By Royal Command

by Laura Navarre

  She drew breath to fortify herself, seeing the magnitude of what she pledged spread before her. “While I was free, I was loyal to my own interests. When you and I are pledged, my loyalty will belong to you.”

  She stared at him with resolve and trepidation, reaching on tiptoe across the gap of suspicion with nothing more than instinct to guide her. She must rely upon someone in this bewildering place. Of all the men and women she’d encountered in these walls, he was the only one she trusted.

  The guileless innocence he wore like a disguise had vanished. That current of energy surged back and forth between them; a strange affinity thrummed in her soul.

  Alone they were, both of them, caught in the twisting maze of life. Somehow they’d stumbled upon one another. Now she’d hold to him like a blind man clinging to a guiding line. Perhaps together they would find their way to safety.

  “Very well, madame,” he said softly. “I too need an ally. I’m not without resources, and you’ll find me a friend worth having. For your part—do not fail me.”

  Even as he committed to her, he warned her. A shiver swept down her spine as he caught her hands in his, a deft touch she could have broken with a breath.

  Disconcerted, she tightened her grip to seal their bargain, then slid free. His warmth lingered at her fingertips.

  “I shouldn’t loiter here,” she murmured, glancing aside to deflect this leaping awareness. “Your mother cautioned me most sternly against disturbing you. In fact, I was hoping to ride this morning.”

  “Is that an invitation?” Gracefully he arranged himself against the jamb. Although she quivered at his closeness, he seemed sublimely unaffected by hers.

  But why should she affect him? Theirs would never be a love match.

  “You say you’ll do your duty, monseigneur, but you make your feelings clear. Rest assured I don’t expect you to dance attendance. I’m accustomed to relying on my own devices.”

  “You’re no less proud than I.” He smiled. “Yet I too yearn to fly free.”

  She found herself smiling back at him. “Shall we seek our freedom together? Before I found you, I was lost within this maze of walls.”

  “My dear lady, you’re in the best of hands. I’ll teach you to navigate this labyrinth by cunning as well as the Black Fox himself.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  The hawk launched free, thrusting Rafael’s arm downward with the forceful ascent. Heart in her throat, Katrin watched the bird soar into the dazzling sky, then circle, riding a current of air. Below the hilltop where they stood, the cultivated fields spread in leaf-green patches—a testament to Argent’s prosperity.

  When she twirled the lure, the hawk folded his wings and dove. His outstretched talons struck the lure with a small explosion of feathers, bringing it to ground.

  “Well done.” Rafael reached into the game bag for a gobbet of meat and coaxed the bird to his saddle block. While the creature gobbled the offering, the baron nimbly fastened the leather jesses to bind it—a captive once more. Clearly, Rafael le Senay knew his sport. He handled the fierce raptor with quiet assurance, crooning as he stroked the downy breast.

  Intent on his task, he spoke. “You must never touch a hawk with your naked hand, lest you damage a flight feather. But caress him with a feather, and you’ll cause no harm.”

  From her saddle, Katrin eyed the curved beak and sharp talons of her own smaller sparrowhawk. Yet she swallowed her misgivings and untied the jesses.

  “There, you have her.” He smiled. “Now remove her hood carefully, and pass me the lure.”

  When he flung the lure high, a ripple of alertness swept through the sparrowhawk. Nimbly the bird hopped to her wrist, talons closing around her padded gauntlet before it launched skyward.

  “Oh, splendid!” she cried as the bird struck the lure. Barely noticing the gamy odor, she tossed the sparrowhawk a strip of offal.

  “’Tis poor sport to keep them mewed up, for they’re fierce hunters.” When the bird finished, Rafael helped her with the jesses. “The sparviter here died last year, and these birds have been flown too little. Borovic prefers his hounds, of course. If the sport’s to your liking, I’d welcome your aid flying them.”

  “I’ll be glad to help.” She felt pleased to be given some useful purpose. “Though it seems such a shame to imprison them.”

  Over the bird, his eyes met hers. “These have been kept so long they’ve forgotten how to fly free. Do you know how they’re tamed? They’re taken newly fledged and their eyes sewn shut until they learn to trust their masters, by scent and sound and touch.”

  Horror swept through her. She thought of her years in the north, when she’d thought herself free to circle within the span of her leash, as blind as these birds. Yet when Ethelred called, she’d flown to his hand.

  She glanced away so Rafael couldn’t read her. “’Tis a marvel they don’t hate us. But who can say what they dream of, when they perch hooded on their blocks? Perhaps they’re no worse off than we.”

  When she bent to gather her reins, his gloved hand caught her wrist. Marshaling light words to her tongue, she glanced up. For a moment she’d forgotten, and said too much. Now she must unsay it.

  Something in his face stopped her. Framed by a tangle of wind-flung curls, his features were fierce as a wrathful angel’s—as though he too struggled with truths he dared not speak.

  The butter-soft smoothness of his glove warmed her skin. Restless, the birds mantled, the wind fluttering cloaks and hair around them.

  “You must feel this alliance has clipped your wings,” he murmured. “I’d set us both free if I could.”

  When he fell silent, she burned with the urge to shake him until he spilled out his secrets. But how could she blame him for failing to trust, when she herself had lied to him? Still, that bracing current flowed between them, stirring like a hot breeze along her skin. He made her want things she shouldn’t. Such desires had no place in this political marriage of theirs.

  “Monseigneur, caution is something I understand—”

  She fell silent. Beneath the wind a sound rose and fell, distant but growing: the belling of hounds.

  Rafael’s hand fell from her wrist. Deftly he vaulted into his saddle, hand hovering near his saber.

  Then the yipping dogs were streaming around them, jostling the horses as they shied. The hawks mantled on their blocks, their screams adding a savage counterpoint as mounted huntsmen surged over the crest of the hill.

  The earl of Argent erupted into view, cantering toward them on his white charger, sending the hounds into renewed frenzy. Her sparrowhawk bated, barely restrained by the cruel jesses.

  “Call off your dogs, for the love of St. Sebastian,” Rafael said curtly. “Or these hawks will damage a flight feather.”

  Startled, Borovic glanced at the hawks. “Sigismund! Whistle down the hounds, man.”

  His vewterer took charge, with a deafening blast from his horn that made the hawks scream anew. Thankfully, the braying pack streamed away. With a good-natured wave, Borovic sent his companions galloping in their wake. An uneasy silence descended.

  The earl remained, wind riffling his sandy hair, eyes moving from his brother to Katrin. She settled her hawk, thankful for something to do to avoid his gaze.

  “Well, my lady,” Borovic said lightly. “It appears you were enticed into riding after all.”

  “My lord asked for help flying these birds.” Uneasy, she included both brothers in her smile. “Your mother made it clear I wasn’t needed indoors. Did you have good hunting?”

  “The beasts are half-starved from winter, or dropping their young. Not sporting to hunt at this season, but it passes the time.” Borovic paused. “Do you return to the castle? I’ll keep you company…and you as well, of course, brother.”

  With no choice but to agre
e, Katrin pivoted her mare, the brothers falling in on either side. Together, they jogged toward the castle that floated on the distant hill.

  “The dowager doesn’t like to loosen her hold on the reins. It’s a family trait.” The earl laughed. “My Aelfwydd submits without a murmur. But I don’t doubt your talents would benefit my household. Should I speak to her?”

  Rafael frowned. “Our mother belongs in the dower house, which has stood vacant these many years.”

  Borovic’s eyes narrowed. “She’s your mother, not mine. Though I show her the proper courtesy due our father’s widow. Don’t press me.”

  Rafael played the reins through his fingers, tension licking like the wind at his hair and garments.

  “Well, brother,” the earl said heartily, “now the weather’s broken, no doubt you’ll ride forth to collect the rents.”

  Rafael slid his brother a hooded glance. “It should have been done in the fall, during the harvest.”

  “Aye, well, that was when Bannan would do it. But he was in his grave last fall, may the Vikings’ black souls rot in Hell for it.” When his stallion sidled, Borovic gave the horse’s shoulder a friendly thump. “So the rents were not brought in, but the king expects Argent’s tithe all the same. It’s best done before the Forkbeard starts his raiding, which he’s likely to do any day.”

  “I believed your lands might be spared the Viking scourge this season, for they’ve been warring among themselves,” Rafael said. “But the heathens have mended their quarrel, so I expect they’ll soon be upon you.”

  “Let them come,” Borovic growled, teeth showing in his beard. “We’ll give them a welcome they won’t enjoy.”

  “But not, I pray, before I return with the rents, if you insist I ride forth on the eve of my wedding. I’d dislike being set upon by raiders with all the shire’s wealth in my saddlebags.”

  The earl grinned. “It’s easier done before your wedding than after. Take the word of a man who’s been twice married for that.”

  “But how long will you be away?” Katrin asked, troubled. She’d barely begun to know this enigmatic stranger she must marry. Already he’d leave her, alone and friendless in this perilous place?

  “Some weeks, for the shire is vast.” Meeting her gaze, Rafael’s eyes kindled. “Never fear, madame. I promise to return by Easter.”

  The wry charm of his smile tugged at her. “Then I pray you remember your promise. I’d dislike going alone to the altar.”

  Borovic spurred his horse closer. “You needn’t worry, Katrin. I’ll protect you.”

  No doubt he’d stay closer than her own shadow. But who would protect her from him?

  * * *

  At sunrise she stood alone on the curtain wall to watch Rafael ride away, just as Thorkell had done—the third protector to leave her, if she counted Eomond. Today Rafael looked more like an assassin than a bishop: a lithe black figure with a streak of silver at his hip, his banner slashed with the crossed spears of Belmaine.

  Does he view this as a penance, one more feudal chore to hold in contempt? But he was worldly enough to recognize someone must do it. The revenues wouldn’t deliver themselves to their coffers.

  At his heels trotted a double column of men—the knights who’d accompanied him from Anjou. Noble and stern as lions in silver steel, they looked vigilant as they emerged from the safety of the walls. No doubt Rafael placed more trust in these twelve than an entire battalion of his brother’s men. Although why a bishop should require such a formidable bodyguard she couldn’t fathom.

  During the empty days that followed, while dark skies and an icy rain kept them all indoors, Katrin made overtures to the dowager without avail. As for young Aelfwydd, six months gone with child and carrying poorly, she kept to her chamber with her Cornish ladies, who looked as cold and miserable as their mistress. Here, too, Katrin made overtures, but the sick and frightened girl was poor company.

  Small wonder if she is frightened. This is her fifth pregnancy, and they say losing the fourth almost killed her.

  Lonely, Katrin found herself responding to the earl’s friendly gestures. She was wary of encouraging his interest, particularly in Rafael’s absence—keenly conscious how easily tongues could wag on her account. Perhaps her restraint discouraged him, for he remained within the bounds of propriety and made her welcome under his roof in a hundred small ways.

  Of all his vast household, Borovic alone looked pleased to see her each morning. Striding forward to greet her with a smile, he showered her with pleasant trifles, like the season’s first blooms—the purple lupines—that appeared in a silver bowl in her chamber. He seated her beside him at the high table and made cheerful conversation, invited her riding or hunting—chaperoned by her ladies, who fought shamelessly for the privilege.

  It became customary to find him in her dayroom, where she sat at her loom. Often he distributed posies all around, embellished with courtly compliments, and seemed pleased as a child at her ladies’ delight. He filled the room with his good-natured noise and a tangle of hounds, and left a trail of overturned furniture and misplaced items in his wake. Nonetheless, she was wryly conscious that he’d managed to charm all of them.

  Yet something in her life had shifted amiss. How not when her promised husband was a dark and beautiful stranger she’d barely met, absent now for weeks, and her husband’s brother spent his days in her chambers?

  One day, Borovic brought an orange kitten, clinging to his tunic like a burr, and gave it to young Alix as a present. Every animal on the estate, from the cats that delivered their kittens in his careful hands to Katrin’s own Arianrod, adored him with singular devotion. Watching the big man patiently entice the tiny kitten across the floor with a strand of knotted thread, while his dogs watched with canine devotion, she decided she’d been wrong to be wary.

  Aye, she knew he was drawn to her. Sometimes she glimpsed it: while they were laughing and breathless from some reckless gallop across the field, his retinue thundering in their wake; when she looked up from singing a ballad in the hall and found him leaning forward, chin propped on fists to stare; and once when the kitten crawled inside the chimney and mewed pathetically for rescue.

  That was the closest she came to jeopardy—perched precariously on a chair, his hands at her waist as she coaxed the kitten down. When the frightened scrap of ginger fur skittered into Alix’s anxious arms, Katrin glanced down at the earl with a laughing comment, and found him looking up at her through eyes that smoked with passion.

  While Alix crooned to the kitten, he lifted Katrin from her perch, sliding her slowly down the length of his body. Disconcerted and alarmed, she tried not to notice the breadth of his shoulders, the bulging strength of his arms. Teasing, he held her suspended, feet dangling, until she asked to be released. When he lowered her and stood staring, eyes telling her without words things that made her face heat, she stammered her excuses and hurried away.

  This is not well done. I must contrive to stop it, before it goes too far.

  But he gave her no clear opening to do it, no improper license she could rebuke. If he practiced restraint, perhaps she needn’t say anything.

  That night, someone pounded on her door as Katrin was climbing into bed. Pulse hammering, she went to the door in her chamber robe, Cate and Elayne crowding behind her.

  Borovic filled her doorway, a desperate look on his bearded features. “Aelfwydd’s fallen down in childbed—and again it’s too soon! Katrin, I beg you to come.”

  “Give me a moment. I’ll come anon.” She did her best to reassure him. “Return to her now, until I join you.”

  She knew something about childbirth, though she’d never undergone the ordeal herself. But this would be no easy birth, with the wee precious thing too tiny to live. Finding her basket of medicinal herbs and sending her ladies to their beds, she descended the stairs and emerged on
the wall walk.

  Icy sleet pounded down on her, extinguishing the candle in a blink. Gasping, she raised the hood of her cloak and hurried through the downpour, shoulders hunched, careful of her footing on the ice-rimed flagstones.

  In the antechamber, Borovic paced before a closed door. The fire bled a sullen light, but could not penetrate the darkness pooling in the corners.

  When he saw her, the earl’s face went slack with relief. “Thank God you’ve come.”

  “I’ll do what I can.” She removed her wet cloak. “My lord, I fear this will be…a difficult birth. We must have a midwife here.”

  “Already sent for,” he said tersely.

  “For all the good that will do,” the dowager said bitterly, emerging like a specter from the shadows. “The girl will give Argent nothing but another dead son. Better to let the midwife sleep, and the Cornish girl bleed out her life in her bed. At least then you might cast your seed on fertile ground.”

  Appalled, Katrin stared. “Sweet Jesus, how can you speak so coldly? Are you a witch to curse her?”

  “Witch I may be, but I can’t magic forth an heir to Argent from that girl’s empty loins. And an heir we must have. I say let her die.”

  “Nay!” Borovic said harshly. Sleet lashed against the casements. “’Tis not her fault she can’t bear, for God in Heaven knows she’s tried! Keep your evil counsel, woman, and let Katrin see her.”

  “I’ll try to help her, my lord, but—”

  He gripped her arm and pulled her toward the door.

  “For the love of God, Borovic! Fetch the midwife—”

  Suddenly he stopped on the threshold, so she ran up against him. Gripping her hands, he pleaded, “Pray with her, good-sister, for you’re the most virtuous of women. Surely God will heed your prayers, though he hears not mine!”