By Grace Possessed

by Jennifer Blake

  “More?” Cate pushed a hand through her hair, trying to free it of what appeared to be a rats’ nest of tangles. How it had gotten that way, she preferred not to think.

  “Word is, Lord Trilborn is to send back reports from everywhere he goes, lists of the men and supplies pledged to Henry’s army.”

  “Showing proof of his industry?”

  “Or his willingness to aid Henry’s cause. The mission was decided upon, they say, during a private meeting between the king and your future husband.”

  “But that was about our marriage,” Cate said in protest.

  “Was it?” Marguerite asked with her most secretive smile. “Or was the marriage about the mission that has taken Trilborn from among us?”

  It was a question for which there was no answer. In truth, it did not matter. It was enough that Winston Dangerfield, Lord Trilborn, was truly gone.

  He was gone, which meant the danger from the feud had been removed. If Ross was going to die before the wedding, which was fast approaching, it would have to be from some other cause.

  And if he did not die, if he lived, what would that mean? Cate refused to think of it. Her chest ached at the knowledge of just how unlikely that would be.

  “What will you do tonight?”

  Cate jerked her head up to stare at her sister. “What do you mean?”

  “Will you go to Ross or not?”

  “How do you—”

  “I am a light sleeper, so saw you return this morning. Moreover, I’m no longer a child, have known about the act of procreation for some time.”

  “Please, not so loud,” Cate said with a wince.

  “Don’t think I blame you, for I don’t. It was brave of you to venture out for what you wanted.” Her sister frowned, lifting a corner of her veil to her mouth, biting on the edge of it. “I don’t know if I’d have had the courage.”

  “Courage?”

  Marguerite gave her a dark look. “For the bedding, also what comes after it. Suppose you fall desperately in love with your future husband, but the sentiment is not returned. What if he dies, anyway? You will have nothing but heartache to show for your nights in his arms. Even if you have his child, they will take it from you.”

  “Never!”

  “Of course they will, if you go into a convent as you’ve sworn. If not, it will be the same. They’ll take the babe and banish you to some faraway keep, hold you under guard till you molder away. I would join you either place if allowed, but will it be?”

  “You cheer me so, dear sister. I don’t know where I would be without you.” Cate should have seen the pitfalls herself, might have except for all else that was on her mind.

  Her younger sister scowled at her. “Watching you and Isabel, I’ve quite made up my mind. I shall avoid being betrothed again at all costs.”

  “The choice may not be yours.”

  “I’ll run away before agreeing, I will. If I find a man who suits me, I shall live in sin with him, without need of vows between us.”

  “But if he loves you…”

  “How are we to be certain of that, you and I? Any man can say he loves us, but the only way we will know is to wait and see if he dies before the wedding. What kind of person does it make us that we can allow a man to risk his life that way?”

  “It’s horrible, I agree,” Cate said, her voice not quite even, “yet what else are we to do?”

  “You could go to Ross tonight and ask him to take you away.”

  Cate gave a short laugh. “I did ask him to go for himself. He refused as a matter of honor, and I can’t believe he would consider it any different if he took me with him. He would probably think it a worse abuse of Henry’s trust.”

  “Of course he would,” Marguerite muttered, “the great Scots numbskull.” She looked up. “I don’t know what is to be done, then, except wait. Well, and take what joy you can of him.”

  Cate could find no way to argue with such logic. She thought, in truth, that it had much to recommend it.

  She failed to allow for the whims of the king.

  At midmorning, Henry gathered a group of friends and rode out from the palace. The all-male hunting party would be gone several days. Naturally, Ross was obliged to go with them.

  The news, when Cate heard it, sent horror through her in a blind rush. Ross had seemed reasonably safe from the dangers of the curse while he remained within the palace walls. That was now at an end. Accidents happened with alarming frequency on royal hunts. Men competed with bow and lance to prove their prowess or win favor by providing the most meat for the royal table. Competition led to recklessness.

  Beyond the dangers of galloping over uneven ground, crossing streams running high with snow melt or cornering stags and boars that might turn on their pursuers, there were arrows that went astray. All such hunting deaths were not accidental. William Rufus, son and heir to William the Conqueror, had been killed that way. It was claimed his younger brother, Henry I Beauclerc, arranged it to take the crown. If a king could fall, how much easier might it not be for someone less protected?

  Nor did it help her fears to know Trilborn was not with the hunt. He could be lingering close by to make certain the wedding did not take place.

  Yes, and what of Henry’s purpose? The palace larder might need replenishing before the wedding feast. It was possible he thought the Scotsman should help provide venison and pork for it. Nevertheless, she could not but wonder if Henry knew what had passed between the two of them. He might prefer to remove any suggestion that Ross had been seduced away from loyalty to his native land.

  Time dragged past. The palace was unnaturally quiet without the king’s presence or his guard. Messengers galloped back and forth between the hunt and the palace. Wagons loaded with every manner of game trundled into the kitchen yard each evening, proving the outing a success. No news of disaster arrived from the hunting party. No message arrived to say when they would return. As the wedding loomed ever nearer, it began to seem that Henry meant to keep Ross away until it was past.

  Then on the wedding eve, shortly before vespers, a mighty salute of trumpets was heard. Cries echoed through the palace. To the sound of shouts and full-throated cheers, the cavalcade of returning huntsmen clattered through the palace gates.

  Cate, hearing the firestorm of welcome that swept through the old pile of stone and wood, ran in haste to a window overlooking the stable yard. She leaned out, watching the men dismount as stable hands came running. For long moments, she could make no sense of the confusion there in the gathering dusk.

  Then she saw him.

  There was Ross, swinging from his mount in a swirl of plaid, tossing the reins to a stable lad with a smile and a coin. He was safe, unharmed, moving with less saddle stiffness than most as he turned from the milling group of riders and dogs.

  Abruptly, he halted and stared up at the palace. He searched the windows as if he felt her presence, knew she watched him.

  Cate drew back inside, away from the window, with her heart pounding in her throat. What was she doing? She wasn’t supposed to care about her betrothed. It would be fatal to fall into that trap, for only pain could come of it.

  But of course she didn’t care for Ross Dunbar beyond appreciation for him as an attractive man and breathtaking lover. His life or death meant no more to her than that of any man in whose company she had whiled away a few hours. She would always remember him because of the gift of caring initiation he had given her, but she would not be devastated by his passing. Her most fierce pang would be from guilt that he had become embroiled in the curse that followed her and her sisters.

  Yes, that was it. Guilt alone caused the odd choking feeling in her chest. Well, and mayhap dread for what might yet take place between this moment and the hour of her wedding.

  The figure of a woman glimpsed at a window set Ross on fire. It had been Cate standing there; he knew it as surely as he knew his name and lineage. He had hunted like a madman these past few days, chasing red deer as if trying to ou
tdistance the gut-wrenching longings that plagued him. It was as if he had drunk some witch’s brew designed to put him in thrall. He could not get Cate out of his head. She rode with him, talked to him in the thunder of his horse’s hooves, appeared in the heart of the fire as he sat beside it, and visited him in his dreams.

  Lust, he told himself. His body, denied these many months, had rediscovered the pounding joy of carnal sur-cease and wanted more of it. His thoughts were centered on his bride-to-be because he had tasted her honeyed sweetness but not had his surfeit. The talons of need that raked him would be routed by a few hours behind bed curtains.

  Striding toward the nearest entrance to the palace, he made swift plans to visit the common bathing stew at the laundry room to remove the sweat, mud, horse and animal stench of the hunt, followed by a meal to quiet the clamor in his belly. He’d then find some way to convey the message that he’d be elated to have Lady Catherine lie with him this night.

  The room set aside for bathing was warm from a constantly burning fire, and steamy from the cauldrons of water that hung above the flames. The bath was hot, herb-scented and deep. Its canopy of mildewed linen on a wooden framework closed off drafts on three sides, leaving the fourth open to the fire. The maidservant sent to tend him was saucy, plump and clean. The look she gave him from under her lashes held blatant invitation.

  Ross was not tempted. He had a finer quarry in mind.

  Dismissing the woman with a few curt words, he rubbed a handful of soft soap through his hair, lathered and rinsed. He scrubbed the rest of him and then lay back with his arms draped around the edges of the wooden tub, which were covered by its linen liner. The warmth of the water took the soreness from his muscles and routed the last chill of the long day. The night was deepening, the candles flickering on their stands, leaving the corners of the room in shadow. He closed his eyes while his chest rose and fell in a luxurious sigh.

  He could make an assignation with Lady Catherine over their evening meal, but that required the rather chancy assumption that she would be willing to risk coming to him again. He could walk with her after they ate, and entice her into his chamber, but such a ploy would expose her to censure if they were seen. He could prowl the palace in search of some corner where they could be private, rather than expect her to be closeted with him, though any place he could think of would be subject to discovery. Or he could simply appear at her small nun’s cell of a chamber and hope that Marguerite would be both complaisant and discreet enough to allow them privacy.

  Somehow, the drawbacks of these possibilities loomed larger than they had as he lay trying to sleep while the king’s men snored around him. None of the ploys suited him, yet the alternative pleased him even less. Abstinence was no doubt suitable for a bridegroom on the eve of his wedding, but Ross could see no benefit in it.

  A soft sound, like the creak of a hinge, scattered his musings. With it came a draft that gently wafted the canopy above him and brought the rise of goose bumps across the tops of his shoulders. No one spoke, however, and no footsteps sounded.

  This was not the entry of another hunter bent on cleanliness, nor was it a serving woman with towels, more water to replenish the cauldrons or a more personal offer. Ross lay perfectly still, barely breathing as he listened to the whisper of fabric against fabric caused by a stealthy advance. Man or woman, he could not tell. Not until he caught the acrid whiff of male sweat and belched ale.

  Above him, on the canvas tent that enclosed the tub, a shadow crept forward, cast by the light of a bowllike lamp on its corner stand. The silhouette moved higher, wider, turned into the shape of a man with something short and pointed clutched in his raised fist. The intruder eased forward, lifted his arm higher.

  Linen ripped with a dull scream. Ross thrust up a hand to catch the thick hairy wrist that appeared above him. He twisted with such force that the knife the intruder held dropped, splattering into the tub between Ross’s spread knees. Surging upward with hard power and a sluicing cascade of sudsy water, he brought the arm down across his bent knee with a hard crack.

  The man screamed, jerking, flailing backward so he dragged the split bath canopy half off its supports. Ross gave him a hard push to send him farther. The attacker landed so hard he rolled, halting just short of the fireplace. Eyes wild, he scrambled to his feet.

  Ross leaped from the tub to plunge after him, but his foot caught in the dragging canopy, skidded in the soap scum spreading over the floor. He staggered, lunging enough that his hand closed on a filthy doublet, but the man grunted and tore free.

  Thrown off balance, Ross hit the stone floor full length, sprawling in dirty suds, jarring his half healed knife wound to a vicious ache. As his attacker lurched toward the open doorway and fled through, Ross leaped up again, swearing in blistering phrases as he sprinted after him.

  Naked, wet and raging, he halted in the antechamber outside, holding his side. A door stood open along the way. He sprinted toward it, emerging in the palace’s laundry yard. The space was a maze of wooden troughs and sagging drying lines, deserted at this time of evening, made hazardous by gathering darkness.

  He could go floundering after the bastard, but the chances of running him down were not good. The fellow seemed to know the palace, and had the additional advantage of being clothed. With a curse at every step, Ross turned and retraced the path made by his wet footprints, closed himself back into the bathing chamber.

  He was dirty again, his skin coated with grit. Stepping back into the lukewarm tub, he splashed mightily to clear it away. As he scooped deep, he knocked against the knife dropped by his assailant. Ross groped for it, curled his fingers around the hilt to bring it up into the light.

  His breath left him in a soundless grunt.

  The blade in his hand was a dainty thing, a ladies’ knife of the kind that usually nestled in a scabbard swinging from a chatelaine. Lethally sharp, it was a poniard with a chased silver blade and a hilt of ebony worked with silver filigree. It was the knife used at meals by Lady Catherine Milton of Graydon.

  Ross felt a sharp pain in his chest, as if the thing had struck his vitals, after all. The wedding was nigh, and he had not yet died the convenient death that would leave the lady free. He had survived whatever accidents and disease usually carried off the suitors of the Three Graces.

  The lady had no wish to be his wife. What was she to do if she was not to be wed on the morrow?

  Why, take matters into her own hands, of course.

  Cate had meant to see that she was spared. She had, so it appeared, decided to invoke the curse herself with the aid of a paid assassin.

  It had not worked, as she would soon discover. What would she do now, with the wedding almost upon them? Might she attempt the job herself?

  His hand closed slowly around hilt and blade, tightening until he felt the sting of a cut and seep of warm blood winding down his wrist. The Cate he had come to know was willful, determined and fearless, yes; she did not bow meekly to her fate as was expected of a lady in her position. Still, he had not judged her to be a murderess.

  What if she wasn’t? What if the point had been a mere reminder of his vow not to be wed? If he withdrew as a bridegroom, might the curse not be nullified?

  But no, that would not serve. She must know he was not so craven. Ross had signed the contracts, which meant he was her husband even if their union was never blessed by the church. The only way to be rid of him was to see him dead.

  Well, then, let her try. Let her, though he would not provide his future bride with so convenient an opportunity as his bed this night.

  Closing his eyes, he whispered a curse more virulent than all the rest.

  Cate’s heartbeat raced as she entered the great hall. Though it was thronged with people, she saw no one except Ross, in his seat against one wall. He lounged in his chair with a wine cup in his hand and brooding intensity in his eyes. His saffron linen shirt stretched across his wide shoulders, with the end of his plaid thrown over his left, but the new je
rkin he wore was of blue-dyed leather that made his eyes appear as dark as a northern storm. His hair was furrowed, as if he’d combed it with his fingers before it dried, yet glinted with health and cleanliness in the torch light. He was every inch the Scots nobleman, easily the most handsome man present, and he was hers.

  She paused, aghast at that instant of possessive pride. Of course, it might have been occasioned by the two ladies who sat at a table not far away, whispering as they batted their lashes in Ross’s direction. How dare they ogle him when tomorrow he would be wed to Cate?

  Skimming forward with the long back hem of her gown sweeping the rushes, she headed toward her bridegroom. Halfway there, she saw him turn his head in her direction.

  He gave no sign of welcome. His features were calm, his gaze as appraising as if she had been a stranger.

  Tightness seized her throat. She had expected a smile, or at least some small acknowledgment of the intimacy they had shared. The lack seemed damning in some way she could not grasp. She did not falter, however, but lifted her chin, meeting his eyes with all the boldness at her command.

  He rose to his feet, inclined his upper body in a bow. It was shallow and far from deferential. Still, he waved her to a seat at his side and pulled out the bench for her convenience.

  “Good day, my lady,” he said, his voice even. “I pray I see you well.”

  “Full well.” She swept her skirt aside and seated herself, though dismay crowded her chest, making it hard to breathe. Such a formal greeting, as if he barely knew her, as if they had not strained together skin to skin, or tangled tongues and breaths. The insult was almost as hurtful as the injury of it.

  He regained his seat, leaned toward her so her view of the room was blotted out. “I rejoice to see you. I had thought I must wait until after midnight.”

  “Why, when you could have sought me out?”

  “Did you expect it, fair Cate? Were you waiting for it?”

  Alarm shifted inside her, though more from the look in his eyes than anything he was saying. “It would have been natural, surely.”