Claudia Dain (28 page)

"You think she wants you?"

"I think," Ulrich said slowly, "I think she fears to want me, and by her fear, I have made good ground in winning her."

Roger shook his head. "That is too much thinking for my part. If that is how a woman's mind spins, 'tis no wonder they cannot be understood."

* * *

"I do not understand you," Conor said, leaning over his only sister's husband. His sister was long dead, but his duty to her children would never die. Such was the way of things in families. It would be the same for Walter, and was even now; he was responsible for his sisters and his sisters' offspring. The ties of a man to the women of his blood lasted beyond all else. "He is nothing, nothing but the promise of a name."

"And he is the only man who can stand against my Juliane's frost. That is something of great import," Philip said. "The decision has been made, recorded. I will not unmake it."

"And I will uphold it," Walter said at his uncle's back.

"There are others who would make a finer match for Juliane," Conor said, ignoring Walter. Philip was still the lord of Stanora and the one to whom all decisions would fall. "What of Nicholas of Nottingham?"

Philip shook his head on his pillow, too spent to speak. Which might work very well in Conor's favor.

"He has land and a name that goes back one hundred years. His land is old, and old is his hold on it. You need give him nothing. He can meet the worth of Juliane on his own merit. Tell me, what have you given to this knight to give him equal worth to Juliane?"

"St. Ives," Walter said.

"A rich holding lost to you to gain a man for her. Take Nicholas for her and you lose nothing," Conor said. He was still looking at Philip, but he was speaking to Walter, and all in that chamber knew it. "All is increased. Why should you rob your own son to enrich a knight errant? He alone gains by this. Is it not your duty to arrange a marriage which enriches all?"

"What do
you
gain?" Philip said, his blue eyes fierce for an instant before fading into exhaustion.

Conor smiled and laid a hand on Philip's shoulder, gone raw and thin in his wasting death. "What do you lose? St. Ives," he said, answering himself. "'Tis too great a loss for Walter to be made to bear."

"I bear it willingly," Walter said, yet not quite so earnestly as he had before. "What does Nicholas bring?"

Conor turned to look at Walter. "A manor with forty hides of land north of the Trent River and a walled tower on the southern bank. The mill is his, and it is rich in fees."

Walter looked to his father, lying silent and still upon his deathbed. Conor watched him and waited.

* * *

"What is he waiting for?" William asked, eyeing Nicholas.

"What we all are waiting for," Edward answered. "For the matter of Ulrich and Juliane to be settled."

"It is settled," Ulrich said. "I am for her and she is mine."

"You say that because you do not know my uncle," Avice said, boldly joining the men in their circle of comradeship. Roger moved his body in such a way as to politely invite her in. Edward did not move at all, shutting her out.

She and Edward had not spoken since their wagered kiss, a condition she was most thankful for. She did not like him. She did not like his look or his manner or his nature. He was too quiet, and yet when he spoke, he said too much and all of it disagreeable. His eyes were too light. His humor was too caustic. He had the deportment of an ox, but without the usefulness.

She most determinedly did not like Edward.

That Edward seemed equally determined not to like her she found oddly gratifying. And so she found a perverse pleasure in invading his circle. She decided in that moment that she would make it a point to intrude upon him at every opportunity for as long as he remained in Stanora, which, God willing, would not be much longer.

"What of your uncle? He will abide by Lord Philip's wishes, as must we all," Ulrich said.

She felt a stab of pity for Ulrich in that instant; he was a stranger to them all and understood nothing of the currents of power and the weight of history that ran between Conor and Philip.

"Conor is my mother's brother, her elder brother, and he has an abiding interest in what happens in Stanora. He always has."

"And so he should, but the matter of a betrothal is the province of a father, not an uncle. Not when the father lives," Ulrich said.

"And so he comes now, when that tide is about to turn," Edward said, looking at Avice without his usual heat. Avice ignored him and answered Ulrich instead.

"He comes and brings a man with him, a man whose name Conor has whispered often into Juliane's ear," she said.

"Juliane does not decide upon her mate. That is the province of her father," Ulrich said, looking hard at Avice.

She truly did feel some pity for him. He was a landless knight of doubtful name; Juliane and her lands were surely his best hope.

"This I know, Ulrich," she said quietly. "Yet ever and always do my father and my uncle strive against each other. It began when my mother married my father. Conor did not approve the match, but what could he do? The match was made, and he was powerless to prevent it. That my mother died with only three children to her credit he holds bitterly to my father's doing."

"'Tis God's doing and nothing less," Roger said.

"So it is, yet Conor's will, a formidable thing, was thwarted in the matter of my mother. He had a betrothal of his own in mind, I think, one that would have allowed him to keep St. Ives, for it was through my mother that St. Ives came into Stanora's grasp."

"And it is with Juliane that it will pass out of all reach of Conor's grasp, once and for always," Ulrich finished. "St. Ives in now in my grasp, and I will not let it go."

* * *

"Do not let it go," Conor urged.

"'Tis a rich holding and one my mother prized most high," Walter said.

The light was fading, softening, a gentle golden haze through which a thread of spider silk spanning the room glimmered like molten silver in the warm light. Philip watched them from the bed, his eyes alert, his mouth stilled as he listened to Conor spin a web of ambition around his son.

"Why should it go to this nameless knight when a baron of title stands ready to do his service to Juliane?"

"And will he stand to Juliane?" Walter asked, showing at least some resistance to the power of Conor's persuasion.

"What man would not? She is a woman of worth and beauty and piety. Any man would be glad of her. Any man could stand the test of her."

Which only showed how little Conor knew of Juliane and how little he believed the careful legend of her. Philip had known that Conor would interfere in her life, and in Avice's too, and he had acted accordingly.

He had moved carefully, protecting his daughters from any move Conor might make against them. From the start, he and Conor had been opposed, their battling crossing over into lives and fortunes and betrothals. Up until this very moment. Until he lay upon a bed, weak and sick and old, facing death. Even now Conor strove against him, seeking to defeat him, seeking to match Juliane to a man of
his
choosing, when it was a father's will which must be obeyed. As Juliane was set to obey his will. He had protected her well. Conor could not touch her now.

Yet now he watched Conor bargaining with his son for his beautiful Juliane. Thank God above that Avice was safe from him, her betrothal unbreakable, Arthur's worth unquestioned.

He would not allow Juliane to be bartered for St. Ives and for Nicholas, whom he knew to be a pawn of Conor's. Nay, Juliane would marry
his
choice for her, defeating Conor yet again. What meat it was to Philip to best Conor in this; it fed him. It fed him well to outplay the man who had sliced off his ear twenty years before.

* * *

"He seems very certain of it," Lunete said.

"He is certain. He will not let her go," William said.

"He may have no choice. The choice lies with Philip, not with him," Lunete said.

William shrugged and shook his head.

"What?" Lunete asked.

"He will not let her go," William repeated, his arsenal of arguments spent.

They stood on the broad stairs that led out of the hall, sheltered by stone and shadow, unnoticed because they had determined to be so. They were small, still children, the world scarcely cast them a glance unless it had need of them. There was no need now; all was of Ulrich and Juliane and the steadfastness of Philip's pledge that Ulrich would have her.

"Does he love her?" Lunete asked, a woman's question. William shrugged again, a man's response to a question he would rather not answer. "Does he?" Lunete asked again.

"He wants her," William said.

"'Tis not the same as loving."

"For him, mayhap it is."

"Juliane will not see it so."

"Does anyone care how Juliane sees it?"

"I do," Lunete said. "Juliane does. Lord Philip does."

"Does he? That is good, then, because he is the one who chose Ulrich for her. If Philip stands by Ulrich, then Juliane must."

When William looked into her eyes, watchful and cautious, waiting for an answer, Lunete only shook her head. And shrugged.

* * *

"Why should I?" Philip asked from his bed.

"Because Nicholas is the better man, better in wealth and name, better for Juliane and for Stanora," Conor said.

"Better for you," Philip said.

"Nay, 'tis not so," Conor said.

"Hold!" Philip said, fighting the onslaught of Conor's words. "You dishonor yourself by bringing this to me now, as I prepare myself for paradise. Juliane is mine. Stanora is mine. St. Ives is mine. All I possess I must give before I depart this earth. I have given all, my duty done, my way assured. Juliane is for Ulrich. St. Ives is for Ulrich. Stanora is for Walter along with all the wealth and responsibility it encompasses. This matter is done. I will hear no more words on it."

Conor said no more, but Philip's vision was not so dim that he did not see Conor's glance at Walter and Walter's wavering determination.

"Bring the priest to me. I want them married here. Now," Philip said.

"Hold!" Conor said as the scribe rushed out to fetch Father Matthew. "To marry Juliane is not enough; that has been managed before. I would see it consummated. I would know that this mating will hold and bear fruit, in God's time."

"You had no doubts about that with Nicholas," Walter said.

"I know Nicholas. I do not know this Ulrich of bastardy," Conor said.

And he still did not know Juliane, Philip thought as the idea of public consummation of their vows rolled through him. Juliane would hate it, but she would bear it. Her core was tempered steel. She would not break even at this.

"Done," Philip said. "But I name the witnesses. Maud, for one."

"And I for the other," Conor said.

"And the priest for a third, in case there is dispute," Walter said.

"Done," Philip said.

Chapter 16

They found her in Maud's chamber and ushered her across the gallery to her father's solar. Since two men-at-arms had found her and now flanked her, their callused hands on her elbows, it would seem that they expected some rebellion from her.

In that, she disappointed them.

She was not going to engage in a fruitless tussle upon the well-lit height of the gallery. Nay, her fighting would take place in private, as it had once before.

Her father lay quietly upon his bed, his body shrunken into the mattress, the linen sheet lying almost flat as it covered him. He looked almost shrouded, his death hovering, breathing cold against him, robbing him of the breath of life. All but his eyes; his eyes glowed like an old and steady fire, throbbing with life and purpose and will. She was comforted by those eyes.

Conor was in the chamber, as were Father Matthew, Walter, the scribe, even Baldric, the groom. Juliane raised her brows at Baldric in question; he shrugged in answer and pointed discreetly to her father. Philip wanted Baldric here? That meant only one thing, and it was no surprise to her.