WinterofThorns (11 page)

The trouble was it wasn’t his to have or
keep.

“How long do you intend to keep her here against
her will?” Lady Millicent asked. She was walking arm in arm with her godson
along the banks of the stream that ran to the north of Wicklow Castle.

“Are you sure it is against her will?”
Vindan asked.

“I have come to know my son’s wife in the
week I have been here, Vin. She wishes to be with her husband and not locked in
this limbo in which you are keeping her. She needs to be with him and he
desperately needs to be with her.”

The prince grunted but made no comment to
her words.

“You are a better man than this,” she told
him.

“Than what, milady?” he asked.

“One who would do what you have done,” she
said, and when he looked down at her she gave him a hard stare. “One who I
believe regrets what he did but doesn’t know how to remedy the situation.”

“I could annul the marriage and Join with
her myself,” he said, holding her gaze.

Lady Millicent stopped walking. She
narrowed her eyes at him. “You would not do that, Vindan.”

His eyebrows shot up. “Wouldn’t I?”

“You’d best not,” she said in a voice rife
with warning.

“What will you do, milady? Run to my father
to condemn me?” he asked, a muscle ticking in his jaw.

“To my knowledge your father doesn’t know
what you’ve done and I shan’t be the one to tell him, but unless you do right
by Seyzon, the king will learn of what transpired at Riverglade. Think you he
will be pleased, Vindan?”

“I doubt he’d care one way or the other.”
The prince unhooked his arm from hers. “I haven’t seen him since my thirteenth
birthday nor have I received one missive from the great man. Presents on my
feast day, aye, but even those were chosen by my mother or one of her women. As
far as King Nolan is concerned, I am little more than an afterthought.”

“He would care, Vindan. Your father has
always been a moral man.”

“If he was a moral man, milady, he wouldn’t
have spread his seed far and wide over this land and several others,” he
quipped.

“A bad trait you have copied it seems,” she
said with a hard edge to her voice.

“Don’t berate me for my appetites, milady,”
he cautioned. “They could get worse.”

“Let me take her with me when I leave on
the morrow. Jana needs to be where she belongs.”

“And if I believe she belongs here with
me?” he questioned.

“Then you are deluding yourself and causing
a good woman—and a once-loyal friend—great stress.”

“Once-loyal?” he repeated. “Is that how
Seyzon views himself now?”

“Truthfully?” she asked. “I don’t know. I
do know he isn’t happy with you.”

“Tough shit,” the prince said and ignored
her hiss of reprimand. “He defied me.”

“And was punished. Let it go at that.”

“What if I can’t?”

“Allow her to accompany me tomorrow,” she
said, ignoring him. “This punishment you delivered to my son has run its
course.”

He dug his hands into the pockets of his
slacks and looked out over the lake.

“He hurt me,” he said.

“No less than you hurt him,” she countered.
“At least he did no damage to your immortal soul, Vindan. Can you say the same
of his?”

* * * * *

For two weeks he kept the Lady Millicent
waiting on his decision. When he finally decided to give in to the disappointed
looks she kept aiming his way, he told her she should return to Lavenfeld.

He did not see her off.

Nor did he actually give Jana permission to
leave with her. What he
did
do was have Jana’s belongings ready at the
stables when the Lady Millicent’s carriage was brought round. As the carriage
rolled away, he stood atop the battlements and watched until it was out of
sight.

But just because she was out of sight did
not mean she was out of mind. If anything, she was even more firmly entrenched
there. Anger at his godmother, at Seyzon boiled inside his blood. Misery at
having Jana leave burned a hole in his heart. He missed her even before he
watched her step inside the carriage. After that, he had to grip the sharp edge
of the stone parapet to keep from shouting to the guards not to allow her to
leave.

“He doesn’t deserve you,” he said to the
wind whipping around him. “You should belong to a man who could lay the world
at your feet.”

A man like him.

He would never forgive Seyzon Montyne.

* * * * *

Seyzon was as miserable as a man could be. Prowling
Lavenfeld like a caged animal, he could not seem to rid himself of the ennui
that had killed his appetite and the depression that had destroyed his sleep.
He rarely spoke to anyone and never smiled. His heart hurt so badly he had
trouble drawing breath. And his soul?

His soul was as murky as the waters around
the moat at Riverglade.

Or as foggy as the midnight beyond the dark
windows.

He reached up to scratch at his chest with
fingernails that needed clipping—and cleaning. His shirt hung open—the sleeves
rolled up his forearms—and it wasn’t clean by any stretch of the imagination.
Neither were his pants. Minus a belt and with the waistband button undone, they
precariously hung on his hips. The disinterest in eating had caused him to lose
weight. The pants looked on the verge of sliding off his lean body as he
stepped on the cuffs.

And he was in dire need of a haircut. The
dirty, lank mop of dark hair that flopped into his face gave him the look of a
homeless man.

He shuffled his bare feet along as he
meandered through the Great Hall and into the library where there were
decanters of liquor calling to him. He was reaching for the Chrystallusian
brandy decanter when his mother’s lover entered the room.

“Your mother is home,” Arbra told him. When
a shrug was the only indication he had heard the Master-at-Arms, Arbra sighed.
“She arrived half an hour ago. I’ve been looking for you ever since. Where were
you?”

Another shrug.

Another sigh.

“She did not return alone.”

A grunt was Seyzon’s reply as he splashed
brandy into a crystal snifter. He lifted the brandy to his lips but Arbra spoke
before he could take a drink.

“I believe your lady-wife was her traveling
companion.”

As though he’d been goosed by a lightning
bolt, Seyzon jerked up his head. “What?” he managed to ask.

“I was told there is a very lovely young
woman with Lady Millicent.”

The snifter slid out of Seyzon’s hand and
hit the floor where it shattered.

“What?” he repeated.

Arbra frowned at the mess on the floor.
“Carlson took her bags up to your room so I’m assuming that’s where they should
be and that’s she’s your—”

With a whoop of joy, Seyzon lunged at the
older man, flung his arms around him and lifted the heavy warrior from the
floor. He could barely hold him and nearly toppled the two of them to the floor
had Arbra not prevented it.

“Go, brat,” he told Seyzon with a laugh.
“Your lady waits.”

Sprinting from the room, Seyzon took the
stairs to the second floor two at a time, his arms pumping as he ran.

“Jana!” he yelled.

His mother poked her head out of her room
and smiled as he sped past. It was doubtful he even saw her standing there. Her
greeting to him was drowned out by the heavy beat of his thundering heart.

“Jana!”

He skidded to a halt before his door and
with shaking hands opened the portal.

She had her back to the door, her arms up
as she stood before the mirror pinning her long braid atop her head. In the
corner of the room was the copper bathtub from which steam drifted. She
turned—her smile as radiant as the sun. Peeking out from beneath the hem of her
traveling gown, he saw her bare toes and for some reason that put a huge lump
in his throat.

“Jana,” he whispered.

“Seyzon,” she whispered in return.

He thought his heart might well burst from
his chest as he stared at her. He stood frozen in the doorway, drinking her in
like a man dying of thirst, barely able to believe she was there in his room. Plowing
a shaky hand through his hair, he took a step toward her—afraid she would
vanish if he as much as blinked his eyes.

“How are you, milord?” she asked.

“Well,” he managed to reply. He took
another step. “And you?”

“I am better now that I am here with you,”
she answered.

He swept his gaze over her from head to
toe. “He did not hurt you.”

“He did not,” she said and it seemed to him
the shining light dulled a bit in her lovely eyes. “He was most respectful.”

“For that I am grateful,” he said. He went
to her but stopped just short of dragging her into his arms as he so longed to
do. “I was terrified that he would keep you from me.”

She bit her lip then closed the distance to
within a foot of him. Looking up into his eyes, hers filled with tears. “Do you
still want me, milord?”

For a moment he was unable to speak. That
she would doubt that he did cut him to the quick but he understood all too well
why she asked. To some, she was damaged goods and perhaps in her own eyes that
was what she believed herself to be.

A single tear eased down her cheek.
“Milord?” she pressed, her eyebrows drawing together.

He reached for her hand and when she put
her palm in his, he sank to his knees before her.

“With all my heart,” he said, his voice
breaking. He lowered his head and laid his forehead on the back of her hand.
“With all my soul and all my being.”

She smoothed her other hand over his hair.
“I prayed that would be the way of it.”

He lifted his face to look at her, brought
her hand to his lips and spoke, looking up through his eyelashes. “Know that it
will always be so.” He let go of her hand to put his arms around her then
pressed his cheek to her stomach, closing his eyes as she gently stroked his
hair.

Neither of them saw his mother standing at
the open door. They did not see her smile nor hear her as she gently closed the
door to give them their privacy.

“I love you,” he said on a hitching breath.
“With all my heart, I love you.”

She took hold of his upper arms and tugged
gently to bid him rise. When he did, she took his hands in hers, brought them
together then kissed the tips of his fingers. Her eyes were locked on his.

“I love you, Seyzon Montyne. With every
breath I take and every beat of my heart.”

Easing his hands from hers, he slipped an
arm beneath her legs and another behind her back and lifted her. She placed her
arms around his neck. Silently he asked the question that had formed a lump in
his throat as though he were a green youth.

“Aye,” she said. “A million times aye.”

He carried her to the bed he had tossed and
turned in for weeks. Little sleep had occurred there for a long time. No dreams
had dented the pillows—only tears. As he lay her down, he could not prevent the
moan that escaped his lips.

“This will be our wedding night,” she said.
“No other has existed before now.”

He nodded, unable to speak. If this was the
way she wanted to remember their first time together, so be it. The night at
Riverglade did not happen. He would do everything in his power to see it wiped
from her memory and in its place, the sweetest memory he could give her. He
would erase Vindan’s touch and replace it with his own. He was about to join
her on the bed when he got a whiff of his body order and he stopped breathing.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, quickly sitting
up. “Have I done something to…?”

“I stink,” he said and he turned his head
to the tub where steam was still curling up from the surface of the water. “I
need a bath.”

She watched him strip off his shirt, shuck
off his pants and march over to the water. Had she never seen a man’s naked
body before, the sight of Seyzon removing his clothing might have caused her to
blush. As it was, she stared at his solid frame and without conscious thought
compared it to the prince’s.

“You have a beautiful body, milord,” she
said.

He was about to step into the tub and
completely missed the rim as he snapped his head around at her words. His teeth
clicked together as his foot hit the floor. It was he whose cheeks were bright
crimson as he realized he had unceremoniously stripped in front of her without
any concern for her sensibilities. He slapped his hands over his dangling cock.

“Milady, I am…”

“Beautiful,” she said, boldly sweeping her
gaze from his tousled hair to his bare toes. “Remarkably so.” She swung her
legs from the bed. “Broad shoulders, narrow hips, flat belly. An artist would
consider herself lucky to have you as a model.”

His eyes flared. “Beg pardon?” he croaked.

She stood and came slowly toward him,
running the buttons of her bodice as she did.

“Just this one time I will say something of
him,” she said and it was obvious she had no desire to give
him
a name
and, truthfully, there was no need to. “He took away my shyness so that I can
appreciate the handsomeness of my husband’s naked body. A body far superior to
the other I saw.”

He seemed incapable of movement as she drew
near him.

The buttons of her gown opened, she peeled
the gown from her body and stepped out of it. Crossing her arms over her chest,
she took the hem of her camisole and wrenched it over her head.

“Oh,” he gasped as her bare breasts swung
free and he saw that all that hid the rest of her shapely form from his view
were the hip-hugging lace panties that molded to her like a second skin. The
moment she slid her hands beneath their waistband and began pushing them down
her thighs, he grabbed the rim of the tub as though to steady himself.

“I took my shoes and stockings off as soon
as I came into our room,” she said, wiggling her toes. “The carpet is so thick
I could not resist.”