Lords of Conquest Boxed Set

by Patricia Ryan

  Thorne nodded, and responded to the steward in English. Martine saw a flicker of wonder in the old man’s eyes, and most of the others exchanged looks. Surely someone had told them their new master was a Saxon, yet his use of their native tongue seemed to shock them. Doubtless they’d never thought to hear a man of his rank speak it.

  The amiable exchange between the two men seemed to relax the others. When Thorne smiled and clapped Burgess on the back, they all broke into relieved grins and beckoned for their lord and lady to follow them into the keep and up the wide staircase in the forebuilding. Thorne took Martine’s arm in his and, apparently sensing her tension, patted it comfortingly.

  He’d been increasingly affectionate of late, not in any overt way—he hadn’t tried to make love to her—but in small, almost tender ways, and only when they were alone. In truth, she craved these little gestures, savored them, even while it shamed her that he still had the power to disarm her this way.

  She couldn’t help but wonder why, after his initial disinterest following their wedding, he seemed so intent on renewing their intimacy, albeit gradually. Perhaps it was merely that he was a man, with a man’s appetites. Sometimes, late at night, as she lay in bed next to him, she sensed him watching her, felt his breath on her, felt his heat, his simmering need. Soon, she knew, he would tire of waiting. One of these nights, he would reach for her. By law, she couldn’t refuse him her body. She had to acquiesce, but she didn’t have to enjoy it. He liked to make her lose control, and three times he had succeeded. The memory of how she had writhed in his arms, had moaned and clutched at him in animal hunger, flooded her with shame. It would never happen again. Never. She would open her legs for him when he finally insisted, but she would feel no passion—nor would she feign it. He would know that she received him not because she wanted to, but because she had no choice.

  Or perhaps his gentle affections promoted some hidden scheme that she had yet to fathom. Whatever cause they served, she would do well to remember that they didn’t serve hers. She must close her heart to him. She must live for Martine, and only Martine.

  When they entered the great hall, she felt like a mouse in a cathedral. Devoid of the people and furnishings that had filled it during Eleanor’s stay, it seemed immense and hollow. Sunlight flooded the hall through the many large, arched windows, casting patches of gold onto the ornate Saracen carpets that still bedecked the walls.

  “I thought those were the queen’s carpets,” said Martine as she released Loki. “Why are they still here?” In French Burgess said, “Queen Eleanor left them here as a gift for the new Baron and Baroness of Blackburn, with her best wishes. Shall I leave them where they’re hung, or would you like them moved?”

  “Sweep the rushes up,” said Thorne, “and lay the carpets on the floor.”

  Martine turned to him, openmouthed. “On the floor? Are you mad?”

  Thorne smiled mischievously. “I’ve told you before—if I’m mad, so be it.”

  Her face grew warm at the memory of the two of them locked together on the mossy bank of River Blackburn. With a glance at Burgess, she said, “Really, Sir Th—”

  “It’s not ‘Sir Thorne’ anymore,” he corrected. “So just call me Th—”

  “‘My lord husband’ is correct, is it not?”

  He grimaced. “The carpets, my lady wife, will go on the floor. I grew quite fond of carpeted floors when I was in Spain and Portugal on my way to the Holy Land. We can get other hangings for the walls, if you’re concerned about drafts.”

  Frowning, Burgess said, “Do the rushes go on top of the carpets?”

  “There will be no rushes,” said Thorne patiently. “Just the carpets.”

  The older man hesitated, as if weighing his new master’s sanity, and then half bowed. “As you wish, my lord baron.” He withdrew a sheaf of parchment. “I keep the barony accounts from Michaelmas to Michaelmas. I am prepared to review them with you at your convenience.”

  “Thank you, Burgess, but for now I believe we’d prefer a tour of our new home.”

  “Of course, my lord. If you’ll but follow me...”

  Blackburn Castle, Martine soon discovered, was much larger and more complex than Harford, representing the latest in castle engineering. Running water was available on each level through a system of pipes that led from a cistern on the roof, and the architecture was wonderfully complex. Besides the great hall, the keep contained a dizzying network of large chambers connected by passages and stairwells. There was a two-story chapel in the forebuilding, with entrances both from the great hall and the huge master bedchamber off the balcony. It was actually more of a suite than a bedchamber, with three anterooms, one of which was tiled and contained a privy, a shallow trough with brass spigots and a drain, and a permanently affixed bathtub! Like almost every other chamber in the castle, it boasted its own fireplace and a heavy wooden door. There were many other bedchambers and storerooms, a lesser hall below the great hall, a guardroom, and various chambers for the servants’ use. Martine was in awe of it all. The fact that she could actually get lost in a castle of which she was mistress both thrilled and unnerved her.

  From the keep, Burgess led them on a survey of the grounds. The inner bailey had been walled off for gardens, which had never been planted. In the center of the outer bailey, surrounded by a cookhouse, granary, stable, kennels, and barracks, was a large and well-stocked fish pond. Crossing the outer drawbridge, Burgess pointed out St. Dunstan’s, nestled in the valley below, as well as the vineyards, orchards, and grazing pastures that immediately surrounded the castle.

  The manors and villages that comprised Lord Falconer’s fief were numerous and vast, he explained, and yielded massive revenues. Since Lord Anseau’s passing, he had continued without interruption to collect the taxes, fees, rents, and tolls that provided his lordship’s baronial income, an income that normally amounted to thousands of pounds annually.

  “Thousands?” Thorne asked.

  Burgess withdrew a sheet of parchment, held it toward the young baron, and pointed. “This is the sum I’ve amassed since Lord Anseau’s death, which I am prepared to turn over to you immediately. And this is the sum I expect the barony to have earned by the end of September.”

  Martine watched as Thorne calmly inspected the numbers. “This money will come in handy. There’s much work to be done on the castle and grounds.” He handed the parchment back to his steward. “That’s all for now, Burgess. Thank you.”

  Burgess recrossed the drawbridge, but when Martine made as if to follow, Thorne held her back. “Walk with me.”

  He took her hand and led her away from the castle and across a rolling pasture to a pear orchard planted in tidy rows. The orchard, like everything else at Blackburn, appeared to have been well tended despite the barony’s recent upheaval.

  “Are you very rich, then?” she asked as he guided her into the cool, green corridor between two rows of trees.

  “Nay.” He smiled and squeezed her hand. “We’re very rich.”

  She couldn’t help but return the smile. They strolled in silence down the shadowy lane, hand in hand, listening to the birds chatter in the trees, savoring the breeze that rattled the new spring leaves.

  Gradually Martine began to relax, to actually feel comfortable walking with him like this. ‘Tis as if we’re lovers, she thought. Or truly man and wife, not two people bound in a travesty of a marriage.

  He was clever, she realized, to have maneuvered her into this situation—alone with him in a dark and private place, her hand in his. Their companionable silence began to strike her as insidious. Wanting to end it, she said, “Must you speak English to the servants? I can’t understand a word of it.”

  He chuckled. “I can see I’m going to have to teach you the language of my fathers.”

  “Can’t you just speak French instead? It’s what everyone else speaks.”

  His features clouded momentarily. “It’s what the nobility speaks. For now.”

  “For now?”<
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  “The Normans persist in speaking it, but the people refuse to accept it. They’re poor, they’re landless, they’re downtrodden, but they’re wonderfully stubborn when it comes to their language. I think there’s every possibility that the ruling class of England will one day have to give in and start speaking English.”

  Martine laughed. “You’re m—” She bit off the rest, but it was too late.

  Grinning, he seized her by the shoulders and backed her against a tree trunk, wagging a finger at her in mock reprimand. “You’ll have to stop saying that—unless you want me to do this.” He cupped her face, tilting her head back.

  “Thorne—”

  Her objections were abruptly silenced when he closed his mouth over hers. She stood stiff and unresponsive, her hands at her sides, as his lips shaped their warmth and softness to her own. It was the first she’d felt his mouth on hers since the kiss of peace during the marriage sacraments. He kissed her with a firm but gentle pressure, as if he knew she was determined to resist him but had no choice in the matter. His tongue lightly traced the shape of her lips, which she kept pressed together.

  He drew back fractionally. “Give in to it, Martine,” he breathed unsteadily, his lips grazing hers. “Please—I need this. Just this. I’ll do nothing more.” He implored her with his translucent eyes as he moved his thumb to the edge of her mouth and forced its roughened tip between her lips.

  She gasped as her mouth parted, admitting a more impassioned assault. Thorne intensified the kiss, his hands wrapping around the back of her head to hold her still, his lips and tongue caressing hers with a kind of relentless ardor. Behind her she felt the hard, smooth wood of the tree trunk. In front, pressing her into that trunk, was the equally solid and unyielding form of her husband.

  The world around her receded into nothingness, and then she felt only his mouth, hot and insistent. At what point she began, with no conscious thought, to seek that heat, to need it, to instinctively return the kiss, she knew not. She only knew that, when it ended, she found her arms wrapped tightly around him, holding him close. In her chest she felt the frantic hammering of not one heart, but two... Over the roar in her ears, she heard not just her panting breaths, but his as well.

  He drew away slowly, and with a seemingly great reluctance, as if it took all of his strength to do so. She withdrew her arms from around him, feeling a pang of regret that the kiss was over, and that he’d managed to uphold his promise to do nothing more. Of course, it was the worst kind of idiocy to want more. She mustn’t hunger for his kisses, mustn’t long for him to raise her kirtle and lift her up against this tree and take her, right here in this orchard beneath the overhanging pear trees—yet she did.

  “Can we go back now?” she asked quietly.

  His gaze lowered to her mouth, his brow furrowing slightly. He paused, then reached out and delicately stroked first the top lip, and then the bottom; they felt swollen, and very tender to his callused touch.

  Nodding, he murmured “As you wish,” then took her hand in his once more and guided her slowly back through the darkness of the orchard toward the waiting sunshine.

  * * *

  “What think you, milady?” called the glazier from across the great hall, indicating the window that he had just finished working on. Martine stepped carefully through the mayhem that separated them, sidestepping the plasterers with their buckets and trowels, and the woodworkers with their stacks of wainscoting.

  “I think my husband is mad,” she murmured, reaching out to touch one of the tiny panes of bubbly, greenish glass. There were dozens of them set into lead, the whole shaped precisely to the dimensions of the tall, arched window. Thorne had ordered every window in the castle glazed; those in the chapel would be fitted with fragments of colored glass pieced together to form designs. It was a wonderment, a miracle. “Will this really keep out the cold in winter?”

  “Aye, milady. But ‘twill let in all the sun you want. And it opens”—he pulled a handle and demonstrated—”so that you can have fresh air on mild afternoons such as this.”

  During the month that they had been at Blackburn, winter had finally yielded to spring. From dawn till dusk, Martine planted gardens—herb gardens, kitchen gardens, even flower gardens—enlisting the aid of as many servants as could be spared from Thorne’s never-ending tasks. There were so many things that needed doing, and although labor was plentiful, supervisors were scarce.

  Peter, Guy, and Albin were in still France, fighting for Henry. Two days ago Thorne sent them a message via Eleanor, who was due to set sail this day for Normandy to rejoin the king, informing them of recent developments and requesting their service when they returned. However, if they were in the field, it could be months before they even received the message.

  And then there was Felda, whom Martine hadn’t seen since escaping from that dreadful cell beneath Harford Castle. She wanted Felda with her, as did Thorne. Yesterday he sent two armed villeins, large men with soldiering experience, to Harford with instructions to fetch her, as well as his precious Freya. They were to do it quietly, avoiding Bernard if possible. If forced to confront him, they were to be diplomatic, using their weapons only as a last resort. They weren’t back yet, but according to Thorne, it was too soon to worry, so she tried to put it out of her mind.

  She leaned out the window to breathe in the blessed warmth. On the far side of the inner bailey, beyond the gardens, stonecutters measured and marked blocks of granite for a hawk house; judging by the plans for it, it would be as large as a manor house, and more elaborate. Thorne said he wanted the birds to have enough room to fly around inside it.

  In the courtyard, Thorne stood with his back against an oak tree and his arms crossed, observing Burgess as he presided over a hallmoot. Twelve freemen listened in silence as a large man made his case, railing furiously in English.

  “What’s he saying?” Martine asked the glazier, a Saxon. Since few people at Blackburn spoke French, she’d had no choice but to put her mind to learning English, and in fact, she could already understand quite a bit if it was spoken clearly. But the man in the courtyard was sputtering and screaming, and she had no hope of following along.

  “He’s a miller, milady,” the glazier said. “He’s defending himself against charges of falsifying weights.” The miller finished his tirade, the jury voted, and Burgess rose and said something that made the miller bellow in protest. “They found him guilty, milady, and now he’s to pay a fine to his lordship.”

  Thorne said something, and the jury and onlookers cheered. Martine looked toward the glazier, who chuckled disbelievingly. “I do believe your husband is mad, milady, no disrespect intended. He says the miller’s got to pay the fine to the people he cheated, and if he cheats them again, he’ll lose his mill.”

  It struck Martine that, whatever his faults, she had married an extraordinary man. Just as she had that thought, the object of her contemplation looked up and smiled at her. Even at this distance, she could see the sky in his eyes, the dimples carved into his cheeks. He had regained the weight shed during his convalescence at St. Dunstan’s, and with it, the impression of strength and vigor that had always emanated from him. As lord of Blackburn, he was completely and perfectly in his element. He was a strong man, a man of honor and compassion... but also ruthless ambition. If he had to choose between her and his beloved Blackburn, she had no doubt whatsoever how he would choose.

  In truth, Martine loved Blackburn as much as he. For both of them, it was the first home they had known—the first real home of their own—since childhood. She felt more of a sense of belonging here than she had ever felt elsewhere, even at St. Teresa’s and St. Dunstan’s. Keeping her from complete contentment, of course, was her strained but studiously polite relationship with Thorne. If only she could cease this terrible longing she felt whenever she looked at him; if only she didn’t secretly crave his company, his touch. It would be better by far if she didn’t care at all about him. But to care like this, despite her better
judgment, to care so much she could scarcely think of anything else, was a constant irritating distraction.

  A movement in the distance caught her eye—two horsemen on the road leading to the castle. She squinted. “Oh, thank God,” she breathed, making out Thorne’s two villeins, one of whom had Felda riding pillion behind him. Behind the other was... She frowned. Clare? What was Estrude’s maid doing with them?

  She negotiated her way through the mayhem of the great hall and met the party as they dismounted near the courtyard. Thorne left the hallmoot to join them. He thanked and dismissed his men, took Freya’s basket from Felda, and greeted her, as did Martine, with a hug and a kiss.

  “Lady Clare,” Martine said, “why did you come here?”

  Tears spilled from Clare’s eyes, and she buried her face in her hands. “Oh, my lady! You have to help me! I had nowhere else to go!” She dropped to her knees. “I throw myself on your mercy!”

  Martine bent to put her arms around the sobbing girl and urge her to her feet. “My lady, what’s wrong?”

  Clare collapsed against Martine, burying her wet face in the crook of her neck. “Oh, I’m such a fool! I brought it on myself. It’s my fault. God forgive me!”

  Taking the hysterical young woman by the shoulders, Martine held her at arm’s length and demanded, “What happened, Clare? Tell me.”

  Clare’s tear-stained face twisted in anguish. “‘Twas... ‘twas Sir Bernard, m-my lady.”

  Martine and Thorne exchanged a look. Felda, her plump arms crossed over her chest, scowled at Clare.

  “All right,” Martine said quietly. “Tell me.”

  Clare’s little eyes slid toward Thorne, then she looked at the ground. “I... I’m too ashamed.”

  Thorne cleared his throat. “I’d best be seeing to Freya. Perhaps a brandy would soothe the lady’s nerves.”

  When they were settled at a table in the lesser hall and Clare was halfway through her second brandy, Martine again gently pressed her for an explanation.