The de Lohr Dynasty

by Le Veque, Kathryn

  He was fuming. “Appreciate it? Damnation, I should spill his innards this very minute!”

  “But you won’t,” Dustin said steadily. “He is the father of your future nephew, Chris. And Deborah’s husband.”

  “Damnation,” he spat, his big body tensed as if he were contemplating some horrible action. Then he looked at her. “You knew about this all along, didn’t you? You even…even approve of this disgrace.”

  “ ’Tis no disgrace to love someone and to want to have children,” she replied calmly. “What’s done is done, Chris. They are married now and the child will not be a bastard.”

  He did not look at her, his expression hard as he stared off into the dimness of the abbey. She watched his face, continuing to stroke his hair lovingly and hoped beyond hope he was reconsidering his stance.

  The truth was that Christopher knew he should be furious, but he could not seem to bring himself to a rolling boil. Had he not loved Dustin as he did, then his fury would be out of control and Gowen would surely suffer a painful death. Yet because of the feelings he held for his wife, he understood and could not bring himself to be overly angry.

  Still, he was enraged because they had taken matters into their own hands, but he knew now why they had done it. And he furthermore knew there was no way he could annul the marriage. Everything now suddenly made sense; all of the pleading, begging, the clues his wife had given him that he had been too narrow to see. As always, he saw what he wanted to see.

  After several long minutes, he simply shook his head and she slipped up behind him throwing her arms around his neck and pressing her face against the side of his head.

  “Be merciful to them, my lord,” she whispered in his ear, sending chills up his spine. “Imagine if it were we who were separated, subject to our fate by the decision of another, afraid yet so desperately in love that we did not regret our hasty actions. If there was a chance I were to be taken from you, would you not do everything in your power to keep us together? That is what Gowen did. Do not fault him for loving Deborah.”

  After a moment she felt his huge gloved hand grasp her arms gently, and she felt him sigh. “I am given little choice in the matter,” he muttered.

  She kissed his ear softly. “Please, Chris. Let them be happy.”

  He closed his eyes at her touch, his mind torn between the issue at hand and her closeness. “Lady, your reasoning and wisdom improve by the day. Soon you will be as wise as your husband.”

  “Who do you think I learned everything from?” she smiled, kissing his ear again. “I love you, Chris.”

  He squeezed her arms around his neck. “Where is Deborah?”

  “In her room,” she replied. “I told her to wait there for me.”

  Christopher sat broodingly another moment, trying to remember when his life went so out of control. He was unused to anything other than perfect obedience and order, but within the past year, he felt as if his command over something as simple as his family was slipping away. Not with David, but with the women, Dustin and Deborah were giving him fits.

  “I would go see my sister’s husband now,” he said in a low voice, gently unwinding her arms and helping her to stand.

  “Can I come? Please?” she asked.

  He kissed her cheek. “Nay, sweetheart. Go see to my sister, as I am sure she is in desperate need of reassurance.”

  Dustin dared a little smile. “Then you will not annul the marriage? You will let them be?”

  He tried to glare at her, but his heart wasn’t in it. “Aye, I shall leave them be. But they live here, under my roof, where I can protect my sister. And to hell with Gowen if he does not approve.”

  Dustin smiled broadly and kissed him. He relented his hard stance with a throaty chuckle and kissed her again.

  “You have a heart as big as a lion, husband,” she said softly. “Surely there is not a more understanding, generous man on this earth.”

  “You have cast a new understanding on the term Lionheart,” he said, his eyes warm. “ ’Tis usually a phrase to describe fierceness and bravery. But you have always seen through me, haven’t you? You are the only person in this world who can read me like a book.”

  “Not always,” she admitted. “You can be mightily unpredictable. And frightening.”

  “Speaking of frightening,” he raised an eyebrow, “why did you fight with Jeffrey like that? You know the man was only doing his duty.”

  “I have done worse to him,” she shrugged. “And he has hit me back on occasion.”

  “He’s done what?” her husband responded sharply.

  She laughed softly. “Mother gave him permission to discipline me if needed and, on occasion, he has. Did you think you were the first person to spank me?”

  He frowned severely. “Of course not, but I never imagined Kessler was the enforcer.”

  Dustin shrugged. “Father did not have the heart, so mother put Jeffrey in charge of dispensing punishment.”

  Christopher shook his head. “Amazing,” he mumbled. “Go upstairs, now. I shall join you later.”

  She kissed him again before retreating up the stairs. He watched her, waiting until the door closed softly before retreating to the sub-level of the abbey.

  Dustin was nearly weak with relief as she made her way back to Deborah’s room. She knew Deborah would be ecstatic with the turn of events, and Dustin was thrilled that the newlyweds would be living at Lioncross. She and Deborah would go through their pregnancies together, and their children would be constant companions. She was full of dreaming of the future as she mounted the stairs and passed into the second floor corridor, her heart and mood soaring with joy.

  Deborah’s door was closed and she knocked, softly calling her name. Receiving no answer, she lifted the latch.

  Four stories below her, Christopher heard the scream.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  “Jesus Christ, she has slit her wrists,” David hissed as he struggled to stop the bleeding from Deborah’s arm.

  Christopher was bent over his sister’s other arm, tying a tight tourniquet in an attempt to stop the blood flow. He did not answer his brother as he concentrated on his task, making sure Gowen was applying tight pressure to the wound he was tending. In the corner, Dustin was sobbing loudly.

  “Is she going to die?” she asked anyone who could answer.

  No one could, in fact, answer her. Deborah had been bleeding for quite some time and Christopher was unsure if his sister was going to survive. His heart twisted with remorse for the actions that had driven his sister to the brink of despair, yet he regretted nothing. If he had to do it over again, he would have changed nothing but for the fact that he would have explained things to Deborah and not assumed that she understood his reasons. He felt guilty, although he tried not to.

  “Where did she get the goddamn dagger?” Edward wound another piece of linen around the wrist David was securing, but it was bleeding rapidly.

  “It is hers,” Christopher replied, checking his sister’s condition by lifting up an eyelid.

  “Lower the head of the bed, Chris,” Leeton said. “And keep her arms up. The blood needs to stay in the vital areas.”

  Christopher nodded and between him and Leeton, they lowered the head of the bed while the others kept Deborah’s arms aloft as they tried to control the bleeding. In the corner, he could hear Dustin crying.

  “Jeffrey, get my wife out of here,” he said softly, not looking at her.

  “No, please,” Dustin said, pushing against Jeffrey as he came to her. “I would stay here. Deborah needs me.”

  “We are doing all we can for Deborah,” Christopher told her, trying to be gentle. “Please go and rest, sweetheart. Let us take care of my sister.”

  Next to Christopher, Gowen was weeping quietly. He was holding Deborah’s arm as Christopher and Edward bandaged it. Dustin’s eyes fell on him and she forced aside her grief to focus on the anguished young man.

  “Gowen,” she pleaded softly, “please come with me.
Let them work in peace.”

  He shook his head, dirty and disheveled from the night’s events. “I shall not leave her to die alone,” he whispered. “She needs me now.”

  Dustin looked at Christopher and saw that his expression was grim. She curbed her hysteria, presenting a calmer picture.

  “I do not want to go, Chris,” she begged quietly. “Please let me stay.”

  He did not reply, seeing that she was easing somewhat after her initial shock. He knew that she certainly wouldn’t rest if he sent her away; indeed, she would be much worse off with worry.

  “Sit down, then,” he replied hoarsely. “Sit down and be still.”

  Dustin obeyed and Jeffrey took position beside her like a huge watchdog. Sir Nicholas and Sir Guy stood in the doorway, watching with great concern as their comrades struggled to save the life of their liege’s sister.

  “If Burwell were here, he’d have her under control,” David muttered, distraught. “Jesus, why did she do this?”

  “Fear,” Gowen answered quietly, staring at Deborah’s white face. “The baron drove her to it.”

  Tension of another kind filled the room. Dustin’s eyes went to Christopher, who was focused on his sister. Even though her husband had been harsh with his sister, even she did not believe he was responsible for this disaster. Anger filled her, her emotions surging from one volcanic peak to the next.

  “That is not fair, Gowen,” she said fiercely. “Christopher did nothing of the kind.”

  Gowen looked up at Dustin and she could read the irrational grief. “He might as well have put the dagger in her hand himself,” he said. “You know how unbalanced she has been lately. Of course he drove her to this with his cruelty and his arrogance.”

  Dustin shot out of the chair. “How dare you speak of my husband like that,” she said, shaking an angry finger at him. “No one is to blame but Deborah for her own foolishness.”

  Gowen stood up and Deborah’s arm went slapping to the bed in spite of Leeton’s attempts to grab it.

  “Everything that has happened this day has been his fault,” he snapped at her. “Had he not been so haughty, we would not have felt it necessary to be married immediately. He broke the sanctuary of the church to bring us back and then threw me in the dungeon. Deborah had no way of knowing my fate and, assuming the worst, has tried to take her own life. How can you be so blind?”

  A huge hand reached out and grabbed Gowen around the neck, fairly lifting him off his feet as he was shoved away from the bed, away from the others. Dustin gasped, her hand flying to her mouth.

  Christopher’s eyes glittered like deadly sapphires against Gowen’s pale, frightened blue.

  “You may say what you will about me, sirrah, for your words do not offend, me nor provoke this action,” he rumbled. “But you will never raise your voice to my wife. Ever.”

  “It is all right, Chris.” Dustin went over to them, her eyes wide and her anger banked. “He did not mean it; he is upset. Please do not be harsh.”

  Christopher did not look at her. “Do you understand me?” he said to Gowen. “If we are to live under the same roof, then you will come to understand a great many things.”

  Gowen was nearly blue. “I….I did not mean to shout at her,” he rasped. “ ’Twas not my intention to offend, sire, but Dustin and I have known each other a great many years and I treat her as I have always treated her.”

  “With such disrespect?” Christopher shot back, his eyebrows raised.

  “Nay, sire,” Gowen was struggling for breath. “As a sister. Who does not yell at their sister?”

  Christopher stared back at him, reading truth in his eyes. Moreover, he was right; were Deborah conscious at this moment, he’d yell his head off at her. After a moment he dropped his hand and stepped back, still eyeing Gowen unsteadily. Before Dustin could touch him, he took long, quick steps back over to his sister.

  Dustin watched her husband sadly for a moment before turning her attention to her friend and new brother-in-law. Her panic was slowly subsiding and she was resigning herself to the fact that her husband and his knights were doing everything possible to help Deborah. She doubted Burwell or God himself could do much more. As hard as it was, she would have to place her faith in them, for there was nothing she could do and her sense of helplessness was overwhelming. Quietly, she moved over and took Gowen’s arm.

  “ ’Twill be all right,” she said softly. “They will help her.”

  Gowen was gray with horror and apprehension, too overcome to speak as he watched the men work on his wife. Dustin watched, too, forgetting about her endless fatigue and swelling ankles. The only thing that mattered at the moment was preventing Deborah’s life from slipping away.

  They struggled with Deborah into the night. The only reason she hadn’t died immediately was because she had slit her wrists cross-wise and not vertically. Christopher was able to stitch the wounds up tightly, lessening the bleeding and promoting coagulation. Dustin sat, wrapped in a coverlet, watching as they strapped her arms up to the bedposts to keep them elevated and to further prevent her from doing any more damage to herself. From that point on, it was a waiting game. If she had lost too much blood, she would die. But there was all the possibility in the world that she would survive, yet no one seemed particularly optimistic, and Dustin was greatly disturbed.

  It was close to dawn and Dustin had eventually fallen into an exhausted sleep in Deborah’s overstuffed chair, wrapped like a cocoon in the feathered blanket. The knights had retreated, save David and Leeton, as Christopher stood vigilant watch at the foot of Deborah’s bed, his eyes never leaving her pasty face. He was damn angry at her for attempting to take her own life and the guilt he had been struggling with most of the night hung heavy about his shoulders. He could feel the weight. Perhaps Dustin had been right; perhaps he had been arrogant and cold. For a man of his ego, it was a bitter pill to swallow.

  The sun was barely peaking over the horizon when he turned from his post and looked at Gowen, still awake but looking an ugly shade of gray as he stared at his wife.

  “Go and sleep,” he said quietly. “I shall stay with her.”

  Gowen shook his head. “This is my place, sire. I shall not leave her.”

  Christopher did not argue, for he knew his reaction would have been the same. He turned to his brother.

  “See about the morning meal, if you would,” he said. “I am famished.”

  David nodded, glancing at Dustin as he passed her on his way to the door. Her face was half shoved into the blanket and he could hear her snoring softly.

  “She snores?” He looked at his brother, his face lit up with a tired smile. “You never told me that.”

  Christopher glanced at his wife. “Leave her alone. Go get my food.”

  David snickered as he quit the room.

  Christopher continued to stare at Dustin long after his brother was gone. She was curled up like Caesar, sleeping so peacefully that he was tempted just to leave her be. As tired as she was and in her condition, she should be in the comfort of her own bed, but he knew the moment he touched her that she would awaken. He left his post and wandered over to her, daring to touch the blond head tenderly before moving to the fire and stoking the embers.

  “I never thought I’d see Dustin married,” Gowen said dully.

  Christopher looked up from the hearth and saw his brother-in-law looking at him.

  “She was more boy than most boys, you know,” Gowen went on. “She could fight, run, and swim… anything. All of the boys in the village loved to be around her, and she thought it was because they accepted her as one of their own, when in fact it was because she was so beautiful that they simply wanted to gaze upon her.”

  “Yet no one was truthful with her,” Christopher said. “Even when she became of age?”

  Gowen smiled weakly. “And risk getting our nose broken? I think not. She could be your very best friend in the entire world, yet at the same time, your biggest fear.”

  “
Fear? Why?” Christopher stood up.

  “Because she is nearly perfect,” Gowen replied. “Isn’t that reason enough for fear? Dustin Barringdon was something above the rest of us mortals, my lord, somewhere in that mystic realm of fairy princesses and legends. She was not meant for any of us mere peasants to have.”

  Christopher gazed down at his wife’s head. “Yet, I have her.”

  “ ’Tis right you should have her,” Gowen insisted. “You are Richard’s warlord and deserving of such a woman. But, in faith, when I heard she had married, I laughed with pity for the fool who had been brave enough to marry her. Surely he had no idea what she-devil he had been saddled with.”

  Christopher’s cool demeanor cracked in the slightest and he grinned faintly. “And you thought not to warn me?”

  Gowen smirked smugly. “Some lessons in this life must be learned the hard way,” he said. “When I heard rumor that you were a favorite of Richard, I assumed your life had been an easy one and found fiendish delight with the thought of the unmanageable Dustin as your wife. But I see that I was wrong, for she obviously cares for you a great deal. You are all she could speak of while you were away.”

  Christopher stood behind the chair, looking down on Dustin as she slept. “We missed each other,” he said simply.

  “I know,” Gowen said softly, his eyes trailing to Deborah once again. His smile faded. “She looks like a prisoner tied to the bed like that.”

  Christopher looked to his sister. “ ’Tis necessary that we keep the blood away from the wounds to allow them to scab over.”

  “I realize that, but it looks so barbaric.” Gowen rose from his seat and went over to Deborah, his eyes trailing the length of her long, slim body. “I worry for the child.”

  “Dustin tells me the village has a midwife; I will send for her this day,” Christopher told him.

  Gowen raised an eyebrow. “That woman? She is more witch than midwife. She has fairly convinced Dustin that she bears the next emperor.”

  “Is that so?” Christopher glanced at his wife, not as confident about her health and the baby as he was just a moment prior. “A witch, you say?”