by Tamara Leigh
“I shall hold him.”
“Your son must needs be bathed, his palate rubbed with honey and—”
“Bring him to me!”
The old woman raised her eyebrows at Gabriel.
At his nod, she passed the babe to Lissant. “A moment only.”
As if the howling child were poured of the most fragile glass, Lissant bore him the scant distance to his mother. “Your son, my lady.” She eased the bundle into Juliana’s arms.
She stared, so still he was certain she had stopped breathing. Then she crooned, “Oh,” and touched the babe’s brow, nose, lips. As if her touch were enchanted, the infant quieted.
Juliana looked up. “Our son,” she said softly as if to a beloved husband. “Ours, Gabriel.”
He longed for that, but as well-formed and healthy as the babe was, it was unlikely. Still, he touched the tiny fist that rooted past the swaddling.
“My lady, you must bear down one last time.” The midwife gestured for Lissant to take the babe. “Your maid shall tend the child so he might return to your arms once the birthing is complete.”
Reluctantly, Juliana yielded the babe to Lissant.
It took more than the midwife’s one last time to expel the afterbirth, but finally it was done, and Juliana sank into sleep with the babe at her breast.
Gabriel sat beside her, captivated by the sight. How had he believed he could take a child from its mother? His son or not, they belonged together. And when Bernart came? Finally, he let himself go to that place he had turned from throughout Juliana’s labor. And was torn by it.
“You would hold your son, my lord?”
He looked to the midwife who had come to stand beside his chair, thought how unearthly she looked with torchlight flicking her sharp nose and chin, lighting her brittle gray hair. He had thought the same when she dressed his scored ribs a short while ago.
“He is done feeding and lies awake,” she prompted.
He considered the babe whose cheek was pressed to Juliana’s breast and found its blue gaze upon him. “How fares the lady?” he asked as he had done a dozen times since the delivery.
“Not as poorly as feared, but come dawn we will know better.” Then she added, “She is strong, my lord—will likely bear you more children.”
More…
She shifted her gaze to the babe. “He has the look of his mother—and you, methinks.”
Once more, Gabriel searched for himself in the child. The bit of hair he possessed was brown the same as Gabriel’s, though with glints of red amid the strands. But no other resemblance did Gabriel find. Nor to Bernart.
He looked around. The servants having withdrawn, Lissant was the only other occupant where she dozed before the brazier.
“The child was born early?” he asked the midwife.
Her eyes narrowed as if she carefully considered her answer. Doubtless, it was not the first time she had to reassure a father a newborn babe was of his loins. “Very possible. Though he is healthy and of a good weight and length, he is small to be born of a man your size.”
Bernart was not as tall or broad, meaning the babe might have been born on time. “If early, how many weeks?”
Her brow rippled like puddling rain. “I cannot say, my lord.”
“What if he had remained in the womb a fortnight or more?”
She pursed her lips, gruffly conceded, “He might not have passed. But your lady is small. Sending the babe early is oft God’s way of preserving mother and child.” She broke gaze with him. “Now hold your son, my lord.”
More likely Bernart’s son. That Gabriel’s recently confessed love for Juliana could not overcome. Such heartache, not only for his loss of the child, but the pain caused Juliana, Alaiz, and Blase.
“The child is content where he lies,” he said.
“You are certain?”
He looked at the infant, felt longing expand his chest. “I am not.”
The midwife leaned near and spoke so softly her old voice revealed a bit of the woman she must have been thirty years past. “All know it is good for a father to hold his child soon after birth—especially be it a son.”
But he was not Bernart. “I would wish it for him, but I fear it is not for me to do.”
Weariness settled deeper in her face. “As you will, my lord.” She hobbled toward the straw pallet the servants had placed near the hearth for her. “I pray you shall not regret it.”
Already he did. Since he had learned Juliana was with child he had believed the babe was his, and that belief had made him a father. He closed his eyes. He had wanted this child, not only to protect it from Bernart’s abuse but nearly as much as he wanted Juliana. Now there seemed naught that could hold either to him.
Though spent from labor, there was a radiance about Juliana that made him touch her cheek. This day she was changed. No longer was she simply a woman. She was a mother. Regardless whether she outlived her offspring, she would be a mother to the grave.
It was not so with fathers as Gabriel knew from his sire’s rejection of him nine years past. Lacking the certainty of parentage granted to women through the womb, it was easy for a man to deny a child, whether he was right in doing so.
Bitterness of old crept in, but before it settled, the babe snuffled.
Was he uncomfortable? Scared? Hungry? Should his mother be awakened? Nay, Juliana needed rest. What of the midwife? He looked over his shoulder.
The woman lay on the pallet with her back to him, shoulders gently rising and falling.
He fought the compulsion—and need—and would have fought longer and harder if not for the babe’s impatience that made it whimper more loudly.
Gabriel lifted the bundle from Juliana, eased it into the crook of his arm.
How strange it felt to hold him, to feel their bodies meet as if they were not one without the other. As if connected. Would that they were…
Juliana’s son blinked and mewled low.
What should he do? Walk him as he had seen mothers do when an infant turned fretful?
He crossed the room, crossed back.
Shortly, the babe’s whimpers became gurgles, but his contentment was nearly as loud as that of his discomfort.
“Hush now,” Gabriel rasped. “I am here, little one.” He stroked the babe’s tiny fist and found his finger grasped.
Then the child yawned, showing pink gums and tongue, closed his eyes, and tucked his chin.
Gabriel started back toward the bed. But he did not return the infant to Juliana’s arms. A few more times around the room, he told himself—just to be certain the babe was fully asleep.
The old woman on her pallet smiled. It was good for a father to hold his newborn son.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
A son indeed, and with an appetite she would not have expected of one who ought to be sickly. Though come early, the midwife said he was as healthy as if he had remained in the womb three weeks longer.
Juliana smiled over answered prayers, looked from the suckling babe to the chair Gabriel had filled throughout the birthing. It was empty as it had been each time she awakened this new day. Would he return or leave her summons unanswered as before? Now more than ever it was imperative he know the truth about Bernart.
“Lissant?”
The maid looked up from her needlework. “My lady?”
“Pray, go to Lord De Vere and tell him it is urgent I speak with him.”
“He said you are not to be alone, my lady.”
Unfortunately, the midwife had departed a half hour past to tend another birthing. “Then send the guard.”
“Word was delivered our lord hardly an hour past.” Lissant smiled reassuringly. “Worry not. He will come.”
Juliana was not so certain. Though he professed to love her—the words he had spoken inscribed on her heart—he likely regretted it. But Lissant was right. She must give him time, though only an hour more. If siege was coming to Mergot, Gabriel needed the keenest weapon possible.
She
considered Lissant who had returned to her needlework, probed, “The people of Mergot are busy these past days.”
“They are.” She continued to push and pull needle and thread.
“Do you think Lord De Vere can hold against a siege?”
Lissant stilled, slowly raised her gaze. “We pray he shall.”
Juliana wished she had not guessed correctly. “Who comes against your lord?”
“I know not his name, my lady, only that he crosses the channel to make war on Mergot.”
Bernart Kinthorpe was his name.
Juliana looked down at the one he meant to steal from Gabriel.
The babe suckled several minutes longer, then loosed her breast.
“Full, little one?” she whispered.
He blinked, startled over the door’s creak.
Juliana snapped up her chin.
Gabriel hesitated on the threshold, strode forward. “How fare you, Lady Juliana?”
Why did he no longer name her Mary in Lissant’s presence? Had he called her Juliana on the day past? Aye, when he had told the midwife to spare her over their child, revealing his feelings for her before speaking them.
“I am sore and tired.” She ventured a smile that was not returned. “The midwife says I should recover fully.”
He halted alongside the bed. “As she told me. The child continues to fare well?”
The child. Not our child. Though the midwife had revealed to Juliana that Gabriel had walked the babe last eve and held him long into the night, he thought the child’s early birth meant he was of Bernart. Once they were alone, she would set him aright by revealing what she had too long held close.
“Your son is hale and satisfied, my lord. You would hold him again?”
From the darkening of his face, he either did not like the child being named his, or he had not wished her to know he had held him. Or both.
But he lifted the babe and settled him against his chest. As he peered at their child, emotion struggled across his face, then his jaw softened and he drew a finger across the back of a little fist.
Relief eased Juliana into the pillows.
“Lissant,” Gabriel said.
The maid stood and hastened forward.
Gabriel turned to her. “Deliver the babe to the donjon.”
Juliana gasped. Regardless of his admission of love, did he intend to take their child from her now? Even though he might not believe he was its father?
“A cradle has been placed in Lady Juliana’s chamber,” Gabriel said as he passed the infant to the maid.
Juliana labored up from the pillows, grasped the hem of Gabriel’s tunic. “Pray, do not—”
“Go, Lissant,” he said.
The maid glanced apprehensively at Juliana, then crossed to the door.
A great hole opening in her, Juliana beseeched, “Do not take him from me, Gabriel! Not yet!”
He came back around. “You shall be together again shortly.”
She searched his face and found no lie there, only what seemed sorrow.
“If you are ready, I shall carry you to the donjon.”
“True?” she breathed.
“True.”
Silently thanking the Lord, she released his tunic and reached to him.
He shifted the bodice of her chemise over her partially exposed breast, and she wondered that she felt no embarrassment—as if she belonged to him. In her heart, she did.
He drew the coverlet up to her chin, then lifted her into his arms.
She caught her breath.
“I have hurt you?”
“Nay.” She drew in his scent she would recognize among a hundred—nay, a thousand—men. “I am tender, is all.”
His gaze drifted to her mouth, and she thought he would kiss her, but he averted his eyes and turned to the door.
Not until they ascended the steps of the donjon amid the soft flutter of snowflakes did she break the silence. “Now you call me Juliana in the presence of others.”
“I do.”
“Why not Mary?”
“You are no longer she.” He glanced at her. “You are Lady Juliana Kinthorpe…of Tremoral.”
Kinthorpe. Tremoral. Surely he did not mean to return her to her husband? And what of their son? “Gabriel, I must speak with you about Bernart.”
He carried her past the porter who held the door for them. “Of what is there to speak?”
“More than you can know.”
Eyes ahead, he strode the hall she had not looked upon for a month. Though still it was not grand, the repair to the hole in the far wall had been made and the blackened walls painted.
As Gabriel climbed the stairs, Juliana heard their son’s cries, to which her breasts responded with a sharp ache.
“Methinks he wishes his mother, my lady,” Lissant said when they entered the chamber.
“Or his father.” Juliana peered up at him.
Mouth tight, Gabriel stepped past the maid where she stood over the cradle and lowered Juliana to the bed.
“Bring me our son, Gabriel,” she said, then to Lissant, “I would speak with Lord De Vere in private.”
The maid hastened from the chamber.
Gabriel’s sigh was evidenced by the lowering of his shoulders, then he lifted the babe and passed the fitful bundle to her.
“There now, Gabriel’s son,” she sang and felt the air expand between her and the man she loved. The babe was slow to quiet, but at last he nestled against her breast.
Juliana looked up and found Gabriel’s gaze awaited hers. “Sit beside me.”
He widened his stance. “What have you to tell me, Lady Juliana?”
His purposeful use of her title furthered distancing him, she struggled for words, but all she could think to say was, “What shall we name him?”
His nostrils flared. “I do not think it is for me to do.”
Certes, he believed Bernart was the father. “Very well, I shall name him.” She kissed the babe’s brow. “In honor of your sire, you are Gabrien.”
Gabriel drew a sharp breath. “Should it not be Bernart?”
“Never could he be named such. He is not of Bernart.”
He strode to the shuttered window, strode back. “These past months you denied I fathered this child. Now that you are proven right, why do you claim otherwise? What game do you play?”
“May the Lord bear me out, I play no game, Gabriel. Had you come to me this past sennight, the sooner you would have known the truth I have to tell.”
“What truth is that?”
She drew a deep breath. “The night you brought me to the tower, you asked that I trust you—that I give you reason not to take our child from me.”
“I did. And you did not.”
“I do now. I should have then.” Drawing strength from the warm bundle pressed against her, she said, “Know you the story of Tamar of the Bible?”
A frown shifted the harsh lines of his face. “It is long since I heard it, but aye.”
“Then you are aware she disguised herself as a harlot to gain a child from a man who would not otherwise have lain with her—that she did it to continue her deceased husband’s bloodline.”
His lids narrowed. “What are you saying?”
“I liken what I did in coming to your bed to what Tamar did. But the greatest difference in our circumstances is that unlike her, it was not of my devising. I was without choice.” She moistened her lips. “Of my own will I did not come to you, Gabriel. It was the will of the one who so longed for evidence he could father a child and so hated the man he once called friend that he forced his virgin wife to steal a child from his enemy.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Gabriel felt as if slammed headfirst into a wall. Bernart had sent her to him? Inconceivable! To steal a child? Outrageous! Juliana untouched? Try though he had to forget his second night with her, the first was mostly forgotten as a result of too much drink. Still, there had been no blood on the sheets the following morn.
; “Such fantastic lies you weave,” he growled.
Tears sprang to her eyes, wet her lashes. “The morn after our first night, you suspected, did you not? Looked upon the sheets?” She must have seen the effect of her words, for she raised a staying hand. “The year before, I suffered a riding accident that yielded up proof of my virtue. You are the first and only man with whom I have been.”
Her rising voice causing the babe to whine, she returned her attention to him.
Though Gabriel longed to leave her to lies that made mockery of what he felt for her, he stood as stone while she soothed the child.
At last, she looked up. “He is yours, Gabriel. Ours.”
“Do you think me so fool to believe that in all the years you were wed to Bernart he left you untouched? Why would he—any man—who had you in his bed slake his thirst with others? With Nesta? More, why would he send to his enemy the one he so prized he kept a nearly impossible vow to remain true to her?”
When she spoke, he had to strain to hear her. “Just as Bernart had no knowledge of me these past years, neither had he knowledge of any woman. Though he wished you to believe he did, it is impossible for him.”
Gabriel stared at her, and as he turned her words around and around, something dimmed his soul, something he did not wish light cast upon.
“It happened at Acre when he was set upon after going over the wall.” Tears slipped to her cheeks. “The injury he sustained is seen in his limp. What he allows none to see is how truly ruinous the swing of that blade.”
Though light shone in the dim of Gabriel’s soul, he rumbled, “It cannot be,” and swung away.
A sob slipped from Juliana. “Such a handsome man he was. Think you he would willingly allow himself to deteriorate?”
“Enough, Juliana!”
“What I tell is true. Bernart was emasculated.”
Keeping his back to her, he squeezed his hands at his sides, longed for this to be her greatest lie. And yet…
He recalled his assessment of Bernart at Tremoral, that excess and lack of discipline rendered him barely recognizable. Next, Bernart’s insistence his old friend accept a chamber in the donjon that caused Gabriel to question what gain he sought. Then Bernart’s attempt to kill him during the tournament following that first night with Juliana. And what of that which Gabriel overheard in the garden between the sisters—Juliana’s assurance she had not suffered and did not suffer? Was it her loss of virtue to which she had referred?
