by Ling, Maria
"Doing what?"
"I'm... not sure."
Well, that was helpful. "What work was he hired for to begin with?"
"Man at arms, my lord."
He had dozens of those. Dogsbodies, for the most part. Must be a young lad, or he'd have been among the force Guy took to Normandy. The steward might know. "I'll find him. Would he like to be bailiff, do you think?"
Her eyes widened. Guy held back a laugh at her naivety. One village bailiff or another, what did it matter to him? But to this girl, clearly, such an honour had the power to choke.
"I think he'd be good at it," she said. Sisterly loyalty rang in her voice, though for all that she still appeared to hesitate. "But I know he's proud to serve your lordship here."
Guy considered her for a moment longer, his humour waning. Either she was remarkably stupid, unable to see an opportunity for advancement, or else she truly had no ideas beyond her station.
And yet she'd told him she would have gone anywhere with him...
He'd experienced such utter clarity when he first saw her. Truly beheld her, as if they had met soul to soul and clad in the raiment of heaven. Not as man to woman - that came with the next step of his horse - nor as lord to serf - that came the step after. But in one crystalline moment as all that he loved and could ever hope for, here on earth.
With an effort he tore his mind away from that image. It was not possible for them to meet on such terms. They were man and woman, lord and serf, there was no way past that.
And he, for his part, could not in truth wish things different. He'd spent far too long sleeping rough and fighting rougher, he wanted now a genteel life. Not some filthy shed where humans coupled like animals in the straw, and rooted through the soil for their food.
For his food, also: he kept people to do such work on his behalf.
No, he liked being lord. And it meant he could command her presence here, and keep her until he tired of her, and then send her back to grub among the peasants as best she pleased.
First, though, he'd set things to right in his own domain. And cease to treat her as anything other than the plaything of an idle moment, for that was all she was and all she ever could be to him. Thoughts beyond that were an embarrassment. They shamed him as a master and a man.
"I was jesting," he said. "Doubtless there are other more suitable men."
"Yes, my lord." Downcast she seemed now, or modest: her hands fiddled with the sheet. Didn't need to, she could drop it clear off and he'd be nothing but pleased.
"Anyone you'd rather marry?" But that was cruel, he regretted the words as she flinched. Too tender a spot, that one. Of course, she had mentioned something along those lines. What was it? Ah, yes. A man in another village.
Guy experienced a sudden urge to take the bastard apart. He could do it, too, even absent sword and armour, he was a fit man. Could hold his own in any punch-up with a peasant.
Not that it would ever come to that. He'd not sully his own hands with such work. Could give instructions on the quiet to one of his lesser knights, maybe. Because he wanted the man beaten to a pulp, just for daring to look at her.
Though by that reckoning he probably ought to destroy every man past boyhood, in every village nearby.
"No one, my lord."
"I thought you said - " But perhaps it was of no consequence. Let her keep that secret if she wished. Meanwhile, Guy had innumerable tasks before him, and must bend his attention to those instead. "You may wash and dress. As soon as you are decent, tell the guard on the door to escort you back to your own room."
Vivid eyes widened in bewilderment. "Mine, my lord?"
Guy contained his impatience. "You recall something of yesterday, I trust?" Though it was a compliment of sorts, he smiled to himself. Yes: he'd also lost all memory of mundane things in the flood of passion she had unleashed within him.
"That room... " She swallowed, audibly. "The huge room with that great bed, where I was left to wait for you, my lord?"
God, she was stupid. Guy's devotion drained away. Pretty she might be, but thick as any cud-chewing beast of the fields. This wasn't a woman he could bear to keep for long, no matter how splendid she proved at night.
"Yes," he said with exaggerated patience. "That precise room. I will not have you wandering about the castle unattended." Distracting his men, and getting lost, and turning up unexpectedly while he was trying to concentrate on more important things. Falling down stairs too, most likely - some of them were both steep and cannily placed, fishing new boys off them was part of the usual entertainment here. Luckily there had been no serious injuries that Guy knew of, but it was a hazard and not one he wished to subject that lovely face to.
"Thank you," Aelfid said, and shrank a little further where she sat. "I will take very great care within it, my lord."
Guy frowned. "Why? Nothing dangerous there that I recall."
"No, I only meant - it is so fine a place, my lord."
Wrong room? He didn't recall any particular finery. Not that he had much use for ostentation. Bed, table, cupboard, curtains. He glanced around his own chamber, the best in the castle, and even that rather shabby and noticeably thin on gold thread.
Though to a girl like her, used to the filthy village shacks, he supposed it might look rather imposing.
"Well, make yourself as comfortable as you dare. Don't break anything." He fastened his belt, allowed himself one final glance at her where she sat tousled and glorious on his bed - then headed out, before he kissed her and fell again, and left all the day's work undone.
***
CHAPTER 3
So, what did fine ladies do all day? Aelfid had paced the room and found it to be six steps precisely in each direction, touched the curtains with reverent admiration, lain on the bed and found it every bit as soft as Lord Guy's own. She'd blushed at that last recollection, and smiled also, and stretched luxuriantly with the memory of pleasure. It had been far beyond anything she might have dreamed of.
But now she was lonely, fidgety, ill at ease. At home she'd have been working all this time, busy with the beasts and the roots and the children, feeding and cleaning and grooming and washing and mending and making and cooking, she'd have had barely an instant to spare for herself. Whereas here the time grew and stretched, turned into long hours that she could gauge only by the slant of the light. She was used to reckoning time by tasks, divided her day by where she worked, byre and pasture and croft shack and house. Though of late she had been more constrained, and more worried too, since Osulf took the farm. It ought to have lessened the work, and perhaps it did, but she hadn't felt that as she might. Too much fretting, and reassuring the children with false cheer, and fending off Osulf's tawdry gropes.
She loathed him. Was at liberty to seethe, now, over the way he treated her. Worried about how things were back home, whether Lord Guy had given his orders yet, appointed a new bailiff, set matters to right. Gone over himself to see, perhaps.
Aelfid hoped he would. She wished he might see that lovely home for himself and understand why she valued it so. Apart from food and shelter, though she had learned to rate those high, squashed into the croft shack with barely a blanket to cover her, hungry and fearful of winter. Oh, she would kiss that farmhouse floor the moment she stepped on it again, she felt she had never admired that beautiful house as she ought, nor been properly grateful for all the food and safety the farm had afforded her. She would never take such things for granted again, she swore it.
But more than that, she loved her home. Wished only that Guy - Lord Guy, she corrected herself sternly, she must not for an instant forget how far above her he towered - might see it and understand. If only briefly, he would never linger there. Had no reason to. And besides, it would look small and shabby to him, he was used to great stone castles and soft beds and pretty curtains, he would never grant her home a second look. But she wished he might see it just once, all the same.
In the meantime, though, she was - not bored, that was an
absurd notion, she ought to glory in every instant of this lazy enjoyment of the luxury that surrounded her - but restless, and oddly discontented. She had no work to do, and in all her life she had never experienced such a thing. This empty pacing, waiting only for the hours to pass, was alien to her, and not pleasant.
Driven to extreme measures at last, she peeked out the door to see if anyone was about. A man lounged in a nearby corner, but straightened up smartly when he saw her.
"Can I be of service?" he asked.
Aelfid blinked at him. She'd intended to ask much the same thing. "I was wondering if there's anything to do - any tasks I might usefully help with," she ventured. "It is not my custom to be idle for this long."
"Nothing I've been told about."
"Cleaning and sweeping," Aelfid suggested. "Making or mending."
"Doubtful."
"Could you ask someone, though?"
The man grimaced. "Ask if his lordship's whore can help with the sweeping? He'd not be best pleased with me if I did."
Probably not, Aelfid conceded. She'd winced at the term, but not much. It was merely the truth. "Would you ask my brother Beorn to visit me, then? Not at once," she added conscientiously. "It's not urgent. But I should like to see him when he can."
"I'll bring him word." The man took himself off down the steep and winding staircase. Aelfid eyed it with a shudder. Climbing up it had been bad enough. She didn't envy him the clamber down.
There was a window of sorts, though, near the top. She strolled over to it and peeked out. Men wandered to and fro, across a patch of beaten earth. And there he was - her heart clenched at sight of him. Lord Guy, cheerful and at ease, looking every bit the nobleman in a tunic of deep green with a flash of gold embroidery.
She would dearly love a dress like that, Aelfid thought with a pang of longing. So she could look like a lady beside him, and not some draggled creature he'd snared in the undergrowth. She picked at her own coarse cloth, the work of her own hands: she'd shorn and carded and spun and woven and finally sewed to make this garment. She'd been proud of it then, many hours of her own labour made into warmth and protection for her body. Beauty she had not considered. It was cloth: that ought to be enough. Yet in comparison to what Lord Guy wore, it was barely fit for a blanket.
Absurd that he'd taken notice of her at all. Who was she, ragged and stained, that a man like that would look twice at her? Yet he had done so, and brought her here, and seemed content to keep her for a day or two. Which she consented to, and gladly, if it brought freedom and prosperity back to her family. As well as pleasure to herself - she flushed again at the recollection. Oh, it had been splendid.
She watched him furtively. A handsome man, without a doubt: she'd never seen a finer. Shaggy brown hair, well combed but dancing rebellious in some light breeze unfelt by her, surrounded an even-featured face on which rested a smile angels might fall for. But that wasn't what drew her, he'd not worn such a smile when she first saw him. She couldn't say what it was, or where it came from; she was conscious only of an absolute conviction that she belonged with him, and he with her, and that no considerations of wealth or station in life could weigh against that.
He glanced up then, as if he felt his eyes on her, sought out the narrow gap in those thick stone walls, and saw her.
She tumbled - felt herself falling, as through some vast empty space - believed for a giddy moment that she could fly. Then struck stone, and struck it hard: the blow knocked her breath out in a shrill scream. She rolled down sharp stone that hammered into her body and cracked her arms as she clenched them for protection around her head and face.
Lay still at last, panting and achy, not daring to move. Never had she known such a beating, and her poor body wept with agony.
Steps shuffled nearer, leather soles on stone. Aelfid uncoiled hesitantly, but her limbs lodged so harsh a protest that she whimpered and stilled.
"God-damned stupid woman." Guy knelt close by her, she recognised his hands and his voice. The scent of him, also, deep and warm and familiar. "What do you want to go tumbling down stairs for? Didn't I tell you to stay in your room?"
"Yes, my lord," Aelfid admitted meekly, and fought back tears. He'd think her insolent now, on top of everything else. And stupid, and foolish, and -
"Do exactly as I say," Guy said with weary patience. "Lie perfectly still. Now tell me: are you in great pain?"
"Yes," Aelfid whimpered.
"Is any part of you not hurting?"
"No," Aelfid wailed.
"Good. That's an excellent start."
Aelfid chilled. She had not expected such a heartless remark. "I am sorry, my lord - "
"Did I tell you to make idle chatter?"
"No," Aelfid admitted.
"Then shut up and answer only the questions put to you. Is any part of you numb or lacking in feeling?"
"None." No more than his heart, Aelfid thought with mutinous belligerence. Here she lay injured, and his high and mighty lordship was nothing but pleased -
"Do you remember falling?"
"Yes." Only too well.
"Did everything turn black during or after the fall?"
"No."
"Did you hear or feel a crack in your skull or spine?"
Aelfid hesitated. Not there, she felt certain. "No."
"And you didn't throw up or soil yourself either, I observe. Very good."
Aelfid cringed. What must he think of her, to make such accusations? She peered up at him, embarrassed and aggrieved, to find that he was looking at someone else.
"Safe to move her, I believe," he told the other man. "Go gently, though."
They lifted her between them, strong arms interlaced under her body, and carried her slowly up the stairs. Aelfid rested her head against Guy's shoulder and thought in despair what contempt he must hold her in now. All she'd done was look at him, and he'd met her with a look of his own -
Such an expression in those commanding eyes of his. She'd lost her footing entirely, which was a dangerous thing to do. Aelfid understood that better now, as he carried her bruised body into the room that was supposed to be hers and laid her down upon the bed.
"Idiot woman," he said, bending over her - but his voice was tender, and his expression one of deep concern. "Do you know how many foolhardy boys I've had to fish off those stairs? Fell down them myself once, and if you'd heard my mother scold... Did it occur to you that perhaps there was good reason why I told you to keep to your room?"
"It does now," Aelfid admitted, shamefaced. She reached up tentatively to caress his arm, endeavoured to convey by touch the fullness of her apology. He yielded to her, leaned down to kiss her, a soft touch that deepened and grew stronger with desire.
"Leave us," he murmured with his mouth still resting against hers, and men's footsteps shuffled obediently from the room.
Aelfid wasn't hurting any more. Achy still, but more with desire than pain. She pulled him closer, and he obeyed, grew hot and heavy against her. Then he slid his hand under her back and into the space between her shoulder blades, lifted her just off the bed to press hard against his chest. She snuffled for air, breathless but too deep in the kiss to want an ending. Guy paused at the sound, then eased away.
"Don't," Aelfid whispered against his mouth, fervent with passion, wanting nothing more than to feel him close to her, and inside her.
"Of course." He quit her entirely, looked almost ashamed. "Forgive me. You are still in pain, I'm sure."
"Not that." A few bruises, what were they? She felt almost contemptuous of her own antics at the foot of the stairs. How absurd to waste precious time wailing over a bump or two, when she could have savoured his closeness instead. She craved it, a hunger that gnawed in every limb and would not be sated.
Aelfid reached out to grasp at him, pulled him back into her embrace, sought his mouth with hers. He understood her then, responded with a fierce heat that singed her, fumbled for her skirts as she tore at his tunic and hose.
"You'
ll be the death of me," Guy whispered as he plunged inside her. She rose to meet him, wrapped her legs tight around him and tilted her hips up against his, felt his member hot and sleek inside her. Rocked against him, set the pace from underneath, until he gave a stifled wail and burst into her, and she gave herself over to the consummation of desire.
"You really will," Guy murmured in her ear. "Be the death of me."
"But what a way to perish," Aelfid whispered, shivering with pleasure, and he laughed breathlessly and hugged her close.
They lay close together, nestled warm against each other's bodies. Eventually Guy sighed and eased himself away.
"Men want their lord," he said. "God knows they can't run this place without me, no matter how well they manage it in my absence." He kissed her, lingering with his lips on hers. "Now stay here in this room and do not hare off on any adventures of your own. I'll take you out for some fresh air and freedom as soon as I can be spared. That's a promise."
"Thank you," Aelfid said, smiling as she kissed him back. "Make it soon."
"I will." He stood up, arranged his clothing for decency, grinned down at her. "What a way to perish, indeed. Cover yourself up, woman."
"Oh." Aelfid flicked her skirt down, blushing.
"Not that I'm complaining." Guy stood for a while longer watching her, and the grin faded. "You'll want fresh linen, I suppose. Send for it from your home - you may instruct the men at the door as you wish." He hesitated. "If you consent to stay with me, that is."
If she consented? "Most joyfully I do." They were both serious now, watching each other with earnest intent. A quiver passed through her heart, of fear or grief or longing. "May I ask how long you intend to keep me here? So that I know what message to send."
Guy sat down on the bed, close to her side, and took her hand. "God knows I'm in no hurry to send you away. How long can you be spared from home?"
Aelfid thought of Mother and the little ones, left to manage all things alone. "Not more than a few days. There's a great deal of work to be done. More if we have the farm back."
