The Holding - Book 1 in The Medieval Knights Series (14 page)

"Yea, le Brouillard, I have learned something of your history, and mayhap you should learn something of mine."

The cold glint of his gray eyes flared for a moment, and he took a step toward her as he spoke, the taper fluttering in his hand.

"I would welcome that," he gritted out, "though it is hours late."

Cathryn jerked as if struck, but she did not back away. Again, he was reluctantly impressed by her strict composure.

"My history
is
one of losing, my lord," she spit out. "All that I had has been lost to me."

"Including Greneforde?"

"Nay," she answered quickly. "Greneforde I give to you, for she needs a knight and his battle skills to protect her. She has been without a man to defend her for too long."

"But you have not," he choked out, his anger flaring.

Suddenly the Cathryn he had had but a glimpse of—her fire, her fight—was gone, and in her place was the Cathryn of Greneforde that he already knew so well. She stood in cool defiance, her expression blank and her eyes cold. When she spoke, her voice was soft and emotionless.

"The air is stale. I would seek fresher."

She moved to the stair, but he blocked her with his body. He had not meant to fuel this fire of anger and distrust between them. He had never known a man or woman who touched his emotions so strongly; it was a new experience and not a welcome one. Who was this woman he had wed?

Trying for peace, he said, "You asked about the seed."

"And you asked about my ancestry," she replied coolly, her breath frosting the air. "At least you are satisfied."

"I am far from satisfied!" William burst out, angry again despite his resolve.

"Then you may share the state with me, for I have grown quite lonely and could do with a partner," she answered, backing up to stare at him as she planted the barb.

"I would say you have been too well partnered and too often!" William shouted.

"So you say, and therefore it must be," she answered with cool sweetness. "You are, I have been told, the lord of Greneforde."

"And of all within its walls," he added severely, his dark eyes narrowed.

"That is so," she politely agreed.

And his senses, in which he put such well-earned trust, told him that she meant it. He could not fathom her; she seemed to resent him personally, but not his lordship of her inheritance. He could make no sense of her attitude. It could not be that she had a dislike for men in general; no, he knew well enough it could not be that. Opening his mouth for another pass in this battle they fought, he was stopped by Ulrich rushing down the stairs.

"William! Rowland has sighted a doe on the edge of the wood and he calls for a hunt! Hurry, my lord, hurry! I can taste the meat on my starved tongue and my stomach cries out its delight."

William turned to where Cathryn had been standing. She was no longer there, but had returned to the trunk and was carefully brushing off the seeds that clung to her fingers so that they fell with graceful precision into the bag that sheltered them. With sure fingers, she pulled tight the strings of the bag.

Turning to face Ulrich, she said pleasantly, "Fear not, Ulrich, le Brouillard will encompass the doe and we shall all taste meat at today's table."

"You are confident in my skills, lady. Whence does this confidence come?" William asked, surprised.

Cathryn walked calmly to the doorway, urging Ulrich to precede her. When she turned back, the taper lit her face with an uneven glow, turning the scar upon her brow suddenly bright pink. She said with a small smile, "From your own lips, my lord. Are you not the man who has no history of losing?"

* * *

"Good shot, William!" Kendall shouted joyfully.

"Your lady was right," Ulrich chimed in with a laugh. "You have succeeded as you always do."

"What is this?" Kendall demanded playfully. "What said Lady Cathryn to William? I demand a full and complete telling of this tale, Ulrich, with no poetic additions."

Ulrich fought a blush at that and hurried to answer. "It is just that Lady Cathryn assured me that we would have fresh meat on our table if Lord William was on the hunt."

"Come, there is more to it than that," Rowland pressed, looking askance at William, who was pointedly ignoring them all.

"She gave me her assurance of success, and when William questioned her confidence in his skill, she answered that he had told her from his own lips that he has no history of losing. Is that not just as a wife should look upon her husband? I tell you," Ulrich continued enthusiastically, "I spoke with her this mom and she was most impressed with William's fighting skill."

"What did you do, pup," Kendall said with a laugh, "bore your lady with tales of knightly valor? Know you not that women much prefer to pass the time in hearing of their own skill at engendering love than of a man's skill at hacking flesh?"

Ulrich looked uncertain for a moment and then rallied. "Nay, she
was
impressed! Why, she could scarce think to eat when I—"

Kendall burst out laughing. "And you require more proof than that?"

Ulrich could not stop the reddening of his cheeks and turned to William in horror.

"What did you tell her, boy, to make her think me so indomitable?" William asked with a rueful smile.

"I cannot think that it was so bad," he stammered, "and she did, in truth, seem caught on every word... I but told her of the battle at the village on the Rhine..." Ulrich's voice trailed away.

"No harm was done," William assured him, ignoring Kendall's rising laughter, "but since you were set to tell the Lady Cathryn a story of knightly bravery, could you not have picked a story in which I was not blooded?"

"I thought that it would arouse her womanly sympathies..." He did not dare admit that he had chosen that tale because of the small part that he had played in the victory.

Kendall laughed the harder, bent over and clutching his belly. Ulrich found himself wishing that he would choke for lack of air.

Rowland sidled close to William and, keeping his dark eyes on the laughing Kendall, asked, "Her words seemed more designed to prick than soothe, or am I misreading her?"

"Nay, 'twas her intent, I am certain, but she did not betray herself with either smile or glint of eye. 'Tis only that I have come to know her better that I can more quickly feel the bite of that smooth tongue she keeps so well guarded. Yet, also, she seemed sincere." William sighed noisily. "I must admit to being perplexed by her."

Rowland smiled slowly and looked at the dirt at his feet. "I do believe that God designed women to be perplexing to men, else we would become bored and stray away."

Kendall had stopped laughing and called to William, "A man of Greneforde informed me that the forests have never been short of game, but they have tasted little of it since Cathryn's father left, and none at all for the last few months." Smiling broadly, he added, "You are the master of a lazy bunch, William."

William answered automatically, "No man is lazy in filling his own stomach, man." He pondered this news of meat that was not taken and not eaten though it was within arrow shot of Greneforde's walls.

William did not ponder alone. Rowland scowled, his eyes trained on the dirt, his mind engaged in heavy speculation. William knew that look—knew that it meant Rowland knew something that he did not.

"What is it?"

Rowland looked up at William, his brown eyes serious. "I cannot say. I have nothing but a sense of it." Clasping William's upper arm, he assured him, "I will come to you before the day is done and give you something more substantial."

William nodded and put the matter from his mind. Rowland was and had ever been as good as his word.

The serfs of Geneforder had finished loading the deer onto Father Godfrey's mule, the carcass quickly stiffening in the cold winter air. The gutting and bloodletting would wait until they were within Greneforde's walls, which were close.

The news of their success must have preceded them, for the whole of Greneforde was there to greet them as they passed through the gate. Eager hands pulled the carcass from the mule and laid it upon the chill ground. Truly they could not delay much longer or the beast would be frozen and impossible to handle. William watched the people of Greneforde as they handled the deer, more closely than he had yet done.

Their movements were furtive, especially when close to William and his knights, and he thought of Rowland's words that they were a beaten lot. Yet the farther they were from him and his men, the more comfortable they appeared, and when they were with John the Steward, their manner was actually easy. They looked to John before making any move, and William saw that John could direct them with just a shifting of his eyes.

And to a man, they were still filthy.

William looked at Rowland, and Rowland turned immediately to meet his eye. With a glance, he indicated John and then looked down again at the carcass, but not before he had seen Rowland's nod of understanding. John would be carefully watched.

Cathryn appeared in the shadow of the stair tower and all activity slowed, all chatter ceased. William noted it, as did Rowland, and they shared the look of experienced warriors facing an unknown enemy. She was the anchor of this place, the hub of the wheel on which all of them sped, and she had betrayed his trust. He could not trust her, and if they all looked to her for guidance, then he could not trust them. It was a coil. How could he be lord here in such a state of perpetual suspicion and imminent betrayal? He could not be. He had voiced both the problem and the solution: Cathryn was the hub. He had but to best her, subdue her, and all would fall into line behind her.

The sun struggled through just then and lit her hair to vibrant gold with filigreed strands of silver running through it. William no longer thought of John or Rowland or strategy; he thought only of his wife and how she looked to him just then. She stood for a moment in the portal and then proceeded gracefully, her movements almost fluid, to stand closer to the cause of the excitement. Long before she reached the deer, William had reached her, though he had no memory of deciding to go to her.

"History need not be rewritten," Cathryn said lightly, to eyeing the deer carcass. Her manner was pleasant, as was her expression, yet she did not smile.

"Would you like it to be?" he asked impulsively.

Cathryn's pleasant demeanor vanished and her guard was fully in place before she answered her husband's unlikely question.

"Would not every man like the chance to rewrite even a small portion of history?"

"And every woman?" he pursued.

With a curt nod, she answered, "Just so."

Her answer soothed him. Perhaps, he thought, she regretted the ill-conceived choices of her youth and would change them if she could. Waywardness was not the sole domain of men, he reasoned. If she felt guilt, if she could but repent... Eyeing her, he was perplexed by her, mayhap bewitched. For all her warm beauty, she was chilly in her actions, and the contradiction drew him on, despite his better judgment. Then the memory choked him. He was not the first man to be bewitched by her, and if not the first, then perhaps not the last. She had spoken of wanting to rewrite history, and he had jumped to the conclusion that she would rewrite her own; it was more likely, knowing her as he did, that she would choose to rewrite the portion that included
him.

Past caring if he was subtle, he asked, "What portion of your history would you alter, had you the means?"

Cathryn folded her hands neatly and would not look at him, yet her answer, when it came, was softly spoken.

"I have not the means so 'tis pointless to think upon."

And with his lightning changes of mood, unknown to him before he entered Greneforde just yesterday, William turned her answer back upon her, his own momentary vulnerability well shielded.

"You speak true," he said with gentle fierceness. "The history of Greneforde will record my possession of it."

"That is so," she responded simply, not meeting his eyes.

"And my holding it," he pressed, leaning over her.

"So you have said," she agreed, as cool to him as she had ever been.

"You do not argue the point," he could not help noting.

"To what purpose, when we have readily agreed that history cannot be altered?"

William writhed on the hook he had set and baited for her. He was brewing for a fight, would have loved to clear the air between them and know her thoughts, no matter how bitter. But she was as cool as mist and as hard to strike.

Yet he gave it one further effort.

"Yea, we are agreed," he said, his voice throaty in its intensity. Gripping her chin between his thumb and finger, he added, "The past cannot be changed, just as a vessel that is broken cannot be made whole again."

This time she could not hide the fact that he had struck, and struck true and hard. Cathryn paled and seemed almost to shrink in stature, appearing less a woman and more a child. Yet he had been pushed so far that he could not feel pity for her.

John, as well as the entire population of the enclosure, had heard the exchange of verbal blows between the lord and lady of Greneforde. John moved to stand with his lady—to stand as her shield before her husband, if need be. Rowland had understood only the charged and warlike atmosphere between the newly wedded pair. He did not fathom the cause. He did not need to. If William had a quarrel with his wife, his cause was just, and William would not be hindered in his treatment of her. He would see to it. He marked John's intent and placed his hand upon his sword hilt, his look heavy with meaning. John paused, considering whether there was not another way.