Castles in the Air

by Christina Dodd

  Well, tonight he would finish the lessons he had begun, and she would forget all her masculine pretensions. She would stop looking to her lands for security and start looking to him.

  She picked up the reins and encouraged the horse to walk. “I can’t imagine what makes you think so. What did you wish to speak of?”

  “Bartonhale,” he said flatly.

  That got her attention. No more feigning she didn’t see him or hear him, no more polite little inquiries about his health: now she focussed on him like an archer on a target. “What about Bartonhale?”

  “It needs a new castellan.”

  Troubled, she said, “We’re sending—”

  “Sir Joseph. Exactly. Sending a disgruntled knight to a rich demesne with no supervision.”

  “I know.” She sighed. “But what can be done? There’s no one—”

  He interrupted her. “There’s Keir.”

  “Keir? He’s not one of my men!”

  “Nay, he’s one of mine. All of your men are now mine.”

  He saw her uneasiness fly under the tide of fury. “Then all of your men are now mine.”

  This was their wedding night. He should be soothing her fears, proving she could trust him, not infuriating her with his rightful claims. But the promise of her white-hot body didn’t allow for wisdom or logic, and he taunted her. “I will permit you to say so.”

  She stopped her horse, but he continued on, ignoring her with the languid ease of a courtier. She asked, “What gives you the right to treat me this way?”

  Without turning, he said, “The priest. The vows. The Church. The law. You’re mine now.”

  She galloped up behind him and pulled across his path. “What are you going to do with me now that you’ve got me?” she taunted back. “You, who have no family, no burdens? I come with lands you covet, true, but I also come with children and servants and villeins and all of them will want a piece of you. All of them will hold you accountable for the filling of their bellies, for their shelter and their safety, for their very happiness. What are you going to do with all those obligations, nobleman?”

  Her aim left him breathless with admiration. She put aside her own misery and targeted with unerring precision the subjects that troubled him—which placed her just where he wanted. “I am a nobleman, trained since my birth to handle the responsibilities of large estates. When I pledged myself in marriage, I pledged myself to your people and your children—and you.” He caught her reins in his hand. “If you don’t trust me to discharge my responsibilities, then I will have to teach you to trust me”—he allowed desire to heat his gaze, and she fumbled for control of her palfrey—“starting tonight.”

  He saw the moment reality overcame her rage. Her fingers trembled and her voice quavered. “Tonight? You mean you’ll come to me in anger?”

  “In anger?” With a rasp of laughter, he said, “’Tis not anger between us, my lady. I have secrets I would share with you, as you will share yours with me.”

  Her indrawn breath alerted him; he’d said something that worried her beyond the natural caution of a woman with her mate.

  “Your secrets…frighten me.”

  Peering into her stricken face, he wondered at her thoughts. The tender, new-shaven flesh of his chin would be pleasing for a woman. His body, his skills had pleased her. They’d proven that time and again. So why, when he asserted they would share the ultimate secret, why now did she cringe from him as if he were a beast?

  Anger and impatience rocked him. Hadn’t he done enough to win her trust? He said, “I’ve been patient with you. I’ve allowed you to keep your chaste bed. I’ve wooed you slowly. But it’s clear to me I’ve made a mistake. You mistake tolerance for weakness. My lady, it’s time to show you who will be the father of your sons.” He emphasized the plurality of the word, and pushed her palfrey forward. “Go to the keep now, and I’ll start your lessons.”

  Her hand slapped down on her mount’s neck, and the horse sprang forward. She knew a shortcut, if only he didn’t follow too closely.

  He didn’t. He sat watching her ride away.

  Anger was a safe substitute for despair, and throughout the wild ride along the narrow path she shouted her rage to the elements. How dare he act as if her lands were his to dispense? How dare he threaten her with himself, raising the unwanted specter of Sir Joseph’s warning?

  Abandoning her horse to the one stable hand, Juliana stormed away. She flung back the door to the keep, and it smacked the wall with a satisfying thud. Did Raymond think he could control her with his intimidation? She stomped on each stone leading to the great hall. She put her hand on the handle of the door, and it swung open with a force that pulled her with it. She stumbled in, not understanding until she saw him towering above her. “You dare?” she cried. “You chased me here?”

  Raymond gleamed with his triumph. “Nay, my lady, I led the way. Do you think that puny animal you ride could beat my horse?”

  “Of course not. Anything you do is better than anything I do.” She slid out of her cloak and flung it in a great, bat-wing swish across the empty room. “Of course you ride better than I.”

  “You little witch. You reproach me for the puny things I can do?”

  “What can’t you do? You take over my castle, charming my servants and my villeins until they don’t remember who their lady is. You bring in a strange youth and make him a squire. Do you think I don’t know that Layamon comes to you for his orders?”

  He reared back like a stallion affronted by a gentle mare. “Would you have me leave you to sink beneath the burden?”

  “Why can’t you just sit around on your rump like the other men? Why can’t you leave the running of my lands to me?”

  “It’s winter. Surely you don’t expect me to loaf until spring?”

  “That’s just what I expect. Why must you poke your nose where it’s not wanted? Why don’t you behave like other men?”

  Grabbing her shoulders, he lifted her to her toes, leaned down until they were nose to nose. “If I behaved like other men, my darling, you’d be letting out the waists of your dresses. You’d be thrashing beneath me, not moaning in your sleep when you dream of me.”

  “You conceited ass. You think I dream of you?”

  He smiled, but it was only a display of teeth. “Don’t you?”

  “Nay, I—” With horror, she realized he’d trapped her, for she couldn’t tell him of what she did dream.

  He brought her closer, crooning. “Don’t you? Don’t you dream of me?”

  His breath, scented with apple and spice, fanned her face. His eyes, green jewels of light, teased her. All along her body, contact brought heat of his body, produced heat in her own. “Raymond.” Her lips moved without a sound, but he heard, for he lifted her with an arm at her shoulders and one under her knees.

  Behind his head, she saw the beams of the ceiling whirl and rush aside, saw the casement as he entered the solar. He tossed her on the bed and feathers rushed up to envelop her. Struggling against the plush restraint, she heard him shut the new-hung door. Propped on her elbows, she watched as he discarded the surcoat and tunic. Opening his breeches, he paced toward her and she saw that the waiting was over.

  Enclosed in the room, once so large, now shrinking, she never thought of denial. She never thought of her lands or her secrets or his transformation. She never thought at all. Instinct, blind and trusting, cocooned her against fear as he climbed on the bed, pushed her cotte to her waist, settled himself between her already open legs. His hands on her bare skin sent a thrill through her. She’d have him at last.

  Without a hitch, he moved inside her. His groan shook the rafters. Her cry echoed without restraint. They’d waited so long, she ached. She moved against him, trying to ease the engorgement of her tissues; he kept her still with his hands on her hips.

  Savage, fiery, he thrust against her. Furious, she smacked his shoulder, wanting to respond with her own fire. He grunted beneath her attack, bent close against her
neck, nuzzled her. She dug her heels into the mattress, lifted herself to him, and in a simultaneous burst, they climaxed.

  Sinking down together, they panted like two of the king’s runners. He tried to lift himself off her; she pulled him back down.

  “I’ll crush you,” he protested without vehemence.

  “Nay.”

  “Should we remove our clothes?”

  “Aye.” She wasn’t quiescent as she should be. Her sensitive skin burned with an unquenched fire. Inside her, little trills of sensation rippled as her body tried to find more of the long-awaited sensations.

  Still encased in her, he detected it; noticed the heat of her skin and the restless movement of her legs. For the first time in six tense days, he chuckled. “For a woman who doesn’t want me, you’re proving insatiable.”

  “Shut up.”

  The silk of her leg rubbed up the back of his, soothing him as she abused him. “I’m only a man,” he said, but by slow stages, her fever transferred itself to him. He pushed her hat off her head, sought the lacing of her gown with his fingers.

  Watching him, her lashes shaded her eyes in unconscious coquetry.

  “I’ll love you only until I’m exhausted,” he warned.

  “That should prove satisfactory.”

  The way she said it made him feel invincible, and he half groaned, half laughed. This promised to be a long night.

  13

  Pickaxes thumped in an uneven rhythm, and the usual bustle in the bailey was absent. Raymond threw a genial arm around Keir as they watched the Twelfth Night revelers trail in, pale with the morning’s payment for last night’s sport. “Sad to watch, aren’t they?”

  “Even the stoutest clutch their stomachs when they drink too deep,” Keir said. He looked at Raymond from toe to head. “You, however, do not seem to suffer from this complaint.”

  Raymond puffed out his chest. “Married life agrees with me.”

  “Lady Juliana complied with your desire for consummation?”

  Remembering only the night filled with scarlet emotions and not the wild conflict preceding it, Raymond said in astonishment, “Aye, certainly she did.”

  “I had surmised,” Keir said delicately, “that the Lady Juliana had reservations about the final act.”

  Raymond felt too good to pay the observation any heed. “Perhaps at one time she did. But her objections were easily overcome.”

  “Easily?” Keir repeated the word, tasted the word, then shook his head. “Then why, even though you shared her bed, have you been like a badger in love with a porcupine these last weeks?”

  With a great burst of laughter, Raymond bellowed, “You jest.”

  As solemn as Raymond was jolly, Keir said, “I never jest.”

  “Juliana…” How to explain Juliana to Keir? She purred like a kitten when petted, never seeming to get enough of the caresses he lavished on her. Her astonishment at her own response expressed itself in little squeaks and moans, and once he’d distinctly heard the whisper, “To hell with Saint Wilfrid’s needle.”

  He’d laughed at that, reminding her they were wed and she was indeed a chaste woman. Her grip had tightened on him then, and the words had faded away. Aye, he’d cured her ills with the application of wedded bliss, and he looked forward to the next treatment with unbridled eagerness.

  Raymond couldn’t explain Juliana to Keir, he realized, and instead waved a dismissive hand. “Women are easily handled.”

  “Easily,” Keir repeated, expressing his reservations with one raised eyebrow.

  Raymond turned away from the gate and wandered toward the keep. “A woman’s needs are minor. Not like a man’s needs.”

  Keir kept pace with him. “I would hesitate to agree with such an assessment. A woman’s problems tend to be of an emotional nature. Women wish to be loved by their mates and by their families, to be respected in the community. When a man has what he considers to be problems, they are usually of a physical nature.”

  Impatient with such nonsense, Raymond demanded, “Such as?”

  Keir looked him right in the eye. “Such as which corner to piss in.”

  “You’re the porcupine, man. Are you trying to tell me something?”

  “Only that I believe your scheme for the disposition of Bartonhale Castle has caused strife between you and Lady Juliana.”

  “Nonsense!” Raymond clapped his hand on Keir’s shoulder. “Who better than you to take over the management of my second estate?”

  “No one better,” Keir said with a fine irony.

  “Juliana gladly gives up her responsibilities to me. If at first she seemed reluctant, ’twas because she didn’t know me.”

  But actually, they’d settled nothing last night. Their mating had been cataclysmic, but he wasn’t fool enough to think he’d diddled her brains away. In the broad light of day, she would wish to lift each and every one of her burdens again, and she would balk as he relieved her of them. “The woman,” he said to himself, “doesn’t know what’s good for her.”

  Keir shook Raymond. “Perhaps I should not have interrupted your orgy of self-congratulation, but I did wish you to realize the pitfalls of your new status. Still, you should never doubt you are good for Lady Juliana. She is like a wounded bird in your hand, sometimes frantic to escape, sometimes complying with your desire to help, and you should not yield to her entreaties to let her go. She cannot be healed except with your restraint.”

  “You’re a deep one, my friend, but—”

  The door of the keep slammed back and a frantic cry interrupted Raymond. “Fire. Fire!” Fayette dragged Ella and Margery out by the arm, and screamed again, “Fire!”

  Raymond broke into a run, Keir by his side. Catching the girls around their waists as they descended the ladder, Raymond asked, “What fire?”

  “In th’ kitchen,” Fayette said.

  “In the kitchen,” Raymond repeated.

  Above him on the landing, Denys cried, “Is Margery hurt?”

  “Get out of the way, lad,” Raymond commanded. “The girls are unharmed, but my Juliana—” He bounded up the steps.

  Before he could enter the keep, Papiol dashed out shrieking, “Fire! We are all going to burn. Fire!”

  Raymond shoved the quivering wreck of a castle builder aside and sprinted through the great hall and down the spiral staircase. Shrieks and shouted imprecations resonated against the stones, and he met two boys with buckets coming up. “Is it out?” he asked.

  “Aye, m’lord. ’Tis out, but ’tis merry hell down there.”

  Merry hell? What did the lad mean? As Raymond rounded the last corner, he stopped so abruptly Keir rammed into his back, knocking him down a few steps. Merry hell, indeed.

  Every servant who should have been above was below, waving his arms against the smoke so that the massive room looked filled with crazed windmills. Every one of them was talking, giving his version of the incident or lamenting the cleanup. His parents stood on overturned kettles, craning their heads to watch the madness. Sir Joseph leaned against the stone in the corner, watching the mania and laughing softly. Layamon strode back and forth, trying to herd the servants back up the stairs and succeeding only in moving them from side to side. The cook stood loudly weeping amid the soaked ruin of her kitchen, while Juliana, blackened with soot and wet from head to toe, stood patting the cook’s back and speaking into her ear.

  Raymond’s gaze settled on the evidence of the greatest damage. Juliana’s skirt had been burned to her knee. Her hand was wrapped in a white cloth, and pain pressed a hard line between her brows. “The kitchen must be moved to the bailey,” he muttered.

  “Raymond!”

  His mother’s screech made him close one eye against the misery of the shrill note.

  “Raymond, we were almost burned in our beds.” Isabel jumped off her kettle and flailed her way through the crowd.

  Geoffroi joined them, pressing so close Raymond backed up a few steps to gain the advantage of height. “A terrible tragedy, n
arrowly averted by my own quick thinking.”

  “Your father told everyone to come down and lie on the fire,” Isabel said gushingly. “And such a surge there was to obey.”

  Layamon waved from across the room and shouted, “’Twas not so bad. Only a bit of an escape from the pit, if you follow my meaning.”

  Geoffroi glared. “I told you softness to a woman would avail you nothing. A real man would—”

  “Get out!” Raymond bellowed. The noise abruptly died, and he jumped off the steps onto the wet floor. His foot went out from under him; he regained his balance and his fury seethed all the more. “Get out!”

  His finger swept the room. “Unless you have a reason to be here, get out.”

  The first rush of servants to the stairway was like the foam that tipped a wave. Behind the first rush came the force, pushing up and up, catching his protesting parents and dragging them in the midst of the swell. Sir Joseph was carried along, negotiating the currents with jabs of his ever-present stick. In an amazingly short time, the room stood empty, save Keir, Layamon, the cook, and Juliana. Raymond stood with his wet feet in the largest puddle and demanded, “What happened?”

  Layamon squatted beside the rock-built fire pit in the middle of the floor. The oven for baking bread swelled out from one side. The other side, a wall with a single thickness of stone, had crumbled away. Layamon pushed the rubble with his finger. “Was the fire too hot, woman?”

  The cook wailed, “Not more than any other time.”

  Keir squatted beside Layamon. He, too, stirred the rubble, then the charred remains of the wood. The acrid odor of wet charcoal rose, and he grasped the end of a log and pulled it out. “A large log.”

  “Sent down in a load an’ shoved in by me new kitchen boy. He don’t know much about fires, yet.” The woman mopped her face on her damp apron, leaving streaks of soot on the broad, fair face. “Still, I’ll always maintain it shouldn’t have popped th’ end out like that.”