Domning, Denise (2 page)

She stirred. Had it been hours or minutes since she'd arrived? From outside came the thunder of hooves, the jangling of harnesses, and hoarse cries of men. The noise pried her steadily from her pain-dazed state into alertness. Someone had arrived, no doubt her husband. Her eyes stung, but she refused to cry. All the tears she shed would no more free her than they would stop her wedding. A shattering sigh shook her to the core.

"Enough," she demanded of herself. Pity was only self-indulgent. It depleted energy without resolving the issue. How long had it been since she'd last given way to it? Too long ago to even remember.

In the wall was a narrow window covered by a simple wooden shutter. Rowena threw back the plain panel to reveal a thin slice of sky and let day's light tumble past her to chase heavy shadows from the dusty corners. Although the air was still light, she guessed it was a good three hours past midday.

So, it was hours that she'd been locked in here without so much as a cup of ale or a bite of bread. She breathed deeply. This February had been a harsh one, and the still freezing air cooled her hot face and eased the ache in her lungs.

She turned away to stare once more around this room. The poverty of Benfield had not stopped outside this thick door. The master's private chamber was barely more than a storeroom with a hearth set in the corner. Neither straw matting nor an embroidered wall hanging was in evidence to keep the winter's chill from seeping in. A single trunk squatted beside a solitary chair. The only sign that it was not a nun's cell was the huge bed, which dominated the room. Thick, spiraling posts jutted up from each of its four corners to support a wooden canopy draped with heavy bed curtains. Drawn back to each corner of the bed, these curtains revealed the soft mattresses and thick blankets that filled its dark, cavernous interior.

The lock groaned. She whirled to face the door as a woman carrying a basket entered. No taller than she, her visitor's tawny hair was bound in a thick braid and concealed by a wimple of homespun. Simple garments of green and gray clung close to a girlishly slim silhouette. Her features were beautiful, but bitterness deeply etched the set of her mouth, and her green eyes were dull and lifeless. It was a moment before recognition occurred, then Rowena gasped. Her mother.

All at once she was five again. She crouched, tangle-haired and frightened lest she be seen and sent away, before the door to this very room. Inside sat her mother. And Philippa.

Philippa, the golden-haired child, petted and cherished. In her recollection, her sister wore a clean and pretty gown and sang to their mother a playful, happy tune. Every so often her mother's sweet voice rose to intertwine with her sister's, and in that moment, the child Rowena knew what sounds angels made in heaven.

How many times had she streaked, barefoot and unkempt, from this hall while her sister and mother loved each other? Memory after hurtful memory tumbled through her, one upon the other.
Enough,
she cried to herself. She turned and slammed the shutter closed. The room plunged into dimness.

"Why did you do that?" The Lady Edith of Benfield's voice was toneless and flat, the voice of an old woman, not one in the midst of her third decade of life. She pulled the door shut behind her, then moved gracefully to the hearth and brought a fire to life upon it. The room brightened only slightly.

Rowena's hands clenched at the pain in her heart. "Have you nothing to say to me? No greeting? Not even a 'How do you fare'?"

"What would you like me to say? We both are well aware, as is every other soul in this keep, of how you feel."

Her mother turned and brushed cobwebs from the chair at the wall, then seated herself. "I am to supervise the maids as they prepare you for your wedding. There is not time for a bath, but I have ordered a basin of hot water so you may wash." From the basket she carried, she took a piece of needlework and picked an imaginary speck of lint from its surface. She calmly pushed her needle through the linen stretched within the wooden frame.

Rowena's rage outstripped her pain as her mother's needle flew. "I have suddenly remembered what I must have worked so hard to forget. I have not even the smallest place in your heart. Please forgive me, but it has been fourteen years."

"Leave me be, Rowena." The words were short and clipped.

"Leave you be? I would like nothing so much as that, but I seem to be trapped here. Be gone with you." Sarcasm lay thick and heavy in her tone.

Her mother shot her a sharp glance. "And I thought the nuns would have taught you to curb your headstrong ways and sharp tongue. Lord Graistan has just arrived, and your father has some last-minute details to discuss with him. I am here because I was sent here."

"Thank the heavens," Rowena snapped. "For a moment I was worried lest you actually meant to spend time with me."

"You rage like a spoiled child." Lady Benfield took another stitch.

"Oh, that I most certainly am not. Anything but that could be proved by the shameful way I am being married." She ticked the items off on her fingers as she spoke. "Without warning, I am dragged from the life I love, held prisoner in my birthplace, and forced into marriage against my will. Do I guess wrongly in thinking that no lord, other than my father and my new husband will break bread at my wedding feast? Nor, if I am right, will any noblewoman save my mother witness my bedding. Could it be that the village priest will be the one who condones this horrid deed?" She stared at her mother who looked away. "I see I have guessed correctly. But, then, I have always known I was not the favorite."

"Are you quite finished?" Edith raised a single, tawny eyebrow.

"You must be lifeless to the core. Tell me, madam, is there not even a single grain of love within you for your youngest child?"

The woman coolly considered her daughter for a long moment. But, when she turned back to her needlework, Rowena saw that her fingers trembled so badly she could not catch the needle. "You are not my child," she said at last, her voice breaking, "you are your father's spawn. The two of you are as alike in temperament as you are in appearance. Now, you, too, would demand from me what is not yours to demand."

Rowena waved her words away with an impatient hand. "Call it simple curiosity, then, Mother. You spurned me. I will know why."

"You will," she hissed and hurled her handwork at the wall. The wooden frame shattered and fell to the barren floor. A ruthless kick sent linen and wood clattering across the room to rest, splintered and tangled, against the room's single chest. "You will," she repeated with an angry gasp. "Today, you and your sire are the victors. Think you'll someday sweep into this place and hear 'my lady, my lady' from my lips? Place no wagers on it, for I'll yet make a pauper of you. You'll have no groat of what should be mine and Philippa's after me."

"What great hurt could I have possibly done to you before my seventh year to make you despise me so?" Rowena sank into the chair her mother had vacated and cradled her head in her hands. Her parents, locked in a selfish war of hate, had made her their weapon of choice. "Why vent your spleen on me and not Philippa if she is bastard as he says?" Her voice was steady, but within her grew a cold emptiness.

Her mother narrowly eyed her. "If he thinks the world will believe his claim now, after so many years have passed, he is mistaken. I will name his words vicious lies. Aye, I will call your whole marriage contract a lie, fabricated by your father to deny me the chance to regain for Philippa any of the wealth my father stole from me. My father," she went on, her face evilly twisting, "may his soul rot in hell, who saw me wed to the Oaf of Benfield to humble me after my mother's death. Me," she laughed, still incredulous despite the years, "for whom no less than an earl had once been considered. But he never dreamed he'd outlive all his sons and see his daughter's children be his only heir.

"Now, your father foully names my beloved daughter a bastard to leave her with only the paltry fields she took with her when she wed.

"How your father loves you," she said with a crooked grin. "He wanted a powerful husband for you, one who could keep these stolen lands from their rightful owners. It mattered naught to him what sort of man he was. I will give you warning now, Rowena. He is a hard, cold man who seeks only wealth from his marriage to you. Try and cross him as you did your father this morn, and he'll snap you between his hands like a dry twig."

Rowena sagged. Her strength, far overstretched by the events of the day, gave way. She hid her eyes as the words slipped from her in a whisper. "Help me, Sweet Mary Mother of God, I am afraid, I am greatly afraid."

"You?" Edith asked with a sneer. "You, the haughty, commanding woman who so recently dared her father to beat her to death, are afraid?"

Rowena shrugged. The movement of her shoulders conveyed both insolence and vulnerability at once. "Life has taught me bitter lessons, madam. I am, as you have said, commanding. I am also prideful and solitary by nature. The priest at the convent admonished me to adopt gentleness and meekness in my manner." She drew a shaky breath. "I swear by the Virgin, I tried, I truly did. I cannot change. It is not in my nature to be less than I am. Now tell me, Mother, how well will my husband like me?"

Her mother smiled in grim satisfaction. "Poor rich heiress. He will not like you at all, but, then, you have been purchased for your lands and your womb. No matter whether you bear him sons or no, I do not imagine you will live long after Philippa receives the rights to my inheritance, and you are poor once again. He's killed two wives before you, you know."

She twitched the soft material of her skirt away from her feet, then went to the window and opened the shutter. Light once more filled the room. Edith stared out at the sky for a long moment before speaking once again. "God curses women who dare to dream of love or who hope for respect. Arrogant brat, you thought you would fly free of all this with your convent-inspired ambitions? Well, welcome to earth with the rest of us sinners." There was a tap at the door. "Come," she called out.

Several maids entered bearing a ewer of water and arm loads of clothing. When her mother turned away from the window, her hate was once again well hidden behind a bitter mask. "Stand up, daughter. You must be dressed now."

It was pointless to resist, so Rowena did as she was bid. All too soon the maids had washed away the signs of her travels and her hurts. She donned a fine linen chemise, then an undergown of deep blue. Its high neckline had been stiffened by heavy embroidery done with silver thread, no doubt her mother's handiwork. This design was repeated in unheard of luxury about the wrists of the undergown's close-fitted sleeves. Her overgown was sleeveless and made from samite in a shimmering rose red. The same, silvery pattern of embroidery trimmed its shortened hemline. All this finery was caught at her waist with a silk belt sewn and studded in silver. The crowning touch was a fine, silver- and-pearl band, which capped her free-flowing black hair.

She smoothed the luxurious materials of her clothing over the full lines of her body, then touched the rich band. "A fortune wasted on an unwilling bride," she murmured.

Edith sneered. "My husband seeks to buy Lord Graistan's respect. You have been clothed to the limit of my father's tightly held purse and in the highest fashion as a part of your dowry."

"To what end?" Rowena's laugh was harsh. "Neither I nor my appearance is of any importance to this husband of mine." She lifted a rich, fur-lined mantle, threw it over her shoulders and fastened the clasp. The dark cloak nearly extinguished the brightness of her bridal costume in its heavy folds. "I am ready."

Her mother threw open the door and stood aside. Rowena swept past her into the hall. There were no ties to bind her to the past. All that remained was the future.

Chapter 2

Rowena's step did not falter as she left the bedchamber, but she paused as she drew nearer to the center of the hall. The two men who stood in the circle of firelight at the huge hearth were deeply immersed in argument. Any information she might garner before being noticed might likely prove beneficial. As her mother started past, Rowena caught her arm. With a silent motion she asked for a few moments to eavesdrop. Edith shot her daughter a hard look, then shrugged in acquiescence.

It was not unusual for a long, narrow room such as this to ring with the noise of its many occupants. But, for now, the castle folk were maintaining a discreet silence so they might better hear the quarrel without appearing to do so. She strained to see the noblemen.

Dressed in a garish costume of red and blue and bejeweled in the newly inherited wealth, her father paced angrily before the fire. Only when he whirled away did she clearly see the other man who must be Lord Graistan, her husband-to-be. He stood a full head taller than her father, which meant he would tower over her.

When he tilted his head slightly, she saw his jaw-line was clean shaven against the fashion set by King Richard, called the Lionheart. Thick, burnished chestnut hair curled lightly over the collar of his mantle. When he lifted a hand, firelight caught in the gemstone of his only ring. In his simple tawny brown tunic beneath a sturdy, plain mantle, he hardly looked the part of a bridegroom.

To others it might appear that Lord Graistan stood casually before the hearth, but she recognized full well the pride that infected the set of his shoulders and the arrogance in the line of his jaw. Carefully, cautiously, she slipped forward to hear what they were saying.

Just then Lord Benfield stopped in his strutting anger and threw his arms wide in frustration. "Why do you now play the reluctant bridegroom? I must hear from others that you plan to delay the wedding, and I am forced to summon you here to confront you. I thought you agreed to wed my daughter." His words echoed through the quiet hall.

Rowena cringed. Surely, the servants found this wholly reluctant bridal couple more diverting entertainment than any musician, mummer, or juggler.

When the trembling echoes died away, Lord Benfield continued in a somewhat quieter voice. "It was my belief you found our terms satisfactory. Have I not already given your churchman cousin our contract and all the rest you desired him to hold for you? Why then must I force your hand to conclude this deed only to have you seek for some other excuse by which to withdraw?"