by Speer, Flora
“How nice of you to prepare this for me, though I fear I have little appetite this morning,” Catherine said, spying the tray of food. Looking more closely at Margaret, she asked, “What has happened? There's more noise than usual in the great hall. Never tell me your father has found us?”
“No,” Margaret said, “but your brother has.”
“My – Arden is here?” Under other circumstances Margaret would have been amused to see how quickly Catherine recovered from her fit of coughing. Her eyes began to sparkle. “How wonderful! Why didn't you wake me at once?”
“It was very late at night,” Margaret said. “Arden was tired after riding through the storm. He wanted only to rest.”
“Where is he?” Catherine cried. “Is he below, in the hall? I must go to him.”
“As far as I know, he is sleeping still,” Margaret said. “He is in the lord's chamber. I moved into one of the guest rooms,” she added hastily. She rose from the bench to stand near the long windows. She made her back rigid and kept her chin high, anticipating the teasing remarks that Catherine was sure to make, and wishing this first, happy piece of news was all she was obliged to tell her dearest friend.
“Oh, Margaret, do you mean Arden burst in on you and wakened you from sleep?” Catherine cried, laughing at the thought. “How naughty of him. And how generous of you to leave your warm bed.”
“The bed is his,” Margaret said, feeling a telltale blush begin in her cheeks. “It is Arden's indisputable right to sleep in that room.”
“I know it is but, still, he could have waited until morning to tell you so,” Catherine said. Her laughter degenerated into another burst of coughing, which lasted for several minutes. When it was over, Catherine became serious. “Why that solemn look? Don't you see, this is the best thing that could have happened? Now you may forget any lingering fears about your father forcing you to return home. Arden will help us.”
“I do not understand how you think he is going to do that,” Margaret said, confused by the changing direction of Catherine's thoughts.
“Neither do I,” said a deep, masculine voice from the doorway of the lord's chamber.
“Arden!” Catherine cried, flinging herself at him. “I thought never to see you again, my dearest, most beloved brother!”
“Most beloved, indeed,” said Arden, “since I am your only brother.”
Catherine laughed, her flushed face glowing with happiness. Her arms were wrapped around Arden's neck, her cheek was pressed against his. After a moment of hesitation Arden put his own arms around his sister, hugging her and patting her shoulder as if to reassure her that he was truly there, safe and well. He kissed Catherine's cheek and stroked her red-gold hair which, as usual, was threatening to come undone from its loose braid. For a brief while, with his eyes closed and a tender smile on his lips, he resembled the carefree young man he had once been.
Margaret watched him holding his laughing, weeping, overjoyed sister, and she felt a pain in her heart for all that Arden had missed by his prolonged absence from home and family.
Then Arden took Catherine by the shoulders, set her slightly apart from him, and regarded her out of eyes in which no trace of emotion remained. And the joy slowly ebbed from Catherine's face as she looked back at him, for Arden was all darkness. The tunic he wore was made of unornamented gray wool as deep as charcoal, his straight, short hair was black, his face was darkly tanned. Seen against the rest of his somber, powerful figure, his blue eyes were startling in their icy paleness.
“Now, Catherine,” Arden said in a low, coolly frightening voice, “tell me why you are at Bowen. I also want to know what you meant when you spoke about Margaret's father forcing her to return home.”
“It’s all rather complicated,” Catherine said. Then she added brightly, “but I am sure you will understand and agree once we have explained, and you will want to help Margaret, just as I did.”
“I can see you haven't changed in all the years I've been gone,” Arden said, frowning. “What wild scheme have you entangled yourself in, dear sister?” He drew the last two words out, making them sound almost like a curse.
“Do not blame Catherine,” Margaret said, unable to bear the wounded look on her friend's face. “Except for a few last-minute details the entire plan was mine, not hers, and Catherine agreed to help me only after I beseeched her in the name of our long friendship.”
“No, Margaret, I won't allow you to take all the blame.” Catherine left Arden's side and crossed the solar to where Margaret stood, to put an arm about her waist. “Aldis and I saw and heard evidence enough of what your father planned to do to you and we agreed that we could not allow it. If there is blame to be placed, we three will share it equally. While Aldis and I live, you will not stand alone.”
“Blame for what?” Arden demanded, his frown growing more pronounced and his eyes colder with every moment that passed.
“I wish to enter a convent,” Margaret stated, very firmly. “I will become a nun.”
“Will you?” Arden murmured. Seeing the way she was dressed, he could well believe it. Margaret's loose, dark blue woolen gown covered her from throat to wrists to ankles, and the edges of her white linen underdress that showed at neckline and wrists confirmed the impression of an angular, rigid female who was untouched by worldly passions. Margaret's hair was completely hidden under a tight, white wimple that only added to her apparent severe modesty. Were it not for the faint whiff of perfume that drifted across the room to tickle his nose when she moved to lay an arm around Catherine's shoulders, Arden might have convinced himself that Margaret was not the same woman he had found in his bed.
The woman in his bed had been all soft, delicate curves and smooth, supple skin. Her hair had been a glorious erotic enticement sliding through his hands and across his body. Her complex, flowery perfume had roused him to a desire that still craved fulfillment in spite of his efforts to tamp it down and forget about it. Thinking about the Lady Margaret who had graced his bed, Arden became painfully aware that he had not succeeded in eliminating that desire, and he was filled with shame for what it meant.
The Lady Margaret who stood before the solar window with the wintery morning light shining harshly upon her face was too tall to be attractive. She was almost as tall as Arden. And she was much too thin for beauty, with little indication of breasts or other feminine curves showing beneath the heavy fabric of her gown.
Margaret's face was pale and her lips were pinched. It was the face of a cold-hearted, man-hating spinster and Arden could not imagine what had happened to induce such a creature to flee from her father. Or, for that matter, why Catherine should care enough about Margaret to help her in her flight.
All Arden wanted from his time at Bowen Manor was peace and quiet and a chance to think without having to consider the needs of other people. It was why he had left Tristan and Isabel so precipitously. Now that he was at Bowen, he did not want to visit with his sister, to be forced to respond to her inevitable questions about his years away from England, or to have to listen to her descriptions of her own life. Even less did he want to see Aldis or to have to answer her queries.
And, most assuredly, Arden did not want to have to deal with Lady Margaret and her family problems. It seemed to him that his best defense against those problems would be an attack, not on Margaret herself, but on Catherine. The tactic would divert both women.
“Where is your husband?” Arden demanded of his sister. “Has he agreed to this mad scheme of aiding a fugitive from her parent's rightful wrath?”
“I am not wed,” Catherine replied, staring at him with wide eyes, as if she could not believe the way he was speaking to her. “I have been waiting – I mean, I still live at Wortham, with Father.”
“Tell me, Catherine,” Arden said, glaring at his sister, “has our father countenanced your presence at Bowen with this – with this lady?” he ended, his gaze caught again by Margaret's dignified posture and by her sober clothes. The contrast between her
present appearance and her reaction to his caresses on the previous night left him bewildered.
“Arden, please listen to us before you begin to scold,” Catherine begged. “Margaret and Aldis and I have good reasons for what we have done.”
“What, exactly, did you do?” Arden asked.
Because Catherine succumbed to another bout of coughing Margaret did most of the talking. She insisted on taking the major share of the blame, though before the story was done it was obvious to Arden that Catherine had acted as an eager participant once her initial scruples were vanquished and her mind was made up. So, apparently, had Aldis.
Left to herself, Margaret no doubt would have gone directly to St. Helfritha's convent, from where she would most likely have been dragged home by her father and her brother and forcibly wed to Lord Adhemar, just as Catherine had predicted. Thus, it was largely his sister's doing that the women were ensconced at Bowen, to chatter and irritate Arden and get in his way when he wanted only to be left alone.
He found Catherine's unmarried state a surprise and could not understand why his father had been so remiss in finding a husband for her. On the other hand, Arden was more than a bit shocked to learn that Margaret had been married for ten years. She did not have the demeanor of a woman who had ever found pleasure in a man's arms. Arden was experienced enough to discern that there remained something virginal about Margaret, an essential part of her still untouched by her late husband.
“What of the obedience due to your father?” Arden demanded of Margaret.
“I no longer feel any sense of duty to him,” she retorted in a bitter tone. “He has broken his sworn oath to me. Thus, I cannot trust any new promises he makes. I am determined to take my future into my own hands.”
“Indeed?” Startled by her proud attitude, Arden regarded her more closely. Margaret gazed back at him without flinching.
Arden did not know any of the noblemen in the tale just told to him, but from his sister's vivid descriptions of them he could easily guess what Margaret's male relatives were like. With little effort he could guess what Margaret's married life had been like, too. No wonder she wanted to become a nun.
And yet, when he had first discovered her asleep in his bed, she had been so warm and sweet, so responsive in his arms. It was the strange contrast between this day's nun-like virtue and the previous night's eager warmth that intrigued Arden, and that roused in him tensions and emotions he did not want to have. Those tensions resulted in a rising irritation.
“You have no right to involve my family in your schemes,” he said to Margaret, making no attempt to hide his annoyance. “When your father learns where you are hiding, he and Lord Adhemar will join forces to make war on my father. The deaths that ensue will be on your conscience.”
She did not cringe or go pale at his words. She only raised her chin a notch and then grew a bit more stiff and still. Arden was forced to admire her courage, however much he disapproved of her actions. When she spoke again he also took note of her intelligence, for it was obvious she had thought through the matter of his family being drawn into her affairs.
“Only a few souls here at Bowen know who I am,” Margaret said. “If they do not inform my father, then he will never know where I took temporary refuge. I do not ask for your help, Arden, only that you will not hinder what I wish to do. I promise, as soon as the weather clears so it is possible to travel, I will leave Bowen. I will go from here alone and I will never reveal that I have been here. Your family's honor will be safe.”
“You will leave today,” Arden said, inexplicably infuriated by her calmness. The woman was rousing too many unwelcome sensations. He wanted her gone, so he could stop thinking about her, so he could sink back into the familiar morass of guilt and apathy that had consumed him for so long. He would not allow himself to admit that if what Margaret said about her father breaking his oath to her was true, then she had just cause to defy the man, though she stood in sore need of a champion to see her safely installed in whatever convent she chose to enter.
Arden considered himself to be outside the law, so he had no right to judge Margaret's actions. Nor was he the man to be her champion. He only wanted her gone from his house.
“Margaret will not leave Bowen!” Catherine cried. “Arden, what has happened to change you so? I do not know you anymore.”
“You have not known me for more than ten years,” Arden said. Tight-lipped, coldly controlled, he glared first at his sister and then at Margaret. “You will leave today, Lady Margaret,” he repeated, “or I will go.”
“Are you mad?” Catherine shouted at him. “Only glance out the window and you will see that no one is going anywhere.”
Thinking to tell her he would have no difficulty in doing what he pleased, Arden stepped to the nearest window. Outside, the snow was piled high – up to a tall man's waist, Arden judged – and more was rapidly descending from clouds that seemed to hold an unending supply. Beyond the palisade the branches of fir trees were bent to the ground beneath the weight of the snow they bore. The broken branches of other, leafless trees hung aloft among the bare, swaying treetops or lay fallen on the snow beneath the trees, there to be quickly covered with more white.
In such a storm travel was plainly impossible. No man could walk through snow so deep; no horse was strong enough to break a path through it for more than a few steps. Certainly, no woman ought to attempt to brave such weather. Arden drew back from the window to stare at the two women in silent frustration.
He was snowbound, perhaps for days or weeks, trapped in his own house with his conversation-loving sister, the cousin he wanted to avoid completely, and a would-be nun whose enchanting perfume and well-hidden body were leading him along paths he did not want to tread.
Arden had come to Bowen seeking a place where he could nurse his guilt and his sorrow. He was beginning to think he had found his Purgatory instead. Or, perhaps, his own personal Hell.
* * * * *
Margaret tried not to look at Arden, but she discovered to her dismay that she could not help herself. His dark-clothed form and compelling eyes drew her attention as if by magic. Each time she looked at him, she recalled the touch of his naked body next to hers, the sensation of his hands moving gently across her soft flesh. She remembered the sight of him by candlelight, clad only in his linen shirt. She felt weak in the knees, her breasts began to ache, and the warmth she had never experienced before Arden touched her on the previous night began to unfold deep inside her once again.
She warned herself not to look directly at him, for if his cold, calculating eyes met hers, he would surely detect her every emotion. She kept her chin up high and shifted her gaze a little, so it was focused on the wall behind him. There she stood, unmoving, awaiting his judgment, uncertain whether he would turn her out into the snow, or not.
“You may stay until the weather clears,” he said after a long silence.
“Thank you, my lord,” Margaret murmured, still not meeting his eyes.
“I knew you would do what is right,” Catherine said to her brother. “Perhaps you are not so greatly changed, after all.”
Arden did not respond. Turning aside from the women, he noticed the tray of food intended for Catherine and went to it. He poured a large cup of wine, swallowed it in two gulps, and poured himself another.
“My lord,” Margaret said with a sigh, “I do not wish to raise a second unpleasant subject when we have just resolved the first one, but there is a matter which was brought to my attention earlier this morning by your squire, Michael. It is a subject that must be dealt with at once.”
“What subject is that, Lady Margaret?” Arden did not look at her. Bending over the tray, he cut himself a wedge of cheese and began to eat it.
“It is about the other guests,” Margaret said, trying to put deep meaning into her voice. When Arden said nothing, she added, to prod him into speaking, “The guests who are shortly to arrive.”
“What other guests?” Catherine joined
Arden beside the tray of food. She broke a piece of bread from the loaf. Holding the bread in one hand, she looked from Margaret to Arden as if assessing the tension between them. “Well, it's plain to see, I should have been out of bed long ago. What have I missed, Arden? Who is coming to Bowen next? Is it anyone I know?”
Margaret saw the gleam of hope in Catherine's eyes and knew her friend must be told immediately that Tristan was on his way to Bowen, and that he was bringing a wife with him.
“My lord, please,” Margaret said, knowing she sounded desperate. “You must be the one to tell your sister.”
“Tell me what?” Catherine asked.
“Arden,” Margaret said, abandoning formal manners in her need to convince him to do what he obviously did not want to do, “think back to the time when we were all young, all fostered together at Cliffmore Castle. Remember our youthful hopes and dreams and be gentle with Catherine. I know you can be gentle, if only you will.” She made herself meet his eyes, praying he would see the plea in them and treat his sister with compassion.
“Arden? Margaret?” With one hand still holding the uneaten bread and the other hand at her mouth to hold back an incipient cough, Catherine looked from her brother to her friend. “You are frightening me.”
“There is nothing to fear,” Arden said. “Lady Margaret is correct when she says you must be told at once. She is concerned that you will be disturbed or hurt by what I will say. In a few days, depending on the weather and the state of the roads, Tristan will arrive. I left him in Portsmouth, to see to our baggage. And to the welfare of his wife.”
“Tristan is coming here? He is alive and well and home in England again?” For a moment Catherine's face shone with a radiant happiness. But almost immediately the color drained away. “With his wife? Tristan has married?” She choked on the words and tears welled in her eyes. The piece of bread dropped from her hand to the floor, unnoticed.
