“The feast!”
“Ah, I see it slipped your mind. Well, then. I am glad I disturbed you. Your guests await their lord and lady. And some very special visitors have arrived to help in the celebration. You will not want to miss them.”
“I cannot believe I had forgotten. We will be down immediately.”
Eurice chuckled. “Aye, do not tarry.”
Turning back to her husband, Alayna’s look was contrite. “I had ordered a feast be prepared at your return, and then—”
“I heard,” he groaned in mock grouchiness. “I suppose I must go down to the hall and make merry, when all I wish to do is to continue celebrating as we have been.”
She smiled, seeing that he was not truly displeased. Picking up her rumpled gown from the floor, she saw the green silk, which would have been perfect for the occasion, was creased beyond use. Her maid would have quite a time setting the delicate fabric to rights. Alayna chose another, this one of deeper emerald, a perfect match to her eyes. She had no wish to call Leda, for it might drive Lucien away and she did not want to give him up just yet, so she shyly asked him to fasten her laces in the back.
His warm fingers brushed against her skin as he complied, a bit befuddled by the garment’s workings but doing quite well in the end.
“I prefer to remove your clothing, wife,” he rumbled in her ear when he was finished. “Somehow, it vexes me to perform this task for you.”
“How are you with a brush?” she asked innocently, holding out the ivory-handled instrument. He looked surprised, raising his hands up in front of himself in denial.
“Nay, no lady’s maid am I.” His chuckle sounded deep and clear, mingling with the higher sound of her own laughter.
She attended to the duty herself while he stepped behind the curtain and made good use of the cold water left in the basin. He dressed in fresh clothes, black, of course. Alayna noticed that though he did not favor the colorful finery of the nobility, he did always wear clothing of impeccable quality. He spurned the soft shoes fashionable for court, favoring boots. Every bit the warrior, she mused proudly.
“Ready?” he asked. Taking his arm, she smiled. She couldn’t help running a hand up and over his, appreciating the strength there. His eyes narrowed darkly at the caress.
“Take care, wife. We may never make it to the hall to feast with our companions.”
Her laugh rang out as they swept from the chamber. In the hall, they were met with a rowdy welcome, the mood high and joyous at Lucien’s recent victory.
Alayna received a great surprise when she spied Lady Mellyssand and Lord Hubert smiling warmly at her from a place of honor at the lord’s table. She rushed to her friends, embracing both enthusiastically. “Why did you not send word that you were returning to Gastonbury? I had no idea that you planned to come!”
Mellyssand cast a look over her shoulder to where Lucien stood, and whispered, “I had Hubert bring me back to see how you had fared with the baron. I see by your entrance just now that all has worked out to your satisfaction?”
Alayna colored a bit, but smiled. “Aye, ’tis considerably more agreeable to me than ’twas before.”
Mellyssand’s smile deepened. “Hubert has a great admiration for him. He said that he remembers his father, Lord Raoul, and told me that he was as remarkable as his son. His mother, Lady Isobol, was a renowned beauty.”
Immediately intrigued, Alayna said, “Lucien speaks highly of his father. I know he admired him a great deal. As for his mother…I believe he was not very fond of her.”
“Yes, well, Isobol is something of a mystery. No one knows what became of her.” Mellyssand’s eyes shifted. “Here comes your husband now.”
“Lady Mellyssand,” Lucien said formally, joining the women. Hubert stepped up to grasp Lucien’s arm in a warrior’s greeting.
“My lord baron,” Hubert rumbled as his wife dipped into a curtsy.
“Hubert, you look exceedingly well,” Lucien said.
“Well, I am not, sir,” the vassal grumped. “I was most displeased to learn of your recent campaign against Garrick of Thalsbury. I was disappointed to the extreme that I was not called upon to serve with you.”
Alayna held her breath at the challenge. But Lucien, surprisingly, did not anger.
“‘Twas simply not necessary, Hubert. Why disturb you from your recuperation when I still had my mercenaries? My resources were more than adequate.”
Agravar came up just then. “Aye, when he has me to rescue him time and again.” He punctuated his jest with a hearty slap on Lucien’s back, to which his friend rolled his eyes heavenward.
Hubert, however, seemed somewhat mollified. “Well,” he conceded, “then you must humor me with a detailed recounting of the battle. I will accept nothing less than every nuance of the battle, and I look forward to hearing how the late Lord Garrick received you.”
“Come, Alayna, let us join the ladies,” Mellyssand whispered, and the two women left the men to their tale.
The night was merry with the ebullient joy of the victorious. Alayna glowed under the gentle gaze of her husband and the good companionship of her friends.
They spoke of the future, and she was impressed by her husband’s ambition, his insight. He talked in his soft voice of his ideas for improvements, his plans for the castle and desire to clear more land to expand the peasant farming. She had known him to be an accomplished man of war, but the ideas that he was expressing now showed him to have an equal talent as protector and governor of the burh. Others joined in as proposed reforms were bandied about. Lucien solemnly listened to their ideas, weighing each one with careful consideration.
The hour was not very late when Lucien’s hand closed over hers and she glanced up to meet his warm gaze. “You look tired, my lady,” he murmured. She smiled, knowing she did not look a bit tired, but it was an excellent excuse to retire early.
“Aye, I am very,” she answered, breathless at how his eyes darkened so quickly to the languid look that could stop her heart.
They left more than a few knowing glances behind them as they slipped up the great stair. In the cloister of their chamber, they removed each other’s clothing and made love again, slowly, gently, savoring each touch, each moment, giving themselves over to passion until they found ecstatic release and, afterward, restful sleep.
A fortnight passed like something snatched out of one of Alayna’s girlhood dreams, filled with all of the love and passion and wild romanticism that she could have ever conjured up in her youthful imagination. Lucien remained attentive and kind by day and an amorous, nearly insatiable lover by night. What he felt for her, he never said. But she was content with all he gave.
Lucien, too, was content. He had Alyana, he had the friendship of Agravar, the loyalty of his villeins, and he was going to succeed in all his plans. He was, he realized with some surprise, perilously close to being happy. It was that elusive and most desirous of emotions that heralded the arousal of a long-supressed need.
His past would not rest until one final detail was resolved.
When he told Agravar his intention, the Viking tried to stop him. “Let it go,” he urged.
Later, when Lucien informed Alayna of his plans, she was silent, but he could read fear in her eyes.
“I shall return within a sennight.” His voice was stern. He didn’t mean it to be so. He saw her flinch.
Alayna nodded, her emerald eyes locked on him.
He left without another word. He could think of nothing to say to comfort her, for he was afraid as well.
Chapter Twenty-Three
It took four days for Lucien to reach Erstentine Abbey. The nunnery was an ugly structure, an austere heaping of gray stone into stark, sharp spires that reached up to pierce the gray sky of dusk. The huge studded doors resounded with a dull, hollow thud as Lucien’s fist struck the summons.
The small portal set at eye level was opened and he stated his purpose to the unseen answerer. He was duly admitted by a young nun who, despite her youth,
was as gray and sharp as the building that cloistered her. He waited uncomfortably in the empty hall as she went to deliver his message to his mother.
He had discovered her whereabouts not long after he had arrived in England. It was the most incongruous place for the lofty Isobol of Thalsbury. As to why she had chosen it, he could venture no guess. But he would have the answer to that mystery soon enough.
If she would not see him, he would simply force his way in, Lucien decided grimly.
The young nun returned and indicated a small room where he could await his mother. It was a square chamber, sparsely furnished and smelling of grease from the candles burning in profusion along the wall.
She kept him waiting a long time in that tiny, uncomfortable room. The ordeal did little to improve his mood.
He felt rather than heard her enter. Taking a deep breath, he turned to face her, his mother, for the first time in over eleven years.
She was older, definitely older. Her face was lined, her skin sagging just a bit with the telltale signs of age. But she was still beautiful. Her hair, a pale copper shade that had no match, peeked demurely from beneath the wimple that bound her head. The eyes were still a startling blue, beautiful but cold, like bits of ice. The proud nose, a feature of hers he had inherited along with her strong chin, was still well-defined. Her legendary beauty had fared well through the years, he decided. But she still had the same frigid, haughty look.
He felt a tightening in his chest. He stood rigid.
Waiting for a moment on the threshold, Isobol only looked at her son. He was ready for her, bestowing upon her his most aloof perusal. Nothing about his appearance indicated the enormous inner tumult he was feeling at that moment.
“Lucien.” It was a breath, a whisper. Tears sprang to her eyes and her full lips trembled. “My son.”
He did not move. He could have handled a scene of the most vicious nature, but he was unprepared for this emotionalism. He watched her warily. Thank goodness, she made no move to embrace him.
“So you have come to confront me at last. I have been awaiting you. I had thought you dead these last eleven years. When I received the news you had returned, I prayed you would come to me.”
“How have you been, Mother?” He was relieved to hear his voice sound so casually cool to his own ear.
“How do you think?” She smiled sadly.
“I would have no idea.”
Silence. She moved gracefully forward to sink into a chair.
“I hear also that you have married.”
Lucien stiffened, alert for any threat or innuendo against Alayna. “Aye,” he said simply. He watched her carefully through narrowed eyes.
“I heard she is lovely.”
“Who told you that?” he snapped.
“’Twas one of my servants. I still have some that are loyal to me. They brought me the news.”
Considering her a moment, he tried to decide if she were lying. “Did they also tell you I just returned from war? I killed Garrick of Thalsbury. He was Edgar’s man. Do you remember him? It was he who murdered Father.” Unbelievably she flinched. “But I suppose you knew that.”
He watched her as she rose slowly, as if laboring under an enormous burden. She went to the small window that was set high in the stone wall. He could only see her in profile, her beauty accentuated by the halo of daylight behind her. She said, “You will no doubt find it difficult to believe, but I did not conspire to have you and your father killed.”
Lucien felt his heart pounding in his chest, half-fearing the sound of it would echo in the tiny chamber, that she would hear it and know his weakness.
“Though ’twas the same as if I had slain him myself.” She turned her head, though still avoiding his eyes. “Raoul was a good man, an excellent man. He was a husband to be proud of, but I was not proud to be his wife. I was spoiled in my youth, conceited about my beauty and ambitious that it would fetch me an earl, perhaps even a prince. My father used to tell me stories of how my beauty would buy him a kingdom, and I was set aside from my sisters with special treatment. I was haughty and selfish. No one liked me, and I was terribly lonely. That only made me more spiteful. I told myself that everyone was jealous of me, my sisters and my own mother. It rotted my heart and turned them away from me even more.”
“Then why did you marry Father? He was no earl or prince,” Lucien asked, amazed at his own curiosity. He found that he needed to know, now that he had the opportunity to learn the answers to the questions that had burned inside him for years.
“My father’s hopes for a great marriage were dashed when he was unable to meet the dowry requirements for any marriage contract he deemed suitable. And any prospective grooms who were not interested in money were soon disillusioned by my shrewish ways. Until Raoul, your father. Despite my renowned beauty, he was the only man who ever asked for my hand.
“He had just inherited Thalsbury when we met. He was a spectacular man, and I admit even I admired him, though I thought him beneath me. I had been raised to be as a princess, you see, and now my father willingly gave me to a minor landholder. I think by that time, he was just glad to be rid of me.”
She turned to face him. Lucien looked back, outwardly calm, but his soul raged.
“I see it surprises you to see me talk so plainly. You do very well to hide it, but I am, after all, your mother. I see things that others do not.” She considered him a moment. “You favor me, I think. I never noticed before.”
“You never looked at me,” he said hoarsely.
She shook her head. “I did neglect you. I admit that, though it pains me to say it. I was proud of you, but you admired Raoul so, it made me feel rejected. You were my only child. If I could not have you all to myself, then I did not want you.”
“You hated me,” he said evenly.
Her eyes rounded. “Nay, Lucien, never that. I was mean-spirited, ’tis true. But I never hated you.”
Lucien’s hand came to his cheek in an involuntary gesture. He ran his fingers along the puckered flesh. He was unaware of the action until he saw the flare of her eyes.
“Aye, I see you remember that day. I used to look at your cheek after it happened, and even then, when I was so completely consumed with myself, even then, I would feel sick at what I had done.”
Lucien felt himself trembling, a great sadness welling up inside of him. It could not be true. She had been a vicious harridan, plain and simple. He had never, in all of his youth and manhood, considered that she was ever in possession of a conscience.
“I discarded that ring. Threw it out of the window into the river. Do you know why I struck you that day?”
She did not wait for an answer. To his utter amazement, Lucien saw tears coursing unchecked down her cheeks. He froze, his pulse thudding painfully in his temple. She could not be crying. It was impossible. He had never seen his mother cry.
“The time you came upon Edgar and myself when we were at Gastonbury was not the first time you stumbled upon our liaison. It had been going on for years. I was so vain! I thought it exciting, I thought perhaps I could divorce Raoul if Edgar would marry me. He was young and handsome, and more powerful than your father.
“That day I struck you, and my ring cut you, I had received a message from Edgar to meet me. I left it, stupidly, on my table. You found it. You were always bright, and even at nine, you were a precocious child. You were learning your letters well. You read some of Edgar’s message. I was enraged. I thought you would know what it meant.” She closed her eyes at the memory. “I panicked, and I was angry. I struck you, though I realized later you did not know what it was you had read. I struck you out of my own guilt, and I scarred you.”
“Not all of the scars are visible,” he said bitterly.
“Aye, and well I know it. Why do you think I came to reside with the sisters? I do penance for the terrible sin of pride and vanity, and for betraying the trust of a good husband. And for my failure to you, my son.”
“Failure,” he ras
ped harshly. “Is that what you call it? ‘Twas it not more like murder?”
“When you were sixteen and came upon us in the chamber, I was terrified that you would tell your father. But Edgar assured me no harm would come of it, and I believed him. I have thought of that so often all of these years. Had I but told Raoul myself, he would still be alive. And you…”
Isobol looked at her son with such a longing that he had to turn away.
“So, now, you see my guilt? I yearned for all that had been promised to me in my youth, then denied me. I felt myself wronged, abused, deprived. Yet, what I had was so much more. I had a fine, strong son and a husband who adored me. I could have had love, and learned love in return. But I threw it away for ruthless ambition.”
She was sobbing now, stretching out her hands to him in supplication. “I begged God to bring you to me. I can only hope that He will answer one more prayer, for I am pleading with you to forgive me. You are my only kin. Please, Lucien, forgive me. Then, perhaps one day I can forgive myself.”
Lucien stared at her. His hands fisted at his side and he had to fight the urge to strike her. He did not speak until he was sure his voice would not break.
“Some things cannot be forgiven,” he stated. “This tender scene does nothing to bring my father back to life, or to take away from me eleven years of hell. You wallow in your sin within these cold walls. Well, that is as it should be. Had you been stretched on the rack for all of this time, it still would not have done justice for the suffering you caused. Now you know the evil that you were. Good. That is very, very good.”
He brushed past her to the door, rushing out of the abbey to where Pelly waited with his destrier. He could hear the sound of his mother’s wails echoing off the cold stones.
Agravar must have left word to be roused the instant of Lucien’s arrival, for he was in the stables before Lucien had taken the saddle off his horse. The brooding warrior did not even acknowledge his friend when he felt the familiar presence at his side. He was in no mood for confidences.
The Maiden and the Warrior Page 21
