The Elusive Bride

by Deborah Hale

  His words sent a chill through Cecily. Long gone. It would not be long until they reached Ravensridge—another day at most. With a fast mount under them, they had already covered as much ground as in the previous two nights of walking.

  Which was good, Cecily sternly reminded herself. The people of Brantham were relying on her to bring aid with all due haste. For their sake she could not afford to linger on the road with her escort, no matter how great the inclination.

  “As I thought,” she overheard FitzCourtenay say to himself. Then he raised his voice for her benefit. “A little brook flows through this woods. We can water the horse, let him rest and crop the odd mouthful of grass to sustain him for the rest of our ride to Cirencester.”

  When the gelding came to a halt, Cecily did not hesitate in sliding off his back. Oh, the relief! She limped toward the brook. Behind her she heard the sound of John dismounting and the rustle of underbrush as he led the horse after her.

  “I beg your pardon, Mistress Cecily. I forgot your…injuries. Will you be able to sit a horse that far?”

  Wading into the brook to her knees, Cecily gathered her skirts about her waist and sank gratefully into the soothing coolness. She resisted the urge to use her sore bottom as an excuse to prolong their journey.

  “I will do what I must,” she answered. Impatience with her wayward inclinations sharpened her voice. “And what I must do is reach Ravensridge as quickly as possible.”

  Her companion flinched. Dropping to the bank of the brook beside the horse, he cast her a rueful glance. “You are right to be angry with me. If it will ease you to say ‘I told you so,’ do it, by all means.”

  “Told you what? You are talking daft, Master John.” The water flowed over her legs and lower body in a cool, rippling caress. “I am not angry with you. You saved me from that brute, Beauchamp, when it would have been far easier to steal out of Lambourn without me. I am grateful…beyond words.”

  His eyes seemed to search her face, though Cecily knew not what he might be looking for. Would her words convince him that she had kissed him only in thanks?

  “You are too indulgent, my lady. If not for me, you never would have fallen into Beauchamp’s clutches in the first place. You said we should go north, and you were right. Better to travel among enemies and keep up one’s guard than risk the treachery of false allies.”

  The look on his face…Cecily had seen it before, on overly pious priests who sought to mortify the flesh by scourging themselves.

  She shrugged. “If you were wrong, then so was I. You made your case for traveling west and you won my agreement. I will not cast it up to you just because your plan went awry. You are not responsible for Lord Ranulf’s betrayal. I’m only grateful you showed wit enough to deliver us. Now, go easy on yourself for once.”

  “You are a rare one, lass.”

  The hushed wonder in his voice sent a shiver of delight rippling through Cecily. Never had a man taken her measure and so clearly approved of what he found.

  Unused to sincere praise, she did not know how to reply. “Aye,” she jested. “Rare mulish and pigheaded. The stripes on my backside are as much my doing as Beauchamp’s. I should have made soft answers and played for time to escape. Lord knows, I’ve been warned often enough that my stubborn streak would land me in trouble one day.”

  John FitzCourtenay stirred the water with his finger. “It would have been wiser to delay than to force a confrontation,” he agreed. “Given me more time to come to your aid. I regret that my delay cost you pain.”

  The blessed chill of the brook water had numbed the worst of it. Cecily abandoned her indecorous sprawl in the water, wading back to the bank, where she settled on a tuft of springy moss beside her comrade.

  “I never expected you to come racing to my rescue. All my life I’ve prided myself on my independence. Never needing anyone—least of all a man. Always able to take care of myself. Get out of any scrape I land myself in. I don’t believe I could have saved myself this time.”

  The ache of that impotent terror tore at Cecily afresh. Suddenly she remembered the grievous news from Brantham that Lord Ranulf’s assault and their flight had driven from her mind. For one of the few times in her life, she surrendered to tears.

  John FitzCourtenay gathered her to him. “Go ahead and cry, lass. You have every right. Independence is a fine thing, but sometimes it’s good to know you have a friend you can trust to guard your back, or pull you out of the deepest hole you’ve ever dug yourself into. And know you’d do the same for them.”

  “It isn’t just that.” Against the sharp exhortations of her conscience, Cecily clung to him, burrowing deeper into his embrace. “Lord Ranulf told me my father is dead. I saw him wounded when I fled Brantham, but I never thought…”

  Her companion tensed, but said nothing. Could it be he understood the powerful, confused feelings she’d carried for her father?

  “I saw him fall. I should have gone to him, tended him. Instead I ran away. I am as much to blame for his death as the bowman who loosed the arrow.”

  “Tush,” John murmured. “You were pulled in two directions and you followed your heart. Your enemy placed you in a quandary with no good outcome. Lay the blame where it truly belongs—on his head.”

  Her tears slowed, and for the first time since she’d turned her back on Brantham, the weight of guilt fell from her shoulders. Not all of it, but some.

  Cecily reflected on FitzCourtenay’s words, about having a friend to rely on. He had proven himself just such a friend to her. Yet she wanted so much more from him than friendship. Things she dared not ask of him. Things he would not dare offer.

  Or would he?

  As his lips pressed into her hair, he crooned, “I swear I will never let such harm or sorrow come to you again, sweet Cecily.”

  If she lifted her face to him now, she knew with delicious, deadly certainty that he would kiss her. Not the swift, impulsive kiss they had indulged in Lord Ranulf’s great hall, but a long, slow, deep kiss that could not be so easily dismissed.

  A kiss that would threaten everything she held dear.

  Pulling out of John FitzCourtenay’s arms was one of the hardest things Cecily had ever done.

  “Can you swear it, John?” she asked, her voice still thick with tears. “Would you protect me—even from your own brother? Tell me, what happened to his first wife on their wedding night?”

  Rowan’s head snapped back as if she had dealt him a glancing blow with a mace. He had only dimly foreseen the pain it would evoke, hearing that question from Cecily’s lips. Seeing the doubt in her eyes. Hearing the quaver of suspicion in her voice. Was it the intuitive dread of this moment that had compelled him to cling to his masquerade as John FitzCourtenay, when reason dictated he should declare his true identity? Perhaps. Rowan knew only that it was easier to defend himself in the guise of another.

  Into an expectant hush, broken only by the trill of the brook and the sounds of the horse grazing, he hurled questions of his own. “What have you heard? And from whom?”

  Cecily wiped her nose on the long trailing sleeve of her borrowed gown. “Lord Ranulf, of course. Who else? Though now that I think on it, there was always something odd in the way folks talked about your brother. At least the few times I ever heard his name mentioned at Brantham. Will you tell me the right of what happened or not?”

  Could she ever understand what had really happened? Was the truth any less a sin than the one she suspected?

  “No one knows the right of it but God. I’m not sure Rowan knows all himself. And if he does, he keeps mum. I have his word that he did not push her to her death.”

  Not with his hands, perhaps.

  “I believe…my brother,” he continued. “As should anyone who bears him loyalty.”

  A grimace of revulsion passed swiftly over Cecily’s face. “Pushed her? You mean…she fell…?”

  “Aye. To her death. From the tower of Duke William’s chateau in Poitiers.”

  He
steeled himself for Cecily’s next question.

  “Tell me about her. What was her name? Was she very beautiful? Did he love her?”

  None of these were what Rowan had expected, and since he was prepared to defend from another quarter, they slipped past his guard. Before he could catch himself, he answered her last question. “To distraction.”

  Aye, he had loved Jacquetta so. Yet his memory of it paled in comparison to the fresh, green desire he felt for Cecily. Her intelligence, mettle and wit had already staked out territory deep within his heart. And her lithe, doelike beauty provoked him to a pitch of yearning beyond anything he’d experienced.

  From bitter experience, he knew that deep love could inflict even deeper pain. Before he dared bare his heart to this woman, he had to know for certain that she could care equally for him. He must test her to find out.

  Cecily provided him with just the opening he needed.

  “Then she was a beauty?”

  “Indeed,” Rowan replied, remembering. For a wonder, the recollection hurt much less than it once had. “With hair black as a moonless night. Skin like milk and eyes the blue-green of the Mediterranean. Dainty. Naive. Full of dreams.”

  Cecily sat quite still. Then a sigh shook her slender frame. “You lied, didn’t you, John? When you told me I would suit Lord Rowan. How can someone like me hope to compete with such a paragon?”

  He caught her hand. “Do not underestimate yourself, lass. True, you are nothing like Jacquetta DeNevers. But not a whit less beautiful for all that.”

  Cradling her hand in his, Rowan lifted it to his lips and bestowed a gentle kiss on the inner surface of her wrist, where her pulse fluttered. Her eyelids drifted closed for an instant, as she savored the sensation. They opened again to reveal a look of puzzlement. And, perhaps…regret?

  “Don’t toy with me, John, I beg you. We can neither of us afford this.”

  There could be no mistaking the note of regret in her voice. Rowan struggled to master his elation. She would not be so torn if she did not care for John FitzCourtenay—a man with nothing to offer her but himself.

  She drew her hand back. Not abruptly, as if in anger. But slowly, as if part of her resisted the necessity.

  “You do not belong to my brother yet,” he reminded Cecily, hoping to lure her into a more definite declaration of her feelings. “I believe there may be something between us. You sense it too, do you not? We owe it to ourselves to discover how deep it goes before you commit yourself, body and heart, to another man.”

  She shook her head. “You said yourself, Lord Rowan deserves my loyalty. And you owe him yours. We have greater responsibilities than to ourselves alone. What of mine to the people of Brantham and to avenge my father’s death? Or do you hold that a woman may dispense with honor?”

  Had Jacquetta protested so vigorously when a young, eloquent Fulke DeBoissard began his campaign of seduction? Rowan asked himself. It suddenly dawned on him that he was now playing Fulke’s part. As his gorge rose, he fought the urge to dive into the brook and wash himself clean.

  Instead, he leapt to his feet and reached for the horse’s reins. “We had better be on our way before Beauchamp’s men do stumble on us.”

  Vaulting into the saddle, he held his hand out to Cecily. Seeing the look of dismay clearly etched on her features, he softened his voice to ask, “Can you manage to sit a horse the rest of the way to Cirencester?”

  She took his outstretched hand. “I told you, Master John, I can resign myself to do what I must.”

  As gently as he could, he lifted her up behind him. Still, when her backside landed on the firm rump of the horse, a sharp gasp of pain hissed between her teeth.

  Rowan jogged the reins and the gelding set off at a leisurely canter.

  “I’m sorry, John.”

  He sensed her soft words with his whole body, as she clung to him, her face pressed against his back.

  “Don’t think I disdain you,” she continued. “I only wish to God I did. But I cannot afford to let myself love you.”

  Neither can I! Rowan longed to roar at the top of his lungs. Not until I can be positive you love me in equal measure.

  He would have one more opportunity to find out, when they stopped for the night. Then he would put aside these ridiculous comparisons to Fulke DeBoissard and compel Cecily to admit her feelings for him.

  Whatever they might be.

  As they galloped over the last few miles to Cirencester, Cecily was hard put to decide whether she was more distressed in body or in mind. Her backside smarted and ached all at the same time. Her thoughts tumbled and spun, inclination striking a blow to conscience, passion pummeling her sense of duty.

  Fie, but life could be unfair! At long last putting her in the path of a man she could respect and love, just when destiny compelled her to marry another.

  All her life she had known only two kinds of men. Those like her brothers—good comrades, though weak or inept in spots. John FitzCourtenay had proven himself the best of comrades. Though not without a few flaws, he had proven himself a worthy consort for her—bold, clever, honorable.

  Men like that, the ones she could respect, had proven time and again they had little use for women. Particularly one like her. They wanted a woman who was beautiful, capable and healthy, to warm their beds, bear them strong sons and manage their homes. They also wanted a woman meek and biddable, who might ask no greater joy in life than serving her lord and master so.

  Cecily had rebelled against her father’s restricted vision of her future. She had rebelled against Lord Ranulf’s similar plan. What would Rowan DeCourtenay want from her?

  None of John’s admirable qualities touched Cecily as deeply as his obvious admiration for her. Not just as a woman, but as a fellow being.

  If only she could have turned back the seasons and prevented the deaths of her father and brothers. She might have settled very happily in one of her small dower manors with John FitzCourtenay. Prepared to build a life together, secure in the knowledge that it would be a partnership of equals.

  Too late to stem the tide of events, Cecily’s sense of honor protested. Brantham was her responsibility now. The Empress had commanded her to wed Lord Rowan. To do otherwise would pose dire consequences for her people. She must stand firm against the blandishments of John FitzCourtenay.

  No matter how her body and her heart ached to yield.

  As the gelding neared the outskirts of Cirencester, Cecily clung to her companion with all the fervor she would soon have to suppress. Lost in the strife of her musings, she nearly fell off their mount when John abruptly reined it off into the hedgerow.

  “What’s the matter?” she demanded, anxious to reach their destination and find relief from the torture of riding horseback. “Why have we halted?”

  “Hush!” The quiet urgency in his voice alarmed her. “Someone up ahead is stopping people on the road. I don’t like the look of it.”

  Dismounting, he drew the gelding farther back from the wayside, into the shelter of a small stand of trees. “Stay here while I see if I can find out what’s going on.”

  Though she longed to climb down, Cecily stayed where she was. It might be necessary for them to flee quickly when John returned. Her senses alert to approaching danger, she heard only a faint breeze stirring the leaves and a lazy drone of bees. Off in the distance, a bell sounded the sixth hour.

  It must be Boulton Abbey, she realized. The bell summoning Boulton’s nuns to vespers. Though they were but a week past, her own days at Wenwith felt like a lifetime ago. She could picture the lay sisters and novices leaving their evening meal for chapel. No doubt Sister Veronica would be carrying some exaggerated tale of a minor misdeed to the Mistress of Novices. What would Sister Goliath think if she knew what Cecily had been up to the past several days? The notion brought an unbidden grin to her lips.

  The grin vanished in a heart-pounding instant when John burst through the screen of foliage.

  “We are between a rock and a hard
place now.” He grabbed the horse’s reins. “I spoke to a few people on the road. Someone up ahead is stopping travelers to ask if they have seen a man and a girl on horseback.”

  “It must be Beauchamp’s men.”

  John FitzCourtenay gave a curt nod in reply. “That isn’t the worst of it, though. A traveler coming west claimed he’d been approached with questions about a lone leper or a young woman.”

  “So we have Lord Ranulf’s searchers ahead of us and DeBoissard’s coming behind.” Cecily tried to keep herself calm, but the thought of falling under the power of either man made her bilious with dread.

  “There’s no help for it,” said John. “We must flee to the north before they box us in. If I had followed your advice to do it first instead of last, we would not be in this pass now.”

  It galled Cecily to admit weakness, but in this case she had no choice. “I cannot stand more than another mile on this horse, Master John. My backside is…well, you saw how it is. Much farther and I fear I might swoon from the pain and fall off.”

  “We cannot stay here and we cannot make swift enough progress on foot. I would not cause you pain for anything in the world, Cecily, but I see no other course open to us.”

  Then she remembered the pealing vesper bell. “Boulton Abbey! It is a sister house to Wenwith, and just a short distance off. We could stay in guest quarters for the night and perhaps get some unguent to sooth my backside.”

  His hesitation showed plainly. Then he flashed her a tired smile. “I should not have ignored your counsel before. I won’t make that mistake again. If you say you cannot go on, I know you must be far past the point when most folk would yield. To Boulton it is.”

  John proved as good as his word. Almost before Cecily realized it, she found herself ensconced in a small guest chamber at the abbey.

  Spread facedown on a pallet, she listened for the footsteps of her companion returning from the herbalist. Had she only imagined the suspicious look on the face of the portress who admitted them, when John had claimed they were man and wife? Might he try to take advantage of the privacy their lodgings afforded tonight? Cecily found herself torn between praying he would not and hoping desperately that he might.