“He is dead.”
“Aye, he is dead, and all he left is his memory. I will not have it destroyed.”
She wondered if he thought her a complete fool. Perhaps to such a man, no one was worth the risks she had taken.
“Was he incapable?” he asked. “Did he prefer other men?”
“That is the sort of speculation I wanted to avoid, Ian. The answer is, I do not know. We spoke of it only once, when I was seventeen. I had realized by then that our marriage was not normal.”
She blinked at the memory of that night seven years ago, when Robert returned from a visit to Clivedale. She had decided that perhaps the problem was that he still saw her as a child, and so she had decided to greet him this time as a woman. How carefully she had tended her hair and gown. How boldly she had tried to kiss him upon his arrival. It had worked. She had seen the stunned realization in his eyes and noticed the way he looked at her during their meal. But that night, he had left her at the solar door as he always did.
“He did not explain the reasons. He asked me not to seek an annulment, because it would undo both the marriage and the truce. Of course I agreed. I had no desire to find myself back with Duncan, and I loved Robert and wanted to stay with him.”
“Does anyone else know?”
Another memory came, of a voice in the solar that night, berating Robert. She thinks it is her. She has a right to know. “Andrew, I think. If there are others, I do not know about them.” She rose up on her elbow, clutching the sheet around her. “You must promise not to tell anyone.”
“I promise nothing. This changes everything.”
She sank back onto the pillow and covered her face with her arm. Aye, it changed everything. Too much to ask Ian to continue this marriage on the terms she had assumed, to let the world still think her barren, to get the annulment. Why should he wait and go through all that trouble? If she had admitted the truth, there would have never been a marriage in the first place. The proof that she had not been misused lay inside her, and a simple examination would reveal it. No challenge from Aymer then, and no need to avoid the consequences of one with this arrangement.
She knew that Ian would not be touching her again tonight. He would not destroy the evidence that would set him free of the murderess he had been forced to wed. Immediately, at that, since she guessed that once he betrayed her deception everyone, even the priest, would just agree to tear up the contract and declare the vows invalid.
I tried, Robert. If you had not died when you did, if Morvan Fitzwaryn had not chosen this year to return, if Reginald had proven true and taken me away to Edinburgh — She sighed at the pointlessness of all those “ifs.”
She threw back the sheet and sat up, reaching for her shift, indifferent to her nakedness now.
“Where are you going, Reyna?”
“To my own chamber.”
“The night is chilled and there is no fire lit there. You will stay here.”
“I will hardly freeze to death.”
“You will stay here. The servants will talk otherwise.” He lifted the sheet for her.
The servants and everyone else would be talking plenty in a day or two. She lay back down and pulled the sheet around her.
Ian settled on his back beside her. His eyes were closed, but a thoughtful frown vaguely creased his brow. She felt the warmth of his skin alongside hers. The intimacy of lying naked like this beside his strength and beauty swept her. She wondered if he had done this so often that he was immune to the disturbing, alluring mood it created.
If she knew anything at all about seduction, she could solve this dilemma right now. Of course, she would have to spend her life with a man who neither trusted nor wanted her, who hated her because she had trapped him. And he might be angry enough to still tell the world about Robert. Yet—
“It will not work, Reyna,” he said. “Despite what you think, I am not a slave to my senses when the circumstances warrant.”
Chapter THIRTEEN
I an slipped from the bed before dawn and pulled on his clothes. His grand statement last night to Reyna had been brave talk indeed. Most of the night he had just looked at her, fighting the temptation to wake her with his mouth and hands, silently urging her to turn to him and reach out with the touch that would shatter his resolve.
He laughed to himself at the irony. He had spent days dreaming of getting her into bed, and when she was finally there because he had married her, he couldn't touch her.
He looked down at her again now. He had said that last night changed everything, and indeed it did. While he watched Reyna's sleeping face during the night, he had been able to set aside his pride and see her love for Robert for the pure thing it had been. She had not betrayed him with lovers in life and had not intended to do so in death, and she certainly did not kill him. There was no reason to, for one thing. Robert surely had not planned to set her aside, least of all for being barren. But also, as she said, she had built her life around him, and she would not have destroyed that.
Would she have maintained her silence even as they fitted the noose around her neck, or finally forsworn her reckless oath and revealed the evidence in her defense? Ian gazed at her fragile, helpless body, awed by the strength and devotion that had carried her through the last few months. Despite what she said, Robert of Kelso had not left her without a center. He had helped her build a core of honesty and goodness that supported her soul like a rod of steel. An admirable woman, strong and clever and true. He had met few men with the mind and spirit to match her.
One course of action was clear. There really wasn't any choice, but she would hardly thank him for it.
He left the chamber and walked down to the shadowy hall. Servants were already putting out bread and ale. He spied the figure of Andrew Armstrong at one of the tables and slid onto the bench across from him. The gray-haired steward stopped chewing for one moment, and then impassively continued. Resignation passed in Andrew's eyes during that brief pause, and Ian saw that Reyna was right, and that Andrew knew and assumed that Ian now did as well.
“Was Sir Robert already married when he wed Reyna?” Ian asked while he poured himself some ale.
Andrew set down his own cup. “Not to my knowledge.”
“He had traveled widely. He could have been.”
“Possibly. But from what I knew of the man, he would not abuse a sacrament in that way, taking one wife while he already had another.”
“Was the man impotent?”
Andrew's lids flickered low on his eyes. “I do not think so.”
“Did you ever know him to take a woman to his bed?”
“Nay.” Andrew looked at him in a frank way, as if challenging him to continue.
Ian looked back, just as frankly. “Did he prefer men and boys?”
“Nay. Such men can perform their marriage duties when they are obliged to, for one thing. Plenty of your English kings have proven that.”
“This obligation was not so great.”
“Whatever story you give out about this, that is the wrong one.” He paused and added quietly, “Such men know each other when they meet.”
“Perhaps. Perhaps not.” Ian waited for the steward to offer an alternate explanation. The man's placid silence annoyed him. “You are not going to tell me the real reason, are you? Did you also swear an oath to protect his memory?”
The steward didn't respond and Ian's anger spiked. “You would have let them judge her and would not have spoken? Let them kill her? The honorable Sir Robert expected much of his friends.”
“She intended to go north. I would have helped her do so. But if it came to it, I would have spoken enough to require someone to seek the evidence that she was not barren.”
Ian knew that he would get nothing more definite out of the steward, and he rose and walked through the hall. He needed to talk with Christiana Fitzwaryn before he led his men to the border to exchange the Armstrong women.
Acluster of thirty Armstrongs waited atop a hill. Halti
ng his troop, Ian gestured for David to bring the horses bearing the women forward.
Thomas Armstrong and ten men rode down the hill. Ian and David moved forward, with the women straggling along with them. They stopped fifty paces away from Thomas, and the women began crossing the divide.
Thomas eyed the approaching women. “Where is Lady Reyna?” he called.
“She does not choose to come,” Ian replied.
“I demand—”
“You have no right to demand anything. These ladies are here through my generosity, but the other stays with me.”
The ladies reached their rescuers. Margery rode up to her husband. Thomas barely nodded his acknowledgment. And then, in a gesture lacking any subtlety, Margery twisted on her horse and cast Ian a poignant look of farewell.
Thomas frowned at his wife and then at Ian. His face turned red. A sharp exchange with Margery ensued.
“Hell, Ian,” David muttered. “No wonder you brought one hundred with you.”
“She kept throwing herself at me. I assure you that my restraint was impressive.”
“Eventually one of these husbands or brothers will kill you.”
“Probably.”
“Here he comes.”
Thomas trotted toward them. “I do not think that you have returned my wife as I left her,” he snarled.
“Is that what she says?”
“It will be my pleasure to kill you when we drive Fitzwaryn from these lands.”
“There is no need to wait. If you wish to try it now, I am agreeable.”
Thomas sputtered angrily. “She says that you have wed Robert's widow.”
“Aye, it is true.”
“She killed a good man!”
“If so, she will answer for it, but not to you.”
“Is Duncan Graham behind this?”
“If he were, he would be cutting you to pieces right now.”
Thomas sneered and jerked his horse around. “If you survive this summer, we will meet. In the meantime, be careful what you eat.”
Christiana emerged from the hall to greet David and Ian upon their return. Ian looked meaningfully at her. Christiana gave the smallest nod.
“Where is she?” he asked.
“In the garden.”
“I am sorry to have involved you in this, my lady.”
“Better me than Duncan and Aymer, Ian, although she is distraught because she does not think they will accept my word and will demand —” Her words drifted off and she grimaced. “I could not promise to spare her that ordeal.”
He left her, but did not go to seek Reyna in the garden. He needed to check something first. Asking David to accompany him, he took a torch from a wall sconce and mounted the steps to the solar.
“What are we doing?” David asked when Ian stood in the chamber and eyed the walls thoughtfully.
“These walls are thick, David. It is common for them to be hollowed out for chambers and such in keeps like this. There is one off Lady Margery's chamber, for example, which she used as a wardrobe. It has a door and is obvious. I find it odd that this solar does not have one too.”
“You think it is hidden?”
“Aye. A safe place for coin and such.” He moved the torch carefully over the eastern wall without any luck, but then he had done this before and not found anything. He turned thoughtfully to the south.
“The stairs leading to the postern tunnel come up this way,” he explained. He handed David the torch and bent to pull the stones. The low entrance swung open.
David examined the internal hinges and iron bar that held the stones together. “Ingenious.”
“Aye. Almost impossible to notice if you do not know it is there. I think Robert of Kelso built this. It bears the mark of his intelligence. But this is the only other external wall, and with these stairs here—” Ian crouched low and slipped into the wall. The vaulted ceiling above him was too low for him to stand upright. Walking down a few steps, he turned and pretended he mounted the stairs, seeking the entrance.
“Hand me the torch.”
David passed the flame to him. The stairs and vaults became illuminated. Straightening, he looked at the wall facing the top of the stairs. It was hollow at the top. Not a chamber, but more of a deep niche. The average-sized man, coming up these steps, would see only a shadow in the torchlight, if he noticed it at all.
Holding the torch close, he peered inside. Metal gleamed at the back of the space. He recognized old armor and the edge of some cloth. Closer, within arm's reach, were two smaller objects.
He picked up the first. A book. He flipped some pages with one hand. The missing herbal. He put it back and pulled the other object toward him. A coin chest, but he guessed that it did not contain coin.
Tucking it under his arm, he returned to the solar. David raised his eyebrows when he saw the box.
“It had to be somewhere,” Ian said. He carried it to the desk and set it atop the books. He flipped it open. Parchments lay within.
“The documents,” David said.
“I decided that Thomas Armstrong would not have taken them, even if he knew where they were. He had to leave fast when the keep fell.”
David began unfolding the parchments.
“Find the marriage contract,” Ian said.
“Here it is.”
“Find the description of her dowry. Lands to the east? Secured to her as dower property when he died?”
“Aye. How did you know?”
“She mentioned the lands once, but Morvan spoke of his property ending just a half mile east, even before the waste begins. That old motte-and-bailey castle was originally on Graham lands then, but given to Robert as part of her dowry.”
David found a small piece of parchment and some ink and a quill. He began to draw. “Here is Clivedale to the north and Harclow to the south, with Black Lyne Keep between them. Graham lands lie east.” He drew three stacked horizontal rectangles on one side of the paper, and a long one vertically along their right side. “From what I can make out, Reyna's dowry transferred these lands here.” He sliced off a thin swath from Graham lands.
Ian studied the new configuration. The dowry land did not simply extend Black Lyne Keep's holding a few miles to the east. It thrust up and down, thin arms separating the borders of the Grahams and Armstrongs both north and south. That was how the marriage created a neutral area.
“No wonder Duncan wants her back,” David mused. “The dower lands alone put the Grahams on the Armstrongs' back again. Since it was not originally part of Harclow, Morvan would let him have it.”
“Look again, David. If the final testament is known, and Black Lyne Keep and its lands go with her, Duncan Graham surrounds the Armstrongs at Clivedale on two sides.”
David's expression turned hard. “He also surrounds Harclow on two sides. Maccus Armstrong put a lot of faith in Robert of Kelso to let the man have such strategic property. If either the Grahams or Armstrongs claim Black Lyne Keep or even the dower lands through her, it is not good news for Morvan, and does not bode well for any future peace.”
Ian studied David's drawing, but its strategic implications really would not make any difference. In the dark hours of the morning, he had already decided the fate of Robert of Kelso's widow.
Chapter FOURTEEN
Reyna heard the footsteps coming down the path through the orchard. She knew who this would be. She continued digging in the garden soil until the steps stopped behind her.
“You bastard,” she said without turning. She inched her knees toward the chamomile, pushing along the box of dirt into which she transplanted the herbs. “You might have warned me.”
“Would that have made it easier?” Ian asked.
In truth, Christiana had made the examination as easy as one could hope for, distracting them both from what was happening with humorous tales from the English court. “Nay. You might have taken my word, though.”
“I needed no proof, but others will. Your word and mine would count for litt
le.”
“Why should they believe Christiana, either?”
“Morvan and David will never doubt her, and she is the Comtesse de Senlis, so no priest will call her a liar.”
Morvan and David and the priest. Fewer men attending the next time, at least.
She stood and brushed the soil from her hands. The transplanted herbs looked pitiful in their box of dirt. This was a waste of time. Duncan would never let her bring them with her. Everything about her life here would end in a few hours, when she left with her father to return to her childhood home.
She turned to Ian. He had removed the armor that he had worn to the border and had on a blue pourpoint. He looked so handsome, his expression serious, those thick lashes lowered to shield the dark pools from the sun.
“I have only two requests,” she said. “Duncan and Aymer probably will not accept Christiana's word. If I must suffer that with them, I want to get it done with at once. I also ask that you find out from Morvan if I may take my books. If I could just have the ones given to me by Robert—”
“The books will stay here, Reyna.”
“They are all I have, Ian. Let me keep something of this life.”
“The books will stay. And so will you.”
Her shock was so staggering that she thought at first she had heard him wrong. “I don't understand.”
“We are married. We will stay married. No annulment now or later. When you get with child, we will attribute it to God's grace.”
“Then why— Christiana—”
“Not proof for Duncan. As you say, he wouldn't believe her. But your virginity supports your innocence in Robert's death, since it removes the motive everyone attributed to you. Only Morvan need hear about it when the time comes, and he will not doubt his sister.”
She looked at her herb garden. It was full of plants found on rides with Robert, or brought to her by him after he visited distant markets. The circle of small beds had spread over the years, as new plants were added. In a way, these herbs represented the history of her life with him.
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