake. If he was successful then the last eight years of hard graft would finally be rewarded and he would be able to repair some of the damage that had been done to his family’s name and fortune by his father’s treasonous acts.

  He sat by the fire long after Merrick had turned in. The logs spat and hissed, turning black as images of his father teaching him to ride his first horse flickered through his mind. He hadn’t known it at the time, but that had been his last taste of sublime happiness.

  He hadn’t thought about the big, burly man who’d raised him in a long time. As a boy he’d idolised him, but just as he’d reached manhood everything had been destroyed. His father had been executed as a traitor and his lands and wealth stripped from the family he’d left behind.

  Braedan had taken his mother and two distraught younger sisters with him to the Earl of Ogmore. Braedan had done his knight’s training under Ogmore’s supervision, but even so it had been beyond humiliating to kneel before him and beg him to take in the three women.

  In return Braedan had sworn his allegiance to Ogmore and he’d been doing his bidding ever since, rising to be his chief of guards and earning himself the nickname The Beast because of the ruthless way he squashed Ogmore’s enemies and the way his face had been disfigured while doing so.

  Now, in return for years of service, Ogmore had promised him stewardship over Castle Swein so long as he safely returned the Earl’s widowed daughter to his care. Stewardship there would finally give him a certain status in the world, and allow him to build up enough wealth for his sisters’ dowries.

  Ellena had been refusing her father’s entreaties to return for nearly a year. Two emissaries had been sent and had failed to return with her. She was apparently every bit as skilled at manipulation and dissembling as her wily father.

  Ogmore’s patience had finally worn thin and he had dispatched Braedan to do the job.

  Braedan felt a stab of guilt every time he thought of how he had finally got her to agree to leave her precious castle. He had told her that she needed to negotiate her freedom to act as steward of the castle with her father directly, and that hiding in Castle Swein was the coward’s way out.

  He’d seen enough of her stubborn nature to know that she wouldn’t like to be branded a coward, and he’d been right. It didn’t sit right with him that he knew something she didn’t, but that castle meant more to him than simply another home. It meant the restoration of his family to their rightful place in the world and the safety and welfare of Katherine and Linota, his two sisters, who had been so badly damaged by their father’s actions, and who would never make good marriages if they were forced to continue living as they were currently.

  If that meant betraying the beautiful Lady Swein then so be it.

  The first watch returned to camp and he heard the second group of men fan out in the forest. He stood from his place by the fire and stretched. He ought to get some rest, as it would be his turn to stand sentry soon enough.

  It felt like only seconds later when he was awoken by shouting. He grabbed his sword and was running before he’d left the shelter of his tent.

  ‘What’s happening?’ he shouted to Merrick.

  ‘A warning’s been sounded. There are men approaching.’

  ‘Stay with the women,’ he commanded as he raced to the edge of their encampment.

  Behind him he could hear the panicked braying of the horses, and in front the sound of men engaged in sword fight.

  He dispatched his first opponent within seconds of joining the fight.

  He was on to the next one before the first had dropped to the floor.

  Soon the metallic smell of blood filled the air. The tip of another opponent’s sword had grazed his neck, but it was only a light cut and he soon had his vengeance by adding his body to the growing pile of their enemies.

  The fighting was intense, but they were gaining the upper hand, and before long he heard the welcome sound of his enemy retreating.

  ‘Make sure they’ve all gone,’ he barked to his men.

  He turned on his heel and raced back to their campsite, muttering a prayer that they’d done enough to keep Ellena safe.

  A watery sun was just beginning to peek through the trees when he burst back into the opening.

  Merrick stepped forward to greet him. ‘Is it all over?’

  ‘For now,’ said Braedan.
‘Are the women safe?’

  ‘Yes, but I’m afraid—’

  Braedan didn’t wait for him to finish that sentence. He pushed past him and rounded the corner of the tent.

  There he found Ellena kneeling in the mud. Eluard’s head was resting in her lap and even from this distance he could tell that the boy was badly injured.

  She lifted a tear-stained face to his and his gut wrenched at her expression.

  ‘He shouldn’t have been fighting but he insisted—’ Her voice broke as she bent over the boy. ‘Why would someone hurt a young man just to get to me? Couldn’t they see he was little more than a child?’

  Braedan crouched down next to her. Her whole body was shaking and he resisted the urge to pull her into his arms.

  ‘Will you take him to my tent?’ she asked, turning her pale face to his.

  He opened his mouth to protest—it wasn’t appropriate for her to have a man in her tent, even a young one—but she forestalled him with a soft, ‘Please,’ and he found himself nodding instead.

  He lifted Eluard, who moaned softly but didn’t wake, and carried him to the bundle of blankets she’d been using to sleep on. Eluard weighed virtually nothing, and he cursed himself for bringing the lad on this mission.

  He gently settled the boy on her makeshift bed. Over the coppery smell of the boy’s blood he could sense Ellena’s delicate fragrance in the air, the soft scent of lavender and something else he couldn’t identify but which he thought of as uniquely her.

  Staying this close to her was dangerous. Being alone with her was too much of a temptation.

  ‘I’ll send Aldith in,’ he said to her, before striding out of the tent and away from the enforced intimacy.

  * * *

  Ellena had cared for her sick husband for nearly four years as illness had gradually taken his life. She’d seen everything the human body had to offer and had quickly got over any squeamishness.