Fire and Steel

by Anita Mills

  “And what of my honor?” she cried. “Do you not even care that I will be pitied—that ‘twill be said that you tire of me already!”

  “In two days’ time?” he asked incredulously. “Nay, ’twill not.” He looked into the depths of her dark eyes, trying to understand her, and he felt a surge of desire. Dropping his hand as though burned, he exhaled sharply and tried to think of what she was saying. “Yesterday you shouted at me because I came, and today you would shout because I must leave. Jesu, Cat, but I cannot understand you. Which would you have of me—that I go or stay?”

  It was not fair of him to make her choose between two things she did not want, she reflected bitterly. “Since we are caught in this marriage neither of us willed, and since Holy Church says we cannot break the bond between us, then I would go with you to Rouen,” she answered finally. “I’d not be left to pity, my lord.”

  His pride would not let him tell her that he had not the money to take her to King Henry’s court as befitted Catherine of the Condes. And as much as he wanted her even now, he’d not give her such power over him. His anger gone, he shook his head. “Nay, Catherine, but I cannot take you with me now. And you cannot wish to absent yourself from your sister’s wedding, after all.” Not daring to touch her again, he nodded toward her dress. “Put on your gown and comb your hair, that we may go down to eat.”

  “You have ended my appetite.”

  “Catherine…” He walked to pick up the dress she’d worn the night before and handed it to her. “I have an accursed temper—so much so that it has taken me all my life to master it even poorly. I would not try me further this day were I you.”

  “I cannot help that I—that we—cannot like what we are given, my lord.”

  His gaze traveled past her to the rumpled bed and a slow smile formed again, curving his mouth. “Nay?” he questioned with raised eyebrow. “’Twould seem we were content enough in each other last night.”

  “But I would have more than that,” she replied, turning away in shame.

  He sobered. “Even that is more than many get, Cat.”

  “Mayhap, but ‘tis not enough for me—I cannot but want what my parents have, my lord. I would be valued as my mother is by my father.”

  “Cat…” He raised his hand to reach to her and then dropped it.

  “And if you think it but a foolish wish, Guy, then there can be naught but this between us.”

  “I can be no Roger de Brione, Cat—there is but one of him on this earth.” He reached out again and turned her back to face him, holding her shoulders and looking into her tear-sparkled eyes. “But I can give you children of your body—we can found a house together, Cat.”

  “And you think that is what I want? That I want to live my life as naught but mother to your sons? Sweet Mary, but there is more to me than that!”

  He knew not how to answer her—he could not bring himself to say what he wanted of her. He would not let her see what she had the power to do to him—not until he knew for certain that he could make her forget Brian FitzHenry. Finally he drew her into his arms, where she stood rigid and unyielding. “I would that I could take you to Rouen with me, Cat, but I cannot.”

  20

  Brian FitzHenry felt the toe of Aislinn’s slipper when she kicked him awake. Rolling over in his pallet, he blinked against the morning light and shielded his eyes with his hand. His head ached as though it had been split with a battleax and his mouth was sour with the taste of last night’s wine.

  “Get up and send your whore away,” she ordered him coldly.

  “Wha…?” He shook his head as though to clear it and winced from the pain. “Oh…’tis you,” he mumbled, drawing his blanket to cover his head. But even as he turned away, her foot hit him again in the small of his back. “Jesu! Why are—?” He didn’t get a chance to finish his question before she poured the pail of drinking water over his head. Beside him, Tyra came awake with a shriek of outrage.

  “Whore,” Aislinn repeated contemptuously. “You ought to be tending to your babes rather than getting more of them, Tyra.”

  The serving woman clutched Brian’s blanket to her bare chest and stared insolently at the younger girl. Brian, sensing even through the cobwebs of his mind that Linn was angry, slapped Tyra hard on her thigh and pushed her off his pallet. “Nay—go on.” Sitting up, he wiped his face with the corner of the blanket and looked up balefully at the girl who stood over him with her hands on her hips.

  “Get up—else I’ll douse you again.”

  “God’s beard, but you are cross,” he complained as he struggled to sit and the blanket fell away, exposing his nakedness all the way to his lap. “’Tis no place for you, Linn.”

  “Nay, it is not, but I would speak with you about Cat, Brian. Get up and get dressed and come down to the field—I will meet you where the quintains are set.”

  “Jesu, but you cannot just wake a man and—”

  “The sun is already high and everyone has eaten but you. Maman already meets with the butler and the chamberlain to speak of the guests, Papa has gone hawking with Geoffrey, as you may remember if you were not too drunk to note it, and Cat practices with Pippa and Bella, showing them how they are to comport themselves at my wedding. Now, do you get up or do I have to go to Papa with the tale?”

  “What tale?” he asked warily. “God’s beard! Make sense, will you?”

  “Are you getting out of that pallet or not?”

  “Aye, but—”

  “Then I will see you at the quintains—and do not stop to eat on your way.”

  The skirt of her embroidered overgown brushed against him as she twitched it behind her and marched from the room. With a sigh that pained his aching head, he groped for his clothes, wondering how it could be thought that she was the sweet-tempered one. He stood naked to relieve himself in the chamber pot and then hastily pulled on his chausses. If Linn meant to carry some tale to Roger, he must have done something ill, but his memory failed him. Jesu, but he could not even remember taking Tyra to his pallet. Not bothering with his undertunic, he pulled on a plain brown wool overshirt and belted it over his chausses to cover himself. Cross-banding his legs to smooth the hose over them, he tried to think. Aye, he’d drunk far more wine than he should have, but he’d done nothing beyond that, surely. He leaned over to pull on his slippers and tied the long toes back.

  He had to balance himself against the stones with one hand and hold his head with the other to negotiate the narrow steps down from the old square tower where the unmarried men slept. Passing the old chapel, a relic from when the Condes was but one tower and a wall, he paused, wondering if he ought to ask God’s pardon for whatever he’d done ere he faced Aislinn again. But for what? “I would speak to you of Cat,” she’d said. Jesu, if he did not have enough on his mind there, for Cat had been behaving strangely to him ever since Rivaux had left nearly a week before.

  “It took you long enough,” Aislinn greeted him sourly when he let himself through the gate and into the practice field. She stood waiting beneath the tall wood-and-straw targets used to train squires on horseback in the arts of lance and mace.

  “You did not want me to empty a full bladder?” he retorted. “Or did you want to watch?”

  “Sometimes you make me glad I had no brother,” she shot back. “You give me a disgust of men.”

  “Then ‘tis well that you wed Mayenne, for he’s more maid than man.”

  “I did not come here to speak of Geoffrey—’tis Cat who worries me.”

  He moved to lean against one of the quintains. Squinting in the sun, he passed his hand over his face and wished for all the world that he had some wine to ease his pain. “What of her? God’s blood, Linn, but you have changed,” he grumbled with feeling. “There was a time when you were the gentle little sister, but I vow you’ve cracked my ribs with your foot.”

  “’Tis no more than you deserve, Brian FitzHenry.”

  “Jesu!” He looked skyward, shaking his head, and blanched fr
om the sun’s brightness in his eyes. “And what is it that you think I have done this time?”

  “I’d not see my sister dishonored, Brian.”

  “Dishonored? I know not of what you speak,” he muttered. Then, meeting her eyes, he sobered. “But that’s what you think I want, isn’t it?”

  “Aye, and only a blind man could not see where you would lead her.”

  “Aislinn, I swear to you—”

  “Do not waste words with me, Brian. I saw you and I heard you last night.”

  “Then you mistook what you saw.”

  She shook her head. “Nay, but I did not, and I swear to you that if ever again I hear you tell her how Guy of Rivaux will not know of it if she lies with you, ’tis to my father you will answer.”

  He colored guiltily, remembering vaguely that he’d shared Cat’s trencher the night before and wondering if he had said such a thing. She’d been in high temper, and her determined gaiety in the face of those who came to witness Aislinn’s wedding had made her even more beautiful. Aye, he could have said something, he supposed. “It must have been the wine,” he conceded, “for I remember it not.”

  “You remember it not. You have no memory of how ’twas that you stroked her hair and then her shoulder, and then, when she did not draw away, you leaned to whisper, ‘Come to me, Cat—he will not know now.’ God’s blood, Brian, but if any had heard you but me, you might as well have branded her your leman in front of everyone! And had Papa not been on the other side of Maman, and had they not been speaking with Geoffrey’s father, he would have heard it! As it was, I had to convince my betrothed husband that his ears deceived him!”

  “I swear I—”

  “I care not what you swear, Brian—I heard you with mine own ears. You sought to use my sister’s anger with her wedded husband to get her in your bed. What a fool you are—what a fool!” She paced furiously before him. “If Guy of Rivaux even suspected what you have said to Cat, not even King Henry could save you from his wrath—do you not know that?”

  “If he cared for her, he’d not have left.”

  “Jesu! And that makes it right? Nay, but it does not! There is the matter of her honor, and her husband’s honor, and my father’s honor—and my honor even. I would not have Geoffrey or his father discover such a thing, else they might think me unchaste. Just because you would lie with anything from hag to wench to…to…” Words failed her at that point.

  “To Cat,” he cut in. “Aye, I admit it, but who would not? Think you Rivaux did not bed her when he was here?”

  “He had the right, Brian. He had the right. He is her wedded husband, lest you would forget it.”

  “Why did you not speak of this last night?”

  “I had not the chance, and I would not have wanted anyone to note it, but if she’d not shared my bed whilst Geoffrey and the count had her chamber, I’d have gone to Papa.”

  “Well, it never happened—I took Tyra to my pallet, as you saw.”

  “Not because you did not wish it,” she answered. “Cat said ‘twas not for me to interfere, but I’ll not stand and watch you bring dishonor to my sister and my family, Brian. I’ll not let you turn her anger at her, husband against her. She may be blind to your lust, but I am not.”

  “The blame is not mine alone,” he replied. “She has teased and enticed me since we were children, and well you know it.”

  “She thinks she loves you, but I’ll warrant ’tis but that you were the only boy we knew then, for I cannot think her foolish enough to really want a man who lies with anyone who will spread her legs for him.”

  “Linn, I meant her no dishonor last night, I swear. I do not even remember what you say.” He met her eyes ruefully and shook his head. “I had too much wine to remember anything.”

  “Aye, you had too much wine—you have had too much wine ever since Guy of Rivaux came to the Condes. Look at you—look at yourself, Brian FitzHenry!” she challenged. “Are you proud of what you are? Can it be that you want naught but to live at my father’s table?”

  “My father gives me not the means to live at any other,” he answered bitterly. “This is my home as much as it is yours, Linn. I fostered here almost as long ago as you were born.”

  “Aye, but you are a boy no longer.”

  “I have not the means to go anywhere else,” he repeated.

  “You have a good sword arm and a horse, Brian. Do as my father did and take service with a great lord. Earn a place for yourself and do not seek to be that which you are not.” Seeing the slow flush that crept to his face, she added in a gentler tone, “You can never be my father’s son or my sister’s husband, Brian, but that does not mean that you cannot be lord of your own lands one day. Go to your father…offer him your service. He knows what it is to have naught—the old Conqueror left him no land, but only a few silver marks. If he is king now, ’tis because he used his wits.” Her dark eyes met his soberly and held them. “If you think to do naught but drink and wench, you’ll be but a drunken sot, fit for nothing but sitting with your head in your trencher.”

  Stung, he stared hard at her, seeing her not as the child who had followed him and Cat about when they were children, but as a woman grown and ready to be married, a woman not afraid to speak the truth to him. “Why do you tell me this, Linn? Why do you care what happens to me?” he asked finally. “And why did you choose not to tell your father?”

  “Because he’d send you away.”

  “’Tis what you would have me do, is it not? You are telling me to leave, Linn.”

  “Brian, you are as a brother to me—can you not understand that? I want you to go of your own will, and not because you are sent in disgrace,” she answered simply. “I’d have you use the skills my father taught you, and I’d see you return someday as lord of your own lands.”

  “You would have me trade wenching for warring, Linn.”

  “I’d have you make your own way.”

  “My father gives me nothing. I am but one of his bastards and nothing more. And I am not one of his favorites like Richard or Robert, so he finds no heiress for me. God’s blood, Linn, but ’tis Earl of Gloucester he makes Robert of Caen! And yet when I asked him, he would not give me Catherine of the Condes!”

  “Be glad of it. How long do you think Cat would tolerate your bastards if you were to wed to her? You’d have to learn constancy or you’d need a taster for your food.”

  Even through the pain that pounded in his temples and throbbed behind his eyes, he knew she spoke the truth. He’d known even before he came back to the Condes that Cat was lost to him. And he’d sworn to himself long ago that he’d do nothing to harm Roger. Aye, not even Cat was worth the cost if he lost the love of her father. Mayhap that was the reason he hated and feared Guy of Rivaux so much—not because he had Catherine, but because he now shared a bond of blood by marriage with Roger de Brione.

  “Brian…” She reached to lay a comforting hand on his shoulder, knowing she’d spared him no pain.

  “Nay—if you are going to tell me again what a sot I have become, I’d not hear it,” he told her wearily.

  “You are not a sot—’tis that I fear you will become one. I’d see you rise before the world as my father has done.” She dropped her hand and sighed. “Come on, I had the cooks save food for you.”

  He pushed off from the quintain support and tried to ease his aching neck. Falling in beside her for the walk back, he felt a sense of loss.

  Finally, after several minutes’ silence, she spoke. “Why do you need so many women, Brian? Is it because you cannot have Cat?”

  “Mayhap I am my father’s son.”

  “But you do not have to be.”

  He reached for her hand and held it as they walked. “You should not worry over me or Cat when ’tis you who are to wed this week. You should think of happier things.”

  “Aye, but I’d not see either of you unhappy.”

  “Do you wish to wed him?”

  “He is my father’s choice for me. An
d we have been betrothed since I was twelve.” She stopped to look up at him. “I am almost seventeen, Brian, so I have stayed here longer than most girls stay at home.”

  “Aye.” He’d heard his father complain that Roger de Brione valued his daughters too highly, refusing to send them to husbands until he could delay no longer. But in Geoffrey of Mayenne’s case, he’d warrant there was more to it than that. The boy who’d showed such promise when he was twelve had proven to be pleasant enough in a gentle, almost girlish way. And he’d grown no taller than Brian, and without the huskiness necessary to wield a broadsword. Aye, if Mayenne had not pressed the matter, Brian doubted Roger would have ever honored the pledge between them. And Brian thought it a pity that he had, for while she did not have Cat’s breathtaking beauty, Aislinn was far too comely for the likes of Geoffrey of Mayenne. But it was not his place to say anything that would make her dissatisfied with the husband she had to take.

  “Art silent.”

  “What would you have me say? You have called me a sot and a lecher and have said I am too lazy to earn my bread with my sword arm.”

  “I never said you were too lazy—do not give me words I did not speak.”

  “Your pardon—I am but a sot and a lecher, then.” In spite of everything, his face broke into a grin. “God’s blood, Linn, but you keep a man from his own conceit, do you not?”

  She looked up, surprised by his sudden lightness. He was not a handsome man like Guy of Rivaux, but there was something about him that made women like him. And she was, after all, a woman. “Aye,” she answered with a smile that crinkled the corners of her brown eyes. “In your case, Brian FitzHenry, ’tis most necessary that someone do it.”

  21

  Unable to sleep, Guy spent a restless night contemplating his meeting with the man who’d sent him into exile nearly five years before. Some things were different now: Henry was the acknowledged lord of all he’d coveted, holding both England and Normandy as his father had done; and some things were the same: the Norman barons still fought among themselves and resisted ducal rule to the extent that England’s king spent more than half his time being Normandy’s duke. And this year had been worse than most, for despite Henry’s determination to rule both lands, he’d not been able to keep the old Saxon custom of wearing his crown in England on the major feast days because of the unrest in Normandy.