Hastings didn’t believe Severin would precisely kill Beamis, but what could she say to that? She would have to travel alone. But she didn’t know where Rosehaven was.
She patted Beamis’s arm as she said, “You are right. I did not think this through. I will not ask you again. It was not fair of me.”
Beamis wasn’t stupid. He had known Hastings since she was a child. He’d watched her grow up. He looked thoroughly alarmed. “You will not go by yourself, will you, Hastings? By Saint Albert’s toenails, promise me you’ll not go to this Rosehaven alone.”
“How could I? I have no idea where Rosehaven is.” Well, she did know that it was near Canterbury, but that was all. There was probably quite a lot near Canterbury.
He looked vastly relieved. “No, you do not.” He even looked skyward and she imagined he was giving thanks to God.
She found Severin with Torric the steward. There was no longer any distrust between them since Torric had told him about Rosehaven. Severin looked up, recognized that stubborn look on her face, and sighed. He left Torric, took her arm, and walked beside her outside the keep into the inner bailey. “You wish to apologize to me? You wish to kiss me again in front of our people and Gilbert the goat? Mayhap you could caress me with your hands?”
Severin rather thought she would do none of these things. She looked more likely to spit in his eye. She said, “You know that it is not safe for the Sedgewick people to return yet. It is another sennight, at least, to be safe.”
“Aye.”
“I know you do not wish to leave Lady Marjorie. Thus I would ask that you allow me to take some of your men and travel to Rosehaven. I will find out who is living there and what hold there was over my father.”
“Why would I not wish to leave Lady Marjorie?”
“Because you doubtless love her.”
“I do not love any woman, Hastings. You know that. I would have given my life for her at one time, but I was only a boy. I have not enjoyed her for many years. Aye, then she was a boy’s dream.”
He had joined to her when he had been just a boy? Before he had gone to the Holy Land? “Do not lie to me, Severin. There is no need. I merely wish to leave. You can seat her in my place and give her my gowns. She can sleep with you in my bed.”
“I can do that with you here. No. You will remain at Oxborough and see to your duties. When I decide we will go to Rosehaven, then we will go.”
He turned from her and walked back into the keep. She didn’t think, just picked up a stone that lay near her feet and hurled it at him. It missed him, but not by much, loudly striking the stone wall of the keep and cracking in two. He turned more quickly than she believed a man could move. He already held a knife poised in his hand. He stared at her, stared down at the stone that had come close to striking him in the back.
She was breathing hard. She hadn’t been aware before, but she was now. There were people about them, all staring now, even the chickens and dogs quiet.
He sheathed his knife again at his waist and slowly walked back to her.
He stopped just inches from her. She didn’t move. “Did you not believe me before, Hastings?”
She stared at his throat.
“You dared to threaten me again?”
“I wish I had struck you.”
He grabbed her arm and strode out of the inner bailey, walking so quickly he was dragging her. She pulled and jerked but it did no good. The sleeve of her gown ripped from the shoulder. He merely closed his hand around her bare upper arm and walked more quickly. When he reached the stable, he yelled for Tuggle to saddle his horse.
He stopped then, stared down at her, and shook his head. “I am going to take you down to the beach and beat you. I should beat you here, before all our people so they will know that I am the lord here, but I do not want to test their loyalties. MacDear might poison me.”
“You mean to beat me to death as my father did my mother? Go ahead, Severin. And what will you give as your reason? You know that my father found my mother in the falconer’s bed. In this case, it is you in Marjorie’s bed. It is I who should beat you to death.”
He actually growled deep in his throat. “You will not learn to keep your tongue behind your teeth, will you?”
Tuggle led out Severin’s huge warhorse, stamping and snorting.
He picked Hastings up and threw her over the horse’s saddle, then leapt up behind her. He forced her to remain facedown over his legs.
Gwent came running toward them, yelling, “My lord, do you wish me to accompany you? Where do you go?”
“I find it amazing that a man who owes me his loyalty tries to protect you.”
“I will vomit if you make me remain like this, Severin.”
“I am taking her to the beach to speak in private to her, Gwent. Leave go.” Severin flattened his palm against the small of her back and kicked his horse in its sides. The last person Hastings saw was Lady Marjorie, standing on the keep steps.
Hastings didn’t vomit. She became dizzy, but it passed when Severin pulled his stallion to a halt at the top of the cliff edge beside the path that led to the beach. He dragged her to the ground.
“Do not fight me,” he said, and shook her. “Come.”
He forced her before him down the narrow cliff path. She stumbled twice. Both times he caught her.
When she reached the sand beach, she pretended to crumble. He eased his hold. She jerked her arm free of his hand and ran. Her foot hit a piece of driftwood and pain shot through her toes. But she didn’t slow. It was then, of course, that she began to think clearly again. There was no other way back up the cliff save that single narrow path. She was running her heart out and there was nothing in front of her but barren rocks and smooth-faced cliff face. Rocks. She’d hit him with one this time.
She stopped abruptly and turned. He was walking slowly toward her, knowing she was trapped, not exerting himself. She picked up a rock and waited.
He saw what she had done. It didn’t slow him. Perhaps he even began to walk faster.
“Put down the rock, Hastings,” he called, his voice loud and strong over the gentle waves that washed onto the shore not more than a dozen feet from them. It was chilly here, the breeze off the sea tangling through her hair, pressing her gown against her legs. She was breathing hard.
She held the rock more tightly. Surely there must be something she could do, save stand here like a fool ready to hurl a rock at him that he would easily duck.
What to do?
She refused to wait here like a goat tethered to a stake, refused to let him so easily take her and beat her. She could see the anger in him, see it in the starkness of his eyes, see it in the cords that stood out in his neck. But he had never struck her, never. But now there was Marjorie. And there had been his saddle, hurled down on her.
“You would beat me and harm your child?”
He waved away her words. “Do not try that tale with me again, Hastings. Marjorie told me you had begun your monthly flux on the day of her arrival at Oxborough. That is why I kept away from you.”
“She lies.”
He just shook his head and kept coming. The sun suddenly disappeared beneath a passing cloud. She shivered. She wasn’t breathing hard anymore. She held that rock. She waited.
It was then she knew she would not remain there for him to beat her. She dropped the rock, turned, lifted her gown above her knees, and ran into the surf.
“Hastings!”
The water was so cold she felt her breath freeze in her chest. No, she would make it. She was a strong swimmer, Beamis had seen to that when she was a child. She would swim around the side of the wall of rocks and boulders to the beach just beyond. There was another path, much rougher than this one, dangerous to someone who didn’t know it well, as she did. The water swirled about her knees. Just as she was about to dive into the next wave, she felt his arms close around her waist, lifting her free of the water, carrying her back to the shore.
She fought him, finally si
nking her teeth into his arm. He dropped her onto the dry sand, stood over her, legs spread, rubbing his arm.
“You are a fool, Hastings. That water would freeze the heart in your chest.”
“No it wouldn’t. I have swum in it before.”
“Did you seek to drown yourself?”
She lay there on her back, looking up at him. He was blocking the sun. She shivered, but not from her wet feet, not from the cold, but from the sight of him.
She saw him over her such a short time before, smiling, leaning down to kiss her, to nibble her earlobe, to kiss her breasts even as he eased into her. And she had held him close, her eyes meeting his, filled with him, and they had been together, and she had believed it would be like this forever.
She laughed aloud at her own stupidity.
He still had not moved.
She rolled onto her side, holding her stomach, still laughing. She heard herself hiccup. She felt tears burning her eyes. Stupid tears.
He came down over her, pulling her onto her back.
She whipped her legs up suddenly and drove her feet into his groin. He stared at her for an instant, knowing the grinding pain would be upon him in but a moment, knowing he would want to die, knowing he wanted to kill her. She was a red haze, nothing more than that, a red haze that dissolved quickly enough into such pain that he knew he would vomit.
“I wish you had not done that,” he said, and sank to his knees, holding himself. He was gasping with pain now, rolling onto his side.
She jumped to her feet and ran back to the path.
Gwent was waiting at the top, his hands on his hips. “You should not have done that, Hastings. Now he will have to retaliate. Are you mad? How will he sire a child if you unman him?”
“He has already sired a child only he is too stupid to believe it.”
“By Saint Sebert’s nose, why did you have to strike him there? I will try to explain to him that your mind is disordered, that you need some of his mother’s potion. Are you certain you are with child?”
She nodded. She felt very tired.
Gwent cursed. “Get you back to Oxborough. I will help Severin.”
“I will give you a rock.”
“You look dreadful, Hastings.”
“Thank you, Marjorie. You look like a goddess.”
“You are all wet and there is sand on your gown. Your sleeve is torn from your shoulder. Your feet and gown are wet. Did Severin beat you? He did not hit your face. That is wise. It could anger some of the Oxborough people who still feel some loyalty to you.”
Hastings smiled. “I doubt he will be of much use to you tonight, Marjorie.”
“Severin is the lord of Oxborough. He is of use to me only because he protects Eloise.”
“Was he so very clumsy then when he took you as a boy, Marjorie?”
“He should not have told you that. We were very young, both of us. I did not wish to be wedded to that old man, to have him take my virginity, thus I gave it to Severin. That was many years ago.”
Hastings didn’t say anything more, just pushed past Marjorie and ran up the solar stairs. She needed clothes—not gowns, but a boy’s garb. She didn’t care about the bandits on the roads. Nothing could be as bad as remaining here, for she knew when Severin recovered sufficiently, he would return and beat her.
She could lose her babe.
She walked head high to the stable, ordered Marella to be saddled, then, while Tuggle was seeing to her palfrey, she eased into the small area where all the boys slept. All the clothes she picked up were too small and filthy beyond anything she could imagine.
She just smiled at Alart, the porter, telling him she was riding into the village. He waved her off, though he was frowning.
She rode directly to the leatherer’s shop and asked Master Robert once again to see the chamber from which the saddle had been hurled down upon her. Ah, she thought, as she rifled through his apprentices’ trunks that were stacked in the corner of the room. She took what she wanted, stuffed them beneath her gown, and took her leave of Master Robert, who was in the midst of praising the gloriousness of the damned day.
She rode into Beethorpe Forest and changed into the boys’ clothes. She hadn’t estimated properly. The trousers were very tight. As for the tunic, it at least bagged enough to cover most of her to her thighs. She fastened cross garters, pulled on the supple leather boots.
She remounted Marella.
She had no money, no food, no weapon.
Where was she to go?
She just sat there on Marella’s back. She deserved to be beaten, but not because she had angered Severin. No, she deserved it because she was so stupid.
She rode back to the village and managed to find Ellen alone, weeding her mother’s small garden at the back of the baker’s shop.
When she rode out of the village a few minutes later, she had a bow and six arrows, a knife, three loaves of bread wrapped in a big cloth, and a blanket.
“You what?”
“She is the mistress of Oxborough. She rides frequently to the village. I had to allow her to leave, my lord.”
Severin cracked his palm over his own forehead. He’d come back to strangle her. At the very least he would have yelled at her until he was cleansed of his rage. That was what he had planned to do with her on the beach, just the two of them alone, but he hadn’t had the chance. Damn her, she’d planned to swim to the next beach. Then she had unmanned him. Only now could he stand up straight. He drank down the ale Alice handed to him.
He gave Alice a sour look. “I don’t suppose you know anything about this?”
She poured him more ale as she said, “If I did, I would tell you nothing, my lord. I do not want her or the babe harmed.”
Severin smashed his fist on the trestle table. “She is not with child!”
“If she said she was, then she is.”
“Did she tell you that she was?”
“No, but Dame Agnes wonders. She said she knew Hastings was queasy in her belly and that her appetite wasn’t right. Hastings is very private. She waits before she speaks.”
“She didn’t wait before she kicked my manhood into oblivion.”
Alice opened her mouth, caught the warning head shake from Gwent, and closed it again.
Severin said more to himself than to Gwent or Alice or the other dozen servants milling about, hoping to overhear something, “I wanted only to talk to her privately. You know there is no privacy here. She even picked up a stone again once she escaped me on the beach.”
Gwent cleared his throat. He saw Lady Marjorie from the corner of his eye. He knew at any moment that Severin would leap from his chair and want to leave Oxborough on the instant. That was the way he was. He was brooding now, and that boded well for Hastings. It gave her time so that before Severin caught her, he would be relieved of most of his bile.
Time. By Saint Ethelbert’s nose, they had best be after her. But where had she gone?
Gwent cleared his throat again. Lady Marjorie was nearly upon them.
“My lord.”
Severin continued to frown down at the trestle table. He drank the rest of the ale and wiped the back of his hand over his mouth. “Damn her, now I must take time and men to find her. I wanted to finish the work on the eastern wall today. If she picks up another rock to hurl at me, Gwent, I will surely . . . We leave at once.”
“Aye, my lord.”
“My lord, what has happened?”
“Eh? Oh, it’s you, Marjorie. Where is the child?”
“Eloise is with Dame Agnes.”
“I am away to find my wife and bring her home.”
“She attacked you, Severin. All saw it. Will you kill her?”
“Now, that is a thought,” he said, nodded to Alice, who looked ready to leap for his throat, and strode up the solar stairs.
He met his mother near the jakes.
“You had best hurry, Severin. Hastings has been gone close to an hour.”
“I will find her, Mot
her.”
“She isn’t happy, Severin.”
“Neither am I. I am now one of the richest men in England and I vow a toad is happier than I am. That’s what she believes me to be—a toad.”
“Surely she would not liken you to a toad.”
“She said I had the feelings of a toad. Ah, Trist, you wish to come with me? You must swear you won’t try to protect her.”
Trist had stuck his head out of Severin’s tunic. He mewled and hung on.
Lady Moraine watched her son stride into his bedchamber and fling the heavy wooden door shut. She hurried down the stairs to find Gwent, the small vial held tightly in her hand.
Marjorie met her at the bottom of the solar stairs, a cool smile on her beautiful face.
23
“YOU LOOK FATIGUED, LADY MORAINE,” MARJORIE SAID, so beautiful surely God had fashioned her after his angels. “Would you care to have a cup of milk with me?”
Lady Moraine shook her head, looking frantically about for Gwent.
“I believe perhaps your eyes look a bit wild. Perhaps you are not thinking clearly? Perhaps you need to rest? Let me help you, Lady Moraine. Let me take you to your chamber. Some time alone would refresh you.”
“Alice!”
Marjorie lowered her eyes to her white hands. She stepped back when Alice nearly ran her down getting to Lord Severin’s mother.
“I need to find Gwent,” Lady Moraine whispered, but Marjorie heard her. She also saw that vial in the woman’s hand. She knew what was in that vial. Eloise had overheard the women talking of it and had told her.
All three women whipped about when Severin pounded down the solar stairs. He carried a fat blanket that was tightly knotted.
“Mother,” he said, leaned down, and kissed her. “I will return as quickly as possible. Ah, Beamis, you and Lady Marjorie will be in charge of Oxborough whilst I am away. Mother, take care.”
He was gone.
It was too late. Lady Moraine slipped the vial into the pocket of her gown. When he brought his wife back, then she would pour the potion into his wine. He was very angry. What had she done to him? And he had left Marjorie to be mistress of Oxborough in his absence. She sighed. She supposed she couldn’t blame him for not trusting that her wits would not wander. At least not yet.