By Arrangement

by Madeline Hunter

  “Why?” she muttered, still floating in the sensual stupor that his hand created.

  “Why? For one thing you should visit and meet the people who live there,” he said, lifting his head to kiss her temple and brow. His hand still caressed her and she found it hard to pay attention to what he said. “For another, I am too old to make love behind trees and hedges.”

  Naming what they were doing intruded like a loud noise on a dream. The sounds of the races instantly thundered around her. His hand on her body suddenly felt scandalous. Burning with shame, she looked away.

  “This is wrong,” she said.

  “Nay. It is very right.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  His hand fell away from her breast, but still he held her.

  “Did your lover give you such pleasure?” he asked softly.

  She blushed deeper. She could not look at him.

  “I thought not.”

  “It was different,” she said accusingly. “We are in love. This is …is…” What? What was this horrible, wonderful thing?

  “Desire,” he said.

  So this was desire. No wonder the priests always preached against it. Desire seemed a very dangerous thing indeed.

  “Well, girl, if I had to have one without the other, I would choose this,” he said. “Desire can grow into something more, but if it isn't there at the beginning it never comes, and love dies without it.”

  He was lecturing her like a child again. She truly resented when he did that. “This is wrong,” she repeated firmly, pushing a little, putting some distance between their bodies. “You know it is. You are luring me. It isn't fair.”

  “Luring you? Why would I do that?”

  “Who knows why you do any of this? Why offer for me in the first place? Why pay the bride price?” She studied him. “Maybe you want to bed me so that when he comes, the betrothal cannot be annulled.”

  “It is a good idea. But that never occurred to me, because I know that he is not coming.”

  He had said that since the first night. Calmly, relentlessly he had repeated it. “You cannot know that,” she snapped. But there had been something in his voice this time that terrified her. As if he did know. Somehow.

  “He is not here, Christiana. He has had your message a long time now.”

  “Perhaps not. Maybe the messenger couldn't find him.”

  “I have spoken with the messenger whom you hired. He delivered the letter into the hands of the man to whom you sent it ten days after you wrote it.”

  “You spoke … you interfered in this? How dare you!”

  “It is well that I did. Your messenger had no intention of leaving at once for your mission. He planned to wait until other business took him north. It could have been weeks. Even then he might have handed it off to any number of other people along the way and spared himself the trip.”

  “But he went at once for you? And delivered it directly?”

  “I paid him a lot of money to do so. And to offer to bring a letter back.”

  She had been given no return letter. A frightening sadness tried to overwhelm her. She didn't want to hear what David was saying, didn't want to consider the implications. The messenger had been back for a while. If he could return in this time, so could Stephen. He could have at least sent a note. But perhaps the messenger had admitted doing her betrothed's bidding and Stephen did not want to risk it.

  Fortunately her anger at David defeated her forebodings, or she might have been undone right there. She glared up at him. “Do you enjoy this? Destroying people's lives?”

  He gave her a very hard look, but it quickly softened. His hand left her side and stroked her face. “In truth, it will pain me to see you hurt.”

  “Then help me,” she cried impulsively. “Set me free and help me to go to him.”

  He looked at her in that way that made her feel transparent. “Nay. Because he does not want you enough to hold on to you, girl, and I find that I do.”

  For an instant, while he looked at her, she had thought that she saw wavering, that he might actually do what she asked. His words crushed the small hope. Petulantly she shook off his arms and moved away. “I want to go back to Westminster now.”

  Wordlessly he led her back to the vendors and over to a woman selling little bits of lace. He spoke a few words to the woman, and then turned to her. “This is Goodwife Mary. Stay with her while I go and find Andrew and Lady Joan. Do not move from here,” he ordered before walking away into the crowd.

  She got the impression that he wanted to get away from her, and she was glad that he was gone, too. He gave her commands the way that Morvan did, and she resented it. We will ride north. We will buy a horse. Stand here and do not move. She was glad that they would not be marrying. Living with him would be like having her brother around all of the time, picking at her behavior. Lady Idonia could always be tricked and subverted. This man would be too shrewd for that.

  She was glad that he had left for another reason. She never had any peace with him nearby. She knew now that it had to do with what had just occurred beneath the tree. Something of that excitement, of that anticipation, was there between them even when they just rode down the Strand and talked. Merely thinking about those wonderful feelings could call up her tingling responses again.

  Desire, he had called it. She did not much like this desire. She did not like the invisible ties it wove between them. The excitement she had felt with Stephen seemed a thin and childish thing in comparison, and she didn't like that either.

  Stephen. He had not come yet, had not sent a letter back. …A horrible, vacant ache gripped her chest. She would not think about that, would not doubt him. She especially would not contemplate what it might imply about her and David de Abyndon.

  “There you are!” Joan came skipping toward her with Andrew.

  Christiana glanced at her friend. Joan looked flush-faced and beautiful. A piece of hay stuck out of her hair.

  “Aye, here I am. David has gone looking for you and ordered me to wait here like a child.” She eyed the hay and plucked it out. “Where have you been?”

  “Oh, everywhere,” Joan cried. “This is much more fun if Lady Idonia isn't with us.”

  “I can only imagine.” She held up the hay and raised her eyebrows. Andrew flushed and moved away.

  Joan shrugged. “There was a hay wagon beneath a tree and we climbed the tree and jumped in. It was a lot of fun.”

  “I thought that you were in love with Thomas Holland.”

  “I am. We just played.”

  “Joan! He is an apprentice!”

  “Oh, you are as bad as Idonia. We only kissed once.”

  “You kissed … for heaven's sake!”

  Joan's eyes narrowed. “It was only one kiss. It isn't as if I am going to marry him.”

  She said it lightly, but the warning was unmistakable. David had been an apprentice like Andrew, and Christiana was going to marry him. I love you, the voice and eyes said, but you are in no position to criticize me.

  A new, sad emotion surged. Joan pitied her. They all pitied her, didn't they? All of the desire and pleasure in the world could not balance that out, could it?

  David emerged from the crowd then. He silently collected them and led the way to the horses.

  “He looks angry,” Joan whispered. “What did you do?”

  It was more a matter of what she didn't do, Christiana suspected. Still, she found herself rather pleased that he was angry. Maybe because this was the first clear emotion that she had ever seen in him. It was the first time that she knew what he was thinking.

  They retrieved the horses and headed toward Westminster. Joan and Andrew fell back and began talking again, but David tried to move at a fast pace. At first Christiana kept up with him, but then she simply slowed her horse and let him pull ahead. Shortly he slowed as well and rode beside her. She rather enjoyed making him do that.

  His silence became oppressive, and after noting with a sigh that he broode
d when angry just like Morvan, she stopped paying him any attention. She occupied herself with speculation about Stephen's home in Northumberland. The worry that David had given her about Stephen quickly disappeared as she found a variety of excuses for his delay in writing or coming back.

  “You are thinking about him again, aren't you?” His voice, hard and quiet, intruded on her.

  “What makes you say that?” she asked guiltily.

  “The look on your face, girl. It is written all over you.”

  She was very sure that her expression showed nothing when she thought about Stephen. In fact, she worked at it. But then, David always seemed to see and know more than she wanted him to.

  “You are a coward, Christiana,” he said quietly, but the angry edge was unmistakable. “It would seem that I am too real for you. You refuse to see the truth. Not just about your lover not coming and this marriage really happening, but about us.”

  “There is no reality to face about us.”

  “I want you and you want me. That is very real. But it doesn't rhyme with the song that you have composed, does it? You continue to live the lyrics that you wrote in ignorance about this man and yourself.”

  “I do not live according to some song.”

  “Of course you do. Duels and abductions are the stuff of songs, not life. Do lutes play when you think of the man who used you? Are your memories colored like the images on painted cloth and tapestries?”

  She looked away, trembling at these harsh words that spoke an understanding of her mind that no one should have. She suddenly felt helpless again against the fears those words raised in her. He was horrible to say that Stephen only used her. Cruel. She hated him.

  His voice sounded raw and angry when he spoke again. “I should send you to him and let you see how your song ends.”

  “Why don't you then?” she cried.

  He stopped both their horses. His hand came over and took her chin. She resisted its guiding turn.

  “Look at me,” he ordered.

  She deliberately turned away. His hand forced her head around to him. His blue eyes flashed with something dangerous.

  “Because he would use you again before he is honest with you. The past is one thing, but you belong to me now. I will let no one else have you so easily. Do not ever forget that.”

  She suddenly realized that his mood had to do with more than her refusing him. It involved something bigger. It was about her and him and Stephen.

  Was he jealous? Of Stephen? It was so unlike him to show his reactions, and this anger flamed hot and alive and visible. Was this emotion one that he was not accustomed to controlling?

  Anger unleashed something frightening in this man, and it made her especially unsettled that the fear itself seemed touched with that other tension that always seemed to exist between them.

  Westminster looked like a haven from a storm when they finally arrived. She hopped off her horse before anyone could help her and ran inside without so much as glancing back at David de Abyndon.

  CHAPTER 7

  CHRISTIANA LIFTED HER knees and rested her head on the edge of the large wooden tub. The warm water almost reached the top, and positioned like this, she could float a little in the soothing heat. A circular tent of linen enclosed the tub and held in the steam, creating a humid, sultry environment that loosened her tense muscles.

  The castle had been practically empty when she called for the servants to prepare this bath. A rumor spreading through Westminster that Morvan was to meet David on London Bridge had drawn the bored courtiers like flies to a savory. Idonia had stayed behind with her, but Isabele and Joan had attached themselves to a group including young Prince John and Thomas Holland.

  Not everyone approved of this duel. Some of the older knights considered it unchivalrous to challenge a mere merchant, but even they understood Morvan's anger. Since the duel was to be so public, everyone assumed that Morvan meant only to humiliate David, and that made it more acceptable, too. After all, these merchants often forgot their place. In overwhelming David, Morvan would be reminding all of London that wealth could never replace breeding and nobility when it really mattered.

  She closed her eyes and tried to get the knot in her stomach to untie. She prayed that David had delayed his return to London as she had advised. She had offered a number of such prayers during the last few days as this duel approached. She wouldn't want to see David harmed. He had become a friend of sorts, and she had rather grown to depend on his presence.

  She had been thinking about him a lot since that day at Smithfield. Sometimes she listened to the remembered quiet voice in the King's private corridor. The more she thought about it, the more it sounded like David who had been approached by Frans van Horlst that day. Other times her mind drifted to the two of them under the oak tree. Those memories were both compelling and disturbing, and tended to sneak up on her when she least expected them.

  Which would be worse? If David had returned from his journey, he would face her brother in front of hundreds of people and be made to look a fool. If he had not returned, the whole world would know him for a coward. Morvan and the court would probably prefer the latter. The lesson would be taught without a sword ever being raised.

  Her brother did this out of love for her and concern for the family's honor, but she really wished he had stayed out of things. He was only making a complicated situation worse, and he might well ruin her plans completely. Did Morvan think that the humiliation would make David withdraw? In all likelihood it would only make him more stubborn. He might even refuse to honor his promise to let her go with Stephen.

  Of course, Stephen wasn't here and the wedding was only twelve days away. She tried not to think about that, but it was becoming difficult. It was one thing to wait patiently and another to see the sun relentlessly set every day on your unfulfilled dreams. Lately she had found herself listening for horses whenever she went outside. Perhaps he planned some dramatic abduction soon. She imagined him riding down the river road with his boon companions in attendance, maybe on the day before the wedding itself. Would he wait that long? How would he get to her and get her out? There were always so many people about.

  She sat up abruptly.

  There were hardly any people about right now.

  Morvan had been nowhere to be found this morning as the rumor of his duel on London Bridge spread. Who had started those whispers? Morvan himself? Or someone else who wanted Westminster emptied of all but the essential guard?

  A heady excitement gripped her. Was Stephen coming for her today? If so, the plan was audacious and brilliant. She couldn't be sure, but it suddenly all made sense. If he had learned of the duel and its location from one of his friends here, he might well make use of it in this way. She hadn't realized that he was that clever.

  Smiling happily, she quickly washed herself. She felt the knot of hair piled high on her head and considered whether she had time to wash and dry it.

  Her arm froze at the sound of boot steps entering the wardrobe where the tub sat in front of a hearth.

  She couldn't believe it! Finally! She eagerly parted the drape to greet her love.

  Her gaze fell on beautiful leather boots and a starkly plain blue pourpoint. A sword hung from one belt and two daggers from another. Deep blue eyes regarded her, reading her thoughts like she was made of glass.

  “You were expecting someone else?” David asked. He undid the sword belt and placed the weapon on the top of one of the chests that lined that walls of the wardrobe.

  She let the drape fall closed and sank into the water.

  “Nay. I just wasn't expecting you,” she responded through the curtain of cloth.

  “I said that I would come. But perhaps you thought that I would be dead.”

  “Badly wounded at least, if you were fool enough to meet him. Why aren't you?” That didn't come out the way she had planned, and she grimaced. It sounded like she was annoyed that he was whole.

  “Edward stopped it as I knew he wo
uld. He is counting on that bride price, you see.”

  She heard him walk over to the wall by the door. He didn't leave.

  What if she was right and Stephen came now? He would find David here. Morvan may not have drawn blood, but Stephen just might.

  “You have to go, David.”

  “I think not.”

  “I must finish my bath. I will attend on you in the hall shortly.”

  “I will stay here. It is warm and very pleasant.”

  She splashed the water angrily.

  “You are giving him too much credit for drama and intelligence, my girl. Stephen Percy is not in London or Westminster. His is not coming today or any day for a long while.”

  She sank her shoulders down under the water. He knows what I am thinking. He knows Stephen's name. Is there anything that he doesn't know?

  “I sent the court to London Bridge, Christiana. I wanted no one to follow your brother to the place where we really met.”

  “Why? So that no one would see him best you?”

  “Nay. So if he forced me to kill him, I could lie to you and you would never know the truth of it.”

  The chamber became very still. It was absurd, of course. David could never hurt Morvan. When it came to skill at arms … and yet …

  Footsteps came over to the tub. The drape parted and he handed her a towel through the slit. “Enough of this for now. The water must be cooling. Get out and dry yourself.”

  She grabbed the towel and jerked the drape closed. She waited as he walked away.

  The water was indeed cooling and the steam had disappeared. It was getting chilly in the bath.

  “Call the servant, please. She is in the chamber.”

  “I sent her away.”

  She looked down at her nakedness. She listened to the silence of the empty castle. She thought of her clothes piled on a stool by the hearth. The bath was losing its warmth quickly, but the chill that shook her had nothing to do with the water.

  “Idonia should be returning soon, David. It will embarrass me if she finds you in here.”

  “Lady Idonia decided to take a ride with Sieg. A very long ride, I should think.”