BOUNDLESS: A Medieval Romance (AGE OF CONQUEST Book 6)

by Tamara Leigh

  “Your brother was victorious.”

  He breathed out relief.

  “But before he could put finish to Campagnon, one of the knave’s men attacked him. Though Dougray bled out that one’s life, it gave Campagnon time to recover. I cannot know if your brother would have himself recovered in time to preserve his life, but I think it possible.”

  Theriot frowned. “What say you?”

  “Baron Roche took no chance on losing his only child. Much to William’s displeasure, he slew Campagnon.”

  The love of a father—rather, fathers, Theriot amended. Though Dougray had wrestled with his illegitimacy despite acceptance by their mother’s husband, good had come of it. “What of the king, Marguerite?”

  “He allowed your brother to wed Em.”

  Theriot nearly smiled. His three brothers had taken Saxon wives as it was possible he would have done one day if not for… He shifted his jaw. “And Michel Roche?”

  “William pardoned him.”

  Theriot nodded. “How is it Dougray’s sire was the one who provided you an escort to Dunfermline—and not for many months thereafter?”

  He heard her draw breath. “Feelings had grown between us. Though still I wished to return home, when he offered the position of keeper of his household so we might determine the way forward, I agreed.”

  Though Theriot told himself he had no cause for jealousy, he felt it.

  “Not only did I wish to discover if what we felt could be more than attraction, but Stavestone was nearer Scotland. However, hardly had we returned than the harrying began, making it unsafe to travel north and providing more time for us to become better acquainted.” She replenished her breath. “Though my attraction for him grew and kisses were exchanged, I did not feel love as he was moving toward. Not wishing to break again a heart first broken by your mother, I revealed my truth to him.”

  “His response?”

  “He was understanding and promised to return me to Scotland once the harrying was done. He kept his word, ensuring my safety by including among my escort a Norman long in England the same as he—Stephen, the one you slew.”

  “The night Edgar fled through the village.” Unable to keep anger from his voice, Theriot lowered his lids, shook his head. “Had I not sent the contingent after him—”

  “You could not know he would risk harming his people, Theriot. As for Stephen, Edgar and I are more responsible for his death than you who but defended your life, just as we would be responsible for your death if…”

  Theriot understood. “The Aetheling would have left me to the villagers who would have killed me for being a Norman. It is good you recognized me.”

  “I am glad you think it so.”

  She was remembering what Hendrie had wrought. “If my sight does not recover, I do not know how I shall live without it, but I am thankful I yet breathe.”

  “As am I.”

  He hesitated to return to what she felt for him, but perhaps as much for him as for her, reminded himself what was cruel now would be kind later. “Malcolm believes you are in love with me.”

  Abruptly, she stood. “What needed telling is told. Now this half-Norman lady who would fare better to look to another for a husband has other matters to attend to.”

  Then she had been present when Malcolm pried at Theriot’s feelings.

  She was at the door before he overtook her with speed that could have shamed him were he not well-acquainted with the hut—and that he stayed ahead of the hound who followed. Closing a hand over Marguerite’s shoulder, he turned her and set her against the door.

  “Release me,” she said above the whine of the dog uncertain as to whom it should side with.

  Theriot wanted to restate it was impossible to feel greatly for her and let that be the end of this, but he could not.

  Lord, he sent heavenward, surely I ought to be able to choose whom I love.

  “Release me,” she repeated.

  Peering into her nearly featureless face, he said, “You were on the wall when Malcolm and I returned to the bailey. You overheard our conversation.”

  Breath expanded her chest against his. “I did and was horrified my king suggested I love you.”

  “Then you do not?”

  “I…wish I did not.” That answer was enough, those words and her tone making it sound as if her heart was breaking as she had feared breaking Michel Roche’s.

  “Certes, you ought not.”

  “This I know, that you could never—” She gasped when the hand he had pressed to the door filled its palm and fingers with the curve of her face. “What do you, Theriot?”

  Sensing an easing of tension about Dubh, he said, “I wish to know how well I saw the face beneath the hood that night in the wood. Will you allow it?”

  “If…you will not regret it.”

  He would, but he slid his thumb atop the smooth skin of her heated cheek, then to the outer corner of her eye. When she lowered her lids, he discovered the lashes were very long and fine and great their reach.

  “Your eyes are larger than glimpsed the night I assisted you into the saddle. What color are they?”

  “Green,” she whispered.

  “The same shade as mine?”

  “I…”

  Her apprehension a reminder the damage was not only to his vision but the appearance of eyes over which clouds gathered, he said, “You have met my brother, Guarin.”

  “I have, and great your resemblance to each other.”

  “The green of my eyes is darker than his.”

  “Then I believe yours and mine are a good match.”

  Throat tightening, he traced the lines of her nose. “This fits what I recall,” he murmured, then moved to her mouth with which he was most familiar both by what was seen in the night and felt beneath his own. He traced the dip between the arches, followed the curve to one corner, and continued down and around her lower lip.

  “It is fuller than thought,” he said, then intensely aware his breathing matched hers, moved to her chin. “Some stubborn here, Marguerite of Dunfermline.”

  “You do not sound surprised.”

  He was not, nor by the longing to kiss her again—and thoroughly. He knew he should end this, but it was as if he was bound to her as once he had been to the posts of the bed.

  He slid his fingers up the side of her face and over her eyebrows. “There is more to them than seen, and your brow is very smooth—except for this.” He traced something near her hairline. “A scar.”

  Marguerite suppressed a shudder. Before Theriot, she had not believed her skin so sensitive. To a feathering touch—aye—but not one so perceptible. “Is it a scar?” she whispered, then fingers brushing his, explored it. “As I do not recall its getting, I must have been quite young.”

  “It does not compare to those on my face,” he said.

  Which numbered four as seen when she tended him whilst he was unconscious. Despite the shadow now between them, enough light tumbled through the window to allow her to study his visage. “Still, yours are not unsightly. Do you remember how they were got?”

  “I remember.”

  When she set a finger on his jaw, he jerked. Finding a ridge beneath the many silvered whiskers of his beard, she followed its course past the dimple to his ear. “This one?” she asked.

  “The slash of a dagger. I was ten and eight—yet a squire—when I stole to a tavern and challenged a chevalier for the attentions of a serving woman. He prevailed and afterward bought me a tankard of ale.” A smile flitted across his mouth. “I thought it fair compensation—until I had to explain to my sire and uncle how I came by that cut.”

  “Was your punishment harsh?”

  “It was, but not so much I did not repeat that adventure.”

  “You were rebellious,” Marguerite said and thought how strange they conversed of such things standing in an attitude more appropriate for kissing—as if both knew they should distance themselves but could not.

  “My uncle, Hugh, wou
ld agree since it was his wrath I most often stirred. Though his instruction shaped me into a warrior, and I am grateful for what it cost him in time and patience, it was not possible to like him for more than hours at a time.”

  “Why?”

  “He was a hard man. Beyond his training, the only thing to recommend him was the great care he had for my sire. If he loved his wife and son, it was barely evident, and he left none in doubt of his dislike of my half-brother.”

  “He did not train Dougray?”

  “He trained him—for my sire who insisted on giving his wife’s son their surname.”

  Marguerite moved her finger to a ragged-edged scar near his left temple. “This one?”

  “A rock thrown by the brother of a boy I knocked senseless when he besmirched my mother’s reputation.”

  “How so?”

  A muscle in his jaw convulsed. “The least of what he named her was wanton.”

  “Then that was the least of what he deserved.” She touched the crescent-shaped scar bracketing his right eye. “This one?”

  “A hawk won in a game of dice when I was twenty. I should not have unhooded the bird amid the revelry of drunken men. It is good its vicious beak did not…”

  His words trailed off, and Marguerite was certain he had nearly expressed gratitude the hawk had not taken his eye. “I am sorry,” she said what could not be said enough.

  Now he would draw away, as told by the narrowing of clouded eyes and the curve gone from his lips, but he rasped, “Marguerite.” Then his fingers were in her hair—pushing deep, pressing against her scalp, tilting her face toward his.

  She could have pushed him away, but she could no more resist this than could he whose resolve ought to be stronger than hers.

  Pray, Lord, not only attraction, she silently beseeched as his head descended. Despite what he has lost, let him feel more for me than desire. Let him stay in my Scotland. Let it become our Scotland. Much more I could love him if he would let me.

  “Theriot,” she whispered.

  As if that was the permission he awaited, he covered her mouth with his. It began as a gentle kiss, but when he angled his head, it became more.

  The first time they had shared this intimacy, she had believed it could not be done better. She had been wrong. Determined to quench her own thirst lest this end too soon, she wrapped her arms around his neck.

  He groaned, drew his hands from her hair, and cupped her face.

  Marguerite heard their breathing, indistinguishable one from the other until he moved his lips to her cheek, then her ear.

  Clearly, she heard her breath.

  Clearly, she heard his.

  Distantly, she heard herself say, “Stay, Theriot.”

  Distantly, she heard him say, “Your face is mostly as remembered.”

  Those words in her ear making her shiver, she turned her mouth toward his, but he released her and stepped back.

  Why? she wondered. Because he fears it could become more than a kiss?

  “Regardless of whether my vision returns, this is all there is for us,” he said.

  She raised her lids. “I do not understand.”

  “I am attracted to you, even moved to affection, but it is not love as you profess to feel. Thus, just as you did not wish to break Michel’s heart, I would not break yours.”

  Too late, she thought. Hating the weak of her knees, she straightened from the door. “Is this revenge?”

  His gaze flickered. “It is kindness clothed in cruelty. Like Michel, you want what you ought not, and better this is done now than later.”

  “Of course it is,” she breathed.

  As she turned to the door, Dubh rose and looked between her and Theriot. The hound did not like what was felt between them and likely questioned her place that must seem less assured than moments earlier.

  “Stay,” Marguerite commanded and slipped outside. “Now I go home,” she whispered and went in search of Malcolm.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  It had been the right thing to do—and for both, as evidenced by his reluctance to reject Marguerite’s feelings when he followed her to the door, his willingness to acquaint her with his past, and another kiss.

  Now with his back pressed to the floor, hands clasped behind his neck, Theriot eased burning abdominal muscles on a long exhale.

  Once more, Dubh growled where she sat beside the door from which she had not moved since Marguerite’s departure. As if displeased with what was told her mistress, she refused to draw near.

  “Oui, I lied,” Theriot rasped. The thought of becoming a burden to the woman whose heart sought to hold his was weighty, but it would be unbearable if frustration and anger at being unable to be a man in full, providing for and protecting her, caused him to break her heart in ways worse than denying he returned her love.

  “It is a lie, but for the best. When I depart, sooner she will let go of what she should not have taken hold of.”

  As I shall let go of her, he assured himself. But when he closed his eyes, an itch at his temple drew a hand to the scar whose getting he had not fully explained to Marguerite. The youth who had spoken against his mother had done more than name her wanton. He had called her a harlot.

  Those privy to the love of Theriot’s parents had marveled over the depth of their devotion, not only because of that act of indiscretion but loss of the use of Godfroi’s legs in battle that should have made it impossible for their relationship to be more than one in which they tolerated each other.

  More impossible than your own debility? he questioned. More impossible than Marguerite being responsible for it?

  “How was it possible, sire?” he breathed.

  Three, my son, Godfroi answered from afar. Only three needed to make it possible—God, your mother, and me.

  Before he could further ponder that, Dubh thrust upright and began barking.

  Her agitation of a strength that reminded Theriot of when the Aetheling sent Saxons here, he rebuked himself for so deeply delving his thoughts he was not the first to sense someone’s approach. However, as he crossed the hut with the dagger in hand, he perceived what the hound did not—the one outside exuded no aggression.

  A second knock sounded. “It is Prince Edgar.”

  Then further Dubh bettered him, sensing aggression he did not.

  Theriot tossed open the door.

  Surely seeing the D’Argent dagger, the Aetheling lurched back. “I come alone.”

  “For what?”

  “As you are aware, King Malcolm believed a prayer vigil with my sister would be of benefit.”

  Angered he could not read a face that might reveal aggression the young man still did not exude, Theriot said, “And?”

  “I come to ask for forgiveness of my trespasses.”

  “By order of the princess?”

  Hesitation, then, “We draw attention. May I enter?”

  “Armed?”

  “Well…you are armed.”

  “I have cause to be.”

  The prince grunted. “As I am persuaded you are a Norman of integrity, I shall leave my weapons outside.”

  His discomfort was felt—and fear—but that was all. Determined not to lower his guard, Theriot said, “You may keep them on your person.”

  The rasp of a buckle went silent and Edgar entered.

  Theriot closed the door. Pleased the prince halted amid the light come through the window, rendering his figure exceedingly visible though his tunic and mantle lost much of their color, he said, “Your sister ordered you to seek my forgiveness.”

  “She did not. Though she encouraged me to make it right with you, prayer brings me here. Whilst on my knees—Almighty, hers must be bruised!—over and again I beseeched the Lord to calm the storm and guide me to the shore.” He pivoted, immediately came back around. “It remains distant, but I know I have wronged you. What you do not know is how much I have been—” He groaned. “Nay, I will not make excuses for my behavior.”

  Admirable if
he remained true to himself, Theriot thought.

  “Not that I need to, the indignity and losses I have suffered at the hands of Normans are surely obvious to all.”

  Theriot waited.

  “In asking for your forgiveness, I give my word I will not unjustly pursue recompense from you. What say you?”

  His trespasses too recent, Theriot was not of a mind to agree, but as the Aetheling sounded sincere, he said, “If that is truly in your heart, I shall begin moving toward forgiveness.”

  “Moving?” Edgar clipped.

  “That is honesty, Prince, which is all I will give you.”

  The young man shifted his stance. “’Tis enough, though I hope for more in future.”

  “As do I. Now I thank you for coming and—”

  “There is something else I would discuss. Ere prayer last eve, I spoke briefly with Lady Marguerite about what happened in the stable.”

  Theriot wished the mere speaking of her name did not cause his chest to constrict.

  “She said better a friend made of you than an enemy.”

  “We are far from friendship,” Theriot growled.

  “This I know, but… As you have a care for my sisters, mayhap for their sakes you will give aid in better protecting them.”

  Theriot frowned. “How am I to do that?”

  “As I think you know, I came late to warring. Had I received Wulfrith training or that of the D’Argents—”

  “Edgar, if you suggest I train you, you are as unseeing as I—and forgetful. This injury was dealt me because you led a Norman contingent through a Saxon village.”

  “Which would not have happened had you not set them after me!”

  “This I know, and that I am also responsible for what happened to the homes of those people—your people.”

  Edgar muttered something, then said, “As told, I came late to warring.”

  It being useless to point out that consideration of the welfare of one’s people was not learned in a training yard, Theriot said, “I cannot aid you.”

  “Not in traditional warring, but what you did in the stable…”

  Stealth training, just as Malcolm wished for his warriors. Though Theriot had been tempted to agree so his efforts might give one whom he increasingly admired a better chance of keeping his country from being devoured by William once he finished digesting England, his oath forbade him then. And now.