Impostress (3 page)

"Aye." Elyn was worrying her hands together, her teeth sinking into her lip. "I love him. I have from the first time I saw him at Tower Fenn. I was but thirteen years, yet smitten upon the sight of him. I have loved him ever since."

"For the love of St. Jude, Elyn." Kiera thought little of the man who had so completely and stupidly captured her sister's heart. "Is he not betrothed to another?"

"Wynnifrydd." Elyn's nose wrinkled as if she'd just smelled rotten eggs. "Of Fenn. They are to be married soon." She sighed loudly, her shoulders slumping as if from a great burden. The first drops of rain began to fall and splatter on the ground. "Brock loves me, not that scrawny wench. I know it. He no more wants to wed Wynnifrydd than I do Penbrooke."

"But you haven't given this a chance. As you said, you've never met Penbrooke. Mayhap you'll find him—"

"Attractive?" Elyn snorted, shaking her head. "Obviously you've never been in love."

"You know that Brock's a scoundrel. You've said so yourself."

"Mayhap, but the heart knows no reason." Elyn stared into the storm as if she was searching for some kind of divine intervention, some kind of insight into her plight.

"Oh, please, stop it! I've heard you spout this romantic nonsense too often, and look where it's gotten you." Kiera felt a pang of something akin to pity.

Her strong sister was such a fool when it came to love, but Elyn had always been a bit of a dreamer. "I know you don't want to marry Penbrooke. Have you not said as much every day since Father announced the agreement? But what you're suggesting is mad ... absurd; it will never,
ever
work."

"It will if you agree to it. Now, you'll not have to give yourself to him, not really." Elyn was blinking against the fat drops of rain falling from the sky. "You can give him a sleeping draft, and he'll fall asleep and I'll make sure there is a vial of blood— pig's blood—that you can spill onto the sheets, so that when he awakens, he'll believe—"

"And why cannot you do this? Why can you not make sure he falls asleep, then sprinkle the sheets with blood?"

"Because I am to meet Brock one last time."

"What?" Kiera cried. This was ludicrous! Insane!

"Please, Kiera, if I can steal one more night with Brock, I will feel as if I have defied the contract that keeps me from my love. It will make assuming the duties as the Baron of Penbrooke's wife bearable, and no one but us will know."

" 'Twould only make things worse. Much worse. Nay, Elyn, this is crazy. I will do anything for you, I gave you my word, but this ... I cannot."

"You will not have to compromise your virginity."

"So you say, but—"

"And everyone will think that he was with me. You lose nothing, Kiera.
Nothing.
And I will have one last night with my beloved."

Kiera was thinking that her virginity wasn't as precious as she'd thought, not if it could be bartered with so easily. Though, of course, Elyn was right. Kiera would never give herself to the man. Yet she could not meet her sister's request despite her promise. Kiera knew the plan could not work. She would not do it. 'Twas a fool's mission.

"This scheme is impossible," she said, gathering her cowl over her head as the rain peppered the garden. "You must go to Father and talk him out of the marriage."

"Don't you think I've tried? By the love of the Holy Mother, I've begged, screamed, cried, pleaded, and all for naught. Father will not listen to me." Her eyes darkened dangerously and her chin set in the same determination Kiera had witnessed a hundred times before. If Elyn had inherited anything from Llwyd of Lawenydd, 'twas his damned pride and stubborn streak. Rain drizzled down her neck, but she didn't bother covering her head.

"Listen—" Desperately, Elyn grabbed hold of Kiera's sleeve. "Have we not fooled our own cousins by pretending to be each other? Did we not trick our own father before?" Elyn insisted, her fire returning. "Even when his eyesight had not dimmed? We look enough alike as to be twins, as to be one, even Hildy has claimed as much!"

Kiera paused for a moment. It was true that many often swore that Elyn and Kiera were nearly identical. Indeed, they shared many of the same features. Both had brilliant auburn hair, green eyes, and chins that ended in a distinct point. Kiera and Elyn had often confused household servants and, aye, even family members about their identities. Yet while they had often played tricks, the plan was simply too implausible and dangerous. "I'm sorry, Elyn, it is not going to work. I can't do it."

Angrily, Elyn yanked on the necklace that encircled her throat. The fine chain broke, but she caught the glittering crucifix before it dropped to the ground. Rubies, emeralds, and sapphires glittered ominously in the rain. "Did you not promise me, Kiera? Did you not swear that you would return my favor by doing
any
thing I asked?"

"Yes, although—"

"So now I'm asking, begging ..." she said, shaking her fist so hard that the bejeweled cross swung crazily from its broken links. "Are you not as good as your word?"

"Of course, but—"

"You vowed, Kiera, to me." Elyn hooked a thumb at her chest. Her eyes snapped angrily. "You insisted that you owed me this favor. 'Twas your idea, not mine."

"Yes, I know I did, nonetheless—"

"So, now, sister, 'tis time to pay."

Kiera's heart tore. She grabbed the cross and chain. "I'll do anything else, Elyn, but this ... this I cannot. I cannot lie to Father. To Penbrooke. To God. I cannot pretend to marry the man. Elyn, please, go to Father. I'll go with you. Mayhap something can be worked out."

"Would you give yourself to Penbrooke in my stead?"

"He would not want me because Father has entailed the castle to you, and Penbrooke wants access to the sea to expand trade, which Lawenydd provides," Kiera said.

"So you are a liar and a coward," Elyn said, her voice cold. "You know, Kiera, I really thought better of you."

"Then you'll speak with Father."

Elyn's lips barely moved as the purple clouds roiled overhead. "Worry not, sister," she said, turning toward the keep, "I'll do what I have to."

* * * * *

This marriage will be little more than a sham,
Baron Kelan of Penbrooke thought as he guided his horse toward the final rise and his doom. His mood was as dark as the cloudy sky, and his muscles were beginning to protest from a hard three days' ride with his pitiful handful of men, none of whom seemed to have lost their amusement that he was finally to be wed.

" 'Tis well past time," Orvis, one of Kelan's guards and a friend, had said with a chuckle as he'd raised a tankard of ale to his lips the night before they'd left Penbrooke. He'd wiped a sleeve over his ragged reddish beard. "Your days of sowin' wild oats are over."

"Aye, and now maybe some of the ladies will look my way," Tadd had chimed in, his blue eyes full of devilment as he'd fingered his dark beard. Tadd was his brother. At twenty, two years younger than Kelan, Tadd was every bit as full of piss and vinegar as Kelan had once been.

"As if ye need more women," Orvis had grumbled, for he was fat and dull with the finesse of a blacksmith and the manners of the gong farmer who cleaned the latrine pits. Yet he was loyal and true, a man whom Kelan had known since his youth. "Ye need to be passin' a few my way, Sir Tadd, instead of beddin' 'em all yerself."

Tadd had lifted a skeptical brow. "And what would you do with them, Orvis?" he'd taunted.

"I know me way around a woman, don't you think I don't." Offended, Orvis had buried his bulbous nose in his mazer.

Kelan had paid the men no mind that night or any other. Their needling and jokes at his expense were to be expected, but he hadn't counted on the smug faith of Father Barton, an elderly priest who couldn't hide his pleasure that the wayward, prodigal son of Lord Alwyn was about to wed, and therefore change his heathen ways. Now that Kelan was the baron, he needed a wife. Or so thought the priest.

"Ye'll enjoy the sacrament of marriage," the old man had intoned less than an hour ago. With his thin white hair, hooked nose, and ever-pursed mouth, he had glanced at Kelan with sanctimonious piety. A bemused smile had dared to soften the set of his lips. He'd clucked to his mount, a docile grayish mare, as she'd plodded along the soggy, rutted road leading to Lawenydd. "A good woman and children, 'tis all a man can ask for."

" 'Tis not what I asked for, nor," he reminded the priest, "what
you
wanted for yourself."

"We all have different callings, my son. Yours is to wed and beget children. Sons."

"So it seems."

" 'Twill be a blessing."

"How would you know? Have you ever been married?"

Father Barton had clucked his tongue. "I am married to God, my son."

"And is He a good wife?"

"There be no need for irreverence." Those old lips had pursed again in tight disapproval, and the priests good humor had vanished as surely as if it had been swept away by the salt-laden wind.

"Nor be there a need for unwanted advice."

"Then think of your poor ailing mother." Father Barton had sketched a quick sign of the cross over his chest. " 'Twill make her happy."

There was little doubt of that. His mother, too frail to make the trip, had made it known that all she wanted from him was that he take a wife and have children, preferably a son to become the next Baron of Penbrooke. She was dying. She wanted desperately to meet Kelan's bride, had begged her son to be quick with the marriage and return. Kelan had not the heart to deny her. But despite his dead father's schemes, the priest's talk of the joys of marriage, and his mother's desperate need to know the Penbrooke bloodline would continue, Kelan felt a cold dread at the prospect of this arranged marriage to a woman he had never seen and had heard little about.

Now, with his horse a good quarter mile ahead of the others and his gloved hands clamped over the reins, he fought the urge to spur his steed and ride fast and far from his fate. His jaw was clenched so hard it ached; every muscle in his body was rigid. Soon he would meet his bride. His stomach soured at the thought. This woman with whom he was supposed to live forever.

Marriage.
'Twas a fool's sacrament.

Were he not firstborn and were his mother not on her deathbed, Kelan would never have agreed to such a hideous convention. Never.

The union was the result of two old men's wishes. His father had wanted an ally to the south, one with whom he could share borders, men, weapons, and trade, a barony with access to the sea. Even more than that, Alwyn had wanted Kelan to sire a son, an heir that would someday become baron. On his deathbed he'd elicited a promise that Kelan would marry Elyn of Lawenydd, and Kelan couldn't go back on his word.

Nonsense!
That's what it was.

Because of his dead father's wishes and his mother's continued, quiet supplication, Kelan had become betrothed to a woman—no doubt a withered old maid, she was almost nineteen for God's sake and should have been married long ago—whom he'd never met. The castles were not near each other, and as he'd been banished for a time, he'd never had a glimpse of his bride. Perhaps it was for the best.

Llwyd of Lawenydd had his own reasons for suggesting the marriage. He wanted protection from the north and use of the river that cut through Penbrooke on its way to the ocean. Though the baronies did not share a border, they would make a strong alliance and could, together, force the small, weaker baronies between to do their bidding. Baron Llwyd had no sons of his own, only daughters to be used as pawns, bartered and traded as if they were wheat or cattle or horses. So an alliance had been formed, one joined by two unwilling marriage partners, to be cemented by a male heir.

Kelan's chest constricted. Well, so be it. 'Twas not as if he believed in love, he thought as his horse crested the forested hill and trees gave way to the vast fields of Lawenydd.

Dried, wintry stubble covered the ground leading toward a tall castle constructed of dark stone. Across a wide moat, the gates to the keep were thrown wide. Farmers' wagons, a peddler's cart, horsemen, and people on foot were converging at the castle while high overhead, atop square towers, the yellow-and-white standards of Lawenydd snapped in the stiff breeze blowing off the sea. He heard the sharp beat of hooves and turned in the saddle to spy his brother riding at breakneck speed only to pull up beside him.

"Ahh ... home of your beloved," Tadd observed, eyeing the keep as if it were a prize to be won at a cockfight. " 'Tis a bit on the humble side, but 'tis no matter ... see over there." He hitched his chin to the town and the piers jutting into the swirling gray waters. Whitecaps and swells rolled with the angry tide. Two ships were at anchor, their sails furled tight, their spars pronging upward toward the ever-darkening sky as the hulls bobbed on the turbulent waves. "What better dowry than access to the sea?"

"You tell me."

"Still not happy?"

Kelan's lips twisted. "Are you?"

"Aye. Often." Tadd slid a wicked glance in his brother's direction. "For though my fate is more lowly than yours, though I will not inherit the keep or anything of worth, I do have my freedom." His eyes were like ice as he said, "So you who reap the privilege must also suffer the consequence of being firstborn. 'Tis necessary that you produce heirs, whereas I can bed any wench I choose and father as many bastards as time allows." He crooked a dark eyebrow as he stared at the castle looming in the distance. "And time, it hastens by much too quickly. Come, brother, smile. 'Tis your wedding day!"

Shivering in her woolen cloak, Penelope peered through the crenels in the south tower. The wind slapped at her face and snatched at her hood as it screamed across the wide curtain wall, but she stayed unmoving in her hiding spot. Her fingers were near frozen despite her gloves. Blowing upon her hands, she spied the newcomers from her niche.

A small band of men—soldiers they appeared for the most part—entered the castle gates. There were less than ten of them, not much of a party, but they were far from what Penelope had expected. Aside from one ancient-looking man bundled in baggy, dirt-colored clothes, they were a strong virile-looking lot. Granted they were a little on the rugged side, but then she supposed, at least to hear her sisters talk, she'd expected that these horsemen would be ruffians of the lowest order—cutthroats, pickpockets, murderers, and such. She'd heard Elyn and Kiera talking about Penbrooke and it sounded like a dark, decrepit, overgrown place where only ogres and trolls and criminals resided. And now Elyn was to marry the leader.