I growled again.
“Control him,” the knight in the saddle behind Yseult said, as a second knight drew bow and arrow.
There was nothing of the queen in her voice when Yseult begged me, “Please.”
I melted out of bow range, but not out of sight. I wanted Yseult to know that man or fae or hound, it didn’t matter. I loved her as all of them. And I would stay by her.
My only regret as we ran back to Tintagel and Tris galloped to parts unknown was that I had failed to give either Tris or Yseult the gift of my trust, the power of my soul.
One day soon, I swore, when this was done and we were together once more, I would gift them with the last secret I held from them: my true name.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
YSEULT
Mark looked on me with weary eyes. “What do I do with you now, Yseult?”
“I am yet your wife and queen. Forgive, and I will rule by your side.”
“Forgive? And what exactly would you have me forgive? That you’ve made a cuckold of me and Cornwall both? Or that after God Himself exonerated you, you turned around and did it all again? I’m no seventh son of some serf working in the fields that you can trifle with. You escaped once—though I think now it must have been Satan The Deceiver that called his Hell Hounds upon us and not God who delivered you. You shall not be delivered so again.”
“You mistake, Your Grace, if you believe I trifle.”
“And yet I hear no denials.”
“The miracle of The Wild Hunt spoke for me.”
“And of the time since?”
“Will I stand accused each night I do not spend in your bed? How many miracles will satisfy you?”
“As many as you give me reason to require. Do you think I want to see you die? Do you think I want all of Cornwall and Ireland and England and Wales too to know my beloved nephew has usurped me in my own bed?” He grabbed a breast through my thin shift and brazenly squeezed it in front of his knights. The hound at my side growled low. “I have missed you, Yseult.”
“I would never have been gone if you had not forced us both away.” Guilt now was my only weapon. Yet it had no effect.
Mark sighed, his thumb circling the peak of the breast he held trying to bring it to life. When it didn’t respond, he shifted to the other one. “So many lies you wish me to believe are truth. But you would run back to him—to Tristan—the first chance you get.”
“I demand trial,” I said quietly yet clearly. “No champion. Would you demand an ordeal? Another miracle? Then you shall have it. But only if you swear my fidelity shall never be in doubt again if God sees fit to absolve me.” The hound whimpered and nudged my palm.
At the word God, Mark’s hand on my breast quickly found its way to my cheek instead. “My oath, if God judges you innocent, neither I nor my knights nor my barons nor any others of my court shall have quarrel with you again over the matter of you and Tristan. You will be a queen, without peer and without suspicion.”
“And what of Tristan?” I pressed. “Will he walk under your protection as well?”
“Tristan is as my son. Prove beyond doubt your innocence and I shall restore him both to my heart and as heir to my throne, second in line only to the child you and I might conceive through God’s blessing.”
“Then I will submit myself to His judgment.”
Mark’s face tightened. “Which ordeal will be yours? Iron? Water?”
Thought of either—carrying a holy relic of iron heated till it glowed red and trusting my bare hands not to burn or of being tied about to a stone, thrown into the sea, and trusting to float upon the waves—held little appeal for me. It wasn’t that my faith in God was lacking, but that in this, my faith in Des was greater.
I pointed to the hound with the eyes that glimmered like fresh-cut emeralds. They knew it for a faery Hound, but no more than that. “Two days from now, with God’s assent, I will give this beast the power to understand and to obey all human speech, Your Grace to command him. If the beast fails me, I burn, no Wild Hunt to save me this time. Will that suffice?”
Mark looked down at the hound by my side who had twisted around to bite at a flea on his back leg.
“What say you, dog?” Mark asked.
The hound proceeded to lick himself, falling to his unwounded hip to gain better access. His cod protruded red and rude, pointing directly at Mark. My lips twitched, barely able to suppress a smile as I firmly swallowed my laughter.
The hound rolled back to his feet and shook himself.
“Agreed,” Mark said to my proposal, loudly enough for all to hear. Then he leaned in close to whisper, “And tonight you will share my bed.”
I nodded.
The crude beast at my side lifted his leg.
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
PALOMIDES
Sir Dinas escorted Yseult to Mark’s chamber, leaving a handmaid with her and posting a guard at the door. To them all I was simply an ill-tempered mystery dog with the same run of the castle most of the lap dogs enjoyed. The guard cared not if I came and went from the chamber, so I stayed with Yseult to keep her company while she ate the supper the handmaid brought, feeding me choice bits from the trencher, while waiting for Mark to come.
It was nearly midnight when he showed up. Mid-evening, around the Office of Compline as the church bells rang, Yseult had let the handmaid remove her overgown and light the braziers, then had dismissed the girl for the night. I shifted, vigilant for the creak of the opening door and making sure the shutters over the high window remained open. Even if there was a guard posted now in the courtyard below, the hound would be able to escape.
“You do realize it’s death if they find you here like… that?” Yseult said, her voice low.
“Death to us both, I would imagine. Would you rather I left?”
“No! Only…”
I arched a brow at her.
“Your presence is”—she dropped her gaze—“disturbing.”
I followed her stare. Already I was quivering, lengthening, rising. “For us both,” I agreed.
“You don’t seem… different.”
As fae she meant. I shook my head. “Not in most ways that you would see.” Nodding to my half-risen staff that caught the fireflame in its sheen, I added, “Nor in any ways that you would feel.”
“I still entice you?”
“My Lady—Your Grace—you madden my senses no less now than before. Your song in my heart is no less full.” I fell at her feet. “I am fae again because of you. My gratitude only amplifies my love.” I wrapped an arm around the curve of her calves and laid my head on her knees in helpless supplication.
She dared one hand to rest on the back of my head. “I still can’t love you.”
“And yet you do. Just as I yet love Tris and Brinn.” Ours was an old argument, yet I understood it more clearly now than ever. “I would have loved you curse or no. The curse only gave me… liberty… to love you more. Just as you would have loved Tris as madly as you do, philtre or no. Isolde’s potion only gave you liberty to choose his love and to certain your heart.”
I found her other hand clenched in her lap. Easing my fingers between hers, I opened her up, stroking the back of her hand with my thumb till she hooked her fingers around mine and held me too. “A wise woman once told me to embrace the love in my heart. To stop denying it. And when I did, a wonderful thing happened. You don’t need to protect me from your love any longer.”
“No,” Yseult whispered. “But I still need to protect myself.”
Had I always been so selfish? Thinking of my own heart, my own pain? Not recognizing the healer might herself need healing.
So we comforted one another with the simple chaste touches of our hands as I drowsed at her feet. Tonight it wasn’t our lust that needed slaking but our hearts that needed healing.
And in the quiet before midnight we found our way to a harmony of hearts that held no pain.
~ ~ ~
The scrape of the latch, expected t
hough it was, sounded sudden in my ears. The door swung open, Mark framed in the torchlight of the guard behind him, steadying him.
“Yseult!” the king bellowed. He shook off the guard’s help as he staggered in. “This I can do on my own. Yseult!”
“I’m here, Your Grace.”
Her hand tensed atop the head that rested still against her knee.
“Up then, woman. All of Cornwall begs an heir.”
I growled, an almost silent rumble in my throat meant for Yseult to feel more than hear. An avowal that at her command I would make it so the king could never swive again.
She sighed and rose, her hand ruffling my ears to quiet me. In the middle of the floor, Mark tottered, hands outspread. Yseult knelt before him, unlacing and discarding first one boot then the other as he clutched at her hair to keep from falling.
Then her hands reached higher, lifting his knee-length surcoat to his hips with one hand and deftly untying his breeches with the other.
I had no shame in being the voyeur when it was she and Tris together. Their want, their need, their passion spilled freely and I sipped at its fountain, intoxicated in their presence, becoming a part of them, their love, their pleasure. As they came together, I blossomed, rising proud and strong, sharing them in a way we would never—could never—share together.
With she and Mark, however… Yseult did well in hiding her disgust from the drunken king, but it was no secret to me, blazing through her as it was in every dutiful move she made from removing his boots and leggings to stripping off his surcoat. Hound though I was, I withered in their presence. And when Mark pawed Yseult’s shift over her head, instead of finding worship in her splendor, I cringed in sorrow. She fumbled his tunic off him amid the octopus of arms all over her.
Then the tunic was off and he was kissing her, great and sloppy lips covering hers in an act of possession. When he plunged his tongue inside, I silently urged her to bite it off.
He pushed her to the bed and shoved her in. Half-limp still, he was no more ready to please her than I would have been as a man watching their passionless play. Sorrow for Yseult flooded me. What did she think of me watching, I wondered. Surely she knew a word from her would be enough to send me away.
Mark fell over her, too flaccid at first to couple, but hardening as he urgently kneaded Yseult’s breasts and kissed her face. Still, he was too drunk to find his way and after several false attempts, Yseult caught him in exasperation and guided him in.
As he labored over her, eyes closed, panting more with effort than passion, she turned her head and found me. Lips pursed and with no flicker to light the storm of her eyes, she looked more annoyed than angry or ashamed, as though she were trying to conjure memories to help find her own way to passion. Deliberately, eye-to-eye, I shifted. She gasped, in both surprise and fear.
Mark mistook the sound.
“Just… a moment… more… Yseult.” His hips shook in fatigue.
I grinned and made a crude gesture with my thumb.
Yseult stifled a laugh.
“Almost… almost…”
I shifted back.
Mark groaned and jerked once before deflating on top of her. One long shuddering sigh later and he was fast asleep. Yseult rolled him off her with such dexterity I knew she’d had practice before.
I shifted again, just long enough to assure her, “I’ll be back before morning,” and to steal a quick kiss. Then I was hound again, scrambling through the open window in search of Tris, baying as I went.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
YSEULT
“Who knew begetting a royal heir could be such tiresome work?” I whispered to the hound.
True to his word, the hound had been curled at the foot of the king’s bed when I awoke. Mark stirred, nuzzling his beard into my neck, squeezing and pinching at me.
“My knights are jealous, Andret and Hagan especially,” Mark said into my ear. “The rumors they’ve spread… I can well believe Tristan lusts after you—what man wouldn’t? But Tristan loves me. And you… How can I believe such charms have been shared with other men when they’re here to delight me so?”
“What woman could want more?” I ran my palm across his flanks, as intimate a gesture as I could stomach so early in the day.
He caught the hand with a laugh. “Not so soon again, my Lady wench.” He nuzzled closer to my ear and whispered, “It will make it that much more pleasurable next time.”
I nodded, a student absorbing wisdom from her teacher, terribly relieved I wouldn’t be bedded by him in the stark light of day. “Then you do anticipate a next time?” I asked, searching his face with an anxiousness that was all too real.
“That will be for God to decide tomorrow. Well, God and that beast of yours.” He kicked a foot toward the hound who growled. “For what worth it has,” he pushed back a strand of gold from where it had fallen across my cheek, “I hope there will be many next times to come.”
“Your confidence warms my heart,” I told him in way of sincere thanks. “And what now?”
He sighed for things that might have been and levered himself from the bed. Picking my shift up from where it lay heaped on the floor, he handed it to me. “Today you spend cleansing body and soul. Tonight you spend in vigil. I won’t see you again before tomorrow.”
When I’d stood and covered myself, Mark opened the chamber door. “Escort the queen to her bower, then inform Dinas that she’s there,” he told the guard standing without.
“God will prove my innocence,” I assured him, backing my confidence with a smile, before following the guard to my chamber, the hound padding behind.
Alone with the hound, I waited for servants to be called and preparations to be made. “Ritual cleansing and a vigil,” I muttered. “Sounds like my wedding all over again. Only without a beautiful gown at the end.”
The hound laid a comforting paw on my thigh. Without thinking, I leaned over and embraced him, his cold nose nuzzling happily between the pillows of my breasts. I grabbed him away by the ears with a stern look. Those big emerald eyes laughed back. Helpless, I grinned.
“Thank you,” I told him and he cocked his head. “For being with me. I might be terrified otherwise, and yet you’ve made me laugh. And while I should be ashamed to have you spy on me and Mark, having you there make me feel more… pity, I think, for Mark. If he were more competent, though, like…” I hesitated over the word as I tended to keep hound and man separate in my mind, “you or Tris, then having another there of equal compare, I—” Flashes of emerald eyes watching from the dark during nights past intruded like a thunderbolt on a fair summer day. I held his paw between my hands and bowed my head. “I would feel too much sadness for the watcher to take any joy from the other.”
The cold tip of his nose touched my cheek.
Then the handmaids came and shoo-ed the hound away.
CHAPTER FIFTY
YSEULT
My knees, stiff from kneeling all night, ached in the morning when the knights commanded to hold vigil with me led me to the public courtyard. It had rained overnight and all was wet and mud. They had given me a cup of watered wine but nothing more to break fast with. Communion with God might have sustained others condemned to trial, but I credited being able to sleep on my knees with keeping my wits in the morning.
Mark stood in the center of the muddy field, the bishop who’d married us beside him and the hound sitting at his feet. Ringed close about were the faces of knights and nobles I vaguely recognized. Further out, serfs and tradesmen with no duties so early in the day had also come to watch.
When he saw me, the hound—Des, I vowed to call him in whatever his form, for he was all and always one with the hound now—loped to me, the plume of his tail waving in delight.
“Do not touch him,” the bishop warned.
What? Would I be teaching him tricks to taint the ordeal in the time it took to cross between chapel and king?
Des twined himself around me as I walked. Apparently him touching m
e was allowed as there was no admonishment otherwise from the bishop.
I wasn’t sure what Des was playing at when he tangled himself so thoroughly between my legs that I tripped over him.
Humiliation?
Something more sinister?
My stomach knotted in suspicion as I fell.
Strong arms caught me in a full-body embrace, saving me from landing in a puddle of mud.
“Gramercy.” I offered thanks to my benefactor, the word coming spontaneously before I even looked to see who he was. He wore the long cloak and hood of a pilgrim, what little I could see of his face grimed with days, perhaps weeks, of dust and mud.
Nothing, though, could muddy those seductive, earth-brown eyes. He winked one them as he righted me.
Tris!
Releasing me with the greatest reluctance, he ducked back among the onlookers as I and Des—the hound remarkably contrite now—walked on.
After the inner circle was thanked for their participation as witnesses, the proceedings were introduced with much Latin and bowing.
Why did men make simple justice so intimidating?
“Are you sure you want to go through with this?” Mark whispered. “It seems as though the hound has already turned against you.”
“Things aren’t always what they seem, Your Grace. Else we would not be here at all today.”
The bishop faced me. “The crown accuses you of infidelity to the king and betrayal of your vows to Cornwall. Do you understand these charges?”
Unlike before, this time I answered, “Yes.”
“And how do you counter? Keeping in mind you swear your answer before God and king.”
God knew my answer well enough. It was the bishop I needed to convince. I chose my words precisely that I might not offend God with any lie. “I swear that never has man born of Eve held me in his arms, save for King Mark”—I laughed lightly—“and yon pilgrim there.” I nodded toward the man who had saved me so publicly from falling in the mud.
Queen's Heart: An Arthurian Paranormal Romance (Arthurian Hearts Book 2) Page 20
