Droit De Seigneur (13 page)

“Ahoy, lovebirds, we have a castle to build yet. Save your sweetings for this evening,” the King teased, approaching them with a wide smile on his face.

Amber curtsied deep and prepared to leave, but her husband surprised her and reached out for her hand. “As you know, my liege, my wife was raised in this area, and she has some very good ideas I would like to discuss with you.” He kissed her gently, then released her.

“My lord, is it all right if I visit my family?” she asked, surprised and amazed that he had told the King that the ideas that he was going to broach with him were hers.

He was very proud of her for asking, as he knew it didn’t come naturally to her, and in front of the King, as well. “Of course. Would you like some coin to bring them each something special?” Piers handed her a drawstring purse with several gold coins. Sunder wasn’t a thriving metropolis, but there were things to be had there that couldn’t be found in the woods where she grew up.

“Thank you, husband!” Amber kissed him warmly on the cheek and, after executing another blushing curtsey to the king, fairly ran off to see what small trinkets she might secure for her sisters, and what tools she might find for her father that would help him with his daily chores.

She settled on a small doll for Faine, although she wasn’t even sure if she was still playing with them, really, and a new knife for her father that she knew he’d love. Starr was harder to buy for, mostly because she knew her middle sister the least, but she settled on a small gold pin.

Chapter Nine

She desperately wanted to but didn’t dare to change into her boys clothes to walk to her father’s house. It was funny to think that it was no longer her house, but it wasn’t. Fordwick was her home now and eventually, the new castle would be.

She wasn’t sure whether her family even knew she was still alive. She breathed deeply every step of the way through her woods, pulling in every single remembered scent that brought her back to her childhood. Soon she was in the clearing where their small shack stood, and she could see her Da in the front yard, sharpening his scythe, and she could walk no longer.

Something – or, more accurately, someone – hit Lawson Cooper like a boulder, and it turned out to be the person he was missing the most, after his wife. “Amber! You’ve come back!” he cried, hugging his eldest tight against him, then standing back and gazing on her with a precise paternal eye. “How’ve you been? What’s happened? We’d heard you ended up at Fordwick and pushed some toff into a fountain!”

Faine appeared in the doorway, looking more and more the young woman and less and less the little girl, and finally Starr, her least favorite sister, peering over her shoulder, then, upon seeing who it was, ducking back into the cottage with a sour look.

Da ushered her into the house and they all sat around the table like they used to – except Starr, who kept popping up for one reason or another, because she still preferred to avoid Amber as much as possible - and Amber almost teared up at how much she’d missed just this simple thing.

“So, what are you waitin’ for, girl? Tell us what happened?” She did just that – leaving out the parts she knew her father really didn’t want to hear, or that she thought would hurt him. And when she got to the point that she was going to reveal the fact that she was now married to Cruel Piers, the eagle eyed Starr came up behind her and grabbed her left hand.

“You’re married!” she crowed, jumping around as if she’d discovered how to turn lead into gold. Now she could finally get married herself, if Bertram – the smithy’s son - hadn’t lost interest by now.

Amber blushed. “Yes, I am.”

Her father wasn’t any too happy to hear about that. “To a man who didn’t even bother to ask your father’s permission? What sort of guttersnipe is he, this husband of yours?” Piers ducked through the small door to the cabin at that point, barely able to wedge himself through it. Everyone either bowed or curtsied, then Amber rose to join him at the door as he looped his arm around her waist.

“Da, this is my husband, Piers de Montforte.”

Piers came forward and shook hands with her father, who was quite literally bug eyed.

“Y- Your husband? Why didn’t you tell me that, girl?”

Amber laughed. “Because you hadn’t given me a chance.”

Then Piers said something that endeared him to Amber’s heart forever. “I’m sorry for not asking your permission for your daughter’s hand in marriage, Mr. Cooper, but the King bade us marry, and we were joined within the hour, so there was no chance. I had intended to meet you with Amber, but the King and I got involved in straightening out the building of the castle.” Lawson accepted the younger man’s apology with aplomb. “Why, that means that you’ll be livin’ close to us, then, not so far away at Fordwick forever?”

“That’s right. We’ll be not too far away, and we’d be glad for you all to come stay with us. I lost my family to plague years ago, God rest their souls, and I would be very happy to have family around me again,” he looked down at his wife, “including, of course, our own children.” Amber swallowed hard. She hadn’t thought of children.

Faine tugged on Amber’s dress, and she squatted down instantly to be on her level. “Yes, poppet?”

“B’fore you left, you tole me you were gonna teach me to hunt.” The entire family laughed, but Faine looked quite indignant.

“No more hunting females in this family,” Lawson proclaimed, swinging his youngest around in his arms.

Amber frowned at her father. “It didn’t serve me too badly, Da, did it?” she asked, patting Piers’ shoulder.

“You were dead lucky, girl, and you know it.” Both Lawson and Piers shuddered, and Amber sensed that they were going to start with the “what ifs”, which never ended well for her.

“When I think of the times that you could have – “

“Don’t we need to go, husband?” she asked, smiling sweetly up at him.

But Piers was intrigued by what his father in law was saying. “I believe I will need to confer with you on a few things, Mr. Cooper, about my wife’s upbringing. The first time we met, I had to spank her, but someone had already done quite a remarkable job -”

“Say no more.” Lawson had already turned to go to the place beside the door where he hung the belt he used only on Amber. He presented it to Piers as if he was giving him a prized calf. “This is yours. Don’t spare it. I wasn’t strong enough to give her the discipline she truly needs. I’m glad she’s found a man who can do that for her. Don’t ever hesitate, no matter what she says or does. She needs it, as did my wife before her. They’re very much alike, in looks and deed.”

As much as she wished the world would simply swallow her up at the humiliating conversation that was going on between her husband and her father, Amber had never heard her father say that about her mother and how much like her she was. It made her want to cry.

To say nothing of the fact that he’d just told her husband not to spare the rod with her –

as if he already did! He didn’t need any encouragement!

Trying desperately to bring their conversation to an end, Amber opened the door, saying,

“I think I hear the King calling . . . “

She wandered into the yard to the sound of her family laughing behind her. She knew she was going to have to do her level best to keep her father and her husband well away from each other, or they were going to prove to be quite dangerous to the health of her backside.

Her father offered his hospitality – such as it was – for them to stay as long as they would like, but they politely declined. They had to stay with His Majesty, anyway. They set up a camp not far from the building site, where they could keep an eye on things. It was decided that a better guard contingency would be left there, to make sure that work continued apace, although Amber assured them that it would.

There was a seamstress in town, and Piers had Amber fitted for several new gowns. Not an entire wardrobe, but enough to replace the ones she was currently wearing with ones that better befitted her current station. Amber had never had clothing of such fine make or fashion, and she knew she would almost be afraid to wear them. They made the same arrangement with the seamstress as they had with the builders – they ordered five dresses, and were going to be here for four days. If she could get them done before they left so that Amber could have them to take home, then she would earn a bonus. She was required to complete at least two of them before they left so that she would have some new dresses to wear once they arrived back at Fordwick.

Not only did he buy her gowns, but belts, hose, shoes, everything else a woman could want, plus one beautiful ruby broach that would go with almost everything they’d bought. He’d seen her looking at it and had surprised her with it later that evening.

While the men were busy trying to get the construction back on track, she kept herself busy seeing patients that had been neglected while she was gone, glad that she’d brought as much in the way of potions as she had. One day, while she was seeing to someone’s tooth and the men had wandered off to see about lumber or some such thing, the town came abuzz as a rag tag bunch of soldiers drifted back into town, dazed, having been ambushed deep in the woods by a group of rebellious men with visions of glory and murder in their hearts. Many of the King’s guard had been killed and the King himself had been injured.

Amber finished up with her patient as quickly as she could and gathered as much information as was possible from the returning men. She knew that Piers was with the party that had gone into the woods with the King, and her heart leapt to her throat.

Luckily, the place that they described was one she knew well, and she thought she had an idea of who the attackers were, too. As she divested herself of her feminine trappings and donned the look of a boy, hiding her glorious hair beneath a disreputable cap, she was glad she’d followed her instinct and brought almost all of her provisions.

But the good thing was that she still had a lot of secret hidey holes that contained even more items. Unfortunately, most of those were defensive rather than offensive, although there were a few arrows and knives amongst them, which she quickly retrieved.

Moving stealthily through the underbrush, she spotted the killers easily, stomping through the woods like elephants, looking for their prey, then found where the remains of the king’s guard, as well as the King himself and her husband were holed up.

“It’s me, Amber,” she whispered to Piers before touching his ankle. “I’ve brought supplies. How is His Majesty? Where was he wounded?”

“Bleeding. His leg.” He was glad she’d identified herself before touching him, or he would have swung his sword before thinking and she would have been dead right then and there.

What the hell was she doing out there, anyway?

She pressed a wad of clean cloths into his hand. “Press these onto the wound hard, and lift the leg if you can without giving yourselves away. I’ll be right back.” He whispered after her, as harshly as he could, that she should stay put, and he knew she heard him, but he could hardly scream at her without giving themselves away. If they lived through this, he was going to make sure she learned how to obey.

But she was gone, and he knew agony such as he’d never felt before at the idea that she might not return.

Amber circled well around the clumsy oafs that were trying to harm her husband, and the idea occurred to her that she would really like to toy with them, because she could, but she knew she shouldn’t, so she simply set about capturing them as quickly and efficiently as possible. As they began to either drop from arrows, or encounter various quick traps she’d setup, they never saw their enemy, and that was a great psychological advantage. As their numbers dwindled, the remaining imbeciles became even more reckless and easier to capture.

When they had all been rendered harmless, she tucked her inappropriate clothing into a makeshift spot and donned her tunic again, and walked back to where the men were, falling on Piers in a dramatic scene that wasn’t very like her, except that she had been very worried about him until she’d found him.

“Husband! Are you all right?” She lay full on top of him, not caring what anyone else thought or said. She was a newlywed. She could get away with it.

The other men were quite bewildered at her appearance, especially when they still considered that they were in mortal danger.

Amber spun quite a story as the men ate it up, all except her husband, of course, who watched her quietly from under a hooded brow. She worked on the King as she spoke, telling them of a young man in the same style of clothing as she had actually worn, who had come to get her while she wandered in the woods looking for them, telling her that he’d rendered all of the rebels moot and leading her to them, knowing that the King needed her medical attentions.

“What was his name? Did you recognize him?” William asked, although he was in great pain. “I would reward this young man.”

“No, I didn’t recognize him, Your Majesty.”

Once she’d had him stabilized, the men decided to bring the King home as soon as possible, where he could be better treated, and would be more secure.

Amber spoke up, though, as he was her patient. “I’m not so sure that that long trip would be good for him at this point. I have an idea.”

Within the hour, the King himself was comfortably ensconced at her father’s house, and her father was about as close to beside himself as Amber had ever seen him. It was a brilliant move. The cottage was unassuming and quiet, all by itself in a quite clearing in the thick woods.

They had departed quietly, as if they were taking him home to be treated, but had instead diverted with as little fuss – and as few men – as possible, to the cottage.

Amber had even suggested that a decoy carry on with the majority of men acting like they were still bringing the ailing monarch home, while he recuperated at her father’s house.

She concentrated every bit of medical knowledge she had on restoring the King’s health.

Luckily, he was of fairly robust health to begin with, but he had also endured a fairly serious wound. Her worst fear was infection, so she did her best to keep the wound clean, which meant cleaning it regularly, which made her cry every time she did it, while he bore it quite stoically.