Lord of a Thousand Nights (14 page)

“It is my plan to go north to Edinburgh,” she explained.

He nodded. “Edmund told me. Said he had made the offer long ago, should Robert die and you want to leave here.”

“He said I could stay with a widow there who teaches some girls. I sent a letter to Edmund before the siege and told him that I would be coming if I could. The notion has appeal. Robert taught me, and now I will teach others. It has a certain rightness to it.”

“It is not a fitting life. Two women living alone in the city? No man protecting you? Robert would not approve.”

“Robert is dead, Reginald.”

“Aye. He is dead, but I am not.”

The rain that Reginald had expected rolled into the sky, and they sought shelter under the entrance to the ruin's foundations. Reyna nested amidst some blankets and fell asleep with the cool rain dripping all around her.

When she woke, the setting sun had turned the moist air sultry. Reginald had left, and the bow was missing.

She thought about the life waiting for her. It had always sounded very alluring, and then, after the accusations began, had turned into a dream. Now that she was on the road there, however, her enthusiasm had failed her. A lump of melancholy had lodged under her heart instead.

She decided it was because she was leaving her home. Still, something else tinged the sadness. Something inexplicable and poignant.

She wondered for the hundredth time if anyone had found Ian. It would be better not to think about him, she decided. Wonderful to never remember what had happened a few hours ago. Dear saints, she hadn't even resisted much, hadn't run away, hadn't told him to stop once he touched her. She not only had succumbed to his practiced seduction like so many other women, but had probably done so more readily than most.

That notion humiliated her. And yet those lush sensations had been glorious, obscuring thought and duty, rolling her along to that special ecstasy. She had been both removed from the world and also more essentially in it than ever before. Oblivious to her surroundings, but absorbed into their natural rhythms. Close to the man in her arms in a way she had never been close to anyone before.

It amazed her that she had found her mind at the last minute, but that memory only humiliated her more. She should be grateful for his understanding about that. Most men would have just forced her if she did that to them.

A strange man, Ian of Guilford. Proud and arrogant and conceited to be sure, and an opportunist no doubt. But kind in his own way. And very clever. She had rather enjoyed matching wits with him these last few days. She admitted with amazement that she would miss him, and that part of her sadness came from her loss of him.

She needed to get her mind off him. She reached inside her sack for the one volume she had brought, a small Book of Hours.

It was the first one she had ever owned. Robert had given it to her as a wedding gift because it had lovely
pictures. While he had lain ill and dying, she had read it to him bit by bit, even though he knew the words by heart. It had stayed on the table beside his bed amidst the potions and parchments and quills, a reminder of their love and promises.

She smiled at the detailed illuminations of peasants and townspeople showing the labors of the months. She never tired of looking at them. When she turned to the month of August, a little slip of parchment fluttered to her feet.

She picked it up curiously, concerned that a page had torn. But the scrap did not come from the book. It bore no words, only a square and circles and curving lines. This scrap must belong to Thomas. He didn't read much, but he would have enjoyed looking at these pictures while he lived in the solar. She slipped it back in the book and continued reading.

Reginald returned at twilight with two rabbits. He built a low fire in the stone circle and set about skinning them. The fire would be hidden here, and Reyna guessed that he had used torches to signal her these last nights. When the meat was cooked, they ate in silence.

Twilight was dimming when Reginald abruptly spoke. “Before Edinburgh, we will stop in Hawick for a few days.”

“That is too close, Reginald. Let us make our way to Edinburgh quickly.”

“Nay. It will be Hawick. I have been thinking about what Robert said to me, about his request that I protect you. I am convinced that he wanted us to marry.”

Reyna went very still. She prayed that she had mis-heard.

“It is the only way to protect you,” he went on. “Elsewise, on what authority do I do so?”

“Chivalry gives you the authority. My late husband gave you the authority. If that is not sufficient, I will give it to you.”

He shook his head. “It will not be fitting for us to travel together otherwise, and Robert would not want you living alone without protection. We will marry and go to Edinburgh and I will find service there. Edmund will know of lords who need a sword.”

“I go to Edinburgh only because of Edmund's suggestion that I teach there and live with this widow. I do not wish to go there to be the wife of a knight in service.”

“It is well away from here, and apart from the jurisdiction of the bishop of Glasgow. It is still the best place to go.”

He had missed the point completely. “Reginald, I am sure that you misunderstood Robert's intentions. If he wanted us to marry, he would have said so to me, and he did not.”

Reginald looked over in a way that was not nearly so simple as normal. “I am convinced that he did so intend. You have no kinsmen to protect you except the Grahams, and you will not be wanting to go back to them. This oath creates a duty that I'll not be handing off to another. If you are unmarried, men will be preying on you like that English bastard back there, and I'll be killing them. Nay, my lady, if we are to be bound for life, then properly bound we will be.”

“I will not let you sacrifice yourself thus.”

“Marrying you will suit me.” He gazed up with a very different expression. Reyna looked into his eyes, and saw what was there.

Oh, dear. Oh, hell.

“Robert is barely cold. To force a marriage, and on a newly bereaved widow at that—”

“From what I could tell this afternoon, your bereavement is well over, my lady.”

So. He had seen or heard enough to reconsider his opinion of her.

The lord's wife and widow had suddenly become available. Not a slut, though, if he was considering marriage. He had probably rationalized her behavior in the way of the church. A woman, being of base nature like all women, would obviously go astray if there were not some man keeping a firm leash on her.

His decision took care of all that. He would fulfill his oath to protect her, save her from the damnation inherent in her femininity, and have his lord's lady whom he had desired as well. No doubt very neat to his mind. Since her first marriage had shown her to be barren, he probably felt incredibly chivalrous.

“I will refuse, and the priest will not wed us.”

“I will explain the situation, and he will. If need be, I will pay him.”

She rose and glared at him. “This is intolerable, Reginald. I always thought you an honorable and decent man, as Robert did, but I see that we both misjudged you.”

“And I always thought you an honorable and virtuous woman, as Robert did, but perhaps we both misjudged you as well. A decent woman would be glad of a husband to protect her. Perhaps today was not the first time with that Englishman. Perhaps Thomas was right, and you handed him the tower after he had had you.” He paused. “Perhaps you even tired of your old lord and sought to be free of him.”

She sucked in her breath with dismay. An unspoken ultimatum hung in the air. If she had loved Robert and had not killed him, if she was virtuous, she would marry
Reginald. If she refused, she was a whore and had probably killed her husband.

Sickening fear seeped through her, announcing her danger. For if she were a whore and murderer, if she declared herself one by refusing his protection in this marriage, she felt convinced that Reginald would take her not to Edinburgh, but to Clivedale.

Well, damn him. There was a third choice. Not much of one, and only a brief reprieve, but better than his.

“I relieve you of your oath.” She snatched up her sack and walked away from the fire. “I never thought I'd see the day when being a captive of an English army was the safest place for me.”

He was upon her in an instant, his iron grip clamped on her arm. “You will not go back there to him.”

“I do not go to anyone, madman.” She stretched to be free of him. “I go
home
.”

He pulled her back toward the fire. “Tomorrow we ride to Hawick. By morning, you will see the rightness of it.”

“Tomorrow we ride through my father's lands. I will scream until we are found by Grahams, and it will go badly for you.”

“Then I will see that you make no sound, my lady.”

Her eyes widened in horror as she realized where he was dragging her. “Nay, Reginald. Do not.”

He bent to scoop up a rope. He forced her into the ruined donjon. She grabbed at a stone and dug in her heels, and he pried her free and lifted her into his arms.

“Not in here, Reginald,” she pleaded, as the black cavern of the foundation vaults closed around them. “Tie me outside.”

“If the gag comes loose, you will scream,” he said, dumping her on the ground and quickly binding her hands together. “I do this for your sake, my lady. You will
see that soon enough.” He drew the rope down and circled her ankles. “All will be well. I will take care of you.”

Already the darkness was working its terror. Defeating her. Making her a child. “Then stay here with me,” she whimpered.

“I must keep watch outside,” he said, striding away.

Oh, God. Oh, God
. She closed her eyes, trying to ignore the silent darkness by pretending she only slept. But it pushed on her as it always did, the void growing fingers to prod and poke at her, the silence beginning to echo with cruel laughs.

She desperately squirmed around until she could see the way from which they had come. The vaguest flicker of the dying campfire was visible between the stone sentinels of the threshold. She pulled over her sack and clawed inside until she found the book. Holding it to her breast like a talisman of rationality, she huddled against her knees and kept her eyes on that small orange glow.

She watched a long time, waiting for the dreadful moment when the coals would die.

Cold. Chilling cold. Desolate loneliness. Sounds to the left and right, and beneath her in the stone itself. Faint sounds. Scurrying and footsteps.

She noticed every spark extinguish. Finally she faced nothing but eternal blackness. The terror seeped into her slowly, insidiously.

She clutched the book and began reciting every prayer she had ever learned, every passage she had ever read.

I
an slapped Margery's hand away from his head and bent to pull on his boots. Margery reached over with some more salve, making irritating little cooing sounds.

“Away with you,” he snapped. She moved away with a pouting expression. Then she glanced back, with a look that said he was a fool who couldn't take care of himself if he planned to ride in his condition.

It was all so predictable that Ian barely kept his temper.

He turned to Gregory. “It is done?”

“Aye. Twenty men to go check the farms. Another ten to the town. A patrol will leave at daybreak to look for signs on the moss.” His skeptical tone indicated he doubted they would find anything. Ian doubted it too.

“You should eat something,” Margery ventured. “I will bring up—”

“Leave now, woman,” Ian ordered dangerously. She drifted away shaking her head. She was acting like his worst nightmare of a wife.

“Who do you think it was? How many?” Gregory asked.

“I saw nothing,” Ian said. He saw nothing because he was lying on top of a naked woman, damn it.

“It could be Thomas Armstrong who took the chance to grab her. Or even Grahams for that matter. You weren't all that far from their border. Of the two, most likely Grahams, since they didn't kill you.”

Nay, they hadn't killed him, although he had lain unconscious a very long while, until the rain had brought him to. Had she argued against his death? A part of him wanted to think so. The weak part.

“Not Armstrongs or Grahams, I think. Someone she knew and trusted is more likely. I do not think she intended to walk to Edinburgh alone.” He strapped on his sword. “I think she was heading to the old castle. I will ride there and see if they left that way.”

“How many men will you be wanting?”

“None.”

“Sir Ian, I know that you are angry, what with the lady snatched from your hands. No doubt you want to even the score. But who knows what awaits? There are myself and six others ready to ride.”

“None.”

“That is unwise, sir, and you know it.”

It
was
unwise. And stubborn and prideful. He had lost her, so he wanted to get her back by himself. But mostly he didn't want anyone around when he killed these men and then dealt with the deceptive little bitch who had played him as if he were some green squire.

Only once before in his life had he so completely misjudged a woman. While he had made his way back to the keep, his head splitting with pain, he had finally seen this one for what she was. She had been manipulating his interest to create an ally and protector, encouraging him to argue away the clear evidence of her guilt in Robert's death.

Her performance today had been masterful. Jesus, but she had shown him for a besotted idiot. Drawing out the time, dangling in that tree, trying to get away, prolonging his seduction. All the while she was waiting for her rescuers to find her. She hadn't yelled her denials at the beginning, but waited until the end when he would be most vulnerable to attack. She had pretended innocence and ignorance and virtue from the start to beguile him.

I can not.
Like hell she couldn't.

“You will be wanting me with you, I think,” Gregory said meaningfully. “Morvan insists she is not to be harmed.”

“Then come, damn it. And bring the others. You are right, there is no telling what awaits.”