Blackheart

by Tamara Leigh

  Of course she did, just as she knew what was said of her—that she was barren or frigid. Servants talked, and what other conclusion was to be drawn from three years of marriage that had begotten naught but indifference between their lord and lady?

  Bernart's fingers dug into her shoulders. " 'Tis said my seed is bad. Worse, that you are without child because I prefer... men!"

  All the more reason for him to hate his brother. Not that Osbern dared flaunt what he was. He simply did not deny it. Thus Bernart thought to prove his lost manhood by asking this heinous thing of her.

  "I can withstand it no more." Tears quavered in his voice. "I beseech you, Juliana, give me a son."

  Not since their wedding night, following his return from the Holy Crusade, had his eyes shined so brightly. It was then he'd revealed the injury done him by the infidel, that she would be his wife in name only. Never to know his touch. Never to bear him children. Through her sorrow Juliana had told him it did not matter and tried to comfort him, but he'd rejected her. It did matter. To him. With each passing day, his bitterness had pushed them further and further apart. A sob catching in her throat, Juliana laid a hand alongside his face—so smooth, so hopelessly devoid of beard. "I am sorry, Bernart, but what you ask I cannot do."

  He squeezed his eyes closed. "Do you love me, Juliana?"

  She had loved him, had thought she would die if he did not return from the crusade. But then, she'd been barely thirteen when he had set off for the Holy Land, and he a man worthy and capable of love. No more. "You know 'tis so," she lied.

  A long moment passed. "Had I not been faithful to you before we wed, just as you asked of me, 'tis likely I would now have a son. True, a bastard, but a son."

  She dropped her hand to her side. "Mayhap you do have one." After all, it was only when she had come upon him trysting with a wench from her father's hall that she'd demanded his vow of celibacy—only months before he had left for the Crusade.

  "You think I have not searched?" Bernart demanded.

  Had he? "I... did not know."

  His nostrils flared. "For you, Juliana, I am denied a child made of my loins. And for what? I cannot even hold you."

  "That is your choice!"

  "I have no other."

  Nay, he did not. He couldn't stand to touch her when there was naught he could do to slake his desire. He clung to his side of the bed and she to hers.

  "Please," Juliana said, "let us speak no more of this. I know you are hurting—"

  "You know naught!" He shook her so hard her head snapped back. "I ask only that you give back some of what I have given you, and you deny me."

  She strained away, but he held tight. "Have I not been a good wife?" she cried. "I keep your household in order, your accounts—"

  "You think that is enough?"

  " 'Tis all I have to give."

  "Nay, you can give me a son."

  Her throat so tight she could hardly breathe, she shook her head.

  In his eyes she saw that he wished to strike her, but he thrust her from him. With higher-pitched curses that belied his earlier attempt to lower his voice, he knocked over her chair, swept the ledger from the table, sent the ink pot soaring. The latter missed the tapestry by inches and dashed its dark contents against the wall.

  "Juli... ana."

  The timid voice reminded Juliana she was not the only witness to Bernart's fury. Regretting that she had not sent her sister from the hall, she turned.

  Alaiz stood before the dais, hands clasped at her waist and bottom lip caught between her teeth as she peered at Juliana from beneath sweeping lashes.

  Fearing Alaiz might become an object of Bernart's wrath, Juliana hurried around the table and stepped from the dais. She laid an urgent hand to her sister's shoulder. Not surprisingly, Alaiz radiated heat and smoke. She always sat too near the fire.

  " 'Tis all right," Juliana spoke amid the din. "Go above-stairs."

  "B-Bernart... angry."

  "Not with you. Now go." Juliana gave her a nudge. "You will come... soon?"

  "Aye. Hurry along."

  With Alaiz's retreat, silence descended upon the hall. Fearing it, Juliana looked around.

  Bernart's gaze was fixed past her to where Alaiz mounted the stairs.

  What was he thinking? Embarrassed as he was by Alaiz, he quickly looked away anytime she fell under his regard. Now he followed her progress with something in his eyes that twisted Juliana's insides.

  "What of Alaiz?" he asked.

  Dear God. Though Alaiz had been schooled for the church and destined to one day take her place among the great abbesses, a fall from her horse a year ago had impaired her mind. The nobleman who'd bought wardship of Alaiz, their mother, and younger brother upon the death of Juliana's father six months earlier had refused to pay the enormous sum the church demanded to care for Alaiz. Thus, had Bernart not grudgingly agreed to allow her to live with them, she would have been turned out to wander the countryside. He had been more than generous, Juliana conceded, but must she pay for that generosity with so cruel a fouling of her body?

  Looking the predator in spite of his flaccid figure and limp, he traversed the dais and stepped down beside her. "When there was no one who wanted her, I allowed her into my home."

  Juliana lifted her chin. "She serves me well."

  His laughter was harsh. Mean. " 'Tis you who dresses her. A lady in waiting, indeed! She is an imbecile."

  Juliana gasped, swept a hand up to strike him.

  Bernart caught her wrist. "She is of no use to anyone. An embarrassment."

  Juliana began to tremble. "Do not speak so of her."

  " 'Tis the truth. For the love of you I took her in."

  She nearly laughed. Though she could have sought an annulment on the grounds that Bernart was incapable of consummating their marriage, for the love of him she had not done it. Only when he had refused to allow Alaiz to come to Tremoral two years later had she threatened to reveal his terrible secret. Thus he had agreed, but not for love of her, as he claimed.

  "Juliana?"

  She met his gaze. Now he was the one with power. "You are cruel," she said.

  "I am what you make me." He thrust his face near hers. "Give me a son. If not for me, then for Alaiz."

  As much as she wanted to cry at the injustice, she would not. "Truly you would send her away?"

  The man her child's heart had once loved flickered and died in his eyes. "I would."

  Could he do it? Not Bernart Kinthorpe who'd set out on that fateful Crusade six years ago, but the man he had become... Juliana drew herself to her full five feet, two inches. "I shall never forgive you for this."

  "You will do it?"

  "Have I another choice?"

  Relief dropped his rigid shoulders. "I thank you."

  She jerked her wrist out of his hold. "Whose seed will you plant in my belly?"

  He averted his gaze. "I have not decided."

  But he would, and soon. "And if this man whom you choose tells?"

  He skirted her. "Fear not; I will see to all."

  "Would you kill him?"

  He halted, was slow to answer. "Nay," he said, keeping his back to her.

  Did he lie? His eyes—she had to see them. She came around him, but he dropped his lids. Emotion was cleared from his eyes when he gave his gaze back to her.

  Juliana filled her chest with breath, took a step back. "Then if 'tis not by death he will hold your foul secret, how? You will pay him?"

  A muscle convulsed his jaw. "No payment will be necessary, for he will not know 'tis you who comes to him."

  "Not know...?" She shook her head. "Pray, how will you arrange that?"

  "Enough!" He backhanded the air between them, missing her by a breath. "There is naught more to be said."

  She was dismissed. "I shall pray for your soul," she said, and started for the stairs. She'd taken only a few steps when another question came hard to her. She swung around. "If he does not get me with child, what then?"


  Bernart's answer came without hesitation. "When is your next monthly flux?"

  He had thought of everything. Though she was tempted to lie so he would not know her time of fertility, she realized it would not turn him from this terrible course. God willing, it would take only once to sow a babe. "A fortnight hence," she begrudged.

  He nodded. "The seed will take."

  Nausea roiled, burned. "And if 'tis a daughter I birth, would you ask it of me again?"

  As if this were an eventuality he'd not considered, his eyes shifted and his brow doubled on itself. "I will not."

  Though it was a son he longed for, a daughter would as well prove his manhood. "I will have your word," Juliana said.

  "You have it."

  Now to put distance between herself and this man who'd once fed her foolish dreams of love. She turned away.

  Halfway across the hall, Bernart's voice reached to her. "Forgive me."

  She faltered, but ascended the stairs without a backward glance. She found Alaiz in the small chamber her sister occupied next to the lord's solar.

  Looking forlorn where she sat cross-legged on the bed, Alaiz glanced up as Juliana stepped inside. "Bernart is still angry?"

  Juliana lowered herself to the mattress edge. "No more." He had what he wanted. He ought to be pleased.

  "He does not..." Alaiz looked to her clasped hands. "He does not Hike me."

  Though Juliana hated lying, she put an arm around Alaiz. "Of course he likes you."

  Alaiz looked up. "Nay."

  Juliana was struck by the lucidity reflected in her sister's eyes. It reminded her of that which, prior to her marriage to Bernart, had shone from Alaiz when she'd disdained her older sister's eagerly embraced notion of long-suffering love. For perhaps the hundredth time, Juliana was haunted by Alaiz's warning that were she not careful she might be granted such a love. How wise she'd been for one so young, and how foolish Juliana.

  A moment later, the lucidity retreated to wherever it hid itself behind Alaiz's eyes. It was not the first time Juliana had glimpsed the young woman her sister had been ere the head injury had impaired her faculties, but such clarity was ever fleeting.

  Alaiz cocked her head. "You are going to have a..." In her search for the elusive word, she tensed, eyelids fluttering, lips trying once—twice—to form the word. Finally she expelled her breath and smiled. "You are going to have a baby, Juliana?"

  What she'd witnessed in the hall had not escaped her. She was childlike, but not an imbecile as Bernart believed. Juliana forced breath past her tight throat. "Aye."

  Alaiz sighed and settled her head onto Juliana's shoulder. "You always... take care of me."

  Juliana squeezed her eyes closed. "And I always shall."

  Bernart felt as if he would retch. He pulled the back of his hand across his mouth, hating himself more than Juliana could ever hate him. But if she gave him a son, all would be worth the pain. It would silence the cruel gossip and ensure that Osbern never held Kinthorpe lands. Os-bern, whose very existence fueled the rumors of Bemart's lack of an heir.

  Bitterness in his mouth, Bernart lifted his goblet. It was empty. He rose from the lord's chair and limped to the sideboard that had escaped his earlier raging. Remains of the evening meal were set there, along with pitchers of wine, ale, and honeyed milk. He reached for the latter, pausing midair to consider the ale. It was a long time since he'd succumbed to his yearning for real drink. He could almost taste it. Perhaps just one...

  Nay, the consequences were too dire, his intolerance for alcohol so great that small amounts depleted his strength and made urination painful. His hand trembled as he poured honeyed milk into a goblet, and more violently when he lifted the vessel and choked down its impotent contents.

  He slammed the goblet to the sideboard, stood unmov-ing a long moment, then splayed a hand over his thigh and crept inward to touch the emptiness between his legs. A whimper broke his lips, rushed revulsion through his gut. The deep voice that had once been his had taken on a feminine quality. He disguised it, at the cost of painfully strained throat muscles, but other effects of his emasculation were not so easily overcome. Much of his body hair was lost or thinned, he carried excess weight he could not shed, suffered from chronic sleeplessness, and had such difficulty holding his urine that the possibility of soiling himself was ever present. His was a hell none would ever understand.

  His thigh began to ache, further reminding him of the clash with Muslim soldiers that had not only cost him his manhood, but had smitten him with a limp he could not conceal.

  Would a son end his pain? Quiet the voices that taunted him long into the night? It was what he longed for, but the thought of another man touching Juliana, especially the one he intended to father his son, pitched the contents of his belly. Juliana was his, had been his from the moment she'd wailed her way into the world, had made him the envy of every man who gazed upon her beauty. If not for the one whose betrayal had cost him the ability to father children, none of this would be necessary.

  Nearly upping the bile that seared his throat, Bernart swallowed hard, coughed, swallowed again. He had to do it. Had to. Now to lure his prey to Tremoral.

  France, April 1195

  A challenge.

  Gabriel stared at the tournament field from which he'd retreated with the breaking of his lance. So Kinthorpe wished to meet him in tournament. Why now? It was— how many years? Four? Aye, four since Bernart had gathered a hundred men to him to take the city of Acre from the Muslims. The memory of it was nearly as clear as the day it had been set in Gabriel's mind. Desperate from months of siege, slaughter, and a stark shortage of food, Bernart and his followers had presented a pitiful image of Christianity knocked to its knees. Destined for death.

  At the age of twenty-three, Gabriel had already earned the reputation of being a knight of goodly skill and courage, but he was also endowed with enough wits to know the difference between courage and stupidity. He'd tried to turn his friend from an undertaking foreordained to failure, had confronted Bernart and the others with the reminder that previous attempts by the Christian army to go over the wall had resulted in mass slaughter. Though Bernart had stood against such reasoning, a score of men had not—had walked away. Desperate to reach his friend, Gabriel had assured him the forces of King Richard would soon arrive to give them victory over the infidels—though he was not certain of it himself. In response, another score of men had withdrawn from the ranks of those soon to die. Enraged by what he perceived to be betrayal, Bernart had accused Gabriel of cowardice and, cursing him, had set off for the walled city.

  In the darkening of day, the coming of night, Gabriel had stared after Bernart and his diminished band of soldiers, had sworn he would not follow, had told himself again and again that his friend had the right to choose his own path. But what a bloody path it had been, just as Gabriel had known it would be. And Bernart was not the only one to bear its scars. Indeed.

  Gabriel ground his teeth. Though he knew he'd saved the lives of those he'd dissuaded from following Bernart, he was burdened by guilt that he had not tried harder to deter a man with whom he'd been friends since boyhood. Then there was the thought that had he not persuaded so many to turn from the foolish quest, Bernart might have succeeded in breaking through the city's defenses. Impossible, though Gabriel could not put it from him. But he yet would.

  Abruptly he turned his attention to the melee. On the field, countless knights and foot soldiers engaged in the mock battle of tournament, the purpose of which was to capture and ransom as many opposing knights as possible, preferably without killing them. During the past two hours, Gabriel had taken three. Providing his good fortune held, he would take as many more before the day was done, and by nightfall his purse would be heavy with the coin of their ransom.

  A wry smile twitched his mouth. France's tournaments were lucrative. Given a few more years, the siege-ravaged demesne King Richard had awarded him here, on the continent, would rival the great baronies on eith
er side of the channel.

  Gabriel searched the battlefield for sight of the knight with whom he'd entered into a partnership upon their return from the crusade. Fighting as a team, dividing their winnings between them, they'd captured more than eighty knights in the past nine months without once being ransomed themselves. But it looked as if their luck was about to turn. Sir Erec was in the midst of a struggle to hold back three knights.

  "Damn!" Gabriel thrust his helm onto his head, seized the lance his squire held, and started for his destrier.

  "Your reply, Lord De Vere?" an urgent voice called.

  He glanced over his shoulder. He had forgotten about the messenger who'd crossed the channel to deliver Bernart's challenge and who had taken the opportunity of Gabriel's need to rearm himself to deliver it.

  Fleetingly, Gabriel considered the generous purse Bernart would award the knight who took the most ransoms at Tremoral—enough to complete restoration of the inner wall of his castle. Tempting, but that was all. "No reply," he tossed back.

  The messenger hurried forward. "Be it yea or nay, my lord?"

  Gabriel put a foot in the stirrup and swung his mail-laden body into the saddle.

  The messenger stepped into the destrier's path. "I am not to return without your reply."

  Gabriel jerked the reins left and put heels to the destrier. "Then you will be a long time in France," he shouted as he swept past the man. Once more upon the field, he sighted Sir Erec where he held against his opponents. Determining the best approach, he couched his lance under his right arm, taking the rhythm of the horse beneath him.

  Was it revenge Bernart sought? The question rent his concentration. It was no secret that he blamed Gabriel for his failure at Acre, the deaths of those who'd followed him, his being lamed, and whatever abuses he'd suffered during his imprisonment. But if revenge, why now?

  Nay! Gabriel jerked his head in his helm. He would think no more on it, not when there were more important matters, namely Sir Erec and the three knights who did not know there would soon be ransom to pay. However, try as Gabriel did to ignore it, the air rushing past him whispered of one he'd not allowed himself to think upon for a long time: Juliana the fair.