Sanctuary of Roses (28 page)

Madelyne pulled her gaze from his and turned
slowly to look about the garden. ’Twas small, and half-shaded by
the castle wall, which, along with some other buildings she could
not identify, enclosed the whole of the garden. Several trees—fruit
trees, she thought, spying green bulbs of unripened apples and
pears—enclosed a small stone bench. Plants that she easily
identified as lavender, basil, thyme, rosemary, calendula, and
other herbs grew in pleasing disarray among narrow pebbled paths.
Obviously uncared for over time, the garden spoke of casual neglect
and it called to her.

She turned back and saw that he’d taken
steps toward her. Her heart thumping steadily in her breast,
reverberating into her throat, she offered a smile of thanks. “My
lord, ’tis very thoughtful of you to think of this. I had been
missing my own gardens—and those at Mal Verne—since our arrival.
But…surely you did not bring me here for any purpose other than to
discuss my future.” Her smile faded as she recollected what that
future would be.

“In truth, I brought you here for two
reasons, Madelyne,” he told her, gesturing to the bench. “The first
was because I knew that it would please you to have a private place
to go…and to be among God’s beauty. I have not forgotten your joy
at Mal Verne when you spent time in my gardens.” He cleared his
throat, glancing at the bench again when she refused his invitation
to sit. “’Tis a betrothal gift to you…of a kind…as I thought you
would prefer it to jewels or other adornments.”

Madelyne’s heart swelled painfully in her
chest and tears threatened to sting her eyes. The foolish man…did
he not know how bittersweet this gesture was? Refusing to look at
him, she reached for a stalk of lavender, pulling her fingers along
its stem. The sweet scent was released into the air as she rubbed
the small indigo flowers between her fingers, trickling them onto
the ground. “And the second reason?” she prompted, allowing a tinge
of annoyance to color her words.

Gavin looked away. “I wished to tell you
what transpired in the king’s chambers in a place safe from prying
ears.” He pushed his splayed fingers through the wild mass of hair
on his head, then his hand dropped to his side as he took a step
away.

“Why do you bring me here to tell me what I
already know?” she asked yanking a bright yellow calendula flower
from its scraggly green stem. “What all the court knows—that the
king has presented Reginald with my hand and the betrothal papers
are to be finalized.” She began to dismantle the peppery smelling
bloom, scattering bright yellow petals on the ground.

“Madelyne, please sit.”

“I shall stand, thank you my lord. I have
been sitting all the day. Please, I wish to hear what it is that
you must say, so that I may return to my work.”

His chest rose as he took a deep breath;
then the words rushed out. “The king changed his mind. He has
decreed that you are to wed with me.”

It was a moment before his words penetrated.
Her body went cold, and then warm. Rushing with warmth. “You? I am
to wed with you?”

He stepped toward her, capturing one of her
hands with his own. “Aye, Madelyne…the court will soon know that
you and I are to wed and that D’Orrais’s suit was declined by the
king.”

“But…why?” she asked, curling her fingers in
his palm, her heart bumping along madly.

“He believed I would be the better man to
keep you safe from your father…and to manage the lands at
Tricourten, when they become yours.” He tugged her closer and found
her other hand. “Madelyne, I am pleased with this arrangement…’tis
my hope that you will not find it too much of a disappointment.”
Though his words were stilted, she saw the uncertainty in his
eyes.

“I do not,” she told him, stepping closer to
him. “I do not find it a disappointment.” His presence engulfed
her…the faint, basic scent of him—something sharp and clean—and the
heat of his person. His fingers tightened around hers and he bent
his head to press his lips to hers…gently.

Warmth streamed through her, as, soft lip to
soft lip, they pressed together…breathed together…sighed together.
Madelyne’s lips curved in a gentle smile under his. Tricky had been
right.

“Do you find my kisses amusing?” asked
Gavin, pulling back just far enough to look into her eyes—and for
her to see the faint amusement in his own. Beautiful, dark eyes in
which she felt like drowning, they were….unshuttered and open with
emotion, soft and bathed in a gentle light. This was a Gavin she’d
not seen before.

She stepped back, her fingers remaining
clasped in his rough hands. “Nay, ’tis not you whom I find amusing,
but my maidservant…and her unerring wisdom.”

“Tricky?” He sat on the bench and gently
tugged her to sit beside him. The sides of their bodies touched,
and he transferred both of her hands into one of his large ones.
With the free hand, he reached to touch a tiny wisp of hair—one
she’d not even felt escape from her coiffure—and smooth it back
over the top of her head. “What is her unerring wisdom?”

Madelyne leaned slightly into his hand as it
slid from the crown of her head to cup the side of her face. She
would not tell him all—she must keep some secrets—but some little
hint might be amusing. “My maid is determined that she will wed
with your man.”

Gavin, his face relaxed from its familiar
sharp planes into an almost handsome appearance, reached to pluck a
daisy from behind her. “That is no secret she has an eye for
Jube…though I would be well-surprised should he decide to wed, as
his favorite past-time is to chase light-o-skirts.” He offered her
the flower.

She took the daisy, brought it to her nose,
then looked up at him from behind the petals, suddenly filled with
joy...and something else, deep and warm and unfurling inside her.
As if recognizing her feelings, his eyes darkened. His lips parted
as he leaned toward her, pushing the flower from his path.

“Nay,” she smiled under his mouth, “’tis not
Jube but Clem that she will wed.” She kissed him back, now,
reveling in how simple it had all become. She loved him and they
would wed and they would kiss like this every day.

A shiver of comprehension flitted through
her. So this was love, she thought, pressing her mouth to his,
feeling his hands as they came around her body to pull her close—as
their breaths joined, mingling with their mouths and mixing with
their sighs.

“Clem?” he said, pulling back as though the
words had just made their way to his consciousness. “Never. He
cannot stand the sight of her.”

Madelyne looked at him, as sure now that
Tricky would have her man as she’d been certain she would not.
“Aye, my lord Gavin, they will wed…for Tricky has a faultless way
of knowing.”

“And what would that be?”

“I would not tell you that. Just mark my
words and when you learn that I’m right, you may beg my forgiveness
for disbelieving me.” She allowed herself one of her rare,
capricious smiles and was rewarded by an expression of pure
desire—there was no mistaking it—that washed over Gavin’s face.

“Madelyne,” he whispered, pulling her to his
chest; not to kiss her, but to hold her ear to his heartbeat, “have
I told you that you are the most beautiful woman I have ever
seen?”

His arms around her, gathering her to him,
her head settled under his chin, and her own hands splayed over his
muscular back, Madelyne felt a security that she’d never felt
before. She closed her eyes and smiled.

Twenty-Three

The news spread like wildfire through the
court: Gavin Mal Verne was to wed again, and to the shy little nun
who was his sworn enemy’s daughter.

Reginald D’Orrais took his loss with
self-deprecating grace, which found him favor with the ladies. And
his slightly injured air—a sensitivity attributed to his broken
heart—only garnered him more favor with them.

“He appears to be recovering quite well,”
Judith commented to Madelyne as she surveyed her friend—soon to be
her cousin-by-marriage—in the gown she would wear for her wedding
on the morrow. “Maddie, you look stunning! Gavin will be unable to
catch his breath when he sees you!”

Madelyne peered at herself in the polished
mirror that Judith kept in the corner of her chamber. “Did Nicola
look beautiful on their wedding day?” she asked. She had been
fighting the curiosity for days—weeks, really, since her arrival at
Mal Verne—and now she felt she had the right to know what had
happened to Gavin’s first wife. Judith would know, and would tell
her the unvarnished truth…and she would live with whatever it was
she learned about her husband.

“She was beautiful, aye, in a brittle,
golden sort of way…while you, Maddie…you are the cool, sensual,
exquisite moon to her brassy, harsh sun.”

“What happened to her, Judith? I have the
right to know now that I am to wed with Gavin. All that I have been
told is that she took a lover…and that she died on the eve she went
to go to him.”

Judith settled back on her stool, looking at
her in surprise. “You do not know the whole of it then.” Her
greenish-brown eyes scanned Madelyne, and what she saw there must
have convinced her to speak the truth. “Her lover was your father,
Maddie.”

Madelyne could not contain a gasp, and she
felt the warmth drain from her face, leaving it cold and pale. “My
father? But…my father is mad!”

Judith took her hands into her warm ones.
“Aye. He is mad. But betimes he was a great favorite of the
court—at the least, for those who did not know him well. I know
from your own words that he laid a heavy hand to you and your
mother…and that the smile he bestowed upon the ladies hid only the
poison behind it. He spoke of his work with such fervor that he was
praised by all—even the priests.

“Work?” Madelyne felt a crawling in her
belly. “Aye…his work in that below-ground chamber….I knew only that
it was a dark, frightening place…but I do not know what work he did
that would have caused praise from the priests.”

“Aye, you must have been too young to
understand….Your father is an alchemist, in search of the Holy
Grail—the Philosopher’s Stone…which he believes will give him
everlasting life. He claims that through his devotion to Mary
Magdalen a vision was made known to him in which God revealed the
secret of the Holy Grail. He even believes that the saint’s own
blood runs in his veins!”

“My father? A holy man? Never…nay, my God
would not reward him thus. ’Tis just the proof that he is mad. How
is it that you know so much of my father…and yet I know so little?”
Madelyne tried to pull the threads of her whirling thoughts
together.

“Gregory was my betrothed, the one I was
contracted to since birth. He was a boy I’d grown up with. He’d
fostered at my father’s house, as had Gavin, and they were
friends—although Gavin was the elder by three years. My Gregory
made a foolish decision and became swayed by the fantasies of your
father, and he tempted Gregory to his side with promises of
immortality and power. The same as he has done with many a man. And
when they beseiged a keep that belonged to Gavin, a great battle
ensued…and in the course of which, Gavin struck down Gregory.”

“Oh, nay!” Madelyne sank onto Judith’s bed.
“Gavin killed your betrothed! Judith, I am so sorry….”

Judith nodded her head, but her eyes were
clear. “Aye, ’tis true. Gavin did nothing wrong, Maddie….I know
that—he sought only to defend his own, and his people, and he did
not know it was him, covered in his helm and filthy with dirt.
Gregory, in his foolishness, led Fantin into the keep through a way
only he knew because of his relationship with me….aye, Gregory made
a terrible mistake and he paid the price. I have long forgiven
Gavin, Maddie…but I do not believe he has forgiven himself.”

“And…Nicola? Was she too struck down…?”
Madelyne could not speak the words, though fear simmered in her
heart. Nay, Gavin could not also have the death of his wife on his
conscience…by accident or design.

“’Tis said she was leaving Gavin to go to
your father…she raced across the fields and into the forest, and
Gavin followed, trying to stop her. He tells me that she fell from
her mount—that the horse took a jump it should not have, and she
tumbled from his back. I believe that is the truth, Maddie, but
there are some who believe that Gavin—in his rage—took his hands to
her neck and broke it himself because he could not stand the
thought of losing her to another man.” She stopped, looking
directly into Madelyne’s eyes.”

“He has too much honor to do such a thing,”
Madelyne told her quietly—knowing that her friend needed to hear
her affirmation for Gavin.

“Aye, he does. I believe that. And that is
why it has been such agony for me to see him as he has slid into
this blackness which has surrounded him since the death of
Nicola…and that of Gregory. If I could see that anguish wiped from
his face, I’d be happy again. Mayhap you will be the one to help
him do so.”

“Mayhap I will.” Madelyne sat with her hands
quietly in her lap. On the morrow, she would wed him—this man whom
she knew not well, but one who’d shown her both gentle and harsh
sides.

“It is my greatest hope that you will,
Madelyne. ’Tis my belief it is God’s will that you have been turned
from your intent to be a nun so that you might save the soul of a
good man.”

* * *

“My daughter is to wed with
Mal
Verne
?” Fantin’s heart roared in his chest and for a moment,
his head felt as though ’twas lifting from his shoulders. He
slammed his palms onto the table in front of him to keep his
balance and stared in disbelief at the man who carried the
news.

“Aye, ’tis so. The king—with a bit of
prodding from his queen, as Mal Verne tells it—has gifted him with
your daughter.”

Yet another reason the queen must be
punished. Fantin’s eyes pounded as they bulged in his face.