LadyOfConquest:SaxonBride (2 page)

Short-cropped hair plastered to his head, face contorted, Sir Ancel demanded, “Who did this to our lord?”

She lowered her eyes to more easily tell the lie. “I did it.”

He grabbed her shoulders. “No more of your Saxon lies. I want the truth!”

“I have told it!”

“Do you think me a fool? It was your lover who put a dagger through him.”

He spoke of Edwin, the second son of the Saxon thane who had ruled Etcheverry before the coming of the Normans. Edwin, whose bitterness kept the enmity alive between the conquering Normans and the vanquished Saxons. Edwin, who was not her lover, though he would have been her husband had the Normans not claimed this land to which they had no right.

Though she would never admit it, he had aided in her escape this morn, and it was he who had fought Thomas and been wounded by his opponent’s blade. But it was not Edwin who landed the deathblow. After Thomas had sliced through Edwin’s sword arm, a dagger had been thrown from the wood.

Thomas’s cry, mingled with Edwin’s angry shout, returned to Rhiannyn as she stared through Sir Ancel. She saw herself take Thomas in her arms, saw the disbelief with which he regarded her as Edwin urged her to her feet, saw Edwin’s contempt as he berated her for refusing to leave with him, saw the injured arm Edwin pressed to his chest as he struggled to mount his horse. And then Thomas’s sightless eyes.

Blinking Sir Ancel to focus, she said, “
Non
, it was I who killed him.”

He sneered. “Where is your weapon?”

What had become of it? She lowered her chin and searched for a glint of silver. The dagger hid itself well, and she had to drop to her hands and knees and scrabble in the wet earth to find it.

She regained her feet and raised the weapon toward Sir Ancel. Though the blade had drawn the mud of the earth, the red spilled from Thomas’s veins was yet visible amid the recesses of the intricately carved hilt. “This is what I used.”

Disbelief continued to shine from the knight’s face and the faces of those behind him.

Did they not believe her capable of the atrocity—that she did not possess the stomach or strength required to kill a man?

She stepped forward. “God is my witness,” she said, promising herself she would repent later.

Sir Ancel knocked her hand aside, sending the dagger into the rain-beaten grass alongside the road. “Lying Saxon. It was the coward, Harwolfson, who did it!”

As she clasped her pained wrist to her chest, Sir Guy retrieved the dagger. When he looked askance at her, she averted her gaze.

“It was Harwolfson!” Sir Ancel insisted.

She shook her head. “You are wrong. I hated Thomas.”

“
Non!”
Having dismounted, Christophe hobbled forward. “You did not hate my brother, and even had you, you could not have done this.”

“I am responsible,” she asserted, which was true whether it was she who had wielded the weapon or the unseen one in the wood.

“Fear not, Christophe.” Sir Ancel grabbed Rhiannyn’s wet hair and forced her head back. “Justice will be done.”

Quelling the impulse to struggle, she said, “Do it now.”

“That would be too merciful.”

Mind ripe with imaginings of what he would do to her, she began to fully feel the chill of clothes soaked through. Or did fear make her shudder? “Do with me as you will,” she said through chattering teeth.

“Be assured, I shall.” He thrust her from him.

She threw her hands up and felt her palms tear when they met the muddied road. Prostrate, she silently prayed,
Dear God, be here, be merciful, be swift.

A hand gripped her arm and, with effort, pulled her to her feet.

It was Christophe. Wondering how it was possible to find no smudge of hatred amid the pain upon his face, her burning eyes brimmed.

He smiled sorrowfully. “Lady Rhiannyn—”

“Do not call her that, boy!” Sir Ancel snapped. “She is no longer a lady—indeed, never was.”

Christophe Pendery, who knew most believed he was undeserving of his surname, looked around. “She was to have been my brother’s bride.”

“
Oui
, and Thomas was a fool to think he could trust her.” The man jabbed a finger at where two knights arranged their lord’s body over a horse. “Your brother is dead.”

Christophe lowered his chin, closed his eyes, and fought emotions that sought to unman him before knights who would scorn him for showing a woman’s weakness.

He had to be strong. With Thomas gone, the estates fell to him, he who would never train for knighthood, whose destiny had been to serve as his brother’s steward. He did not want the responsibility, nor the struggle for power that would ensue. But what other course? Of the four sons born to Lydia Pendery, but two survived, himself and the eldest.

He opened his eyes. “Maxen,” he whispered. He to whom all would have belonged had he not pursued a different life. A
far
different life.

But would he come back out into the world? If so, would he stay?

CHAPTER TWO

His demons quieted, the lone figure rose from before the high altar and lifted his tonsured head to consider the holy relics—sole witnesses to his prayers.

“Answer me, Lord,” he said. And waited, as he did each time he prostrated himself in the chapel, but again he was denied deliverance from memories that had made him seek this place.

Disdained by God who was not yet ready to forgive him his atrocities, he strode from the chapel. He would try again on the morrow, and the morrow after, and one day there would be peace for his soul. God willing.

Paying little heed to the cool wind and its whispers of winter, he left his head uncovered and crossed to the cloister where his studies awaited.

It was Brother Aelfred who intercepted him. “A messenger from Etcheverry is here to speak with you,” he said from deep within his hood.

All of Maxen went still. For two years there had been silence, as he had directed upon entering the monastery. What was so important Thomas should break his vow to leave him be? Had ill befallen the house of Pendery?

“The man awaits you at the outer house,” Brother Aelfred prompted.

Maxen inclined his head and changed course. As he approached the building, he saw the one who stood to the right of it. Facing opposite, wind sifting short black hair and ruffling fine garments, the man appeared to be appraising a section of the monastery’s outer wall. But as if sensing he was no longer alone, he turned.

Maxen halted, causing his heavy clerical gown to eddy about his feet. “Guy.”

The knight who had fought beside him at Hastings grinned. “No other.” He strode forward and gripped his friend’s arm. “It is good to see you.”

Demons roused, Maxen demanded, “Why have you come?”

Guy blinked, released his arm, and donned an impassive expression. “Let us talk inside.”

“Something is amiss at Etcheverry?”

“It is. I would not have come otherwise.”

“Thomas sent you?”

“
Non
, Christophe.”

As Maxen was a dozen years older than the youngest Pendery, that would make his brother a mere fourteen years of age. Thus, it boded ill that it was he who had directed Guy to the monastery.

“What of Thomas?” Maxen asked.

A long silence, then, “I am sorry. Your brother is dead.”

Maxen’s chest constricted. Another brother destined for the dirt. Another taken too young.

Memories he had struggled to bury rising from their graves, he saw the sloping meadow of Senlac, the strewn, ravaged bodies. He heard the Norman battle cries of
Dex aie!
and
God’s help!,
the Saxon cries of
Holy Cross!
and
Out! Out!
He smelled the spilled blood and felt the heat of bodies pressing in upon him. And then…Nils.

He wrenched himself back to the present. Thomas was dead, the same as Nils. Of his three brothers, only Christophe remained. “How did he die?”

“A Saxon woman. She whom he wished to wed.”

“A woman?” Maxen barked.

As if uncertain of how to deal with this man of God who, in that moment, must look anything but, Guy took a step back. “She claims she was the one, but Sir Ancel believes her rebel lover murdered Thomas.”

Maxen knew he should distance himself by accepting his brother’s death and returning to the chapel to pray for him, but he had to know. “For what did she betray Thomas?”

“Rhiannyn is the daughter of a villein who died at Hastings. She blames the Normans for the deaths of her father and two brothers in battle, and of her mother during a raid upon their village before the fighting.” Guy shook his head. “Thomas thought he could make her forget her loss by bringing her into the castle and grooming her to become his wife.”

Hands concealed in the long sleeves of his robe, Maxen closed them into fists in an attempt to squeeze the breath out of emotions he had not thought to experience again. “It was Thomas who lost,” he growled. “Everything.”

“So he did. Rhiannyn refused to wed him, and though he might have gained her consent by threatening her people, he was determined she would come to him willingly.”

“And she never did.”

Guy shook his head. “She slipped free of the castle a sennight past. Though the wood teems with Saxon rebels, Thomas rode after her without awaiting an escort. When we found him, he was dead—put through with a dagger.”

“What of the woman?”

“Rhiannyn was there. She claimed she killed your brother, but it is unlikely she possesses the strength or skill to down a warrior.”

“She protects her rebel lover.”

“Edwin Harwolfson, to whom she was betrothed before William claimed England’s throne.”

“Who is he?”

“The second son of the thane who possessed the lands King William awarded Thomas. As the only survivor of his family, he claims rights over Etcheverry, refuses to acknowledge a Norman as his overlord, and leads the Saxon rebels who abound in the wood of Andredeswald.”

“He murdered my brother for revenge.”

“For which he is more than qualified. A worthy adversary.”

“Is the uprising restricted to Etcheverry?”

“No longer. It touches other Pendery lands, and many villages are dying as the young and strong leave to join the rebellion. There are not enough to work the land and tend—”

“Tell me more of Harwolfson.”

Guy drew a deep breath. “He was a royal housecarle to King Edward before his death. Next, he served the usurper, Harold.”

Surprise sprang through Maxen. A housecarle who had not died with his king? According to Saxon tradition, no housecarle should leave the battlefield alive if his lord was killed. There could be no worse disgrace.

“Harwolfson does not limit his foul deeds to Normans who pass through the wood,” Guy continued. “He leads attacks against Etcheverry Castle and its sister castle, Blackspur. The first year, he set fire to both so often Thomas began replacing wood with stone.”

Returning to what was yet unknown, Maxen asked, “How is it Harwolfson did not die at Hastings?”

“The Saxons say that while Harold expired a hundred feet away, an old witch pulled Harwolfson from beneath the dead and breathed life back into him. Afterward, she took him from the battlefield and healed his wounds with magical words and herbs.”

“What do the Normans believe?”

Guy’s brow was momentarily disturbed, as if he was tempted to point out Maxen was also Norman. “They say Harwolfson is a coward and ran to the wood when his king fell.”

“What do you think?”

“Word abounds of his courage. And with my own eyes I have seen the wound he is said to have gained while fighting to protect his king. Though I dare not say it too loudly, methinks he did not take to flight.”

Maxen wondered if he had met the man. By invitation of the now deceased King Edward, who’d had a particular fondness for Normans, the Penderys had resided on English soil for nearly a quarter century. For this reason, the first language of the Pendery offspring was Anglo-Saxon, though they were equally fluent in Norman French. But following King Edward’s death, the Penderys had not supported Harold Godwinson’s claim to the throne. Instead, as commanded, they had taken up arms for their liege, Duke William of Normandy. So much bloodshed…

The images sharpening, as if yesterday he had thrust his sword into the blood-soaked soil of Senlac and walked away, Maxen silently raged.
Curse Thomas for his obsession with the Saxon wench!
Curse him for dying and leaving none but Christophe to take control of the Pendery lands!

“There is none but you,” Guy said.

Maxen jerked. “What speak you of?” Not that he did not know. He just did not care to know.

“Christophe cannot do it, nor does he wish to. If what belongs to the Penderys is to remain theirs, you must come out.”

Leave his refuge that with prayer might someday free him of his demons? “I cannot. My vows are spoken. My life is here.”

“A petition has been dispatched to King William. If he agrees, which he would be a fool not to, you will be freed of your vows—at a price, of course.”

Further reminded of who he was and what he had done, Maxen struggled to contain emotions that might once more make of him an animal. When he had entered the monastery, he had determined he would never again know the outside world in which he had become merciless and bloodthirsty—as had been expected of him to prove his family’s allegiance to Duke William. More, he had given himself to the Church to ensure the world beyond these walls would never again suffer him.

“Christophe sent the petition?” he growled.

Guy swallowed loudly. “I did—with your brother’s blessing.”

Maxen stepped toward him. “You?”

“I had to, not just for our friendship, but because I could not bear to see all lost.”

“But Christophe—”

“I have told you. He is not fit to lord Etcheverry, nor Trionne once your father passes on. If you do not come out, it will be Sir Ancel Rogere who controls Pendery lands. At best, Christophe will be a figurehead.”

“Rogere?”

“Thomas’s friend, whom he intended to make lord of Blackspur Castle. Surely you remember him?”

He did. Thomas had become acquainted with the Norman prior to the Battle of Hastings. A landless noble, Rogere had sought his fortune fighting alongside Duke William in the quest for the English crown. However, it was told he had fallen early in battle, and a handful of coins had been his only reward.