The corner of Johanna's mouth lifted slightly. "Mayhap I was not for a time." It was a hesitant admission of the hate she'd borne for him. "Things changed recently."
The old monk closed the space between them to catch her hand. Holding her fingers tight in his dry, hard palm, he looked up into her face. Reflected in his gaze she saw the knowledge of the wrong he and his sire had done her. But where it had ceased to ache in her, it yet rankled deeply in him.
"It was to protect you that Walter did what he did," he said, the words tumbling past his lips. "He feared for what would happen were he to allow your marriage to Rob stand. You must understand that Rob was but ten and seven and did not yet own the mastery of his trade. Even if you'd been married before the church door as is mete, Katel's sire would have fought it. If your union held, he would have set himself to destroying the trade, thinking to revenge himself for this betrayal. You, Rob, all Walter had built would have been gone." The words were a plea for forgiveness and understanding. "He was dying. There was time for nothing else."
She freed her hand from his, then caught the old man's face in her palms and pressed a kiss onto his creased brow. "How can I not forgive you when you and Papa meant only my good?" This she offered him even though by forcing her marriage to Katel, her father made Peter a bastard.
Brother Colin's eyes glistened as a tiny smile touched his mouth. "You cannot know how we hurt over what we did that day. Thank you, lass, for my sake and your sire's. You have taken a great burden from my shoulders." With a small smile he freed her hand and stepped away. "Now I must return to my pots and stills. Go you within. Your son has been impatiently awaiting your arrival."
Johanna blinked in surprise at this. "Peter? What is he doing here?"
Rob reached out to embrace her from behind, drawing her a step backward until she leaned against his chest. "He was hurt trying to defend Katel from the crowd, love."
With a gasp, Johanna turned in his arms. "You didn't tell me," she cried out, pushing away from him. A touch of anger woke in her. "How could you not tell me!"
Rob shrugged and shook his head. "I saw no need to worry you when he is so greatly improved.”
"He is fine, Johanna," the monk said, laying a calming hand upon her shoulder.
Johanna did not stay to be consoled. Rushing to the forebuilding, she flew up the stairs. A child's laughter echoed to her from the hall, followed by Peter's distinct hoarse tones of amusement. Worry and anger warred with relief. If her son could laugh all could not be as bad as she was imagining.
She stopped in the hall door. A goodly number of the household servants were within the room presently at loose ends because of their master's demise. Among them were others she did not know. No doubt these were Rob's servants. There was something familiar about the tall, golden-haired man who stood at the hooded fireplace with his back to the room.
At the hall's center a lad of ten or so with curling brown hair was turning a slow circle. A length of yarn trailed from the child's hand. Leaping and pouncing, Katel’s cat was following the trailing string through the rushes. Peter was seated on a stool to one side of this arena of activity. A great purple bruise marked one of his eyes, another one, this more yellowish than purple, lay along his neck. His left arm hung across his chest, supported by a sling. He was smiling as he watched the cat play.
"Peter," she called as she strode across the room to kneel before him.
Lifting a hand, she ran her fingers through his curling hair and tried to smile. Words failed her. Not only had her son been attacked along with his father, he'd witnessed his sire's death.
The previous moment's laughter died from his brown eyes, leaving only deep sadness in its place. "Mama," he cried softly, "Papa is dead."
"I know," she replied, reaching out to embrace him.
He laid his head against her shoulder. "I tried to stop them, but I couldn't." There was such helplessness in his voice.
Tears touched Johanna's eyes. "Ah sweetling, you mustn't blame yourself. Even if you had succeeded in preventing the folk from what they meant to do, you could not have saved your father from his fate. He did a terrible thing."
"I know," he managed to get out in a choked voice. Peter's shoulders shook as he fought back a sob. "Mama, I hate it here in Stanrudde."
"I've been telling him he should come to Lynn, mistress," the lad with the string said as he came to squat beside Peter's stool. "Folk are friendly in Lynn," the child assured them both, his green eyes solemn.
“I want to go," her son said, his bitter tone only partially hiding the pain in his voice.
Johanna leaned away from her son. "But what of your apprenticeship?”
Peter threw back his head in aching defiance. "My master no longer wishes to keep me. He says it will be bad for business."
The blond stranger came to crouch down at Johanna's opposite side. "There will be plenty of masters willing to take you in Lynn," he said, "especially when they learn you are from Master Robert's household."
Johanna glanced at the man, then caught her breath and looked again. "Arthur?" she cried in surprise.
Arthur's green eyes sparked with pleasure. His lips bent within the confines of his thick blond beard. "It is good to see you again, Johanna. I would have you meet my son, William." He nodded to the boy at her other side. "He is Rob's apprentice." With a groan, he lifted himself back to his feet. "I am not the man I once was," he complained, shaking the cramps from his legs.
Johanna stared up at him. "You are married?" She wasn't certain why this should startle her so. For a second time, she glanced from Arthur to his son. There was very little to name them father and son, save for the color of their eyes. Will offered her a shy smile then rose to again play with the cat.
"Did I not tell you he was well?" Rob called from the hall door. "It is a malaise of the heart that is plaguing your son just now." His voice gentled as he took the space Arthur had vacated to Johanna's right. "And so he should feel. I have told Peter how deeply it hurt me to lose the man I believed was my father when I was naught but Will's age. So too, have I told him the tale of his grandsire's generosity and love for that orphaned lad."
Peter sat back on his stool and rubbed at his eyes, then wiped his nose on his sleeve. "I have thought over your offer, Master Robert." Even as he spoke the corners of his mouth were pulled downward by the same weight that tugged on his heart. "If my mother chooses to go to Lynn with you then I will as well. I have not yet decided on the other."
"What offer is this?" Johanna glanced from Peter to Rob.
"Were you worried over your Peter's state?" A tiny smile touched his mouth as his gray eyes warmed to nearly blue. "Fie on you, love," he chided. "Was not your father like unto mine own? If Peter wills it I will make him my son, and so I have vowed to him." His expression sobered as he reiterated his promise.
Johanna shifted to sit on the floor as she looked in astonishment at the two men she most loved. "You would do this for Katel's son?" Her words were but a soft breath.
Rob shook his head, the rawboned lines of his face filled with gentle chastisement. "Nay, I do this for your son and for Walter of Stanrudde's grandchild."
So great was her love for Rob that Johanna thought her heart might burst. Beyond speech, she reached out to embrace him. This was the man to whom she was married. This was her husband, who owned in his heart the same generosity of spirit her father had known.
With that thought the wrong that had been done all those years ago was made right. The last of the bonds that had so long trapped Johanna in her misery broke. She gave thanks to God that she had survived to know this moment for all that came after would be happiness.
Stanrudde
Two hours past Vespers
The Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, 1197
As Rob closed the door on the servants in the hall the bedchamber fell into an instant dimness. Still, the teasing and the laughter penetrated the thick wooden panel. It was against the possibility that they meant to
take their jests to a more physical level that Rob set the bar.
Carrying a tallow lamp, Johanna crossed to the room's far end where a fresh night candle had been left on its iron stand. Once the candle took light, she set the lamp on one of the two clothing chests that sat behind it. Between the two there was enough light to chase the thicker of the gray shadows into the corners. As she turned back into the room, she laughed again.
"I am overwhelmed. I vow my head reels against such a fabulous tale," she cried aloud.
Once Peter had gone to seek his rest in the kitchen she'd heard the story of these last days from every participant and all possible angles. It had stunned her to learn it hadn't been Wymar who'd carried her message, but Syward, who'd done it as a boon for Watt. But the strangest of all was Leatrice's bold lie. "Speaks in his sleep, indeed! In all his life I doubt Katel once uttered a coherent word whilst he was at his rest. That cheeky lass was but repeating what she'd heard us say in the tower."
"Then, it is fortunate we told the truth," Rob said, standing before the bed as he removed his mantle and his vest. These he hung over the clothes pole at the bed's head, then worked at loosening his brown tunic.
"This is different" He touched the blue and gold curtains that draped the bed. "I remember the curtains as being red and yellow."
"Katel bought new before our"—she stopped herself, not willing to say marriage.. She was wed to Rob and only Rob. "After my father died."
"Ah." He pulled off his tunic. Dressed only in his shirt and chausses, he sat upon the mattress to loosen the cross-garters that held his knee-high boots to his calves. Once he'd set aside his boots he smiled at her then patted the mattress at his side. "Come and sit with me."
New shyness took root in Johanna. Of a sudden she saw herself for what she was, a woman of one and thirty, old enough to be grandam. Yet despite her many years, she had little experience in bedding. What if Rob laid with her then was sorry he had committed himself to her?
Despite her thoughts, Johanna did as he bid, easing into place beside him. He caught her hand, lacing his fingers between hers. "This is how married folk do upon retiring," he said, an almost awed tone to his voice.
Johanna looked at him then sighed at herself and her silly fears. This was her Rob, the same boy she had loved and the man she did love. She raised a hand to catch a strand of his hair. When she pressed it into a dark curl upon his cheek, he smiled at her. She traced her fingertips downward from the high lift of his cheekbone until she smoothed the narrow line of his beard, then raised her hand to trace the outline of his lips.
Fiery lights came to life in the cool gray color of his eyes. "I will sit here all this night if you but promise never to stop touching me," he said softly.
Once again the shyness struck. She drew a sharp breath against it. With what-ifs tangling in her brain she let her hand fall from his face then chewed nervously on her lower lip.
Rob's brow creased in concern. "Did I say something amiss?"
"Nay," Johanna said, her worry growing. "Nay, I am just now realizing how much time has passed between us. Rob, I am no longer the girl you remember."
Concern eased from his face to be replaced by a mummer's expression of skepticism. "Old, are you? Show me the gray that streaks your locks."
His teasing eased a tiny bit of her worry, and Johanna laughed, just a little. She freed the nun's wimple from her head then tossed aside the plain head covering. "Do you find any?" she asked, tilting her head toward him so he might view her braids.
"How can I tell when your hair is plaited so tightly?" he retorted.
Her smile grew as she loosened her hair until it flowed freely around her. Once again, she tilted her head toward him. "Now do you find any?"
"Nay, not yet, but I am not finished searching." Rob brushed her hair over one shoulder, thus baring her nape.
"What are you doing?" she asked as he turned her head away from him.
"I am looking on the underside of your hair for the gray you say you own." He touched his lips to the sensitive skin of her nape.
Johanna shivered against this caress. Heat returned to life in her belly. "Do you find any?" she asked, her words breathless against what he did to her.
"Not yet," he replied, his breath warm against her skin as he kissed his way down to the collar of her white undergown. Johanna melted at his play. Her hand fisted into the blankets against what was both torment and pleasure.
"Perhaps if I saw your hair displayed against a white gown instead of this gray one I could better see the truth," he said between gentle nips along the curve of her neck.
"But of course," she managed in a trembling voice. The heat within her was moving rapidly upward, nearing boiling. "How sensible."
Her fingers tore at her cord belt. Where it went, she didn't care. Rob ceased his torment to loosen the tie at the back of her gray novice's overgown. Johanna came to her feet and pulled the garment over her head, then tossed it onto the ground. Her undergown, which lacked any tie or lacing to give it shape, was unbleached linen, not truly white.
"Nay, that will not do," Rob said, shucking his shirt. "I need something whiter still, else I might mistake gold for gray."
Johanna stared at him in admiration. His shoulders were broad, his arms well muscled against an active way of life. The night candle's golden glow outlined the strong planes of his chest.
"How white?" she asked, her voice choked against her growing need to touch him.
Heat darkened the skin along his cheekbones. He held out a hand to her. "I remember that your skin is very white," he said. His voice roughened with the same passion for her that she felt for him.
Johanna swallowed as what burned in her destroyed all reluctance. Age and inexperience were forgotten as she tore off the loose undergown, taking her chemise with it. It was without shyness or shame that she stood before him.
The cool gray of his eyes warmed as he looked at her. Reaching out, he laid a fingertip to her shoulder, then traced a line downward to draw a circle around the peak of her breast. Johanna's knees shook, her eyes closed. Down his finger went, passing her waist. She loosed a soft cry and braced her hands upon his shoulders to keep herself upright. As he followed the curve of her abdomen she leaned forward, resting her brow against his head as she enclosed them in the red-gold curtain of her hair.
His finger stopped at the place where her leg met her hip. He leaned forward just far enough to catch the tip of her breast in his mouth. Crying out, Johanna threaded her fingers into his hair, urging him to do more.
At her response, he moved his hand along the curve of her thigh until he brushed his palm against the most private of her places. A new and deeper trembling started in the core of her being then shot through her until she feared she might faint. With a gasp, she pulled away from him.
"Do I displease?" he asked. The amusement in his tone said he knew he did not. So did what strained at his chausses.
"No more teasing,” she begged softly. "Love me, Rob.”
"Always," he promised, rising to discard his final garment.
Once more her heart took flight as she gazed on him. How had the boy she'd loved turned into such a beautiful man? There was no flaw in him. If his frame was large and powerful, it was only gentleness that radiated from him. She knew she would find comfort and protection in the shield of his arms. What a fool she was to worry. He was hers, and they had sixteen years of wrong to redress.
Reaching out, she clasped her hands behind his neck then pulled herself against him. He made a sound deep in his chest as he embraced her. The feel of his skin against hers was wondrous. His shaft lay between them, hard and more than willing to do as she bid.
She rubbed herself against him, gasping as she teased them both. This time the noise he made sounded more like a moan. He caught her face in his hands, tilting her head up to his. His mouth took hers, his lips slashing across hers.
Johanna let the passion of his kiss feed the aching emptiness in her then begged him for
more. She stroked her hands down his back to his hips, holding him tightly to her as she moved in tiny motions against him. He gasped against her mouth.
It happened so swiftly she wasn't certain how he'd done it. In the next instant, she lay beneath him atop the bedclothes. His mouth was scorching a path down her throat, then lower still, until he suckled at her breast. With a sharp cry, she arched beneath him.
Once again, his fingers came to rest atop her nether lips, stroking at this secret place of hers. Of their own volition, her hips lifted, and she could not catch her breath. Between what he did with his mouth and the great stabs of pleasure his fingers were sending through her, Johanna was certain she would die. She cried out again and again.
He shifted atop her. In fierce joy, she softened beneath him, opening her thighs to urge him to make himself one with her. The heat of his shaft seared her, but when he laid his mouth atop hers, his kiss was gentle, even placid.
Johanna frowned. It was his passion for her she wanted now. She caught his face in her hands and took his mouth with hers as he had done to her.
He groaned at this. With that, she lifted her hips and demanded that he give her what she so needed. He thrust forward. Johanna cried out as they were joined, her pleasure mingled with just a little pain.
Lifting his mouth from hers, he kissed her brow, then rubbed his thumb across the fullness of her cheek. "Have I hurt you?"
"Nay," she growled, "but I will hurt you if you persist on dallying when we have other matters at hand"
This made him laugh, and he began to move slowly within her. What pain there'd been was soon destroyed by the wondrous sensations his slow and carelful motions were waking in her. The intensity of it grew into a burning urgency. She lifted her hips, begging him to move faster.
When he ignored her, she did it again, thrusting herself down on his shaft. This sent so strong a thrill through her that she did it again. And again.
The next time she moved Rob met her thrust with his own. She cried out against the great bubble of feeling that was trapped within her. Her legs curled around Rob's hips, her arms wrapped around his back. Rob's breathing grew ragged and hoarse as the force of his thrusts increased. Pressing his mouth to her ear, he told her how no one save she could please him. Then, he told her how much he loved her.
A Love For All Seasons Page 32
