A King's Betrayal (23 page)

             
‘So wet and hot,’ he murmured as he kissed her throat.  ‘You smell delicious – like honey and flowers but no flower that I have ever plucked.’

             
His mouth was on hers as she murmured something but the words were lost as his tongue pushed inside, tasting her sweetness, meeting with hers.  She gasped, her body close to his as she matched him, straining towards him, her breath coming faster as the heat built between them.  He looked down at her, seeing the need in her eyes, a need that was echoing within him.

             
‘You are ready, my sweet water nymph?’

             
‘Yes,’ she whispered.  ‘I am ready, my Knight of the Raven.’

             
So she had noticed him that day.  Raoul smiled as he slid into her, thrusting gently at first, feeling her tightness and the silky warm of her sheath as he took her slowly, knowing that his size was sometimes too much for a woman who had not borne a child.  She gasped but raised herself to kiss his lips, her nails raking his shoulders as she silently begged him to continue.  Thrusting deep inside her, he heard her scream but knew it was pleasure that made her cry out.  He smiled and thrust harder, crying out himself as she brought her hips up to meet his and something inside him gave way.

             
It was as if he had been released from the shadows and grief that had lain heavy on him since Burgundy had told him of his father’s murder.  He had no thought now but to please and be pleased, to love with such intensity and joy that he was swept along to a pinnacle of rolling desire that made him shout out as his climax came and came and then he lay on her.  In a moment, he was rolling to his side, taking her with him, still joined, imprisoning her with his leg, as if he feared that she would escape him.

             
‘Who are you?’ he asked as he touched her face and wiped her tears.  ‘You are sweeter than the dew on the first rosebud of summer.’

             
‘I am called Beth,’ she said.  ‘You are the Knight of the Raven.  I saw your arms when you rode to the castle.’

             
‘My name is Raoul,’ he said and brushed her mouth with his thumb.  ‘You are the witch’s daughter.’

             
‘Marthe is dead.  She was not my mother.’

             
‘Then who are you?  Where do you truly belong?’

             
‘I do not know.’

             
‘A mystery,’ he said and smiled and held her closer.  He did not want to let her go yet, this water nymph, this girl who did not know where she came from.  Their loving had been such that he would need to rest before he had her again, but he knew that soon he would want her again.  He held her tighter, determined not to let her go, but a strange lassitude was creeping over him and his eyelids were heavy, as if the nights of too little sleep had suddenly overtaken him.  ‘Sweet lady of the woods…’

Beth lay beside him as he slept.  She liked the musk of his body scent and her hands moved over his strong back and shoulders.  His body was so beautiful – as fine and perfect as his noble face.  He was the fairest man she had ever seen, the more so when he wore no clothes and she could see his dark blond hair curling wetly into his nape, and the slender hips and long legs, the sprinkling of fine hair on chest and naval.  He did not have Sir William’s powerful build but he was very strong, his muscles hard beneath her touch.  She had seen scars, proof that he was the fierce warrior his emblem seemed to proclaim him.

             
She did not know how he had found his way to her pool.  It was her secret place and she had formed the habit of visiting it late at night because the nights were hot and she wanted to cool herself after the labours of her day.  He had startled her when he first entered the pool but somehow she had not feared him; it was as if this moment had been destined, as if she had been waiting for him all her life.

             
He had loved her, as Mistress Soames had told her a man would one day.  Where Sir William had forced and taken, this man had persuaded and given.  She had given willingly, finding the experience so delightful that she wished it might happen again.

             
Beth smiled as she realised her knight was sleeping soundly.  She moved slightly but his arm and legs imprisoned her and to escape him she would have to wake him from his sleep.  He looked so peaceful and she was warm and safe cradled within his embrace.  She had never slept in anyone’s arms, but nestling into his body she found that she liked the feeling and her eyes closed; she drifted away into a pleasant dream.

             
It was the warmth of the sun filtering through the canopy that woke her.  Beth opened her eyes and sat up, looking about her.  What was she doing here by the pool? As the memory came sweeping back, she felt both pleasure and anxiety.  She was lying on something soft – a cloak of velvet.  He had left her his cloak, wrapping part of it over her so that she would not turn cold.  Why?  Was it a sign that he would return?  Why had he not waited until she woke and told her that he must go – told her that he would return one day?

             
Beth stood up and looked for her clothes.  She kept the cloak wrapped round her as she retrieved them and then dressed hurriedly.  Her stomach was empty for she had not eaten since the middle of the previous day.  She must find food and fetch water from the spring.  For a moment she considered what to do with the cloak.  It was very fine.  If she left it here it might be found and stolen.  She would keep it for him, because surely he would return if only to retrieve his cloak.

             
As she hurried towards the hut, she was smiling.  If it had not been for the velvet cloak she might have thought she’d imagined the previous night.  The sweet loving between them seemed almost a dream, something precious to be remembered and kept in the backwaters of her mind.

             
Her knight had said such sweet things to her as he held her and loved her.  Mistress Soames had told her that one day she might find such a man – such a love.  Beth had thought it unlikely.  Who would love a woman like her?  Men lusted after her but they did not love her.  She thought that John Blacksmith and the priest had hated her.  Why should the Knight of the Raven be any different?

             
His name was Raoul.  She remembered now that he’d told her his name and asked her who she was and where she came from.  A smile touched her lips.  He had been gentle and tender but strong and powerful too.

             
Was this feeling inside her love?  She did not know but she knew that she was happier than she had been for a long time.  At the moment it did not matter if she saw her knight again.  She had experienced something special and sweet, a feeling she had never expected to know.  For the moment it was enough.

As he rode towards Winchester and the meeting with his friends, Raoul felt a faint regret that he had not waited to see her wake.  She was more beautiful than he had dreamed a woman could be, giving herself with such sweetness that his feelings of rage and hate had been washed away.  He was not sure why he had not waited.   Surely her life was hard in those woods.  She might have come with him had he asked. Yet he knew that the bitterness was still there inside him.  He needed to cleanse himself of sin before he could become whole again.  He would take Henry’s message to the Duke of Burgundy and then he would go on a pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady and pray to be forgiven for the evil he had done.

             
He forced his mind to the task in hand.  Duke Burgundy had been his father’s staunch friend and it was he that had heard the rumour that took Raoul flying home to discover that his father was dead – foully slain by his beautiful wife and the sly priest.  They had both deserved their deaths.  Raoul would seek forgiveness but he would not suffer nightmares again.

             
His sweet lady of the woods had healed him.  One day he would see her again and then perhaps he would ask her to be his mistress.  He would take her to his chateau in France and install her as its lady.  He must one day get himself an heir, but his wife could live in England, at his estates there and he would keep his lady of the woods in France to ease his heart and give him rest.

             
But he must think of the business in hand.  Raoul had no doubt that Henry V of England had made demands that the French could not accede to in order to have an excuse to make war.  He wanted to claim the heritage that he believed was his by right, and wars were useful to keep the unruly barons in place.  Left to themselves they might make trouble, and William de Burgh was not the only one who thought that Edmund Mortimer had more right to the throne than the son of the Lancastrian usurper.  It would not be surprising if there was already a plot to put the young man in Henry’s place.

             
Raoul had not yet decided where his loyalty lay.  It might depend on whether Burgundy was for Henry’s claims or his own.  De Burgh had suspected him of being in Burgundy’s camp.  Better that than he should know the truth.  Raoul had given service to the English King for one purpose these past months.  Now he was free to do as he pleased.

             
He might take an honoured place at the court of  Burgundy.  It was one of the richest and most splendid courts in Europe and he would be welcomed there – and yet something called him back to England, to the woods at the edge of Sir William’s estate.

Thirty Two

Beatrice was walking in the walled gardens at the back of the house.  The power of the sun was less fierce than it had been earlier in the summer.  Here and there roses still bloomed and the herb garden was thriving, throwing out a pungent scent that floated on the still air.

             
In the distance she could hear the cries of her sons as they played.  They were a boisterous pair, healthy and strong like their father.  Beatrice loved them but still her memories tugged and she could never quite forget that she might have been Richard’s queen.  Had things gone otherwise, he might have acknowledged her at the end and her daughter might have been England’s queen one day.

             
Suddenly, she saw her husband striding towards her through the courtyard.  There was something about him that made her heart quicken.  She went to meet him, searching his face.

             
‘You have news?’

             
‘Do not hope for too much, Beatrice.  I can scarce believe that after all this time we should hear something but the fellow swears it is true.  I asked why he had not come forward sooner but he insists that no one told him we searched for a child until I sent out messengers again.’

             
‘What did he say?’  Despite his warning, Beatrice’s heart was racing.  ‘Did he see her?  When – was it recently?’

             
‘No.  I warned you it is but a faint hope, my love.  He remembers that it was at the time when Owain was first on the move in Wales.  He saw a woman wearing the clothes of a pauper but she had with her a child dressed in silk…he says it was a green silk dress and that the girl’s hair was a reddish gold…’

             
Beatrice felt the blood drain from her face.  Her head was whirling and she could hardly breathe.  ‘Elspeth.  It must have been her, Tomas.  She isn’t dead.  She was stolen away.’

             
‘It is but a vague recollection,’ Tomas warned.  ‘So many years have passed that we cannot guess where she is now or even if she still lives.’

             
‘If those men did not murder her she lives.  I have always felt it inside and now I am certain.  She was so close to me the other night that I could almost touch her.  We must find her, Tomas.  We must!’

             
‘Yes, if she lives.  I promise that I shall never give up if there is a chance – but do not make too much of it yet.  She could be anywhere, though…’

             
‘What?  You know something more.’

             
‘The fellow who claims to have seen them says that the woman asked him if she was on the right road for Shrewsbury.  He believes that she meant to cross into England.’

             
‘Elspeth is in England?’  Beatrice’s eyes glowed.

             
‘She could have gone anywhere.’

             
‘You will find her,’ Beatrice said.  ‘I know you will.’

             
‘I shall strain every sinew to bring her back to you.  I swear it on my life.  I would give my life for hers…’

             
‘Do not speak of giving your life for hers, Tomas.  I want both of you – and my sons.’  She touched his hand as the boys came running.  ‘You have given me hope.  I shall be better now.  I shall be a good mother to my sons and a good wife to you.’

             
‘I can promise nothing.’

             
‘I ask for nothing but your willingness to try.’

             
‘That I can promise you.  If she lives I shall find her and bring her back to you.’

             
‘I know.’  Beatrice met his passionate gaze, holding her arms out to her sons as they rushed at her.  ‘I’ve always known.’  She bent and kissed the heads of her boys, gathering them to her in a hug.  ‘Just do your best, Tomas.  It is all I ask.’