He tightened his arms around her softness curious, asked, “What’s not fair?”
“That you get to determine your own fate and I must remain safely tucked behind and wait for someone to come to me and deliver the news of my future.”
His lips curved and he nodded, acknowledging her point. “I suppose you are right, it is not fair, but I would not be able to concentrate on winning this battle for our futures if I had to concern myself with your safety while I was in the midst of it.”
He’d said, ‘our futures’, Elena realized breathlessly. As if they were one and the same. “You didn’t promise me,” she reminded him, suddenly realizing his earlier oversight.
“What did I fail to promise you?”
“You didn’t promise me you wouldn’t die and leave me alone.”
She made no effort to disguise her desperate longing in the glance she raised to his and when Michel’s strong arms tightened around her, drawing her closer, she gloried in the feel of his masculine strength and leaned against him as he lowered his mouth to claim hers. He didn’t coax her lips apart to allow him access, his tongue demanded and she gave, moaning softly in the back of her throat as the now familiar feelings swamped her. Familiar, yet not familiar. There was a new urgency in his kiss that had not been present before.
When his hand cupped the fullness of her breast, she whimpered against his lips and her head fell back to grant his lips uninhibited freedom to trail along her chin, down her throat, impatiently pushing aside the offending barrier of her gown and then dampening her chemise as his mouth closed over her breast through the thin material.
Elena never wanted the glorious feelings coursing through her to stop. She thought to tell him so, to demand he never let her go, never stop touching her in this intimate way, but she couldn’t catch her breath long enough for the words to form on her lips.
“Elena, love, we must stop.” Michel’s mouth blazed a trail across her heated flesh to whisper in her ear.
“No.” The single word of denial was all her scattered thoughts could summon in argument against his intent, and she felt his lips curve upward in a smile against the sensitive lobe of her ear. As if conceding the justness of her position, for a moment he allowed his lips to tease her flesh as he drew a deep breath against the side of her throat, then, with obvious reluctance, moved both hands to rest on her shoulders and set her away from him.
Michel stared down into the passion-glazed eyes she raised to his and wondered at his own recklessness. She was his ward. King Barnabas had placed his young niece in his care, and though it had been his predecessor’s wish he marry Elena, Michel had made no such commitment in his heart or in his mind to the maid. He had no right to awaken the passion for him he read in her innocent gaze if he did not intend to satisfy it. Since the only way he could rightfully do so was to marry her, he wondered at his insistence in seeking her out. For he did not fool himself into believing it was only Elena’s determination not to be parted from him that accounted for the attraction between them. She affected him as no woman ever had. Whether it was her youth or innocence, or her desperate need for a champion that tugged at his will, he did not know, he only knew he was beginning to regard her with a possessiveness that went beyond that of a guardian for his ward. It should have worried him. She was disrupting all of his carefully prepared plans for the future, none of which included marriage to a maid barely old enough to enter into such a sacred covenant, and one who regarded him with all the love in her pure heart shining from the depths of her eyes as they beheld him.
He realized he could barely recall all of his carefully prepared designs from his previous life and he was once again reminded of his predecessor’s warning, “Once you enter the city your heart will find its true home and you will never be free again.” Michel had dismissed Barnabas’ prediction as a fanciful longing on the dying king’s part for his successor to love his kingdom as he did, but no longer could he pretend there was no truth in it. Less and less did his thoughts dwell on a future beyond the rich and fertile lands of Calei. The restlessness that had haunted his spirit and led him to pursue a wanderer’s life, the only one of his brother’s so afflicted, no longer drove him as relentlessly as it once did.
His visions of the woman who would one day capture and hold sway over his heart the way his mother had bewitched his very rational, very straight-laced Saxon father were no longer fuzzy images of a lady who was at once a combination of his twin’s stunning beauty and bold spirit, and that of his younger sister’s deep and gentle femininity, but now, inexplicably, all of those half-formed dreams seemed more and more to be coalescing into the lovely features of the young maid who was regarding him now with fresh anxiety in her serious glance.
He should be furious at the inevitability of it all, the way fate seemed intent on leading him along on a path of its own choosing. He’d always been fiercely independent, disregarding the shackles of expectation and conformity with the same ferocity a determined bachelor avoided the bonds of matrimony. Yet here he stood with the claws of his destiny closing in around him, and the proverbial sword of Damocles hovering over his head and he felt no driving urge to evade the bonds of expectation he sensed from every angle binding his future to that of his grandfather’s kingdom.
He nodded in silent acknowledgment of Barnabas’ cunning, remembering his own careless dismissal of the king’s request that he at least commit to no other until he had met his niece. Now his memories of every other woman of his admittedly wide experience were slowly fading from his thoughts to be replaced by the pure virtue of the young innocent he was so reluctant to loose from his arms.
“Michel?” Elena whispered hesitantly at his long silence.
“Yes?” It amused him to hear the anxiety in her voice whenever she addressed him, as if she was afraid he was about to disappear into thin air.
“Have I displeased you?”
He could also admit Elena’s innocent eagerness to please him stroked his masculine ego in a way no other woman’s bold compliments had ever done. “No, Elena, you have not displeased me, but I have no right to take advantage of your innocence and my position as your guardian to force such intimacies upon you.”
She appeared both stunned and offended by his choice of words, but it was the very real anger he read in her glance that both surprised and intrigued him at the same time. She pushed away from his embrace and boldly faced him, “I am not the child you insist on seeing me as, nor am I some spineless twit without a mind of her own. I was willing to face my own death rather than allow Raulf to force his attentions on me and you insult me most grievously by implying that I would accede to yours by the simple virtue of my uncle having appointed you my guardian.”
He was so pleased by her show of spirit, Michel grinned into the furious gaze she was blistering him with. Elena stamped one foot in frustration at his obvious amusement and Michel only just managed to dodge the clenched fist she aimed at his grinning face. He laughed outright at her show of temper and clamped his hands over her arms. Entertained by her efforts to squirm away from his embrace, he drew her closer, showing her without words his superior strength and his intent to have his way.
When she stopped straining against him, but contented herself with expressing her outrage at his manhandling of her with the seething glance she regarded him with, he merely bent his head to brush his lips across hers and admonished her to be mindful of Baron Timothy’s instructions before abruptly releasing her and striding through the entrance of the tent with a wide smile curving his lips. He was beginning to think Elena had more in common with his twin than he previously realized; a thought that both pleased and alarmed him in equal measure.
Chapter Ten
Elena barely caught a glimpse of Michel the following morning as she was awakened shortly after dawn and hurried from the camp under an escort of Baron Timothy’s men. There was an air of anticipation riding along the chill air as they passed the soldiers hastily consuming their morning meal and preparing themselves for the
day ahead. Most of the soldiers sported wide smiles on their usually stoic and intimidating faces, as if a highly anticipated treat was about to be bestowed upon them. Elena was unable to reconcile their excitement and high spirits with what she knew the day might hold. Michel had warned her he could not take her along with him into what might very well prove to be a battle for control of the city. She supposed her fear of such an eventuality was what was responsible for the soldiers’ high moods.
As she rode from the camp, she cast a last glance over the gathered forces, wishing for just a single glimpse of the man who’d been a stranger to her short weeks ago, but who now held her heart and her every hope for the future in his grasp. She was denied her wish and was forced to content herself with sending up a silent prayer to her maker to watch over Michel and his men when they rode off to a potential war against Raulf’s followers. Once again she silently bemoaned the fate of women which required her to point her mount in the direction of safety rather than in the direction of the place she most wished to be…at the side of the man she loved.
Michel refused the armor Amele urged on him. “We are riding to a conference, not a war, my friend. If we arrive arrayed for battle, then we would only precipitate its advent.”
“No doubt, my king, but the failure to array ourselves for war is unlikely to prevent us from ending up in the middle of one. In such an event, the armor will provide you better protection against an enemy sword than the justness of your position.”
Michel grinned in response to his friend’s ironic observation and merely waved his squire from the tent. “Ah, my friend, I cannot imagine what enemy you speak of. Surely all of the noble families of Calei wish only for the rightful king to ascend to the throne of their homeland.”
Amele rolled his eyes at his continued obstinacy as Timothy entered the tent in the wake of Michel’s squire. “If only that were true, my king, I would not blanch at the sight of you riding with your person so exposed into the lion’s den.”
But Michel merely laughed off his companions’ concern. “Assemble the men. I will speak to them before we ride off to meet our common destinies.”
“As you wish, my king,” Timothy bowed in Michel’s direction and retreated from the tent to see his command carried out.
“Do you trust him?” Michel asked.
“Timothy?” Amele echoed astonished.
“Yes.”
Amele considered and admitted cautiously, “I do not know him well enough to make such a judgment. Gabriel trusts him and insists he is loyal to our cause. Frankly, I was relying on your easy acceptance of him to guide my own. Why? Does your heart trouble you in regards to Timothy’s fidelity?”
Michel shook his head. “No, but I sometimes wonder why it does not trouble me more. As you stated, neither of us know him well enough to have placed such trust in him and though I don’t dispute Gabriel’s greater familiarity with the baron and his aims, I do marvel at the ease with which he has insinuated himself among us.”
“You entrusted Lady Elena’s care to him,” Amele reminded him.
“Yes and my heart tells me she will be safe with him. He is old enough to be her father and I think counted Barnabas a true friend. I believe he can be trusted to do his best by her.”
“But not by you?” Amele countered stunned. He was obviously growing increasingly uneasy at the direction of their conversation. Baron Timothy was in their deepest confidence and was familiar with every detail of their strategy to claim the kingship for Michel.
“Do not fear, my friend. All will be well, but I think Baron Raulf is not the only contender we will be forced to defeat before Calei will be ours.”
“Of that I have no doubt,” Amele agreed, not without bitterness.
So it was clothed only in a fresh linen shirt and close-fitting breeches, with his sword riding low on his hip and a rich, violet, fur-lined cloak depicting his noble status with the royal family’s crest emblazoned in gold upon his breast, that Michel faced his mail-clad army, more than four decades in the making. The sun speared through the low hanging clouds, its rays striking the bright armor the soldiers wore and reflecting it back into the sky where its light was muffled by the clouds, preventing the guards on the parapet walls of the castle from seeing the evidence of their deadly intent.
Each of his soldiers wore a cloak similar to his, proclaiming their loyalty to their cause. They were lined up in three long columns in accordance with their assignments that day, and assembled in rows of six across at the head of each column, their mounts restless beneath them. It was an impressive sight, worthy of a king, and Michel felt a fire ignite in his breast at the knowledge this long awaited day was finally upon him, and upon them all.
His squire held Arden’s lead in his hand, the boy’s excitement and apprehension etched across his young face in equal measure. Michel gave him a reassuring smile, took the lead from his outstretched hand and gained Arden’s back in one fluid motion. A king for a king. The fanciful thought whispered through his mind and Arden shook out his mane, as if in agreement with his silent conclusion. Turning Arden to face his men, Michel signaled for silence and a hush immediately fell over the soldiers as they trained their eyes on him.
“Today is the day we have trained all of our lives for.” A large cheer rose from the ranks. Michel raised his voice to carry over the din of a thousand voices. “Today we remove the stain of dishonor and the blood of traitors from the throne of our homeland.” The men yelled even louder. “Today is the day we take back what is ours!!!”
Fury erupted over the mountains as with one voice the soldiers roared their purpose and clapped their swords against their shields, the din loud enough to shake the still sleeping foundations of the city. When the noise quieted, Michel added in a voice of deadly intent, “Our long vigil is at an end. The time for reaping our destiny is finally upon us. Let us make the most of it.”
The columns of soldiers fell silent as each man accepted the weight their young king laid upon them. They moved in silence through the mountain passes and met with no resistance from the seemingly non-existent outer defenses responsible for guarding Calei from marauders. Apparently those in temporary charge of seeing to the city’s defense had concluded the greater threat to the peace would come from within its heart, rather than prey upon them from outside the city’s intricate gates.
When the passes diverged, the three columns of mounted men diverged as well according to their respective purposes. Two columns would flank the city and hold their positions until the order was given to attack. Though it was his sincere hope that the transition of power would be accomplished peacefully, Michel was prepared to re-take his grandfather’s throne by force if necessary. The third column, with Michel at its head, included Barons Timothy and Paul as well as the core of their most experienced forces. Amele rode at Michel’s right as they passed through the gates, unchallenged by the astonished guards who could do no more than present their swords in a show of loyalty to the colors of the royal family that had never been so openly displayed in the course of their young lives.
As the noon hour approached and they took the main road through the center of the city towards the keep, Caleinians came out of their shops and their houses to view the spectacle of an army of mounted men bearing the royal colors and to see for themselves the handsome, young man who led them. Rather than cower in fear at the threat of impending war about to break apart the tenuous peace that still held sway over the grieving and anxious inhabitants, they cheered loudly the promise of the return of the true king hinted at by the livery of his men. Michel exchanged a surprised if somewhat amused glance with Amele at the warmth of the reception afforded them, thinking to himself an invading army had never been so fondly welcomed by the city it was intent on conquering.
Amele remarked over the cheers of the gathering crowd, “Did not King Barnabas predict the people’s hearts would awaken at the return of their true king?”
Michel acknowledged his point with a somewhat self-mocki
ng nod and Amele was seemingly unable to resist the urge to remind him, “I believe at the time you accused your predecessor of succumbing to the mystical nature of his kingdom.”
Michel refused to rise to his friend’s teasing, merely shaking his head and grinning in response. Then as the castle’s imposing entrance came into view, both men turned their attention to the more serious matters awaiting them. It was decided that only eight of their company would attend the gathering. Along with Michel and Amele, were Barons Timothy, Paul and Nicholas, all heads of noble Caleinian families, accompanied by their commanders.
The discordant conversations echoing among those already assembled for the meeting to decide Barnabas’ successor fell silent at their entrance and all turned the focus of their attention in their direction as soon as they entered. Michel took in the expressions of the men gathered in the grand hall, most of whose attention was focused squarely on him, the majority of which did not bother to hide their curiosity and/or disdain at the presumption of a stranger, dressed in the colors of the royal family, to insinuate himself amongst them at a meeting called for the exclusive attendance of Caleinian nobility to decide who would be king.
Michel knew they were aware of the speculation surrounding his identity, but he was in no hurry to confirm those speculations just yet. In his mind, and in the minds of his supporters, there was still some uncertainty as to the alliances of the remaining contenders for the throne and he wished to discover as much as possible before revealing himself. He was not surprised, however, when Raulf appointed himself the spokesman for the gathering he had not called and hailed their company in an arrogant voice.
“Barons Timothy, Paul and Nicholas you are welcome amongst us but as I have previously made clear this is not the time to have a stranger in our midst while we decide the important matters confronting the noble families of Calei and the future of this kingdom.”
It was Paul who responded to Raulf’s challenge. “We have brought no stranger to this gathering. This man is of Caleinian descent and he has proven his noble status to me and my companions.”
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