Virgin Bride (13 page)

Chapter 10

H
ow long did you think to keep it from us?" the abbess asked as she lifted her hand from the younger woman's softly rounded belly.

Graeye lowered her eyes as she searched for a response, but none was fast in coming.

The abbess, Mother Celia, clasped her hands together at her waist and waited, all the while reflecting on the young woman's return to the abbey nearly five months past. Though Graeye had always been a solemn soul, there was something changed about her—a kind of sadness that came only with disillusionment of the heart.

From the day she had returned, she had been thus. When she had been urged to complete her vows of sisterhood, she had declined to do so in no uncertain terms, offering only a tersely written note from the new baron of Medland to support her stand. Subsequently, she had entered the order of the convent and kept herself conspicuously absent from all but those activities she was required to attend.

However, there was also a strength and resolve to her character that showed itself most clearly with each passing day. No longer did she seem ashamed of the mark upon her face, refusing to don a wimple even when Mistress Hermana insisted upon it. Chin high, she carried herself well among the others, paying no particular attention to the stares that followed her. Nay, she was no longer the reserved child who had left the abbey with dreams in her eyes.

The abbess let go a long, weary sigh. Though her instincts had proved correct regarding the loss of her charge's virtue, she had hardly expected this to be the result. Mildly irritated, she tapped a foot among the rushes, her gaze dropping again to Graeye's waist, which, beneath the voluminous bliaut, hinted at nothing out of the ordinary.

If not for Sister Sophia's experienced eye, it might have been weeks longer before any had known of her condition. But why had Graeye kept it to herself for so long? After all, it was not unusual for daughters of the nobility to be sent to the abbey to give birth to bastard children, thereby avoiding dishonoring their families. Even now there were four others at the convent in various stages of pregnancy.

"I was ashamed." Graeye finally found the humble words to express the hard knot of anxiety that had settled over her since she had first guessed her state three months earlier.

"Ashamed?" Mother Celia repeated. Her eyes shone with a kindness and understanding that made Graeye want to seek the comfort of her arms. "Methinks 'tis likely you have little to be ashamed of, Lady Graeye. Was this not a man's doing?"

Since she had been a novice ready to take her vows, Graeye was not surprised the abbess believed her pregnancy was the result of forced intimacy. Though it would have been easier to let her continue to believe that, Graeye could not lie to her, not even by omission.

Shaking her head, she looked away. "I fear 'twas entirely my own doing," she admitted. "I blame no one but myself."

Her declaration was met with silence. When she finally ventured a look at the other woman, she was truly surprised at the compassion Mother Celia wore upon her face.

"I would leave here if it so pleases you," Graeye offered, having already given the matter some thought.

"And where would you go, child?" the abbess asked, taking her arm.

As Graeye contemplated this question—and not for lie first time since she'd discovered the new life growing inside her—the abbess led her to a bench and urged her down upon it In turmoil she stared sightlessly at the woman's retreating back as Mother Celia walked to a sideboard across the small room. A moment later a goblet of watered wine was pressed into Graeye's hand.

"Drink it all, child," Mother Celia said, lowering herself beside Graeye. "Then we will talk of your future."

Relieved that, at last, here was someone with whom she could speak of her mounting fears, Graeye quickly drained the goblet and turned to face the older woman.

A placid smile upon her lips, Mother Celia removed the goblet from Graeye's tense fingers and set it aside. "Now," she said, "tell me of the father. Is he wed?"

Graeye was painfully aware that she did not know the answer to that question. While at Medland she had never even thought to ask about Gilbert's marital status—had assumed he was without a wife. "I do not think so," she muttered, her shame growing twofold with the confession.

"Hmm." The abbess's lips twitched. "Think you he would be willing to wed with you if he does not yet have a wife?"

This was the most remote possibility of all—absurd. Gilbert Balmaine wanted nothing to do with her, bastard child or not.

"He would not," she said, her throat tightening painfully. "Methinks he would first give himself to the ..." Her voice trailed off as she prudently withdrew the word that had nearly fallen from her lips.

Knowingly, Mother Celia nodded. "And he knows naught of the babe?"

Graeye shook her head.

"Do you fancy yourself in love with him, child?"

Graeye's mouth opened and closed several times before any sound issued forth. "Nay!" she finally gasped. "He is the veriest of curs."

Mother Celia was quiet a long moment, reflecting back upon the note given her the day of Graeye's return. Though brief, the baron had been explicit regarding Graeye's entry into the convent Because she had not wanted to read too much into it, Mother Celia had not understood then what she thought she did now. There was simply no reason for the man to have concerned himself with Graeye's future at the abbey, unless he'd had knowledge of her undoing—a knowledge that, she suspected, was of a personal nature.

"Do not worry," she said, patting Graeye's hands where they were tightly clenched in her lap. "You will be provided for." She stood and walked to her writing desk.

Having been excused, Graeye withdrew from the chamber and slowly made her way back to the modest room she shared with two others.

***

The cold, wintry months that followed Graeye's return to the abbey did little to improve Gilbert's disposition. Not only were his days filled with the management of his newly expanded estates, but also with numerous forays against the brigands that attacked his villages.

Worse, the long nights dragged by on leaden feet. When sleep finally came to him, too often his dreams were haunted by sad, pale eyes, soft lips that rarely knew a smile, and the feel of silken strands that ran through his fingers in an endless stream of burnished gold.

Most nights that he lay awake, his body burned with a great, aching need, but he found little ease with any of the willing wenches he took into his bed. Soon he refused their invitations altogether and fell into a deeper kind of torment that made it nearly unbearable for him to live with himself. Constantly, he fought the unwanted visions of Graeye, even attempting to banish them with the fading memory of Lady Atrice, but he had no more success with that than he'd found with any of the women. It made for a restless sleep and a foul temper when the morn finally deigned to arrive.

Five months after Graeye's return to Arlecy, a messenger made his way through a frigid, pelting rain to Medland in search of Gilbert. Gilbert, however, was at Penforke. Sir Lancelyn, who had been made the castellan of Medland, bade the man pass the night at the castle and, before the sun rose the next morning, sent him on his way with a small escort to speed and ensure his safe journey. Thus the disgruntled messenger was very nearly in as foul a mood as Gilbert when he was ushered into the great hall of the donjon at Penforke.

After a brief introduction, which Gilbert cut short with an impatient wave of his hand, the man was led to await his audience on a bench against the far side of the room. Had he had not been so frightened by the size of Gilbert Balmaine, he would surely have been tempted to return the man's rude manners.

The time lengthened, and when the messenger was finally beckoned forward to deliver his message, it was found he had fallen asleep, an angry scowl upon his face.

Having spent a good deal of the morning confined with his droning steward, who had painstakingly cited each of the losses suffered from the raiding brigands, Gilbert had little tolerance for the messenger's fatigue. He divested the man of his duty by retrieving the message himself. The man slept on with nary a groan of protest.

Without regard for the elaborate wax seal that held the parchment closed, Gilbert broke it and strode back to where his steward was bent over his books. He grabbed the man's arm and held the parchment out to him.

Though he could well do it himself, Gilbert found reading and writing tedious work. Given a choice, he left it to his steward, or any other man capable of that rare talent with words. He far preferred the spoken form over the written.

Leaning back against the edge of the table, he impatiently drummed his fingers on its surface as he waited for the steward to begin reading.

" 'Tis from the abbess at Arlecy," the man informed him, squinting at the broken seal.

Gilbert stilled.

"It says, 'Baron Balmaine, there is a discreet matter of great importance that I must discuss with you regarding ...'" He cleared his throat. "... Lady Graeye Charwyck. She is—' "

Before he could read any further, Gilbert snatched the parchment away. Ignoring the steward's stammered entreaty, he turned the message toward the light of a torch and held it at arm's length to read it for himself.

"She is many months with child," he read silently, then dropped his lids closed over eyes that burned with fatigue.

His heart beat a lurching rhythm in his chest as he attempted to get the surge of emotions—a mixture of outrage, disbelief, anger, suspicion, and even a spark of something he refused to put a name to—under control.

His hands trembling, he reread the message from the beginning, then paused momentarily before proceeding with the remainder. "As she was last under your guardianship, I would ask that you make haste to call at Arlecy that we might discuss this matter more fully."

Allowing the parchment to curl back on itself, Gilbert drew a hand over his face, raking his fingers through the thick growth of winter beard. Was it possible Graeye carried his child—after but one night of joining? And if she did, why had she waited so long to inform him of her condition? Was this yet another of her carefully worked deceptions?

In spite of his body's constant, treacherous yearnings for the woman, Gilbert knew he mustn't forget she was a Charwyck. Aye, it could just as easily be any other man's child she carried ... if she carried a child at all.

In the back of his mind he acknowledged that, even without the arrival of this message, the unwanted bond between himself and Graeye would have had to be addressed sooner or later. Unfinished business stood between them, and it needed to be seen through to its completion ere he could free himself of this stranglehold she had on him. Not for the first time in the past months, he entertained the thought that if he could but have her once again, it would be enough to rid himself of her forever.

Still, if it was his child she carried ...

His thoughts turned to the trap he had been planning to lay for the brigands two days hence. It was an opportunity he was loath to let pass, for if carried out without mishap, it would likely see Edward Charwyck, the brigands' leader, delivered into his hands.

Until that moment Gilbert had thought there was nothing he wanted more than to apprehend the man.

He was wrong.

Groaning, he crumpled the crisp parchment in his fist and called for his squire.

Chapter 11

W
ith growing impatience Gilbert paced the room he'd been asked to wait in a very long half hour past. From time to time he stopped before the window and scanned the courtyard below, and the winter-ravaged garden that stretched far to the left. Then he resumed his pacing.

What was keeping the abbess? he wondered with deepening irritation. Though he'd given no warning of his arrival, he had been assured she would be along shortly. Considering the wintry weather, his men would have grown restless by now where they awaited him outside the walls of the abbey. Had he known the wait that lay ahead, he would have insisted upon their being brought inside as well.

Cursing beneath his breath, he dropped down upon the hard bench facing the door and began to massage the aching muscles of his leg. Since he and his men had left Penforke two days past, nearly every waking hour had been spent in the saddle. Though that by itself did not usually trouble his old injury, coupled with the cold, damp weather, it proved quite painful.

Mayhap the abbess was in the midst of none, that time of prayer taken shortly after dinner, he thought, trying to reason himself out of the foul mood he was sinking more deeply into with each passing minute.

A moment later there was a light rap on the door, then silence.

"Come," he called, and stood as the door was pushed inward.

Tall and regal as any queen, the abbess stepped inside, then closed the door behind her. "Baron Balmaine," she said, coming to stand before him. "I am Mother Celia, Abbess of Arlecy."

He had expected Graeye to accompany her, and he felt oddly disquieted by her absence. Was she in the corridor awaiting a summons? Or did she wait in one of those buildings where none but the clergy were allowed to venture?

Forcing his mind from its wandering path, he bowed, then removed the travel-weary parchment from his belt and handed it to the woman. "You wished to discuss this matter of Lady Graeye with me," he prompted.

Smiling faintly, she took the document from him and lowered herself to the bench. "Umm, yes," she said, perusing her own precise handwriting before looking back up at him. "First, though, I must apologize for having begun to question your sense of responsibility, Baron. You see, I expected you much sooner, and when you did not come ... well ..." She shrugged, gracefully lifting her hands palms up.

Lips twitching with irritation at the thinly veiled reprimand, Gilbert crossed to the window and stared down at the small procession of nuns walking across the courtyard. They kept to a line so straight and unwavering, he could have been watching a military parade.

"As I was not at Medland when your message arrived," he said, " 'twas delayed until it could be delivered to me at Penforke."

"Ahh," Mother Celia breathed. She was somewhat placated by his explanation, but she wondered at the black mood emanating from him. She had expected he would be less than pleased by her missive, but had never guessed he would feel it so deeply.

"You are here now," she said, hoping to draw him back from the window, "and we've much to discuss. Come, sit beside me." With a sweeping hand she indicated the length of vacant bench.

He did not move from his position at the window, apparently preferring the distance he had placed between them, but he did give her his full attention.

" 'Twould seem there is much to discuss," he agreed. "But where is Lady Graeye?"

The abbess nodded toward the window. "If she is not there yet, she will be shortly. Always after dinner she feeds the birds."

Gilbert glanced down into the courtyard again. For the first time he noticed the mass of birds that walked the flagged stones and flitted from ledge to ledge as they waited patiently for their-promised meal. But he saw only the backs of two nuns as they passed from sight between two buildings. Shaking his head, he looked back at the abbess.

"Shortly," she said in a reassuring tone that set his hair on end.

Did she think him anxious to catch sight of Graeye? he wondered. His lips compressed tightly as he rejected such an absurd idea. Nay, it was mere curiosity as to her whereabouts that bade him search her out.

"I would have expected her to accompany you," he said, forcing as much indifference into his voice as he could manage.

"Oh, nay." The abbess shook her head vehemently, as if to impress upon him the error of his assumption. "I assure you, Lady Graeye knows naught of your coming, Baron."

"Then?"

The abbess clasped her hands and pinned him with a serene gaze. "Upon discovering Lady Graeye's condition, I took it upon myself to contact you. You are responsible, are you not?"

Drawing a deep breath, Gilbert leaned an arm against the wall alongside the window. "She has said I fathered the child she carries?" It was more a statement than a question.

What looked to be a self-satisfied smile flitted across the woman's face. "Nay, but I have guessed correctly, have I not?"

If the abbess was to be believed, and Gilbert was reluctant to extend his doubt of God to this woman, then his conclusions about Graeye's character lost much of their credibility. It unbalanced him to hear she had not laid claim to him as the father, and that she was unaware he'd been sent for.

Still, he offered a nonchalant shrug before answering Mother Celia. "There is a possibility the child is mine," he said, "but only that."

The abbess let go a deep, unexpected sigh of relief. "Then 'tis certainly yours."

Gilbert's eyes narrowed on her. "I do not know that," he said, wondering what sly trickery she was attempting to work upon him.

"Long have I known Lady Graeye—though I admit, not well. I was but a sister of the order when she first came to us ..." The abbess paused and calculated the period of time since elapsed. "Eleven years ago." She offered Gilbert a fleeting smile that lit her features and made her considerable number of years dwindle to insignificance.

Gilbert blinked, and when next he focused upon her, she looked her age again. Settling himself in for the duration, he folded his arms over his chest and nodded for her to continue.

"Graeye has always kept to herself ... a very sad child when she came to us," she said with regret. "Most of the children sent to us do visit their homes, though it may be infrequently. But it was not that way for Graeye. Not until her father sent for her last autumn did she leave Arlecy since she first arrived as a child— and never did she receive any visitors here, 'tis not an easy life she has had."

For an unguarded moment the walls around Gilbert's heart began to soften. He rebelled by dragging forth the crumbling memory of Graeye's deception.

"Although I have never met the man," Mother Celia continued, "I have heard much of Baron Edward Char—"

"No longer baron," Gilbert was quick to inform her.

The woman nodded. "However, this I do know. Though the blood that runs through Lady Graeye's veins is that of her father's, she is not of the same ilk."

Determined to maintain his beliefs about Graeye, Gilbert simply stared at the woman. He did wonder, though, what enlightenment she might use next to persuade him of whatever it was she aspired to.

"I had great hopes for her in your world, Baron," she said some moments later, her gaze direct. "You see, I have always known 'twas not in her heart to join the sisterhood—"

"Then why did she consent to taking the veil?" Gilbert interrupted, though he felt regret for having stepped again upon the woman's words.

The abbess let his rudeness pass without reproach. "There was no other option for her, and 'twas her father's express wish that she become a nun."

"Why?"

Mother Celia shrugged. "The mark she bears." She touched a finger alongside her own eye. "Though I know it only to be a mark of birth, there are others who would say 'tis of the devil. That was also her father's belief, and methinks he thought to appease God by offering Graeye to Him."

Turning this over in his mind, Gilbert looked out the window and down into the courtyard where a single figure had appeared. Though covered from head to foot in a long black mantle, her back to him, he knew it was Graeye. Without realizing he held his breath, he watched as she attempted to coax a reluctant bird down from its perch atop a roof. Unable to resist her offering of a large crust of bread, it was not long in coming down.

Gilbert felt not only a softening of his heart as he stared at her, but a decided crumbling of the walls that guarded it. Again his mind threw up her deceit before him, but it was useless. It would seem she had not set out to trap him into marriage as he had convinced himself, but she still had used him so that she would not be forced to take vows into sisterhood. After an internal struggle so fierce, he felt he'd taken on wounds as fearsome as the one that scarred his leg, he finally conceded to a standoff between heart and mind. But it was a confusion he could not afford—a tumultuous mixture of antagonism and yearning that he could see no way to mesh.

"How many months is she with child?" he asked, frustrated by his inability to glimpse the shape of Graeye's body beneath the layers of winter clothing.

"It approaches five months since she returned here," the abbess stated as she stood and walked toward him. "So she is at least that far along. No less, I assure you."

Gilbert's jaw worked, alternately tense and slack as he followed Graeye's progress about the courtyard. He willed her to turn around so that he could get a better view of her and see again the delicate beauty of her face. He was sorely disappointed when, a minute later, she unknowingly fulfilled his desire and turned. He could not even glimpse her hair or features, completely hidden as they were beneath the spacious hood.

"She does not belong in a cloister of nuns," the abbess murmured, having come to stand beside him. "Lady Graeye is of your world."

"Aye," he heard himself concede. "She does not belong here."

Moving nearer, the abbess captured his gaze with hers. "Then you will wed her and give her child your name?"

There was no hesitation in Gilbert's response to that ridiculous proposal. " Twould be impossible for me to many her," he declared.

Frowning, Mother Celia stepped back from the baron. "I do not see the difficulty," she said, secure in the knowledge gained from her recent inquiries into his personal life. "I am told you are without a wife. Mayhap you are betrothed?"

She watched as he threw a wrathful glare down at Graeye, who once again had her back to them. "Nay," he ground out, turning the fire in his eyes upon the abbess. "Were I of a mind to wed with a Charwyck"—he fairly spat the name—"there would be naught to prevent me from doing so. But as I would never entertain such an idea, I fear 'tis not the solution you seek to this dilemma."

It was Mother Celia's keen perceptiveness that had elevated her to her position at the abbey. She used that talent now as she studied the baron. "I know naught of your dispute with the Charwycks, Baron Balmaine," she said, "but I would ask that you not visit the sins of Lady Graeye's family upon her. She is hardly responsible for any wrongs done you by their hand."

"And what of wrongs done me by her hand?" he rejoined, his anger obviously mounting.

"I know not what wrongs you speak of, Baron, nor can I guess at what Lady Graeye might have done to earn your ire. But if you condemn her, I would first have you consider your own conduct." His head snapped back. "My conduct?" he roared. "Aye." She nodded curtly, indifferent to his vibrant rage. In truth, she was too concerned with controlling her own emotions to worry overly much about his.

"The lady was chaste when she left the abbey, and spoiled without benefit of marriage when she was returned to us. That you would set yourself to seducing an innocent young noblewoman is beyond reproach— and then restore her to the Church with your child growing full in her belly!"

Gilbert almost choked on that, his face darkening as he met her reproachful gaze. So it was he who had done the seducing, eh?

"Then she has accused me of having seduced her," he snarled, clenching his fists so tightly, his nails dug into the toughened skin of his palms. "Truly, it doth surprise me she did not think to call it rape."

The abbess's lids fluttered momentarily before lifting again. "Nay, as I have already told you, Lady Graeye accuses you of naught, Baron Balmaine. Though I had initially thought otherwise, she made it most clear she had not been ... forced."

But she had made it clear she'd been seduced, Gilbert concluded. And it was obvious the abbess did not believe Graeye capable of any deception. Bitter laughter, accompanied by denial, very nearly made it to his lips before he forced it back down. Regardless of what lies the wench had told, he would not reveal to anyone the true circumstances surrounding her impregnation— though she certainly warranted no such consideration.

Mother Celia's voice broke into his thoughts. "I would ask that you reconsider and marry the lady Graeye."

"She is a Charwyck," Gilbert bit off, "and every bit as deceitful as her brother and father. Nay, look elsewhere, for I would not bind myself to that one."

In an instant the abbess abandoned all efforts to keep her composure intact. "Then your taking of her virtue was merely a ploy by which to have revenge upon the Charwycks?" she asked blundy, annoyed at this man's continued obstinance.