A Warrior's Kiss

by Margaret Moore

  “Oh, come you! I just asked a simple question.”

  “Why don’t you ask Mair?”

  “I will. And then I’ll ask her when her baby’s due.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “Baby?” Trystan demanded in a harsh whisper, not willing to believe this could be true, or if it was, that Mair would not have told him.

  “Aye. At least I think she’s with child. She’s got that glow to her face. I asked her about it, but she didn’t—” Dylan paused and a puzzled expression came to his handsome face. “She’s just having a baby. It’s not as if she’s done murder.”

  “Did she tell you she was with child?”

  “No.” Dylan got a warning look in his eyes. “You’re not going to be nasty about this, are you? I know you don’t approve of the way she chooses to live. Anwyl, I should have kept my mouth shut.”

  “Anwyl, yes, you should,” Trystan said, getting to his feet and glaring at his cousin. “If Mair was with child, she’d tell you, wouldn’t she? You two are thick as thieves. You always have been. If she’s not, how can you talk like this when you’re not sure. You’re worse than a gossiping old crone, you are!”

  “No need to get so—”

  “You’d better keep your mouth shut about babies or suspicions of babies unless she tells you she’s with child for certain. Good night!”

  With that, Trystan set down his mug with a bang, then marched off toward his chamber.

  Dylan watched him go as he leaned back in his chair. A wry smile twisted his sensuous lips.

  “Well, well, well,” he muttered softly.

  Then he raised his mug in a salute in the direction of Angharad’s house. “Well, Angharad, I am going to have to beg your pardon. All this time I thought you were having your own little jest at Trystan’s expense. Now I find it is not so impossible, after all.”

  “Mair!” a voice whispered in Mair’s ear as she slept.

  She awakened in an instant. Opening her eyes, she sat up and peered in the deep darkness at the man standing beside her bed.

  “Trystan?” she whispered. “What in God’s name—?”

  “Hush! Arthur sleeps above, does he not?”

  “Aye, he does. What do you want?”

  As she waited for his answer, she realized he wore no cloak, only his usual dark tunic and breeches, a heavy belt about his narrow waist. What made her heartbeat quicken, though, was his look of impassioned determination. “I need to talk to you. Come with me. Please.”

  “In the middle of the—?”

  “Yes!”

  He sounded so desperate, she made no protest as she climbed from the bed and wrapped her blanket over her thin shift. “We can go to the brewery.”

  She went to the glowing embers of the hearth and lit one of her candles in a brass holder. Candles were expensive and she reserved them for rare and special occasions.

  She sensed this was just such a time. And she wanted to see his face more clearly.

  Clutching her blanket with one hand and holding the candle aloft with the other, she regarded him studiously.

  He looked as serious as death.

  “Here, take this while I get my shoes,” she ordered in a hushed voice as she handed him the candle.

  Their hands touched for the briefest of moments, and she struggled to ignore the sensations even that aroused while she sought her shoes and slipped them on. The stiffness of the leather against her feet seemed to remind her that this was no dream, but an unexpected reality.

  “Now we can go,” she said.

  He nodded and led the way, and she closed the door softly behind her.

  Outside, the night was chilly, and the moon and stars obscured by scudding clouds. The branches of the trees in the wood nearby bent and moaned with the wind. Ahead, Trystan cupped the fluttering, feeble flame with his hand.

  She had to nearly run to keep up with him, yet dared not ask him to slow down. She didn’t want to make more noise than necessary at this hour of the night.

  After they entered the brewery, he set the candle on the top of a pile of small casks, then, motionless, watched her enter and close the door behind her.

  The brewery smelled of ale and honey and the spices she used for braggot and mead, a homey smell that usually comforted her. Tonight, it only seemed to remind her of who she was, and the higher status of the man facing her.

  Despite the difference in their rank and all that had passed between them, Trystan was still the most attractive, compelling, honorable man in the world to her, a man whose embrace she craved with an almost physical hunger.

  Yet now his brow was wrinkled with concern, his mouth a grim line, his eyes in shadow. “Dylan says you are with child.”

  She bit back a curse. It was too soon even for her to be absolutely certain, despite Angharad’s firm belief. Angharad must have broken her word to keep quiet, and that realization added to her anger and dismay. “Why does he think that?”

  “He claims he can tell by your ‘glow.”’

  “Nothing else?”

  “Nothing else,” he confirmed.

  “Then why would you believe him?”

  “Because he knows women well. And others also claim to be able to do the same. My father’s old nurse said she could tell the day after a child was conceived by the look in a woman’s eyes, and she was never wrong.”

  “You would credit Dylan with that same skill, then.”

  “Aye, I would.”

  “I don’t.”

  Trystan’s expression grew anxious in a way she had never seen before. “If you were with child, and the child mine, you would tell me, wouldn’t you?” he asked softly.

  She could not lie to him, not with him looking at her that way. “It’s early days yet to be sure.”

  Trystan lowered his head as if deep in thought. Or shame.

  “Would you want to know, Trystan?”

  He raised his head. “What?”

  “Would you want to know? I do not have to say, especially if doing so would cause trouble.”

  His eyes grew as hard as flint. “If I am the father of a child, I want to know.”

  “Under any circumstances?” she pressed, determined to be certain.

  “Under any circumstances,” he grimly affirmed.

  “I have not been with Ivor since my last woman’s time, so if I am with child, he is yours.”

  “He?”

  “Angharad says I am to have a son.”

  “A son!” His expression softened. “Our son.”

  Oh, how her heart soared to see that look! “Yes, our son, Trystan,” she agreed softly. “I will have another baby after hoping for so long.”

  His visage hardened, reminding her that he came from a race of warriors. It was a look to strike fear in the heart of an enemy, and to make her suddenly afraid. “I am betrothed to another. The contract has been written and signed.”

  Confused by this change in him, she responded with hasty assurance. “You need not claim him outright, Trystan. I will understand if you would rather not. As long as you make some provision for him, in secret if need be, I will be content.”

  Trystan’s harsh visage lightened a little. “If you bear me a son, I will claim him.”

  “Truly?”

  Sir Trystan DeLanyea drew himself up proudly. “I will claim him, and he shall have what rights and privileges he deserves as my son.”

  She had to ask. “Under Welsh rules, or Norman?”

  His gaze faltered, and he became again the boy she had known. The boy she had fallen in love with, and still loved.

  “An inheritance and title don’t matter so much, Trystan.”

  “They do to me—and they do to the Normans.”

  She straightened her shoulders and spoke frankly, as one warrior to another. “I say it must be so.”

  She went to him and took his hands in hers. “Trystan,” she said firmly, “you know Lady Rosamunde better than I, but do you honestly believe she will not begrudge a child of ours anythi
ng, even to the air he will breathe? Do you not see that she will do all in her considerable power—and that of her family—to destroy him? Anwyl, Trystan, you wanted to be wed into a powerful family, and so you will be. Now you must reap what you have sown.”

  His grip tightened as he regarded her just as steadily. “And do you honestly believe that I would let anyone—anyone—cause harm to a child of mine?”

  He let her hands drop as he stepped further back into the shadows. “If it comes clear that you bear my child, come to me and tell me. I will acknowledge him—or her—as an honest man should. As a Welshman should.”

  She sighed, knowing he would keep his word. “Thank you, Trystan. What of Lady Rosamunde?”

  “I will deal with her,” he said grimly.

  “How?”

  “Let me worry about that.” He started for the door. “Good night, Mair.”

  “I do wish you joy in your marriage, Trystan,” she managed to say evenly.

  He turned again to look at her. “Mair, Dylan told me what you said, about why you didn’t marry him. Is there no man you have loved enough to marry?”

  What would he have her answer, this man who already belonged to another? Who was betrothed to the woman he had chosen, the daughter of a rich and powerful man who had the means to elevate Trystan to the highest rank in the land?

  A rank Trystan deserved, for he was the best of men.

  She was nothing but an alewife.

  Yet oh, how tempting it was to tell him how much she loved him! That she had always loved him, and would never love another. That she had only gone with Dylan and those others because she thought Trystan would never care for her.

  It was too late to tell him that.

  She shook her head. “No, Trystan. I have not yet found a man I could love enough to marry.”

  “I see.”

  He left her as silently as if he were a spirit.

  After he was gone, she took the candle and made her way back to her house. She could hear Arthur snoring softly as she blew out the candle and returned to her cold and lonely bed.

  Standing beside the road leading to Dylan DeLanyea’s castle where they had come to bid their father farewell, Trefor turned to his half brother.

  “I’m going to Fitzroy before you,” he noted loftily.

  “Of course you are,” Arthur said with a trace of rancor. “You’re older. I’ll come in the spring.”

  “I suppose you’re extra glad of that now.”

  “Of course. I am to be a knight.”

  “No, that’s not what I meant,” Trefor replied with his usual cryptic superiority.

  Arthur snorted with disgust and turned to leave him.

  “Don’t you want to know what I mean?” Trefor demanded.

  In reality bursting with curiosity, Arthur halted. “Then say what you mean, you gnaf!” he charged.

  “I meeeean,” Trefor said, drawing out the word as an additional torment, “with all the noise a baby makes, you’ll be glad to be away.”

  “What baby?”

  “Don’t you know?”

  Arthur’s hands balled into fists. “Know what?”

  “Your mam’s having a baby.”

  “She is not.”

  “She is too!”

  “Is not!”

  “Is too!” Trefor asserted.

  “My mam isn’t having a baby. She would have told me if she was!”

  “Are you calling my mam and our da liars?” Trefor demanded, his arms akimbo. He was taller than Arthur by a head, and had the broad DeLanyea shoulders and lean, muscular build.

  But then, so did Arthur.

  “I heard them talking myself,” Trefor continued.

  “Listening at doors like a sneak.”

  Trefor flushed. “I wasn’t!”

  “You were, too! You’ve always been a sneak!”

  “I’m not!”

  “Are too!”

  “Am not!”

  “You are—and I’m going to tell my mam you’re spreading lies about her!”

  “It’s true! My mam knows!”

  That gave Arthur a moment’s pause, a pause Trefor was quick to exploit. “Our da knows, too. He can tell by their faces, he says. You know he wouldn’t lie.”

  Even as dismay and dread filled Arthur’s smaller frame, he squared his shoulders defiantly. “So who’s the father, then, if your mam’s so wise?”

  It couldn’t be that Ivor; he hadn’t come round for days and days.

  Trefor’s lips curled up into a nasty smile. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  That was all Arthur could take.

  Too angry to speak or even think clearly, he flew at Trefor, knocking the bigger boy down. He sat on his chest, pummeling his half brother as Trefor struggled to shove him off.

  “Arthur, stop!” Trefor cried. He tried to cover his face with his arms as the surprisingly strong blows continued to rain down on his head. “Arthur, I yield! I yield!”

  Panting heavily, the words finally registered and Arthur lowered his hands.

  “It’s Trystan.”

  “Who?” Arthur mumbled through the haze of his exhausted fury.

  “Trystan is the father,” Trefor repeated. “At least that’s who my mam says.”

  “And our da?”

  “He said he didn’t believe it at first, but he does now.”

  Slowly Arthur climbed off his half brother.

  It had to be true. If his father and Trefor’s mother said it was so, it had to be.

  And he himself had seen Trystan leave their house after being alone with his mother. He had heard his mother crying in the night. Those things had puzzled him at the time; they didn’t anymore.

  “You’re not going to tell your mam I told, are you?” Trefor asked anxiously.

  Arthur slowly shook his head as he walked away.

  “Where are you going?”

  Arthur didn’t answer.

  Nor did he, or Trefor, see the horseman who had slipped from his mount to hide behind the underbrush, and listen.

  Trystan stared down at the chessboard and tried to concentrate on the game. In truth, he was but an indifferent player, preferring outdoor sport to chess and other such amusements. His father, Dylan, Sir Edward and others had gone hunting, but Lady Rosamunde had not been in a mood to ride today.

  Thinking of possible confrontations to come, he had decided to remain behind with her. She had suggested chess, and he had complied.

  They were not by any means alone in the hall. Maidservants came and went, bringing refreshments to the tenants who had business with his father and were awaiting his return. Giggling and whispering like giddy birds, they also cleaned the hearth and laid a new fire, replaced burned-out torches in the sconces on the wall, laid new rushes and sprinkled herbs.

  They were really rather distracting, but even if they had been utterly silent and as inconspicuous as the wooden furnishings, Trystan knew he would still be losing the chess game.

  Lady Rosamunde was a remarkable chess player, despite her efforts to make it look as if she were not. She could blush and demur all she liked, yet there was no mistaking the competitive gleam in her eye.

  His father had been wrong to say Lady Rosamunde had no spark. She had a spark, all right, when she wanted to win, and Trystan surmised that was every game and every time she played.

  Even now, he could tell that she had planned her move well before she made it, hesitating only to add to the impression that she wasn’t sure what she was doing.

  He, on the other hand, took his time because he could barely concentrate on the game.

  Most of the time he was thinking of Mair, and her child.

  Her possible child.

  His possible child.

  Their possible child.

  Over and over again, he recalled their conversation last night.

  She said she had loved no man enough to marry. Not Dylan, not Ivor, and apparently not him, either.

  Surely it was better he know the tr
uth. After all, what would he have done if she had said she loved him? As she had said, he had allied himself with a powerful Norman family; to break an agreement with them would have disastrous consequences, and not just for him. Dylan had rightly pointed out that what Trystan did could affect the rest of his family, too. Although his father also had powerful and influential friends, Trystan was not sure their help could outweigh the damage Sir Edward could inflict.

  No, he had set his course when he had asked Lady Rosamunde to be his wife.

  “How is it that the king moves again?” she asked, looking at him questioningly with her large, limpid blue eyes.

  Patiently, he told her, while inwardly he wondered how he could ever have thought her more lovely than Mair. Mair’s eyes were stars of light and laughter; Rosamunde’s eyes seemed greedy and shrewd.

  If Mair did have his baby, he hoped he would have Mair’s lively brown eyes. And freckles, like fairy kisses across his nose.

  He realized Rosamunde was looking at something behind him. Judging from the curl of her rosy lip, she wasn’t pleased to see it.

  Wondering what in his father’s hall could bring that expression to her face, he twisted to look over his shoulder.

  With a very determined look, Arthur marched toward them, oblivious to the curious regard of the maidservants and waiting tenants.

  Trystan couldn’t fault them for staring. It was rather obvious Arthur had been in a fight. His hair was disheveled and muddy, his cheek bruised and both knees of his breeches were torn.

  “I have noticed your people tend to lack a certain respectful attitude,” Lady Rosamunde observed quietly, “but how can this urchin have the gall to come into your father’s hall in this bold manner?”

  “Arthur has every right to come here,” Trystan explained. “He is my second cousin and Dylan’s second son.”

  “Oh, yes, one of your cousin’s wild oats in the flesh.”

  Trystan didn’t reply; he was more interested in what had brought Arthur there, and with such a look on his young face.

  Glowering at Trystan and ignoring Rosamunde, Arthur came to a military halt beside the table.

  “Yes, Arthur?” Trystan inquired.

  “I want to know if it’s true,” the boy demanded in Welsh.