In his arms is where she belonged.
CHAPTER EIGHT
It was unfortunate for Juston that Emera still didn’t feel the same way.
He began to suspect that when he felt slapping to his face. He ignored it. He was enjoying a deep and lusty kiss with the woman when a fist suddenly hit in him the throat. That forced him to release his hold on her, grabbing his throat as he struggled to breathe. In the process of her fight, however, Emera ended up on her bum. As Juston drew in a great gasping breath, she scrambled to her feet, ran for the smaller chamber, and slammed the door. The sound of the bolt being thrown filled the chamber.
Juston could hardly believe she’d run from him. Infuriated, he went to the door, hand still on his throat, and rattled the latch with his free hand. It was clearly bolted, but instead of yelling at her through the door, he was going to show that he was resourceful, too. He went to the hearth, which was smoking heavily and giving off a great deal of heat, and used one of the big ash shovels to move the peat aside, enough so that he could create a passageway through the hearth and into her chamber on the other side.
Emera, seeing what he was doing from the other side, grabbed her own ash shovel. As much as he would shovel the peat away, she would shovel it back again. That went on two or three times until he took his ash shovel and hit hers, causing her to drop it. She shrieked but pick the shovel back up again, in time to smack his shovel as he tried to move the peat aside again. Soon enough, they were dueling through the flaming peat, each one trying to hit the shovel out of the other’s hand.
Juston had managed to hit her hands a couple of times, undoubtedly bruising her, but she wasn’t giving up. It was a trait he’d admired in her but now found tiresome. Finally, he stopped battling her all together and scowled at her through the flames.
“This is how you treat the man who holds your life in his very hands?” he demanded. “What is the matter with you, woman? Are you completely daft?”
Emera still had the shovel in her hands, terrified he was going to charge through the hearth, flames and all. “I will not let you degrade me,” she hissed. “I told you I have never known a man’s touch but, still, you force yourself upon me. I will not let you!”
Juston sighed heavily. “Do you ever wish to marry?”
She faltered, confused by his question in the midst of their argument. “I… I do not know. Why does that matter?”
“Because the way you behave, you will never know a man’s touch because no man will want to touch you. You have the beauty of an angel but the disposition of a shrew!”
She was incensed. “And you have the manners of a barbarian!”
He jabbed a finger at her. “If you were more agreeable, there is no telling what I would do for you. I might even give you your chamber back. I might even let you and your sister sleep in comfortable beds. You understand that you belong to me, do you not? I do not have to ask your permission for anything. I can just as easily take it!”
Her insults turned to fear. “If you try, I… I shall kill myself!”
He threw up his hands. “Good!” he boomed. “Then I will no longer have to deal with your foolishness. Did you not stop to think that I want to kiss you not because I’m trying to rob you of your innocence, but simply because you are beautiful? Because I find you alluring and desirable?”
Emera came to a sudden halt, her eyes suddenly wide at him. She’d never heard such words spoken to her, at least not honestly spoken to her. She could tell, simply from his tone, that he was being completely truthful. She was astonished.
“Me… desirable?” she stammered.
When Juston realized what he’d said, he felt like a fool. He’d spoken thoughts he had only intended to keep to himself, ever. He certainly hadn’t meant to shout them at her. But something had compelled him to spit them out, shouting at her across a smoking hearth, and he’d angrily yelled things he shouldn’t have yelled.
Vastly embarrassed, he abruptly stood up and threw the ash shovel to the floor. He had to get out of there, to get clear of her overwhelming presence. Something about the woman made him lose his control and he didn’t like that in the least. He was almost to the stairwell when the door to the smaller chamber flew open.
“Wait!” Emera called after him. “Please… please do not leave.”
“I must.”
“Nay,” she begged. “Please… you must understand… please, do not go. I do not mean to be ungrateful but I cannot allow you to grab me whenever you please.”
He came to an unsteady halt, facing her with much anger in his expression. “You do understand that I do not have to ask you if I want to touch you.”
“But I will not allow you to treat me like a… a whore.”
“You are what I say you are,” he snapped. “If I want you to be my whore, then you shall be.”
“Is that what you want?”
Now, it was his turn to falter. Her question had been soft, nearly painful. It shook him. “I did not say that!”
He was yelling at her but he wasn’t leaving the corridor, at least not yet. He lingered there as if they had unfinished business, unspoken words hanging in the air between them. Emera sensed that the great conqueror of Bowes, the man whose word was obeyed without question, had something more to say to her. He was still intimidating and imposing, but there was something more there… something softer, perhaps perplexed and seeking.
Was it possible he was bewildered somehow? It was as if he didn’t even know what he wanted or how he wanted to treat her. He was trying to be kind, but kindness wasn’t in his nature. It was completely alien to him. In that moment, something told Emera that there was far more going on in the man’s mind than she could understand. Something that had to do with her. She could tell that simply by the way he was looking at her.
At that moment, she started to look at him a bit differently as well.
“I have spent the past two years fighting off Brey de la Roarke,” she said, her voice considerably softer. “It is simply the way I have become accustomed to reacting to a man who tries to grab me as you have done. I have spent two years fending off unwanted advances and… do you really think I am beautiful?”
She asked the question as if she could hardly believe he meant what he said. But Juston was ashamed, feeling terribly uncomfortable as he stood at the top of the stairs. Nearly everything within him was willing him down those stairs to get away from her, but something – a very small but powerful something – was holding him back. He cleared his throat softly.
“Do you not even know that?” he asked quietly.
Emera shook her head even though he couldn’t see her. “I… I do not,” she said, taking a step towards him. Her heart was racing and she could hardly breathe. She had no idea why she was feeling this way. All she knew was that it had everything to do with what Juston had said to her. “My father told me I was. Brey told me I was, but coming from them… I am sure my father told me that because I was his daughter and Brey simply wanted to… well, I have told you what he wanted to do. I have never had anyone other than my family tell me I was pleasing to look at.”
Juston turned to look at her. Her black hair was mussed, her face pale, but the blue eyes were alive. Looking at her did something to his soul.
“You are more than pleasing,” he said simply. “You are beautiful.” He turned back around, facing the stairwell. “I have duties to attend to and you should return to the wounded. You may leave your possessions in that room, for I will tell the knights they are not to use that chamber. You and your sister may sleep in that chamber instead of in the cold vault.”
Emera was truly astonished. “But why would you do this? You told me your men were to take the chambers in the keep. I do not understand why….”
He cut her off. “Why must you question everything I say?”
Emera shut her mouth, realizing he was correct. She had, indeed, questioned nearly everything he said to her since the beginning of their association. Moreover, she d
idn’t want him to change his mind. Juston sounded like he was defeated somehow. He appeared to relent his stance of a captor to a captive. It was so very strange coming from a man who had shown nothing but arrogant disregard for her since the moment they had first met. Now, he was showing some compassion, far more than she’d ever expected.
Emera didn’t say a word as he descended the stairs and disappeared from her view, wondering why he was suddenly so subdued and wondering why she felt guilty about it.
Giving him time to descend the stairs and get clear of them, in pensive silence, she followed.
By noon, the clouds had bunched up overhead and by early afternoon, freezing rain was, once again, pummeling the land. It made for genuinely slow and miserable travel as Christopher, David, and Marcus had made their way north to Cotherstone Castle.
The village of Cotherstone was set to the southwest of the castle, which sat on a rise overlooking the small Balder River, a tributary of the River Tees. It was a bustling village with a good coach inn that was popular with travelers called The Lion and the Lamb. Christopher, David, and Marcus had been to the inn before, at various times, since it was on a major road through the Pennines from Scotland. In fact, many a knight coming down from the north had stopped at the inn which was famous for its collection of “talented” wenches.
The castle was secondary to the fame of the inn, to be truthful. The castle was nothing more than a garrison for the Bishop of Durham, holding the road from the north. At any given time, it housed no more than two or three hundred men. It was really rather small as garrisons went. But it was a strategic location and that was why Juston wanted it. The more of a foothold he had in Durham, the less of a foothold Henry had.
Traveling through the morning in freezing rain had been a miserable experience for the knights. A trip that should have taken an hour at the most took far more than that. The rain had turned their mail into sheets of ice, heavy and frozen, and the horses were spent, exhausted from the cold weather and terrible traveling conditions. The main road they were traveling on was flooded out and they’d had to find a detour which took them far out of their way. The conditions of travel were, simply, awful.
The wind was picking up now, whipping the freezing rain straight at them. As the trio neared Cotherstone, Marcus, who had been in the lead, pulled his horse to a halt and waited for Christopher and David to catch up with him.
“Do you know what I have been thinking?” he asked, his gaze on the town ahead, visible through the heavy foliage that lined the road. “I have been thinking that we must be smart about our reconnaissance of Cotherstone Castle. In truth, on a day like today, with the weather as it is, do we believe they will have patrols out? We’ve not seen evidence of any patrols. Only a fool would be out in weather like this.”
Christopher, with ice forming on his trim beard, looked off to the west where the dead landscape gently rolled. “Then count us among the foolish,” he muttered. “Cotherstone Castle is nothing more than a pele tower surrounded by a wall. There is no moat but there is a river to the north. I am not sure what we will see of the castle or her level of alert considering what happened at Bowes, but we have come this far. Let us separate here and converge on the castle from different directions to see what we can see.”
Marcus shook his head. “I have a better idea.”
David was interested, mostly because he didn’t want to be crawling through the frozen tundra, spying on Cotherstone from icy trees. “I am listening,” he said.
Marcus pushed his helm up on his head, scratching at his forehead. “We all know of The Lion and the Lamb,” he said. “It is a popular place with travelers as well as knights. I have been there a few times myself. I would be willing to wager that since it is well known, and many travelers stop there, then mayhap the men of Cotherstone populate it as well.”
Christopher looked at him, quickly understanding what he was leading to. “Exactly,” he agreed. “The men of Cotherstone more than likely haunt the place on a regular basis and it is well known that The Lion and the Lamb has a selection of women for a man’s comfort.”
David caught on as well. “Then we find a woman that knows something of the men at Cotherstone,” he said as if he’d just had a great epiphany. “Women cannot keep their mouths shut. They will speak freely of what they know of the men of Cotherstone.”
Marcus nodded. “I suspect we might find out much more of Cotherstone from the tavern wenches than from trying to gather intelligence ourselves,” he said. “In fact, if we hang around the inn long enough, men from Cotherstone might even come in. We can pretend to be Henry supporters and there is no telling what they will discuss with us.”
While David liked that idea a great deal, Christopher wasn’t so sure. “If they have heard of the siege of Bowes, then it is possible the garrison commander has bottled up the castle and is not letting anyone in or out,” he said. “But I do think visiting the inn and seeing what we can extract from the women is an excellent idea. Besides… I’m cold and hungry. I have no desire to remain out in this weather any longer.”
The decision was made. The knights spurred the horses onward, entering the village of Cotherstone. They rode past closed businesses and homes, heading to the heart of the town where the popular inn was. As they sighted the two-storied stone structure, with two heavily smoking chimneys, the first thing they did was locate shelter for the horses, in this case in a livery across the street. It was a long, rather slender stone building with a low ceiling, smelling strongly of hay and animals.
The old man and his son who ran the livery were more than happy to tend the heavy-boned horses with the generous coinage Christopher paid them. The knights collected their saddlebags, waiting until the tack was removed from the horses and they were bedded down with plenty of grass and grain before leaving because the horses could be excitable at times. The horses were fed oats, usually reserved for sheep, which they loved. The knights quit the livery to the sounds of munching, happy horses.
The rain had picked up as they crossed the road and entered the smoky, warm establishment that smelled heavily of sweating bodies. It was not particularly crowded at midday and they easily found a table near the hearth that gave them a prime view of the entire common room. They settled down for a good, long stay, slinging saddlebags across other chairs, and pulling the table closer to the hearth. Their commotion attracted attention. Like a moth to the flame, the serving wenches began gravitating in their direction.
There were worse looking knights in England but between Marcus, David, and Christopher, there were few that could be considered more handsome. With Marcus’ black hair and deep blue eyes, he was an exceptionally attractive man and the first wench to the table focused on him. Big-breasted, with curly dark hair, she smiled openly at Marcus as if no one else in the room existed.
“Stopping to rest on this dreadful day, m’lord?” she asked, leaning in to him. “I’ve got several things to keep you warm. Anything you like at all.”
It was a hugely leading question because she clearly meant herself. Marcus, who could handle an aggressive woman quite ably, smoothly handled her proposal.
“Warmed wine will do for now,” he said. “But do not go far. I may require something more.”
Her smile brightened. “My pleasure, m’lord.”
“And send some of your friends over here. My comrades require warmth as well.”
As she sashayed away from the table, Marcus looked at Christopher and lifted his eyebrows in a rather suggestive manner. Christopher bit off a grin but David couldn’t quite hide his; he lowered his head with a smile on his face, focusing on removing his gloves as three more women approached the table.
It was open season on knights.
David suddenly found himself with a petite blonde hanging over him, her long hair tickling his face. “Welcome to The Lion and the Lamb, m’lord,” she said in a squeaky little voice. “Can I bring you anything? Anything at all?”
David had to pull back to look at
the woman because she was literally hanging over him. She was a cute little thing. He was immediately interested.
“My friend has ordered warmed wine,” he said. “What else do you have for us back in the kitchen that is hot and satisfying?”
It was a sexually charged question and the young woman giggled. “There is plenty in this place that is hot and satisfying, m’lord. You need only ask.”
“I’ll take food for now. We’ll speak of the rest afterwards.”
She nodded, enticed with the thought of spending some time with her naked flesh against his. “There is some excellent stew and fresh bread,” she said. “I will bring you some.”
David grinned, reaching up to touch her cheek as she giggled again and ran off. Meanwhile, there were two fairly curvy wenches who were on either side of Christopher as he removed his gloves. He wasn’t much interested in being smooth or glib with women. Usually, he was quite serious and focused on his knightly duties, which made him something of a challenge for a woman trying to attract him. As he pulled off a glove, one of the women took hold of it and yanked while he extracted his hand.
“My thanks,” he muttered as she set the glove on the table. When he saw that she was trying to help him with the other one, he simply let her. That was the extent of his flirting at the moment. “Again, my thanks.”
The woman smiled as she took the gloves and set them on the hearth to warm. “It is a pleasure, m’lord,” she said. “Your friends are having warmed wine and food brought to them. What can we do for you, m’lord?”
Christopher looked at the pair; they weren’t unattractive, but he simply wasn’t one to arbitrarily bed women. He was far more selective with the women he pursued. Still, they had come to this inn for a purpose. He forced himself to play the game.
“You can bring me warmed wine as well and some food,” he told them. “And then you can sit and talk to me. It has been a long time since I’ve had such lovely companionship.”
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