White Lion's Lady (36 page)

“Dominic of Droghallow,” the king’s official said. “As sheriff for our lord and king, Richard of England, I hereby arrest and charge you with the counts of kidnap, conspiracy, and treason against the crown. You will stand trial for your crimes by week’s end. Meanwhile, your titles, lands, and all your possessions are declared forfeit and shall be surrendered at once.”

Dom dropped his head in defeat as the sheriff and guards led him away.

“Richard will be looking for a new lord for Droghallow,” Sebastian said as he came up beside Griffin. “Perhaps I will make a recommendation on your behalf when I next have audience with the king.”

“No,” Griff replied. “I want nothing more to do with this place.”

“What of Montborne?”

Griffin turned to regard his brother, frowning at Sebastian’s enigmatic smile. “What of it?”

“I have decided to join the king on crusade in the Holy
Land. The call for soldiers and arms has gone up again, and I am going.” Sebastian raised a brow, his gaze lighting with a spark of excitement. “I will need to place Montborne under someone’s charge while I am away. Someone who could hold the fief, should anything happen—”

Griff swore a curse. “I cannot do it. You must know I cannot …”

“I would trust no one else to this.”

Griffin stared at him, shaking his head at the enormity of the request. And there was another concern, too. “What about Isabel?”

“Come,” Sebastian said. “We can talk on the journey back home.”

More than a week and a half had passed since the night Griffin left Montborne. By morning Sebastian had been gone as well, accompanied by a retinue of soldiers. While neither man had disclosed their plans of where they were headed, Isabel harbored any number of fears that, somehow, they would both end up at Droghallow.

She knew Griffin too well to think otherwise, certain that no matter his plans for his future, his pride would not allow Dominic’s treachery go unchallenged. As for Sebastian, well, she need only know his brother to understand how he, too, would be compelled to take issue with a knave like Dom. But suspecting where they had gone did not ease the worry of what might befall either one of them once they arrived on Droghallow’s soil.

Meanwhile, at Montborne, wedding preparations were well underway. Isabel had observed the activity of servants and seamstresses with an odd sense of detachment, as if the ceremony set to take place in a fortnight concerned another woman, not her. She had endured the fitting and hemming of her bridal gown in a state of emotional numbness, unable to look for more than a moment when the maids brought her to stand before a polished glass mirror, unwilling to acknowledge the farce to which she had subscribed.

How would she ever be able to wed Sebastian when her heart yearned for his brother? That he had not repudiated
her upon learning of her indiscretion with Griffin bespoke of his honor, but what of her own? How could she allow herself to pledge before God that she would keep Sebastian as her husband, forsaking all others, when she would never stop loving Griffin?

She had posed these very questions to Lady Joanna in the days they had spent together at Montborne, days in which the two women had formed a close bond, each of them waiting for word, worrying for the men who mattered most in their lives. To Isabel’s concerns about her pending marriage, Lady Joanna had simply embraced her, advising her to trust in God that everything would work out as it should. Isabel was not so confident.

Retiring to the solace of her chamber after the midday meal, she took up a seat at the small desk situated next to the window. Beside her on the smooth oak writing surface was a folded square of parchment, addressed to a certain convent in France—her letter of apology to Maura, a sister’s deep regrets for not being able to send for her after all, for being unable to fulfill her promises to both Maura and her betrothed. Isabel had written the letter in the hours after she had first arrived at Montborne; today she would finally send it on its way.

A beeswax candle burned in an iron holder on the edge of the desk. Isabel reached for it, bringing it over the missive and tipping the shallow metal dish to pour a dollop of melted wax onto the parchment as a seal. She nearly dropped the entire thing when the herald’s call sounded from high on the tower’s ramparts. The series of staccato blasts rang through the keep, rousing all within earshot to the joyous announcement.

Montborne’s lord had returned.

Her heart heavy for the news she would deliver him, Isabel could not bear to look as the bailey filled with the clank of the rising portcullis and the subsequent beat of horses’ hooves, thundering through the gates and into the
courtyard. There was a flurry of activity below, folk rushing to greet Sebastian and his men. Inside the castle, servants scurried about excitedly.

Isabel rose and moved away from the desk, her letter to Maura clutched in her hand. She hardly had time to gather her resolve before a maid rapped softly on her partially open door.

“My lady? My lord is arrived at last. He requests the favor of your audience in his solar.”

“Thank you,” Isabel replied. “I shall be right there.”

Mustering her courage, she smoothed her skirts, then crossed her chamber and made her way down to the lord’s solar. As she approached the door to the chamber, a servant came out carrying a wooden coffer filled with silver tankards, coins, and other objects of value. He bowed to Isabel, then bustled past, calling to another servant to assist him in gathering up a trunk of clothing for their lord.

Isabel frowned in curiosity, then stepped into the doorway of Sebastian’s private chamber.

“Come in, my lady,” he called from where he sat at his desk. He looked more alive than she had seen him before, leaned back in his chair, his booted foot propped up on the desk. His dark hair was wild and windblown, his cheeks flushed ruddy with color. He gave her a reckless, boyish smile, his pale eyes dancing with unbridled energy. “We must needs talk.”

“Yes,” she acknowledged softly. “I warrant we must at that, my lord. About our marriage—”

“You should know that I have decided to join King Richard in the war against the infidels, my lady. A ship sails from Portsmouth in a few weeks. I mean to be on it.”

“You go to join the crusade?” Isabel gasped. “But, my lord, it’s so dangerous—”

Sebastian’s grin seemed to indicate that he might actually welcome the idea. “Do not worry for me,” he said. “And you needn’t worry for yourself or Montborne, either,
my lady. I have made arrangements for someone to stay and hold the fief in my stead.”

Isabel sensed a sudden shift in the air to her left, a movement in the shadows that sent a current of awareness through her every fiber and left her shaking with anticipation, trembling with a flood of hope. She turned her head and there he was, standing a few paces beside her, all but concealed by the afternoon gloom that stretched into the corner of Sebastian’s chamber.

“Griffin,” she whispered.

It took every ounce of control she possessed not to close the distance between them and throw herself into his arms. He was bloodied and travel-worn, but whole and hale, and so very handsome. Seeing him before her once again was a sight so heartbreakingly welcome that Isabel could scarcely breathe. She took a step closer to him without realizing it, her feet moving as of their own accord.

“I met up with him at Droghallow,” she heard Sebastian say from behind her. “The chivalrous fool might have gotten himself killed if I’d have let him march into Dominic’s lair on his own. I saved his noble arse, and now he’s agreed to do me this favor and hold Montborne in my absence.”

All the while his brother spoke, Griffin’s stare remained fixed on Isabel. His gaze was intense and unwavering, but maddeningly unreadable in the murky shadows of the room. She wanted to shout her glee at the prospect of Griffin’s staying, but a more reasonable part of her warned that this would be the worst sort of torture, to have him so near when, if she remained as well, she could only do so pledged as Sebastian’s wife.

“How soon do you leave, my lord?” she asked the earl quietly.

“As soon as I am packed.” As if Sebastian had followed her train of thought, he cleared his throat, and said, “There does exist one slight dilemma, I’m afraid. The king expects to hear that the demesnes of Montborne and Lamere are
joined through marriage. I am loath to go to him without being able to assure him that his will is done. So I think it best if the wedding be conducted without delay.”

Isabel’s heart lurched. “My lord, I fear I cannot—”

Sebastian cut her off with a rakish grin. “I realize he is a poor substitute for me in many ways, my lady … but would you consent to take my brother as your husband instead?”

“My lord?” She gasped, utterly astonished. Her limbs lost all feeling; the letter to Maura slipped out of her slack fingers and fluttered to the floor. “W-would I … what?”

“Allow me, if you will, brother,” Griffin drawled. He stepped forward and took Isabel’s hands in his. Then he sank down on his knees before her. “My lady, can you find it in your heart to forgive me for thinking that I could live even one day without you? I realize I am least deserving of the gift of your affection, but I beg it of you now, humbly. You are the love of my life, Isabel de Lamere. You are my heart, my soul, my saving grace. You are my home.”

“Oh, Griffin,” she whispered. “I have been so lost without you.”

He smiled, pressing her palms to his lips, his kiss achingly tender, filled with all the emotion that smoldered in his gaze. “Then will you have me, my lady? Will you marry me?”

“Yes,” she answered tearfully. “Yes, my love, I will marry you. Nothing in this world could make me happier.”

June, 1190

The sound of a child’s laughter caught on the early summer breeze as Griffin of Montborne rode through the open gates of his home. He drew his white charger to a halt in the courtyard, the morning’s hunt called short when one of his squires had ridden out to deliver him a letter just arrived from the Holy Land. Though he had not paused to read it, he knew the bold handwriting could only belong to his adventurous brother, gone now some six months on crusade.

He dismounted and headed for the keep to find Isabel. Then he heard the girlish giggle again, echoed this time by the sweet laughter of his lady wife, the lovely sounds coming from the area of the castle garden. Griff tucked the letter into his sword belt and turned away from the keep, rounding the corner of the tower where Montborne’s gardens bloomed with fruit blossoms and fragrant summer flowers.

“Look, Isabel—I caught one! I caught one!”

Eight-year-old Maura de Lamere, a red-haired sprite with laughing blue eyes and a cherub’s smile, ran from the far side of the enclosed garden to where her elder sister stood clipping roses and dropping them into a basket that hung from her arm. Isabel lifted her head as Maura came up beside her, her hands clasped together carefully as if she
held a fragile egg and feared she might break it. Moving slowly, Isabel braced her free hand against the base of her spine and bent down to see Maura’s prize.

“Oh, it’s beautiful,” she said, smiling as she reached out to caress the young girl’s cheek.

With a giggle, Maura opened her hands and a tiny yellow butterfly fluttered up into the air. Both of them watched it dance and climb up over their heads, their happiness seeming to beam from their eyes and their lips, filling the garden with a sweetness—a simple yet profound innocence—that Griffin thought he would never get used to. Isabel must have sensed his presence, for in that next moment, she glanced away from the butterfly and turned to meet his gaze.

A look passed between them: part contentment, part longing. They had spent every day and night of the past six months together, but the mere sight of Isabel was still enough to set Griff’s blood pounding with desire. She had never been more beautiful. He looked at her and his breath came a little faster; she smiled and his heart squeezed a little tighter. And he could tell from the smoky sparkle in her topaz gaze that she was equally affected by him.

“Maura,” she whispered to her sister, her eyes and her slow-spreading smile yet fixed on Griffin. “Run along and ask Cook if I should bring him any peas from the garden, will you?”

The girl bobbed her head and dashed toward the garden gate to carry out the request. She grinned up at Griffin as she approached him and he gave her a wink, reaching down to ruffle her wild red curls as she passed.

“You shouldn’t be out of the keep,” Griff gently scolded, stepping forth to take his wife’s hand and help ease her onto a squat bench near the rose arbor.

Isabel was big with his child, so big, she had been advised by the midwives and Lady Joanna to stay in her bed for the duration of her pregnancy. But she was not the sort
of woman to abide orders merely for the sake of obedience, and Griffin rather enjoyed that headstrong streak in her. He leaned in and kissed her, then he kissed her belly, something he did every day with no small measure of love and complete, wordless awe.

“Your babe is active today,” she told him when he lifted his head. “Maura got to feel it kick a short while ago. She wanted to know how the babe got in there.”

Griffin laughed, positioning himself behind Isabel to support her back as he gathered her into his arms. “What did you tell her?”

“I told her that love put it there.”

She tipped her head back and Griff placed a loving kiss on her forehead. He held her against him for a long while, happy just to lose himself in the sound of her breathing, to feel her fingertips softly caressing his arms, her heartbeat pounding in time with his. She smelled of roses and warm woman, the combination made all the more arousing to a man gone some weeks without being able to make love to his wife. Not that they hadn’t been creative with the problem of Isabel’s condition. They had discovered many highly pleasing and erotic alternatives to satisfy their hunger for each other, and at the moment, Griffin was contemplating several of those alternatives quite seriously.