Midnight Magic (3 page)
Gwendolyn wasn’t careless, having learned from her parents the importance of holding her heart on tight rein. So she appreciated Alberic’s handsomeness as if admiring a finely sculpted statue, choosing to ignore the faster beat of her pulse.
She could tell nothing of his thoughts during his perusal of the castle and contents of the bailey. Then he turned to look at her, and his eyes narrowed in disapproval at the sight of her chain mail.
Understandable, she supposed, and of no importance. What he thought of her strange garb mattered not.
Garrett, who’d looked weary from a distance, looked nigh on haggard up close, but not for all the gold in the kingdom would she embarrass the proud knight by fussing over him.
The knights dismounted, Garrett with the difficulty of age, Alberic with the grace of a skilled horseman.
Garrett attempted a smile. “Thought that was you on the battlements, Lady Gwendolyn. A welcoming sight to these unworthy, weary eyes.”
Now wasn’t the time for smiles and gallantry.
“You bring news, Garrett. What has happened?”
Garrett took a long, steadying breath. “The worst news, I fear. My lady, I am given the sad duty of informing you that your father and brother have . . . fallen.”
Nay! Sweet Jesu, nay!
For several long moments Gwendolyn could only stare at Garrett, unable to breathe, struggling to deny what she couldn’t possibly have heard. Then Sedwick cursed, mocking her feeble attempt at disbelief. Grief hit hard. Tears welled up and spilled down her cheeks. To keep herself upright, she grabbed hold of Garrett’s forearm.
“Fallen? Both?” she asked, almost choking on the words.
“In battle, near Wallingford.”
Briefly her thoughts flew to her sisters. The elder, Emma, and the youngest, Nicole.
Orphans, all of us.
But not poor, and not without resources. Father had been most specific on her course of action should the worst happen.
Gwendolyn palmed away her tears, forcefully setting aside her grief. Later she would mourn, but now she must see to her duty to her loved ones, and then to the legacy.
With her father gone, she alone could ensure the safety and continuation of the legacy.
“Where are they?” she asked of Garrett, relieved to hear her voice sounded stronger.
“On a cart in the woodland.” Then he sighed and put his free hand over Gwendolyn’s. “We brought Hugh and William home for burial. However, we cannot bring them into the castle until we are assured all at Camelen are prepared to accept their new lord.”
Shock left her speechless. Gwendolyn soon reasoned out who that
new lord
must be.
Sir Alberic of Chester.
She glared at the knight she’d witlessly allowed entrance. “You have no right to Camelen. My father’s will clearly states that if William does not survive him on his death, Father’s estates should be divided between his three daughters. Emma is entitled to the castle as her dowry, and Nicole and I to our proper portion of manors and fees. I suggest you seek your fortune elsewhere!”
“In time of peace, or had Sir Hugh supported the rightful king, then his will might have been honored,” Alberic said in his deep, rumbling voice that now held a surprising and unwanted note of sympathy. “Unfortunately, your father rebelled against the king from whom he held the charters for his estates, which gives King Stephen the right to seize and dispense the lands as he chooses.”
Garrett’s hand pressed down on hers where she still clutched his arm. “Sir Alberic is right, my lady. I witnessed the gifting. We have no recourse.”
She snatched her hand away, distraught Sir Garrett could so blithely abandon his loyalty to her father in favor of an upstart knight.
“What if we do not accept this new lord, Garrett? What stops us from tossing him out the gate and raising the drawbridge?”
Garrett, damn his hide, looked to Alberic, who answered.
“The king kindly allowed a company of royal soldiers to accompany me. They are in the woodland, guarding the men of Camelen who survived the skirmish and the cart bearing your father and brother. If I do not give their captain the signal to bring all into the castle, he will take everyone back to Wallingford for King Stephen to dispense with at his whim.”
Gwendolyn’s heart sank. “You dare hold the bodies of the lords of Camelen hostage? My father deserves a lord’s burial in the church! My brother beside him! ’Tis unconscionable for you to deny them—”
“I do not deny them, my lady. Too many men of Camelen have already been lost—”
“How many?”
His countenance softened. “We bring sixty-three survivors with us, many with wounds. That I know of, five chose not to return and went on their way. Three were wounded too severely to chance the trip. I expect they will be buried at Wallingford with the others.”
Gwendolyn quickly calculated, her heartache deepening. She looked to Garrett for confirmation. “Thirty-two men lost?”
He nodded. “One knight, several squires, including your father’s and mine. The rest foot soldiers.”
Sweet Jesu! So many. So very many.
Alberic continued. “So you see why I wish a peaceful transfer of lordship, my lady. Once done, you are free to bury Sir Hugh and William with all the honor and ceremony they deserve.” Then he turned to Garrett. “Tell the captain of the guard to disarm the garrison. Until I am assured of the men’s loyalty to me, only royal troops will carry weapons. Any man not willing to swear loyalty must leave by nightfall on the morrow.”
Garrett bowed. “So it shall be, my lord.”
My lord.
God’s blood, Garrett had truly gone over to the enemy! All those lives lost fighting an enemy of which Alberic had to be one, all for naught. How could he?
Gwendolyn opened her mouth to protest; Sedwick’s hand landed gently on her shoulder.
“My lady, your father always knew he might one day suffer retribution for his part in the rebellion. It appears the day has come, and ’tis we who must pay the price. If what Garrett and Sir Alberic say is true, then we have no choice but to bow to our fate.”
Gwendolyn closed her eyes and willed tears of anger and despair not to fall. If both Sedwick and Garrett, two of her father’s most trusted retainers and advisers, conceded the battle to Alberic, then he’d won the day.
She glared at the knight who usurped her father’s estates, and damned his cruelty in holding those she held dear as hostages against her cooperation.
Someday, when Maud won her crown, justice would be served. The usurper displaced. Camelen and its lands returned to the rightful heirs: she and her sisters.
For the nonce, she had no choice but to acknowledge Alberic of Chester’s lordship of Camelen, but swore she would never, ever recognize him as
her
lord. Thanks to the same father who’d lost Camelen to another man, she had resources of her own with which to flee and a safe haven awaiting her.
Soon after she retrieved the ring from her father’s hand, she must leave Camelen. While leaving her home and sisters behind would hurt deeply, go she would. The legacy, and the fate of all England, might depend upon her success.
A
MEN,” GWENDOLYN SAID IN RELIEF
, closing the bed-chamber door behind the departing priest. “I thought he would never leave us alone.”
Emma pushed back the green velvet coverlet, revealing her buxom nakedness, and eased her legs over the side of the bed. “He certainly gave me no comfort.”
Father Paul had stumbled over his words, the prayers he murmured with the intention of easing their grief having little effect at all. But then, perhaps the grief was simply too new and heavy for easing.
Gwendolyn helped her sister rise, grasping Emma’s forearm to lend support. “One cannot judge Father Paul too harshly, Em. He did what he thought right, though I admit a prayer or two less would have done. Nicole, fetch Emma’s chemise and surcoat.”
Ten-year-old Nicole nimbly jumped down from the chair she’d slid under the window slit, where she watched for signs that their father and brother were being brought into the bailey. Her wide brown eyes were reddened and puffy from weeping, a condition she shared with her older sisters.
Nicole handed over the chemise, then announced, “I say we get a sword and run him through.”
Emma gasped and sank down onto the bed. Shocked as well, Gwendolyn could only stare at the girl. Certes, Nicole tended to act first and consider the repercussions afterward, but the suggestion was beyond belief!
“Do you truly believe the priest deserves death for faulty prayers?”
Nicole placed her hands on her hips, ire twisting her pert, bow-shaped mouth. “Not Father Paul, this new
lord
. He is surely mean and . . . and evil. We cannot allow him . . .”
Fresh tears threatened to fall when Nicole’s bottom lip began to tremble. Gwendolyn wrapped the angry, fear-filled child in an embrace and strove for a soothing tone.
Not easy, given her own distress.
“Hush, now. Murder is not a solution.”
Nicole sniffed. “Why ever not? The king’s men killed Papa and William, did they not? And is this Alberic not a king’s man?”
The king’s men most certainly had killed their loved ones, and many more, and Sir Alberic undoubtedly was the enemy. Gwendolyn’s anger and grief threatened to overpower the need to chastise Nicole.
Gwendolyn released Nicole slightly in order to sit down on the bed next to Emma, who’d managed to put on her chemise. She shouldn’t be out of bed. One could still see the glaze of pain in Emma’s eyes, sense what it cost her to rise. Just leaning forward to take her surcoat from where it draped over Nicole’s shoulder caused her to pale.
Nay, Emma shouldn’t have to suffer so, and Nicole shouldn’t be driven to violence. And Gwendolyn wished she didn’t have to be the strongest among them, again.
Damn war. Father and William shouldn’t both be dead. But they were, leaving the de Leon daughters to grapple with the aftermath as best they could. Leaving Gwendolyn to hold heart and hearth together for the time left to her.
Gwendolyn swallowed her distress, grasped hold of Nicole’s hands, and prayed for the strength to find the right words.
“Father and William were . . . killed by the king’s men, ’tis true. But they fell in battle, with honor. There is no honor in murder, Nicole. Besides, we know not how they died, or at whose hand. But mark my words, ’tis probable they gave a good accounting of themselves. Never doubt that more than one king’s man suffered the same fate as Father and William.”
Knowing her father, he’d probably been in the thick of the fray, William close at his heels, their pride allowing nothing less. And look where pride led them: to their deaths.
“Would that this war would end,” Emma said softly. “No more deaths, honorable or no. No families left to grieve.”
“Stephen should surrender the crown to Maud,” Nicole declared, mimicking an opinion heard often from their father, a sentiment his daughters shared.
“Aye, but that is not likely to happen soon.” Gwendolyn pulled Nicole in for a brief but heartfelt hug. “Nor can we do aught about it just now.”
But you might be able to now,
a little voice whispered. Gwendolyn roughly shoved the nagging thought aside. No sense contemplating invoking the legacy to put an end to the war. At least not for the nonce. All of the conditions hadn’t yet been met and wouldn’t be until she reached her betrothed.
Nicole nodded her acceptance of her powerless state, then asked, “Will Sir Alberic allow us to stay? What will become of us?”
Gwendolyn wished she had an answer to allay what she realized might be Nicole’s worst fear, that the new lord might banish her from her beloved home.
“I know not for certain, but that is for Emma and I to worry over, not you. We will see you taken care of no matter what happens. Can you trust in us?”
Again Nicole nodded, though she looked no less concerned.
Indeed, what choice did the girl have but to trust her older sisters? Their mother had died ten years ago, shortly after Nicole’s birth, leaving the babe in the hands of a disinterested father, a loving but hapless brother, and two sisters who were more than eager to try their hand at mothering. Gwendolyn hoped they hadn’t done a bad job of it and ruined the imp beyond repair.
Sweet Jesu, may we all find the strength to bear whatever is to come.
She squeezed Nicole’s hands. “Go back to the window and watch while I braid Em’s hair.”
Nicole assumed her post at the window slit without comment, an oddity for her, a measure of her upset.
Emma used Gwendolyn’s shoulder as support when she rose, and Gwendolyn worried over Emma’s ability to withstand the next few hours without collapsing.
“Perhaps you should return to bed. Nicole and I can—”
“And have it whispered about that Sir Hugh de Leon’s eldest daughter gave her father and brother less tribute than their due?
Never.
Help me with my surcoat.”
If Emma was determined to see this through, then she would. Such was the power of her will. Would that her aching head succumb to that will. Unfortunately, the sick headaches ran their own course, sometimes lasting for several days. Rest and herbal potions made them bearable, but nothing they’d tried over the years could give complete relief.
Surcoat in place, Emma shuffled over to the stool. Gwendolyn fetched the ivory comb and eased it though the tangles, knowing every tug must hurt.
Emma rubbed at her brow. “The new lord, this Sir Alberic.
Is
he evil?”
Gwendolyn bit back a hasty, hateful comment about evil lurking in the hearts of all men; an answer Emma’s question might have evoked from Father Paul. Now was not the time to let loose her temper, not with Nicole in the chamber.
“I think not.” And not unfeeling, she had to admit. Alberic had expressed genuine sympathy for her loss, which she hadn’t wanted to hear from the man who’d benefited greatly from her grievous misfortune.
“Young? Old?”
“Perhaps a bit older than you.”
“Ancient, then.”
Gwen smiled at the attempted jest by a woman a mere two years older than herself. “Aye, beyond prime for certain.”