Joining (17 page)

Milisant hugged her. “I mean not to take out my upset on you—”

“Nay, better me than him,” Jhone said, then, “Very well, I will speak of it no more—for today. And we had best go down, ere they send someone looking for us. You look lovely in that rose color, by the way.”

Milisant looked down at the rose bliaut that Jhone had lent to her and snarled, “Just the thing to say to ruin my appetite.”

Jhone chuckled and pulled her sister along down the circular tower stairs, teasing, “I am beginning to think your problem is you have too much vigor and not enough activities to use it up, thus you vent it all into being as surly as you can be.”

“I’m not surly,” Milisant grumbled.

“You are. But Dame Elga confessed to me
once, the easiest way to expend all vigor and have none left for moping—or aught else for that matter.”

“I suppose this is some great secret you are about to impart?”

“Nay, and a simple enough solution it is, too.” But she moved a bit ahead on the stairs before she ended, “Just have lots of babies,” then raced down the remaining stairs before her sister could clout her.

Twenty-two

He saw them
enter the hall. They were not dressed identically today, yet were they still identical. One was laughing, the other scowling. For once, it was so easy to tell which was which.

Wulfric railed silently once more at the fates that had gifted him with the unnatural sister, rather than the normal one. And yet, oddly, looking at Jhone now, so lovely, glowing in her amusement, he felt not the least attraction to her, not like he’d felt when he’d thought she would be his. But looking at her sister …

Blast and bedamned, he could feel his blood stirring. He just couldn’t understand why. He had never liked women who threw tantrums, who were caustic and disagreeable. When a man wanted some bed sport, he did not want to deal with tempers. Yet when had his betrothed not been in a temper of one sort or another? And even now, when she was obviously annoyed, judging by her expression … how could she stir him?

“Must you frown so when you look at her?” Guy asked in a tired voice.

Wulfric glanced at his father. He hadn’t heard him approach. Nor had they spoken of Milisant again since his return, other than of the attacks on her. He had reported those last eventide before he’d found his bed, and in much greater detail than what he had told his mother.

He relaxed his expression now and replied simply, “I had not realized I was frowning.”

Guy made a tsking sound. “Your feelings for her need not be made so public. Nor will it benefit you to have
her
know how displeased you are with her.”

Wulfric almost laughed aloud. He did smile wryly before admitting, “She already knows. And furthermore, she feels the same way. She loves another, Father. She admitted as much to me.”

Guy frowned for a moment, but then scoffed, “Faugh, a defensive reaction, no doubt because she could not help but sense your dislike.”

Wulfric could hardly discount that possibility when he had himself done exactly that, lied to her about loving someone else when she’d told him that she loved another. However, that did not account for her very real animosity. Because he had killed her bird? He could hardly credit someone carrying a grudge for that long over an animal. Because he hadn’t gone after those curs who’d attacked her that day on the path? More likely. Yet even that was not enough for her wanting out of their contract, which she surely did.

But he wasn’t going to stress that to his father.

In fact, he said lightly, “No matter. She and I are—adjusting. Her father has allowed her a few weeks to do so.”

Guy raised a brow. “So you are no longer so averse to this joining yourself?”

Wulfric shrugged. “Let us say I am not
as
averse. I still think she will give me naught but difficulties, but mayhap those difficulties will be—interesting, or at least not as unpleasant as I thought. Her father thinks that once she settles into marriage, she will change—you
did
know that she wishes she had been born male? And that she prefers manly sport to that of her own sex?”

Guy flushed. “I know that she is sometimes lacking in the female graces—”

“Sometimes?” Wulfric cut in with a snort. “You could have warned me that she goes about dressed like a man. I nearly clouted her when I thought she was a serving lad with a surly tongue.”

“Jesu,
how could you mistake that soft skin …?”

“Mayhap because she also dresses in dirt.”

Guy winced. “I know she used to dress so. Nigel could not help but lament her boyish ways to me when he was deep in his cups. Yet did I think she would have outgrown that peculiarity. And look at her. ’Tis not as if she does not know how to behave properly.”

“Merely that she would rather not.”

Guy cleared his throat uncomfortably before he said, “Well, I am of the same opinion as my friend. Wed, bed, and get her with child, and you are sure to find her more agreeable, and
certainly more womanly, though I have never seen her otherwise myself.”

Again Wulfric wondered if his parents had ever really met the true Milisant, or if they’d thought her sister was she, but to the subject he merely said, “Actually, he thinks love is the answer.”

“Love
can
change people,” Guy agreed. “I have seen it happen time and again. But then I have also seen a brutal knight treat his child with extremely tender care, and a shrewish woman turn into a saint after she has had a few babies, so do not discount the wonders of siring offspring as a means to turn the lass around.”

Wulfric chuckled. “Now, I wonder why you wouldst stress the latter. Mayhap because of the pleasures involved in that direction?”

“There is much to be said for—pleasures. Just as a foul-tasting medicine can be made palatable with a dose of honey, so, too, can—” Guy paused when Wulfric rolled his eyes. “You are determined to disagree with me as usual,” his father ended up mumbling.

“Not so,” Wulfric protested with a conciliatory grin. “I just would not compare a wife to foul medicine, when the one is taken and as quickly forgotten, but the other is like to linger for the rest of your days.”

“Never mind the comparisons, as long as you see the point. You
did
see the point, aye?”

“Assuredly, I always grasp your meanings, Father. Rest easy on the matter of the girl.”

Guy stared at him for a moment, then conceded, “Very well, on this subject I will. On that other matter, though … have you given it more
thought, on what I asked? We must know who is behind these attacks.”

When Wulfric had spoken to his father about them last night, Guy had asked him to come up with some names. He’d been hard-pressed to do so.

“I have had no serious altercations with anyone that I can recall,” Wulfric said, “other than with one of John’s mercenary captains.”

“King John?”

“Aye.”

Guy frowned. “What sort of altercation?”

“Naught that I had thought to worry about. I had just lost one of my men to a Welsh arrow and was in no mood to listen to his belittling of our efforts. I clouted the fellow. When he recovered some hours later, he was heard to say that he would see me rotting at the end of a spike.”

“You should have dispatched him permanently.”

Wulfric shrugged. “The king does not take lightly losing his captains to petty squabbles. Besides, I did not take the threat seriously. He was an idiot, thus do I think him incapable of plotting this sort of revenge. He would go straight for me, not try to hurt me through another.”

“Who else then?”

Wulfric chuckled at his father. “Think you that I have enemies aplenty? Verily, I can think of no one else. But what of yourself? You wouldst be hurt as well, does this marriage not take place.”

Guy seemed somewhat taken aback. “I had not even considered that, but you are correct, we should. I will give it some thought. Unlike
you, I have made numerous enemies over the years.”

Wulfric gave him a doubtful look. “Numerous? You? When your honor is so sterling it would take a complete fool to question it?”

Guy grinned. “I did not say I had honorable enemies. Far from it. ’Tis those lacking all scruples who have reason to fear and revile an honest man, and want revenge when they are exposed—if they manage to escape a hanging. But I want more than just precautions taken where Milisant is concerned. Who have you assigned to watch her?”

“Aside from Mother?”

“You jest, though your mother
is
diligent in her duties, and she will consider the girl one of her duties.”

“All passages out of the castle are being watched, Father. Milisant will not step foot from the tower that I do not know it.”

Guy nodded. “I will also tighten the restriction on who may enter Shefford. But when the wedding guests begin arriving with their own servants, I think we may needs confine her to the women’s solar.”

“She will balk at that,” Wulfric predicted.

“Mayhap, but ’tis necessary.”

“Then I will leave it for you to tell her when the time comes.” Wulfric grinned.

Twenty-three

The castle folk
were beginning to fill the lower trestle tables for the meal. The long table on the raised dais where the lord and his retainers would eat was still empty. Typically those welcome to eat there waited until the lord took his seat at the center. However, Lord Guy was still deep in conversation with his son.

Milisant had noticed Lady Anne approaching her, but thrice she was detained by servants needing her attention. She hoped the lady did not want to talk of the wedding again. She wasn’t to find out, though, since Anne, at last free to continue on her way, changed direction now to gather her husband instead, to start the meal—which left Wulfric alone for the moment, and turning his attention to her.

Before he could fetch her, if he thought to do so, she grabbed her sister’s hand and dragged her to the table, which was quickly filling now, so they could find two seats together that would leave no room for him to join them. She cared not that it would appear to Wulfric as if she
were trying to avoid him. She was. And she did find one narrow bench left, with room for only two.

“What
are
you doing?” Jhone hissed as Milisant pushed her down on the bench.

Milisant whispered back, “Making sure he cannot speak to me in private.”

Jhone sighed. “A useless endeavor, Mili. Does he want words with you, he will have them, will you nil you. And you
should
be sitting with him.”

Her jaw tightened stubbornly. “Why? So he can spoil my appetite?”

“You give me too much credit, wench,” Wulfric said as he sat down beside her.

Milisant stiffened and glanced his way, to see that the old knight who had been sitting next to her on that side had moved down the row of benches to accommodate her betrothed. She made a sour expression that she turned on Wulfric.

“So good of you to join me, m’lord.”

“Sarcasm does not become you,” he replied tonelessly and without expression.

“I wish you would leave. Is that better?”

“Much. The truth is always preferable—even when it avails you naught.”

She snorted and turned back to her sister, to begin a conversation that was so mundane that even did he overhear it, there would be little for him to comment on. It worked. He did not try to intrude.

Would that his silence was all that was needed to ignore him. But alas, even though she crowded Jhone to keep from touching Wulfric
at thigh, shoulder, or anywhere else, not for a moment could she forget that he was there, next to her, just inches away.

It caused a tension in her that did indeed affect her appetite. She ate, but she knew not what she ate. She drank, but the wine could have been vinegar, for all she noticed. It was almost a relief when she heard his voice again.

“Give me your attention, wench. We are supposed to at least look like a betrothed couple.”

Wulfric’s tone was distinctly surly. She was beginning to realize that he called her “wench” when he was not pleased with her.

She turned to raise a curious brow at him. “And how wouldst such a couple appear?”