Winterbourne (14 page)

"Yes, I sometimes think that I would," Jaufre murmured, never taking his eyes from Melyssan's distant figure until she disappeared around the corner of the donjon. Then he realized with a start that the falconer was offering him the hawk. "N-no. Unhood him and place him back in the mews. I will look at him again, mayhap tomorrow."

He strode away in pursuit of Melyssan. She had not gone far, having paused by the washing trough near the kitchen. She bent over, trying to see her reflection in the water as she restored the strands of hair escaping from the net at the back of her head. As Jaufre came up behind her, he saw her efforts were futile, since the wind kept rippling the surface of the water.

He cleared his throat to announce his presence, but the way her shoulders tensed revealed she was already aware of him. " 'Twould be easier if you consulted your mirror."

She continued to stare down into the trough, trailing her fingers through the part of the water where the image of his own face wavered. "Mayhap it would, but I have not got a mirror."

"What! No mirror? I thought 'twas the first thing every mother pressed into her daughter's hand, teaching her at a tender age the art of admiring herself."

"My mother never thought I had much to admire," she said as she turned around. The bruise on her cheek had already dulled to a yellow shade, and although deep shadows ringed her eyes, they were once more as the sea becalmed. An uncomfortable silence stretched out between them, and she pulled her mantle more snugly around her shoulders, putting him in mind of last night, when it had been the only thing she wore.

Quickly he averted his eyes, lest his imagination wax too hot. "Did you sleep well?" he asked. The instant the words were spoken he could have driven his fist into his mouth.

" Y-yes," she whispered.

When he glanced back, he saw two bright spots of color glowing in her cheeks. He dreaded that she would turn his own fool question around on him, but fortunately she did not. His face would have flushed as red as hers if he had been obliged to describe his agonized slumber in polite terms.

He crossed his arms in front of his chest, feeling as awkward as a page slipping up to the ladies' bower to leave flowers for the lord's daughter. Whatever intimacy had existed between himself and Melyssan in his bedchamber was now whipped away by the morning wind.

"I need to talk to you in private," he said. "Is it too cold for you out here?"

She shook her head. "'There is a bench in the garden behind the kitchen."

It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her he remembered it well, he'd lived at Winterbourne much longer than she, but he swallowed the comment, aware that his irritation was more with himself for feeling so stiff and clumsy. He indicated his agreement with her suggestion and refrained from taking her elbow to steady her. Such gestures were one of the few things he'd ever seen raise the light of anger in those otherwise gentle eyes.

Most of the flowers in the small garden had already died on the vine—heliotropes, roses, irises, all withered brown, not to bloom again until the spring. There was a strong scent of apple in the air as Melyssan seated herself on the wooden bench beneath the tree, the ground around her feet littered with rotten fruit.

Jaufre chose to stand, not wishing to add to his sense of confusion by the feel of her body brushing up against his side.

"I fear I may distress you, my lady," he said. "But I must broach the matter of Hubert Le Vis's death."

The color began to drain from her cheeks, but she replied in a steady voice, "I can understand that, considering I have heard some strange accounts of it this morning."

"Mostly put about by myself. As far as the world is concerned, I caught Father Hubert breaking into my silver cupboard. We fought and I killed him. I saw no reason to risk your reputation by having people believe you had actually been—been…"

"Despoiled?" Her lips curved into a bitter smile. "Thank you for such consideration, my lord."

"I am sorry if my words give you pain, Melyssan. But you must know 'tis the way of the world to hold the woman responsible for such attacks upon her person."

She flinched. "And is that what you believe, my lord? That I invited Father Hubert to try and rape me?"

He began to pace, kicking aside the soft brown apples. "Don't be absurd. If I thought that, I would not be trying to shield you. I place the blame solely where it belongs—with that dead bastard they carted out of here."

But his voice lacked conviction because of something Tristan had said earlier that morning, stirring in Jaufre feelings of his own guilt.

"What possessed
Le Gros
to think he could ravish a lady under the protection of your roof?" Tristan had scowled.

"Too drunk. Too stupid. Take your pick." Jaufre had shrugged.

But Tristan had been satisfied with neither explanation. "Nay, part of the blame is yours, Jaufre. The wild way you talked to me on the way back from Normandy about what you would do to that harlot back at Winterbourne.
Le Gros
must have overheard you, probably thought you would not care. And you never even knew anything about the woman you called a whore. I'll wager you still don't."

Although he had silenced Tristan and tried to dismiss his words, the knight's criticism stung all the more because Jaufre feared there might be some truth in the accusation. The supposition was not a pleasant one, and he turned the wrath he felt at himself back against Melyssan. He had never invited the wench to come to Winterbourne. If she'd stayed at Wydevale where she belonged,
Le Gros
never could have touched her.

He stopped his pacing and planted himself in front of her. "I think the time has finally come, my lady, when you had best tender your excuses to me of why you did pretend to be my wife."

Melyssan gasped. "Why, yesterday, I tried and tried to tell you."

"Now I am of a humor to listen, so proceed. And, mind you, I am a fair judge of when someone is lying to me, so take care you speak nothing but the truth."

She set her mouth into a mutinous line, angry and dismayed by Jaufre's manner of questioning her. Muscular calves spread wide apart, hands resting on lean hips, his face darkened with a scowl, Jaufre looked no more of a humor to hear her explanation than he had upon his arrival at Winterbourne. He made her feel like a criminal brought before the king's justice—and Jaufre was her executioner.

She could almost laugh at herself when she remembered how she had descended to the courtyard, her heart fluttering with the thought of seeing him again. Alternating between shyness and anticipation, she had slowed and then scurried, her mind colored with remembrance of Jaufre cradling her in his arms, the tenderness of his caress as he laid her down upon the bed, his chest her pillow, the heat of his body restoring her to a warmth she thought she'd never feel again. He'd been so kind, so gentle, almost as if he genuinely cared that she'd been hurt, almost as if he cared…

That she'd cherished such notions was now a source of embarrassment to her as she faced her inquisitor. This Lord Jaufre with his stony brown eyes was enough to make her believe the man who had rescued her from Hubert Le Vis did not exist. She'd been daydreaming again, imagining an ebony-haired champion who was not real. The tall lord who towered over her now looked more like Father Andrew's description of the earl,
a dark, vengeful man
.

"Well?" Jaufre said, the sharpness of his voice making her jump. "I do not have the rest of the day to await your reply, Melyssan."

She sighed and with great patience began to recount her tale. She told it simply, leaving out much of the terror she had experienced at the thought of surrendering herself to the king, how much it had gone against her notions of honor to use his stolen ring, to tell such lies.

"And somehow the king believed my story about a secret marriage, and he arranged an escort to bring me to Winterbourne. He must have a great deal of respect for you, my lord."

Jaufre's lips curled. "Well, for my grandfather he had, since the old comte was one of the few to support John's pathetic attempts to retake Normandy. As for myself, that remains to be seen."

"But—but he made you the earl of Winterbourne."

"Aye, he did." Jaufre laughed derisively. " Tis amazing what you can purchase for the sum of a thousand pounds."

Melyssan's mouth dropped as Jaufre thus smashed another of her cherished illusions. "You bought your title?"

"What did you think—that I'd won it by some heroic deed of arms?"

She ducked her head and said in a small voice, "But even at Wydevale, we heard the tales of your valor in the Norman wars, how you risked your life to bring food to the soldiers starving at the siege of Gaillard."

"Valor does not fill a man's coffers or bring him advancement. Now enough about me. Get on with your tale."

"There's not much more to tell. After the trouble with Pevensy, I just stayed on and tried to help look after Winterbourne. I felt I owed you that much for the use of your name."

"Such a sense of duty. I trust it's strong enough to make you accede gracefully to my next request, for I must insist that you keep on being my wife."

Melyssan's heart skipped a beat. She was sure she had not heard him correctly. He could not… could not possibly be asking her to marry him. Despite herself, a foolish hope fluttered to life, only to be crushed by his next words.

"Of course, it would only be until I can find a bride to replace your brattling of a sister."

"Of course," she echoed bitterly, her hands resting on the staff, a reminder of her folly. How should she have dared think that Lord Jaufre would wed a crippled girl, risk having children that might be as accursed as their mother! Nonetheless she rose to her feet with quiet dignity.

"Lord Jaufre, I know that I have wronged you, but I think it a harsh punishment that you should force me to become your mistress." Then, as he raised one mocking eyebrow, she soon realized she'd made another humiliating mistake.

"We both know by now that I have no taste for forcing women, so there's no need for you to try to summon up any more tears. Nay, my only intention was that you should continue in your role as chatelaine of the castle, everywhere except in my bed."

Melyssan rubbed her throat in an attempt to rid herself of the lump rising there. "Can—can you not just let me go?"

"No, I can't!" When she regarded him with surprise, he added more calmly, "I am in enough difficulties. I shall probably be called to account for the death of Hubert Le Vis, and the king's suspicions have already been aroused against me since my trip to Paris. I don't need to further incur his displeasure by having him think I conspired to deprive him of a plaything he desired."

"Then why not just hand me over to him?"

"Nay, I might as well have let
Le Gros
have you last night as give you up to John now." Jaufre gave her an annoying pat on the shoulder. "I will continue to protect you from the king if you do as I say. In time we'll find some pretext for an annulment, and no one need ever be the wiser about your deception. Who knows? Mayhap we are distantly related."

"I hope the connection is very distant," she muttered.

He laughed and turned to walk away, seeming to take her lack of further protest as her consent to stay on at Winterbourne. But he halted at the corner of the low wooden kitchen building and looked back at her.

"There was one other thing that has been bothering me, Melyssan. How come you to be out of your bed at such a late hour last night?"

The question came so soft and sudden, she was not prepared. Before she could will it down, the flush of guilt spread over her cheeks. "I—I heard Father Hubert down in the solar scratching at the mural and I went to see what was wrong."

"You have remarkably keen hearing, my lady, to detect such a slight noise when you were on the floor above. Now I was passing right next the door, and the thickness nearly muffled the sounds of your struggle with
Le Gros
. It was only by chance that I entered the room in time to help you."

"Sometimes I just sense things," she said, staring down at his boots. "And I often walk at night. My—my leg gets stiff."

"I see." But the bland tone of his voice did not tell her exactly how much.

"Another strange event took place last night," he continued. "Those pilgrims that were at our feast just vanished. Do you not find that odd?"

She gave a tiny shrug of her shoulders, her mouth having gone so dry she could not speak. Jaufre gently pressed her, "What think you of that? Did you share any speech with these travelers whilst they were at Winterbourne, obtain any inkling of why they would risk the perils of the night to be on their way so suddenly?"

"Nay," she cried with too quick a denial. "Not at all. I have never been on a pilgrimage, so I know nothing of such things."

To her great relief, he let the subject drop. But before he strode out of sight, he gave her an odd penetrating look, and she knew with frightening certainty he had not believed a word she'd said.

Chapter 6

The clang of metal striking metal disrupted the quiet of the still morning air. Lord Jaufre drummed his fingers upon the hilt of his broadsword as he watched the progress of his squires paired off with sword and shield to practice the skills that would one day earn them their spurs.

But the young men whacking away at each other with such enthusiasm blurred as his vision scanned farther afield, across the bailey to the lone figure of a woman. She hugged the folds of her cloak tightly against her delicate frame, appearing to shudder as much from the blows she saw delivered as the biting cold.

"It's been a fortnight now," Tristan remarked softly as he brushed against Jaufre's elbow. "How much longer are you going to make that girl stay here?"

"As long as it pleases me."

" Tis not fair. She did not pose as your wife out of any motives of treachery or malice. Do you not believe what she said about the king?"

"Aye," Jaufre said. "I believe most of what she told me. That still does not mean I can permit her to walk away completely unchastised when her actions made me look such a fool."