Suzanne Robinson (17 page)

As he went, he wondered if he dared slip into her bed as he’d promised. He longed to with a violence previously unknown to him. His nights were restless with ungratified desire, and now that he’d touched her skin and lain on top of her, he knew he wouldn’t rest until he’d taken her. Would she welcome him in spite of her words? He couldn’t be sure, for whatever her learning and wit, Mistress Oriel was as unpredictable as north country weather. And he was beginning to suspect her passions were as violent.

Oriel sat on her bed fully dressed and waited to see if Blade would indeed try to steal into her chamber. The hangings on one side had been thrown back so that she could see the door to the withdrawing chamber. On the floor by the bed and a small brazier lay Nell’s cot, with Nell huddled in blankets. She too gazed at the door.

“Ooo, mistress, how can you visit the crypt in the middle of the night? There’s bound to be shades walking about.”

Shivering, Oriel threw off the cover she’d been using for warmth and replaced it with her heavy cloak. The fur lining enveloped her, and she buried her nose in it

“I won’t be alone.”

“You keep well behind his lordship.”

The door swung open, slowly, and Oriel clambered off the bed. She had believed Blade’s threats and thus had slept a few hours, then rose and dressed so he couldn’t catch her abed. Blade’s head appeared, then the rest of him, and he scowled at Nell and then Oriel.

“Coward.”

Oriel pulled on the hood of her cloak without replying.

“Ooo, mistress, mayhap you should take a knife or something.”

“What good would that do against shades?”

Nell oooed again as Oriel preceded Blade out of the chamber.

“You’re a distrustful soul,” he whispered to her.

“Afore God, I trust you to do what you threatened after what happened in the cellar.”

She had reached the stairs when he suddenly took her gloved hand. He bent to look into her eyes. She could see the gleam of his teeth and knew he was smiling.

“Yet you still accompany me privily to a place of darkness and concealment.”

Pulling her hand free, Oriel tried to see his expression, but failed. “You said you wished to see Uncle Thomas’s tomb. If you intend to try your evil tricks, I will not accompany you.”

“But
chère
, you said you wouldn’t be frightened the next time.”

“I—I was addled by your attempts to cozen me when I said that. I have reflected and remembered my virtue.”

She tried to take a step down the stairs, but he caught her arm. She felt his breath on her cheek.

“Liar. You’re afraid.”

Shrugging off his hand, she continued down the stairs without answering. She didn’t hear him follow, but he had, for she heard his whisper just behind her.

“Alas. I’ve found the exception to Petrarch’s rule that rarely do beauty and virtue dwell together.”

She stumbled when she heard this, and he caught her. As his arms came around her, she turned and gazed at him. He was frowning at her.

“God’s breath, girl, take greater care. You take five years off my life every time you slip.”

She nodded. “Beauty?”

He was paying attention to the stairs as they began their trip down again. “Mmm.”

“You said beauty.”

“Yes. Shhh.”

They reached the bottom, and he led the way past a sleeping usher posted at the main entry. She kept silent until they had emerged from the house by a side door. They came to a hedge, and she tugged on his cloak.

“You said beauty.”

“Yes. What of it?”

“You think I’m—” She couldn’t say the word

He was looking at her. She could see him in the moonlight, and his face held amazement.

“Never tell me you thought yourself ugly.”

“Not precisely ugly. Odd, and plain”

She almost cried out when he cursed, darted at her, and swept her over the hedge. Dropping her on her feet, he snatched her hand and pulled her after him.

“By all the doxies in the London stews, think you I try to seduce monsters? No, I have it. Those cursed aunts of yours have made you believe you’re ugly.”

“They never said I was ugly, but I’ve read about great beauties, and I don’t look like them.”

“Then you’ve been reading the works of fools.”

He put a finger to his lips and slipped inside the chapel, pulling her after him. It was dark except for the altar candles. They waited to make sure the chapel was deserted, and as they waited, Oriel watched Blade.

He thought she was beautiful. That he thought so was to be marveled at, for no one had ever said such a
thing to her before. When he had abducted her from the masque, she had thought he was making a jest of her, but she’d been mistaken. Then he’d kissed her and tried to make love to her, and she’d almost succumbed. Until that encounter in the cellar she had found it almost impossible to believe that he could love her.

Now enlightenment burst upon her. This young man who had legions of women tripping over one another to get to him, this man who had pillaged numerous French court ladies, this wild and mysterious interloper, actually fancied her for his mate. Why else would he tell her she was beautiful? If he wished to marry her, he could arrange a contract with George and her aunts with little trouble and even less dealing with her, as long as their relationship was amicable. Yet he hadn’t been able to keep his hands from her.

Her life had been lonely for so long, except for Uncle Thomas. Now there was no one to whom she was essential. No one who waited for her to enter rooms, who worried if she was ill, who longed for her presence because it brightened his days. She had longed secretly for such a one, and now he’d come to her wrapped in an alluring package of dark beauty that haunted her days and nights as well. As they waited, she said a quick prayer of thanks to God for this living gift.

Then her gift began to move, and she stopped praying. Blade retrieved a torch from its wall socket, lit it from a candle, and returned to light their way. They crept down the nave to the south transept and gained the stairs to the tunnel that led to the crypt. Nell’s warnings about shades and evil spirits came back to her as she followed him down the short tunnel and into the crypt.

Closed in the blackness of the crypt, she said a quick prayer beseeching Uncle Thomas’s protection. Blade had stopped at Uncle’s tomb and was holding the torch near the inscription on its face. The only sounds in the place were their breathing and the hiss of the flame from
the torch. She noticed Blade was caressing the hilt of his sword as he read.

“Domine Deus
 … Here lyeth the Right Honorable Sir Thomas Richmond, son of Sometime of the household of His Eminence, Cardinal Wolsey.…”

“You see why it’s so strange he would tell me to read the inscription if I was in trouble. There’s naught in it of great import.”

They stood side by side and read the inscription again. The minutes passed as they thought about the words. Finally Blade sighed and turned away. Walking around the tomb, he shoved the torch into a wall holder between two older tombs set in curved archways. As he turned from the wall back to her, he stopped. His hands dropped to his sides and he narrowed his eyes.

“Chère
, come here.”

She joined him while he retrieved the torch. He went to Uncle Thomas’s tomb and held the torch next to another inscription carved into the side away from the crypt door. Cut in Roman letters as high as the length of Blade’s hand was a phrase in Latin.

Blade touched the letters with his gloved fingertips. “ ‘Touch me not.’ This is from the Bible. Jesus said it to Mary Magdalene.”

“Yes, but it’s unlike Uncle Thomas, such a quotation. Why would he warn us away from his tomb? Or mayhap he was afraid of grave robbers.”

“Robbers in this crypt?”

“I told you the whole matter was wondrous strange.”

“God’s blood it’s cold.” Blade stamped his boots on the stone floor and glared at Uncle Thomas’s effigy. “You couldn’t have made the puzzle a simple one, put somewhere warm.”

“Noli me tangere,”
Oriel said to herself.
“Noli me tangere. Noli me tangere.”

“Repeating it over and over won’t do any good,” Blade said.

“I’ve read that before.”

“Of course you have. In the Bible.”

She shook her head. Running her gaze over the Latin words again, she cupped her hands over her cold nose and rocked back and forth on her heels.

“Noli me tangere
,” she said.

Blade said nothing, but moved closer to her and never looked away from her face.

“Noli me
—Sir Thomas Wyatt!”

“What mean you?”

She clutched at his arm and almost danced in her excitement. “In the weeks before he died Uncle Thomas made a great point of having me read the poetry of Sir Thomas Wyatt. He used to say Tom Wyatt knew better how to write verse than to live his life. He had this book of copies of the poems, and he insisted I read all of them.”

“Where is this book now?”

“In the library, I think.”

He snatched her hand once more and dragged her up to the chapel again. She was out of breath by the time they reached the chapel, but he gave her no chance to protest. Only pausing to douse the torch in sand, he quickly pulled her back to Richmond Hall. By the time they reached the second floor gallery, she was ready to dig in her heels.

“Why are you stopping?” He yanked on her hand.

“Give—
puff
—me—
puff
—time.” She gulped in deep breaths.

“Pardon,
chère.”

Instead of waiting, he scooped her up and carried her into the library. Dropping her into Uncle Thomas’s old chair, he busied himself making a fire while she regained her breath. He vanished into the adjoining
withdrawing chamber and returned with a wine flagon and goblet. He poured some and thrust the goblet at her. She took a sip, then another, and sighed.

“Where is the book?”

“You see that stack beside my tabled I put it there after I recorded it on my list. I think.”

Blade lit a candle and searched the pile of books resting on a chest beside her worktable. He was forced to remove several stacks before finding the Wyatt poems. He came back to her and placed the book in her hands.

“Which is the poem?”

“I don’t remember. All I remember is the phrase
‘noli me tangere
.’ I will have to search for it.”

She began turning pages. Halfway through the book, Blade knelt beside her and watched the pages turn. She pressed another page flat.

“Here! I remember now. Uncle said this one was written about Anne Boleyn. Wyatt was in love with her, you know, but old King Henry got her instead. Uncle said Wyatt nearly died when she tossed him away for the king.”

Together they read the sonnet.

Blade sighed. “What means this hinting with sonnets and circuitous reasoning? Know you why he would put the poem in your way?”

“No, but it’s most curious that he would go to all this trouble to give hints only I could understand.” Oriel rose and placed the book open on the table. “Mayhap it all means nothing, but signifies our foolish imaginations.”

“If that were so, your uncle wouldn’t be dead.”

She turned back to him in surprise. He had gone back to the fireplace. Having removed his gloves, he was holding his hands near the flames. She went to stand on the opposite side of the fire and removed her gloves as well.