THE VEXING: A Medieval Romance (AGE OF FAITH Book 6)

by Tamara Leigh

  “Lady Beatrix is beautiful,” Beata whispered. “Forsooth—” She closed her mouth, having almost revealed it was Baron Wulfrith who had prepared her for the differences between his sister and The Vestal Widow.

  “Forsooth?” Elias drawled.

  She cleared her throat. “I understand she hardly resembles her older sister.”

  “I have not met Lady Gaenor, though she is soon to arrive with her husband and son, but I also understand the sisters are different in looks and disposition.” He leaned in. “This afternoon, I heard two chambermaids twittering over Sir Durand. One claimed that were she as blond, fine of face, and small of figure as Lady Beatrix, she too could catch his eye. And his heart.”

  In that moment, Beata feared she understood the reaction of the queen’s man when Eleanor had revealed Beata’s name, as well as the encounter with Baron Wulfrith when Durand had become visibly discomfited over talk of Lady Beatrix.

  Nay, I do not fear, she told herself. I have naught to lose. And Durand has naught to gain with a happily married woman.

  “I am thinking your tale might be worth stirring the pot,” Elias murmured. At her forced smile, he clicked his tongue again. “You will have to do better than that to fool me.”

  “What?” She opened her eyes wide.

  He rolled his. “If Sir Durand feels the same for you, methinks it possible you may shed the vestal and the widow.” At her gasp, he added, “Preferably not in that order.”

  She pressed her knuckles hard into his upper arm that, before the youth had fled France, had not been as muscled. “Ever the teller of imagined tales!”

  He frowned. “Just invite me to the wedding. As my father cannot object to me accepting an invitation from the Wulfriths, one from Conrad Fauvel’s widow ought to go down easily.”

  Knowing further protest would only goad him, she said, “You forget he does not approve of me.”

  “His loss.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “Mayhap Sir Durand’s gain.”

  “Do stop, Elias!”

  He raised his goblet and winked. “I shall require another pour, mayhap two, before the night is done.”

  At her frown, he said, “Sir Rowan and I are to entertain those of Stern. The children—young and old—demand it.”

  So they did, the most outspoken being Lady Annyn’s daughter, who might one day find herself as maligned as The Vestal Widow. But as a Wulfrith, perhaps she would be granted grace.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  She had watched wide-eyed, gasped, laughed, and clapped. Though she might have been too loud and generous with her encouragement, she had not felt as constrained as she had at court.

  At Stern, the presence of children loosened propriety’s laces, granting even men of the sword permission to enjoy themselves as if they were of an age it was acceptable to appreciate the sweet things in life.

  For the sake of the children, they would surely excuse their behavior were they called to account. Just as likely, some of the blame would fall on the example set by The Vestal Widow.

  Fortunately, Lady Isobel delighted in her grandchildren’s response to the tales of Elias and Sir Rowan, as evidenced by smiles and soft laughter. Of added benefit, she seemed to have forgotten Durand. Of course, that was more easily accomplished since he hung so far back that the few times Beata searched him out, he could have no doubt he was the reason for the disruption of her attention. But each time their eyes met, he had given a semblance of a smile that seemed acceptance of her enthusiasm—perhaps even amusement.

  Though she normally stayed for a second round of tales, she was weary, and what better time to slip abovestairs than whilst Elias and Sir Rowan’s audience clamored over the refreshments?

  It seemed she was the only one of that mind. Though she had thought Lady Isobel and Lady Annyn, who walked well ahead of her, might also make for the stairs, they continued past toward the high table. But a moment later, the younger woman said something that made Lady Isobel pull her daughter-in-law into an alcove.

  “Gallant monk!” the hissed words halted Beata just short of her destination. “Oh, such fun Eleanor has with that, though well she knows—”

  “Do not do this to yourself,” Lady Annyn said, only her skirts visible where she faced Lady Isobel whose back was turned to Beata. “’Tis in the past where the Lord would have it be, just as you would remind me did I not let go of what ought not be held.”

  Do not listen, Beata counseled. But they spoke of her escort and of things that would account for the reason the lady looked ill upon Durand.

  A strident breath was drawn, and in a calmer voice that played Lady Isobel’s accent as if it were music, she said, “You are right. ’Tis just made all the worse with Garr’s delay and the feeling Everard knows something he will not tell. For what else would Abel have Sir Durand deliver a missive that could more easily have been carried by Sir Rowan? And what of Sir Durand’s injuries? Something is afoot, Annyn.”

  “I also worry, Mother. But for all, especially your grandchildren, we must carry on in the belief the Lord will return your son to us ere this babe blesses my straining seams.”

  A weight pressing on the soul Elias and Sir Rowan had lightened, Beata would have braced a hand to the wall were she near enough to do so.

  Lady Isobel sighed. “I just pray Sir Durand is well gone before Gaenor’s arrival.”

  “My lady, it is unlikely Gaenor will arrive ere the sennight. More, she and her husband have made their peace with him.”

  Peace. What so terrible had happened that Lady Isobel’s daughter and her husband needed to make peace with the queen’s man?

  “This I know, just as I know we are much in Sir Durand’s debt, but—”

  “It is only for the night, my lady. On the morrow, he departs to deliver his charge to Wiltford.”

  Silence, then, “Ah, that lady!”

  Now I am to be disparaged, Beata brooded. But such was the price of listening in on others. Turning toward the stairs, she caught movement across her shoulder.

  Durand remained just inside the corridor that led to the kitchens. A shoulder to the wall, one leg crossed over the other, his attention was on the girl before him—she who was named for Lady Isobel.

  Head tilting this way and that, one hand gesturing then the other, Issie Wulfrith might one day rival Elias in the telling of tales.

  “Dear Lord, what was the queen thinking to trust him alone with her?” Lady Isobel continued. “If she is vestal, the longer she keeps company with him, the less likely she will remain so.”

  It took Beata a long moment to make sense of that, there being no fit for the man with whom she had spent several nights without fear of being reduced to a mere widow. No fit for the one who had ended her kiss, receptive though he had seemed.

  “I do not believe that of Sir Durand,” Lady Annyn said. “He is changed.”

  Changed? Beata mulled and startled when the queen’s man looked to her and frowned. Not an expression of displeasure—rather, concern.

  “’Tis as he would have us believe,” Lady Isobel scorned, causing Beata to break eye contact with Durand and look around, “but to think changed one given to preying on young women—”

  “Cease!” The word sprang from Beata.

  Lady Isobel swung around, then she and her daughter-in-law stepped from the alcove. Eyes wide, they stared at her—as, doubtless, did others in the hall.

  Stir not the pot, Beata told herself. Do as Lady Isobel and conceal your blunder beneath laughter.

  She could have, but the lady looked past her and gasped, “Issie is with him!”

  “Mother!” Lady Annyn was the first to voice disapproval of what was implied.

  Beata was the second—and not as proper. “You are mistaken, Lady. Horribly mistaken! Why, it is unimaginable you raised honorable sons.”

  Boots across the rushes. The silence of voices no longer lit with merriment. Movement before and to the sides of her. Tears brightening Lady Isobel’s eyes.

  Dear Lord,
what have I wrought? Beata sent heavenward.

  “Lady Beata!”

  Did that voice belong to Durand coming behind her? Or Sir Everard approaching opposite? Both? Regardless, she was at the center of their wrath. And soon to be cornered. Though it was not the same as when men sought to press their attentions on her, the leaves stirred so much she felt them rise on the wind of her imagination and brush her fingers, throat, and cheeks.

  She looked from Lady Isobel to Lady Annyn who—was it possible?—regarded her with concern. “Forgive me,” she gasped and took a single step forward before arresting her flight.

  There were too many corners abovestairs. Certain she would soon find herself backed into one, she turned. Glimpsing Sir Everard advancing on one side, Durand the other, she snatched up her skirts and ran toward the doors that gave unto the inner bailey.

  It is dark there, protested the little girl within.

  It was. But this night no thunder. No lightning. No rain.

  Hearing Durand call to her, she pushed past the porter and opened the door herself.

  It was cold outside, but not as frigid as that shore across which death had scattered itself. Though she had been damp and weak following the shipwreck, for a long while she had weathered the elements without a mantle. This was naught, and she welcomed the brisk air gulped down as she descended the steps.

  Ignoring the sharp regard of those manning the inner bailey, she looked around and confirmed she was not followed.

  Where? she wondered as she passed beneath the portcullis into the outer bailey.

  Anywhere absent disapproving eyes. Anywhere without a corner. Anywhere.

  Stern’s guard pointed the way as Durand had known they would when Elias de Morville stepped in his path and insisted he be the one to bring Beata back. He had not insisted long, Durand surprising him as much as himself when he slammed a fist in the eye of one who was a knight only because the grateful Everard Wulfrith had bestowed the title. It would be days before the troubadour once more used that eye to wink at a lady.

  Before the stables, Durand halted and drew a calming breath before opening the door and stepping into the building that housed dozens of horses, their feed, and equipment.

  Lanterns burned at both ends, placed where their flames were in no danger of being tempted beyond their wicks. Though they provided little light, it was enough to see one’s way between the stalls.

  He glanced at the loft, dismissed it for the difficulty of ascending its ladder in skirts, and strode forward. Nearly all the stalls were occupied by destriers, palfreys, and workhorses, and those empty of beasts were also empty of the lady. As he neared the far wall, remembrance struck of what had happened there eight years past.

  Lady Annyn would have died had her husband not gone looking for his missing bride. With bestial wrath, Baron Wulfrith had laid down the miscreant who tried to hang his wife, and Sir Rowan had dealt the killing blow.

  That was during Durand’s early days of service at Stern, before Beatrix Wulfrith had reached an age to capture his heart. In later days—and years—she had entranced. But now…

  If only one good came of him pausing at Stern, it would be the discovery she no longer made him ache. Though his love for her had eased considerably when his acquaintance with Helene made him realize the Lord could not have created only one woman capable of claiming his affections, this day nearly all that remained of that love had blown away with Beatrix D’Arci’s kind greeting.

  The answer to prayer. The lifting of a great weight.

  Seeing the door of the farthest stall was open, Durand increased his stride.

  Beata was inside, but not tucked in a corner. She sat at the center of the stall where enough light shone to reveal she rested her chin on knees drawn to her chest.

  When he halted before her, she lifted her face, and he caught a sparkle amid the shadow he cast over her. Tears?

  “They would not let me out,” she said with more calm than when she had defended him to Lady Isobel.

  “Out?”

  “The drawbridge is raised for the night.”

  Of course the castle guard would not allow her to depart without escort—be it night or day. “You meant to leave?”

  “In a temper, I grow foolish, as can attest Lady Isobel, Lady Annyn, Sir Everard—” She gave a huff of laughter. “As can all who but wished a night of merriment. Blessedly, I soon come right once I have space and air aplenty to breathe.”

  Knowing it best they converse where they were visible enough to keep tongues from wagging more than already they did, he said, “Come,” and raised her to standing.

  When he released her, he saw the hair braided off her brow had worked free on both sides, causing dark tresses to curve about her cheeks and their ends to perch on her shoulders.

  “Certes, Sir Everard will wish the guard let me out,” she said. “And now you must be all the more eager to give me over to my father.”

  He ought to be, but—

  What? he silently demanded. She is trouble you do not need. Trouble you do not want. And likely soon to be another man’s trouble.

  “Are you not angry?”

  He was, though not as much as when he had found himself bound aboard her ship.

  Take her from here now, reason commanded, but he asked, “Why did you defend me over something you cannot speak to?”

  “You know what Lady Isobel suggested?”

  “I heard enough.” And even that little had been unnecessary. Though a good and godly woman, the Wulfriths’ mother could not forgive him.

  “If you heard, how can you question my defense? Surely better than many a woman, I can vouch for the high regard in which the queen holds you—tell ’tis not foolery that causes her to name you her gallant monk.”

  He longed for that to be the truth of him, not merely a truth amended, but he could not undo what he had done. Nor did he wish to explain Lady Isobel’s disdain. Revelation of his past would tear off the scab that grew smaller with his every triumph over sins of the flesh, causing this lady, who thought too well of him, to think ill of him. Too, his great failing could be of no consequence to her. Soon he would leave her behind, whether as a widow caring for her aged father or an heiress wed to the nobleman who proved most grateful for the king and queen’s generosity.

  “Aye, I can vouch for you,” Beata said, and when still he did not respond, took a step nearer. “I know not what misunderstanding caused Lady Isobel to speak as she did, but she is wrong.”

  Durand wanted her to believe the lie that she knew his character well, but he could not. “Lady Beata, even were we of better acquaintance, ’twould be impossible for you to vouch for my honor.”

  Silence, as if she doubted herself, then she said, “I can.”

  The light reaching across his shoulder revealing the dance of dust between their faces, he reminded himself of the importance of not delaying their return to the donjon. But her eyes were luminous…lips soft…voice honey…

  “I know you, Durand.” She slid a hand over his right arm and shoulder, then moved the other up his chest and set it on his bearded jaw.

  He could not move. Or was it he dared not lest he move in the wrong direction? The only thing of which he was certain was of being too aware of every place their bodies touched.

  “I know you,” she breathed and pushed her fingers into the hair at his nape and urged his head down.

  He did not set her back, but neither did he yield to a taste of her mouth. Feeling the absence of breath between them, he set his forehead against hers and a hand on her waist.

  “Durand,” she whispered.

  Heart beating faster, he explored the reach of her lower back, and when he curved his hand around her other side and gripped the soft place between ribs and hip, she arched toward him.

  “Beata,” he groaned.

  “At last, I am that to you.”

  It was as he had come to think of her. Why? More, why did he revel in the feel of one so different from the women t
o whom he was attracted? That question needed an answer before—

  Before what? he wondered. The only before with this woman is before you were given charge of her. The only after shall be remembrance of the trouble she caused.

  “This time, I would have you kiss me,” she said.

  Do not, Durand. You will only make this moment more regrettable.

  “Durand?”

  The Durand of now, who knew the folly of uncoupling mind from body, stepped back from the Durand of old, who moved his forehead off hers and touched his mouth to her nose…cheek…corner of her lips…

  Then he angled his head, pressed his mouth to hers, and coaxed the exquisite response that would grant him permission to proceed. When she sighed into him, he deepened the kiss. When she murmured encouragement, he gathered her nearer.

  These things he did that he should not. Things that could be the ruin of her.

  And the ruin of him—ashes from which he would not rise again.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Durand Marshal, Wulfen-trained and Wulfen-proud, had just begun to believe himself more redeemed than not—that should he fall again, it would not be far. Certainly not as far as he had fallen with the Wulfriths. Now this.

  Other than Beata’s hands straining where he gripped them between their chests to keep her fingers from convincing him this night was all that mattered, she was still.

  Cheek pressed between his neck and shoulder, it was she who rent the silence. “You stopped,” she said. Not with sorrow. Not with accusation. What?

  Telling himself it did not matter, he breathed deeply for the dozenth time since heeding the Durand of now who protested caresses and the undoing of hair so undone it caped the lady’s shoulders and back.

  “I did, and you ought to be glad, my lady.”

  She drew her head back. As the dust resumed its dance between them, she said in a voice so small it was difficult to believe she had caused all of Stern’s hall to seem a stage, “Unless you feel naught of what I do—and I am not so innocent to believe it—I am right about you. You are gallant. Though certainly no monk, you are enough in control that were I to wed again, as on that day no more could I be named a widow, only on that night could I no longer be named vestal.”