Fair Border Bride (14 page)

“John Errington is a fine man,” Alina said fiercely, “and if I’d never met Harry I’d have gone to my wedding without a qualm. But I love Harry Scott. Oh, Matho, do you know what it feels like to be in love?”

She’d said the words without thinking, and as soon as they were out expected nothing but ridicule. Matho was not a man to speak of insubstantial things like love. He had been looking out over the ravine, but at her words his head came slowly round and his hazel gaze locked with hers. “Aye,” he said slowly. “Ah reckon ah do.”

Her relief was enormous. “Then you’ll help Harry when he comes? You’ll send him on to Grey House?”

He nodded.

Alina was so pleased she failed to see the shadow in his eyes.

***

When Harry walked into his father’s comfortable rooms in Carlisle Castle, Sir Thomas Wharton was busy. He waved Harry towards the wine table and went on calmly dictating to the black garbed clerk who spent his life writing letters and reports for the Deputy Lord Warden.

Harry swung off his short cloak, dropped it on a stool and poured a glass of sherry sack. He swallowed a generous measure. Since Sir Thomas and his secretary occupied the only chairs, Harry crossed the floorboards to the small leaded window, leaned his shoulder against the stone walls and looked out on the dour grey streets of Carlisle. Today the slick grey cobbles were empty but for the crows stalking through the rubbish.

Harry looked across the small room.

Father never changed. Even in his late forties, he was still the hard, spare-bodied man Harry remembered from childhood. Life as Deputy Warden of the West March kept him fit. He avoided the enormous furred cloaks and intricately slashed doublets of the courtier, preferring instead a simple shirt, sober breeches and a plain doublet with a wide belt. A thick woollen riding cloak hung by the door, and even now, at rest in his office, he wore riding boots of good leather.

His father’s voice, chill and precise, continued dictating. The scratch of the secretary’s quill across the parchment seemed loud against the small sounds of the hearth fire. Harry listened with half an ear. It seemed new rules meant every
village,
township and parish must fetch its animals in from their grazing and keep them in the streets at night. Both ends of the street or village, whichever was more appropriate, were to be watched and guarded. A hue and cry should be raised if thieves approached.

Sir Thomas’s steady instructions paused. Harry glanced over his shoulder. His father consulted lists of crabbed writing, ran his finger down and across the page and barked out names of those to be appointed as setters of watches. Harry smiled at the command that a second tier be set up to ascertain that men turned up and performed their appointed duty. Defaulters were to be reported, and fined.

“Alexander Heron and Alexander Baxter shall set watches for the areas of
Alnewyke
, Corbridge, Halton….The overseers shall be Cuthbert Carnaby and Thomas Weldon.”

Harry’s shoulder came off the wall.

“What’s the matter, boy?” Sir Thomas’s cold gaze lifted at Harry’s sudden movement.

Harry shrugged. “I know Carnaby, that’s all.”

“Allow me time for another page, and this matter will be ended. Then we may talk.”

Harry nodded and turned back to the window. His father went on at great speed, leaving Harry to stare at his own reflection in the glass. His thoughts turned to his last sight of Alina in Corbridge market. The reflection shuddered, reformed and a pair of great brown eyes surrounded by glossy chestnut hair stared back at him.

He stirred restlessly, remembering their stolen kisses beneath the Roman arch of the old stone church. She crept into his thoughts at the most inopportune moments, had done so most of the way to Edinburgh. She invaded his dreams, hovered at his shoulder while he persuaded desperate men to accept the English king’s silver. He shook his head, unaware that he smiled.

She was not the bride he wanted, not the bride he dreamed of marrying. She possessed no title, no estates and no prospect of such things. He leaned his brow against the cool glass. He’d be a fool to tie himself to her. And yet, she haunted him.

The scrape of chairs drew him back into the room. The business of the day was complete and the black-garbed secretary rose and bowed himself out of the room.

“Now, Harry. How are you?” barked his father. “What news have you brought?”

Harry drained the last of his sherry sack, carried the glass to the table and dropped into the still warm chair vacated by the secretary. “My trip was an adventure from start to finish.”

Wharton’s stern features relaxed, though the grooves at each side of his mouth remained in place. “Are we likely to die of starvation before I hear it all?” he asked gruffly. “Should I call for food and wine before you begin?”

Harry nodded. While they waited for the meal, he heard how King Henry’s romantic inclinations interfered with his father’s daily life. William, Lord Parr, appointed Lord Warden of the Western March in April, had recently shown an inclination to prove himself.

“Not yet thirty,” his father scoffed. “Brother to Latimer’s widow, the Lady Catherine Parr, knows next to nothing about the Borders.
Got the post because the King showers favours on his latest lady love.”

“She’s to marry him, then?”

“She accepted him at Greenwich mid-June. I hear she’s for Reform in England.”

“That could be dangerous.” Harry stared into the flames. “I hope she’s as sensible as they say. He’s vicious when he turns on someone. They say he never says farewell.”

He said no more while food was brought and set out on the table.

While they ate roast fowl, munched their way through apples and cheese and downed a cup or two of sherry sack, Harry got the Edinburgh business out of the way.

“I rode to Edinburgh and got through as if I had a charmed life,’ he concluded. Not a hitch. It was easy enough to make the kind of contacts you wanted. Men are so desperate for coin that they would have slit their grannie’s throat for a small amount of silver. They vowed to hold themselves ready should we need them, and I have brought a good deal of silver coin back with me.”

His father shook his head. “You’ll not have heard yet of the Treaty of Greenwich, I suppose? King Henry made a deal with Edinburgh at the beginning of the month. The baby Queen of Scots, not yet eight months old, and Prince Edward, currently five years old, are sworn to marry in a few years. Then, so the story goes, our two countries may live in peace and security.”

Harry banged his fist on the table. “Then my contacts are useless! Dear Lord, I went all that way for nothing.” He slumped against the chair back. “That means…oh, hell and damnation.”

If Harry wasn’t mistaken, humour lurked at the back of his father’s cool, considering eyes. Harry shrugged. “There’ll be another chance, one day.”

It wasn’t quite all for nothing, a small voice whispered at the back of his mind. Think of Alina Carnaby. He frowned, groped inside his doublet and handed a slip of paper to his father. “Those are the names.” He shrugged. “They may come in useful for something else.”

“I’m sure they will.” Wharton scanned the paper, folded it and slipped between the others on his desk. “Now, tell me the rest. I sense there is more to this exciting tale.”

Harry poured another cup of sherry and settled down in his chair. “I met a man called Cuthbert Carnaby.” He proceeded to recount the meeting in some detail.

Wharton swore violently at the story of the Leap. “
Jesu
, Harry! How in God’s name did you escape? Tell me again.”

“I had bruises for a couple of weeks but thanks to Matho, I’m alive. Without him, I don’t know….” Harry ran a palm across his face. “I don’t know how it would have ended. It still gives me nightmares.”

“I’m not surprised. I must look out for Carnaby,” Wharton said grimly. “You have been lucky in your friends. The girl helped you initially, then Matho. This man Carnaby,” he said, and then paused, his head cocked to one side. “I think I may know him. He is the younger brother of Sir Reynold Carnaby, who still hangs on to life?”

Harry nodded.
“The very same.”

“Sir Reynold got more favours out of Percy than Percy’s own family and he became Receiver for lands once belonging to Hexham monastery. He had Cromwell as his patron, until Cromwell vanished the way of Queen Anne Boleyn.” Sir Thomas gazed at the fire. “His wife, you know, was connected to our family.”

“You mean Sir Reynold’s wife? But she’s dead, isn’t she?”

Wharton nodded. “And Sir Reynold, I hear, will not be long till he joins her. A timid man, I’m told, hated by the men of Tynedale.”

“He acquired a good deal of life’s riches, for a timid man,” Harry said dryly.

Wharton chuckled behind his cup of sack. “He has the luck of the devil. I know the Duke of Norfolk once wished him in Paradise, but Cromwell saved him. Sir John Heron negotiated Carnaby’s release when the men of Tynedale kidnapped him back in ’40. Believe it or not, he leaves three daughters in my
wardship
. You could do worse than marry one of them.”

Harry caught back incautious words of refusal that leapt to his tongue. It was not time to mention Alina yet. “How do you know?—he isn’t dead yet.”

“No, but I have a copy of his will in safekeeping.
A very careful man, Sir Reynold.
He didn’t want to leave anything to chance. He leaves Aydon Hall and his lease of Corbridge to this same Cuthbert Carnaby who damn near killed you, and the manor of
Beaufront
to his grandfather’s second wife.” He caught his son’s glance, and chuckled. “What’s the matter? Surprised?”

Harry grinned. “I learned long ago never to be surprised at anything you know, or what people do.”

“What about marrying one of these daughters? They’re young.” Wharton grunted. “Probably far too young, now I think about it. I wouldn’t like to see you waiting ten years for a wife.”

Harry shifted about in the hard wooden chair then leaned forward and braced his elbows on his knees. “I’d rather not, sir. I’ve picked out a girl and offered to marry her. Her name’s Alina—”

“Carnaby?
Thought as much.”
Shadows moved on the lean, hollowed planes of Wharton’s face as he loosed a brief guffaw.

“You’re not against it?”

Harry watched his father pick up his glass and examine the colour of the wine against the glow of the fire. Harry emptied his own glass, held it nestled between his palms and waited. The political aspect of marriage was of vast importance in the border regions. He had no wish to put his father in a compromised position among the reiving families.

He wiped his palms against his hose.

“Have you thought about this carefully?” His father watched him from cool grey eyes. “Or are you head over heels and unable to think with anything but your balls?”

Father rarely descended into such common speech except on the battlefield. “
Er
, yes, I have managed to control my raging lust and consider the consequences of such a match. Alina is beautiful and intelligent. Her grandfather is Sir William Carnaby of Halton. The family as a whole own much of Corbridge and Hexham. Her mother is sister and heir to Roger of Horsley. You probably know more of the family history than I do, but remember she saved my neck at some risk to herself. If her father had found me the morning of the raid he wouldn’t have stopped to ask questions. He’d have run me through and ridden off on his Hot Trod without a second thought. I don’t like to think what he might have done to her for hiding me.”

Wharton sipped his sack and stared into the fire. “You’ve lived in Cumbria long enough to know how people survive in this area. These damned feuds go on and
on,
and woe betide the man who gets between them. They know nothing but theft, arson, kidnapping, murder and extortion and all,” he added, shaking his head, “pursued in peacetime. Anyone outside a man’s kin is considered an enemy. It doesn’t exactly surprise me to know that Carnaby considered you a reiver and treated you as such.”

Harry’s brows lifted. “So you condone what he did?”

Wharton shook his head. “No man should take the law into his own hands. But there is the King’s Law, and there is Border Law. Borderers, they say, should be the judge of a Borderer and only they should assess his guilt and punishment. In a way I sympathise with them. Not that I’d let the devils know that.” He dragged up a convenient stool, settled his heels on it and leaned back in his chair.

“It is easy to become a lawless man, living on reiving and a wild life in the woods, fields and fells. Very few can make a living without the backing of a rich man. In fact,” Wharton added, “there’s an old saying in Northumberland: ‘where beggars increase and service decays.’ It comes from the habit of dividing a deceased man’s land equally among his sons.”

“Each gets so little he cannot live on it?”

“Exactly.
Yet these men make excellent soldiers. They are brave and hardy men.” Wharton’s expression held something close to resignation and Harry wondered what was coming next. “I have to warn you, Harry. To marry into such a family means you complicate your life unnecessarily.”

“And yours, Father? Will it compromise your position as Warden?”

Wharton held out his glass for more wine. “I think you can allow me to plod my way through the complexities. But you,” he added grimly, catching Harry’s eye, “will find that all Carnaby’s enemies become your enemies overnight if you marry this girl.”

Harry stared into the fire. He had promised Alina he would return, and he intended to keep his promise. His dreams of an heiress had faded over the last few weeks. He didn’t know how it had happened, hadn’t been aware of it happening, but it had. It was as if he had pulled back a blanket and found a whole new landscape lying in wait for him.

Since he had reached his mid-twenties without finding a girl who stirred his heart, then he would be a fool to let the blanket fall and hide such happiness now. Sitting by the fire Harry knew he could make all the wise decisions in the world, but half of his mind was already packing his saddle bag to ride out to her at the earliest opportunity. He looked up and encountered his father’s steady grey eyes.

“If she has enemies, then I will protect her. I cannot give her up. And if I do not move at once, she will be married to John Errington of Sandhoe.”

Wharton sighed and shook his head. “Then we must think out a strategy that will at least keep you safe from Carnaby. The rest is up to you.”

***

Alina crept downstairs one step at a time, her cloak bundled in her arms. The house was dark, and she took great care to avoid the creaky steps and the floorboard that rattled down onto the joist below every time someone stepped on it. By the time she reached the kitchen, her heart thudded as if she had been running.

It had been a trying day. Father, his face ashen, had retreated to his chamber without a word for anyone after Sir Reynold’s death. Her mother tip-toed anxiously around the solar, shushing the boys and eventually sending them outside with instructions to walk quietly up and down the lane to Halton. Alina sat by the north window, hoping for a glimpse of Harry. As the day crawled by without his appearance, her doubts churned into anxiety.

At some point during the interminable day she had made the decision to leave Aydon. She had considered the idea in a flippant sort of way many times in the previous weeks but it had always been a last resort, something she’d never truly expected to do. Yet here she was, creeping out of her family home in the middle of the night.

Some things were in her favour. She had the key to Grey House safe in her pocket, and there was a moon tonight. The servants retired early to their beds, so bundling a loaf and hunk of cheese in her warmest shawl had been easy enough. The servant who snored on his truckle bed by the kitchen hearth never stirred and the guards, extra vigilant after the recent raid, were all at their posts on the wall-walk. Matho was in charge tonight, and they would not dare scuttle into the kitchen while he oversaw the watch.

She rolled and tied the shawl around her shoulders and flung her heavy wool cloak over the top. It would make her look like a hunchbacked witch, but maybe that was not a bad thing tonight. Trailing her fingertips along the stone walls so as not to lose her way, she ventured downstairs towards the storerooms beneath the kitchen where the blackness seemed thicker than ever.

Harry had promised he would come on the fourth day. Something must have delayed him. Her marriage to John was due in a few hours, and there had been no sign that Sir Reynold’s death would delay the ceremony. If she did not go now, she would find herself John Errington’s bride, and should Harry ride through the gate five minutes after she’d said her vows, it would be too late. At least this way she would gain a day or two’s respite. She could not hide out at Grey House for ever, she knew that. But surely those two precious days would bring Harry to Aydon.

Her stomach quaked at the thought of her father’s rage, her mother’s recriminations and the displeasure of the Errington family. An image of John flashed into her mind. Her palms flattened against the wall, and she hesitated between one step and the next. He would be hurt and for that she was truly sorry.

She reached the last step. Warm air met her, and the stink of beasts penned inside for the night. Edging towards the opposite wall, one hand against the stone and the other held out in front of her, she moved towards the side door and prayed that she would not walk into a cow in the darkness. Beasts moved restlessly, sensing her presence even if they could not see her. A cow bellowed, and Alina’s heart leapt to her throat as the sound reverberated around the stone byre.

The old wooden door creaked as it turned on the socket pins. She cringed, for it too sounded overloud in the stillness of the night. She stepped over the stone sill and turned to bar the door.

And realised she could not do it. Faced with a blank wooden door, she dithered.

It was a cardinal sin to leave a door unlocked. She might be leaving a way open for marauders to gain entry to the house and murder everyone in their beds. Laying her forehead against the old oak, she closed her eyes, said a swift prayer and turned toward the gate.

A horse shifted in the nearby stable as she picked her way past the old lodging house and stepped onto the beaten earth of the courtyard. A dark pool of shadow surrounded the well and then the gate loomed in the curtain wall not far ahead.

She took a deep breath. A dark figure stood above the exit arch in the curtain wall. It would be Matho, watching out for her. The massive wooden doors stood ajar and he would secure it behind her, since she could not lift the huge drawbar.

Matho would probably check the door into the storeroom, too, and she felt better for the thought. She slipped through the narrow gap and gasped as cold wind blustered around her ankles and slapped her cheek. For a moment she stood there, undecided.

This was madness.

The lane to Halton showed as a lighter ribbon through the shadows before it disappeared beneath the trees. The squat, cosy hind’s cottage stood in darkness on her left, and the bushes before the door shook and rattled in the wind.

Madness or not, she had to go. Pulling her cloak tight against her throat, she hurried to the crossroads. The undulating land rose towards Grey House, snug and protected below the old Roman Wall. Open fields all the way, with only the odd scattered tree to give shade to the beasts in summer. Fields she had
run,
walked and skipped across all through childhood; yet the thought of striking out on her own, in the middle of the night, made her stomach curl into a tiny ball of fear.

With Lance and Cuddy at her side, she would have thought nothing of it, would have comforted Cuddy if he did not like the rustling darkness. If she could have done it with them at her side, she could do it alone.

The sharp wind tugged her cloak and frisked her skirt about her ankles. She glanced back at the gate, but the solitary figure of Matho had vanished.