White Lion's Lady (17 page)

“My sister lives in the northern country, outside of Yorkshire,” the priest said, seeming intent on engaging Isabel in friendly conversation. “Lovely area. And neighboring Rievaulx Abbey is a sight to behold. Have you ever seen the place, my child?”

She shook her head and Father Aldon went on to describe his last visit to the large Cistercian foundation, regaling her with his impressions of the nearly six hundred monks, lay brothers, and servants who lived at the abbey, a massive population that was of late turning its combined efforts toward the lucrative new venture of sheep farming. Isabel listened patiently to the priest’s report, even though she was growing anxious to be out of his company.

She felt conspicuous in Father Aldon’s presence, as if his casual talk was merely a means for him to delay her, to observe her a while longer, his gray eyes keen and watchful. She wondered if her shame still showed in her face, wondered if the priest could read her thoughts, if he could read the sin and worry that she was trying so hard to conceal.

“I take it you have been long away from home, my child.”

“Forever,” Isabel answered. After all, it was true enough. She blinked past her pang of sadness to offer Father Aldon a smile. “I suppose I have been here in chapel overlong as well. My husband will begin to worry about me if I do not soon return to the hall.”

“Protective of you, is he?”

“A bit,” Isabel answered.

“Well, that is understandable, I expect, given the circumstances.”

Isabel looked up suddenly, caught off guard by the comment. Too late to call back her startled expression, she realized only belatedly that he was referring to her presumed delicate condition. The breath she exhaled in relief sounded a trifle shaky, even to her own ears. “Will you excuse me, Father? I really must be going.”

She took a step to leave and Father Aldon reached out to her, placing his hand on her arm. “Are you certain there is nothing troubling you, my child? Nothing you wish to confess before you go?”

Isabel’s gaze snapped to him. “Confess?”

He tilted his chin down, his lips pressed together in a knowing smile. “I suspect that things are not quite as they seem between you and that man … are they?”

“W-what?” she asked, taken aback, fretful to hear him suddenly refer to Griffin as
that man
. She attempted a look of mild confusion. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean, Father.”

“Do you not, child?” He asked the question gently, but the look he pinned her with was unyielding. “He is not your husband, is he? The both of you are masquerading for some reason, pretending to be wed. And you are pretending something more, are you not?”

Isabel blanched under Father Aldon’s unwavering stare. She knew full well what he was insinuating. Of their own
accord, her hands drifted down, settling atop the rumpled gown she concealed beneath her dress, a deception that felt so false, so wrong in this place of truth.

“Does he pose some manner of threat to you?” Father Aldon pressed, his voice careful but probing. “Are you in some sort of danger with this man, my lady?”

“No,” Isabel denied at once, shaking her head vehemently and shocked that he had been able to unearth so much of her guile from just a few moments in her presence. “No, he poses no danger to me at all. I appreciate your concern, Father, but I assure you, all is well. I am fine.”

But it seemed he believed it no more now than he had the first time she had tried to convince him of that fact.

“Why don’t you tell me what this is about,” he suggested kindly. “Perhaps there is some way that I can help you.”

Isabel’s first reaction was to refuse. She need not divulge any of her troubles to the father; while he had divined a portion of the tale on his own, to willingly share the rest could be a mistake. Indeed, it might very well put her in jeopardy. She and Griffin would be on their way as soon as the weather cleared, which surely could not be long.

And then what? she wondered. Several more days of running, of hiding. Several more nights of being alone with Griffin.

Far too much opportunity for temptation.

She knew it was only a matter of time before she gave in to this thing she felt for Griffin, this burning, wicked thing that made her crave his kiss, made her loins tremble with sinful longing. The shame of what she had nearly done with him, the knowledge of all that she might have forsaken for the bliss of his touch, pressed down on her in that moment like a weight too cumbersome to bear. She was a weak woman; if she had not known it before, there could
be no denying it now, when the mere thought of Griffin’s caress still beckoned, making her yearn to be back in his arms though the only safe thing—indeed, the only sane thing—to do was to deliver herself as far away from him as she could.

“Child,” Father Aldon said, “you needn’t shoulder your troubles alone. Let me help.”

Isabel stared into the priest’s smiling face, uncertain of where to turn. Should she confide in him? Griffin had warned her to trust no one save himself, but now she questioned if he had done so to protect her or, rather, his own interests. Had he said it to keep her dependent on him alone, to ensure that she did not seek help from someone else, thereby denying him his chance to demand a reward from Sebastian? Would she not be safer under the protection of the church?

And what of Griffin? He was an outlaw now, hunted for his involvement with her. If Dom’s men caught up to them on the road, they would surely punish him, perhaps kill him without delay. Despite all that had happened between them—moreover, because of all they had shared thus far—Isabel could not bear the thought of Griffin’s meeting with harm. Even worse, she could not bear the fact that she would be the cause.

Had she not asked God to help her? Had she not asked Him to show her a way out of her pain and confusion? Perhaps, she thought, this was it. Perhaps this exposure of her lies to Father Aldon—and his offer of intervention—was in fact God’s way of answering her prayers. Perhaps the safest path to Montborne was one she must travel alone now, in faith.

Without Griffin.

Swallowing past a new onslaught of emotion, past the knot of guilt and trepidation that lodged itself in her throat for what she was about to do, Isabel met the priest’s expectant
gaze. “I must get to the northern demesne of Montborne, Father—my life may well depend on it. Can you assure me the church’s protection until I am delivered there?”

“Yes, of course, my dear child.” Father Aldon nodded and took her hand in his. “You’ve made the right decision,” he assured her, smiling, the very picture of benevolence and gentle understanding. “I will make all the necessary arrangements at once.”

Griffin’s head was still reeling some time after Isabel had fled their encounter in the tower. Unable to face her rightful scorn and outrage, he had quit the castle and gone to the stables. He shook off the rain and threw a gruff nod of greeting to two squires who sat tending some of the Hexford knights’ gear. He stalked past them to where his and Isabel’s mounts were stabled, pleased to find them near the back for he sorely needed the space and quiet.

He needed time to think, to try to reconcile what he was feeling and, more to the point, what he intended to do about it. He had been horribly cruel to Isabel, behaving like a brute, pawing her like a lust-crazed youth, not ceasing until she was reduced to tears. Around her, he seemed to have no control. She commanded his thoughts, his moods, his actions. More troublesome was the fact that she was also beginning to command his heart, something no other woman had managed to do before. Of course, Isabel was hardly just another woman.

It was easy to forget that she belonged to someone else. Easier still to forget she was a virgin, untried and innocent.

He would never in the rest of his days be able to purge from his mind the image of her standing before him in that Edenlike setting of the tower chamber, framed by a garden of painted flowers and wreathed in butterflies. For a moment, he had almost believed that she was his wife in truth, that the blush in her cheeks when she saw him was affection,
not surprise, that the swell of her waist was due to his child—their child—slumbering peacefully beneath its mother’s heart.

Even now, the memory brought with it a swift surge of possessiveness.

It was a feeling he had no right to claim. Despite the breathless admission he had coerced from her with kisses and blatant manipulation, if Isabel felt anything for him, he supposed she should feel contempt. Given a chance to reflect on what he had done, Isabel would likely despise him now more than ever. Perhaps it would be better for both of them if she did. It would make it all the easier to keep his distance from her, something he would strive to do if he had even a shred of honor left in his scoundrel’s heart.

Taking a brush down from a shelf beside the gray’s stall, Griffin stepped inside and began to curry the destrier’s coat and mane. Over the rhythmic scrape of brush against hide, he could hear the two squires talking. They spoke of trivial things: tourneys and horses, games and festivals. Griff could hardly remember what it was like to be so young, so pure of heart.

How long would it be before these boys lost some of their zeal? he wondered. How many years of knighting would it take before they learned what it was truly like to make a living by one’s sword, forever serving the whims of another man, fighting not because they believed in something but because it was their duty?

How many nights would they drink themselves into mind-numbing oblivion, trying to wash away the gritty taste of smoke and ash and infamy, trying to drown the man they had somehow allowed themselves to become?

Griff scoffed to himself and tuned out the boys’ chatter, marshaling his thoughts around matters he still had some measure of control over, like what his best strategy was for getting Isabel safely delivered to Montborne. Strange how it was becoming harder and harder for him to imagine that
day. When he had set out on this journey, his plan had been so clear, so straightforward. Deliver the woman, demand his reward, then leave and never look back.

He was not sure when his focus had begun to shift, but now it did not seem so simple as that. Nothing did anymore. He was coming to know Isabel, and it was changing him somehow, affecting him beyond his attraction to her. Beyond reason. No, this fierce emotion he had for her was something he’d had no experience with before, something that terrified him as much as it seduced him.

“Jesus,” he sighed in astonishment, feeling the startling impact of what he was about to admit to himself …

Was he falling in love with her?

The stunning realization was intruded on by the approach of someone outside. Running footsteps sloshed in the puddled yard, then clomped into the stable. “Did you hear the news?” a breathless, youthful voice asked. “There is an outlaw on the loose and thought to be somewhere in our area!”

The hair on the back of Griff’s neck prickled to attention. His hand stilled, the brush falling idle midway down the gray’s shoulder as he waited in dread of this condemning information.

“An outlaw?” another boy exclaimed, his question rising with excitement. A jingle of dropped tack rang out as the young grooms both threw down their work to hear more. “Is it true?”

“Aye. Lord Hexford’s brother came to visit this morn and brought the word. He said that soldiers from a demesne some days to our south arrived at an inn where he stayed the night. They searched the place from top to bottom, he said, inquiring after a rogue knight who has stolen a woman from her betrothed. The soldiers warned all to beware, for the cur has already killed one man who tried to apprehend him.”

“God’s eyes,” the third boy breathed in apparent awe.
“An outlaw and a murderer! Do you think he will be hanged if caught?”

“Oh, I wager so.”

“I saw a man hanged in Derby last spring,” one of the youths volunteered. “His neck snapped like a dried twig!”

“I heard that sometimes ye don’t die right away,” another said. “A man can swing for hours before he breathes his last.”

“Just as well for the knave loose on our county,” a different lad commented, his youthful chivalry evidently offended. “Only the worst sort of rogue would kidnap an innocent maid. He’s got no honor at all, that one.”

Griff did not need to hear anything else. He set down the brush and casually left the stall, then walked purposefully toward the trio of zealous knights-in-training, risking no more than the slightest sidelong glance as he left in case the guards had furnished a description of him. He need not have been concerned; the boys were too engrossed in the morbid new focus of their discussion to pay him any mind.

“Does this blackguard have a name?” one of them asked as Griff passed.

“Droghallow,” he heard the first youth answer behind him, spitting it as if it were poison on his tongue. “They say his name is Griffin of Droghallow.”

Griff cursed under his breath and stalked out into the muddy bailey. If Dom’s men were scouring the nearby areas, it could not be long before they arrived at Hexford. He had to find Isabel at once. Although it was sure to send her into a state of understandable panic, he had to tell her of this latest setback so they could take swift measures to avoid a potential confrontation. They certainly could not afford to be sitting in Hexford’s hall when an army of Droghallow guards rode through the gates to beg a search.

They would have to leave first thing on the morrow—perhaps tonight if at all possible. Yes, tonight, he decided, checking the skies and seeing that the storm front appeared
to be moving off at last. They would take one final meal to tide them over, then slip out of the castle before the hall was cleared. No one would suspect they had gone until they were already hours away.

Though Griffin doubted he was given this portent of danger through any brand of divine intervention, nevertheless, he sent a quick word of thanks heavenward. Even if the news of Dom’s search party had traveled the entire keep, he and Isabel were still relatively safe from discovery, for now at least. The guards were looking for a knight and his noble lady hostage, not a common man and his expecting wife.