by Lisa Hendrix
Steinarr’s fist bunched and flexed on his thigh. Matilda held her breath. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, he collected himself. The rigidity eased. His back broadened as he drew in a deep breath.
“Of course.” The evenness of his voice, untainted by any trace of the anger she knew was there, astonished Matilda almost as much as his agreement. “You shame your cousin, Robin, demanding such a vow before so many when it should have been asked in private, but if you want it, you have it. I will guard your cousin’s chastity” —Did he put some odd weight on that word?— “with both body and sword. My bond.”
Osbert’s face fell.
So did Robert’s. “Oh. Well. Then. I accept your vow, my lord.”
Curse it, Robin had thought to stop her with this humiliating foolishness. He’d thought Sir Steinarr would refuse to make such a promise. But he had made it. He had, and by forcing him to it, Robin had given him good cause to say their earlier bargain was no longer valid. Curse it.
Sir Ari released the bridle and stepped back to give Steinarr a slight bow. “A good journey to you then. I will see you back here in, what, a month’s time? ”
“Oh, less than that, my lord,” said Matilda. “Little more than a fortnight, I hope.”
“Hmpf.” Steinarr glowered over his shoulder. “Put your arms around me, maid, or I will tie you on like an infant.”
He might have sounded calm speaking to Robert, but he clearly wasn’t. Pressing her lips together, Matilda checked her defenses again. His anger was there, but distant. She threaded her arms around him.
Like a lover.
The thought had barely touched her mind when Steinarr put his spurs to the stallion and they galloped out of the clearing, away from Robert and Sir Ari and Osbert.
Away from anyone who had heard his vow.
HE WOULDN’T WANT to be Marian for the next day or two, Ari decided as he watched the stallion and its two unhappy riders disappear down the path. Not that Steinarr would hurt her, but he wasn’t going to be pleasant to be around until he figured out that this was for the best.
“To work, everyone,” said Hamo, putting his mattock over his shoulder. “Not you, of course, monsire, begging your pardon. Nor you, Robin.”
Everyone grabbed their tools and headed off to work on the huts, which must be completed before Hamo would let work start on the charcoal pit. Ari waited until they were well away before he went over to squat beside Robin’s bed.
“That was a bold thing to do, lad.”
Robin flushed. “Maud likely wants my head for it.”
“Or something lower.” Ari laughed as Robin’s color went even darker. “Once she stops to think, she will realize you only did it to protect her. Now, let me see what Edith has done for you.”
He flipped back the blankets to expose the injured leg and began to peel away the comfrey root poultice Edith had made.
Robin lifted his head, straining to see. “How does it look?”
“Lie back and let me see.” Ari poked around a little and declared, “’Tis better. The swelling is beginning to ease, though, so the splints are loose. I will adjust the bindings so your leg does not move around too much.”
He began going through the knots one by one, untying and tightening each just enough to keep the splints in proper position and the leg straight. Robin lay patiently, wincing slightly when Ari had to shift his leg to fix the knots above his knee.
“Sorry.”
“’Tis not as bad as yesterday.” A cock wren chattered and burbled overhead, and Robin stared up, searching for the bird among the leaves. “Should I have asked for Sir Steinarr’s promise in private, my lord? Did I shame Marian with the way I did it?”
Ari shook his head. “Every man here understands why you asked for his vow before all. Even Steinarr.”
“He did not look like he understood. For a moment, I feared he would come off that horse and break my other leg, like he threatened the carter he would do.”
“I would have stopped him. For you, not the carter,” added Ari. “You were shrewd to wait until they were ready to leave. If you had demanded the oath earlier, Steinarr might have ridden off without Marian, and then she would be furious. For my own part, I would rather face an angry knight than a raging woman. No, you handled Steinarr rightly enough, lad, even if he did not like it.”
“ ’Struth, he did not.” Robin shook his head. “I hope he does not take out his anger on Mau—er, Marian.”
“He will be cross, but it will stop there.” Ari decided to put the boy out of his misery on the maid’s name. He was going to tire of the constant stuttering over it. “Why do you sometimes call her Maud and other times Marian? ”
Robin went bright red. “I … she …” He stopped himself and his brow crinkled with thought. Ari could see the instant he came up with a story. “I had trouble saying her name as a child and shortened it to Maud. She prefers Marian, but ’tis hard to change the habit now.”
Not bad, but the boy was not built for guile. His eyes darted around too much. Now the maid—she was practiced. She could lie with the best. If he were a raven during the day instead of at night, he would travel along and watch her and Steinarr spar, just for the sport.
“Well, she is not here,” said Ari, turning his mind back to the subject at hand. “Call her what you will, and I will not tell her if you get it wrong.”
Robin’s mouth twisted in chagrin. “My thanks, my lord, but I should still probably remember to call her Marian.”
“And I still will not tell her,” said Ari. He pulled the last knot tight and started to put the poultice back in place.
“Hold there, my lord,” said Edith, coming up behind him. “I have fresh knitbone.”
Ari stepped aside and watched the old woman wrap her cloth, soaked in the paste from boiled comfrey root, around the break. She bound it all loosely, then gently tucked the blankets around Robin’s legs and pushed to her feet with the wheeze of someone who had breathed too much heavy smoke. “There you go, lad. Now rest a bit.”
“I would rather do some useful work. Prop me up and give me my knife and some wood, and I’ll carve you a spoon or a spindle or something.”
“In a day or two,” said Ari. “For now, stay flat and rest. That leg must stay still lest it heals with a crook. Besides, you had a hard day yesterday.”
Robin looked to Edith, but she shook her head. “His lordship’s right, lad. Rest. We’ll have a spoon from you another day.” She took the bowl he’d set aside and carried it over to the fire to dump the uneaten gruel back into the pot to stay hot with the rest.
Ari followed her. “Speaking of useful work, do you have an extra mattock at hand?”
“What do you need dug, my lord? I will set one of the lads on it.”
“You mistake me. ’Tis not my work but yours. I want to help Hamo and the others.”
“Oh, no, my lord.” She watched aghast as he unbuckled his belt and leaned his scabbard and sword against the nearest wagon. “That would not be right. That is work for peasants, not noble knights.”
“Knights need strong arms to fight. I can either build them swinging my sword at straw men or swinging a mattock at the turf.”
“I don’t know …”
“I have a month to pass waiting for my friend, and I cannot spend all of it watching Robin mend.” Ari peeled off his good gown and tossed it down next to his sword, then tucked his chainse hem into the waist of his braies and started rolling up his sleeves. “Come, woman, where is that mattock?”
THEY KEPT TO the road all day, passing through the scattered villages of northern Nottinghamshire with barely a stop to stretch their legs and let the horses rest. Late in the afternoon, though, Sir Steinarr suddenly wheeled the animals off the road and headed into the woods. “Hold on.”
Matilda caught at his waist as they plunged down a short slope. “Where do we go, my lord? ”
“ ’Tis time we stop for the night.”
The night. With him. Her body tightened in a
nticipation or fear or … She didn’t know, but she did know he hadn’t answered her. “That tells me the hour, not our goal.”
“A safe place I know. Does that help you?” His voice was crisp. Curt.
She understood his continuing ire; she was still furious with Robert herself. In his zeal to protect her, he had forced Sir Steinarr to renounce the one thing that had persuaded him to agree to this journey in the first place. By all rights, he could claim the bargain he’d made with her was broken. In truth, she was surprised he hadn’t, that he’d carried her this far, that he’d brought her along at all. All day, she’d been waiting for him to turn around and take her back, or worse, abandon her in some strange village to find her way back alone.
But here they were, preparing to stop for the night, and she had yet to figure out what he intended to do.
She knew what she intended to do—live up to the agreement she’d made. She’d decided that even before they’d reached the Headon road. She had kept it to herself, hoping to find a moment when he wasn’t quite so angry, but now the hour was nearly upon her and he still seethed. She was simply going to have to tell him. Show him.
They rode more than a league into the forest, following trails so faint she could barely make them out, although Sir Steinarr seemed to find them easily enough. Finally, one trail led into a clearing at the foot of a slight cliff. Steinarr swung his leg up and over the stallion’s neck and hopped off, then reached up to help Matilda down, all without saying a word.
Safely on the ground and out of his hands, Matilda peered at the face of the cliff. “Another cave?”
“A little better.” He tipped his head toward the south end of the cliff. “Over there.”
It took Matilda a moment to spot it: a tiny, stone wall built into an overhung hollow in the side of the cliff. “A shepherd’s hut?”
“A hermit’s cell.”
“Truly? I have never seen one. Where is the hermit? ”
“Long dead.”
Curious, Matilda went to explore. It seemed to be an ancient dwelling. Moss encrusted the lower part of the wall and the door had rotted away, leaving only the rust-stained holes where hinges had once hung. The hermit, whoever he had been, had clearly spent some part of his life as a mason, for where the moss didn’t grow, the stones fit together so tightly a blade of grass wouldn’t fit between them.
She stepped inside and spread her arms wide. She could span the space in one direction, and nearly so in the other. A few cobwebs draped the corners, but for a place that had been abandoned for so long, it was amazingly tidy and free of litter and vermin, as though someone had been there not too many years before.
The light dimmed and she turned to find Steinarr blocking the door, his hands resting against the frame. She steadied herself with a deep breath and plunged in. “Is this where we will sleep?”
He stilled, and anger buzzed at the edges of her awareness. “We? Were you not listening to the vow your cousin demanded from me?”
“It was not his place to ask it.”
“And yet he did.” His hands fell away from the frame and he took a step toward her. “You played it very well, Marian.”
“Played it?”
“Having him ask me before Ari and the others.”
“I had no hand in that, my lord. I told you I would not tell Robin of our bargain, and I did not.”
“You expect me to believe the little askefise thought of it on his own? ”
“Do not call him that,” she snapped. Askefise. Ash-blower—a man who stayed by the fire while others went to war. Father had wielded the same word like a whip, choosing the English to insult Robin’s origins as well as his courage. “Just because a man is gentle, it does not make him a coward.”
“Man.” Steinarr’s lip curled into a sneer. “He hid in the bushes while they killed John Little.”
“I told you, John told us to hide. We had no weapons.”
“A man would have stood by him.”
“And died? To leave me to them? ”
“Instead, he has left you to me.” His gaze raked over her, stripping her naked so quickly, so thoroughly, she had to curl her hands into fists to keep from covering herself.
She raised her chin and glared at him. “Then have me, my lord, as we agreed. I release you from the vow you made to Robin.”
His shift from anger to desire and back again hit her like a hammer blow, nearly taking out her knees. “To your fortune, I have more honor than he.”
He whirled and stalked out, leaving her shaking amid the cobwebs and the chaos of his emotions. So it wasn’t all anger after all. That incredible, rutting lust was still there, as strong as ever, but mixed so deeply with the fury she couldn’t tell where one left off and the other began.
“Get out here,” he bellowed.
Yes, she could: that was pure anger. Well, piss on him. It wasn’t her fault he’d let himself be outwitted by Robert. She pulled back hard until both his mind and her trembling faded.
When she stepped outside, she found that he was unloading the rouncey, piling the bundles and sacks and kegs neatly under the overhang of the cliff. She stood there, hands on hips, waiting for him to say something, but he kept working. Finally, she stepped into his path, so that he had to swerve around her to toss the rouncey’s packsaddle next to the stack. “What did you want, my lord?”
“Firewood,” he snapped, turning back to get the stallion’s saddle. “Lots of it. These woods are thick with wolves.” He tossed the second saddle by the first and dropped both pads on top. “I will water the horses.”
He led the horses off, and she began to gather wood. Again. It had been one of her chores with the colliers, too, and she was growing tired of it. She was growing tired, period, and her back ached each time she bent to pick up another stick. She’d thought herself a hard worker; acting as mistress of Huntingdon after her mother’s death, seeing to the stores and meals for five-score men and women, and directing all the weaving, spinning, and sewing kept her busy from dawn to dusk. But the sort of labor she’d done in the last week had given her a fresh appreciation of the burden peasant women carried—they did all that she did, plus tended their animals, saw to their children, and worked their own fields beside their husbands, in addition to whatever service they owed the manor.
Of course, they didn’t have to hold a man’s mind at bay all day either. Some of her exhaustion came from that, and as she moved farther away from Steinarr in search of wood, she realized how much. The greater the distance, the greater the relief, so she wandered far and worked slowly.
By the time she threw the last armload of wood on the pile, Steinarr had returned with the horses, measured out their oats, gotten a good fire going before the hut, and sliced several thick slabs of bacon, which he had hung on sticks over the fire.
Matilda’s stomach grumbled aloud as she watched the bacon drip and sizzle. Steinarr looked up. “Hungry?”
“Aye, my lord.” She inhaled deeply, savoring the smell.
“If there are so many wolves, will not the scent of meat attract them?”
“So will the scent of you.” He reached into the food bag and found a cloth-wrapped loaf, which he held out to Matilda. “Food is food to the beasts of the forest, and you would be a tender morsel. Cut some bread.”
She cut two thick slices and started to rewrap the loaf.
“More,” said Steinarr. He watched her cut another slice. “More. I do not want to find myself hungry come midnight. And you want it even less.”
She eyed him sideways, waiting for an explanation to such a strange statement. When it didn’t come, she counted pieces of meat and cut a slice of bread for each. Steinarr seemed satisfied at that, and as soon as the bacon was hot through, they settled back to eat in silence.
Slowly, as they worked their way through the meal, Steinarr’s anger began to fade. She knew it without using her ability, just by watching the way the tautness in his face eased. She recalled a similar shift in his mood that first
night, when he ate the cheese and bread. It was as though he were starving all the time, and the hunger brought out the anger or made it sharper. Perhaps it was as simple as that. If so, she must try to see that he stayed well fed. It would make her life easier.
When they were done, three pieces each of bacon and bread were left. She started to gather them. “I will set these aside for morning.”
“No. Leave them. They will be eaten tonight.” He dragged the skin of ale into his lap, removed the plug with a twist, and hoisted it high to take a deep drink. He made a face. “God’s knees, this is worse than yesterday.”
“Why drink it, then? The water in the spring is clear.”
“It may look it, but it stinks of sulfur. And as your collier friend said, even poor ale is better than none.” He took another drink and wiped his chin on the back of his hand before he passed the skin to Matilda.
There was no way to sip from a skin, so she steeled herself and hoisted the bag for a large draught. She came up spluttering. “Are you certain the water is worse than this? Why did you even take it? ”
He almost smiled. Almost. “Ivetta insisted on filling it for me this morning. I could not find a way to refuse her.”
“Likely she wanted to be rid of it, so she can brew her own.”
“Likely.” He took the skin back and had another draught. “She can hardly do worse.”
“In truth, she does far better. We drank the last of what she’d made in Maltby as we traveled. ’Twas so good I would like to hi—” Matilda caught herself just in time. Hire her for Huntingdon, she’d almost said. She switched directions and finished without a pause, “Have it every day.”
“That good?”
“You can try it when you take me back for Robin.”
And his anger was back, that fast. “That may be sooner rather than later.”
She sat up straight. “But you swore!”
“I have found myself swearing too many things in the past few days. The vows demanded of me do not agree, one with the next.” He stared into the fire, muttering something that ended with the word English.
