“It will be over soon!” Sir Guy said joyously, and he leaned across the desk heavily to plant a kiss upon her forehead. “And when I return, Genevieve . . .”
Father Thomas cleared his throat. “If we have messengers from the King as our guests, perhaps we should be seeing to their comfort.”
“I’ll see to it—” Guy began. But Genevieve interrupted him.
“Aye, Father. As the Lady of Edenby, I shall see to it.” She stood regally, squaring her shoulders. Responsibility had fallen upon her; she’d no choice but to take it. But it was something that she was determined not to relinquish. Father Thomas was worried that she was a woman alone; well, for the time being she would stand alone, and neither Guy, nor Father Thomas, nor anyone else would take what was hers by right. She had fought too hard to maintain it.
“Sir Guy?” she queried politely. “Would you see to the men and arms we offer the King?”
“Aye, Genevieve!” he agreed. He caught her hand and kissed it feverishly, then rushed out.
Father Thomas lifted a brow to her, smiling slightly. “I believe he feels he is the lord of the castle already.”
“Perhaps he will be one day,” Genevieve said. “And perhaps he will not. Father, I’m discovering that I enjoy my power. Perhaps I will do so all my days!”
Father Thomas started to frown disapprovingly, and she smiled. “Oh, Father, let’s take this a step at a time, shall we? Right now we must go give food and drink to the King’s men, and send them all on their way—although, God knows, surely I am needier than the King at this moment! And then . . .”
“And then?”
“Then we must have Mass for our dead,” she said quietly. “Father?” She offered him her arm. “Will you stand with me now and serve as host in my father’s place, since I would be wary of any other man?”
He smiled. “Aye, Genevieve. I’ll stand at your side. And,” he muttered, rolling his eyes towards heaven, “I will pray for your soul at Mass.”
Seven
“If we brought a party around so,” Tristan said, making a diagram on the ground, “just a few men in small rafts, we could take the guards at the far tower by surprise. Following along these parapets, we can force those guards to open the gates—before anyone in the keep is even aware of danger. Meanwhile we can have two men assigned to reaching the dungeons and freeing our men there. Before any alarm can be raised at all, we will have subdued the castle.”
Hunched down and balancing on the balls of his feet, Tristan looked from Jon to Tibald. Both were studying his drawing with frowns, as if they looked for a flaw in the plan. They could find none.
Jon spoke eagerly. “When?”
“Nightfall, I believe.”
Tibald shook his great, shaggy head. “My Lord Tristan, you have only just begun to recover. It is a miracle that you live, when we had accepted your death.”
Tristan grimaced, then grinned broadly and stood. He felt wonderful. The true miracle had been the effect of clean, fresh water, a hearty meal, and the physician’s assurance that nothing had been so beneficial to his wound as the sea water that had cleansed it. He was still sore, but not plagued by dizziness or weakness. Having shaved and dressed in fresh garments, he felt as renewed as the ancient Phoenix of myth, rising from the ashes.
“Tibald, I have never felt so ripe for battle in my life. And,” he added, a scowl darkening his features, “we’ve men imprisoned in their dungeons. I fear that we cannot waste time. Jon, you will accompany me—with a group of ten men—around the cliff by way of the sea. Tibald, you will lead the bulk of the men when the gates are opened.”
“And what are the orders to the men—this time?” Jon asked thickly. Tristan gazed at Jon and saw in his eyes the same smouldering fury that he had felt himself.
Tristan walked around to his desk and sat, musing over the question. When he had awakened in his grave of rock, he would have gladly slain them alt—every last inhabitant of Edenby, from soldiers to children—even dogs and cattle. But his temper was easing somewhat. His moral sense was returning, just as his health had been restored. He felt a needed distance from the event now; an objectivity toward all—but one woman.
“Jon, Tibald,” he said at last, lightly drumming his fingers and staring beyond them. “We would gain nothing from mass slaughter. If we kill the masons, no one will rebuild the walls. If the farmers are gone, there will be no one to bring in the harvest. We will need wool for Flemish trade, so we will need shepherds to care for the sheep.”
“You can’t suggest that what was done to us go unpunished!” Jon said incredulously.
“Nay, I do not make that suggestion at all,” Tristan said with a quiet vehemence that set Jon’s mind to rest. “I found,” Tristan continued dryly, “that the greatest torture I faced was not being struck down—it was wondering what my fate would be as I struggled to free myself from my grave and fight my way back to life. Uncertainty and fear are great weapons. The dungeons at Edenby will be full.”
“If we don’t do something more,” Tibald reminded him, “they will not fear or respect us.”
“Oh, we shall have floggings,” Tristan murmured. “And set up a court where the tenants and craftsmen may swear their new loyalties. Infractions will be brutally punished. There will be a steel band of authority that they will learn has no tolerance for anything other than strict adherence to orders.”
“And the night that we go in?” Jon pressed. “What do we tell the men?”
Tristan laughed bitterly. “Tell them that the young women are fair game. We will not take the farmers’ wives, but we will have their daughters.” His eyes narrowed sharply. “There is but one that I claim myself, and that is the Lady of Edenby. When she is discovered, she is to be brought to me.”
“I’d ask a boon,” Jon said tensely.
“Which is?”
“The Lady Edwyna.”
Tristan remembered the aunt who resided in the castle. “She is yours.” He gazed at Tibald. “And have you no requests, my friend?”
Tibald laughed. “Nay—give me a score of broad-hipped farm girls, and I’ll find myself happy. And give me a plot of land on which to build a manor. That is all I ask.”
“Done,” Tristan said, then added dryly, “Now we have naught to do but put our plans into action. And see that they are fulfilled this time. I warn you both, as I would warn the men—never turn your back upon those people. Take no chances. Trust no soft words or pleas for mercy or—”
He broke off with a frown. From beyond the tent came hoofbeats and an excited rise of voices. There was the blare of a trumpet and then the sound of footsteps racing toward the tent.
Tristan rose and strode the distance to the entrance, ducking beneath it to see the visitors. Jon and Tibald followed behind him.
His men were grouping around the newly arrived party on horseback, calling out greetings and shouting salutations. The newcomers bore banners with the colors of the Lancastrians; fresh red summer roses bedecked their mantles. It was a small group, dangerously small to roam the countryside at this time. Tristan recognized Sir Mark Taylor—one of Henry Tudor’s greatest advocates—in the fore, and stepped forward to meet him, accepting the clamp of his arm as they met. “Lord Tristan!” Mark greeted him. “We’ve urgent matters to discuss!”
Sir Mark was slim and dark, of a strong and wiry build, a man who had spent all his years since childhood in battle. He was a decade Tristan’s senior but neither landed nor titled, and Tristan knew that he sought Henry’s kingship not only for the Lancastrian party, but for his own social rise. Yet there was honesty about him; and few men followed a would-be king without hope of their own gain.
Tristan raised a brow and directed Mark into his tent. The knight, heavily clad in armor, clumped his way in, idly observing Tristan’s diagram upon the floor.
“You’ve not taken the castle of Edenby yet?” Mark inquired.
Tristan shrugged. “The castle will be mine now,” he said flatly, “I’ve no doubt.
”
Sir Mark was not much interested in the diagram. Tristan was careful to walk over it; he was not having his conquest taken now by any other—not even a man of his own follow-ring.
“The castle of Edenby will have to wait.”
“What?” Tristan demanded, frowning fiercely. “I am here—I need but a night—”
“The real and true battle for supremacy is upon us. Richard’s troops are amassing—in greater number than ours. You and your men must come with me. By order of Henry Tudor. He needs every able-bodied fighting man that he can draw upon.”
Tristan walked around his table and sank into his chair, compressing his lips, idly clenching his fists together. To have come so close . . . and find himself called away now! Ah, but the taste of revenge grew bitter on his lips. He could well fall on the battlefield and never return.
But the moment of true importance had come at last—the Yorkist King would meet the Lancastrian aspirant to the Crown. He had no choice.
“I will alert the men to break camp,” Tristan said, rising again. Leaving Sir Mark behind him, he set out from his tent.
From the entrance there he stared across the distance of field and cliff to Edenby Castle, rising out of rock and boulder, impregnable, taunting.
“I will return,” he muttered darkly. “Lady, I will return.”
He strode outward in the circle of tents, his mantle flowing behind him, his footsteps strong and sure.
“Break camp!” he called with a thundering conviction. “We ride for the House of Lancaster! The time has come to best a Yorkist King!”
* * *
Genevieve climbed to the ramparts by the main gatehouse and looked back over Edenby, sighing softly with a great deal of satisfaction. Her people were builders. Already the burned-out shops of the smiths and stonecarvers had been timbered, though it would take months to repair the damage done the walls by the Lancastrians’ cannons, Edenby was again totally defendable. A second steel gate had been added behind the outer wall, and new “murder holes” had been added to the gatehouse. Should the enemy ram the heavy wooden gate of the outer wall, they could be trapped in the portcullis of the gatehouse—and men on the floor above could pour boiling oil upon them from comparative safety. Light arrows could also be used and any number of other techniques—or so Sir Humphrey had assured her.
But when she turned her sights the other way, looking southeastward, away from the coast, she saw nothing but total peace and tranquility. It would soon be autumn; the crops were beginning to come in, the grain was being milled. The sheep were beginning to grow their thick winter coats again. All appeared well and fine.
Hearing footsteps behind her, Genevieve started and swung about. She relaxed when she saw Father Thomas approaching her, and ridiculed herself for her nervousness. What had she to fear in her own castle?
Nightmares.
These nightly torments continued to plague her. Genevieve would have expected to dream of her father, of Axel, and of poor Michael. But it wasn’t of them that she dreamed. It was of Tristan de la Tere.
She had been so very busy . . . trying to rebuild, struggling along with Tamkin and Giles to see that their food supplies and their defenses were brought back to survival levels. Perhaps the nightmares were natural. The day kept her too busy to remember the good about those she had loved; the night claimed her exhausted mind and sent it further terror instead.
In her dreams she walked the cliffs alone as around her the sky grew dark and stormy. Unable to find her way home, she would start to run—only to race into an implacable wall. Looking up, she would discover that she had run into a corpse—that of Tristan de la Tere. But he would be very much alive in death, as virile and powerful as ever; and he would laugh at her, reach for her, swear that she would pay, that she would join him in death. Genevieve would try to run, but his fingers would entwine in her hair and she would be forced to meet his deep, dark eyes, which fascinated and compelled her—and left her speechless, unable to fight. She would feel the fire those eyes kindled in her blood, a blaze that threatened to engulf her for eternity . . .
Then he would hold her tightly, and she would feel the strength of his arms; and his brutal, deep, and searing kiss would enflame her like burning oil. She could feel his hands on her, so intimately that she felt she would melt with the shame of it ...
And then all would grow cold. His hand, his lips. He would smile at her and his features would take on an icy mask of cruel mockery, he would whisper that his kiss was the kiss of death.
“My Lady Genevieve!” Father Thomas called, interrupting her thoughts.
Genevieve turned to him. “Yes, Father?”
He smiled at her with his now customary concern and lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “There is nothing, really, that requires urgent attention. The Flemish merchant has arrived to pay for his wool. He and his party are in the hall, where the Lady Edwyna sees to their welfare.”
“Perhaps I should go back,” she murmured.
“There is no need,” Father Thomas said.
She gazed at him curiously, with a little smile. “Then what is it you wish to speak about, Father?”
“I have no thought to speak at all. I thought that you might care to—as you have not been to the confessional lately.”
Genevieve stared out at the land, then turned to face the westerly cliffs and the sea. “Father,” she said, “would you accompany me out the rear gate? I’ve a sudden yearning to walk along the beach.”
He arched a brow, then shrugged, somewhat disturbed by the silver and gray storms that seemed to rage in her eyes. “You should not venture out without the guard—”
“Then summon a member of the guard, will you, Father?”
He shrugged and did so. Moments later they followed the parapets and towers around until they came to the rear gatehouse. They did not traverse the cliffs; there was a slim path, overgrown with thistle and weeds, that led between bluffs to the scant area of beach. The guards positioned themselves discreetly. Father Thomas remained behind Genevieve as she laughed and ran to the water, shedding her shoes and heedless of her gown, to allow the tide to run over her feet. She turned back. “Father! Have you never run through the sea?”
“I was not born near the sea,” he responded, but he smiled suddenly, and Genevieve returned his gaze, aware that he thought that she had been far too morose in the days past.
“You have missed much!” Genevieve told him. “Come and feel the water!”
He stepped forward skeptically. Genevieve was already sitting in the sand, so close to the water that the waves washed over her again and again, loving the water that rushed all around her. Father Thomas joined her, wincing as the cool water soaked through his frock to chill the flesh of his rump.
She was staring straight out at the sea. “Father, did you return the body of Lord Tristan to his men?” she asked him, sounding most casual.
He hesitated, having no desire to tell her that they had not been able to find the body. The entire cliff was rock—and Tamkin could not be blamed for forgetting such a burial place at such a tempestuous time. Nor had there been an odor to assist them; the sea here kept the rugged terrain fresh, and they had given up the search. It was likely that marauding wolves and buzzards had taken their toll.
“It is something you need not worry about,” he told her.
She turned to him suddenly, fiercely. “Men truly do not come back from the grave, do they, Father?” she asked him.
He laughed. “Nay, that they do not. Is that what worries you?” he asked her.
She shook her head sheepishly. “Not really—I suppose I knew the truth. I have just been thinking ... when I was young, my father used to bring me here. I was not a ‘lady’ then—not a grown one, at least—and he would allow me to swim and play by the shore. Edwyna used to come, too, and we brought food, and the sun shone. Those were the easiest, most delightful days.” She sighed, drawing a pattern with her finger in the wet sand. “I wonder, Father, what it
would be to live so again. What it might have been to live when the country was not in constant turmoil. I wish I could go back—such a little bit of time, really. Before my father’s death. And Axel’s, and Michael’s. And before—”
She broke off abruptly, painfully.
“Before the ... the ... death of the Lancastrian?” Father Thomas could have bitten his tongue; the word had nearly tumbled out.
“Before his murder. Yes,” she said softly. “I wish I could go back. Oh, God, it’s horrible. I really couldn’t have acted any differently. I had to—to do what I did. Sometimes I just wish—” She shook her head miserably, staring at the water, where the blue and gold sky and the indigo sea met to form the horizon. “I wish that my father had given Tristan de la Tere a single stupid meal. Then none of this had come to pass!”
“You wish that you hadn’t been forced to do what you did,” Father Thomas broke in gently, slipping an arm about her shoulders.
“Will I go to hell, do you think?”
He shook his head. “Genevieve, you did what you had to. You fought with what weapons you had. You fought in defense.”
She nodded, swallowing unhappily. “I keep dreaming of hell. Are you so sure that I will not wind up there?”
“I am convinced that God knows the hearts of men—and women. And your heart, dear girl, is pure.”
She didn’t feel that her heart was very pure. Nor did she believe that God would be so forgiving of the fact that she had tried to use her physical beauty to lure a man to his death. Perhaps, though, he would understand that she’d had no choice.
“I worry, still.”
“About the battle to come?”
“Aye. So much blood has been spilled! Do you believe that Richard will triumph? Then, at last, our wars will end, when the Tudor is defeated.”
Lie Down in Roses Page 12
