Pride dissolved into despair. All this might have been his save for Aymer's need to futter everything in skirts. Aymer's unborn heir was nothing less than God's retribution on him for daring to dream of owning this place. From the moment of Aymer’s death, the desire to make Freyne his had become no less important than his need to breathe. This torment would be his penance for aiding in one nephew's death in order to guarantee the other's demise.
His eyes narrowed in refusal. He wouldn’t let it go now. Why should he be denied wife and home? He'd worked like a peasant to make Freyne what it was. If Lady Elyssa and her babe must die to make way for him, then die they would.
Deep within his mind came a tiny, snaking voice, hinting that murder was not necessary. His brother's wife had begged for a miscarriage. If she wished to be rid of Aymer's babe, he had the means. The village midwife kept his brother's whores supplied with a concoction that could cleanse a mother's womb. Although it wasn't always successful, it worked more often than not. Now all he needed was the means to get the potion to his sister-by-marriage.
Caught in this evil thought, he descended the stairs and started along the downward path toward the bailey. As he reached the drawbridge crossing the inner ditch, a woman appeared from around the hall's corner. She hurried toward the stables, her cloak flying wide in the wind to reveal blue skirts.
Clare.
His spirits ebbed to an even deeper low. It wasn’t enough to hold Freyne; he wanted this woman, his own lady, at his side. Another hopeless dream. This was the day his love departed Freyne, no doubt never to return.
The need to touch her at least once more before he saw her nevermore spurred him. Reginald raced heedlessly across the drawbridge and into the bailey. "Lady Clare!"
She turned and came toward him, her every step grace in motion. Beneath the shadow of her cloak's hood, her face was delicate and fine. Pleasure woke in him at the gleam of her vibrant smile.
"Why Sir Reginald, you are just the man I needed to find," she said. Her voice was sweet, her tones all femininity, unlike her cousin's abrupt, almost masculine manner.
"Am I?" Within him, his heart sang, daring to hope that she'd sought him out for love's sake. "What is it that you would have from me, my lady?"
She took another step toward him. Reginald half-reached out with his free hand, ready to pull her into his embrace. His heart leapt in his chest.
"Lady Elyssa insists on riding with the sheriff. We'll be needing two gentle palfreys. Also she would take her bed with her into Crosswell. Could you send it after us as it best suits you? You'll probably wish to use the cart that brought us here from Nalder."
His hopes crashed to earth as his empty hand fell to his side. He was nothing but a casual acquaintance to her. "That I can do, my lady," he said with a brusque nod. He waited for her to turn and leave him. Instead, she held her place, her gaze yet clinging to his face.
"My thanks." This was but a fairy breath as she watched him, brown eyes bright. Her cheeks, already pink from the chill, grew to a deeper rose. At her continuing stare a new warmth filled him, flowing across his skin.
"Is there aught else I might do for you, my lady?" His question was husky against his growing need.
She blinked as if startled by his words, and her smile died. "Nay," she said, all life gone from her voice as she turned as if to return to the hall.
Reginald caught back a cry of pain. She was going, and he'd never see her again. Before he could stop himself, he reached out and took hold of her elbow to draw her back to him. "Stay a moment," he begged quietly.
Although she made no attempt to break free of his grasp, when she raised her face there was a bitter cast to her mouth. "To what purpose?" The ache in her words spoke of the same longing he knew within himself.
Reginald sighed in pleasure mixed with pain. He risked both pride and heart on his next words. "Because I wish to look upon you. Your beauty ever leaves me breathless."
The color grew in her cheeks, but she did not chide him for his forward response. Instead, she laid her hand on his forearm. "I am an old woman," she whispered, "beyond my fortieth year. There is no beauty left in this worn face."
A smile crept across Reginald's lips. "You are not old to a man reaching for his fiftieth year. And, even in my dotage, I know beauty when I see it."
"I will call you blind, old man," she teased gently.
Reginald's smile deepened. "Will you linger to speak with me?"
Her blush was fierce, lending her a girlish glow. "I would like that very much."
Her reaction answered the boyish pounding of his own heart. "Then come you out of the wind, Lady Clare."
He led her around the corner of a shed, then threw open the door. It was filled with odds and ends, unfinished wheels, casks of tar, pieces of wood for creating new sheds and such. Although the interior was no warmer than the air outside, the thin walls protected them from the wind's biting edge. Clare hesitated at the door.
"We shouldn't be alone," she said with a sudden quiver in her voice. In her eyes lived a virgin's fright.
The thought that she might yet be pure, untouched by any other man, made Reginald's pulse leap. "You have no reason to fear me or my motives, not when you own my heart. What I want from you can only be had after we've spoken vows before a priest." He stepped into the shed, setting his book upon a barrel top and leaving the door ajar.
Her eyes widened in surprise then joy shone in her face, her smile wild with happiness. "You would ask me to wed? In all my life, I never expected to hear these words." Buoyed by his revelation, trust washed across her fine features. She stepped boldly into the small building's darkened interior.
When he came to stand before Clare, he took her hands in his. Like everything else about her, her fingers were fine and delicate, but cold as ice. He enclosed them in his grasp, hoping to warm them a bit.
"My thanks," she said, her teeth rattling. "It has grown fearsome cold this day. I cannot say I look forward to riding in it."
"Your departure will leave my life cold and dead." He sighed against his future pain.
A glorious smile curved her lips. "This affection of yours for me is no less than a miracle. For all the times we conversed about the weather, the betrothal, and other such nonsense, there showed no clue to this on your face. Here I was chiding myself for a fool to let my heart fix on you, when it seemed more likely you disapproved of me as did my sisters' husbands. I am but an extra mouth to feed."
Reginald frowned at her lack of self-worth. " Never say that," he told her in a ferocious whisper. "If your cousin tells you such lies, I despise her for it. Would that I could protect you from her and the way she treats you as her servant when you are her equal. Look how she makes you carry her messages."
"You are wrong," she whispered shyly. "She cares for me, treating me far better than my own kin did. Do you know she has offered to settle some small worth on me, so I will not come to you a pauper?" Longing for him again woke in her expression, and she freed her hands to brace them against his chest. "Would that we could wed on the morrow, for then there'd be no need for us to part," she cried softly.
Joy exploded from Reginald in a deep laugh. He caught her face in his hands and touched his mouth to hers. Her lips softened beneath his. Although he warned himself to be gentle, the passion he carried for her would not be denied. His mouth took hers with all the heat he knew for her. Clare flattened herself against him, winding her arms around his neck as she answered his emotion with her own.
Need grew in him until he was giddy with it. He caught her at the waist, lifting her slightly to place her woman's softness against the part of him that would be one with her. She gasped at this, her breath of protest startling him back to his senses. Shaken, he stepped back from her, catching her hands in his as he moved.
"You wake a fire in me that I fear I cannot control." His voice broke under the weight of his need.
Fear tangled with pleasure in her expression then tears gleamed in her eyes. "N
ever have I felt like this. Over the years, men have pursued me seeking to steal with flattery and paltry gifts the one thing I hold most dear. I rejected them all, sometimes needing to drive them away with my screams when they refused to heed my nays. But here you are, retreating instead of pursuing me." She shook her head against the wonder of this.
"It’s a precious thing you offer me," Reginald said, his voice yet trembling against the power of the emotions she stirred in him. "I fear I have nothing of equal value to give you. Wed with me and you doom yourself to a lifestyle far less comfortable than the one you now know. We will be but servants to Freyne's lord."
"What care I for that when I would be with you?” she replied with a smile. Then her happiness dimmed. "Do you truly think the Church will let us wed? We are within four degrees of kinship. Lyssa says they'll not be concerned as I am past the age of bearing children."
He shook his head, a bit surprised that she had discussed so much with her cousin. "My life has been spent doing what is in the best interest of others. Now that the chance has come for me to take what I want, I'll not let a Churchman stop me. I’ll draft a petition. But, be you warned. If the Church refuses me, I will beg you to accept me with nothing more than a hand-fast between us."
Again, her smile burst forth, glorious in her affection. "If there are to be no children for us, what does it matter if we speak vows before a church or only before God himself? I will accept you. I cannot tell you how your love supports me. It’s like unto a shield, protecting me from Crosswell's evil." She shuddered and fell silent.
"Clare, love, do not take to heart what Lady Gradinton has spewed." Reginald drew her close, wrapping a protective arm around her. "I think me this is but another attempt on Gradinton's part to destroy a man he hates."
"Would that I could believe you." She buried her head against his shoulder, tucking her face into the curve of his throat. "Oh Reginald, I do not wish to go to Crosswell."
"Then stay with me," he offered.
"I cannot," Clare replied, a wishful tone to her voice. "Lyssa needs me. After her many kindnesses, I cannot abandon her to go alone to that horrid place."
Reginald caught his breath at the opportunity in her words. If Clare's cousin were not with child, there'd be no need to go to Crosswell. He opened his mouth to offer the potion only to catch back his words. It was Clare who'd intervened between Gradinton and Lady Freyne, seeking to protect the babe. Far better that he go slowly, probing for the right path rather than leaping blindly only to destroy what he most desired.
"Lay your blame for this trip upon my brother's head, for he is the one who once more set his seed into his wife," he said, his heart pounding in his throat as he sought again to murder his brother's get. Although guilt stabbed at him once again, it wasn’t nearly as deep as when he'd first begun to contemplate killing his brother’s children.
"True enough, but too late now. Ah well, I must find my strength in your assurances, for go to Crosswell I will." She freed a short, sweet laugh, her breath warm against his neck. "My job is to see my pigheaded cousin doesn't goad the sheriff into abusing her as she did Gradinton."
"So, how long will you be forced to stay at Crosswell?" For the potion to work, Lady Freyne must not be past her third month.
"In seven months time, that is, if she manages to carry the wee thing through her coming heartbreak." Clare eased back from him a step and shook her head in worry. "My Lyssa loves too deeply. When she finally admits she's lost Jocelyn, I must be at her side to see she doesn't lose this babe as well. Already, I worry that the seed hasn't set as firmly as it should. She is very ill."
If her words made it clear she longed for Lady Freyne's babe, Reginald's spirits took flight at her worry. The potion worked best when the babe was not well settled within the womb. But how could he make certain Lady Freyne drank the brew?
He drew Clare close once more, then stared into the shed's darkest corner. If she believed what she did was for her cousin's good, she would give it to her. The words he needed to win her compliance clung to his tongue's tip. It was wrong to use her this way; such trickery did not honor her love for him.
Aye, but if he became Freyne's lord, Clare would be its lady instead of a mere servant. Surely, this justified his intervention here. After all, it couldn’t be murder if the babe might have been miscarried anyway. Suddenly, he was grateful she couldn't see his face.
"Over these last years I have gained great respect for Freyne's midwife. She has many ways of strengthening a failing seed. If you'd like, I could see to it you have one of her concoctions, even before you leave here this day."
Clare pressed her lips to his jaw. "You are so kind. Thank you, I would like that very much."
Her words were bolts of guilt through his heart. "Then, you shall have it," he said. "Now, I must meet with the sheriff. Say me a fare-thee-well, holding in your heart my love and my belief that we will soon stand before a priest."
Even by the murky light in the shed, he could see the joyous glow in Clare's eyes. "Fare thee well, my love." She took a single step toward the door.
"And thee, as well, my love," he replied, his arms aching to hold her once more.
She paused then threw herself at him. Her arms caught him around the neck, and she showered kisses on his face. "I cannot go without speaking of my love for you, just once more. My heart is yours, my love, adoring as I do your kindness and care for me and mine." Her words were a heated whisper against his lips, then she turned and ran from the shed.
Reginald watched her go. He was right in what he did. Clare’s love for him was too fine to degrade by making her Freyne's servant. To offer her Freyne as a wedding gift was worth the risk of any sin.
"My lord, what would you have me say to her?"
The question, expressed by Crosswell's master-at-arms, was no less icy than the last frigid blast of wind. Before Geoffrey could answer, his big gray steed reacted to the nearness of the soldier's mount. The warhorse sidled and snorted, lifting his forelegs in threat.
"Cease, Passavant," Geoff suggested, knowing that to demand compliance from the strong-minded brute only ever led to war between them. Only a calm and steady hand kept Passavant on task.
Once the horse settled, Geoff turned his head to consider the gaunt knight who had served the sheriffs of Crosswell for more than a decade. Broad of face with a nose so beaked it nigh on bent his helmet's nasal, Sir Osbert's mouth was caught in a dour downturn, and his pale eyes glittered with dislike. Whether it was a distaste for his new sheriff or his present role as messenger, shuttling between nobleman and noblewomen, Geoffrey wasn’t certain. The men who filled Crosswell's garrison were either mercenaries, like Osbert, or soldiers drawn from local lords for the forty days of required military service landholders gave their king; they owed their sheriff neither love nor personal loyalty. No matter. All Geoffrey wanted from them was their obedience.
The newest sheriff of Crosswell gave his head a brief shake against the widow's request. "She cannot crave a stop so soon. We’ve hardly been in our saddles an hour yet." It was a flat remark.
"Her lady cousin says she’s very ill." Osbert's cold tones were as emotionless as his master's.
Geoff looked away from the man in frustration, the feeling persisting longer than most emotions did in him. Traveling with a breeding woman, and doing it when he was pressed for time, was utter idiocy as yesterday's ride had proven. Although they'd started out well after midday, he'd expected to do better than five miles before nightfall. He needed to be back at Crosswell, but the widow begged a halt every hour, claiming exhaustion and illness.
He rubbed at the sudden ache in his neck. There was no one to blame for this but himself. He’d known when he purchased this position that the past six years had seen three sheriffs come and go in this shire, each inflicting upon the position his own version of chaos. Now the Archbishop of Canterbury was demanding all England’s sheriffs bring their tax collections and backlogged legal actions up to date. In little less
than a month the itinerant justiciars would be at Crosswell to open court and hear cases. He wasn’t ready, and the widow wasn’t helping.
Looking up to ease the pinch, he watched another ferocious blast of wind hit the rolling line of treeless hills ahead of him. The sky's raging breath tore at the short grasses clinging to their crests. Pity woke in him for those tiny blades; he knew just how they felt. After surviving so many months in hell this woman was the final thing, the one detail, that would destroy him.
"My lord, what would you have me say to her?" came Osbert’s almost impatient prompt.
Irritation followed frustration, creating inner warmth where before there'd been nothing "Say?" he snapped. "Say to her that if she is half as delicate as she claims, she'd be dead by now, and I'd be free of her."
So unexpected an outburst sent Osbert's wan brows flying upward as his mouth moved oddly. "God's truth, my lord? You would have me tell her that?"
Geoffrey grimaced, surprised at the depth of his dislike for the lady when he truly knew her not at all. "Nay, best not, however much I chaff at her pretense of feminine frailty." He opened his mouth, meaning to tell Osbert they would not stop, when an entirely different set of words exploded from him in a heated breath. "By our Lord's cock, I pray this is no harbinger of the months to come, else I'll not survive her stay."
Osbert coughed several times then gave vent to a low rumbling chuckle. "If you permit, I shall add my prayers to yours, my lord."
That his irritation with the widow managed to tease a friendly comment from a man given to naught but harsh and icy glances set a wry twist to Geoffrey's mouth. A momentary sense of camaraderie woke in him. "My thanks for the offer, but what reason has God to listen to your prayers? Are you a holy man, Osbert?"
"As the pope himself, my lord sheriff," his master-at-arms replied with a cocksure lift of his brows.
The Seasons Series; Five Books for the Price of Three Page 104
