by Jane Feather
Ariel smiled sweetly at the slammed door and thought with pleasure of how furious her brothers were going to be at the assumption that their sister was now truly the wife of the earl of Hawkesmoor. That satisfaction more than made up for the tedious business of having to go through the motions of performing her wifely duties, Ariel decided, dancing lightly back into her own chamber, where her husband still lay abed.
Chapter Six
ARIEL DIRECTED THE maid to place the tray on the side table. “Will you drink now, my lord?” She turned to the bed, her hand on the ale jug.
Simon nodded. “Thank you.” Then he turned to the manservant. “In my chamber you will find my razor and strop on the washstand. Be so good as to bring them in here.”
“Aye, my lord.” Timson bowed and went off, returning in a minute with the required articles. He set them down beside the hot water. “Will there be anything else, my lord?”
“No, thank you.” Simon drank from the tankard Ariel had placed at his hand. “You may go.”
“Does that apply to me also, my lord?” Ariel inquired demurely as the door closed behind the servants. “Or is there some other way in which I can serve you?”
“Pass me my chamber robe, if you please.”
Ariel handed him the robe he’d been wearing when he’d entered her chamber to tangle with Oliver. Simon shrugged into it, pulling the sides closed over his torso. Then he said with sudden and unusual sharpness, “You had business in the stables, I believe.”
Ariel curtsied with more than a hint of irony and left the chamber. Simon pushed aside the covers and slowly swung his legs over the end of the bed. He had not been self-conscious about his unsightly scars in the firelit night, but in the harshness of broad daylight, he found he needed to hide them from the clear gray eyes of his bride. He was always stiff in the morning, too, and he couldn’t bear that Ariel, so light and supple herself, should see his grimacing, dragging progress as he forced feeling and movement into his knotted muscles and aching joints.
He had felt no need to hide his weaknesses from Helene, he reflected, swinging his lame leg from the hip, ignoring the screaming pain of his stiffened muscles, knowing that only thus would he restore any fluidity to the limb. But then Helene loved him. She was his friend, closer to him than any battlefield companion, the most beloved of lovers.
Once he’d removed his nighttime stubble, he hobbled across the corridor to his own chamber. He had not stopped for his cane last evening, when he’d heard the sounds from Ariel’s chamber. It astonished him now to remember how he’d sprung from his own bed and how rapidly he had managed to get to Ariel’s chamber. He had given his body’s frailty no thought as he’d snatched up his robe and the small, deadly knife he wore always at his belt, and he’d laid hands on Oliver Becket with a strength born of fury. His responses had been utterly instinctive, just as they were in battle, and not once had he questioned his body’s ability to obey those instincts.
It was the first time he had moved with such mindless ease since he’d been so dreadfully wounded at Malplaquet. Even now, he could remember as vividly as if it were still happening the icy dread that had tormented him when he lay in his fever in the hospital tent, surrounded by the screams of the dying, the stench of blood and death, the agonized shrilling of those under the surgeons’ knives. His dread had been that he would not die but would live the rest of his days a one-legged cripple, dependent on the charity and kindness of others.
He had refused to allow them to take off the leg, had screamed that he would prefer to die than live unwhole. And because he was the close friend and companion of the duke of Marlborough, they had not dared to gainsay him. He had lived. And he had kept his leg. It was scarred, useless, a dragging pain most of the time, but he still felt himself to be whole. And somehow, last night, his leg had responded to urgent need and had supported him uncomplaining into the fray.
He was paying for it now, though, he reflected with a grimace, as he dressed laboriously. The limb hurt today almost as much as it had done when he lay bleeding on the battlefield.
Had he stopped a rape last night? Or merely interrupted some mutually enjoyable rough foreplay? He twisted the ends of his cravat loosely and tucked them into his shirtfront in the Steinkirk style. It was a simple fashion that he preferred to the more customary falls of ruffled lace. In essence, it didn’t matter what had been going on. What mattered was that he had stopped it, taken the play into his own hands.
He drew a comb through his close-cropped hair. What else did the Ravenspeare brothers have planned for him? He had foiled one humiliation, but there might be other unpleasant surprises in store for him. A month was the devil of a long time to have to spend in the enemy’s lair. Yet he could see no way to leave earlier in the face of two hundred guests without appearing a discourteous coward. To the queen it would seem a deliberate rejection of Ravenspeare’s lavish gesture of friendship, and that would be handing a neat victory to the enemy.
And just what line was he to take with his bride? She was an intriguing creature. Her air of cool detachment from her surroundings made her seem older than her years, but when she’d danced that wild tarantella with Oliver Becket, she had been all fire and life, a sensual, passionate whirl of flame. An intriguing paradox, and one he had better figure out sooner rather than later.
He found his own friends in the Great Hall when he went down a few minutes later. They did not look as if they had spent a night of debauchery and drinking, which didn’t surprise Simon. War had made them all past masters at taking their pleasures with a degree of control.
The well-kempt condition of the Great Hall, however, did surprise him. He’d left it looking like a battlefield, spilled food and wine thick on the floor, benches upturned, littered tables and stained cloths. The riotous assembly had continued until past dawn, so the servants had had little time to achieve the present scene of cleanliness and order. When the masters of a house were as neglectful as the lords of Ravenspeare, their servants tended to reflect their carelessness. But someone in the castle kept a tight hand on the household reins.
The floors had been swept and polished, the long tables scrubbed. The air was sweet with beeswax and lavender. Bread, meat, ale, and coffee were set out on a table before the brightly burning fire, and it was here that the cadre were gathered, breaking their fast before going for a morning ride.
“I give you good morning, Simon.” Jack Chauncey greeted him with a wave of his tankard. “Will you break your fast?”
“Thanks, but I’ve already done so abovestairs.” Simon sat on the bench, stretching his aching leg to the fire.
Jack smiled slightly. “You passed a pleasant night, I trust.”
Simon merely nodded and his friends understood that he didn’t wish to discuss his wedding night.
“Your bride’s a beautiful girl, Simon, but I could wish you’d chosen a wife from some other family than these damnable Ravenspeares.” Lord Stanton cut into the sirloin before him.
“Aye, they’re a vile-mannered crowd,” agreed Sir Peter Lancet.
“No more than expected,” Simon pointed out, leaning forward to the fire, his hands resting on his knees. “But I suspect they’ve some tricks up their sleeves.”
“You’ve had wind of treachery, Simon?” Jack looked sharply across the table.
Simon shrugged. “Some. I’d be glad if you’d watch my back.”
“That’s what we’re here for.”
There was a short ruminative silence, then the door to the hall crashed open and the two wolfhounds bounded in ahead of their mistress. “There’s a real Fen blow going,” Ariel declared in explanation for her tempestuous entrance. “The wind snatched the door from my hand.” Her cloak was blown away from her shoulders, her hair torn from its pins, her cheeks pink.
She came up the hall, looking around with a frown. She drew off her gloves and ran a finger over the long mahogany table that stood against the far wall, then pulled the bellrope. A servant appeared almost immediat
ely.
“Paul, the grate is tarnished,” she said. “And the andirons haven’t been polished.”
“I’ll see to it directly, Lady Ariel.” The man bowed and hurried away, returning in a few minutes to set to work with rag and scouring pad.
Ariel watched him for a second, then nodded as if satisfied, and came to the table. She cast an eye over the platters. “I trust you have everything you need, my lords. It’s simple fare at this time of day, but breakfast will be at midmorning.”
“You run an admirable household, Lady Hawkesmoor,” Jack observed. “I’d never have expected such order so early this morning.”
“The servants are accustomed to dealing with my brothers’ messes, Lord Chauncey,” Ariel said shortly. “If you wish to ride out before breakfast, I will instruct the stables to saddle your horses.”
“There’s little enough amusement to be had riding in the teeth of a Fen blow, as I recall,” Simon observed. He was the only member of the group familiar with the Fenland’s irascible and unpredictable weather, and he knew well the miseries of the great dust clouds as the topsoil was ripped from the land by the gale.
“No,” Ariel agreed. “But if one stayed indoors whenever the wind got up, one would rarely venture forth. Particularly in winter.”
“True enough.” Simon bent to massage his aching leg. He had no desire to ride out himself into a wet and freezing gale, but neither did he wish to remain idly in the castle waiting for the malevolent brothers to awake from their drunken stupors.
“If archery appeals to you, my lords, there are targets set up in the far court. It’s well sheltered from the wind,” Ariel suggested, frowning as she watched Simon rub his leg. She had a salve in the stillroom that would ease the ache, but she would need to administer it herself and she was reluctant to perform such an intimate service.
“Excuse me,” she said abruptly. “I have things to do.”
Simon watched her walk briskly out of the hall through the door leading to the kitchens, the dogs trotting at her heels. Ariel may have had no female guidance, but it seemed she knew how to manage a large and difficult household. The servants treated her with genuine respect, untinged by the fearful subservience they showed toward their masters.
“Archery, Simon?”
“Aye, by all means.” He got to his feet. Practice with both long-and crossbow kept his upper body fit and muscular, maintained the strength in his arms and hands. All he had to rely on these days.
Ariel stayed awhile in the kitchen, but Gertrude had everything in hand both for the breakfast and for the evening’s banquet. Ranulf had planned a duck shoot for his guests after breakfast, and to ensure good sport, he had had the gamekeepers decoy flocks of birds into the nearby meres and rivers. His guests would have good sport that afternoon, and the bride and groom would, of course, take part.
Perhaps Ranulf had some nasty surprise planned for his brother-in-law among the reeds, Ariel thought. Should she warn the Hawkesmoor of her brothers’ murderous intentions, or let him take his chance? He seemed well able to take a care for himself, and he had his own warrior friends at his back. But if she didn’t warn him, and if he did fall into a trap, wouldn’t she then be as guilty as those who had set the trap? Was a crime of omission as bad as one of commission? It was a grim dilemma.
But her Arabians would still prove the way out for herself. A thousand guineas for one colt! And she had two more that would be ready for sale in a month, and a mare in foal. If the word spread among the newly growing racing community, she would be able to achieve her independence. She could leave here, leave her husband, set up on her own. If she had financial independence, then she could achieve anything. And if she saved the Hawkesmoor’s life, maybe he would even agree to give her her freedom. An unconsummated marriage could be annulled. If she saved her husband from her brothers, he would owe her something.
She became aware of a hand tugging at her skirt and snapped out of her reverie, realizing that she was standing stock-still in the kitchen door and had been for many minutes. “What is it?” She looked down at the grimy child at her knee.
“Me mam,” the little girl said. “She’s powerful bad. They sent me to fetch yer.”
“That’s Becky Riordan, m’lady.” Gertrude looked up from stirring a cauldron over the fire, her face red, perspiration beading on her forehead. “Her mam’s expectin’ over Ramsey way.”
She’d never have time to get to Ramsey, help the laboring woman, and return to Ravenspeare before the duck hunt. Let alone before breakfast. And if she wasn’t here, there would be awkward questions. But Sarah and Jenny could take her place, if she could get them there.
Without further thought she fetched from the storeroom the leather bag that contained her shiny instruments. “Come, Becky.” Taking the child’s thin hand, she hurried with her to the stables. “Put the gray to the gig, Sam,” she instructed a stable lad. She helped the child into the vehicle; the dogs leaped, barking around the wheels, and streaked off along the narrow cart track as their mistress drove hell for leather toward the village.
The cottage seemed even lonelier than ever, perched on its hillock above the dike, with the wind howling, whipping up the still waters of the river, and carrying clouds of dust across the flat lands stretching to either side.
Despite the wind, Jenny stood at the cottage gate. Her uncanny ability to sense when someone turned onto the track leading to her mother’s house had obviously been keener than ever this morning.
“Is it you, Ariel?” she called, smiling, as Ariel drew rein at the gate. Without waiting for a reply, she opened the gate. The wolfhounds bounded through, pausing to rub their heads against the woman’s worsted skirt in greeting.
“Good day, Jenny.” Ariel sprang down from the gig.
“Who’s with you?” Jenny turned her blind eyes to the gig. They were large and beautiful, light blue with deep dark pupils, and if one didn’t know they were sightless, it would be impossible to tell.
“Becky Riordan.” Ariel swung the child down as she explained the situation. “If you and Sarah would go to the woman, I could take you in the gig and be back at Ravenspeare in time for the shoot,” she finished, walking with Jenny up the path to the cottage.
“Mother, it’s Ariel,” Jenny called as they crossed the threshold into the dim interior, lit in the daylight only by a rush lamp and the glow of the fire. The small windows were shuttered against the wind, and the single room was small, sparsely furnished, but the earth floor was swept clean and the air was fragrant with the racks of drying herbs set above the fireplace.
Sarah came forward quickly, holding out her hands. She took Ariel’s in a firm clasp, smiling silently, but her eyes were as sharp as ever as she scrutinized the girl’s face. It was the first time she’d seen her since her marriage, and she found herself looking for some sign of her new status upon the girl’s fresh bloom. But she could see nothing unusual.
And then her eyes dropped to Ariel’s hands still clasped within her own, and that deep shuddering began again in her belly. She stared at the serpent bracelet on Ariel’s wrist. She touched it, raised her eyes inquiringly.
“Ranulf gave it to me,” Ariel said, holding the bracelet up to the light. “He gave it to me as a betrothal gift, but I haven’t worn it until now . . . or at least not until the wedding. It’s strange but rather fascinating, don’t you think?”
Ranulf Ravenspeare had given it to Ariel? How could it be that the bracelet had passed from the man she had given it to into the hands of the Ravenspeares?
“Ranulf said it was a family heirloom, but I’d never seen it before,” Ariel continued, for a moment unaware of the older woman’s silent turmoil. “He gave me my own charm, though.” She touched the silver rose. “That’s quite beautiful, don’t you think?”
Sarah nodded but her smile was effortful.
“Are you unwell?” Ariel said swiftly, bending to kiss the faded cheek. “I am come on an errand of mercy, but if you cannot manage to go, I�
�ll go with Jenny.”
Sarah shook her head and her smile strengthened. She gestured inquiringly at the child clinging to Ariel’s skirts, her eyes wide with a fearful curiosity. All the local children knew of the two women herbalists who dwelt among the reeds. The one who never spoke, the other who couldn’t see. No evil was known of them—on the contrary, they were renowned for their healing skills—but they were strange folk and people called upon them with mixed emotions.
Jenny explained the situation to her mother as she moved efficiently around the interior of the cottage, filling a basket with what she deemed they might need to help the laboring woman. On her own ground, Jenny’s sightlessness was no handicap. “Ariel must be at her own wedding celebrations,” she said, reaching up for a bunch of dried thyme. When crushed and warmed in melted honey, the herb made a drink that could relax cramping muscles.
Sarah nodded and set about her own preparations. A few minutes later the women and child left the cottage. Sarah closed the door but made no attempt to lock it. They had little enough to steal and no enemies. They climbed into the gig and Ariel turned the patient pony in the narrow track.
She glanced up at the sky when they reached the main road, if such a narrow unpaved track could be so called. It was overcast but the wind was dying down and the faintest shadow of light was diffused behind the clouds. Ariel judged it to be close on midmorning. It would take half an hour to reach Ramsey. She must stay awhile and give her own opinion and advice on the situation. Another three quarters of an hour back to Ravenspeare. Breakfast would be well over by the time she reached the castle. The absence of the bride at the board, for the first meal after her wedding night, would draw remark, but it couldn’t be helped.
In fact, she stayed much longer than she’d expected to at the side of Becky’s mother. The woman lay on a mattress on the floor beside the fire. Chickens, coming in out of the cold, scratched unheeded around her. Her six other children wandered in and out of the cottage, letting in icy blasts that sent the green logs in the fireplace spluttering. The woman’s husband sat in a corner, puffing on a clay pipe, drinking from an ale pot, heedless of the whimpering children or his moaning wife. When the three women came in, ducking under the low lintel, he took their arrival as his own cue to leave the scene of pain and struggle and seek out his own companions in the tavern.
