by Колин Глисон
She could not speak for a moment, so unexpected was his reaction. Then, sanity reigned, and she replied, “But only moments before you came to me, a page delivered it, saying ’twas a gift from you.”
“Did you drink of it?” He grabbed her shoulders, pulling her near him as he searched her eyes. “Maris, did you?”
Maris pulled sharply away. “Aye, but no more than a small sip. What ails you, Dirick?”
“It could have been poisoned. It most likely was poisoned!”
“Why should anyone poison me?” She could not contain her shock.
“For the same reason they should try to run you down in the market place. I do not know.” His face sagged into serious concern. “Maris, you must have a care! Someone here does not want you to live. Promise me, promise me, that you will go nowhere without me or Raymond until we leave this place.”
Maris nodded, the lump in her throat lodging any words she may have wished to speak inside. Why should anyone wish to kill her?
“Did you recognize the page? What did he say?”
She shook her head and described what had happened when he’d brought the wine. There were no answers there, she knew, and even only the suspicion that the wine had been poisoned. They would never know for certain.
“We will leave Westminster the day after we are wed,” Dirick told her firmly. “I will take you to Derkland for a time, to meet my mother, and then we shall go on to Ludingdon. At any rate, I shall take you away from this place and we shall stay where I know you will be safe. No one will be able to get to you in Derkland or at Ludington.”
Maris was just about to speak when another page approached. “My lady Maris?” She nodded acquiescence and he bowed. “I have been asked to inform you that your mother, Lady Allegra of Langumont, has arrived.”
“My mother?” she repeated dumbly. She had hardly given Allegra a thought in the last se’ennight.
“Aye. She has been shown to the ladies’ chamber, and wishes you to attend her.”
Maris rose, guilt blossoming inside her. “Aye. I will go to her.” She looked down at Dirick, who stared up at her with eyes that seemed to devour her. “I will look to see you at dinner this night,” she said, barely resisting the urge to touch his cheek.
“My lady, I look more to two days hence when we shall be wed.” He grabbed her hand and pressed a kiss to the inner part of her wrist, then released her. “Until then.”
~*~
Allegra had been summoned to Westminster in order to attend her daughter’s wedding. She’d had no choice but to respond to the king’s wishes, and the journey had been one of haste and discomfort.
When Maris appeared, she wore a surprised but pleased expression on her face. “Mama! How glad I am that you have come to see me wed!”
Allegra drew her daughter into a brief embrace, then set her back gently. When had her daughter grown into such a lovely, strong young woman? “You are to marry Sir Dirick de Arlande?”
“Aye, only now he is called Lord Dirick of Ludingdon.” Maris sat in a chair next to her. “Mama, why did you not tell me Papa is not my father?”
Allegra’s heart skittered in her chest, and stopped beating for a moment. “How did you come to learn this?”
A familiar expression of stubbornness crossed her daughter’s face. “It does not matter how I came to learn of it, only whether ’tis true.”
She closed her eyes, struggling to manage the sudden horrible foreboding that settled like a heavy stone in her middle. “Aye, daughter, ’tis true. Your papa did not sire you.” She clenched her hands tightly. “But how did you come to learn this? Tell me.”
“Papa wrote it in a missive to the king,” Maris explained.
“Your papa?” Suddenly, she couldn’t breathe. “Your papa told the king?”
“Aye, Mama.”
She swallowed tightly. “Your Papa did not know—oh, I did not believe he knew. I did not tell him. ’Twas my greatest sin….” Dear God, she was cursed. Damned!
If Merle knew that Maris was not of his loins, it would have been no hardship to tell him of Bon’s threats…and why he could not betrothe her to Victor. Instead, she had lived the lie, protected it for eighteen years. Now Merle was dead, and she still had judgment to face. A sudden trembling overtook her and she stuffed her hands into the folds of her skirts.
“I must go to confession.” She stood abruptly, moving without hesitation and without a backward glance, to the door. She ignored Maris’s shocked stare as she swept from the chamber.
Later, when night had come, and when Allegra had said enough paternosters and Ave Marias, she hoped, to salvage her soul, she crept from the chapel, tucking her graying hair into her veil. She cast about, looking for a page, a maidservant, someone to guide her back to the ladies’ chamber.
“Allegra.”
The smooth voice from the shadows caused her heart to leap into her throat, and she whirled to face him. “Michael! Oh, Michael!”
“Sshhh,” he admonished, stepping fully into the light. He pressed a finger against her dry lips with a soft caress, “‘Tis not meet for us to be seen together.”
“Why? Why should we care?” she said, just so she could feel her mouth moving against his beloved flesh.
“Come.” He dropped his hand from her lips and grasped her own fingers, firmly tugging her along in his wake.
Allegra followed. She would do anything he bid—and he drew her along in the shadows of the dark hall. Reaching a small alcove, he pulled her inside and into a bare chamber, then into his embrace.
With a cry of delight, she pulled his face to hers, sampling his mouth with her starving lips. “Michael,” she sighed. “Oh, my beloved, how I have missed you. I thought to lose you yet again after you left Langumont.”
His hands were warm and possessive over the swell of her hips, pressing into her the need that pulsed at his groin. “You are my only love,” he told her as his mouth slid to the hollow of her neck. “Marry me. Dearling, be my wife.” He pulled back so that she could see the glitter of hope and desire in his eyes.
“Oh, aye, Michael, aye. ’Tis half my life I have waited to hear those words of your lips!” Her hands were busy, pulling his tunic up so that she could feel his warm, solid chest against her fingers.
“’Tis a lifetime I have waited to utter them.” He helped her by yanking off his tunic, then pushing his chausses down past his waist. Michael slid her to the floor, pulling up her gown so that it bunched above her hips. When he thrust inside of her welcoming body, she cried at the pleasure of it, raising and lowering herself to meet his rhythm.
With a sharp, guttural groan, he met his end, and she with him. They lay for a moment in a heap of tangled clothing, sweat, and lust.
“Let us marry on the morrow,” he suggested, pressing a kiss behind her ear, at a place that never failed to cause her to shiver.
“But, Michael, what of the banns? We cannot find a priest to marry us so soon! And what of Maris?”
“I have already paid a priest to marry us without calling the banns. I meant to ask you tonight and could not bear to wait any longer than need be. He awaits us on the morrow. And,” he slid his tongue into the depths of her ear, sending a sharp, pleasant twinge down her spine, “let us not tell Maris as yet…she may look askance at us for marrying so soon after Merle’s death.”
Allegra pulled away as a thought struck her. “Did you tell Maris that you are her natural father?”
Michael peered down at her in the dim light as if trying to read her face. “What did you say?”
“Her betrothal to Victor was repudiated and now she is to marry Lord of Ludingdon…was it you who told the king of her relation to your son so that he would deny the betrothal?”
Michael nodded. “Aye, he was prepared to formalize the contracts between them, and I could do naught but step forward and share the truth with him. ’Twas all for the best. Dirick of Derkland seems a fine fellow.”
Allegra nodded, pleased at his concern for t
heir daughter, and overwhelmed by the comfort of his nearness. “I have never stopped loving you, Michael, and I cannot believe that we shall be husband and wife at last!”
She felt him smile against her cheek. “Aye. ’Tis all that I have ever hoped for.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Dirick leaned heavily against Raymond’s shoulder, his head reeling from the large amount of ale he’d imbibed at The Blue Goat, The Bow and the Apple, The King’s Shield…and all of the other places his men had been dragging him to.
“This way, m’lord,” directed Raymond, his voice slightly slurred. The party of men stumbled along the street, their way lit as much by the full moon as by the lanterns that hung intermittently about.
“I know where I am,” growled Dirick, struggling to hold his head upright. It was not the best thing to do the night before one’s wedding, but it had been impossible to deny his men their chance to celebrate his marriage and the betterment of his position as well—for his increase in stature with the king translated into their own improvement.
Verily, dawn could be no more than two or three hours away. Dirick groaned at the thought. Henry expected him, as well as the other two bridegrooms, to join him for a celebratory hunt not long after the sun rose…to be followed shortly after by the wedding ceremony. In a matter of hours, he would be married to Maris.
Even in his befuddled state of mind, Dirick grasped the clarity of that fact. At this time on the morrow, he’d be abed with his new wife. And despite the amount of ale his men had poured down his throat, Dirick’s body reacted accordingly, filling and hardening with desire.
He’d not seen Maris since the announcement that her mother had arrived from Langumont. Between the king’s demands on his time, his new responsibilities as Lord of Ludingdon, and Maris’s attention to Allegra, neither of them had been in the great hall for meals at the same time. He’d not see her again, he realized, until they met at the altar on the morrow.
Not for the first time, Dirick wondered if she’d become accepting of the fact that he was to be her husband. He did not want a battle in their bedchamber on the night of their wedding if she had not.
She’d ever welcomed his kisses in the past, he reflected, the heaviness between his legs growing…and if they were truly wed, she’d have no reason, and, he prayed, no desire, to refuse him.
Dirick stumbled over a rock in the street and would have pitched face first onto the ground had Raymond not had a firm grip on his tunic. One of the men in their group—he thought it might be Sir Gerald, but everything was a bleary mess—guffawed loudly in the still night, commenting that his lord had nearly fallen into a pile of dung. Dirick responded with a slurred insult, which the rest of the men found so uproariously funny that they nearly failed to spot the shadow slouching along the wall near the castle’s entrance.
“Ho!” Raymond stopped short. He was the least inebriated of the bunch, Dirick realized, and was thankful ’twas he who’d offered to guide him home. “Who goes there?”
As the shadow moved into the torchlight, metamorphosing into Bon de Savrille, Dirick pulled himself upright, standing solidly under his own balance. His muscles tensed.
“What do you here?” Dirick demanded, separating himself from his men and approaching Bon. Through the haze of drunkenness, he found the comforting handle of his dagger.
“Do not fear,” sneered the other man, “I do not wait to accost you, but only to issue a warning.”
“You seek to warn me? Against what?” Dirick choked back a deprecating laugh. Then he lashed out to grab the other man’s arm. “Is it you who seeks to show Maris to an early grave?”
Bon shook off his grip with effort. “Nay, fool! Why would I wish to see the woman dead? ’Tis why I come to warn you.”
Dirick stared at him, uncomprehending. “Speak more clearly, then, man!”
Bon leaned toward him, his dark eyes glittering with intensity. “I do not wish to see her dead, but there is one who does…and the same one wishes harm to you as well.”
“Why do you warn me, then, as I know you have no love for me!”
The other man shook his head. “Nay, I do not,” he agreed, “but ’tis Maris for whom I care…and I would see her protected.” He looked at Dirick with bleary eyes. “I love her.”
“She is mine.” Dirick snapped the words, suddenly afraid that Bon might find a way to have her.
“I am aware that the king has promised her to you.” Bon’s reply was bitter. “But that is not the purpose of my warning to you. Ask yourself why did Merle of Langumont not return from Breakston, and you will know why someone desires her dead.”
“Merle of Langumont died in the siege of Breakston, most like of your own hand,” Dirick returned slowly, the ale still swimming in his mind.
“Nay. Merle of Langumont was alive to accept my surrender,” Bon told him.
“You do not—”
Bon began to melt back into the shadows. “Nay, that is all I can tell you, sirrah, as I do not wish to be the next casualty…an’, in faith, I wish to be the one left to hold and comfort my lady when all is said and the battles done.” With that parting promise, he disappeared from sight.
“Who is it!” demanded Dirick of the shadows.
“Her father.” whispered a voice before its owner swept away into the night.
Her father. Dirick’s mind swam as he lay on his pallet, Bon’s words echoing in his memory, swirling among the ale that sopped his brain. Her father was dead, he reminded himself. What did the man mean? Nay, Merle was not her father, he remembered foggily. Ask yourself why Merle of Langumont did not return from Breakston. Why?
I love her. Those words taunted him with their sincerity. Another man loved his betrothed wife—truly loved her, if the pain in Bon’s voice was to be believed.
A heaviness settled over Dirick’s chest. His breathing quickened, then slowed, then rose faster again. If another man loved her enough to warn his enemy of danger, just to ensure that Maris should be safe, what would he do to have her?
The chamber around him spun and swam as he lay there.
Could she love him?
Nay, of course not.
Could she?
Dirick frowned at his absurd thought, fighting to crystallize the murkiness of his mind. Damn that last jug of ale!
Her father. The words returned. I love her.
Ask yourself why Merle of Langumont did not return.
He slept, dreamt, slept.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Dirick’s head felt thrice as large as normal, his ears a hundred times more sensitive, and his belly like the ocean during a storm.
The barking of the dogs was enough to drive him mad, yet he gritted his teeth and managed to smile at Henry’s jest.
“What ails you, Dirick?” the king asked, obviously noticing his pained grin.
“Naught but enough ale to drown a village,” he admitted.
Henry chuckled. “’Twould be a pity were you not at your best this eve when you take your bride to bed.” He laughed outright. “Say the word if you cannot perform your duties and would wish some assistance.”
Dirick glared at the king, finding little humor in his liege’s jest. “Nay, your majesty, I assure you—I have waited long enough for this night, and I will have no problem performing as I should.”
The king laughed again, then turned his attention to the howling hounds. “They’ve scented a boar!” he cried in excitement. With a spur to his mount, he leaned forward and the stallion leapt into the wake of the frenzied dogs.
A party of twenty some men and their horses trampled through the forest, bearing down upon the hounds. The fresh air whipping about his face dissolved the brunt of Dirick’s nausea and he began to get into the spirit of the hunt. With a cry of delight, he brandished the spear he carried and urged Nick harder, so that they gained ground on the king.
At last, the howling of the dogs indicated that they’d cornered the boar. The hunters raced into the clearing, rein
ing up on one side, readying themselves to take passes at the snorting animal.
The boar’s red eyes blazed from its long snouted face, and angry tusks curled with enough curve to rock a careless dog before tossing it into the air. Bristling, wiry hair sprang from the beast, and hot breath rasped from flaring nostrils as it cast frantically about for an escape route. Hound, horse, or man blocked all avenues of freedom, and the boar grew more frenzied as it readied itself to rush through the blockades
“Now!” cried Henry, nodding at the three bridegrooms, who’d been given the honor of the first strokes.
Lord Bartholemew readied his spear and dug his heels into his mount’s sides. They leaped forward, crashing through the clearing, passing by the boar in a flurry of hooves, flapping cloak, and a well thrust spear. A spurt of blood sprang forth from the beast’s shoulder, and a cheer erupted from the other hunters.
Lord Richard followed shortly after, missing his stab at the boar, but distracting the howling beast from the spear wielded by Dirick. His aim was true, and the boar received another telling wound in its belly.
As Dirick halted Nick to the side, watching as the boar pawed the ground, readying itself for a vicious pass through the ring of men that surrounded it, he had a moment to reflect upon his garbled memory of Bon’s warning from the night before.
Why did Merle not return from Breakston? If he were alive when Bon saw him last, and he was not felled during the attack upon the keep, then he must have died by the hand of someone else.
Michael and Victor d’Arcy?
The thought sprang to his mind, followed quickly by the question of why.
A shout from one of the hunters distracted Dirick from his thoughts, and he saw that the boar was wavering on its feet.
Her father.
Could Michael be Maris’s father? That could explain Allegra’s odd reaction when she greeted them back at Langumont. The hair prickled at the nape of his neck. Things were beginning to make sense.
Dirick turned to Lord Bartholemew, who watched the last thrust at the boar with rapt attention. “Bart, know you much of Lord Michael d’Arcy? Is he trustworthy?”
