by Traci E Hall
The memory of her plump lower lip, just ripe for nipping as she leaned over the basket of food earlier made his balls tighten. He’d wager she had no idea how seductive her innocent desire for a kiss had been.
He was beginning to suspect there would not be much to use against her. She loved her liege and proved it by following her on Crusade. Nothing to fault her for there. Dressing up like a warrior went against the grain, but it was explainable: the lady did it to please her queen.
There was something else, though, and he would find it. Perhaps a trip to the leopard cages might loosen her tongue?
Which brought to mind her lovely mouth. His mouth plundering hers as he held her tight. He’d almost sampled her lips this afternoon—in public, for God’s sake. When was the last time he’d come so close to forgetting himself? Her pliant mouth would give and then demand more. But how much more? Those were the kind of secrets he wanted to uncover.
“Raoul, are you even listening to me?”
He shook his head and answered honestly, “No.”
Emperor Manuel laughed at the shocked look on King Louis’s face. “Pay him no mind, Louis. He is allowed to speak the truth. He forgets sometimes to soften his delivery in front of others.”
Raoul met King Louis’s forthright gaze and understood for the first time why men would follow such a quiet, penitent leader. His goodness shone like a halo as he gave a curt, forgiving nod. “I am pleased to meet a man who honors truth above all else. It’s not always easy to stand by one’s word.”
Bowing his head, Raoul agreed. What in the hell was the king alluding to? There was something at play between the two leaders. He dared not look at Manuel but would save his questions for later, when the emperor could speak freely.
Most outsiders didn’t understand the dissimilarities between ruling the eastern world and ruling the western world. Manuel had been trying to teach Raoul the difference in order to teach him tolerance.
It hadn’t been working—or maybe it had, which might explain his fascination with the shy yet opinionated Lady Isabella de Lacey.
“I was saying I wish to invite the king, queen, and their attendants to view a chariot race at the Hippodrome. Will you see to it? And perhaps you could bring the leopards. The crowd loves Star and Serena.”
Raoul scowled. “For tomorrow?” Such events usually involved weeks of planning, although the leopards were always happy to play and be the center of attention.
“Yes,” Manuel said smoothly. “Louis has a schedule to maintain and cannot enjoy the fruits of our city for long. I wish him to remember his stay fondly.”
“Your churches are beautiful enough to make angels cry,” Louis said. “But I’ve heard of the great races at the famed Hippodrome, and I would enjoy such entertainment, as would Eleanor.” The king lowered his voice. “I will have the ladies choose their clothing with thought to others.”
Ah. So he was not so unaware of his wife’s antics after all. Raoul’s enmity toward the French king lessened.
“As you see fit,” Emperor Manuel said with a suave lift of his shoulder.
“I’ll start the arrangements,” Raoul announced, backing away. And get extra coin to grease the cogs.
“This does not excuse you from meeting us all for the evening meal, Raoul.” The emperor looked to the king and explained in a wry tone, “My most trusted man has a general dislike of everyone since a run-in with Raymond of Antioch five years ago.”
King Louis snapped to attention. “My wife’s uncle?”
Raoul, so angry at his liege he could not stay without making a scene, excused himself with a curt bow. “I will let the emperor share what was not his to share once I am gone.”
Fury pounded in his head, at his throat, in his belly. How dare Manuel share his personal tragedy as if it were fodder for royal gossip?
He headed for the fight yard, bloodlust clouding his vision.
CHAPTER 8
Bella and Sarah returned to their room, where Fay and Catherine immediately peppered them with questions. Sarah ignored them all, heading straight for the wine in the cupboard and a glazed goblet. She poured, put the bottle down, sipped from her cup, then sank onto the cushioned chair by the window.
Bella placed the basket of food left over from her afternoon with Raoul on a side table. She grabbed the goblet from Sarah and took a fortifying swallow.
“You have been gone all day,” Fay complained, stealing the empty cup from Bella and refilling it to the brim. “The only excitement was when the bells in the watchtower rang, and then we could see the soldiers gathering. They are so correct.” Fay gave the wine to Bella. “So disciplined.”
“They have to be or they’re killed.” Sarah exhaled and stretched her legs. “I struck up a conversation with one of the stable boys. He told me warriors are chosen at a young age and disciplined in the old Roman way. It’s an impressive sight, I have to admit.”
Bella slipped off her shawl and put it in the basket with the others. “Raoul is certainly disciplined, but I don’t think he’s from Constantinople. His discipline comes from something else, I think.” Something broken inside him.
“I don’t care for him,” Sarah declared. “Even if he did buy you a charbet.”
“Why do you hate him? I spent a wonderful day with Raoul, and he is not the monster others would make him out to be.” Bella looked at Sarah and waited for an explanation.
“He’s so much bigger than you, and he looks mean. Oui, he has a cruel upper lip,” Sarah said, as if that were enough to condemn a man. “He reminds me of a bully I knew growing up. This boy would pull the wings from butterflies.”
“Raoul would never do such a thing.” Bella thought of how he’d kicked at the chickens. “Without a reason. You must get to know him.”
“I don’t have to. We aren’t going to be here long enough for me to care about whether or not Raoul Laskaris is a nice person. And you shouldn’t care either.” Sarah took the lily from her hair and set it in her lap.
Fay sat on the edge of the couch, patting the seat for Bella to sit too. “Tell us everything. This was your first time alone with him. Jonathon snuck up the stairs looking for you. Did you really evade him on purpose?” Fay’s gray eyes widened with curiosity.
“Jonathon is so handsome.” Catherine sighed. “And I believe he has feelings for you, Bella.”
Bella twisted her mouth as if she’d tasted something sour. “Not any longer.”
“What happened?” Catherine asked. “You rode together on more than one occasion. He read poetry to you and wrote a sonnet praising your dark yet fair beauty. There was a nice line dedicated to the crushed grapes that were your violet eyes.” Her mouth twitched.
Bella laughed softly, looking from Catherine to Sarah with a shrug. “So far no man of my acquaintance has convinced me a tryst will bring flame to the cool embers of my desire.” Raoul’s broad shoulders and muscled legs came to mind, and she quickly cleared her throat.
“You’ve only been widowed a year,” Catherine pointed out, embroidering as she listened.
“I have never been in love.” Fay sighed unhappily. “Each day I wake up hungry, and I think of filling my belly. Only second do I think of the queen and rarely of love or a husband. The church says a woman’s duty is to marry and beget children. Am I bound for hell, do you think?”
The women all laughed. “Never,” Bella declared. “You are too pure of heart to be sent to the devil. And too sassy to be sent to a convent. You will have to be a guard forever. Will you hand me that basket by the door?”
“What’s in it?”
Bella pulled back the cloth. “Olives, grapes, flatbread, and chicken.”
“No chicken. I can’t abide the smell.” Sarah moaned.
“Sorry.” Bella wrapped the chicken and took an olive, then gestured for the others to help themselves. “I don’t know that I will ever marry again and risk losing this freedom.”
“Not even for love?” Fay pressed. “As the queen teaches in her
court, love is the finest gift a man and woman can share.”
Bella shrugged.
“We have much to thank the queen for. Traveling in her guard is the smallest part of it. She gifted us with sisters and honor and purpose. It’s why I braved being kidnapped by Turks. She’s worth any risk.” Catherine calmly knotted the thread and chose another color from the skein.
“You loved your husband,” Bella said. “Would you marry again?”
Catherine’s cheeks paled. “I loved him very much, but we were young and foolish. He was killed during an illegal joust for coin and left me penniless.”
“I’m sorry,” Bella blurted. “I thought you were a relative to the queen.”
“That’s me,” Fay said, nibbling a wedge of hard cheese.
Catherine paused, as if gathering courage. “The queen found me walking on the road in the middle of a rainstorm and took me in. No questions.” Chewing her lip, Catherine forced a half smile. “I don’t know that I would marry again. I’ve lost at love once already.”
Bella wondered what other secrets Catherine hid as she quietly threaded a needle.
“And you, Sarah?” Catherine looked across the room. “What do you think of love?”
“I think it stinks, actually. Cupid’s arrow does not pierce equally. It’s unfair and leads to foolish decisions. Forget love, Fay. Who needs it? It makes one vulnerable when we should be strong.” She lifted the wine goblet as if making a silent toast.
“I pledged my life to the queen when we were just girls of twelve and thirteen,” Fay said, “before Eleanor married King Louis. I’m a royal cousin many times removed.” She scrunched her nose.
Bella had a difficult time reconciling Fay’s age of twenty-five or twenty-six with how young she looked: sixteen, perhaps eighteen at most.
“It’s possible love is not meant for me. I cannot imagine my life without the queen at the center of it.”
“She binds us all, Fay.” Sarah stared out the window, her cup as empty as her voice.
“What’s wrong, Sarah?” Bella rose from the couch to walk toward her dear friend.
Sarah shook her head and forced a smile. “Nothing. I wish to leave this terrible palace with all its gilded luxuries and make our way to Edessa. I have a miracle to pray for once we reclaim the holy city.”
“If it’s a miracle you seek, let’s go to Hagia Sophia. Raoul said it’s the most beautiful church in the entire world with a curved ceiling and painted walls.” Bella took the cup. “Miracles abound.”
“I’d like to see that.” Catherine laid down her embroidery, eyeing Sarah with concern. “I will add my prayers to yours, sister, for a miracle.”
“Me too.” Fay leapt from the couch and ran to hug Sarah. “We will all pray until the angels listen and grant your desire.”
“It’s not my desire I need granted. Just the miracle, please.” Sarah gently pushed away from them as she stood.
Bella noticed dark circles under her eyes but didn’t press. Whatever was bothering Sarah could be her secret or not, as she chose. “Shall we go to the church now?” Bella gestured toward the door.
“It will be dark soon,” Sarah said with a shake of her head. “Tomorrow.”
Catherine rose, stretching the small of her back. “I found out little today. Mostly grumbling about the German Crusaders being fiends and demons. It’s no wonder we didn’t receive help from the towns along the way.”
“I heard that too.” Bella packed up the basket, now empty save for the chicken, and put it by the door. Tomorrow she could return it to the bazaar and buy the charms for her friends. “Emperor Conrad made an enemy of these people, and we were judged guilty.”
“How can we change the people’s opinion?” Fay paced.
“We cannot,” Sarah concluded glumly. “Odo de Deuil might be a toad, but in this I think he’s correct. This city is filled with treachery on all sides, and it’s making me ill.” She peered out the window toward the lapping water in the distance.
Bella noted her friend’s pinched mouth and creased forehead. “Shall we send to the kitchens for broth?”
“Non. I have an all-over ache.”
“I can read your fortune,” Catherine offered with a smile. “I know how to read palms, and when I combine that with mesmerizing, sometimes I see the future.”
Sarah jumped back from the window and held up her palms as if to ward off evil. “Stay out of my head, Catherine. Promise me!”
Looking hurt, Catherine folded her hands loosely in front of her. “I would never presume to do something against your will. It’s just for fun, like the time I drew your face on the side of a potato.”
Bella wondered at Sarah’s ferocious response to a party trick but realized now was not the best time to probe. With Sarah, it never seemed to be the right time. “Come, lie down. Poor darling, you’re just tired.”
Sarah burst into tears. “I’m sorry for being such a beast. I am tired. So tired.”
Catherine helped Sarah take off her shoes, while Fay drew down the curtains around the bed.
“Is that better?” Bella whispered, lightly brushing her friend’s blonde hair off her forehead, feeling for fever, but there was none.
She kept her eyes closed tight. “Oui. You are kinder to me than I deserve. I will make it up to you tomorrow. I want to see the church. And maybe the relics?”
“Of course.” Bella drew the last fabric panel so the large bed was completely enclosed. She joined the other ladies at the far end of the room.
“Shall we call for the physician?” Fay’s gray eyes brimmed with worry.
“Non.” Bella sat. “She is exhausted. The journey was hard for all of us, but I think Sarah did not sleep as well.”
Catherine nodded. “I too am a light sleeper. Had I known she was awake, we could have kept each other company.”
“I can sleep anywhere,” Fay said.
“Me too,” Bella answered with a lift of her shoulder. “I didn’t realize it was a blessing. The last month of the journey seemed especially difficult for her, but tomorrow we’ll visit the churches and find her some relief. If God can’t help her, then who can?”
“If we stop in the market, I can buy some lavender for under her pillow. Lavender draws the dreamer deep.”
“True. Good idea, Fay. I have extra linen; I can make the sachet while we talk.” Catherine reached into her sewing basket for the scraps of fabric.
“I try,” Bella said with a shudder, “to enjoy sewing, but I stick my fingers more than the fabric. I would rather wind thread or yarn.”
“Tell us about Raoul.” Catherine smiled.
There was so much to be said. Where to begin? The facts. No emotion. “He gave coin to a sleeping beggar because the man had once shown honor as a fighter in the Hippodrome.”
Fay sighed, deftly braiding tiny strands of thread together with beads for a bracelet. “I knew there had to be more to him than just black on black.”
“He has a darkness in his soul.” Bella looked down, remembering the feel of his hand over hers. Tanned fingers, the grip of a warrior, firm yet gentle on her arm.
“Do not get emotionally involved,” Catherine cautioned. “It will be easier, especially since we are leaving within a fortnight, to act without love.”
“Love? I doubt Raoul has ever felt the stirrings.” Bella shook her head, trying desperately to rid her mind of him. Of their almost kiss. “And I just shared my views on the subject.”
Bella heard a noise in the hall and quickly walked to the door. After a series of determined knocks, she answered before the sound woke Sarah. “Yes?” She poked her head outside the chamber.
A young servant, who was dressed in royal purple with gold trim, distinguishing him as a slave of Emperor Manuel, presented a wooden tray holding a folded piece of paper. The child lowered his head. “For the tall, blonde woman.”
With an apprehensive glance toward the bed where Sarah slept, Bella accepted the letter and thanked the slave with a coin.
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br /> Why hadn’t Raoul brought the letter? It was his duty to see to the emperor’s safety, in and out of bed.
Fay stood, dropping her thread for the bracelets. “Should we get Sarah?”
“Let her sleep for now.” What could a few more moments hurt? Bella glanced guiltily at the letter. “Just for a while.”
“Should we read it?” Fay peered around Bella’s shoulder. “It’s sealed.”
“May I see that?” Catherine held out a hand, palm up.
Bella knew from the way Catherine’s lips thinned that she sensed something about the letter. She gently laid the missive in her hand.
“Danger,” Catherine whispered, meeting Bella’s gaze. “I feel angry reds and dark blues. Sarah should take care.”
“Is it from the emperor?” Bella’s brows drew together as she waited for Catherine to answer.
“I don’t know. I see purple. Royalty.” She handed the missive back to Bella as if it were too hot to handle.
“It would have to be.” Fay shrugged. “Unless someone has a stable of children trained to pretend to be royal slaves for nefarious purposes.” She tucked a strand of light brown hair behind her left ear. “It could happen.”
“Let’s just agree that appearances are what they seem, and the letter is from the emperor for Sarah. Perhaps to meet in a few days.” Bella pressed the letter to her chest, not feeling anything negative or dangerous from the page.
She and Raoul had spent a wonderful day together. He’d asked her about a tryst. Why hadn’t he delivered the missive himself?
Perhaps—Bella flushed—he is not as enamored as I wish.
“Sarah must be at her most angelic best to seduce the emperor.” Fay tapped against the tip of her nose and stared at the curtained bed. “She’s our closest weapon when it comes to finding information that might aid the queen.”
A drowsy Sarah poked her head out of the curtains. “Bring that letter here, Bella, please. I appreciate you attempting to be quiet, but each sound is magnified thanks to the splitting ache in my head.”
