Come to Me

by Tessa Fairfax

  Brother Baldric had moved to Brother Lefrid’s side to begin preparing the body. He was always the one to do so, since he was the abbey herbalist and skilled with simples and potions and balms. Brother Anselm remained at prayer on the floor while the single candle in the wall sconce flickered and swayed in the gloom.

  Her heart had sunk to her toes like a stone, anchoring her feet. Her gaze fastened on the austere crucifix hanging just over Brother Lefrid’s head. “I should have been here. Whilst I was making merry at the feast, Brother Lefrid was slipping away.”

  She hadn’t intended for anyone to hear, but the earl responded softly. “What could you have done, had you been here?”

  She drew in a shaky breath and let it out.

  “What could you have done?” he asked again. “He was beyond your teas and ointments.”

  “He saw me through my dark times. I could have seen him through his.”

  “He had God, had he not, beside him? Come, let us add our prayers for his soul and light a candle in the sanctuary.”

  “Very well,” she murmured and allowed him to escort her to the church, where they both knelt for a time. The bells began to toll. She was still praying her rosary when he rose from her side and left. He didn’t demand she go with him, so she finished a few moments later.

  When she found him waiting in the stable yard, he bided stoically, the reins of his mount in his hands.

  “I’m told the requiem Mass will be in four days’ time,” he said as she approached.

  She nodded.

  “I will escort you back for it.”

  “Thank you.”

  She felt subdued, emptied out, and the tolling of the death bell had squeezed her insides dry with every clang. Still, she couldn’t help noticing how kind FitzHenri had been. To find him waiting for her salved her raw places.

  “For now, we must return to the keep,” he pointed out, albeit gently.

  “Did you not say you wished to visit the village elders?”

  “There will be another day for that. Let’s get you home and fed.”

  “I’m not hungry, I assure you.” She couldn’t choke down a crust of bread if she tried. “And I’m not weary at all.”

  “All the same, let’s return.”

  For the first time that day she looked at him, really looked at him, and almost stumbled over her feet. How powerfully he stood there, so vibrant and healthy, in his sleeveless leather tunic and pine-colored leggings. He regarded her impassively.

  She swallowed hard. That tunic… Belted at a taut abdomen and open at the throat, it bared the biggest arms she’d ever seen, swollen with muscle and tinted bronze. The dark suede cuffs he wore at the wrists only served to emphasize the thickness of his limbs.

  Verily, her hands together could not span one of those forearms. She wanted to reach out and try as a surge of longing buffeted her.

  Her own urges confounded her. She didn’t even like men in that way!

  She hurried past him. “I forgot. I must see if Brother Odo has some calendula wash for the boil on Alaric’s toe. I’ve run out.” When she reentered the yard moments later, his lordship issued a sound that could have been the restless snort his horse would make. He turned to mount. She stuffed the flask of precious calendula tincture into the pouch at her girdle.

  It was then she spied the abbey’s little brown ass that stood awaiting her. He expected her to ride the poor beast?

  “But I’m too big for him!” she argued.

  A frown skipped across his brow. “’Tis a beast of burden. He is accustomed to his place.”

  This wasn’t the response she’d hoped for, though she wasn’t certain what would have been. Something more along the lines of, “You’re not too big at all,” at least.

  Why did he want her to ride separately this time? Just as well. The way her body reacted to him, she needed to stay as far away from him as possible.

  With a sigh she took up the animal’s rope lead and hefted herself up, wriggling into a dubious perch with both legs to one side. She flicked the rope against the animal’s nape. “Come along, Brother Aesop.”

  The creature grunted in objection but jerked into motion, bearing her sloppily past the earl.

  The lord’s big horse started walking behind her. Before long, the larger animal had overtaken the ass and was leading the way through the abbey’s northern gate, which opened to the monks’ fields. The death bell still clanged overhead, and though most of the brothers had already assembled in the sanctuary to pray Brother Lefrid’s soul into purgatory, a handful of them were yet strolling in from their toils. A few waved, and she waved back.

  The earl held his mount back so that she could catch up. “I am sorry about Brother Lefrid,” he said when she came abreast.

  She looked up, surprised. “’Tis kind of you to say so. Thank you. I’ve known him since I was a child.”

  They began riding side by side.

  “I know what ’tis like to lose someone close.”

  “I am sorry in return.”

  Now he spoke to the top of his horse’s head. “My first wife—”

  “Aye,” she cut in, not wishing him to speak of such disturbing matters. “We heard the sorrowful tale. You did not deserve such a fate, and neither did she.” Indeed, the poor girl had wed him when they were both very young, by arrangement of their fathers. She had cuckolded him, the story went. Cuckolded him, and later died by her own hand, about to birth a child. It was all such a melancholy, wretched tale.

  He glanced down at Bridget, his expression unreadable, then quickly away. “Nay, she did not.”

  Bridget sensed he’d revealed too much and was embarrassed. A warrior with a tender spot? For a wife who had shamed him so? What was she to say to that?

  After a time, he renewed their dialogue. “You say Lefrid saw you through dark times.”

  “I suffered the foolish travails of a child, ’tis all. While the other children played games and learned to sew pretty borders, Brother Lefrid taught me to read and cipher.”

  “You were not interested in playing games and learning to sew pretty borders?”

  “Nay.”

  “Strange child.”

  “Aye.”

  “And your father took no issue with this direction of yours?”

  Watching the line of trees ahead, she smiled. “Not when I learned so many things from which he could benefit. He sired no sons, as you know, and it behooved Shyleburgh to have one of the family skilled in certain things, such as tallying and herbs and such.”

  “So Brother Lefrid taught you reading and scribing. Abbot Giles taught you my language.”

  “Brother Baldric taught me what I know of honeybees and simples—”

  “Bees,” he interjected. “I loathe bees.”

  “Do you?”

  He cast her a serious expression. “Have you ever had a bee trapped inside your helmet whilst you were wearing it?”

  She laughed. “Nay, I have not.”

  “Well I have. ’Tis no pleasant thing.”

  “I can well imagine. This makes it all the more fortunate that my pot of bees didn’t shatter yesterday when you made me drop it.”

  His eyebrows shot upward. “You carried bees with you?”

  A helpless smile tugged at her to see his disconcerted reaction. With difficulty, she schooled her features. “Aye. Many of them.” She liked conversing with him in this manner. Perhaps she could be friends with him, after all. It would be nice to be on good terms with her brother-in-law.

  “Peculiar, indeed.”

  “Not so. Last St. Mark’s Eve something raided my hives, completely destroying one of them. The bees perished in the following cold snap. Brother Baldric and I wish to see if my bees take to his hives. In the event they lose their home again. ’Tis an experiment.”

  “How will you know if your bees take to Baldric’s hives?”

  “I marked them and will watch for them entering his hives later.”

  “You marked them.”r />
  “Aye, with a dab of red ink. So they stand out from Brother Baldric’s bees.”

  “The creatures allow this? Do you not fear being stung?”

  “Nay. The creatures don’t seek to annoy me. I’m used to working with them, so they leave me alone.”

  He fired her a sideways glance and offered up a hrumph of skepticism.

  “’Tis true!” she said, grinning. She couldn’t help it. The mix of disbelief and mock revulsion on his face was endearing. He was teasing her!

  At last, one corner of his mouth lifted in an answering smile. As he gazed into her eyes, a bubble of warmth swelled in her belly. She looked quickly away.

  “’Tis the season for culling the hives and harvesting, you know,” she said. “Brother Baldric will come and help us heft our hives, and when we are done, I will go to the abbey and help him. ’Twill be the first time Brother Lefrid is not here to join in.”

  “I am sorry for that,” he said.

  “He will be in heaven soon. His time in purgatory will be brief, I’ve no doubt.”

  In silence, they plunged into the darkness of the greenwood extending in a thin strip between the abbey fields and Dead Viking Fell. As the path was designed to be taken by foot, riding abreast was impossible. While the earl held Phoenix back to let her pass, he kept peering about them, squinting deep into the brush, his back rigid and his hand upon the hilt of his sword.

  Bridget’s pulse clamored in her throat. “Do you believe Black Hand has ventured here?”

  “Abbot Giles has word that his followers are on the move along the border.”

  She gasped. “To meet up with him?” she asked tremulously over her shoulder.

  “Aye. There is talk that the Thane of Mawdor is among them.”

  “The Scottish chieftain? Why would he concern himself with Black Hand?”

  “His lands border England at Sallee Beck. Each spring, he tries to take the opposite bank, but we successfully repel him. He would relish an ally this side of the border.”

  “So Black Hand collects wealthy supporters and greater numbers.” Her unease grew tenfold. “Do you think he would ever attempt to take Shyleburgh?”

  “He might, with Mawdor’s aid. Reggeland is in ruins, and they would seek a healthy stronghold to establish a base. We rounded up most of the mutineers he stood with at York last summer, but if the man thinks he has a claim here because he was promised to your sister, he might find enough Englishmen—”

  She drew Brother Aesop to a halt and twisted round. “My lord, Samson of Reggeland was betrothed to me.”

  His gaze flew to hers. “Was he?”

  “Aye,” she whispered quietly. How had he not known this? Not that it made any difference, of course.

  His expression held confusion…and something else she couldn’t decipher. “I was told he was pledged to a daughter of Shyleburgh. I assumed…”

  “Of course.”

  “But when…?”

  “When did I pledge myself to the church?” she supplied as he paused. “As soon as your king proclaimed all English lands his and all pacts between English nobles void.”

  A scurry in the underbrush startled them. FitzHenri turned sharply toward the sound, brandishing his sword.

  When a squirrel scampered out of the dead leaves, she sighed in relief.

  FitzHenri lowered the weapon. “Peel your ears, and be ready to duck into the nearest hollow should I tell you to. With none of your stubbornness about it,” he added.

  “None of my st—”

  “Just do as I say when I say it, ’tis all.”

  They started on once more.

  The idea of Black Hand or any of his allies lurking nearby forced shivers along her spine, but with the earl’s watchful presence behind her, the fears evaporated. She had one of England’s greatest warriors at her back. The brawny knight would be her protector, and that knowledge allowed her to relax—while secretly relishing the princess-like feel of it.

  Within the fragrant arms of nature, she inhaled deeply, and admired the crisp, dry smell of summer’s end. A towering stillness encompassed them, broken only by their mounts’ footfalls and the occasional skittering of creatures in the leaf litter, which drew her escort’s intense focus. Because the ass moved so slowly, huffing and snorting with his efforts, the horse was periodically forced to stop and wait impatiently for Aesop. One time Phoenix actually nudged the ass’s rump with his nose.

  Perhaps it was the natural intimacy of such an environment that made her unable to contain the question beating at her insides. Perhaps it was the new camaraderie she and FitzHenri shared. Or perhaps the monotony of riding the little ass had lulled her into reverie and the sense that he wouldn’t actually hear her. Whatever the reason, she found herself suddenly asking, “What did you mean by kissing me, my lord?”

  He was behind her so she couldn’t see him, but she knew by his silence that he stilled.

  She turned her head and observed him from the corner of her eye. “Yesterday at the abbey?”

  “What do you think I meant by it?” he questioned her in return, the words curt and unkindly spoken.

  “I don’t know. What prompted you?”

  “Surely, you know why a man kisses a woman.”

  She faced forward abruptly. “Nay, I do not know. Leastwise, not why you would kiss me. Was it too early in the day for reasoning? Mayhap you were half asleep and taken by surprise to see a woman there. Or that you were inebriated from the night before. It was dark, and perhaps you thought me an easy conquest.” And then she told him what she really wanted to say. “Whyever you did it, it was wrong. You were on your way to meet your bride.”

  Behind her, his voice came as a wolfhound’s growl. “What do you seek from me? An apology for such a minor happenstance? Because I have already forgotten it.”

  She bit back a sound of dismay. His comment should have pleased her. He’d meant nothing by the kiss. Yet, the words had a different effect in her soul. Tears beat at her eyelids. Naturally, as a woman, she was easily forgotten. Alas, why could she not do as much herself with him?

  Because, as a man, Grégoire FitzHenri was all too memorable. She’d thought about his kiss at least once an hour since it happened.

  Her throat tightened painfully. Her own weakness roused her choler. Between clenched teeth, she said, “Aye. I seek an apology.”

  He growled again, louder this time. “You have it then. My apologies, lady.”

  “I accept your apology.” Though her insides kicked and screamed against the notion.

  “We are in accord, then.”

  “Aye.”

  Nay. They were not. She was not so forgettable!

  The silence that ensued was awkward and unpleasant. His apology meant he acknowledged the event had happened, and he knew how she disdained him for it. That, at least, was something. The rest…well, that was her own demon to wrestle.

  If only the days to come and all the hours she’d be forced to spend in his company were over and done with. The very idea was distressing. She would make herself remember he had already discounted kissing her as if she were a serving wench passing in a tavern and he a drunken patron. The man was hard and unlikable.

  She wanted to believe that with all her heart.

  Chapter Twelve

  The next morn, Bridget broke her fast with her family. The earl had eaten with his men before dawn, which she knew because she’d heard him talking with them as they ambled past the chapel where she was whispering her lauds prayers. Despite yesterday morn, it appeared he was an early riser like herself. However, she doubted he said his daily prayers.

  Just as she finished her goat’s milk and eggy bread, his squire approached the dais and addressed her with a bow. “Lady Brigitte, my lord summons you to his chambers.”

  Her pulse leaped. She told herself it was merely surprise, not excitement. Verily, he’d been kind to her the day before—except for that bit of conversation on the way home—and kinder still, once they’d arrived
home too late for the evening meal. He’d taken her to the kitchen and rounded up scraps of cheese and bread for them to eat. She exchanged a glance with Aislinn, who shrugged a shoulder and resumed bickering with Karlan. Those two were like an old married couple, always arguing over their music.

  Refusing to feel eager about seeing FitzHenri, Bridget rose and followed Saunders up the great stairs.

  In the solar, his lordship awaited her. Embarrassed, she couldn’t even look him in the eyes. The night before, after their late supper in the kitchen, they had visited the keep soldiers, and she’d interpreted for him as he ordered the watch for the night. It may have been fantasy, but she could have sworn his bronzy-green gaze had lingered warmly on her as she suggested a couple of fitting men for his proposed training with the crossbow.

  No trace of warmth remained now, however. His behavior was perfunctory. Lordly, even. He showed her four coffers and a large trunk, all stowed haphazardly in a corner. They sat open, the contents piled high. Spoils of war, she assumed.

  “More is coming, I assure you,” he told her. “I trust you to find something here to make the lady happy. Bring whatever it is to me before the late meal.” With that, he strode to the door.

  She nodded in understanding. But inwardly, she shook her head. Men, and what they considered valuable or desirable.

  As he left, she could only sigh. Typical male, not to have thought of such a fundamental aspect of wooing. And now that he was aware, he couldn’t be bothered to participate in the selection. At least he found her trustworthy with his hoard. She hated to think what he might have chosen if left to his own devices.

  With a sigh, she knelt and began to sift through the contents of the chests.

  There were mostly bronze and silver items—buckles, goblets, clasps, and the like—as well as leather gloves of all sizes, a few gold rings, a pair of fine men’s boots in a glossy black, implements for personal hygiene, and yards of cloth in various colors and textures. A gold silk and a delicate linen dyed to a dried-blood color truly were lovely, but not something her sister would appreciate so early in the relationship.