Queen of Lost Stars (Dragonblade Series/House of St. Hever) (9 page)

She had no idea what he meant. “My lord?”

“You may even call me Kaspian. Addressing me formally seems strange under these circumstances. May I call you Madelayne?”

She nodded before she could even think about what he had asked because the conversation had her muddled. “You may,” she said. “But… are you certain I will not be a burden?”

“You let me worry about that,” he said. “For now, you will continue to sleep in the chamber you shared with Cairn and you will continue with your chatelaine duties. It is the least I can do for Cairn, Madelayne. You will remain here with us until the situation must be addressed again.”

Madelayne had no idea how to respond to him. She simply nodded her head, feeling confused and strange about the entire conversation. In fact, she didn’t want to talk about it any longer, knowing that he was allowing her to stay because he felt pity for her. She didn’t like that at all. She didn’t want to be a charity act for him.

“You said that you wished to see Thomas?” she said, rising off of the stool and heading for the chamber door. “Would you like me to send him to you now?”

Kaspian watched her move, stiffly, and he remembered she had given birth days before. “Send a servant for him,” he said. “You will not go. Return to your chamber now and I will send for you when I need you.”

When I need you
. More suckling, more touching, more silent fantasies in her heart about the man. A cold, impersonal man who made her feel more alive and excited than Cairn ever had. It was terrible and unhealthy for her to think that her association with St. Hèver could be anything more than what it already was. The man only needed her breasts. He didn’t need, or want, anything else about her. She was a burden but he was too loyal to Cairn to say so.

A burden.
A widowed woman will face a bleak outlook.

As long as she remained at Lavister, that was all she would ever be.

Silently, she quit the chamber and sent a servant to find Thomas. As she slowly descended the stairs and entered her chamber, she looked at the four walls around her and realized that she couldn’t bear to remain. She only had horrible memories of this room, where she had birthed two dead children, and where her dead husband had lived with her. As she looked around, all she could see was pain. She couldn’t stay no matter what St. Hèver said.

She had to go.

Before the hour was out, she did.

CHAPTER SIX

W
rexham.

It was where her father lived, the one she rarely spoke to, but it was her destination. It wasn’t too far from Lavister, to the south about ten miles, so she knew she could make it in a day. She knew that she could have made it faster had she been feeling better, but she was still rather stiff from having given birth a scant five days before.

In the days when women were kept in bed for weeks after giving birth, the fact that she was up and moving, and determined to walk to Wrexham no less, would classify her as something of an idiot, but Madelayne didn’t particularly care. She simply wanted to get away from Lavister where the commander of the keep viewed her as something to be pitied. It was better for them all if she left and she kept telling herself that with every step she took.

This month had been oddly dry which meant the roads were in decent shape to travel upon. Usually, May was a very wet month but this year had seen the anomalistic dry weather pattern. It wasn’t particularly cold, either, but Madelayne was wrapped up in a dark cloak against the weather and also to keep herself covered up. She felt exposed enough, a woman on foot, without announcing herself to anyone she passed. On this main road, she had passed several people, traveling out of Wrexham to points north, but most had been farmers or merchants who hadn’t give her much notice. She wanted it that way.

Foolish wench!

She could hear her father now when she showed up at his door. He’d never much cared for his only child and had been quite happy when Cairn had offered for her hand. Melchoir Gray was a cousin to the Northumberland Grays, an offshoot of a big family who had become wealthy from transporting fabrics and oils from France. Melchoir’s father had started the business, eschewing his family ties because he fell in love with a peasant woman. That woman had been Madelayne’s grandmother, a woman she remembered well and a woman she greatly favored, but a cancer had taken her grandmother away just as a cancer had taken away Madelayne’s own mother away. Two women in the family taken by a cancer. It was something Melchoir had never been able to rectify in his mind.

So he ignored his daughter and spent his time on his business or whores. There was no kind way to put it – he spent his money on women, sometimes two at a time, and Madelayne had grown up in a fine house in Wrexham, ignoring the trollops who dined with her father and stole from him. On more than one occasion, Madelayne had caught the women stealing plate from the feasting hall and she’d taken a broom to them, beating them soundly as they fled the house empty-handed.

It was her duty to tend the house, and the contents, and she wouldn’t tolerate thievery from her father’s companions. Madelayne had been the keeper of the home as well as of the business books, as she had been educated in her youth and knew how to cipher. It was only through her that her father’s business survived, for he spent money foolishly, so she wondered what she was going to find upon returning home.

It made her sick to think about returning to that home where her father cared nothing for her and she lived in loneliness. Perhaps that had been her main reason for marrying Cairn; to get away from the loneliness. But at least in her father’s home, she wouldn’t feel as if she were a burden like she would if she remained at Lavister.

The morning progressed as she continued to walk, moving along the edge of the road, trying to keep her head down and not make eye contact with anyone. It was incredibly foolish to be traveling like this but she had little choice. Her body hurt badly but she ignored it, trudging along, trying not to think on what she’d left behind.
A dead husband, dead sons
… that was all she had left behind. A life that was over before it ever really got started. She missed Cairn’s guidance and protective instincts but, strangely enough, she also missed the feel of Kaspian’s arms around her. Those few short days with the man, sleeping alongside him, knowing he was dependent upon what she could provide… instead of bonding to her child, she had bonded with a grown man.

And she felt guilty as hell about it.

So she moved quickly down the road, scurrying along, praying to make it to Wrexham before dark. All the while, she kept her thoughts on what lay ahead, on what she would say to her father when he saw her standing on his doorstep. But no matter what she said to him, she knew what he would say to her…

Foolish wench!

She thought on resuming her old life, on seeing her old friends, friends she hadn’t seen since she had married Cairn. There were the baker and her daughter, and the butcher’s wife down the avenue. Round women with lips that were perpetually blabbing everyone’s business. She thought on what she would tell them about her life at Lavister, being married to a powerful knight. She knew that whatever she told them would make it all over town in minutes. She was thinking so much on seeing her old friends again that she failed to notice a farmer and his son who had been trailing her.

The pair had passed her going the opposite way about an hour earlier and they had eyed her with great interest. A lone woman traveling down the road. The farmer had been more interested in her than his son had been, for the farmer had recently lost his wife and had been on the hunt for a new one for some time. This lone woman traveling might be the perfect wife for him. A lady that surely had no one, for no man would allow his woman to travel alone as she was. He had caught a glimpse of her face beneath her hood and from what he had seen, she was pleasant enough to look at. And that gave him an idea.

So he turned the wagon around and began following her, far enough back so she couldn’t hear noise from the horse or the creak of the wagon wheels. Surely she didn’t have any kin or even a husband if she was traveling alone, which was why the farmer thought he might very well like to pluck her right off of the road and take her home. The son wasn’t so keen in abducting the woman but the father was. He needed someone to cook and clean and sew, and he’d been unsuccessful in finding a wife candidate on their weekly visits to town. Some women seemed to react adversely to his one brown eye and one milky eye, and also the fact that he reeked of cheese. It was an appalling smell but the farmer had never really noticed. He didn’t particularly care.

If he couldn’t find a wife, then he would take one.

Unaware of the danger behind her, Madelayne’s pace was slowing as her exhaustion increased. Her legs hurt, her belly ached, and the area between her legs was sore and chaffing. She could see Wrexham in the distance, nestled amongst the green Welsh hills, so her goal was in sight. Just a little further and she would be able to rest under her father’s roof. Already, she was thinking ahead to what possible mess might be facing her in the two years since she left. She would be surprised if her father was still in business. Therefore, she tried to work up the focus to face what was to come and not think about what she left.

Who
she left.

But those were her last coherent thoughts as someone grabbed her from behind. Strong, sinewy arms went around her ribs, lifting her off the ground, and she immediately began to scream and fight. Caught off guard as she was, all she could feel was utter terror. Cowering in fear, or surrendering to whoever had overwhelmed her, never came to mind. She screamed her head off, trying to kick whoever held her, and she was lucky enough to make contact with a bony knee. With a curse, the man dropped her and she fell to her hands and knees. Before she could pick herself up again, he grabbed her once more and dragged her backwards. Madelayne could see a wheel and part of a wagon bed from the corner of her eye.

“Enough with ye!” a male voice in the wagon hissed. “Put her in the wagon and let us be off!”

Panicked, Madelayne continued to twist and fight, knowing that whoever had her was strong and obviously male. There was a second man in the wagon. Put her in the wagon and let us be off! Obviously, they had wicked intentions. God help her, she was in the exact situation she had strived not to fall in to during her journey from Lavister. She’d covered herself up, tried to move swiftly, but in spite of her precautions, she had been set upon. She could only scold herself at the moment, much in the words of her father.

Foolish wench!

Aye, she was foolish. Foolish to let herself fall into lascivious hands. But she had fight in her and unless they tied her up or killed her, she would continue to fight. She wouldn’t make an easy victim. So she continued screaming and fighting with her overtaxed and sore body, even as she was dragged into the bed of the wagon and the entire vehicle lurched forward, nearly spilling her and her abductor off of it. Madelayne tried to climb off of the wagon bed but bony, strong fingers held her tight.

She kept screaming even as the wagon bounced off the road and headed west, hoping someone would hear her and help.

Praying for a miracle.

God help me!

*

“Get back into
bed! Are you mad?”

Dolwyd was shouting at Kaspian, who had just risen to his feet from his deathbed. Thomas and Ewan were standing in the chamber, watching him, their expressions grim. It was grim news indeed that Ewan had just brought to Kaspian, enough to propel the man out of his bed. Even as he rose to his feet, he staggered and Thomas reached out to grab him. Dolwyd was flitting around, shouting.

“You are not well, St. Hèver, not in the least!” he said. “You must get back into bed!”

Kaspian was gray with pain and exertion, holding on to Thomas so he wouldn’t fall down. Ignoring the furious physic, he looked at Ewan.

“I saw her in my chamber this morning, a mere few hours ago,” he said, hunched over with a hand over his injury. “Have you looked everywhere? She did not simply disappear.”