by Lisa Hendrix
Alaida glanced over toward her groom and thought she might join the rising smoke as well, scorched away by what she saw. The bemused expression he’d worn earlier had vanished. His eyes burned like they had those first moments in the hall the night before, like those of some beast on its prey. Bright. Possessive. Hungry.
Without taking his gaze off her, he passed his belt and sword to Sir Brand. “Clear the room.”
Voices rose in protest. Brand cut them off with a slash of his hand, but Oswald stepped forward. “Your pardon, my lord, but ’tis custom to see the bride put to bed.”
“Your custom, not mine. My wife’s bounty is mine alone,” said Ivo. Relief washed over Alaida, even as the men grumbled at the loss of their sport. “Her serving women may stay. The rest of you, out.”
“You heard his lordship,” rumbled Brand. “Back to your feasting. There’s plenty of good ale to ease the sting.”
The room emptied quickly, though with a great many snickers and knowing looks. Only Father Theobald lingered, looking somber again, as though he might launch into the sermon he’d neglected to give at the chapel. Something about marital temperance, no doubt. Alaida smiled encouragement.
“You, too, priest.” Brand put a hand between his shoulders and steered him toward the door with a none-too-gentle shove. “There’ll be no more need for your services tonight.”
“I’m not so certain, messire,” said Oswald from the doorway. He spoke loudly, so his voice would carry to those in the hall. “The father here is a fair hand in the fields. I wager he could teach a man a bit about keeping his blade sharp and his furrow straight, even though he does not plow for himself.”
Brand’s response was lost to the roar from below as he followed the others out. His departure left only Alaida’s laughing women, whose job it was to ready her for her husband. She struggled to keep her balance as merry fingers plucked away her wimple and belt and pulled her gown over her head. Someone loosed the plaits from her hair while Hadwisa and Bôte knelt to remove her shoes and hose. On the far side of the room, Ivo stripped off his cote and tossed it aside, then turned to watch as her women gathered the hem of her chainse.
That heat again. This time it reached across the gap to scorch her, as though she’d wandered too near the smith’s forge. Alaida held herself tall, determined neither to look away nor to cover herself when they stripped her.
“Dismiss your women,” said Ivo, his voice rough with desire. “I would be alone with you now.”
The women froze. Alaida stood there for an eternity, her chainse bunched to the middle of her thighs, before she found her voice.
“Leave us.” Her fingers felt clumsy as she tugged the garment away and let it fall back into place.
“But, my lady.” Hadwisa blinked like a mole at midday. “We haven’t … That is, you’re not …”
“Hush, girl,” said Bôte. “I wager his lordship knows how to undress a woman. Away with you lot.” She shooed Hadwisa and the others along, but stooped to pick up one of Alaida’s shoes and put it at the head of the bed, a reminder that she was to submit to her husband. Then she turned and gave her a fierce hug.
“Ah, my lamb.” She raised up on tiptoe to place a kiss on Alaida’s forehead. “I have slept by your side each night for nigh to a score of years, but now I give you up to your husband in good joy.” She leaned close to whisper, “Have some more posset if you’re frightened.”
“I’m not,” said Alaida firmly.
“Good. Good.” Suddenly Bôte’s face crumpled. She snatched up the corner of her headrail and blotted at the tears that dribbled down her ruddy cheeks. “Oh, my lamb, my babe, gone to wife. It seems but yesterday your lady mother put you in my arms and—”
“God’s legs, woman. Out!”
Ivo’s snarl startled Bôte out of her tears. She backed away and made her escape, pausing just long enough to give Alaida an encouraging smile before she slipped out the door and pulled it firmly shut. It was a heavy door, made of oak bound with iron, and it had a bar meant to keep out the most determined invader. It cost Alaida a great deal to stand there as Ivo crossed to drop that bar into place. Whatever he intended for her, she thought, no one would stop him. The walls themselves would fall before that door gave way.
When he turned back to her, he wore an odd expression, still heated, but tempered by a wry smile. “I fear I have little patience for crying women.”
“You will not be burdened with my tears, monseigneur.”
“We are so very pleased, madame,” he answered, mimicking her formality. He turned to the tall iron candlestick by the door and began pinching out the flames one by one. “Did I hear the old woman aright? You are twenty?”
“Near one and twenty.”
“So young,” he mused. “And yet old to be going to wife for the first time.”
“Very old, my lord. Ancient. You should call Father Theobald back and ask for an annulment before you find yourself saddled with a crone.”
“But such a pretty crone.” Chuckling, he pinched out another flame. “How is it you come to marry so late?”
“To my mind, it is yet too early.”
He glanced at her, one eyebrow lifted in question. “You did not wish to marry at all, then?”
“Only to you, my lord,” she said bluntly. “I was betrothed at fourteen, and willingly, to a man my grandfather chose. A brave and honorable man.”
Her cut had no effect. He simply kept at his candles. “Where is this paragon, that he never married you?”
“The marriage was much delayed because of warring, and he was killed before we could wed.”
“Not at table and by a lady’s knife, I hope?”
“In a melée, by a broken neck. He did not mock me, as you seem driven to do.”
“He likely never saw you dressed as a nun.” He moved to another candlestick and continued. “Is he the man who taught you to kiss?”
“No. Though I think he might have liked to.”
“No doubt. Then who?”
She recalled a certain May Day and a passing knight who had joined the woodland revels for an afternoon before he rode on. “No one you would know, my lord, nor anyone you’re likely to meet.”
“How unfortunate.” Another flame died between his thumb and finger. “I wish to thank him.”
“More likely have Sir Brand gut him.”
He paused over a candle, and though the smile stayed on his lips, his voice hardened. “No, I would do that myself. But only if there was more to his lessons than kissing.”
“Never fear, William gave you a virgin,” she said drily. “Besides, if there had been more, my grandfather would have gutted him for you.”
“Good.” He continued to work his way around the solar, extinguishing candles until the edges of the room receded into shadow. As he crossed to the last candlestick, his path brought him near Alaida, and as he passed, he stopped abruptly.
“It is you.” His fingers closed around her arms, gripping them so she couldn’t turn to face him. He inhaled deeply. “That scent has tickled my nose all evening, but I thought it was the rush-herbs. What is it?”
What was this distraction? Brows knit in suspicion, Alaida sniffed, first the air and then, realizing what he smelled, at the sleeve of her chainse.
“Wormwood and rue … and tansy, I think,” she said, trying not to let on how distracted she was by the pressure of his hands. “For moths. They were on the gown I wore.”
“Ah.” He sniffed near her ear and it tickled. “I thought you might have doused yourself in some strange perfume in an effort to drive me away.”
“I had not thought of it. Would it work?”
“No.” Bending to the curve of her neck, he inhaled deeply once more. “I am not a moth.”
The words warmed her skin as he breathed them out. She turned her head away to escape the heat, but that only exposed more skin to him, skin over which he brushed a kiss. The contact was like steel to flint, and the sparks it produced scattered over h
er skin, spreading until she had to dig her toes into the rug to stop them. He pressed another kiss to the spot, then released her and stepped away, leaving only the swirl of chill air to take his place. A moment later, the bed creaked as he sat and began taking off his boots.
The first boot plopped to the floor. “If Geoffrey has done his job, there is a small gift for you on the tray.”
More distraction. He truly was playing some game with her, trying to put her off guard with these feints, though to what end she wasn’t sure. Chary but curious, she shook off the last of the sparks and sidled over to the table. There, between the oil lamp and the horns of ale and posset, lay a fat leather pouch. Coins jingled as she hefted it.
“Silver?” She let the purse fall back to the table with a thump that echoed her disgust. “I am not a whore, my lord, that you must pay for access to my bed.”
“I never buy what is already mine.” The second boot hit the wall as he tossed it aside in exasperation. “By the saints, woman, must everything be a battle with you? I said it is a gift. Ten shillings, to replace what you gave as alms today.”
“Oh.” She sagged a little, the wind out of her sails. “I didn’t think you … But of course. Sir Ari told you.”
“He did.”
“He was very kind.” He was also right about his lord not taking her purse, and Alaida wondered what else the seneschal had correct. More to the point, what else did she have wrong? She’d presumed much about this man before her, and thus far was being proved wrong at every turn. Feeling ever more the fool, she wrapped her arms around herself and stared down at her bare toes for a long while before adding with reluctance, “You are … also … being very kind.”
Ivo snorted. “Pains you to say that, does it?”
“A little.” Her mouth twisted ruefully. “Kind is not a word that has been much on my mind since you arrived at my gate.”
“My gate,” he corrected. “Is it so strange an idea, that a man might be kind to his wife?”
“No, my lord. But many men are not, especially to a wife who does not want them.” She sounded small even to her own ears, but pushed on. “And I did not want this marriage.”
“So you have made clear. Numerous times.” The creak of the bed as he rose made Alaida look up. He had rid himself of his hose without her noticing, and now his chainse went, too, tossed aside so that he wore only his braies. He stretched vigorously, like a warrior about to begin combat. “And yet you have it. So now you must decide what you will do with it. With me.”
“I will not fight you, my lord, if that is what you mean.”
“Wise. But I want more from you than simply not fighting.” Holding her eyes, he flipped back the furs to reveal the fresh linens. “Much more.”
Alaida’s mouth went as dry as old parchment. Blindly, she reached for the nearest horn. She’d gulped down several mouthfuls before she tasted Bôte’s spices.
Ivo padded over to the last candlestick and slowly put out the final tapers, leaving her standing in the thin pool of light thrown by the fire and the lamp. Beyond its edge, her lord and husband was a ghostly figure against the blackness, with eyes that glinted like shards of glass as he turned toward her.
She looked away, just for a moment, and when she looked back, he was barely a pace away and the wall of his chest filled her vision, all planes and muscles and pale gold skin.
“You’re trembling,” he said, taking the posset horn from her hand and setting it back in its rest.
“I’m cold.”
“You will find it warm in my arms.” He stepped closer, and as his hands spanned her waist, the heat billowing off his body proved that he, at least, was not lying. “God’s truth, Alaida, I would rather spend the night pleasuring you than sparring with you. Tell me what it will be. Will you make yourself completely mine?”
He used the same words he had in the hall, but filled them now with invitation rather than challenge. The trepidation that had been lying in her belly like a rock suddenly thinned and softened into a warm, smoky mist that curled though her.
“That was the vow you demanded, my lord, and the one I gave. I will honor it.” Her voice grew rough as his thumbs traced lazy circles below her ribs, but she saw the triumph that lit his eyes and fought back in what small way she could. “Though I do not see what pleasure I will find in it.”
“Do you not?” he asked softly as he lowered his head. “Then I must help you hunt.”
His mouth covered hers, gentle at first, then more determined, until she parted her lips to his probing tongue. I can do this, she told herself. She could let him take what he wanted without letting it touch her.
“No.” He broke off the kiss and brought one hand up to grip her chin. “You gave yourself away with that kiss, Alaida. I know that you know better. I know that you want better.” He tilted her face into a better position, then lowered his lips to within a hair’s breadth of hers. “Now kiss me, wife. Properly.”
She had little choice but to give him the kiss he commanded, the kind she’d so foolishly demonstrated in the hall. This time, though, he kissed back from the first, his tongue parrying with hers, and to her shock, he tasted good, like Bôte’s spices but better. And astonishingly male.
How had she missed that earlier?
Her blood began to stir despite her intentions, and as she sought to bring herself back in hand, he changed his attack, shifting off her mouth to kiss his way down her neck and back up to her ear, where he proceeded to do things with his teeth and his tongue that sent shivers down her spine. Waves of shivers, which continued to wash over her even after he finally returned to her lips. And what he did to her then was even worse.
Or better. Alaida suddenly wasn’t certain. She tried to separate herself again, but couldn’t find the place where his lips left off and hers began.
It was the posset, she thought. Bôte’s spices. That must be why her body was behaving so traitorously, why it was turning all warm and liquid when she didn’t wish it to.
Or perhaps it was the kissing. She liked kissing, what she knew of it, and he did it well, nipping and sucking at her lower lip and then soothing away the ache he created with yet more kisses. Her May Day knight had not used that particular trick, nor had he made her knees go so weak. If he would just keep to kissing …
But of course he didn’t. He began to explore her body, his hands moving over her with confidence but also with a gentleness she hadn’t expected. Slowly, she realized she hadn’t lied to Bôte. She wasn’t afraid of him. Nervous about what would happen once he took her into the bed, but not afraid of the man himself. So when he stepped back a half pace and reached for the opening of her chainse and said, “Time to be rid of this,” she blushed, but she nodded.
“Yes, my lord.”
“Ivo,” he said. Carefully, he spread the opening. It parted to reveal a wide wedge of neck and shoulder but would go no further. He placed a kiss at each edge. “You have yet to say my name, except in your vows. I would hear it from your lips.”
“The neck is too narrow, my lord,” she said softly, defiant even as she told him how to undress her. “It will not go that way.”
“No?” He dipped his fingers in and brushed his knuckles over her breasts, smiling as her eyelids fluttered, then took the cloth in both hands and gave a sturdy tug. It tore to her navel. “I think it will.”
She blushed more deeply, but stood fast. “Perhaps you are right, my lord.”
“Ivo.” He dipped a hand into the tear and flattened it against her belly. Awareness quivered through her as he slid it lower. She tensed, waiting for that touch, there, but he switched directions, slowly tracing a line up her belly with his fingertips, trailing fire between her breasts and up over the soft skin of her throat. Carefully, he tipped the chainse off her shoulders. It slid to her hips and hung, barely. Letting it be, he took his fill with his eyes, then slowly slid his hands up to cup her breasts. She gasped as his thumbs circled the peaks, and his eyes darkened with desire.
He bent to taste her, and that was when she discovered that kissing could be more than lip to lip, that a tongue could do things to her body she’d never imagined in her most sinful daydreams. Sensation spiraled out from where he suckled, joining with the spices to make her giddy with want. Such want. With a harsh, almost unwilling sigh, she curled her fingers into his hair.
He had her. Ivo would have crowed his victory, except his mouth was full of her summer-sweet flesh and he had no wish to give her up. He tongued over her again and shifted to the other breast, working both until her breath came in uneven gasps.
By Freyja, it was going to be hard to go slow, with his body already screaming to be buried in her. There was a hunger on him he hadn’t expected, keen as the edge of his sword and growing sharper with every breath. He could slake it easily enough, carry her down onto the bed and simply have her, but he wanted more than simple release. The memory of women long ago, women like Ingigerd, who had lain with him not for money or out of obligation but for the joy of it, drove him even more than his wager with Brand.
“Come lie with me, Alaida,” he whispered. She nodded, and he scooped her up and carried her the few feet to the bed. Kneeling over her, he looked down at the woman who would be his, her lips and breasts smudged and swollen from his mouth, and her fair skin carrying the flush of a woman ready for a man. He reached for the tie to his braies, but thought better of it. If he bared himself now, he would be in her in a heartbeat, maidenhead or no.
“I will not hurt you,” he vowed to them both as he reared back and dragged the torn kirtle from her hips.
Her legs splayed a little as he yanked the linen free, enough for him to see the shadowed gate to her womanhood. Reddish curls, the same rich copper as her hair, surrounded it, begging for his touch, and only force of will kept him from falling on her like the raider he had once been. Like the eagle he was.
To slow himself, he started with her lips and kissed his way down, pulling another gasp out of her as he locked his lips over her breast again. She reached out for him and he let her pull him down, twisting to land beside her instead of on her, so that he retained both his sanity and free range of her body. His hands wandered over her skin as he suckled her again, making her fingers clutch at his back and his hair. He shifted and kissed his way to her belly.
