Lady Gallant (54 page)

Two days after saving Christian's life again, Nora was overseeing the spinning of wool when Arthur burst into the spinning room, out of breath and flushed with agitation.

"Lady, they're righting again, and I cant find the Earl." Arthur skidded on the flagstones as he tried to halt his flight. His foot knocked the leg of a spinning wheel, and the maid who was using it tried to cuffhim. Arthurducked and pranced out of reach. "Hurry, my lady!"

Nora lifted her skirts and dashed out of the chamber. Running behind Arthur, she only caught up with the boy at the door to the gallery. Though closed, she could hear Blade's angry tones through the panel.

"I won't do it."

Christian replied in his lilting minstrel's voice, which caused Nora and Arthur to exchange looks of dread.

"How foolish of me to expect you to be grateful."

Nora hastened to enter. Knowing that sweet tone marked the coiling of her husband's temper, she hurried to join him. He was sprawled in a chair in the bay of a window, long legs hanging over one of the arms. Dark hair gleaming in the sunlight and ruby earring flashing, he toyed with a sealed letter.

Christian glanced at Nora but returned to his lazy inspection of the seal on the letter. "The whelp summoned you to defend this ungrateful churl."

"How haps it that such defense is needful?" Nora asked. "I so enjoyed these brief days of peace."

Throwing up his hands, Blade snorted and jerked his head in Christian's direction. "I won't be herded like a sheep anymore. And I should be grateful for being prisoned in towers, beaten, and harried?"

Yawning, Christian suspended the letter between thumb and forefinger and began to swing it to and fro. Nora tried to read the name on it, but the parchment swung too quickly. She could see that, as intended, Christian's nonchalance dug into Blade's hide. The youth balled his fists and hissed curses under his breath. Before he could erupt into action, she darted her hand out and snatched the letter.

"This is for you," she said. She held it out to Blade, who put his hands behind his back.

Christian rose from his chair and slouched against the frame of the window. "He won't take it. Stubborn as a hired nag. My father sent emissaries to his father, all that way to the border and back, and now he sticks at reading the reply. I'm going to tie him to this chair and read the thing aloud to him."

"Whoreson pig-tupping ass."

Christian leapt from his slouched position to Blade's side, but Nora was ready for him. She dashed in front of her husband at the last moment and grasped his arms. Responding naturally, Christian enfolded her, then groaned as he realized his defeat. Over her head, he threatened Blade.

' 'If you don't clean your dockside tongue in Nora's presence I'll cut it out."

"Please, both of you," she said. "I'm weary of this bickering. Blade, why won't you read the letter from your father?"

Turning away, Blade said nothing.

"Come on, marchpane," Christian said. "Answer Nora, for it will be easier than answering me."

Quelling her husband with a look she'd learned from him, Nora went to Blade and put her hand on his shoulder. "You're afraid."

Blade nodded.

"Christian was afraid to face his father once, too."

Christian growled at her. "Nora!"

"He feared," she went on, "that the Earl wouldn't want him once his name and deeds were blazoned throughout the kingdom." Blade nodded again, and she squeezed his shoulder. "But the Earl cared naught for any of it. He loved Christian and wanted him back. Does your father love you?"

Blade's chin almost rested on his chest from his efforts to hide his face, but he managed another nod.

She held the letter out. "Then this can only be a message of love and rejoicing, and you need not fear to read it."

She waited patiently and at last heard a sigh. She edged the parchment nearer, and Blade took it. He stared at the seal, rubbing it with his thumb. Nora left him to take Christian's hand and urge him down the gallery.

"I don't want to go yet," Christian protested. "He might not read it, and I promised to send him north with an escort."

She jerked his hand, refusing to let it go as he hung back. "Heaven's mercy, I wish before God that someone had taught you that you can't govern the course of everyone's life."

A hand snaked around her waist, and Christian swept her up in his arms, carrying her out of the gallery. He kissed her as they passed a gaping Arthur.

"Beshrew Blade. I've found someone else who takes much more governance. And I've a yen to try my hand at it in bed."

"Christian, I was spinning." Nora kicked her feet as he climbed the stairs to their chamber two at a time.

"You can spin beneath me if you're able."

"You're a lewd man," she said as he paused at the head of the stairs to bury his face between her breasts.

"Yes." Christian's voice was muffled. "Remember to thank God in your prayers."

A se'night later, on a cool and misty morning, Nora stood at Christian's side and waved Godspeed to Blade as he rode across the drawbridge on his way north to his father. Blade's fears had receded, and she was only a little apprehensive about his safety, since the Earl accompanied him. Christian assured her that even Jack Midnight wouldn't attack an earl and his party of soldiers and knights.

Rubbing drops of mist from the tip of her nose, she waved one last time. Christian took her hand abruptly and began pulling her info the manor house and up the stairs.

"What are you doing?" She still couldn't accustom herself to Christian's tempestuous behavior.

"Hurry. We must change and be gone quickly if we're to be in time."

She clutched the banister as he hauled her behind him. "Gone? Where are we going? "

"It's a surprise."

Minutes later Nora found herself dressed in a coarse wool petticoat and a gown that laced up the front. Her hair was covered with a white cloth, and she wore a cloak whose fabric sported shiny patches denoting its age. Christian matched her in his wool stockings, leather jerkin, and scuffed boots. He donned a plain soft cap, which he cocked at a jaunty tilt before grabbing her hand again.

"Come," he said.

Nora hung back, opening her cloak. "I can't. Look at the neck of this gown." She dodged Christian's groping hands. "No, sirrah. IVe a caution of you when you turn that fierce wolf look on me."

"But sweeting, you're so—"

"Help me with these laces or I won't go with you. I think the petticoat is caught beneath." With Christian's assistance, Nora pulled the garment up until it covered more of her breasts. "Where did you get these clothes?"

"Marry, sweeting, I've forgotten, it's been so long, but it's clear that the lady who owned it before was boy-flat in the chest and wide as a galley at the hips. Are you sure you don't need more help?" He trailed his fingers down the cleft between her breasts, and she slapped them.

"You're the only nobleman I know who keeps chests full of clothes that belong to wool merchants and peddlers."

"We're going to be late."

He hurried her out of the manor, warning her to keep her cloak pulle'd over her gown. They set out with Inigo, Hext, and a dozen men, riding into the mist that still clung to the fields and forests that surrounded Falaise. They rode most of the day along little-used trails, with only short breaks for rest and food. The sky never cleared, and they traveled beneath a screen of unbroken gray.

As afternoon wore on, the mist thickened and the air chilled. Nora was riding beside Christian when he turned his mount and dropped back to speak to Hext. He returned quickly, and she noticed their escort left the track they were following and plunged into the trees. As they vanished, she turned an inquiring look on Christian.

"We'll go on alone from here," he said. "Hext will make camp for us."

"But what about thieves and Jack Midnight?" she asked.

"No thief travels these woods."

"Why?"

He stared into the thickening haze and smiled slightly. "These are special woods."

"You're being deliberately mysterious."

"Mayhap you're weary. We'll rest in a little while."

He guided them down into the woods. As they rode on, the mist thickened into a white sea of moisture, yet to Nora it seemed that Christian never faltered nor confused his way. No birds sang, and all the animals of the world seemed to sleep, for she could hear little but the thud of their horses' hooves on the padded forest floor, the clink of snaffles, and the creak of saddle leather.

When Nora's bottom was numb and her leg cramped from hugging the sidesaddle, Christian at last called a halt. After tethering the horses behind a screen of bushes, he gathered a blanket and a leather water bottle. He led Nora to a pile of blackened wood, the remains of a tree that had been struck by lightning. Behind it he spread the blanket and helped Nora sit. Groaning, she stretched her legs out in front of her while Christian dropped to her side.

"Now will you tell me where we're going?" she asked.

"No."

Fidgeting with the tassels on her cloak, she cleared her throat and tried to keep her voice from quavering. "You're—you're not angry with me?"

"Of course not."

She wet her lips and tried again. "Christian, you haven't decided to—to put me away?"

Shooting upright, he gaped at her, eyes wide. "By God's toes, you're afraid."

Letting out a sigh, she shook her head. "Not anymore. Not when you look so astonished. It's just that I hardly know you."

"It wül take time for you to learn to trust me completely." He rested on his haunches and gave her a gentle kiss. "I understand, though it hurts to know that you fear me still. Don't be afraid."

, He kissed her again, and her agitation vanished.

"I'm so glad you're not going to put me away," she said as he rubbed his cheek against hers. He murmured something she couldn't understand. ' 'Because I would have to escape and fight you, for Arthur's sake."

Christian kissed her neck, then looked into her eyes. "I don't want to fight."

His stillness and the way he fixed his gaze on her finally snared Nora's attention.

"We're in the middle of a forest," she said, and put both hands on his chest.

He grasped her wrists, pulling her hands away as he bore her down beneath him. "I know."

"There's a mist."

"I know."

She wiggled as he grasped her ankle and slid his hand up her leg. "There could be bears and wolves."

"Not in this forest."

He pressed his palm against her inner thigh to spread her legs farther apart. When he slid between them, Nora tried to get up, but he pushed her back by the force of his lips on hers. She protested between kisses.

"We can't. Anyone might come along."

"Trust me. No one will come along."

She felt his fingertips teasing a path from her neck to her breasts. "Is this the surprise?"

"No. Now be quiet."

"But Christian—"

"Marry, woman, I shall have to make you be quiet."

Unfastening her cloak, he kissed her, and with his tongue in her mouth she couldn't voice her objections. She tried to capture his hands, but he was too quick. Before she could stop him, he pulled the neck of her gown down to expose her breasts and stroked a nipple with the backs of his fingers. Tendrils of pleasure crept through her body, and she arched her back, forgetting bears and wolves.

They made love fiercely until at last they subsided together, weak and damp with sweat and mist. Christian sank down to her breast, and Nora could feel his sex buried within her, still swollen and alive with readiness. She lay in a daze and squeezed the taut mounds of his buttocks while he panted in her ear. After a moment he lifted his head and looked at her. She was shocked to find his eyes glassy with unshed tears.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"Nothing. Everything is so right that I fear I'll lose it all, lose you somehow." He rested his forehead against hers. "Now do you see why I didn't want to need you, to love you? I'm afraid. It was like this when Father found me again. I was so afraid of loving someone, of being happy. If you love, you risk being hurt, and now I love you so cursed much, I think I would die if I lost you."