He carried no walking stick, but then Michaela remembered its destruction in his chamber. His boots were different today than the black ones she was used to seeing. These were slimmer, with a more pointed toe, although still more bulky than typical riding boots.
Her confusion deepened when Roderick Cherbon bent both knees and crouched before Leo. He seemed to wobble a bit, but balanced himself with little effort.
Michaela had never seen him do that—did not think his left leg was capable of it. Since coming to Cherbon, she had never seen it bent as it was now.
“Leo, I’ve a fancy for a ride this morn. Would you and Lady Michaela care to join me?”
Michaela heard Leo gasp and she thought for a moment he would choke on his tongue.
“Ee-oh wide on Papa’s hohse?”
Roderick nodded.
“Wif him papa?”
Roderick laughed. “Yes. Now run along and fetch a cloak of some sort. We’ll wait for you.”
The boy set off from the hall in a dead run, whooping with joy.
“Leo, do you need help?” Michaela called, but he was already gone, leaving her alone with Roderick.
He rose, slowly, carefully, but without a wobble. When he looked at her, his smile was gone, but still his eyes glowed like firelit gems. Michaela’s cheeks began to burn and so she dropped her gaze.
She heard his footsteps drawing near, and when his boots came into her line of sight, she had just enough time to notice how lessened his limp had become.
What in heaven’s name…?
Then he crouched again, this time before Michaela, and took her chin in his large, warm fingers. “Michaela,” he began quietly.
She jerked her face free from his grasp, aghast at the tears she felt welling in her eyes.
He did not take her chin again, but covered both her fisted hands in one large palm. “Michaela,” he said again. “I’m sorry.”
It didn’t even sound like Roderick Cherbon—not the words, not the tone of voice.
“You’re only apologizing because you think me to leave now. But I’m staying—I have no choice, do I? Your precious Cherbon is safe.”
His other hand joined his grip on her and he squeezed. “I’m not apologizing only because I hope you’ll not leave—although that is what I hope. I’m apologizing because I’ve treated you horribly, and I want to make amends. To you and to Leo. Won’t you help me, Michaela?”
“That’s all I’ve done, is try to help you!” She snatched her hands from him, unused to his kindness and not certain how to respond to him. The hurt she still felt was coming out as anger, but she clung to it, lest he switch back once more and smash her floundering hope. “All I’ve received for my efforts is punishment.”
Roderick rose up enough to perch on the bench next to Michaela and he sighed. “You were right. The things you said to me last night. The way I treated Leo in the past was in part due to the way my father treated me. I don’t want that for him. I want him to look back upon his childhood with fondness. To remember a father, and a mother”—at this, Michaela looked up at him—“who had only his happiness in mind. You and I, we can do that for him, can we not?”
Michaela knew she was staring like a ninny. She nodded faintly. “What’s happened to you?” she blurted.
Roderick gave her a boyish smile, but in his green eyes Michaela thought she might have seen a flash of something akin to fear. “I…I don’t quite know. Something, though. Is that all right?”
Michaela opened her mouth to speak—although what she would have said only God knows, because Leo came into the hall once more at a dead run, wearing one of Sir Hugh’s fancy, embroidered wool undershirts. The hem came to his ankles and the sleeves flapped about him like wings as he pumped his arms. It looked like a rather fancy gown.
“Ee-oh weddy, Papa!” He was not slowing as he raced toward Roderick, and Michaela felt a collision was imminent.
But at the last moment, Roderick stood, his arms out, and scooped the boy up midstride, swinging him away from the table in a circle. Leo’s hiccoughing laughter rang in the tall, dark hall like ghostly chimes.
“Well then, let’s be off!” Roderick announced gaily. He looked down at Michaela and smiled. “My lady?”
Michaela tried to return the smile for Leo’s sake, but all the while, her heart jarred her chest like hoofbeats on a packed winter road, her throat felt frozen tight with snow, and she was afraid.
That evening, soaking in a large, round copper tub before the hearth in her chamber, Michaela smiled at her earlier fear. How like her old self to be wary at a turn of good fortune in her life—there had been so few of them, she saw any change for the better as a bad omen.
Silly, silly girl.
She still had no earthly idea what had marked such a dramatic turnabout in Roderick Cherbon, but at this point she did not care one whit. The entire day had been a dream—riding through the country at Roderick’s side, an ecstatic Leo fronting his father’s saddle. The man had been busy with preparations beforehand, obviously, because the horses had stood ready at the stables, and Roderick’s saddlebag had been filled with provisions for their holiday over the land: skins of wine and milk; bread and cheese and a pudding; a whole, cooked chicken, which Roderick had quartered for them with a small dagger hidden in his right boot; heavy blankets to spread on the ground and guard them from the chilly damp.
They were away the whole of the day, riding and exploring, talking and laughing and taking time down from their mounts for Leo to run wild. Now Michaela’s body was feeling the effects from her long hours astride, but she relished each twinge as a souvenir from her and Roderick’s first day as a truly betrothed couple. She could not have been happier.
Roderick was off putting Leo in his bed for the night, with a promise to return to her after he’d had his own wash. Although Michaela was more than pleased with this change in the Lord of Cherbon, she hoped to finish her bath and don proper clothing before Roderick appeared—memories of their previous encounter in his chamber still haunted her, and she wanted nothing to ruin what was left of the day.
She had only finished rinsing the last film of soap from her when a soft rap fell on her door. Before she could call out a warning, the door opened and Roderick slipped through the slit of shadow beyond, closing himself quietly inside the room.
Michaela slid down in the tub, until the water touched her chin and the copper rim was her horizon. “It seems you’ve caught me unawares, my lord.” Her bare knees were poking from the water like stepping stones, but she could not pull them under. She lamented her earlier reckless splashing about.
He didn’t seem surprised in the least to find her in the bath. As a matter of fact, he crossed the room as if out of habit and sat at the small table before the hearth, his body comfortably sideways to her, and poured himself a chalice of wine. His hair was damp, long, combed back from his face and down his fresh shirt, leaving a long strip of wet between his shoulder blades.
He wore no cloak at all, and for the first time, Michaela saw that his shoulders really were that wide—it was not a trick of the black material he draped himself in.
His pants fit him snugly, his left leg still twisted, but oddly it seemed not as severe a malformation as she’d noticed before. His right leg was perfect in the close black material. He still wore the riding boots.
“Did you enjoy yourself today, Lady Michaela?” He took a sip of wine, admiring the snapping flames to his right, as if giving her time to become accustomed to his presence.
“Certainly,” Michaela said. “And I do believe it was the happiest day of Leo’s life.”
Roderick nodded thoughtfully. “He is not difficult to please, is he?”
“No.” The water was growing cool, but Michaela was unsure how to go about lighting from the tub. Would she be embarrassed if he turned to watch her?
Would she be disappointed if he didn’t?
She snaked an arm over the rim of the tub for the long length of linen folded on the s
tool, shook it to its full length in same moment as she stood from the tub with a fall of water.
“If you have no objections, I’d prefer for us to be married right away,” Roderick said, and she held the cloth before her just as he turned his head.
She stood there, unwilling to risk exposing her more private parts by stepping foot over the tub. A chill rushed up her back, both from the coolness of the chamber and his statement.
What had happened to this man after she’d left his chamber last night?
“I have no objections. I’ll send for my parents right away.”
Roderick turned back to the fire, as if sensing her need for a moment of privacy, and she hurried from the tub to don a wrapper as he continued to speak.
“I’ve already taken the liberty. Cope should be returned from his rounds in a day or so. We can be married in the chapel, as you requested, and celebrate the Yule Tide season as a family.”
Michaela knotted the belt of her wrapper, her stomach mimicking the motion at the mention of the fateful holiday that had haunted her since her earliest memory. Her continuing nightmares, too, did little to help, as they stayed with her in all the waking hours, vivid and terrifying, as if warning her. She paused a moment before retrieving the linen once more to address the locks of hair escaped from the knot atop her crown. She stepped her icy feet into her slippers and approached the man at the table, still rubbing at her neck and face with the towel.
When she stood near him, he turned to look up at her. His face seemed to be shadowed by worry, or perhaps it was only a trick of the flames beyond.
She had to know.
“My lord, about last night…”
“Sit down, Michaela. Please.” When she had sat, he continued, his green eyes pinned to her, never wavering. “I am a cripple,” he blurted without warning, and his tone was neither self-deprecating nor defensive. “And there are parts of my body which…which I’d rather you not see.”
Michaela frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“I know you don’t. My behavior last night…I forgot myself, to put it quite simply.” He shrugged and his gaze skimmed over her thin robe. “You are a very beautiful woman, Michaela. Sensual. Desirable. Giving you pleasure reminded me of my failings, and what I am incapable of as your husband.”
A thread of fear began to twist around Michaela’s throat, tiny and cutting. “What are you saying, Roderick?”
“I am saying that we will never make love.”
“What?” Of all the things Michaela feared he might say to her, this had been the very last she expected.
“We have Leo,” Roderick continued in a mild tone, ignoring her shock. “He is my heir, and you will be the only mother he ever remembers. I believe we can be happy that way.”
“This makes no sense, my lord,” Michaela stuttered. “In one breath, you tell me how desirable I am to you, and in the next you tell me you don’t want my body?”
“Oh, but I do want your body, very much,” Roderick said without apology. “But I would not expose you to—”
“You look quite fine to me,” Michaela interrupted. “And I myself heard you tell Harliss that there was nothing wrong with your…with your—you know.” She waved a hand toward his waist.
“That is true. But you cannot understand my…scars. My deformities. The sight of them would change me in your eyes, and I cannot allow that. We can pleasure each other in different ways, if you wish. Or, my offer still stands for you to take a lover.”
“If I—?” Michaela shook her head. “You think me to disparage you for your scars? When I think so little of the ones that are visible? You would deny me the full partnership of a marriage? My own children? You would share your wife’s body with another man?”
“I want you to be happy, Michaela,” Roderick said. “I want us to be happy. And the scars on my face and arm are but lovely decoration compared to what you do not see.”
Roderick had never hurt her like this. Not in all the harsh words he’d thrown at her since her arrival at Cherbon, not after the way he’d discarded her from his lap last night. To make her feel as though she were so shallow that she would refuse him because of his injuries—what kind of woman must he take her for?
“How can I marry you, knowing that I will never be your wife, in truth?” she asked incredulously. “Our marriage would be little more than a farce! If the king found out, you would lose Cherbon!”
“No,” Roderick argued. “No one need know what does or does not go on in our bedchamber.” He looked down at his left leg. “Mayhap one day…” He shrugged. “But I would that you not get your hopes up.”
“I don’t know what to say.” Michaela sat, staring at him, the linen cloth twisted in her fist on her lap. “I am greatly insulted by this.”
“I did not say what I have to insult you,” Roderick said lightly. “Because I enjoyed this day, as well. And would have many more like it. Can you not take this good part of me that has returned? Take it and let us both make the best of it?”
Michaela stood. “I don’t want only the good of you, Roderick. I want all of you.”
“I can not offer that. For both our sakes.”
She looked at him for a long moment, but could think of nothing more to say to him. Nothing that would perhaps convince him that what he was asking of her was of an impossible nature. “I need to be alone.”
Roderick stood, not even bracing a hand on the table for support. “I understand. I do hope you will consider it, Michaela. Would you like to go about again on the morrow? I’m sure Leo would enjoy it.”
“Yes. Yes, that will be fine, of course,” she said distractedly. She felt surreal, as if nothing made good sense any longer.
He nodded. “Good night.” Roderick crossed the floor with no noticeable limp at all now, and slipped from her room.
Beneath her robe, the metal link was cold against Michaela’s skin, and she felt hunted.
Chapter Twenty
Roderick felt better than he had in years; since before his arrival in Constantinople, since…ever, really. The cold winter sun shone prisms in his frosty breath over Leo’s—properly hooded, this time—head, and at his side sat Michaela on her own horse. She was singing them away from the castle wall, down the road that led toward the sea, and her voice was angelic.
She must have sung the song to the boy before, for Leo joined in sporadically. It was a lovely duet. Roderick was mesmerized.
Not a word had been breathed between him and Miss Fortune about their discussion of the previous night, but Roderick could see the faint purple streaks in the delicate hollows of her eyes, and could feel the distance she’d placed between them.
She would accept it. She must.
Because Roderick could feel himself improving. It was madness, he knew. Or magic, or devilish sorcery, mayhap. He didn’t understand it, and he didn’t care. A maddening idea had seized him that perhaps once day, his entire leg…
But he would not let his thoughts go there in the daylight. He still wore the old brown leather shoe on his right foot, under his own bulky riding boot. He’d not taken it off since first donning it, and he had no plans to.
Walter Fortune would never know the boot still existed, and to hell with his crazed ideas of the fabled Hunt. Nonsense. Impossible.
Isn’t what’s happening to you now impossible?
The shoe was Roderick’s now. It was in his home, had been meant for him to find, he was certain of it.
Miss Fortune finished the last chorus and Leo applauded enthusiastically.
“Here, here!” Roderick added. “Well done, Lady Michaela.”
She gave a dainty bow over her pommel. “You both are too kind.”
“Oh, no, your voice has no equal. I am certain of it,” Roderick argued. “I’ve traveled quite far, my lady, and I assure you it is exquisite.”
Leo nodded. “Aid-ee Mike-lah sing pity, Papa.”
“She most certainly does.” Roderick cupped the tiny head below his own chin with o
ne palm, rather amazed at how good it felt to carry the boy on his lap. “Where should we be off to, now, Leo? The shore?”
“Find nuts!” The boy pointed over the horse’s head to where the road twisted into the heart of the forest, and Roderick’s left foot itched madly.
As if she sensed his discomfort, Michaela turned a slight frown to him, her hand going mindlessly to her bosom. “There likely are none left, Leo. Perhaps—”
“Nuts!” Leo said again. “Pees? Ee-oh see skurls!”
Michaela was afraid of the wood, Roderick could tell, and the relentless sensation in his left boot warned him. But his right boot spurred him. There was no need to pander to such nonsense. It was his wood. A harmless tract of forest.
“Just for a little while, Leo,” Roderick said, hoping the confidence in his voice would put whatever worried Miss Fortune to rest. “And then it’s back to the keep for your lie-down, all right?”
“All wite, Papa.”
Roderick urged his mount forward with a smile for Michaela, entering the woodland road as if passing into a cave, even though the arching branches overhead were long bare. It was several moments before he heard the clop of Michaela’s mount following them.
A thousand eyes seemed to be watching Michaela, from every knot of wood, every black mound of soggy leaves. She could hear Leo’s carefree chattering to Roderick up ahead, see his short arm dart out from one side then the next of the large man, pointing at this or that with awe and excitement.
But traveling slowly, warily behind them, Michaela’s head swiveled at each creak of wood, each rustle in the underbrush, as if she was keeping watch over the males ahead, although what she was protecting them from, she did not know.
Her most recent nightmare bloomed fresh in her mind, more sounds than images: the pounding hooves again; screeches and screams; dogs baying at a hidden, malevolent moon; the growls of some hungry creature, searching for fresh, warm blood….
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