“Look who is here, Claudia. Our fair cousin Avalon.”
The woman named Claudia stayed in the shadows. She leaned her head back, as if trying to focus on something too close, and then looked away over Avalon’s shoulder.
“Welcome to Trayleigh Castle.” Her voice was husky and blurred. “Or welcome back, rather.”
“Thank you,” Avalon replied, almost at a loss, fighting the crush of disappointment at the woman’s words. No one could possibly call Claudia eager, and perhaps to cover for her lack of enthusiasm Bryce became even louder.
“You must be fatigued, dear cousin. Come inside. Rest. How happy you must be to be home again.”
Avalon walked with him past the long line of women, all of them but Claudia watching her closely.
The great hall had also changed from her girlhood view, seeming smaller again, with different tapestries hanging, different tables. Even the light seemed changed, sharper and harder. There was a strangeness in the air, a sense of wrongness that Avalon could not define. The tiny prick of unease she felt before grew stronger, harder to ignore.
She felt the chimera in her roll over in its sleep, disturbed.
Bryce waved his hand and a servant appeared, a woman little older than Avalon.
“You will be taken to your chambers, where you will rest until tonight. We look forward to your company then.”
Avalon looked up at her cousin—fair-haired and imposing in his stone-studded tunic—and noted the understated command in his words. The wrongness around them uncurled further—long, grasping tendrils.
“Good day to you, cousin Bryce,” she said, curtsying.
His smile was brilliant.
“Good day, Avalon.”
The rooms they assigned her were not the same as those she had had as a girl. It seemed to her these rooms used to be the quarters of some noblewoman, a gentle lady who had always had a kind word for her, who was it? Ah, Lady Luedella. Avalon wondered what had happened to her, then blocked the thought from her mind. If the Picts had found her, Avalon didn’t want to know.
The rooms were fine. The pallet was clean and covered with ample furs. The rushes on the floor were fresh and fragrant; there was a small fire going in the fireplace. She even had a rug, a fanciful Persian thing that had so many intertwining lines and flowers in it that it gave her a headache to look at it.
Everything was perfectly satisfactory—even better than that, practically luxurious, a clear reflection of the wealth of the estate. So why was Avalon unable to rid herself of the feeling of entrapment?
She wandered over to the window and peered out, searching for that old birch. The farthest-reaching branches were in her sights, but that was all. The birch faced the other side of the castle, really. She was glad that there was green on what little of the tree she could see.
No one ever talked of the raid to her. Not Hanoch, not Maribel, not even the servants. It was as if everyone wanted it wiped clean from the very memory of God. Was there anyone left from that time, back when Avalon had thought her life whole and happy? Perhaps. Perhaps there was someone.…
A maid entered, small and deferential. She bobbed a curtsy, then opened the door wide for the series of men who came in carrying Avalon’s trunks. There were a lot of them.
Avalon and the maid watched the men enter, set the trunks down against a wall, then go back out only to return with more.
“Tell me,” Avalon began, and provoked a startled jump from the girl. She smothered her smile. “I beg your pardon.”
Embarrassed, the maid blushed, not meeting her eyes.
“Could you perchance tell me what became of the woman who used to have these rooms?”
The maid looked tortured, as if the simple question was beyond her, then shook her head down at the floor.
“Well, then. Could you tell me of someone who would know?”
At this the girl looked up into Avalon’s eyes, almost fearful, then glanced over at the men still coming and going. Avalon followed the look and saw something she doubted the maid did: the wrongness creeping into the room through the open door, its sliding tendrils winding around the ankles of the girl. Avalon blinked a few times and the vision was gone.
The maid had not moved, and Avalon addressed her again.
“Perhaps you could simply tell me your name?”
“Elfrieda, milady,” the girl whispered.
“Elfrieda.” A man entered with the last trunk on his shoulders, heaved it next to the others, and bowed as he left. Avalon considered the maid. “How old are you?”
“Fourteen, milady.”
“Fourteen! So old! You look as if you could be my daughter.”
Elfrieda looked up, swallowed the silly lie with a lighter heart. “Indeed not, milady! You look younger than my sister, milady, and she being older than you!”
Avalon gave a little laugh. “Do you think so? Then I feel better.” She walked over to one of the trunks and perched on its lid.
“Elfrieda, tell me, is there no one you can think of who would know of the Lady Luedella? She is the one who had these rooms when I was a child. I would be grateful for any help.”
Avalon couldn’t say why she was suddenly so determined to discover the fate of the woman. It just seemed important, immensely so.
She reached into the folds of her skirt and withdrew the small jeweled pouch she carried on a chain on her belt. Loosening the drawstring, she shook two golden coins onto her palm.
Elfrieda watched, disbelieving, as Avalon held them out to her.
“Any help at all,” she said quietly.
The maid inched forward, threw an agonized glance at Avalon’s face and then back to the coins. Avalon grasped a fragment of her thoughts.
Food, enough for weeks! New seed for the crops. Mayhap even a cow for Mama, milk for the baby.…
“Take it,” said Avalon flatly. She stood up and slapped the coins into the girl’s hand then turned away, disgusted with herself. What had come over her, toying with a child like that?
Elfrieda was leaving, bobbing more curtsies at the door, mumbling something incoherent and thankful before she was gone.
Avalon went back to the window and stared, unseeing, at the view.
Cousin Bryce was laughing loud and long at something Avalon had said which was not particularly humorous.
Avalon found that the evening meal was punctuated with such laughter from him, accompanied by exclamations of her wit and charm. It was both unnerving and tiresome. Perhaps he actually thought her completely lacking in wit, Avalon considered, to think he was fooling her—that she would believe his show was natural, that he really cared enough about what she thought of his presentation of the leek pie to bring it up three times.
But she smiled cordially and nodded and made the appropriate comments to her host as they ate at his table on the dais in the hall that used to be her father’s.
Soldiers and nobles alike sat alongside each other in the large room, dining almost in silence as her cousin plowed on with his anecdotes and solicitations of her opinion. He offered her the choicest portions of each serving, fawned over her as she tried to eat, admired her manners repeatedly, and constantly refilled her goblet until it remained brimming with wine, untouched.
It was almost as if he were courting her, Avalon thought, disbelieving, but then shook her head at the idea. No matter how overly friendly he might be, Bryce d’Farouche was still her cousin, albeit once or twice removed. And he was already quite married.
Lady Claudia ate almost nothing, Avalon noted. She merely sat back in her chair and sipped her wine, watching her husband, watching Avalon. She had not joined in at Avalon’s tentative attempt to include her in the conversation, but had instead stared at her, silent, letting Avalon’s polite observation of some insignificant fact drift off, unanswered. Then she turned her head away and took another drink from her goblet. Bryce had talked over the moment, distracting Avalon by offering her another serving of venison. Avalon had declined.
&nbs
p; She had never had such a strange meal, not even in Scotland, where the men remained boisterous while they ate, nor at Gatting, where all attempts to show her the world of the well bred had included dinner conversations not monopolized by one person.
Her father’s hall had always been loud and cheerful, or so it had seemed to the little girl who watched enviously from the top of the main stairs, still too young to join them.
This was a different time and place, obviously. This was not the home she remembered. There was a tension here, no doubt about it, the wrongness around them all fed by the nervous looks of the nobles, the grim chewing of the soldiers.
Lady Claudia, watchful and filled with wine, now sat with a slightly curling smile on her lips.
Avalon had to stop herself from leaping to her feet when the last course was finished.
“I thank you for your hospitality, cousin,” she said, pushing back her chair in what she hoped was a slow enough fashion.
Bryce stood up much more quickly. “What? Are you thinking of retiring so soon, dear Avalon?”
The hall fell silent.
She paused, still sitting, then replied, “Why, yes, I am. It has been a very long day.”
Bryce maneuvered himself until he was standing behind Claudia’s chair as Avalon watched from hers, wary. He placed one meaty hand on his wife’s shoulder.
“But the hour is yet early, Avalon! Do not say you will leave us so soon. Why, Claudia has been telling me how much she looked forward to hearing you play for us after the meal, is it not so, my wife?”
Lady Claudia’s teeth were stained with red wine, making her mouth ruby bright. She licked her lips and gave a lazy smile. “It is so.”
Avalon stood up and spoke firmly.
“Indeed, I am sorry to disappoint you both, but I’m afraid I have no talent for music. I cannot play.”
Bryce put his other hand on Claudia’s shoulder. “Of course you can’t. How clumsy of me to suggest such a thing. Growing up as you did, there would be no opportunity for you—”
“They have music in Scotland, my lord,” she interrupted, more amused than irritated. “All I am saying is that I have no skill for it.”
“Then Claudia will play for you, won’t you, my dear?”
Claudia bowed her head, seemed about to burst into laughter. “Of course I will,” she gasped, after a moment.
There seemed to be nothing to do but to follow Claudia, who walked over to the fireplace, holding on to her peculiar smile.
She played the psaltery, and fairly well, Avalon judged. She would have thought that the wine would make nimble fingers ungainly on the strings, but Claudia kept the pace of her song steady, tapping her foot against the floor as she sang a lively tune in her husky voice.
The women were clustered around the fireplace, the remains of the meal had been cleared by the serfs, the men were off doing Avalon had no idea what. Even Bryce, after making certain that his cousin was firmly entrenched by the fire, had left the group, entreating his wife in his loud and happy voice to keep playing.
And play Claudia did. After Bryce left she switched songs, moving now to a French ballad, slower, more melancholy. The mood seemed to permeate the group of women. Claudia stopped only to take swallows of wine between songs.
Avalon rested her cheek on her hand, staring into the fire, wishing she could be in the solitude of her rooms right now instead of here listening to this sad plinking of notes and tragic themes. The flames were beginning to slowly die, settling down to embers, molten centers, scraps of smoke.
Claudia finished another piece and Avalon quickly stood, intending to take her leave.
“You play delightfully,” she said, edging away from the group. “How sorry I am I must retire now. I simply cannot keep my eyes open anymore.”
Claudia, to her surprise, made no attempt to stop her, only strummed a few strings as she watched Avalon back away. The dying flames were clearly reflected in her eyes.
“Thank you so much” Avalon said, impatient to leave but still seeking a thread of normalcy in the moment. “Good eve to you.”
“Cousin,” came a voice behind her.
Avalon turned around to see Bryce, returned from the darkness, standing quiet for once in the doorway. She wondered how long he had been there.
There was a man beside him, further back in the shadows. Both of them began to walk into the room.
Claudia continued to pluck at the strings of the psaltery, pursing her lips and looking down.
“Lady Avalon, I present to you your cousin Warner, my brother. Please do forgive his appearance, he has only just this moment arrived from the Continent.”
Warner came forward and took her hand, bowing over it. He was large and fair, like Bryce, with gray eyes and sandy hair, at least two decades older than Avalon. There was a fine layer of dust over all of him, marking the creases around his eyes and mouth in pale spider lines.
“Cousin,” he murmured against the back of her hand.
The chill came immediately, snaking up her arm, and she thought: Of course, of course, Bryce wasn’t courting me, good heavens, he doesn’t want me for himself—
He wanted her for this man. For his brother.
The air left her lungs at her discovery, her fingers grew cold even as Warner squeezed them. Bryce was watching her closely, monitoring her reaction.
For an instant she had to admire his audacity. He actually planned to break the betrothal. He would brave the wrath of two kings and the Clan Kincardine to keep her in the family, and that wrath would not be inconsiderable.
And thus he would also keep all her lands and her wealth. Which were also not inconsiderable.
She stifled the laugh that rose in her throat, made herself take back her hand from Warner and nod to him coolly.
“A pleasure,” he said, inspecting her face, moving boldly down to her shoulders, her breasts.
Avalon took a step away. “I regret I cannot tarry further, my lords. I have traveled far today. Though not as far as you, I am sure, cousin Warner.” She gave the smallest smile to Warner, watched his gaze linger on her lips.
Claudia at last hit a sour note on her instrument.
“I find I am fatigued as well,” she said, rising and handing the psaltery to one of her attendants. “I will escort Lady Avalon to her chambers, my lord.”
Bryce examined his wife, then looked at Avalon, who strived to appear impatient.
“Good eve, then, my dears,” he said to them both, and bowed.
“I look forward to seeing you in the morn,” said Warner to Avalon, and she nodded again, taking Claudia’s arm and ignoring his stare on her back as they left.
Avalon remembered the way to Luedella’s chambers but walked back in silence with Claudia, matching her slow, measured pace, perhaps a result of all the wine.
Marry Warner! Again Avalon smothered an amazed laugh at the thought, then threw a glance at Claudia, who kept moving forward in her haze, unperturbed.
Obviously the notion was completely mad, but Bryce’s plans threw her own into disarray, and the damage could be anything from inconvenient to disastrous, depending upon how soon he thought to push her into the engagement.
“Tomorrow night we are having a celebration,” said Lady Claudia evenly to the walls as they walked.
“Oh?”
Perhaps Claudia had her own chimera; she seemed to know what Avalon was thinking. Her face was serene as she met Avalon’s gaze. “Can you guess why, my lady?”
Disaster.
“I believe so.”
“I thought as much.”
Claudia let that hang in the air for a moment until they passed a sentry guarding a doorway, then she continued.
“Men do strange things, do they not?”
“Aye,” Avalon agreed, wholeheartedly.
“Take any man. Take my husband, for instance. Your own cousin. He may have a castle of his own. He may have lands reaching out forever. He may have power, serfs, knights. He may have all this, bu
t will it quench his thirst for more?”
Avalon didn’t reply.
“A man is an unfathomable thing,” Claudia said, thoughtful. “We women cannot comprehend the desires he keeps in his head and in his heart. Perhaps it is better this way. Perhaps it is better not to know why a man would do something rash, for example. Something certain to bring trouble onto his house.”
They had reached Luedella’s door. Claudia released her arm. “Perhaps it is better not to understand why a man would turn his life into a dare against two kingdoms and a mighty group of families, just to gain more of what he already holds.”
The torchlight softened Claudia’s features, was captured by the darkness of her eyes and sunk down into them, absorbed.
“Perhaps,” Avalon said.
“I have heard that your fiancé has returned from his crusade, Lady Avalon. I have heard that Marcus Kincardine has come home again.”
Avalon took in this new shock, tried not to let it show on her face, but Claudia gave a bitter smile.
“It’s true. I have heard that even now he rides to claim his bride. Which is why, I think, Warner has hurried over from France so quickly, and why my husband has brought you here so suddenly. I believe now you have a very clear idea what will happen at the celebration tomorrow night. Warner will not have the luxury of asking you nicely to wed. He is a man after my husband’s mind, I think. Not opposed to—” she seemed to consider her thoughts, raising a finger to her lips, “—to force, I would think.”
There were no words on Avalon’s tongue, surprise had taken them away and left her with a pounding heart and the whining tinge of panic in her mind.
“Are you aware of what the Kincardine has been doing in his absence, cousin Avalon? Are you aware of what they call him, your betrothed, this man my husband thinks to cross?”
Avalon, mute, shook her head.
“He is called Slayer of the Unholy,” Claudia said, the words falling flat around them. “A slayer. He has been off these years killing and killing and killing. What a small thing it would be, I suppose, to kill the family who would dare to steal his bride.”
Claudia turned aside, appearing overcome with her own statement, but soon looked back again and studied Avalon. Her face was impartial once more in the shifting shadows.
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