The King's Favorite (Daughters of Avalon Book 1)

by Tanya Anne Crosby

  Malcom Scott.

  Not Malcom Ceann Ràs.

  If his peers ever knew him else wise it was only as the Mad Scot—a nickname he’d earned not through the angst-filled fury of his youth, but because he’d fearlessly embraced every challenge set before him by his king. And yet, until now, he’d never known what it was to be afraid because he’d never once feared for himself. This terrible new feeling deep in the pit of his gut—it was not for himself, but for Elspeth, and the further he rode, the harder he rode, the more he sensed the advent of something worse than the war Rhiannon had portended.

  Hie thee north.

  Call your banners.

  War is nigh.

  Was Matilda returning with a new army? Was Scotia bound to join the fight? Were the northern barons even now renouncing their oaths?

  If only Elspeth hadn’t spoken to him in the same fashion, he might have thought himself gone mad as a sack of ferrets. And now, if he believed all that he’d encountered with Rhiannon, he must also wonder how much of his thoughts Elspeth could glean as well.

  No matter, he told himself; whatever secrets should be known to her, that unsettling discovery took a low grade to the one he harbored deep in his gut: Somehow, this mistress of Stephen’s was far more than she appeared to be. Morwen was a danger to the realm.

  God’s truth, he had never believed in witches—or dewines, or druids or whatever name they should like to be called—but they appeared to be as real as the sweat on his brow.

  When finally he spotted Amdel’s turrets looming on the horizon, he felt a rush of relief—though not nearly the rush he would feel once he had Elspeth back in his keeping.

  Relieved to find that Beauchamp’s men did not hurry out in droves to place him in shackles, he rode straight into the lord’s bailey, half expecting to have to draw his sword from his scabbard. He swung his leg over Merry Bells, riding on one stirrup.

  When only a groomsman came to greet him, he ushered the lad away, commanding him to leave the horse where she stood because he intended to ride within the hour. The boy bolted away, but not to the stables; he ran quickly to the donjon as fast as his skinny legs could carry him.

  Cursing beneath his breath, he left Merry Bells drinking at the trough, loosely hobbled to a post, with the express purpose of going inside long enough to rouse Elspeth from her slumber. He was more than relieved to find her rushing out the door, tripping down the steps in her haste to greet him. She passed by the groomsman and Malcom bolted after her, overjoyed when she embraced him as vigorously as he did her. “Malcom! Oh, Malcom!”

  He swept her into his arms, holding her close.

  “You’re back!” she cried, and for the first time in his life, he was beside himself with glee to hold a woman—this woman. He allowed himself an instant to drink her in, to revel in the feel of her soft, warm body and her familiar scent.

  He splayed his fingers through her unbound hair, turning her face up to his scrutiny. The words, ‘I love you’ teased his tongue, parting his lips… alas, they were not words he’d ever said. “We’re leaving,” he told her, instead.

  “Now?”

  “Aye, now.” Far too aware of the need to be away, he released Elspeth from his embrace and took her firmly by the hand.

  “What’s wrong, Malcom?”

  Peering back at the donjon, Malcom pulled Elspeth toward Merry Bells, rueful that he would be putting his faithful horse back on the run. “I’ll explain when we’re away.”

  “Malcom! You are frightening me!”

  “I’ll explain everything when we’re gone,” he said again.

  She tried to free her hand from his. “My dress!” she protested. “It was a gift.”

  “There’s a coffer full of rich gowns at home that belonged to my grandmother. You may do with them what you will, and if they do not please you, I will buy you a hundred more.”

  Still, she struggled to free herself. “But your silver, your hauberk, your blade?”

  “I have plenty of silver,” Malcom reassured, refusing to release her. “My armorer will fashion me another. And it was an old dirk; I’ll get myself another.”

  “It was not an old dirk,” she argued. “Tis shiny and new and bears the sigil of your house!”

  “Our house,” he reminded her. “What is mine is also yours.”

  “Wait!” She gasped, sounding alarmed. “My Llanthony tunic, Malcom! We cannot leave it here, or he’ll know.”

  They reached Merry Bells and even before he lifted her up to put her on the horse, he untied Merry Bells from the post. Then he grasped Elspeth about the waist and set her atop his saddle, praying Merry Bells was up to the challenge.

  “’Tis like he already knows,” he told her. “You must trust me,” he demanded. “As I trusted you.” As he’d trusted her sister, though he wasn’t ready to say that yet, lest she wish to dally longer to hear more.

  She opened her mouth to speak, but said not another word, and Malcom mounted behind her, drawing up Merry Bell’s reins. “Hie, lass!” he called. “Hie!”

  Outside the chamber room where Elspeth slept, Alyss knocked gently.

  “M’lady?”

  There was no answer, so she pushed open the door, calling again for the lady of Aldergh. Only after she entered, she found the room empty—save for the scarlet dress that lay folded on one chair.

  Could she have gone to break her fast? But nay. Alyss had come straight from there, having gone to fetch Dominique a slice of bread to settle her belly. After all, that’s why she was here now: to explain to Elspeth that her mistress would see her later once the ill effects of their festive evening had passed. The bed was still mussed. The drapes were left open. She went to the window to pull them closed, but first peered down below, and saw that the Lord Aldergh had returned. Confused, she watched as he put Elspeth atop his black horse, then mounted behind her.

  Were they leaving? Now? With no good-bye? But how rude.

  Evidently, she hadn’t liked her gown—the one that Dominique had been saving for her own wedding and so graciously gifted it. Instead, she’d stolen the gown Dominique let her borrow.

  “Hmph!” she said and turned about, once again examining the room with the morning sun.

  Spotting a glint of silver at the foot of the bed, she bent to pick up the coin, and then spied the gleam of a blade under the bed. She stooped lower to find a pile of garments hidden there. Frowning, she reached under to pull out the pile, examining the garments one by one.

  On top lay a costly hauberk, probably worth more than Alyss’s entire dowry. The blade itself was expertly fashioned, and she recognized Lord Aldergh’s sigil. There were also a few more coins tucked into the folds of an old ruined sherte, but the tunic and breeches were a shock. The breeches were leather, like those a soldier might wear, and the tunic was done in coarse blanchet. It was nicely embroidered with the sigil of the Church, a red cross extending across the front, with four small, identical crosses beneath each arm of the crucifix.

  She screwed her face. Had Elspeth come from a nunnery? But why hadn’t she said so? Could it be that Lord Aldergh impregnated a nun? How very, very gauche!

  Somehow, she sensed William would be pleased to know these things—and perhaps he would reward her well? More than anything in this world, she craved her lord’s approval, and so often it seemed she displeased him. Taking the garments and folding them all neatly into a pile, she set the blade on top, but slipped the silver into the pocket of her skirt.

  Unfortunately, the pile was too heavy to bear whilst rising from her knees, so she stood up, then lifted up the hauberk, which must weigh no less than a full stone. She folded it neatly on the bed, then bent to pick up the remaining garments and placed them all on top of the hauberk, and then she lifted them all up together, heading toward the door with her arms laden.

  First, she would stop by her own chamber to hide the pieces of gold and silver, then she would take the garments to William. If later Elspeth should return for her belongings, sh
e would gladly return the silver, but if she gave them to William they would never be seen again. She knew her betrothed very well. Moving into the hall, she closed the door behind her, intending to return later to clean the room.

  They couldn’t have traveled more than a few miles when Elspeth turned to see if they were being followed. The sight that greeted her made her stomach plummet.

  A conspiracy of ravens flew from a smoke damaged tower at Amdel, a fluttering of wings so dense it looked like more smoke unfurling. Her breath caught as the mass swelled, lifting and diving in sync then separated after a macabre dance across the dusky morning sky.

  Swallowing, she turned to peer into Malcom’s taut-jawed face. “Malcom?” she said. “Whatever it is you need to say, I beg you tell me now.”

  Chapter 24

  By the look on his face, Elspeth didn’t need to hear him say so to know that her mother had swept into the priory in the middle of the night, taking Seren, Rose and Arwyn. What she wished she hadn’t foreseen was that she’d sent Rhiannon by tumbril to Blackwood.

  Obviously, they had been wrong about d’Lucy. He must have agreed to accept Rhiannon as a bride, but, if so, why the tumbril? Perhaps Morwen meant to make a point and humble Rhiannon in the process: that, for all the Goddess’ favor, Rhiannon was still subject to her mother’s whims.

  But if d’Lucy knew of this and approved, he was more of a monster than Elspeth ever supposed. She had abandoned her sister to this man!

  It didn’t matter that Rhiannon was more accomplished than she was; Elspeth was the eldest, and as the eldest, it was her duty to protect her sisters—a task she’d failed at, quite miserably.

  If there was any comfort to be found it was that Rhiannon had been very clear with Malcom: She was going precisely where she wished to go.

  And now, apparently, so was Elspeth, for Rhiannon had charged her “champion” with spiriting her north to Aldergh. And though Aldergh was also where Elspeth wished to go, she didn’t appreciate being used as a pawn in a game of Queen’s Chess.

  Nevertheless, none of this was Malcom’s fault. He was but answering a call from the Goddess, and perhaps after all was said and done, he would be equally as horrified as Elspeth.

  Only after they were far enough away from Amdel, with no sign of pursuit, did he finally slow their pace and produce the grimoire she and her sisters had begun putting together. Small as it was, Rhiannon must have found a way to hide it in on her person. And if Elspeth weren’t so appalled over the entirety of the situation, she might have laughed over the manner of Rhiannon’s delivery. It was just like her sister to be so theatrical—a small trait she and Morwen shared, along with her temper. Thankfully, that was all they had in common, and the world was a safer place for the disparity.

  I’ll put a turd in your teeth and turd in your bride’s teeth too! she’d screamed. But where in the name of the Goddess had Rhiannon ever learned to speak such blasphemy?

  Evidently, there was a lot Elspeth was beginning to realize she didn’t know about her sister—perhaps not all of it good.

  As for the book… there was little wonder no one suspected it. There weren’t many men who could read or write, and fewer women. But, of course, they would think it no more than a heap of filthy rags.

  And, it was dirty—stained with so much soil from their garden and all the tints and tinctures they’d created whilst crushing herbs. Malcom had hesitated to put it into his saddlebag after she was through with it, but Elspeth reminded him that he’d ridden halfway from Wales with the book nestled against his bare chest. He laughed, but it was rueful.

  Along the way, he slowly confessed everything: He told Elspeth about finding the empty hut where she’d lived with her sisters, scrubbed free of every trace of its occupants; the strange conversation he’d shared with Ersinius; the broken wheel on the tumbril; the unsettling conversation he’d had with Rhiannon—everything.

  And if he, too, seemed quiet thereafter, Elspeth well understood why: It was not every day a man was asked to believe the impossible.

  How she longed to explain everything she knew about the Craft, but she wouldn’t do so, unless he asked. It was not her custom to speak openly about such things—not when her whole life she’d been warned against it and her grandmamau had suffered deadly consequences.

  And aye—perhaps Morwen did betray their grandmother, but it was Elspeth who’d told the Scots king’s son about her grandmamau’s skills. At scarcely five years of age, she had boasted to that wicked little boy that her grandmamau would cast a spell on him if he didn’t stop teasing her, and the wretch had gone to tattle to his father, who then told the Bishop, who then approached Morwen for confirmation. For the price of Blackwood, Morwen then handed her mother over to the Church to be burned alive, swearing her own innocence and devotion to the Church.

  But Morwen was no Christian. She was a disciple of the Crone, the witch Goddess whose dabbling in the hud du had been the downfall of Avalon.

  Fortunately, her sister was right about this much: So long as Seren, Rose and Arwyn did not challenge Morwen, her mother would no more harm them than she would toss a pot of gold into the Endless Sea. They were but a means to whatever end she’d imagined, and Elspeth suspected Morwen meant to place them all strategically, as she did her gruesome little ravens, each daughter in the house of a lord she could manipulate to her will.

  Her mother was naught if not patient and she had been planning this ill-conceived scheme for some thirteen years or more—most likely from the day she’d beguiled their father.

  Poor, poor Henry.

  But he was not alone; there weren’t many men who could resist Morwen’s wiles, and those who could, had little chance against her sorcery—dark magik Elspeth had no knowledge of, and therefore little recourse against.

  They rode much of the afternoon in silence, and over the course of the following two days, they traveled by day, staying clear of the king’s roads, and sleeping by night on pallets, snuggling for warmth.

  Malcom didn’t try to kiss her again, and neither did Elspeth tempt him—even if she did long to see if she could feel again what she’d felt that night of their vows. But it bedeviled her to know that even ensorcelled, he hadn’t wished to bed her.

  Breeding, humph! She was not breeding, and quite likely she would never know the joys of children. Come one year and one day, Malcom would cast her away like that turd Rhiannon promised to cast between her teeth.

  In fact, some part of her worried that he knew, deep down, that whatever he felt for her, it wasn’t real, but the problem was… Elspeth was coming to love him, as surely as her bones ached from so many hours in the saddle.

  What was love, after all, but a higher form of magik born of faith, trust and affection?

  In retrospect, she realized Rhiannon must be right: Whatever care Robert had had for them was perfunctory—as it was with Matilda.

  For all that he’d rebuffed her, Malcom was the only man who’d ever truly supported her, in spite of their differences, and despite his fealty to Stephen—even despite the way she’d treated him on the day she’d first met him.

  All this time, he’d fed her, cared for her, worried for her, and he’d offered her the ultimate sacrifice of all… he’d wed her. He’d put his entire life on hold, trusting her when she’d claimed that her sisters were in trouble, and without any proof that he could see, he’d ridden to aid them.

  Once the spell faded, would he come to regret it?

  Don’t think about that, Elspeth.

  Don’t think about Rhiannon, or Seren, or Gwen or Arwyn.

  Put your best face forward, and do what you must.

  Of course, it was sage advice, but whence had it come?

  Is it you, Rhiannon?

  Silence.

  Rhiannon!

  With a shudder, she recalled the ravens that were released at Amdel. By now, they would have probably reached her mother. But she tried not to think about that either, lest she summon her mother’s hud du without int
ention.

  Only considering the grimoire in his saddlebag, Elspeth peered down at the white ribbon that slipped from her sleeve. Yesterday, she’d attempted to return his ring, but he’d bade her keep it, and remembering it now, she felt for the cold knob between her breast.

  What is mine is yours, he’d said—did he mean it?

  Regardless… until such time as he should cast her away, Elspeth swore she would make him a good, loyal wife. Somehow, she would repay him for all he had done for her.

  You are the lady of Aldergh, she told herself. Raise your chin high.

  But this was difficult to remember, hour after hour, mile after mile, as Merry Bells ambled ever northward.

  The closer they came to their destination the more anxious Elspeth became. Would they accept her as their lady? Would they come to look at her askance for all her beliefs and her kinship? Would they cross themselves in her presence—or gnash their teeth behind her back?

  Malcom’s brooding silence worried her more.

  Swallowing her questions, Elspeth watched as the countryside shifted from lowlands to midlands and then into the rugged uplands of the north. “How long before we arrive?” she dared ask when her backside grew numb.

  “Four, perhaps five days. I’m reluctant to push Merry Bells more than I have.”

  Her bottom ached, but, of course, it must be as it must be, Elspeth told herself. So long as she was with Malcom, she had no complaints over the pace, and she was far less concerned over the journey north than she was over the prospect of leaving her sisters so far behind.

  But Malcom’s persistent silence was killing her, because in that silence she imagined all the worst possibilities.