The Bride Gift (9 page)

“No thanks to you!” Incensed, she wound her fingers in his tunic and dug her nails into the wool. “I could have been beaten or killed, but you would not have known. You were running forward too fast to look back.”

“Let go of me.” Colin grabbed her hands and yanked, uncaring that fabric tore. He gripped her wrists hard. Colin was slim, but strong.

Helena tried to pull free. He tightened his hold and shook her. “How dare you demean me?”

“You left me there, alone!”

His hands fisted to the point of pain around the thin bones of her wrists. His face darkened into a scowl, his eyes narrow and glittering. “I had no choice!”

She could see him building into one of his rages, but the desire to placate him, to calm him, was not within her. Righteous anger blazed instead. “You had a choice. You chose to be a coward.”

“How
dare
you!” He thrust her away; she lost her balance, staggering backward into the wall. “You are a bitch.” Colin loomed over her. Spittle flecked around the corners of his mouth. “Do not
ever
call me a coward.”

He raised his hand as if to strike her. Colin’s rages were rare but legendary within the keep.

Helena braced for the blow. She refused to flinch before him. She had saved his miserable skin this morning and he’d repaid her by leaving her to face Guy’s wrath. Now he thought to abandon everything?

“Coward.” Helena spat the word at him.

The blow snapped her head to the side. Heat exploded across her cheek. The edges of her vision went black. Fury clawed at her belly in the sudden silence. Not since they were children had he dared as much.

Their breathing was harsh in the deathly stillness.

“You struck me—” Helena could barely form words. Her fingers shook violently as she raised them to her throbbing cheek.

“You called me a coward.” Colin edged away from her, shock and sudden guilt clearly visible on his face.

“I am glad I am not to marry you!” Tears burned the back of her throat, but she would not shed them. “You are not worthy to be my husband.”

Anger won and Colin’s face tightened. He advanced on her again.

Helena faced him squarely. Let the miserable churl do his worst. Let him dare to strike her again.

“Sweet Mother of God, what is going on here?” Bridget demanded from the entrance to the hall. “They can hear you two squabbling in the next borough.”

Colin stopped with his fisted hand poised mid-air.

Bridget’s eyes darted from one to the other and lingered on Helena’s face. “Did you strike her?”

Colin slowly retreated, but his eyes still blazed.

“What possessed you to raise your hand in this way? Roger would have had you strung up for this.”

“Roger is gone,” Colin snapped.

“Aye.” Bridget fixed him with a piercing stare. “And fortunate for you that he is.”

Silence reigned, before Colin finally dropped his gaze to the floor.

Helena’s cheek pulsed with pain. She wanted to rage and cry all at once.

Bridget turned Helena’s chin with gentle hands. She clicked her tongue. “That it should come to this.”

“I beg your pardon, Nell.” Colin stared at his hands as if he’d never seen them before. “I struck you and I am most truly sorry.”

“Is it bad?” She spoke to Bridget instead. The rending within her breast would spill over if she allowed it. Deathly calm strangled her voice and left it devoid of expression.

“It will mark for sure,” Bridget replied.

“I shall leave,” Colin mumbled in a voice rife with emotion.

Helena could only find him pitiful.

A flush of colour stained his cheeks. “I shall leave before he reduces me to a beast like himself.”

“
He
did not strike me.” Her anger thrummed beneath the surface, but she could not allow it to escape. Colin had struck her. Had Bridget not intervened, he would have done so again. A choking bile rose in the back of her throat.

“I am sorry, Nell,” Colin pleaded, his hands outstretched toward her. “I am not myself. How can you expect me to be? He has taken everything that was mine. Even you.” His finger shook as he pointed it at her. “He has taken you from me, otherwise you would never have spoken as you just did. You would never have provoked me to strike you.”

Helena’s hands tightened into claws. In Colin’s mind none of this was his fault. She could see, even now, the certainty growing in his eyes that he spoke true.

Always, in the past, she and Roger had allowed him his little conceits. They had never challenged his view of himself. She had been blind. Colin was naught more than an indulged, petulant boy in a man’s body.

Disgusted, she turned away. Her resolve grew stronger as she strode toward the stairs.

“You cannot expect me to stay here,” he called after her. “Not with that lout sitting at my place a-table and sleeping in my bed. I will not grovel like a dog before some limp-minded behemoth.”

Helena climbed the stairs and Bridget fell into step behind her.

“You do not understand!” Colin shouted. “My position here is insupportable. I was to be lord to this pile of stones and now I must play the serf? I cannot do it, Helena. I warn you, it is not to be borne. I am a man. There is a limit to what a man can take—”

She and Bridget ascended to the upper level, leaving Colin and his nonsense behind.

“My lady?” She started as Geoffrey hailed her. He emerged from her solar, tripping only once on his way. “I have been searching—” His gaze narrowed on her cheek.

“What is it, Geoffrey?”

Geoffrey frowned as if struggling to contain himself. “Sir Guy sent you a message. He rides out this night with Sir Ewayne.”

Helena nodded, too wrung out to question Geoffrey any further. “My thanks.” She dismissed the boy.

“He will be back only after Vespers.” Geoffrey visibly struggled to contain himself. Questions flooded his eyes. “Mayhap I should . . .”

Bridget gave him a gentle shove. “Go, lad. You do not want to keep Sir Guy waiting.”

Geoffrey stammered and blushed, but backed away and clattered down the stairs again. He narrowly missed ploughing into Willie.

“God’s Bones,” Willie breathed, his eyes wide as he caught sight of her.

Helena’s face heated beneath the boy’s avid stare. The mark on her cheek ached.

Willie yelped as Bridget laid hold of him by the ear. “Watch your tongue.”

“Take him below.” Helena motioned to Bridget. “I would like some quiet.”

Bridget hesitated, but nodded and dragged the yowling Willie down the stairs.

Approaching the sanctity of her solar, Helena’s feet dragged like a woman aged a hundred years since she had woken this morning. Suddenly she wanted to cry.

“Lady Helena?”

Helena groaned. “Over here.” She turned as Lady Rosalind approached.

The woman held a small clay pot in her hand. “You had best put this on your bruise before Guy sees it. Or he will separate your precious Colin from his head for sure.”

Silently, Helena accepted the vessel.

With a smirk, the woman sauntered away.

Helena’s fingers tightened around the pot, longing to hurl it at Rosalind’s retreating back.

She slipped into her solar instead. Closing the door, she barred it and approached the bed, dropping face first into the furs, wincing as the action jarred her wounded cheek. The tears refused to come and after a moment she rolled over onto her back.

The salve was still clasped in her fist and she raised it and took a sniff. It smelled vaguely bitter, but not unpleasantly so. She stuck her finger into the pot and pulled out a large dollop. With careful fingers, she soothed it over her cheek. It stung a little before reducing the ache to a low throb.

The ache in her chest only grew larger.

Chapter 10

Helena stood at her casement as Guy rode out of the bailey. His men clattered across the drawbridge in his wake. His coif was drawn back as he sat, tall and unbending, on the back of his destrier.

He seemed a knight straight from a minstrel’s tale as he kicked his horse into a canter and disappeared from view into the forest. Helena rested her head against the cold stone beside the casement.

Guy departed this evening to ensure the safety of the keep whilst Colin skulked somewhere within, nursing his bruised ego. So different to Colin in every way, Guy was the very kind of man she’d chosen not to marry and yet, Roger had overset her plans in one bold stroke.

Helena touched the sore spot on her cheek. Even in his anger, Guy had remained in control of his emotion. She could still feel the way his body shook with the effort to contain himself. Colin struck out viciously when he felt belittled. Guy kept his anger in check, a man of violence, but also a man of restraint. Colin had shown no restraint.

Her sigh came from deep within. Guy was also a man with a mistress about to birth a child. Did Colin have a mistress? She had certainly never heard mention of anything of that nature, but Colin was a man. Men did as they pleased and women bore the burden. It was the way of the world.

She was adrift and so terribly alone. Mayhap some buried part of her had always known Colin was not for her. He had put one barrier after another before them being wed and, in truth, she’d not fought him that hard. What was to be done? Guy was her husband and the idea was no longer so terrible that she needed to fight it with all that she had.

Willie wove into sight below her, staring forlornly after the retreating men. How quickly a child such as he could adapt to a new hand on the reins.

An idea struck Helena with almost dizzying force. Willie was still staring after the knights as the idea took root in her mind. It was so obvious. She had to catch the edge of the casement to contain her whirling head.

Her thinking had been too tame, too mired in her woman’s fears. She could see how she’d missed the most obvious solution. She needed to stop thinking like a woman, passive and meek as she awaited her fate. She must think like a man.

All her life, she had been at the mercy of men and their will. If this morning had taught her anything, it must be to take action. Her fate was in her hands; she must reach out and grab it. She must be bold and strike first.

She’d been cowering behind Roger to prevent Ranulf from getting her. It was time to step out from behind her protector. She had, at her disposal, the perfect weapon to strike first. Never mind Colin and how she could always cozen him into doing her bidding; how much more could she accomplish with a man of action? A warrior whose skills were known throughout the kingdom would make a far better ally.

Helena threw open the door to her solar. The plot was bold and daring. Vigour surged through her. She nearly collided with Bridget coming up the stairs.

“What has you in a lather?” Bridget groused, straightening her kerchief.

There was no question of sharing her latest plan with Bridget. The old woman would have plenty to say on the subject, Helena would wager her best girdle on it.

“What has you in a sour temper?” she asked instead.

Bridget jerked her chin in the direction of the sewing room. “Her Highness would like some goat’s milk, warm, but not tepid and sweetened with one and a half spoons of honey.”

Lady Rosalind. Helena hadn’t quite worked the other woman into her plan.
Dear God.
The idea had just come to her and it needed work. A mistress could present a thorny problem.

Then again, a wife held so much more sway than a mistress. First, she needed to understand how much of a problem before she acted to eliminate the danger. A clever commander gathered intelligence before she planned her campaign.

“We have goats.” She grinned at Bridget. “And we have honey. I will take it to her.”

“Oh, ho.” Bridget folded her scrawny arms over her chest. “Now I know you are up to something.”

“Trust me, Bridget,” Helena sang out. “All you need do is trust me.”

“Is this going to work as well as your plan to wed Colin?”

“Better.” Helena threw her a glittering smile. “Much, much better.”

“That is what I feared,” Bridget muttered. “I suppose I have a goat to milk.”

She limped away.

Rosalind had transformed the homely jumble of the sewing room into a feminine bower. Swathes of fabric in glorious rainbow hues draped the tired furnishings. A bed had been placed near the window and more lush colour turned it into a beckoning haven.

Helena advanced cautiously into the room. The sweet scent of lavender hung in the air.

“Lady Helena.” Rosalind eased onto her feet, still graceful despite the size of her belly. “This is unexpected.”

The woman was depressingly beautiful, the dark, sultry appeal of her face undeniable. Her eyes were so blue as to be almost dazzling. And they were giving Helena the same keen interest.

“I brought your goat’s milk.” Helena indicated the small salver she carried. “And some poppy seed cakes. They are my favourite.”

“My thanks.” Rosalind took the salver from her. She set it on a chest covered in a vivid scarlet silk embroidered with clambering roses. Helena winced for the treatment of such a costly fabric.

“So,” Rosalind said. “You have come to see the whore.”

“I know not what you mean,” Helena demurred, trying for a charming smile.

“Please, let us not play games amongst ourselves. Save that for the men, but betwixt us we can be honest. Your husband has arrived with a woman ready to birth a babe, and you want to know the particulars.”

“Very well. I want to know what you are to Guy.”

Rosalind laughed, a warm, husky caress of the air that surely no man could be immune to. “Wondrous.” She clapped her hands together appreciatively like a happy child. “Did you not hear what the priest said? I am a very old and very dear family friend.”

“I thought you said no games betwixt us,” Helena replied in a hard voice.

Rosalind grimaced ruefully and then offered a smile sparkling with direct challenge.

Helena’s hackles rose.

“Well played, my lady, and ensnared in a web of my own making. Very well, then.” Rosalind lifted the cup of milk and took a sip. “I am not his leman.”