Time Enough for Love (2 page)

“No, Alberto, please.” Gwen stepped back, frantic. “I’m not ready. We don’t even know each other.”

“What is there to know? Jesus God, woman, I am lord of Canossa, and I have declared my love.” He grinned devilishly. “And you are a beautiful she-monk from Britannia.”

Gwen looked into his eyes. No, she was a linguist, a twenty-first century California girl, who had been working on her master’s degree in Italy. The monk’s disguise had at first been a fluke and a stroke of luck, given to her by a priest after she’d time traveled, to cover her skimpy modern clothing. The false identity had given her a modicum of freedom to journey about and survive in this man’s world
.

She-monk? As if. Time traveler? Yes.

Shaking her head, she realized he might never understand her truth. Was he too much a man of his time? If so, she’d never be able to marry him, because she would not consider living a lie with the man she loved, lies upon lies about who she really was, where she was from, going on forever. The realization washed over her in a tide of grief.

“Please, Alberto.” Gwen’s voice trembled as she shook her head. “Please, listen to me. As much as I’d love to, I can’t marry you. I’m sorry.”

He looked stunned. “I do not understand.”

“I know,” she said. “I wish I could explain.” She stared at the ground.

“Gwen, do you love me?”

She heard his voice as the faintest whisper. It took all of her self-control to resist, to do what she knew was right.

Their eyes met. “Alberto, don’t. Please, just take me back to camp.”

He got down on both knees. “Do not say no, my Gwendolyn. Promise you will think again on my offer of marriage.” He clasped her hands, holding them, desperate. “Please! Never have I begged for anything before!”

Moved by the depth of his anguish, she knelt before him. Alberto was a proud man. She knew if she refused this time, he would never ask again.

Indecision vied with pragmatism.
I can’t marry him. I love him!
She couldn’t imagine never seeing him again, never holding him.

Alberto’s words repeated in Gwen’s mind:
Promise you will think again
.

Heart shattering, she opened her mouth to reject him, but instead, at the last moment she heard herself say, “Yes, my Alberto. I promise, but you must give me time.”

*

Gwen worked feverishly to get her things ready to move out, her mind a jumble over Alberto’s proposal. Father Warinus worked beside her, gathering his own gear, but when he stopped abruptly and faced her, she knew he had questions.

“I do not mean to pry, but I saw Lord Alberto take a knee before you. Was he asking your forgiveness for something? Should I have cause for concern?”

“No, Father,” she said, dropping her voice to a whisper, her eyes focusing on the ground. “He said he loves me – wants us to marry – wanted to take our vows right there in the woods.”

When Warinus didn’t answer, she raised her gaze to his. His eyes were wide, mouth open, the very picture of surprise.

“I couldn’t say yes, Father, and I think that hurt him deeply.”

He shut his mouth.

“You see, Father, we hardly know each other, and there are things… I can’t marry him and spend a lifetime lying, and I can’t tell him… I can’t be dishonest.” Gwen hung her head.

“Dear Lord, are you already wed to another?”

Gwen looked up. “No.”

“Do you come to Alberto sullied?”

She glowered. “
Dammit, no!
”

“Forgive me for asking, but what then can your past possibly hold that is so troubling? If it be sins, ask God for forgiveness and rest easy. If your heart is pure before God, then you need have no qualms about keeping anything from Lord Alberto.”

Gwen stood there, desperately trying to think of a way out of the conversation, when a flurry of motion surrounded them. Everyone was ready to leave. Gwen scanned the area, needing to see Alberto one last time.

“Gwendolyn, go to him,” Father Warinus said as he led his mare forward. “He cannot go into battle with a heavy heart. Give him hope.”

“Father, yes, I––”

There he was. Alberto.

Gwen abruptly left the priest, pushing her way past soldiers and horses, not letting her gaze stray from the man she loved. She reached Alberto and grabbed his arm, just as he was turning away from another one of the scouts.

She spoke softly, not wanting his men to overhear. “I had to see you. I… we… Alberto, you’re going into battle!”

When he didn’t respond, Gwen looked at him and saw a smile.

“We’ve been over this before, my Gwendolyn. I shall do my utmost to avoid injury.” He brushed his hand against her cheek, then pulled her close, despite the watchful eyes surrounding them. “Especially now. I will carry the hope of your victory kiss in my heart, and that will make my arms all the stronger.”

Gwen held on tightly, inhaling his scent, masculine, woodsy, willing the moment to memory. “I’m still frightened, now more than ever.”

He covered her mouth with his, kissing her deeply, tenderly, then whispered, “I want you in my bed.” He kissed her again and the world fell away. Her body throbbed with desire.

“Excuse me, my lord.”

She started at the interruption, and Alberto pulled away, smiling at her as he responded to the soldier. “Yes?”

“All is in readiness,” the man said, holding Alberto’s warhorse, Heracles, and studying the leaves hanging above his head.

Alberto gazed at Gwen for a moment more, then kissed her lightly on the forehead. “Gwendolyn, we shall achieve victory. Then you and I will no longer be pestered by constant interruption and endless calls to duty.”

She felt a sudden dread. The battles in this time were hand-to-hand combat, and Alberto was not the sort of commander to sit atop his horse and direct his men from afar.

She found her voice. “You
must
come back to me.”

“If God wills it, I shall, Gwendolyn. You must take good care of yourself as well. I shall keep you in my heart.”

He took her into his arms and kissed her thoroughly once more, a little moan escaping from his throat as he pressed himself to her. Her knees gave way, and if he had not been holding her, she would have fallen.

Alberto drew back and grinned. “My lady love.” With that, he mounted his horse in one deft movement, winked at her, then clicked his tongue and cantered away, his men falling in line behind him.

Gwen watched until he was out of sight, then turned away. Within minutes, she had her things strapped onto her horse, and once mounted, Warinus, Barca, and Ranulf joined her, their horses laden and ready to depart.

With the fervent hope Alberto would return to her whole and alive, she faced La Rocca and her own, deadly serious mission.

14 July, 951, The Austrian Alps

The Alps filled Liutprand of Pavia with wonder. Clear-blue skies. Swaths of silver fir and spruce spiking toward gray pinnacles, crowned in gleaming white, the piney air thin, yet bracing.

Afoot and breathing hard, Prand led his mare over the scree, up, up, away from the travails of the bloody-minded South, the savage world of greed and ambition, in hopes of finding the one man who might put a halt to the conflict and misery below. The one man who might yet save Queen Adelaide.

Otto of Germany.

Prand had spent the night at the monastery-hospice of the young mountaineer-monk, Bernard of Menthon, famed for his goodness and his pack of huge rescue dogs. Bernard’s monastery was new and constructed near an old pagan site, for he was laboring to convert the heathen souls who clung to the deep woods and mountain passes. Most still practiced their ancient, godless ways, and, as Prand had seen, even now wore the furs and grass cloaks of their wild forebears.

Ahead, one of Bernard’s recent converts acted as guide, scrambling up a rocky path, his cloak of dried grass rustling. At his heels a mountain dog slobbered, its collar tinkling with little bells. The man was named Avitus, and he was young, not much over twenty. He looked back at Prand, his sun-bronzed face covered with spiraling, blue tattoos.

Throat parched, Prand’s gaze fixed on the small cask of wine hanging from the dog’s collar.

Avitus smiled and held up his hand.

“Thanks be to God,” Prand muttered, leaning on his walking staff as he sought to catch his breath.

Man and dog retraced their steps, Avitus coming down on his haunches a few paces away from Prand. There was a sheen of sweat on Avitus’s brow, but otherwise he seemed little affected by the thin air.

“Liutprand… my lord,” he said, speaking with a heavy accent. “We shall rest, for the way ahead is steep.”

“Thank you.” Prand hobbled his horse and let it graze on the new, sweet mountain grasses poking up from melting snow patches. Sitting on a log, he took a long pull from his wine skein and then offered it to Avitus, who gratefully took a swig.

Prand glanced at the dog. “Does he need water?”

Avitus nodded. “There is a stream over yonder.” His head tilted toward some scraggly willows. “We shall go that way. Brother Bernard has given the dog a name, my lord. He calls him Peter.”

The dog’s tail wagged.

“Ah, that is a good name for him,” Prand smiled at the massive animal, “for it means ‘The Rock.’” Proudly, he gestured toward his mare, her coat shiny and dappled gray. “Her name is Artemis. She comes from excellent stock. She was a gift from Alberto Uzzo, lord of Canossa.”

Avitus stared at the horse. “She is beautiful, but I would rather you had a donkey for this trek.”

“Of course that would be wiser, but I could not refuse his lordship. Besides, the passes are clearing from what Brother Bernard said.” Prand was about to add a bit more about Artemis’s bloodlines, when he noticed the young man’s gaze shift, fixing on something in the distance.

“My lord!” Avitus exclaimed, pointing.

Prand turned, squinting at the mountains. A dark mass moved on the slopes. Soldiers? Could it be possible? The news of Adelaide’s capture by Lord Berengar – may he be cursed for eternity! – must have traveled on the wind. Was it truly Otto?

Prand looked keenly at the coming swarm of scouts, then watched as Avitus stood and eased the axe from his belt.

“No,” Prand said, motioning the weapon down. “Calm your fears. He is the one I seek. King Otto.”

“How can you be certain, my lord?”

“Look to his flags. They bear his coat of arms, the double-headed eagle.”

*

As Prand and Avitus moved toward the king’s forces, they were aware of watchers in the woods. “German scouts, no doubt,” Prand told Avitus as they caught occasional glimpses of dark, shifting shapes amid the forest’s perennial gloom.

An hour later, two horsemen wearing the Ottonian crest appeared on the path, boldly confronting them. “Halt! You may go no farther on your own. Our king would know your business before he lets you pass,” one said as they turned their mounts and led the way to camp.

Just before sunset, Prand and Avitus reached the outskirts of the encampment. This was the largest army Prand had ever seen, with at least a thousand troops and hundreds of cavalry. He smiled at the soldiers as he walked on. That dark place in his heart, the spot filled with such hatred for Berengar, brimmed over with happiness. His enemy’s fate was sealed.

Soon, Prand stood directly before Otto’s tent. Avitus, along with the dog and Prand’s mare, had been directed elsewhere for food and tending. Prand’s gear and weapons, even the correspondence he carried from Alberto Uzzo to the king, had also been taken from him, for safekeeping, he was told.

Upon entering the royal tent, Prand glanced around, eyeing the sparse, yet rich, furnishings lit by the glow of several oil lamps. He was surprised to find he was alone. Where was King Otto?

As if in answer, Prand heard the tent flap drop. He pivoted on his heel. Two men stood there: one a servant, inconsequential; the other a tall man, a blond Saxon lord, the “Lion of Germany,” his gaze cool, reserved. Prand studied the king’s famed physique. Although nearing forty, he still held the look of a young man, broad-shouldered and slim of waist, a strapping barbarian.

Prand bowed. “Sire,” he began in German, “I am Liutprand of Pavia. We met four years ago, at the wedding of King Lothaire and Queen Adelaide.”

The king’s gaze momentarily flickered, flashing pain – and rage? – his brow creasing. But just as swiftly his expression reverted back to one of detachment.

“I remember you well, Liutprand,” he replied in the common tongue of the Italian people. He held up a scroll, but didn’t read from it. “My chancellor tells me this says you left Berengar’s house and have now sworn new allegiance to the lord of Canossa. Are we to expect your loyalty will last this time?”

Stung by the criticism, Prand lowered his gaze. “Yes, my lord. Without question.”

Otto regarded him silently for several moments. “So be it. I welcome you then.” He addressed his servant in German, “Translate the other documents, but don’t disturb me until I call for you.” The man bowed and left.

Prand knew Otto had a talent for languages, yet was unlettered. This astounded him, but it didn’t seem to bother the king in the least.

Ah, such are the strange ways of barbarians
, he mused.

Otto held up the scroll again. “I’m told this also relates how you rescued Queen Adelaide, and then it describes the circumstances of how she fell back into enemy hands, as well as may be ascertained.”

Prand nodded, his mood shifting to somber reflection as he recalled all that had happened to him, his queen, and family.

“I shall be blunt… I knew all this, Liutprand, for I have spies in high places and low,” Otto said grimly, “in places that would surprise even you, I think. That is why I am already on the march. I could not bide my time, awaiting an invitation to come to the queen’s aid. I had to act.”

“Which saved me much time and a long journey north.”

“Indeed. Now, I would hear the events of the past few months from your own mouth.” The king indicated a table, set for two. “Share a meal with me, and tell me of my lady’s plight.”

Prand knew Adelaide would be touched by the king’s genuine regard. “I would be honored.” He followed Otto to the table.

No other servants appeared. King Otto poured his own drink, then Prand’s, explaining, “I ordered no one disturb us.” He raised his cup and waited as Prand did the same. “To Queen Adelaide.”

“Queen Adelaide.” Prand drank deeply, thankful for the refreshing, nutty ale.

“Now for your part, tell me what happened,” the king continued. “I would also have you divulge all details of my enemy and his camp.”

“Before I do that, I would repeat the queen’s words, something she requested I tell you in person.”

Otto’s gaze softened. “What did my lady say?”

“Sire, she expressed this to me the last time I saw her. We were sitting in my uncle’s farmhouse…” Prand’s voice trailed off and he drained his cup, then without thinking held it forth to the king.

“Yes, Liutprand. I was told what happened to your family.” Otto poured them each another round. “All the more reason to wish for settling old scores.”

Prand looked at the king’s expression: sober, but not vengeful. “Yes, my lord.”

“You were saying?”

“That eve, the queen was filled with contentment – bless her soul – for she anticipated two things: reunion with her daughter and victory over Berengar. But then, reality intervened, and we discussed strategy, fearing Lord Alberto alone might not be able to make swift work of our enemy. She said, ‘Tell King Otto the Queen of Italy has need of him.’” He paused for the briefest moment, feeling the heat of embarrassment creep up his neck. “I do not, however, believe she was speaking solely of troop strength and battle plans.”

Otto sat there in silence, looking at his cup, swirling his ale.

“Sire, I have known the queen since she was newly arrived in Pavia. Yet even at that tender age, she was immeasurably self-reliant, a brilliant, independent girl. If ever I have a daughter, I could but wish that she… that she…” He shook his head. “Never have I heard Queen Adelaide say she needed anyone before.
Never
.”

Otto looked up, surprised, his feelings momentarily unmasked, then his eyes grew flinty.

Prand blurted, “My lord, I am no gossip. She bid me tell you this.”

Otto nodded, his gaze still hard, yet managing to express both sadness and anger. “I intend to kill Berengar,” he said, his darker nature revealed. “Only God, or the Pope, might have the power to stay my hand, or mayhap not.” The king gave a harsh laugh. “No, Liutprand. I think even they could not sway me.”

*

Although summer’s flowers bloomed in meadows not far below, a winter-like grip still held firm in the high alpine passes of southern Germany.

King Otto stomped slush from his boots and then stooped to enter his tent. After his meeting with Liutprand, a sudden hailstorm had inundated the camp. Not one to leave details to others, Otto made certain his soldiers were looked after, the horses well tended. He had walked through the icy muck, taking time to stop by dozens of campfires, sharing conversation with his men, eating a bite with them here and there, or swigging ale.

Feeling drained after the long day, Otto removed his fur-lined cloak and placed his hands before a brazier. The glowing coals made his freezing fingers ache even more.

His body servant, Henry, quietly came to his side, holding a large mug of wine. “Sire.” The man bowed and exited the tent, leaving Otto alone for the first time that day.

Yawning, Otto sat by the brazier and stretched out his legs, then sniffed his drink. Spiced wine, heavy with cinnamon and cloves. He took a sip. The heat was perfect, just enough to warm his tongue and soothe his fingers.

Savoring the moment, he knew it was, in all probability, the final lull before open war. He and his men would soon cross the Brenner Pass into Italy. After that, he planned to unleash hell on his enemy, and rescue the woman who ruled his heart.

His thoughts drifted back some four years. A widower with young children, Otto had been a vigorous thirty-five, already a king, a friend, and honored wedding guest of Lothaire of Italy. Ah, yes, he remembered the trip so well.

Pavia, what a grand city! The architecture was open, airy when compared to his capital, Quedlinburg, the weather sunny and bright, the cool, westerly breeze bringing the first bare hint of winter’s coming fury.

Otto dismissed his bodyguards at the door of St. Peter’s Church of the Golden Ceiling, then quietly entered, dabbed his finger in the font of Holy Water, and crossed himself. He wandered about until he spotted a statue of St. Monica in a side chapel. Removing his cloak, he knelt before the statue and bowed his head in prayer, relishing the silence.

“Blessed lady, please––”

He jumped at the
boom
of the church’s bronze doors. Choosing to ignore the interruption, he returned to his prayers, knowing he couldn’t be seen from the entryway. These moments were his own and not for public display.

Once finished, he rose and brushed off the knees of his leather breeches, then glanced casually about to see the new arrival. He stopped short when he spotted a young woman kneeling before the high altar. Shafts of sunlight bathed her in a golden radiance, which seemed meant for her alone. Her thick, blond hair hung loose, well past her waist, a gilded dream.

The sight of such beauty jolted him, and his body flushed with a heat he hadn’t expected or experienced in years. Annoyed by such an adolescent response, he slapped at his dusty knees once more, hoping to calm his racing pulse with stern practicality. When the glimpse of her hair forced its way back into his mind, he looked again, confident the unsolicited temptation had passed.

She knelt there still, seemingly unaware of his presence. Forcing himself to think rationally, he noted that she was of a wealthy family, by the fine fabric of her dress, by her delicate, poised figure. Her unbound hair told him she must be a virgin, unmarried, yet she seemed to be of an age to wed – his heart thumped again, like a stripling lad’s.