Claire Delacroix (8 page)

Gaston flushed as he bowed low, a delighted smile at this praise threatening to ruin his attempt at a somber manner.

“Though you might lay hands on a tabard that looks less disreputable. The lady, no doubt, is accustomed to riding with a party appropriately garbed.”

Gaston looked to Gabrielle in alarm, as though he feared she had taken insult at the mere sight of him. Gabrielle could not help smiling in reassurance, and some of Gaston’s cocky manner was immediately restored.

Yet he bowed low to his knight. “Yes, my lord.”

Gabrielle was forced to admit that the knight was not unfair with the boy. Michel might well have seen Gaston whipped for his failure to fulfil all his tasks.

But Yves sought to win her approval, that much Gabrielle knew, if only to prove that he could have whatever he desired even if she chose to deny it to him.

And likely
only
because she chose to deny it to him. Gabrielle knew full well that a man like Yves de Sant-Roux would never pursue a plain woman like herself of his own volition.

That was what she had to remember.

“I should fetch the meal, my lord.”

Yves nodded dismissal and the boy scampered away, leaving knight and lady alone together. Methuselah eyed the knight with some of the suspicion Gabrielle was feeling. The steady beat of the rain on the roof, the distant sound of squires working and the swish of the horses’ tails filled the silence between them.

The shadows were such that Gabrielle could not see Yves’ expression clearly, and she disliked how much that troubled
her. She kneaded Methuselah’s heavy leather reins between her fingers and could not find a thing to say to this taciturn knight.

Gabrielle wondered whether his cheek still burned from her blow.

Her own lips felt swollen and she barely restrained herself from raising a finger to touch them anew. Gabrielle heard her pulse hammering in her ears and wished suddenly that Yves would seek out his own steed.

“We have only to await your staff, then,” he said finally. The practical words stood in such marked contrast to the turmoil of Gabrielle’s thoughts that she felt her cheeks flush scarlet.

“I have no staff,” she said with a proud lift of her chin. “There is only Chevalier Leon who accompanies me, and I am certain he is already somewhere within the stables. His squire will be with him.”

The knight folded his arms across his chest. “No maids?”

“Not a one.” Gabrielle shook her head, well aware of the unconventionality of her choice, and deliberately kept her voice haughty. “I have no need of such luxury, especially in these times.” She reached for her saddle, but the knight was quickly beside her.

Once again, she could smell the heady masculinity of his skin, and nervous butterflies took up residence in her belly as a result. Curse the man for the way he unsettled her!

“Is something amiss?” she asked as coldly as she could manage.

Yves stiffened immediately, his eyes narrowing as he glanced at her. He looked as though he might say something, but then shook his head and knotted his fingers together. Gabrielle saw now that he had already donned his leather gauntlets.

His glance flicked to hers and she caught her breath at the brightness of his amber gaze. “Might I have the honor of giving you a hand up?”

Oh, he had charm, that much was certain! Though Gabrielle’s heart lurched to find him so close, never mind to have his handsome features etched with concern apparently for her, it was time to end his attempts to charm her.

“No!” she retorted, more firmly than was certainly warranted under the circumstance. “No, you will not touch me again!”

His lips thinned briefly before his features were composed once more. “Perhaps you mistake my meaning,” he said with dangerous calm. “I merely offer you assistance to mount.”

Gabrielle snorted. “My point exactly, sir, though I doubt we have the same manner of mounting in mind.”

Yves straightened abruptly. “There is nothing inappropriate in my offer.”

“And I should say that there is!” Gabrielle snapped. “Indeed, I shall have your promise, sir, and have it this very morning, that you will never endeavor to lay a hand upon me again!”

“Not even for common courtesy?”

“Not for any reason whatsoever!”

The knight folded his arms across his chest and glared down at her. He was too close by far, but there was no room within the stall for Gabrielle to back away. “It is long indeed since a lady found me so offensive that she would not even let me aid her to mount her steed.”

Oh, he would not fool her with his pretty words! This touch would be but the first of many, and if she ceded in this, she had no doubt his sensory assault would be relentless.

“And it is long indeed since I met a man reputedly of honor who moved to break his vow on the same day as making it!” she declared. Her words clearly stung, for he inhaled so sharply that his nostrils nearly pinched shut.

And then the knight was perfectly composed once more. It was as though she had imagined his fleeting response, but that realization was an unnerving one. All the same, Gabrielle would not back down.

“What flight of womanly fancy is this? I have never broken a pledge!”

“That kiss last eve was no flight of fancy and neither was it welcome! You swore agreement to a match in name alone, and only a potential one.”

The knight glanced to either side, then he leaned closer and lowered his voice. “My lady, this is neither the place nor the time appropriate for this discussion.”

“Ha! I wager that you will
never
find the time or the place to discuss your breach of our agreement.”

“Breach?” Yves visibly ground his teeth, then continued with low urgency, his gaze boring into Gabrielle’s own. “I made no breach of our pledge—”

“No? That kiss was far beyond the terms.”

“That kiss,” Yves said through his teeth, “was for your benefit alone.”

Gabrielle nearly gasped aloud at his audacity. That he would put such a thought into words astonished her. “Well, you do have a lofty opinion of your allure, sir!”

“And I had thought you a woman of uncommonly clear wits!” the knight muttered in frustration. He shoved one hand through his hair and glanced down at her once more, irritation now blazing in his amber gaze.

“You remarked yourself on the need for confidentiality.” His tone had dropped to a low rumble that made something deep within Gabrielle quiver.

She would have rather died than give any sign of his effect upon her, though. “You take your idea of confidentiality rather far for my taste, sir!”

“My lady!” The knight audibly ground his teeth, then leaned even closer and spoke in a low murmur. “There are those within this keep who might suspect the count’s tale. Indeed, I heard whispers of as much last eve.”

Gabrielle could not tear her gaze away from the intensity of his own.

“The count, you may have noted, is convinced that I take
your offer because I am smitten with your charms.” Yves’ lips twisted, as though they shared a secret Gabrielle’s stomach plummeted to her toes with the certainty of what that secret must be.

“We both know that is not true. However, it seemed fitting to promote the tale,” he concluded.

But Gabrielle’s pride would not let the matter pass so readily. They might both know how completely ridiculous the count’s belief was, but it was beyond churlish for Yves to have stated the truth so flatly. So annoyed was she with his poor manners that it took her a moment to realize the import of what he said.

Then she glared at him. “You kissed me on purpose,” she hissed with incredulity. “You did that purely to fuel gossip.”

Yves nodded, evidently proud of what he had wrought. “It seemed best for you. We would not want speculation to travel beyond these walls.”

“Knave!” Gabrielle slapped the smile from the knight’s face for the second time in less than a day. “How
dare
you tarnish my reputation purely to serve your own ends? Have you any idea what people have said to me this morn? What manner of woman do you imagine they think me to be, taking a lover en route to becoming a bride of Christ?”

Gabrielle spat on the stable floor, and the knight took a step backward in obvious astonishment. “Take
that
for your favor! And spare me any further ones of its ilk!”

With that, she grasped the pommel and stuffed her foot into the stirrup. She hauled herself into Methuselah’s saddle by force of will alone. It certainly was not an easy task, but Gabrielle was angry enough to accomplish the deed.

She looked down at the knight to find his hands on his hips once more, his cheek blazing crimson from her blow. “You are not thinking reasonably about this,” he said with unexpected calm. “Gossip will inevitably come and go, but the greater good will be served by some speculation on our—”

“I do not care about your ideas of the greater good!” Gabrielle
raged. Methuselah pranced impatiently, the steed evidently responding to her mood. “My reputation is the one thing of merit I had left to call my own, and I will not stand by and watch you destroy it for your own ends!”

His frown deepened. “I mean no harm, my lady, but—”

“But you have done some, nonetheless!” Gabrielle was in the most fulsome rage of all her days, though she did not dare examine why this man earned such a measure of her anger.

Instead she jabbed a gloved finger in the direction of his chiseled nose. “I have spent my entire life being told how I might be useful to one man’s needs or another’s, and I am well and done with the role! I shall
not
dance to your tune, Chevalier, regardless of how sensible you might think it to be. There will be no such contact between you and me again. Do we understand each other?”

Yves’ lips thinned as he stared up at her, and Gabrielle’s pulse pounded like thunder in her ears.

What had she done? Oh, she had erred in granting her tongue such full rein—especially before a man she did not know well! What had possessed her to make her thoughts so clear to Yves de Sant-Roux?

But Yves merely donned his helmet with an impatient gesture. “We most certainly do, my lady,” he said savagely.

“Then let us depart.” Gabrielle touched her heels to Methuselah’s sides and the steed sprang away, anxious to be on the road after his days in the stable here.

But Gabrielle could not outrun her own unwilling response to the knight she had taken to her cause.

To Yves’ mind, it was not a good portent to have a trip—let alone a mission upon which they would each need the other—begin so poorly. The party rode in awkward silence and were drenched to the skin within a matter of moments from leaving the count’s abode. The gray weather was fitting, he concluded, for the lady certainly was in foul temper this morning.

Surely he could not have wrought such results with a single kiss? He had only intended to protect her from rumor spreading to Philip, to ensure the security of their mission, but Lady Gabrielle certainly had not shared his view.

Yves had not intended to insult Gabrielle, much less tarnish the reputation she so carefully guarded, but why could she not see that the greater good would be served in this? Any speculation would be forgotten within days, when some more titillating rumor captured the imagination of idle minds at court.

Gabrielle’s garb and manner were more earthy than those of most women, but in the end, her heart sang the same whimsical, emotional tune. Yves chastised himself for his foolishness in expecting her to be different.

He had been so convinced that she was a woman of good sense. He flicked a glance at her, but she rode with her chin high, those unexpectedly sturdy boots locked into her stirrups. An errant thought made him straighten abruptly.

Would Gabrielle’s response have been different if his birthright was legitimate? Was the kiss the root of her response, or was it his issue?

Yves scowled at the road. It had taken precious little time for Gabrielle to show that she was no less conscious of bloodlines than any other noblewoman.

Indeed, Gabrielle was apparently even more afflicted by his issue than others were! To think that his illegitimacy made him unworthy of even aiding her to mount her steed.

Now that was beyond unreasonable! In light of this, it was all too clear why she wanted a match in name alone—the lady could not bear the thought of a man who might be half-common touching her noble flesh!

Yves hunkered down beneath his cloak and glared at the road unfurling before them. And all this fuss launched by a simple kiss. His impulse had been a good one and he knew it well. And the kiss…well, Yves had found the kiss itself
rather pleasurable. He might not have been adverse to sharing another sometime.

But not now that the lady had shown her true colors.

And that was more disappointing than Yves thought it should have been.

T
hey rode in virtual silence for ten entire days.

On the morning of the eleventh, the small party plunged into a thick forest. Gabrielle led an unerring line through the trees, though no path could be readily discerned. At any given moment, Yves could not have easily determined precisely which way they had come. Yet she rode decisively, her carriage tall and proud, and his admiration for the lady he escorted grew even greater.

Surely it could be no more than admiration that compelled him to watch her so closely, to admire the tilt of her chin, the decisive glint in her eye, the firm grip of her slender, gloved hands upon the reins.

Surely it could be no more than that.

Deliberately, Yves turned and looked at the forest about them. These trees, vestiges of snow clinging to their branches despite the eruption of vibrant new leaves, made him deeply uneasy. It was all too easy to recall the fateful autumn day that he had ridden into a similar woods, indeed one not far south of here, and lost his only sister to a pack of hunting wolves.

It seemed the past, so long laid to rest, would not now let Yves be, and he spurred Merlin onward in uncharacteristic frustration. The silence of his companions only granted those
memories more time to unfurl within his mind. His emotions were unsettled, and Yves, as a man used to having his emotions conveniently locked away, was decidedly at odds with this state.

He slanted glances toward Lady Gabrielle, respecting despite himself the way she rode without complaint, and did so as long and as hard as he, Leon and the horses were able. There was no fussing from her—not over her hair, her toilette, the food or the accommodations.

Each night Gabrielle made do with what opportunity offered. Indeed, Yves knew many knights who could have learned much from her manner.

It was curious how quickly her one emotional outburst had come to the surface, then disappeared. Yves conceded wryly that bastardy must be an issue of particular import to her, and he felt his lips thin to a taut line.

Gabrielle wheeled her steed at that precise moment, giving Yves the eerie sense that she had heard his thoughts and did not approve. She halted her destner, her gaze colliding with Yves’ in challenge. He reined in Merlin, well aware of Leon’s assessing gaze upon him.

The place they halted was unremarkable, being indistinguishable from the forest they had already seen. A small clearing, it was carpeted in a thick blanket of pine needles, and a minute patch of sky was visible overhead. There was not even a place for the horses to take a drink.

It must be near midday, Yves decided, by the sun.

The lady watched Yves survey the place, evidently waiting for his gaze to settle upon her once more. A pale finger of sunlight fell upon her face, her hood having slid back slightly during the ride, and the pallor of her skin made her features look wrought of stone.

Certainly her expression was uncompromising. Yves was aware once more of being measured against some invisible standard and found lacking. That it was the circumstance of
his birth Gabrielle held against him was frustrating beyond all, for it was one thing that he could not change.

The lady eyed him as though she could read his very thoughts. Yves doffed his helmet and stared back at her, feeling his own expression become uncompromising beneath her steady stare.

“Why do we halt here?” he asked, when it was clear she would explain nothing of her own volition.

Gabrielle lifted her chin, though her gaze did not waver, and Yves knew he would not like whatever she intended to say. “You cannot progress farther without a blindfold.”

“What is this?” he demanded, hearing the steel of disapproval in his own tone. Such a breach of trust between the two of them was unfounded! This was beyond unreasonable!

“You must be blindfolded to continue,” Gabrielle repeated, without any inflection in her tone.

“Why?” The word cracked like a whip between them.

“I cannot risk having any witness the location of those troops loyal to my house.” Gabrielle’s lips thinned. “Surely you, who warned of listening ears, can understand the necessity of that?”

That the woman’s prejudice against his birthright should extend to not trusting in his word was appalling beyond all! Yves fought to keep rein on his suddenly explosive temper.

Never had he been so insulted!

Never had he been treated with such disrespect!

Regardless of his father’s games, Yves had earned his spurs honorably and by his own labor! The woman owed him the respect due to his accomplishment, especially as it had been made against such odds!

With an effort, Yves kept his tone level, though his words were terse. “But you have hired me to your cause.”

“And you were pledged first to the count’s hand,” Gabrielle countered with enviable ease. “How could I say what causes the count may have taken to his heart? You said yourself that the Lord de Tulley had already appealed for your aid
in this cause. How could I know what truly governs your hand?”

That she could cloak her opinion in logic was more infuriating than he might have thought possible. Despite the hammering of his pulse in his ears, Yves was determined to match her argument in kind.

“The count released me from his service,” he observed with forced calm.

Gabrielle shrugged with an indifference that made Yves long to give her a shake. His cheek chose that moment to heat in recollection of the blow she had dealt him and he gritted his teeth at the way this woman could make his blood boil.

“This I know by your claim alone,” she said mildly.

Again his guarantee was worthless in her estimation! “I grant to you my most solemn word of honor,” Yves said, spitting out each word with precision.

The lady was still unimpressed. “Which means naught without knowing to whom it has been granted first.” She snapped her fingers and gestured to Leon. “Have you a cloth to blindfold him?”

That was enough.

“This is outrageous!” Yves dismounted with a grace born of fury and closed the distance between them with quick strides. He glared up at Gabrielle.

“How
dare
you question my word and my honor simply because of the taint of my birthright?” His anger, given rein, could not be checked once the flow of words had begun. “I have earned my spurs by deed alone, and my word of honor is not something to be readily discarded!”

“Your birthright?” Gabrielle looked perplexed by his words, but Yves was not fooled by her feminine tricks.

“Play no games with me, my lady! I am not so witless that I cannot see your revulsion in being touched by a man of bastard birth!” Yves gestured angrily to her booted foot. “Why else would you refuse to let your noble foot be sullied
by my aiding you to mount your steed? Why else would you insist I never touch you, even in courtesy?”

He propped his hands on his hips. “Why else would you not even deign to speak to me, a man whose parentage might be half-common?”

“I am not certain—” Gabrielle began, but Yves did not let her finish whatever lie she was concocting.

“I have been shunned by many nobles, concerned for the propriety of their social relations, by virtue of my tainted pedigree,” he informed her, and was vaguely aware that the lady looked slightly dumbfounded, “but never, my lady,
never
has anyone treated me with such rudeness and disrespect as you have done on this day. Perhaps you might recall that you have hired me to your cause by virtue of the kind of warrior I am.”

Yves folded his arms across his chest stubbornly, all that needed to be said on the matter clearly expressed, to his mind. “I will
not
bow my head to be blindfolded simply to suit the whim of your illogical prejudice.”

His tirade having run its course, he glared up at Gabrielle.

She blinked, cleared her throat and glanced at Leon, before looking back to Yves.

“You were born out of wedlock?” she asked quietly.

Yves felt his lips thin. “Do not feign ignorance now!”

Gabrielle stiffened. “There is no need to feign ignorance, for I quite simply knew nothing of your birthright.”

What was this?

Yves stared at her in shock, but Gabrielle continued in the same relentlessly steady tone. There was something about the lady’s manner that, despite his conviction in his own conclusion, tempted him to believe she told no lie.

“Though I can understand how you interpreted my actions, I assure you that I would never have cast such aspersions upon your character even if I had known of your birthright.” Gabrielle met Yves’ gaze pointedly. “A man can scarcely control the circumstance of his own conception.”

Yves opened his mouth and shut it again, so unexpected was the lady’s concession. That it so admirably echoed his own opinion of the import of his bastardy was no consolation.

But he was not so readily convinced of her innocence in all of this. “Why, then, did you refuse my aid in the count’s stables? Why decline my assistance in such a simple matter?”

To Yves’ surprise, Gabrielle’s cheeks stained a light pink. She glanced nervously toward her knight Leon—who took to examining the foliage of the trees with marked interest—then looked back at Yves. She seemed markedly younger when she flushed, much softer and more innocent than was the norm with her, and Yves warmed to her anew.

“I…I have never been the target of gossip before,” she said haltingly. “It was most distressing.”

“And I apologize for my role in your embarrassment,” Yves interjected quickly. “Truly, my lady, it was never my intention to see you hurt. I fear I saw only the need to disguise our true mission from prying eyes for the sake of Thomas.”

The lady smiled. “Yes, I understand that now.”

Yves recalled suddenly how sweetly Gabrielle’s lips had curved beneath his own and the delightful shiver she had given beneath his touch. Desire flickered to life within him, and not for the first time since he had made the lady’s acquaintance.

“I apologize if I have behaved poorly in this and caused you anxiety,” she said in a low voice. Her color heightened yet further in a most bewitching way. Yves wanted suddenly to pluck Gabrielle from her saddle and taste her sweetness once more.

What madness did this woman inspire in his mind?

His own confused silence seemed to compel the lady to explain herself further. “You see, Chevalier, I have had one husband.” She paused and licked her lips, evidently having difficulty finding the words to explain her thoughts. “And we have made an agreement, you and I. Even if we should
wed…” Her voice trailed away and Yves realized suddenly the import of what she was saying.

“We pledged to a match in name alone,” Yves said quietly.

The lady nodded and looked away, her cheeks crimson.

And that condition had been on her insistence. Yves saw now that that had not been because of the taint of his birth, for Gabrielle truly had known naught of that.

Gabrielle de Perricault was still in love with her deceased husband.

There could be no other explanation. The anger that had raged through Yves abandoned him callously, leaving him feeling curiously despondent.

The lady loved a dead man.

That the explanation was perfectly logical did nothing to mitigate the undeniable disappointment that Yves felt weigh on his heart.

Disappointment? But that made no sense at all! Just days past, he had been perfectly willing to accept the terms of a match in name alone. Indeed, he had welcomed it!

Surely nothing could have changed?

He looked to Gabrielle and saw sympathy shining in the violet depths of her eyes. “I would not mislead you,” she said softly.

It had been his kisses, Yves saw, too late to repair her mistaken impression. She had thought—not unreasonably, he supposed—that he meant to push the boundaries of their arrangement, like some base knave. But he had not intended any such thing.

Had he? Yves felt completely at a loss in this newfound tangle of emotion unleashed by Tulley’s visit. Undoubtedly, he would be his own self once Sayerne was farther behind him.

And that was the most encouraging thought Yves had had in a long time.

“I granted you my word once already on this matter,” he conceded, surprised to hear his flat tone.

Gabrielle nodded but did not look at him, bittersweet memories evidently engulfing her thoughts. Yves frowned at that, not nearly as pleased with this turn of events as he thought he should be.

He should be relieved that the lady had no interest in him, that her heart still beat for the memory of a man long gone. He should be delighted that she would make no emotional demand upon him, that any relationship they might have would be based on the purity of reason alone, that any marriage they made would not be flooded with complicated entanglements.

But seeing Gabrielle ache for the loss of her husband irked Yves. He was not disappointed—no, that would have been unreasonable considering how little he knew the lady.

He must be feeling sympathy for the loss she had endured. Yes, that was it! It made perfect sense, even if it was the strongest bout of sympathy Yves had yet felt.

Curse Tulley for opening old wounds and giving Yves’ heart free rein!

Gabrielle turned suddenly and impaled Yves with a bright glance. “Surely you can understand that I cannot risk revealing the location of my troops to you, as little, as we are acquainted at this point.”

There was an appeal for understanding in her tone now, instead of the demand that had been there earlier, and Yves felt himself responding to the lady’s allure.

Somehow he had to win her trust, for in this campaign they could ill afford a lack of understanding between them. The very thought was so sensible that Yves was immediately reassured.

And with reassurance came inspiration. Yves knew suddenly that there was but one way to resolve this thorny issue. The lady held her son’s welfare in highest esteem, after all.

Yves unsheathed his blade with a smooth gesture. As Gabrielle
watched, he dropped to one knee, laid his naked blade across his palms and offered the weapon to her.

“I pledge that the count did release me from his service and grant me the freedom to swear my fealty elsewhere,” he said solemnly. “On this day, in this place, I pledge my blade to your son, Thomas, heir to Perricault. I vow not to rest until both he and his legacy are retrieved from Philip de Trevaine.”