Mary Reed McCall

by Secret Vows

  “I met William Marshall several times when I was a young knight, Clare. He used violence when ’twas necessary, not for the kind of lawless brawling that took place in our village this day,” Gray chided.

  Gilbert’s face went white in anger. “So you say, Camville—yet what know you of acting within the bounds of law?”

  “Enough to ensure that you’ll receive justice here today,” Gray answered sharply. “I’ve handled many disputes as lord of my estates, with results deemed just by those who received them. Fear not. You’ll be judged most fairly.”

  “I do fear the kind of justice I’ll receive,” Gilbert muttered, his eyes narrowed on Gray. “And you know why.”

  Gray went silent for a beat. “I’ve given you my word, Clare, and that should be enough.” He glanced to the bailiff. “Proceed.”

  “Nay! I will not accept your word for my fair treatment. Your word means nothing, for I know what is spoken of you at Court—tales of your lawlessness and crimes of the worst kind, committed when you were even younger than I!”

  Several of the villagers gasped, their gazes shifting from Gilbert de Clare to Gray. Catherine felt a flare of outrage. How dared this youth accuse Gray of wrongdoing? His audacity bordered on dangerous, she knew. One look at Gray and she realized that it might well prove fatal.

  “Watch your tongue, lad.” Gray’s voice was deceptively quiet. “You know nothing of what you speak.”

  “Think you to keep it secret, then?” Gilbert’s face screwed into a mask of derision. “For the love of Christ, man, you slew your own sister! You’ve no right to pass judgment on me, or any of these men who have been brought before you today!”

  The entire square fell silent at his horrible accusation. Catherine felt as if someone had sucked the air from her lungs, and she watched, stunned, as several of Gray’s men leapt forward, obviously intending to throttle the young knight senseless. But Gray waved them off. Catherine could see the war he waged in himself for control, and she found herself holding her breath, awaiting the outcome.

  Finally he cast a sarcastic smile at Gilbert. “You continue to live right now, boy, thanks only to your tender age. Regardless of what some say, I am not a murderer of children.” His hands fisted at his sides, and a muscle in his jaw twitched. “You will be tried by this jury and a judgment assessed to you for any damages you caused here this day. After that, ’tis my will that you be gone from here. Never darken my lands with your shadow again.”

  Gilbert looked ready to explode, yet Catherine thought his silence meant that he would abide the ruling. But then his chin jutted out again.

  “I refuse to be judged by you or by any of these fools!” Gilbert growled. “Let God serve as my arbiter. Face me in an ordeal by battle and let us see who will emerge victorious!”

  The crowd burst into an uproar, and Alban grabbed Gilbert by the back of his tunic, shaking him. “You insolent whelp. Think that you may command the king’s High Champion to combat and be obeyed? You’ll command nothing but a view from a cell while we await ransom for your worthless hide.”

  “Is Camville a coward, then, as well as a murderer?” Gilbert shrieked, struggling and kicking as Alban began to drag him toward the path to the castle.

  “Wait.” Gray’s voice cut through the noise in the square, but Alban seemed unable to hear it; he kept going, forcing Gray to yell, “Wait, Alban!”

  Giving the youth another shake, Alban ceased his progress and stared dumbfounded at Gray. “You don’t mean to entertain the thought? Do battle with this wretch of a…” His voice trailed off and he shook his head in obvious reaction to the look he saw on Gray’s face. “Oh, nay, this is not good. ’Tis not good at all.”

  Gray walked the distance to Gilbert with rigid, even steps. Almost methodically, Catherine thought. His movements reminded her of something. Something unpleasant. The recollection flashed suddenly into her mind. Aye, that was it. It was the same as the day of the mélée—that horrible moment on the field when he’d seemed so stiff and detached, like an instrument of death…

  Oh, sweet heaven, he was acting just as he had in the moments before he almost drove his blade through Eduard’s heart. Icy cold washed over her, but she had no chance to speak. Gray had reached Gilbert and a new hush descended over the crowd. Even in the stillness, Catherine had to strain to hear what he said.

  “You wish to fight with me, Clare? Right here and now, in an ordeal by battle?”

  “Aye,” Gilbert spat, straightening and glaring up at him. “If you’re man enough to take my challenge.”

  Gray looked as if he was going to laugh, but then his face regained its preternatural, rigid lines. “If we fight, you’ll die.”

  “’Tis a chance I’m willing to take.”

  “Then make your peace with God and arm yourself, boy, because your insults will be answered in blood.”

  Without another word, Gray turned and stalked a few paces away. He drew his sword and the crowd pulled back, leaving space for the fighting to commence. Catherine pushed to the front of the throng, trying in vain to catch Gray’s gaze. But he refused to look at her. He just stood there, staring straight ahead as he waited for Gilbert de Clare to enter the fighting space.

  Uncontrollable tremors radiated from her stomach, and she laced her fingers tightly together. Her lips moved of their own accord in a soundless prayer, interrupted only when someone came close and touched her elbow. She met Alban’s gaze, seeing her own worry reflected in his eyes.

  “Is there nothing you can do?” she whispered. Nausea rode up into her throat, choking her. From the side of her vision, she saw Gilbert walk stiffly into the clearing, his sword held tight in his grip.

  “Nay,” Alban answered. “’Tis gone too far to stop. We must trust Gray to do what is right.”

  She nodded wordlessly, too overcome with dread to say anything more. In the next instant the fighting began; with a howl, Gilbert raised his sword over his head and lunged, but his blade glanced off of Gray’s as if his blow held no more force than the weight of a gnat.

  Gray made no sound as he faced the youth, though his eyes shone like green ice. He hardly shifted his stance as he delivered two swift strokes in return. The first hooked Gilbert’s sword and sent it sailing out of his grip; the second sliced down to just above the young knight’s knee, cutting through his chain mail and deep into the tender flesh beneath.

  Blood spurted and Gilbert went down screaming, gripping his leg as Gray raised his sword again. The crowd gasped, women covering their mouths or shielding their children’s eyes as they prepared to watch their lord deliver the death blow he’d promised. Swinging down in a stroke meant to decapitate his opponent, Gray shifted back at the last instant, slicing into Gilbert’s cheek instead.

  The young knight shouted in pain again and reached to his face, staring up with frightened eyes as Gray smoothly lifted his sword to the side and sheathed it, growling, “Let this be a lesson to you, boy. Be thankful that you kept your life this day. Now go, before I change my mind.”

  Gilbert gaped like a fish, terror seeming to paralyze his ability to speak. With a whimper he scrambled to his feet and stumbled as best as he could from the clearing to his friends, who helped him mount his horse before all of them rode away down the road as if pursued by devils.

  Gray stood silent for a moment more. He breathed deep, fisting his hands at his sides; then without a word to anyone, he stalked away. Catherine watched him stride with a purposeful gait toward the outskirts of the village.

  The buzz of the crowd swelled again as she watched him go, uncertain whether or not she should follow him. People began to disperse, and she realized that Alban would be no help in deciding; he’d already gone to gather some knights to follow Gilbert, to ensure that he and his friends left Gray’s lands after paying their fines.

  She was on her own.

  Biting her lip, she considered her options. She knew that she played with fire to approach Gray now. And yet she couldn’t be a coward. Setting
her gaze ahead, she followed his path, stepping gingerly around piles of animal leavings and debris as she went.

  When she finally caught up to him, she found him standing at the limits of the village, gazing out at a clearing where the rye had recently been cut. Birds lit on the stubble in quest of grain, chirping every now and then and lifting in a graceful mass before settling to earth again. It was a peaceful scene; the sun shone warm in the late afternoon sky. And yet even with some of the villagers milling about, Gray looked very alone.

  His broad, powerful back was tense with emotion, his arms crossed like bands of steel over his chest. As she approached, she saw his face in profile. He wore that familiar, troubled look, his jaw and neck rigid. She stepped a little closer.

  “’Twas a fine thing you did just now, sparing Gilbert de Clare’s life,” she said softly, coming up beside him.

  Gray hardly shifted a muscle. “He was a raw knight, barely in his spurs. I could not kill him.”

  “Aye. And yet his falsehoods were enough to make any man yearn for blood. None would have blamed you for killing him. You gave him every chance to recant his lies, and he refused.”

  “His lies?” Gray said, twisting to glare at her. “Play you a farce with me, lady, to say so?”

  “Of course not.” Catherine looked at him in confusion. “His accusations brought him what he deserved. Anyone who knows you could never believe you capable of committing such a horrible deed as that which he accused.”

  She met Gray’s fierce expression head-on, searching his gaze with hers and watching his anger fade to surprise before his eyes darkened with pain. But in the next moment he tilted his head back, a sardonic chuckle rumbling from his chest. “You don’t know, do you? You truly have no idea what Gilbert de Clare was talking about today.”

  “Nay,” she said softly. “I only know ’twas a shock to hear him speak so of you.”

  “Ah, this is rich,” Gray murmured, shaking his head. “Eduard brought you here and wed you to me, and yet he neglected to tell you. How perfectly perverse—and how very like him.”

  “What? What didn’t Eduard tell me?”

  “About my sister and my past.” Gray’s gaze captured hers, searching her in a way that made her breath catch in her throat. “It seems that you have been misled, lady. I am not the man you thought me to be when we married.”

  “Nay, my lord, you are much more. In truth I’ve never met someone like you in all of my life. I never knew such goodness could exist.”

  His expression tightened. “I am not so different from other men, Elise. Worse, if anything.”

  “Most of the men I’ve known were animals. You are not like them.”

  The poignant simplicity of her statement made Gray go still. The aching well in his heart cracked open, sending warmth flooding through his chest. He sucked in his breath against the bitterness, against the pain that swelled and left him feeling exposed, raw and vulnerable.

  His hands trembled, and to mask it, he raked them through his hair. “You would not think that if you knew the whole truth, lady,” he murmured.

  “What is it? I pray you tell me so that I can show you how meaningless it is. It holds no weight compared to all of the good you do every day. To all of the kindness you’ve shown me.”

  Calm descended over Gray. A calm like that he remembered from childhood, before the darkness had swallowed him and destroyed Gillian. His wife had inspired that calming feeling in him from the first, though he’d denied the gift, believing such a blessing undeserved by one such as he. Virgin or no, her soul had shone clear and sweet from the moment he’d seen her face on their wedding day. Only then he’d thought she’d known the truth about him. He’d thought that she’d accepted him in spite of it.

  He tried to laugh again, but it sounded more like the choked rattle of a dying man. “Gilbert de Clare spoke true on more than one point this day, lady. I did have a sister. She was my twin. And she is dead because of me.”

  Ignoring Elise’s startled gasp, Gray plunged ahead, committed now to his path of self-destruction. “Gillian was as beautiful and sweet as she was pure. I was supposed to protect her from harm.” His fingers clenched against his thighs as he forced the words to form on his lips. “And instead of keeping her safe, I killed her.”

  This time Elise’s hands flew to her mouth and her gaze filled with horror.

  He lifted his hands, palms up, pain shooting into his brain as he saw Gillian lying in his arms, saw the welling wounds on his own flesh, earned in his rage-filled attack on Thornby—watched his blood course over his fingers to soak his garments, the floor, her hair. His blood. Her blood. Mingled together as it had been from their conception.

  Dropping his hands to his sides, Gray shifted his gaze to his wife. “I didn’t kill Gillian myself, lady, but ’twas the same as if I did. She died because of my sin. Because of my weakness.”

  “What happened?” Elise whispered. Her eyes seared him with their innocence. “How—how did she die?”

  Gray looked away again, the images firing through his skull. “We were still children when Maman caught the pox. In order to ensure Gillian a home and food, I worked as an errand boy for Bernard Thornby, the whoremaster who’d led my mother to ruin. He all but owned me. I was young and stupid, and I began to drink as a way to forget. As the years passed, I started stealing from him, selling what I took in order to satisfy my growing thirst. When he discovered my thefts, he took revenge by hurting Gillian.”

  Gray’s voice wavered, but he went on. “We were only fourteen, but that didn’t stop Thornby from beating her and violating her. He put his filthy hands on her and hurt her in ways no woman should ever be hurt—” His voice broke, then, and he had to pause before he could finish. “By the time I found her it was too late. My sister died in terrible pain, gasping my name with her last breath.”

  Gray had watched Elise turn ashen as he spoke. Now she faced him, speechless, though he couldn’t tell if it was pity or disgust that he saw in her gaze. It didn’t really matter. She knew the whole truth about him now. Now she would cease this talk of goodness and see him the way he really was. Corrupt. Sinful. Irredeemable.

  But instead of being relieved, he couldn’t help but feel as if he’d just jabbed a red-hot knife into his own gullet and gouged out what was left of his heart.

  Gray pasted a mocking smile on his lips. “Less than a year ago, your brother learned of my past—how, I don’t know—but he found out the sordid details and used them against me, spreading the tales at Court. Only he claimed that it was I who had killed Gillian in a drunken rage. We came to blows over it. The king was not amused to find his two best champions at war. He forbade any further fighting between us. ’Tis why he arranged your marriage to me, as a union of peace between our houses.”

  “I didn’t know.”

  He remained silent for a moment before adding, “In truth, I despised your brother for trying to ruin me, and yet I cannot deny that he was right in a way. I did kill Gillian, through my weakness. I am not a good man, Elise. Justice and honor are but the trappings I wear to hide the sin beneath.” Gray looked away, unable to bear the weight of her gaze on him any longer. “Do not count on outward appearances when you judge a man’s worth, lady. I am proof that you will oft be deceived.”

  Turning on his heel, he strode away, sure that if he stayed he might buckle from the pain. For in the past weeks, he’d watched his wife grow in confidence and freedom, watched the spring come into her step and seen the smiles come to her face more freely. Curse his soul, but he’d even tasted the sweetness of holding her as she shattered with passion in his arms.

  And yet just now he’d earned a far more dismal response from her. One that damned the others all to hell…

  For today, in one, fell swoop, he’d managed to gather all of the sadness and pain Elise had worked so diligently to abandon, and he’d poured it right back into the clear blue innocence of her eyes.

  Chapter 12

  Catherine watched hi
m go, too stunned at first to say a word. But then something snapped inside of her, and she lunged forward, racing to catch up with him as she called, “Gray, wait! Please!”

  He slowed and finally stopped, but he wouldn’t look at her. She felt his muscles clench beneath her palm as she grabbed his arm, tugging him around to face her.

  Several villagers and knights who stood nearby struggled not to gape at the strange sight of their lady accosting their lord in public, but Catherine paid no heed. All that mattered right now was making Gray understand that his past meant nothing to her. That it was the man he’d become in the days since his tragedy that made her feel truly happy.

  That made her feel loved.

  She gripped his arms and looked up at him, trying to make him understand. “I don’t care what you did, Gray, or didn’t do, when you were a boy. Aye, I ache for the loss of your sister and the pain it must have caused you, but I don’t blame you for her death. No one could. Her murder was a horrible deed committed by an evil man who abused women as a way of life. The fault of Gillian’s death lies with him, not with you!”

  “’Tis in your nature to be generous,” he said, finally meeting her gaze. “That is why ’tis hard for you to believe that I bear fault in this, Elise. And in truth, these past weeks with you, I’ve felt…”

  He stopped and looked away, seeming to subdue his emotions by force before he was able to bring his gaze back to hers. “As much as I’d like to, I cannot change reality. I must accept the fact that I almost allowed myself to forget my part in Gillian’s death.”

  “But—”

  “Nay, lady,” he said, touching his finger gently to her lips. “Let me finish. Every hour I continue to breathe must be lived to make up for her loss. I vowed that long ago. ’Tis why I never let anything cloud my mind again, be it drink or remedy. ’Tis why I must continue to fight whenever possible as the king’s champion.”

  “But how can that honor Gillian’s memory?”