by kps
"Look there, Jena." Rodrigo pointed acrossthe lake to an island at its center, a lush, green outcrop of wooded land almost a quarter of a mile away., Even as they watched, the boat carrying Fiona and her attendants set out toward it, their destination a large manor house that could just be seen through the trees. "That is Lady Fiona's family home, apart from the rooms she keeps at the castle." His smile turned down the comers of his mouth and became a sneer. "I have allowed her to keep her little domain, a sanctuary where she rules supreme.
It affords her a slight feeling of security, I believe."
"How magnanimous you can be, Sire," Jenny remarked sarcastically. "You've already taken everything else that was hers … why hesitate to make her kingdom completely yours?"
Rodrigo ignored the sharp, biting reproof. "I could," he admitted, "I easily could but it serves to keep Fiona in line and anxious to please me." His arm tightened about her shoulders as he led her a short distance along the shoreline, his armed mercenaries hovering a discreet distance away.
"Jena, I am the lord of everything you see or have yet to see. Do not fail to remember that, my dearest wife. Nothing is beneath my notice; every movement you make is reported to me." He released Jenny and stood facing her, then raised her chin with one hand until she was forced to look into his eyes. It was one of his favorite methods of impressing an idea upon her. "No one disobeys me; no one dares defy my strength. From you, most of all, I will not brook any defiance. Is that understood?"
"I believe Napoleon made similar remarks before they exiled him to Elba, m'lord!" Jenny snapped, catching her breath as his fingers bit into the soft skin of her face. "You are a dictator, Rodrigo, not a beloved monarch. All dictators topple eventually, they face death or Elba. I shall preserve my health for that day, for even if I am dragged down with you, I shall enjoy it to the fullest!"
There was an angry white line circling Rodrigo's mouth. For a moment he looked furious enough to strike her, but he'd never done that with an audience. Instead Rodrigo determined to use his body as a weapon to subdue this spirited show of insolent rebellion, and who was there to say nay to Laird Rodrigo? His mouth, those lean sensual lips that knew not the meaning of tenderness, closed on hers with suffocating pressure, allowing her to take no breath and smothering her instinctive resistance until she was nearly faint.
With a pounding heart, Jenny stopped struggling, allowing him his empty, meaningless victory of domination. She was alone, helpless in his power, and she must survive somehow, if only fueled by hatred and a desire to see the end to which, even now, she was sure he must be heading.
Rodrigo's men were openly watching now, enjoying their employer's fusty display, sharing ribald jests as they wagered over whether "Laird" Rodrigo would throw Jenny down on the shore and cast up her skirts or whether he would be able to restrain himself until they returned to the castle.
Jenny maintained an imperious silence while returning to the castle, a silence which her husband, in a rare mood of good humor, chose to ignore. Following his vulgar display of dominance on the banks of the lake, he had released her and almost gently cupped her chin.
Her face was flushed with embarrassment, her blue-gray eyes hot and wet with tears. .
"Must you make me appear the whore before that rabble who serve you?" she'd demanded.
"For all your faults, Rodrigo, I've never known you to be crude!"
He was unmoved by her anger. "Why should I care what they think? Those common hirelings work for me; their opinion is nothing. You know me well enough to realize I answer to myself and no one else. You are my wife, Jena, my property to handle as I please, in private or in public! That is something you have never quite accepted, a flaw in an otherwise perfect possession." His fingers had lost their gentleness, tightening until her fair skin had reddened around them. "You are mine. You will be docile and obedient, or I will not hesitate to make you so. Remember, the bastard you carry means nothing to me."
Staring into the hard, pitiless coals of his eyes, Jenny was seized by a horrible sense of inertia, as the abject helplessness of her situation sunk in. She was alone and pregnant, a stranger in a land whose people cared as little for her as they did for Rodrigo. If he cared to throttle her on the spot, no one would move a muscle to come to her aid. Why should they?
She belonged to this man who was familiar with her body and was yet a stranger. When he'd finally insisted she smile and address him as M'Lord, she had done so with a meekness that left her: feeling disgusted by her own weakness.
What was the use of any further rebellion? Over and over Jenny's lethargic mind repeated the same phrase like a litany as she obeyed him, trying to ignore his triumphant smirk, his cheerful tone as he turned to his men and ordered them to mount. With a great show of consideration that was a mockery in itself, Rodrigo had helped her into her saddle and they had turned the horses back, to travel the same path to the castle.
From a second-story window in the island's manor house, another had watched the amorous scene on the banks of Loch Gowd, a tall, broad-shouldered man whose fingers had clenched the, wooden frame of the casement with impotent fury. They couldn't even restrain their lust before the hired hands, Dev thought contemptuously, jerking away from the window.
Until he'd seen it with his own eyes, Dev had hoped the stories Fiona had brought from her visits to the castle .had been fabrications, or at least, exaggerations of the truth. Now, though, he knew she hadn't lied. Jenny had brazenly molded her body against Rodrigo's, with no regard for those watching their passionate embrace. She might have cared for him once, that Dev still believed; but Rodrigo had been her first love, the man she'd offered her virgin body to on the night they were wed. Perhaps that accounted for the bond between the two.
Fiona had told him how quickly Jenny had taken to the lifestyle at court, how she sat by her husband's side and smiled during long evenings of entertainment and banqueting.
She hadn't questioned the lie Raddock had given Rodrigo about Dev's supposed death and had shown no signs of grieving. Was she really so shallow a woman? It struck deeply at his pride that she could go so easily into another man's bed only days after she had reassured him of her love.
Dev paced the room with the nervous intensity of a big cat, his taut muscles crying out for a release of the energy they contained. He was free enough to roam the house and grounds, Fiona and Mara, her grandmother, had repeatedly assured him of that, but he'd spent five weeks on the island now and still felt imprisoned. If he were to row across the loch to the mainland, something he would dearly love to do, he would be risking capture by Rodrigo's men. And the girl who'd saved him, the lovely, cool-tempered Fiona, would also be endangered, along with those who were loyal to her.
This place called Beann Gowd'en was still a mystery to him. Dev found it incredible that the colony could have existed here for over five hundred years, a colony of Scots settlers who had founded the mountaintop country two hundred years before Columbus had touched at the shores of Venezuela and claimed it for Spain! The terrain of the rain forest had served to protect it, as well as the fact that it lay nearly three thousand feet above the valley with access only through hidden caves that honeycombed the mountain.
Driven by a desire to seek a peaceful sanctuary away from strife-torn Scotland, Fiona's ancestor, Sir Thomas the Rhymer of Erceldoune, had gathered a loyal group of followers about him and set sail in two ships for a land that, acoording to the time-aged manuscript Fiona had shown Dev, had been promised him in a prophecy by his mistress, Elainn. She'd been gifted with the power to forecast the future, and Thomas himself had been a well-known seer.
Thomas's carefully detailed diary told of a strange crystal called the Anacalypses, a crystal that was capable of revealing future events to those with psychic powers of sufficient sensitivity. Thomas claimed that this crystal, a parting gift from his beloved, had guided him to the mountain, deep in the interior of the wild, untouched country that had later been named Venezuela.
Dev s
coffed at the idea of such prophecies, but he had no idea how else Thomas had led his two ships across uncharted, unexplored waters to a safe landing in South America. Fiona insisted it had been the crystal, and when he'd asked to see it, she'd shrugged, telling him that, in a part of the manuscript now in Rodrigo's possession, Thomas had written of seeing his beloved Elainn's death in the Anacalypses and in his grief; had hidden .the box containing it. No one had seen it for over four hundred and fifty years.
Lady Mara, a woman of close to seventy years who had the youngest eyes Dev had ever seen, had been most courteous in making him feel welcome. Though she'd stayed in the background during the initial stages of the plot Fiona had concocted to overthrow Rodrigo, the plan met with her approval, and she lent what support she could provide to it. The first week after Dev had arrived, when he was recovering from his head wound, Fiona had confided that her men had stolen a quantity of ammunition and weapons from the armory at the castle. Was it possible for him to teach her knights to shoot, she'd wanted to know, for it would enable them to make a stand on equal footing with Rodrigo's heavily armed ruffians.
From the start, Dev had had his reservations about the use of guns. There was no way, he'd explained, that the men could practice enough to develop their skill and accuracy when the sound of the first shot would carry for miles, drawing Rodrigo down upon them. Dev had only been half-jesting when he suggested that it would be far easier to slip poison into the Spaniard's food, but Fiona had replied in all seriousness that killing only Rodrigo would loose those armed outlaws of his, unchecked by his authority, and the country would suffer even more.
His opinion had been changed when Fiona took him down to the caverns the first time. The whole mountain was laced with subterranean caves, and the entrance to one lay directly beneath the cellars of the manor. An underground river roared through one section of the cavern, providing a sound-deafening backdrop above which the practice of gunfire could not be heard. That same week Fiona had gathered together her knights, many of whom were quartered at the manor, and told them of the plan, pledging them on their knightly honor to follow a daily routine of practice in the caverns under Dev's direct command.
They were coming along fairly well for men who had previously known nothing of such weapons. He was due at the practice within an hour, Dev reminded himself, and he'd be damned if he'd stay in his room brooding over Jenny's infidelity! He was just about to leave when he heard a knock at his door. It was one of Lady Mara's women, and she bobbed a curtsey before informing him that her Lady had requested his presence in the solar.
Well, it was one way to pass the time, Dev mused, following the plump, older woman to the tower whose unusual skylight provided the sunniest spot in the house. He and Mara frequently passed the time there playing backgammon, a game he'd learned from Jenny at the ranch. Mara looked up now as the servant named Morgana ushered Dev within and asked if she might bring some refreshments.
"Yes, dear," Mara said gently. She never spoke except in the same mild and regal manner.
"By the looks of him, our Devlan could use a strong brew, perhaps some of our aged brandywine. For me, a cup of jasmine would do nicely." She dismissed the woman with a nod and smiled at Dev, suggesting he sit opposite her at the table where the backgammon board was already set up. "I've nae drawn ye away from something more pleasurable, lad?"
she asked with a twinkle in her eye.
Dev took a seat opposite her and returned her smile, some of his irritation ebbing. She was well aware that he and Fiona were lovers and, because she liked him so, had checked her natural tendency to disapprove of such goings on. "You know nothing gives me greater pleasure than sitting here for hours with you. If you were a little younger, I'd be-"
"Och, now, Devlin, ye be a watchin' ye'r tongue or I'll nae spend any more time alone wi'
you!" Mara grinned, her expression stern even though she was blushing from the teasing. "I have not lived this long to be thought a fool, m'boy-I know full well tha' if m' grand-child were here, I'd have nae chance to bid for ye'r time." She winked, then picked up the dice and rolled for her first move.
There was a companionable silence for a while as they concentrated on the game, then after her move, Mara asked him a very blunt question. "Could ye be tellin' me what feelin's ye hold for the girl in those company ye arrived, Devlan, Rodrigo's wife?"
"Feelings?" Dev tried to concentrate on his move and, failing, glanced up with a shuttered expression. "I don't know as I have any feelings one way or the other. I was merely a guide,"
he lied, "with the expedition searching for her husband. She's found what she was looking for and from what I hear, she's more than happy. What made you ask?"
"Just an old woman's curiosity. I thought ... ye might've been in love wi' the lass. From all accounts, she's fair bonnie to look at. All the court is agog over her beauty." Dev had made his move, and Mara threw the dice, sending one of his men to the bar, a man that should have been protected by doubling on his last throw. "I understand .she's expecting a wee bairn come October. Rodrigo will nae doubt be pleased at the thought of an heir. "
Dev looked up, startled, the dice dropping from his fingers. He stared down at them with a puzzled, preoccupied air and started to make his move when Mara's thin, blue-veined hand patted his own. "Ye're on the bar, lad," she said firmly, "and m' points are covered. Now, if I can still keep a count at my age, October would leave the Lady Jennifer several months shy for the babe to be her husband's." She leaned forward and folded her hands patiently.
"Would ye care to be tellin' me the truth?"
For a few minutes Dev refused, staring past Mara with a sulky, resentful look in his changling eyes, then he sighed. He didn't want to talk about Jenny. It somehow made it worse to think that she was carrying his child and submitted to Rodrigo, like a double betrayal of loyalty to him. Rodrigo seemed to have it all-power, wealth, and the freedom to move about at will-as well as Dev's wife and now, Dev's child. And he could do nothing. How did a dead man lay claim to what was his?
Dev's emotions were a mix of love and hatred, desire and rejection of what he desired, and the frustration roiling within him came spilling out like the burning, endless flow of lava from a suddenly active volcano. Mara listened patiently, interrupting occasionally to ask a clarifying question; and when Dev was through, she knew everything, from how he'd met Jenny and come to love her, to the bitterness and helplessness he felt now.
Twenty One
"It's ye'r turn, m'dear," Mara reminded her guest, studying Jenny's face. Now eight months into her pregnancy, the girl had laid her hand on her rounded belly as a mystical smile softly lit her features. " 'Tis a bit hard to concentrate on backgammon when a little one deals ye a kick, hmm? Ah, but I recall when I was carryin' m' wee Jamie bairn. For all his little size when he was born, the rascal punched and kicked for the last three months. 'Twas a relief when in'
pains finally came!" She looked at Jenny with sympathy and suggested they should postpone playing if she was uncomfortable. Jenny would be here for a two-day visit, in response to an invitation Mara had issued a month before when she came to the castle to meet the girl.
"No, please, let's continue. I'm enjoying this so-"
Jenny's face was shadowed by a flicker of sadness that was quickly banished. "At the castle there is little enough to occupy my time. Rodrigo, my husband, does not approve of my being seen in public now that I look so … awkward and graceless. I think the sight of me annoys him, for I'm limited to a daily outing in the garden, and he never goes there."
Awkward and graceless, indeed! Mara thought irritably, suppressing a grimace of distaste for Rodrigo's opinion. The girl was lovely, even in the shapeless gown and kirtle that draped her figure. She may have been forced to move slowly because of the burden she carried, but her body was still slender except for the graceful curve of belly that sheltered the bairn. And her face, Jenny's face had a glow of health, a soft glimmer of inner tranquility as she patiently awaited th
e child's birth.
Mara had invited Jenny to stay because she felt the girl's loneliness and pitied her. Jenny was as much Rodrigo's pawn as were any of the subjects he ruled with such an iron hand, perhaps more so because she was vulnerable and helpless in her present condition. There was another reason, though. Mara was determined to find out the truth of the rumors circulating amongst the castle's serving people that Rodrigo had possession of the legendary Anacalypses. She could not believe that he had discovered its secret hiding place, though he did possess the portion of Sir Thomas's chronicles that mentioned his intent to bury it.
"Well, then, we'll continue," Mara said with a cheerful smile. " 'Tis still ye'r turn at the dice."
Jenny retrieved them from the board, marvelling to herself at the skilled craftsmanship that had gone into the creation of the polished, inlaid points of hammered gold and the field of gold-veined crystal that surrounded them. Then, as she made her move and took two of Lady Mara's pieces to the bar, she glanced up at Mara's comical look of dismay and laughed, enjoying the relaxed atmosphere of the room and her own laughter-a sound that came rarely to her these days.
"You're letting me win on purpose, m'lady!" she protested. "Please, don't think that you must humor me,I enjoy the challenge of winning on merit."
" 'Tis only that my mind is off the play, dear," Mara claimed, looking for an opening by which she could introduce the subject of the crystal. "I've heard tell of a rumor tha' distresses m'
thoughts." She leaned forward, her eyes suddenly brightening as though an idea had just occurred to her. "Ye might be the very one to put me at ease. I do na wish to pry into ye'r personal relationship wi' your husband, but have ye ever heard him speak of a crystal? Its value is more sentimental than anythin' else." She held her breath, waiting for a reply.
