“And now mine,” Alex said, “although I need a servant like a hard knock on the head. But he has already absolved me of intending harm to Frewyn, I hope. There are twenty men, no, twenty-one with Godric, who can swear I did not return to Exceat before dawn the night Frewyn died. How did you know Pollock was asking questions?”
“He asked me!” Elias’s lips pursed with disapproval. “As if I would hurt my lord. As if I did not love him. Only because I came in late, after Father Harold had carried out the flagon to be filled. He asked me too if I had seen it on the little table.”
“He thought, I am afraid, that you might have done what Frewyn ordered,” Desiree said. “Father Harold was afraid of that too. When we saw the powder in the bottom of the flagon he—he did not wish to hear what I tried to tell him.”
“Foolish and unnecessary.” Elias looked disapproving again. “I will speak to Father Harold and ease his heart about that. Sir Frewyn made no bones about the fact that he would be glad if Lady Alinor’s medicine took some days or weeks from the end of his life, but he was enjoying his renewed strength. He spoke to me as we were drinking that accursed wine of a scroll of tales sent to him by a friend that he wished Lady Desiree to begin reading to him. He did not intend, nor expect, to die that night.”
Vachel arrived in Roselynde just before dinner on the day that Frewyn had been buried. He said he had left Exceat to make room for Frewyn’s numerous family. He brought news of Sir Nicolaus’s stuffing and garnishing of Telscombe. To his surprise, Lady Alinor was delighted to see him and said so. In fact, she admitted she and Simon had been worried about where he was and what he was doing. What Alinor did not mention to Vachel was her feeling that if you have a spy in your midst, it is best to keep him under your eye so that you know what he is doing, what he already knows, and whether it is worth the effort to imprison or kill him.
After speaking sadly of Frewyn’s death, Vachel felt it was natural to ask when he might meet Simon.
Laughing merrily, Alinor shook her head. “Alas, he is not here. He has gone off to Kingsclere to pick up some men Sir Henry has been training. You will begin to think that Simon is avoiding you apurpose, but it is not so. Indeed, he is most interested in meeting Alex’s brother. But he will be back in a week or two at the most. You will be my guest until then, will you not?”
“With great pleasure,” Vachel said, and by the time he was led off to the same wall chamber he had used on his earlier visit he actually had begun to feel pleased. He realized that he would need time to plan his uncle’s murder.
Vachel had less trouble than he expected in making himself a common visitor in the kitchen. The maid who regularly carried Lady Alinor’s orders to the servants and sometimes brought drinks and delicacies to Alinor’s chamber found him there. She raised her brows in surprise, looked at the maidservant to whom he was talking, and then regarded him sidelong.
Vachel understood. He smiled at her and beckoned. She smiled back, but shook her head slightly and went to find the chief cook and deliver her message. On her way back, however, she stopped and said demurely that she would be glad to bring anything he wanted to him. Vachel touched her arm gently and said that if she brought herself, he would need nothing else.
From then on the kitchen was their meeting place and the staff grew accustomed to Vachel’s presence. Alinor was considerably puzzled by Vachel’s behavior. He only bedded Gertrude once and did none of the things and sought none of the information that might be helpful to an invader. Yet Gertrude was not the real lure, he often stopped in the kitchen when there was no chance that she would be there. Bidding her servants to watch and listen but on no account to let Vachel know he was being watched, Alinor left the matter to resolve itself.
Alinor did not expect to be puzzled for long. Simon had written that she should expect Alex and Desiree in another week—about the time he expected to arrive from Kingsclere. He had sent Sir Andre to hold Exceat so that Alex could escort Desiree to Roselynde. He needed to take an interim fealty from her and confirm her charters. And, Alinor thought, I will be able to see how matters stand between her and Alex.
When Sir Andre arrived in Exceat with Simon’s summons, Alex’s guilty mind leapt to the conclusion that Simon had somehow discovered that he and Desiree were lovers. That Sir Andre was ignorant of their guilt and that the summons said clearly that Desiree must bring her charters to be confirmed and swear fealty, Alex discounted. He knew the axe had fallen and they were to be separated.
Although at their parting in the records room he had told himself firmly that they would not be able to meet to make love again, they had somehow managed to fall into each other’s arms every day. The very evening after they had made love on the floor of the records room, Desiree had come into his chamber, medicine chest in hand, and scolded him for not telling her that he had been hurt in a battle.
She then told him to undress so she could salve his wounds—and closed the door of his chamber. Being appalled at what was happening did not slow Alex down in shedding tunic, shirt, braies, and chausses. Desiree was undressed before him, having sensibly removed all her underclothing before she pulled on a gown and came down. She did indeed salve the now-healing wound on his side and the bruises on his thigh and back, but that was after.
The next morning before Mass she came to show him the quit-claim that Elias had found. She was wearing no more than she had been the previous night, although to outward view she was decorously clad, and Alex was not yet completely dressed. She held out the parchment to him and bade him look at the middle part where the terms were set out, complained his candle was wavering, and closed the door.
In the late afternoon, Alex sent a servant to ask her to come to the shed where grain was stored. They began to count and calculate, moved some bags, and then had to close the door to get at others. Sacks of grain make a very fair mattress, particularly when one is so inflamed that one would think broken glass a good bed so long as one’s love rode his hips. And so it went, Alex having lost the battle with his conscience, determined to extract every moment of sweetness.
Thus, when Simon’s summons came, and both agreed with Sir Andre that they must leave the very next day for Roselynde, Alex found a private moment to beg Desiree to come softly to his chamber after the household slept. He was waiting for her naked and he stripped off her hooded cloak and then her bed-gown very slowly. They had been hurried at each previous meeting; now Alex kissed her hair and forehead when he pushed back her hood, kissed her throat when he removed the cloak pin, kissed her shoulders and the tops of her breasts as he opened the neck of the bed-gown, knelt and kissed her feet, her ankles, her calves, and her knees as he raised the bed-gown to remove it.
Desiree seized it from his hands and pulled it off, casting it aside so she could take his head in her hands and press his face between her thighs. He kissed her nether lips and his tongue found the little nubbin of flesh that made her shudder and cry out. This time she gritted her teeth against any betraying sound, but after a moment she pulled away, slipping down beside him to push him back so she could mount him, sinking down on his shaft with soft sobbing moans of pleasure. And this time she would not let him pull out to spend between her thighs. She dammed his protests with her lips and worked above him until she drained him dry.
“Desiree,” he protested when he had breath to do so. “Do you not understand the danger—”
“It is no danger to me,” she said. “If I were with child, it would be a warranty for marrying that child’s father.”
Chapter Nineteen
However, Desiree’s hope that Alex’s seed might quicken in her was not to be. She wept a little when she found her courses had come upon her the morning after she had made him spend into her, but as she was busy making ready to ride to Roselynde, she had no time to indulge her disappointment. She was distracted by her mingled eagerness and trepidation over meeting the lady who loomed as near a goddess in Alex’s mind.
Had Alex been alone with the small troo
p he took for protection, he would have ridden the entire distance between Exceat and Roselynde in one long day, but he could not press Desiree so hard. She was accustomed to riding distances, but not so long as that between Exceat and Roselynde and not at the speed necessary to arrive at Roselynde before the middle of the night. Beside that, he saw, she was pale and somewhat unwell, although she made no complaint.
It was excuse enough to seek shelter when the sun was near setting and it gave him some extra hours at least to listen to her voice as she spoke to their host. He did not dare raise his eyes to her himself or say more than a single word or two in answer to questions put to him about the defense of the coast, but Desiree was smooth and gracious as she accepted condolences on the loss of her husband.
Her host was clearly surprised to see tears in her eyes and then on her cheeks, and even more surprised when she spoke in a broken voice of Frewyn’s kindness, of how much she missed being able to talk over with him the events of her day and hear his advice. Whether the young baron had intended to make some proposition to her that had been deflected by her mourning—or by Alex’s glare—was hard to say, but they left at first light so the doubt was never put to any proof.
They reached Roselynde just before dinner and were shocked when they were halted by the guard of the inner gate. Alex turned pale, sure his uncle was about to take back his horse and his protection and drive him naked from England for his transgression. Desiree flushed with determination and rage, her usually rounded jaw jutting into an angry square.
However, it was Alinor herself who came running out of the keep to greet them, to apologize, and then tell them that Vachel was a guest in Roselynde and that she wished them to pretend that they did not know he was Prince John’s man. Alex sputtered a protest and Desiree, no longer fearing that she and Alex were to be separated and braced to fight for him, sagged in her saddle, feeling exhausted and limp.
Alinor’s attention was on Alex and she did not notice how Desiree’s shoulders slumped. “If you have a known spy in your midst,” she said as Alex and Desiree dismounted and grooms came to lead the horses away, “the safest mode of dealing with him is to watch to see what he wants to find out. That, or murder.” She grinned at Alex and shook her head. “I did not kill him. He is your brother, after all.”
“That did not give him the right to use our relationship with Sir Simon for a dishonorable purpose.” Alex’s voice grated.
“Perhaps not.” Alinor shrugged again. “But I have not been able to fathom his purpose and I would like Simon to have a go at him. Until Simon gets here, which should be later today or tomorrow, I wanted to warn you so you would treat him civilly—as you would if you had hidden his purpose out of shame and not exposed him.”
“I nearly did so,” Alex muttered.
Alinor nodded. “It must have been hard.” She patted his arm and turned her head to Desiree, drew a quick breath and said, apologetically, “You are so pale, my dear. I am afraid you are not accustomed to riding so long and hard. Can you join us for dinner or would you prefer to eat in the women’s quarters? I would join you, but I am afraid that Alex will strangle Vachel in righteous wrath—and I do want Simon to talk to him.”
“No, no,” Desiree said, ashamed of displaying weakness before a lady she knew had ridden across the Pyrenees and the Alps and followed her man across the hot and disease-ridden Holy Land. “I am only—” she lowered her voice and leaned close to Alinor “—it is the second day of my courses and I still have some cramps.” Then she smiled. “But I am quite looking forward to dinner.”
Her presence was very welcome too. After time taken to wash the dirt of the road off and for Alex to unarm, Alinor took her place in her chair in the middle of the high table. Vachel was demoted to a bench at her left while Desiree had the place of honor to her right with Alex to her right. It was a better arrangement, Alinor felt, than one man on each side of her and nothing, really, to distract them from each other. And Desiree seemed best able to deal with Alex.
The initial meeting of the brothers had not gone well. Vachel had almost fainted when he entered the hall and saw Alex, and Alex, not being much of an actor, displayed what he felt. His face turned so grim and threatening that even Alinor might have shrunk away from him had not her duty as hostess prevented it.
Desiree, Alinor was interested to see, did not quail. She surreptitiously dug Alex in the ribs with her elbow and hissed something at his ear, since she was too short to speak directly into it. Alex started, and like an automaton whose mechanism had been initiated by the dig in the ribs, said, “What a surprise to see you here, brother.”
That Alex had not burst out with a denunciation gave Vachel hope that he would not, and he answered boldly enough, “You have done so well out of your meeting with our uncle that I thought I would ask if he had a place for me.”
“You wish to serve in Simon’s household?” Alinor asked quickly, seeing Alex’s eyes bulge with outrage.
Desiree put a hand on Alex’s arm and Alinor saw the long polished nails dig into Alex’s hand. She began to speak at random of Simon’s many duties and the fact that he might well be glad to enlarge his household, especially with a nephew, who would be more trustworthy than a stranger. Alex made a gobbling noise, and Alinor saw that Desiree had stuffed a large piece of lamb into his mouth and was now speaking urgently into his ear.
After that, Alex seemed to become calmer. He did not look at his brother or address any remarks to him, but he seemed less ready to leap at Vachel’s throat. Alinor also did not miss the ease and intimacy of Desiree’s handling of Alex. It was plain that she would not need to point out to the girl the advantages of marriage to her castellan. Alinor hoped she had not betrayed her aged husband—there was something very ugly about that—but she could understand the terrible temptation someone like Alex would be.
When they were about to rise from the table, Alinor turned to Vachel and said, “I am sorry to need to ask you to ride out for me yet again, Master Vachel, but I am expecting my husband to arrive at any time and I do not want to leave Roselynde. You remember the farm we visited on the north slope, I hope?”
“Yes, my lady. I remember.”
“Oh, good.” Alinor smiled. “Would you ride up there and tell the bailiff to send down three more lambs and a ewe that will breed no more.” She saw Vachel’s surprise at being sent on an errand a servant could do, so she glanced very pointedly toward Alex.
Vachel’s eyes went to Alex and quickly shifted away. “I will do your errand happily, my lady,” he said. He could wait no longer—when Simon arrived, he would act.
Actually, Alinor no longer cared if Alex beat Vachel to within an inch of his life. She should have known better than to try to get Alex to deceive anyone. But Vachel might still believe that Alex had not betrayed him out of shame or fear of being himself tainted. In getting rid of Vachel, she would prevent Alex from admitting he had told Simon Vachel was a spy.
In addition, Alinor wanted to get Desiree into a private place so she could bring the girl to confess her desire for Alex and assure her she and Simon would approve. To that effect, she saw Vachel to the door of the hall and called to Beorn, who was just leaving, to see that Vachel was mounted and guided to the farm on the north slope.
Returning to the hall, she saw Desiree, again with her hand on Alex’s arm, assuring him of something. Alinor felt that looked hopeful, but the girl seemed ready to drop and there was a dark spot, perhaps blood, on her skirt.
“Alex,” she said, “go into Simon’s office. To the left on the table are three parchments we have received from Newhaven, Kemp, and Slade Port. Read them so you can tell Simon whether there is any truth at all in the reports.”
“I do not know Slade Port at all, my lady, but I have some news of Telscombe, which—”
“Tell Simon. He will only make you repeat everything if you tell me first.” She dismissed him with a wave and turned to Desiree. “Come, love, you are about to fall off your feet and,” she lower
ed her voice, “you need new bleeding rags.”
When that matter had been taken care of and Desiree’s shift, tunic and gown set to soak in cold water to remove the bloodstains, Alinor tucked her into a cot in the small chamber used by her maids.
“Alex,” she said, grinning, “is not very practiced in deception.”
“No,” Desiree sighed. “He wants to kill Vachel.”
Alinor was surprised. She had provided an opening for Desiree to tell her what a fine man Alex was so that she could comment on his lovableness, on his gentleness to women, on the value of having an honest husband—of which Alinor personally knew both the joys and the pains.
“Alex wants to kill his brother?” she repeated. “That is too fine a sense of honor. After all, Vachel owes nothing to King Richard or to England. If his fealty is given to Prince John, what he is trying to do is not totally despicable. It is not, perhaps, very honorable to claim kinship and then act as a spy—I can understand why Alex is ashamed—but to wish to kill a man of his own blood…”
“No, not for that,” Desiree said, struggling to sit up. Her face was so intent, so anguished, that Alinor did not urge her to lie back and rest but hurried to find cushions to prop her upright so she could talk more easily.
“Then what?”
Desiree swallowed. “We believe…but we have no proof and…and it seems utterly insane…an act with no reason behind it, and so terrible an act…”
“What?” Alinor repeated.
“Vachel seems to have—murdered Frewyn.”
“Murdered your husband? In the name of God, why? Was he—was he courting you?”
Desiree wet her lips. “No. He did make some attempt to flatter me when he first came, but I turned him away so firmly that he gave up. There is no reason that we can discern. None except a reason so small, so light, so farfetched that we cannot credit it. That is why Alex did not write to Sir Simon when Pollock—” She stopped and took a deep breath as if she were having trouble getting air.
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