“And you can see.” There was flatness to her voice, but it strengthened as the elation in his good fortune took her from herself. “God’s blessing on you, William! You can see!” She brought his head close with her palms on his chin and kissed him full on the mouth. Her hands came away wet. “Tears?”
He leaned his cheek against hers, and she wondered at the reverse of their positions. When she had the moment, she would give in to the despair that licked at her existence.
He was crying beside her. The way he cried astonished her. No sobs, no shaking of the shoulders. Just silent tears soaking her neck. It seemed to bring him pain, as if each rare tear ran with his heart’s blood.
She found, to her surprise, that his tears caused her pain, too. When had anyone cried for her? Since the death of her mother, nurturing had been a gift she had given to others and almost never received. Now this man, tough and purposeful, a warrior in every sense of the word, cried for her. And it distressed her, more than the evidence of her first selfish reaction. With shaking hands, she stroked his hair back from his forehead and cleared her throat. “Why are you crying?”
He didn’t answer, only his hand rubbed her knee, his arm hugged her waist. He tried to crawl into her skin and share her travail.
Her stroking hand grew stronger, tugged at his hair. “Surely I’ve taught you that blindness limits us only as we let it.”
“It’s…not…that.”
“What is it?”
“I’ve been a foul-mouthed knave.”
“Well, I don’t know.”
“A beetle-headed malfeasor.”
“Nothing so—”
“A base, proud tottyhead.”
He paused, but she said nothing.
“Aren’t you going to object?”
“No,” she drawled the word. “Humility is so refreshing in a man.”
Instant outrage brought him to a half crouch, and then he remembered his harshness and sank back to her. “You have a distressing manner of teaching humility to a man. When I think back to all the times I’ve mocked Lady Saura, made fun of your age and said you didn’t understand my plight, because you could see, I want to flog myself.”
“Actually, you didn’t mock me, you teased me. There’s a world of difference. To a woman of advanced years, it would have been flattering. To me….” She thought about all the barren years in Theobald’s house, ignored by any eligible men or taunted about her disadvantage. Or being offered a place in some knight’s bed with the arrogant assumption she’d be grateful. “To me, your teasing has been a kindness.”
To her horror, her voice shook with emotion, and his grip on her tightened. Hoarsely, he said, “I’ve been cruel to you, yelling at you, being rude.”
Surprised, Saura laughed. “So? Why am I so special? You’ve yelled at every one of your household, and hurt your son’s feelings and your father’s, too.”
His misery abruptly checked. “I have not!”
“And they’re the ones you really care about,” she continued as if she hadn’t heard. “I’ve been quite flattered.”
“Flattered!”
“Aye. It makes me one of the family. If you didn’t yell at me, I’d think you didn’t like me.”
“Woman!” he thundered, rearing back from his position of penitence. “Shut your mouth and listen to me. I do not shout and I am not rude, and I certainly am not going to be rude to you anymore!”
“Of course not,” she chuckled, and with a groan he settled his head onto her bosom.
“You are,” he said, “a wicked woman.”
“A beetle-headed malfeasor?” she suggested, swallowing the tickle of enchantment that threatened to overwhelm her good sense and reduce her to torrents of merriment.
“At least that,” he agreed gloomily.
“I am not. But I am what Bronnie worried about.”
Her voice lowered with carnal significance, but his thoughts were elsewhere. “I wish you’d stop trying to hold in your laughter,” he said, his voice laced with disgust. He looked up at her. “I can feel it fighting to get out, and that expression of innocence on your face wouldn’t fool a friar.”
Hastily she rearranged the muscles of her face in a gentle smile, and he snorted. “I’ve always wondered what Saura, the nun, looked like. Now I know.”
“I am not a nun,” she protested. “And I’m damned tired of having you compare me to one.”
“Believe me, love, I know you’re not a nun. No one knows better than I. I’m the expert on your lack of nun-ness.”
Saura could feel his face approaching hers.
“Not only do I know you’re not a nun, I’ve ruined your chances to become anything but a penitent nun with the simple act of—” He stopped, so close his breath skimmed her face and her lips were pursed in ready anticipation. “What do you mean, you are what Bronnie worried about?”
“I’m the sort of woman the priests warn of.” He drew farther back, and she followed him with her mouth until she realized her behavior rivaled an effervescent bubble chasing the blustery north wind.
“How did he know that?”
She didn’t like his tone, and she said, “By my wanton demeanor, I surmise.”
“What have you been doing with Bronnie?”
Pulling one hand out of her cover, she shook her finger right beneath his nose. “He was worried when I had him strip you. He thought I wouldn’t be able to keep my hands off a naked man, but I assured him my intentions were pure. Do you quarrel with me?”
“Ah.” He sighed. He caught the finger that waved too close and folded it among its fellows. “I could never quarrel with you.” His hand moved to her wrist, and he pulled her arm out straight, ignoring the jerks she used to regain possession. “But I’m glad to hear you resisted your pure intentions.”
She could hear the smile grow in his voice, and it infuriated her. “I may have resisted my pure intentions last night.” She jumped with the application of his open mouth to the pit of her elbow. “Stop that!”
“Go on, scold me,” he said against the tender skin, and the hairs rose on her arm in blatant reaction. “I’m listening.”
“But those intentions are clear this morning!” She flung her arm back, and he let it go with no struggle, and the blanket swung back to expose more than half her body. “You rogue!” she cried, as he caught her bared waist and tumbled her backwards across the pallet. “Do you think you can insult me and then,” she gasped as his body followed her down, “then attack me?”
“Attack is a drastic word.” Deftly, he untangled all of her limbs from the blanket. “I’m going to strongly persuade you.”
“To do what?” Frost coated her features, and her freed hands bobbed to his chest to protest his encroachment.
“I just want you to kiss me.”
“Kiss you? You insinuated—” She put a little pressure against him and grimaced. As easy to lever a boulder with a twig.
“I’m sorry.” His fingers brushed her rib cage and pranced away. “I’m sorry. I’m a jealous fool.”
“You’re a man.” Loathing dripped, scorn withered. She was good with nuances of voice.
They were wasted on William, who with abominable cheerfulness admitted, “Guilty as charged. I’m only a man, and you must make allowances for my pigheaded,” a daring caress to her stomach, “asinine,” a tender squeeze on the lobe of her ear, “positively loathsome doubts about you and that stupid little whine-tit.”
He tickled her ribs and her hands flew off his chest and snatched at his hands, which eluded her by spreading out in a Y. She braced herself, but his upper body landed on her gently. “Muscle control,” he grunted.
She could ignore him, surrounding her with massive masculinity, but she wondered how to recover her hands, squashed between their bodies. Dignity seemed to elude her under William’s influence, and she said, “That stupid little whine-tit, as you call him, brought food and water and bandages. You ought to be grateful.”
“Oh, I am,” he br
eathed against her neck.
“Grateful that Bronnie—” His tunic provided a sweep of soft cloth that moved against her. “Bronnie….”
His tongue outlined the rosy shell of her ear, and the wet temptation halted her thought processes.
He whispered, “I’m sorry for my lunacy. I know you too well to seriously suspect you of misdeed. ’Tis my own damaged self-esteem that spoke so rashly.”
The warm draft affected her auditory perceptions, creating a loss of crucial resentment. The movement of his lips against her skin felt too good; what could he do with a full attack on her senses? “You base, proud tottyhead,” she murmured, and he slid his mouth across her cheek, surprising her with a light kiss, as he had promised the night before. So close to her, she felt his grin stretch his muscles and bathe her with sunshine.
“At last we agree.”
His contagious grin affected her mouth and she knew her rancor had lost the battle. She pecked a kiss onto his nose, on his cheek, on his chin, and she heard danger rumble in his chest. His lips coaxed her until she opened and let him in. Shyly, she returned his surge of tongue with quick touches of her own. That seemed to ignite him, for the body above her heated and he wiggled one knee between hers. In the cradle of her hips, she encountered his tumescence and it gave her hope for another skirmish. His marvelous vehicle had carried her away last night. She squirmed to accommodate him, hoping to roam with him this morning.
So when he lifted his head, she murmured in protest, and his most unromantic “Sh!” hurt her freshly created confidence. Then she heard it, too: the scrape of a key in the lock.
William leaped up. “Stupid idiot,” he complained, and lifted her to a sitting position, swaddling her in the blanket. As he tucked it under her chin, he noticed the trail of a tear down her cheek and wiped it with his thumb. “Not you, love, I was talking about me. Don’t cry, my indomitable one, I need you to be strong now.”
The door swung open as he spoke, and he twisted toward the man who stood in the doorway. He wanted to speak his name, but the masquerade of blindness suited him now; it gave him a vulnerability that would destroy the inhibitions of the slightly built man who gloated with such humor.
“My dear guests!” said Arthur, his frisky voice grinding on William’s nerves. “Lord William of Miraval and,” his eyes bugged in open avarice as he surveyed the lady’s tumbled state, “Lady Saura.”
“Of Roget,” she reminded him.
Relieved to see she had gathered her blanket and her invisible cloak of dignity tight around her, William rose to his feet. “Ah. ’Tis Arthur. To what do we owe this unexpected hospitality?” Arthur, he was pleased to see, took one step back in reaction to William’s commanding size, and then one step forward in the press of men behind him. Whipping his voice into scorn, he added, “And how many men do you need to help you enforce your hospitality on one blind man and his woman?”
Arthur’s stature was always a sore spot to him, and he reacted as William knew he would. “Go, go.” He waved his men out the door, glanced back at William, and pulled two armed hulks back in. “There, we’re alone now.”
“Exactly so,” William agreed, cursing his bad luck. He would have laughed at Arthur’s cowardice, at his ignorance about what a blind man could know, but the situation reeked of deceit and destruction. The fragile, vivid woman Arthur ogled with such rapacity depended on him. Of all the people to have kidnapped him, Arthur was the worst. Flighty, vindictive, impossible to question because of his lightness of mind. It would take all his wit and skill to save Saura from ruin. Fixing a vacant gaze in his eyes, he asked, “What do you want?”
“Why, nothing.” Arthur simpered in expectant pleasure. “Only your lands and wealth and all those other things.”
Arthur smiled at Saura, noting the flush of her cheek, the bright sparkle in her eyes, the rosy blush of her well-kissed lips.
William’s hands itched to slap him. “How?” he boomed, and Arthur twitched his attention back. “How do you propose to do that?”
“Well, we were going to do it with your little accident, but I told him it would never work. You’re too damned tough. But it did blind you, and that made this whole game a little easier.”
“Game?”
“Your kidnapping! He’s received my message by now. He’ll be so surprised!”
“Aye. When he gets here, he’ll be horribly surprised.” William stroked his hand over his beard, and wondered who “he” was. And more important: “When do you expect him?”
“Soon, I would think. I got the message from the mercenary yesterday afternoon. It has taken them days and days to get close to you but I sent a message to him immediately. I boarded the boat last night to get here. I couldn’t wait to see you. Oh, William, this is so much fun! I’ve never been in on a plot before, much less actually thought of one.”
“Didn’t he think of this plan?”
“Nay.” Arthur shrugged petulantly, impatient at being interrupted and not wanting to discuss the omnipotent “he.” “He wants to think of everything. He thinks I’m stupid, but I showed him.”
“Who is he?” William asked.
Arthur waggled his hands. “Nay, I’m not going to tell you. I want to see your face when he gets here. Your expression will almost be payment enough for the hardships you’ve put me through.”
“But I won’t know him,” Saura interrupted. “What’s his name?”
William cursed silently as Arthur’s attention switched back to her. “A woman as lovely as yourself shouldn’t concern herself with such trivial details.”
“As trivial as who’s going to kill me?” she asked bluntly.
“He’s not going to kill you.”
“Well, somebody’s got to do it,” she snapped. “Is it you?”
“Nay.” Arthur took one step closer to the pallet. “I’m sure we’ll work something out.”
“Soft as butter where women are concerned. And as slippery,” William said with contempt. “Be advised, your friend won’t be pleased about having you kidnap Lady Saura.”
“Well, William, what else could I do?”
“You could have had her left on Burke land.” William saw the slide of Arthur’s eyes as he contemplated the tousled woman, already naked, already on the palliasse. “Or was it simply the thrill of using my woman?”
Arthur began to laugh, trying to be sophisticated and succeeding only in sounding high-strung. “Could you have done better?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never done anything so dishonorable.”
William’s flat statement infuriated Arthur, and the soft laughter stopped. “Of course not. You’re so damned honorable it sickens me. We all used to laugh about you behind our hands, about what a fantastic, godly knight you were and how you never stooped to rape or lie and how you never slapped your servants or picked on us squires.”
“Actually, I have slapped my servants for good cause, and as for not picking on my squires, ’tis not a mistake I’ll make again, if this is the result.”
“Don’t fret, my high and mighty Lord William, you will never have squires again. You’re blind, remember? You’re going to be dead, remember?”
“Nay, you hadn’t told me that part, yet,” William rumbled.
“Aye, and as your dear friends, we’ll go to comfort your father, and in no time we’ll be sitting on your bench, drinking out of your goblet.”
“I doubt that.” William’s voice resounded with confidence. “You haven’t the courage to kill me, nor the stalwart strength to take my place.”
“Your father will be so distraught.”
“My father’s not a mewling fool! Do you think he hasn’t mourned his failure to implant in you the seeds of chivalry? You’d be the last—”
“You puff your chest like a pigeon, so proud of your puny wit!” Arthur stripped off his surcoat and tossed it into the corner. “I’m going to have that woman you’ve already warmed for me! You’re going to die and the crows will pick at your body.”
He flung himself at Saura, knocking her backwards against the wall, and her small cry was engulfed by the roar of rage from William. Arthur dared! Two steps took William to the pallet, two hands seized Arthur and turned him. When Arthur’s eyes had widened to the point of terror, William said with harsh conviction, “But I can see. I can see you, you sniveling little worm.”
The guards, frozen by the turn of events, rushed them at his words. William grasped Arthur by the neck and the seat, and raised him above his head and heaved him like a dog at the rushing guards. That body, inert with shock, flung them against the wall with a crash of tremendous proportion. It resounded in the little room and brought the slam of guards’ armor from outside the door. William was there before them, wedging the spike of the iron candle stand into the wood. One guard inside began to struggle to his feet, but as William raised a stool over his head he prudently dropped back to the floor and played dead.
“Clever man,” William approved, and stepped over the bodies to Saura. “How is your head?” Before she could answer, he said, “Here are your clothes. Let me help you.” He raised her to her feet and with the impersonal touch of a eunuch. “I’ll not make the same mistake again.”
He pulled her cotte over her head and she objected, “My chainse!”
“No time.” He laced it tightly, trying to cover as much of her bared skin as he could. “I’m the stupid idiot who didn’t have you dressed when Arthur arrived. Patience!” he called to the pounding on the door. “I’ll not compound that mistake when his accomplice arrives. We must leave before reinforcements come to finish Arthur’s pitiable job.”
“I’ll not argue that.” She wiped her hands on her skirt, the hands that still felt the pebbled feel of Arthur’s acne-pocked skin. “But how will we leave with the guards at the door? And what’s happened to Arthur?”
“He’s dead.” He answered the last question first. “Broken neck. Didn’t you hear it crack? And we’ll walk out of here. Arthur’s servants are nothing if not disloyal, they’ll scatter like mice freed from a trap. Where are your shoes?”
“Back at Fyngre Brook.”
“Then we’ll have to have horses,” he decided, folding the blankets and tucking them under his arm.