The Winter Mantle (4 page)

Dismounting with fluid grace for a man so large, he tied his own horse to the low branch of a tree. Softly, he approached Jolie from the side.

'Be careful.' Judith's voice rose, despite her attempt to keep it level and free of panic, 'she will attack.'

'No, no no,' he answered, his voice a low croon that set up a vibration in the pit of her belly, 'she will not. I like horses, and they like me. Ever since I was a small boy I have had a way with them. Prior Ulfcytel always said that I could have been a groom.'

He took a firm grasp on the mare's reins and stroked her sweating neck with his open palm. Judith had watched him swing a battleaxe with those hands, his precision and control deadly. Now she watched him gentle her horse, and felt her limbs melt. He murmured soft love words and breathed his own breath into the mare's nostrils as she had seen the stable hands do on occasion. Slowly but steadily he moved to the mare's hindquarters and eased his hand down her injured leg. Jolie flinched. So did Judith, fearing that Waltheof would be kicked and trampled, but after that single recoil the mare stood quietly for him.

'She will not be carrying you to Fecamp,' he said without altering the timbre of his voice so as not to startle the horse. His dark blue eyes were troubled as they found Judith's. 'There is much damage to the leg, I think.'

Judith moistened her lips She looked from him to the horse. 'She will not have to be killed?'

He shrugged. 'Likely not, my lady. Even if she stays lame, she can be used for breeding.' His lips twitched. 'Of course, if it was a stallion it would be a different matter - especially with a hind leg.'

Judith's face flamed. She knew that a stallion could not mount a mare unless he had two sound hind legs to take his weight in the act of mating. Suddenly she was intensely aware of her vulnerability. She was Duke William's niece and she had committed the cardinal folly of being unchaperoned. How easy it would be for him to throw her down on the carpet of violets around their feet and rape her in retaliation for his captivity and her uncle's winning of the English crown.

'You need not be afraid of me, my lady,' he said, as if reading her mind.

'I am not afraid of you,' Judith answered boldly, although in truth she was terrified.

The curve of his lips became an outright grin. 'You are like me,' he said. 'It is impossible for you to lie, because your face betrays you.' His gaze dropped to her bosom. 'I am no ravisher of women,' he said softly. 'Much as I am tempted.' Turning away he untethered his horse from the tree, swung astride, and held his hand down to her. 'Best mount up, Lady Judith, if we are to catch up with the baggage train before it arrives in Fecamp.'

She stared at his hand while her stomach churned so hard that she thought she was going to be sick. 'What about my mare?'

'You can send a groom back for her once we reach the others,' he said. 'She will have to be rested up in the nearest village until she's fit.' He beckoned persuasively. 'Come, you cannot stay here, and I promise to restrain myself.'

Against her better judgement Judith gave him her hand, set her foot over his in the stirrup, and let him pull her up. After an initial clumsiness and flurry of skirts, she managed to perch sideways on the chestnut's rump and clutched the saddle cantle to stop herself from falling off.

He glanced over his shoulder, amused that she should sit astride her own horse without a thought but consider it improper to straddle his. 'Warn me if you think you are going to fall,' he said through a grin. 'I would hate to bring you to your uncle across my saddle like a slaughtered hind.'

'I know how to ride pillion,' Judith snapped, stung by his teasing.

'Then that is well,' he answered, 'for otherwise I should have to dismount and walk at the bridle.' He clicked his tongue and, with a flicker of its ears, the chestnut broke into a smooth walk.

Judith gazed at the farmland and resisted the temptation to glance sideways at her rescuer's broad back. Her mother would be furious. She chewed her lip. It was not her fault, she told herself - or at least only in the sense that she had pushed Jolie too hard and caused the mare to overreach and strain her leg.

Waltheof Siwardsson was whistling softly through his teeth. She thought of him swinging that great axe in Rouen's courtyard. 'Did you fight my uncle in the great battle?' she asked.

'On Hastings field you mean?' He twisted slightly in the saddle to look at her. 'No, my lady, I did not.' His smile developed a sour edge. 'Mayhap I should have done.'

'What prevented you?'

'Ah, now that is a long tale, and I am not sure that I know the answer myself.' He was silent for a time, guiding the horse across the field where the wheat was beginning to form a shallow green carpet. Then he sighed. 'I owed neither allegiance nor loyalty to the Godwinssons. They had done nothing to advance my family. They took Northumbria from my bloodline and gave it elsewhere.' He shrugged. 'I do not expect you to understand.'

'But I do,' Judith said, thinking of her mother's constant lecturing. 'A man's birthright is his pride.'

He smiled. 'Well, I never thought that I had much pride, my lady, until I was led in silken fetters to board a ship for Normandy. And now it burns me and I wonder if I was wrong to hold back from Harold's last battle.'

Judith said nothing, for she knew she was out of her depth, but Waltheof answered the question himself with a shake of his head that sent a sparkle of light through the coppery tones of his hair. 'Even if I had fought, your uncle might still have won. And if by chance Harold had taken the victory, I doubt that I would be any closer to having my desire of Northumbria. Morcar is its earl, and Harold was his brother-by-marriage. There is no one to fight for the house of Siward, lest it be Sweyn of Denmark.' He sighed deeply. 'Sometimes I think that it would be better had I remained at Crowland and become a monk.'

'Indeed, I had heard you were trained for the Church,' she murmured.

He nodded. 'I was, but my older brother was killed in battle, and I was taken from the cloister to be educated as befitted the warrior son of a great earl. I had scarce been home two years when my father died too, and his northern lands were given into the hands of Tosti Godwinsson.' He crossed himself and suddenly he was not smiling.

'Would you have liked to take holy vows?'

'Sometimes I think I would.' He relaxed again. 'There was peace at Crowland and you could feel God's presence. It is harder out in the world to hear his voice - too many temptations.' He gave her an appraising look. 'Richard de Rules said that you were difficult, but I do not think you are.'

She raised her chin. 'I speak as I find. Surely that is being honest, not difficult?'

He inclined his head, conceding the point. 'Indeed, you are much like your uncle, my lady,' he said, giving the horse a gentle dig in the flanks so that it quickened pace.

They reached the main baggage train and a groom was sent back for Judith's mare. Waltheof delivered Judith to her mother's wain. The Countess Adelaide eyed him narrowly as he helped Judith within the stifling interior, aromatic with the smell of horehound and sage.

'Fortunate that you were on hand to come to my daughter's aid, Earl Waltheof,' she said, but not as if she were pleased at the notion.

'Indeed it was, my lady' Waltheof gave her a broad smile and bowed. Adelaide inclined her head in frosty acknowledgement and then looked away, indicating that both her gratitude and the conversation were at an end.

'Thank you, my lord,' Judith murmured, feeling that she had to add something and that her mother's response was scant recompense. She was aware of the avidly staring maids, and of her sister hiding a giggle behind her hand.

'Think nothing of it, my lady. I enjoyed the pleasure of your company.' He bowed, regained the saddle with swift grace and reined away to greet the first of the returning huntsmen.

Adelaide gave her daughter a hard stare. 'The pleasure of your company,' she repeated in a voice nasal with cold. 'I hope that you did not encourage him, daughter.'

'Of course not!' Judith glowered at her mother. 'I have done nothing wrong. Why should I not converse with him when he is my uncle's guest?'

'Converse by all means, but do not encourage,' Adelaide warned. 'He is more and less than a guest, as well you know. You had no choice but to accept his aid just now, but I would rather that it had not happened. And I do not know what your uncle will say.'

'It is no concern of my uncle's!' Judith felt a quiver of apprehension.

Adelaide shook her head. 'Everything is a concern of your uncle. If you seem to favour one man above others, it complicates matters when it comes to settling a husband upon you. Granted, Waltheof of Huntingdon is handsome and pleasant, but he is not of high enough rank or quality to make a match with our house.' Her lip curled on the words
handsome
and
pleasant
, making it clear that she did not view such attributes with favour.

Judith flushed. 'Even though my grandmother Herleve was a laundress and the daughter of a common tanner?' she retorted.

Her sister gasped at the blasphemy. Adelaide reared like a serpent - no mean feat given the deep cushions and the rocking of the cart. 'I have not raised you to show such disrespect for your blood,' she said icily. 'My mother, your grandmother, God rest her soul, whatever her origins, died a great lady and you will not refer to her in such terms - is that understood?'

'Yes, Mother.' Judith compressed her lips and contained her resentment, knowing that if she continued to argue she would be whipped. Her mother was inordinately sensitive that Herleve de Falaise was indeed a tanner's daughter whom Robert of Normandy had encountered pounding washing in a stream and brought home to his castle. She had borne him two children out of wedlock, one of them Duke William, the other Adelaide, and when the attraction had paled she had been married out of the way to one of Duke Robert's supporters, Herluin de Conteville. Adelaide had set out to distance herself from all mention of laundering and tanning. As far as she was concerned, only the noble bloodline existed, and it was to be enhanced. Judith knew, although it went unspoken, that her mother considered matching her daughter with an English lord a step backwards for the family name - even if Waltheof Siwardsson's pedigree was better than their own.

Until her mother's outburst Judith had not really considered the notion of a match with the English earl, but now she did.

Sitting in the oppressive cart, beneath her mother's disapproving scrutiny, she thought of the journey she had just made on the rump of his horse. The copper flash of his hair against the soft dark blue wool of his cloak. The warm good humour. What would it be like to live in a household with a lord who would rather smile than frown? The thought was enticing and filled Judith with a feeling of restless excitement. She was accustomed to a regime of stern words and duty. Would it not be strange and wonderful to throw back her head for once and laugh with abandon?

'He won't give her to you,' scoffed Edgar Atheling, shaking his head at Waltheof in disbelief. It was the second day of their journey to Fecamp and they were close enough to see the smoke from the city hearth fires and inhale the occasional eddy on the sea-salt breeze. 'Not when he has as good as promised his own daughter to Edwin of Mercia. He is not going to marry off all the virgins in his household to English captives.'

'William has not said that he will give his daughter to Edwin, only that he will consider it,' Waltheof responded. 'It is as likely that he will give his niece to me as it is that he will give his daughter to Edwin.'

Edgar snorted. 'Mayhap you are right, Waltheof,' he said. 'Mayhap neither of you is destined for a Norman bride.'

Waltheof twitched his shoulders irritably and wished that he had not said anything to Edgar about his interest in Judith. He was annoyed at Edgar's scoffing, which reinforced the warning given by Richard de Rules that William the Bastard's niece was out of reach. She had not been out of reach yester afternoon, he thought. He could have abducted her across his saddle and forced a marriage by rape - a marriage that would have lasted about as long as it took the Normans to spit him on a lance. Waltheof grimaced. Perhaps Edgar and De Rules were right. Perhaps he should forget her and look elsewhere for a bride - a flaxen-haired English or Danish girl who would bear him. enormous Viking sons. But it was not what he wanted.

What he wanted was travelling fifty yards behind in a covered wain, guarded by her mother like a dragon sitting on its precious treasure. What he wanted was to melt the ice and discover the fire.

'Don't be a fool,' Edgar said. 'She is comely, I know, but there are a hundred better women you could consider for a wife.' He made a thrusting gesture with his clenched fist. 'And a thousand in Fecamp alone who would welcome you to their private chambers for no more than the price of a smile.'

Waltheof snorted with reluctant amusement. The latter notion had already crossed his mind. Wooing and winning Duke William's niece was a matter for the future, albeit that how to do so was occupying much of his time. The tavern girls of Fecamp were accessible and would go a long way to cooling the heat of his blood - especially if he could find one with long, dark braids and sultry brown eyes.