“What you will do, Daria, is return with me to the great hall and see to your guests.”
“They are not my guests, Roland. They are yours; they are here at your keep; they are here at your pleasure; they are enjoying your bounty, not mine. I have naught to do with anything. Don’t lie to me about them being my guests. I am nothing here and they are nothing to me.”
“It is a pity you removed yourself before I could finish my toast.”
She looked at him warily, not willing to trust him an inch. “What do you mean?”
He flicked a piece of lint from the sleeve of his tunic. Her eyes followed the movement and she was looking at his long fingers when he said, “Without you—and your magnificent dowry, that is—I wouldn’t be able to make needed repairs on the keep. Without you I wouldn’t be able to increase my herds, hire more soldiers, bring in more peasants, and see to luxuries within the keep. Because of you, Daria, I am able to bring my home to its former glory now rather than in the misty future.”
It was his home, just as all she had brought through the marriage was his as well. She shoved him out of her way. Because she caught him off-guard, she was able to slip past him. She raced along the narrow rampart walkway to the wide ladder that rose from the inner bailey.
He watched her climb down the ladder. She moved carefully, even in her anger, to protect the babe in her womb. He watched her dash across the inner bailey, gracefully avoiding refuse and puddles of water and two sleeping goats. He turned back and took her place at the rampart wall. He leaned his elbows on the rough stone. The night winds rose and the air thickened. He wondered, suddenly, without warning, what his father would think of him right at this moment. He saw his father’s face after Roland had finally told him of Joan of Tenesby’s treachery. He could still hear his deep soft voice as he said to his second son, “Listen, Roland, and listen well. You were played the fool, boy, but it didn’t kill you. It hurt your heart and your pride, nothing more. It won’t last, these sorrowing feelings. In the future, when you hear of the man who weds Joan of Tenesby, you will feel pity for the poor fellow, for he had not your luck. Nay, he will have gone blindly to his fate. You will tread more carefully now, and when it comes your time to wed, you will know what to seek and what to avoid in a wife. Honesty, Roland, honesty is a rare commodity in any human, man or woman. When you find honesty, then you will be the winner.”
Honesty, Roland thought. Honesty. Rare indeed, and he hadn’t found it.
He turned away from the ramparts wall. No, he hadn’t found honesty and he was himself becoming more dishonest with each passing day.
Just that morning, as the soft pearl lights of dawn had filled their small bedchamber, he had pulled Daria against him, then rolled on top of her. He’d felt the small roundness of her belly and it had driven him mad. He’d taken her quickly and left her. And he’d wondered if this child she carried would look like the Earl of Clare.
Katherine of Fortescue felt wonderful. She was sitting in the small apple and pear orchard at the rear of the keep. It was a warm day with a thick hot sun, but the dense branches of the apple tree shaded her well enough. She set another perfect stitch in the gown she was sewing for her daughter. She surprised herself by humming, something she hadn’t done in so long she’d thought she had forgotten, but she hadn’t. She hummed louder, charmed by the sound and by her nearly delirious sense of freedom, then burst into song. The gown dropped unheeded to her lap. Her voice was thin but true and she sang until she heard Sir Thomas chuckle behind her.
She turned to smile at him. “Do you come to silence the noise, Sir Thomas?”
“Nay, I come to smile and feel my old bones warm.”
“Old bones. You speak foolishness, sir. Why, you are still a young man.”
“If it pleases you to say so, I shan’t cavil.” He seated himself beside her on the narrow stone bench. It had belonged to his grandmother. So many years had passed, so many events had shaped what he’d become now—
“I’m glad you haven’t yet taken your leave,” Katherine said, looking at Sir Thomas straightly.
“Roland has asked me to stay.” He shrugged then, adding, “I cannot, in any case. Your sweet daughter—” His voice trailed off. “Nay, ask me not, Katherine, for I know not what trouble lies between them. I act as the block of wood between the two of them, a comfortable block, stolid and silent, and both of them look to that block for ease and safe conversation. Think you I should take my leave?”
She shook her head and set another perfect stitch.
“You are a woman of good judgment,” he said, plucking a long piece of grass and wrapping it around his callused fingers. “You don’t meddle. You treat your son-in-law with respect and kindness. You don’t frown your displeasure at him when you see your daughter’s pale face. You don’t try to tell your daughter what she does wrong and try to correct her.”
Katherine grinned at him. “I am lazy, sir. Why should I work when Daria wishes to assume all the responsibility?”
“You lie, my lady. It is your wisdom that holds you silent, that and your love for your daughter.”
“Like you, Sir Thomas, I shan’t cavil if you wish to pay me compliments.”
Sir Thomas said abruptly. “Are you healed?”
Her fingers stilled and she was silent for many moments.
“I’m sorry to distress you. It is just that I would kill the Earl of Reymerstone were he here. Indeed, I wonder if I shouldn’t pay the bastard a visit when I leave here and show him the contempt I feel for him.”
Her hand shot out and closed over his clenched ones. “Damon Le Mark is a paltry creature, Sir Thomas. He knows no honor, no loyalty, and his treachery has rotted his soul. Ah, he knows pleasure because another’s suffering gives it to him. Let him die in his own misery. And he will die as he deserves to, I know it.”
“But he would have killed you had not Burnell brought you here.”
“I must admit I felt a good deal of relief when Burnell told me I was coming here. Actually, he’d beaten me worse than that several times before.”
Sir Thomas drew back, pain and shock contorting his features. “I must tell Roland. I must, for it is his right to avenge you.”
“If you tell such a thing to Roland or to my daughter, I will call you a liar. Leave go, Sir Thomas. Another lady lived that wretched life at Reymerstone. A new one, reborn if you will, sits here with you, humming and singing wildly as a berserk sparrow. This lady is happy and content and deems herself the luckiest of women. Sit here quietly for a moment and I will fetch you a flagon of ale. Should you like that, sir?”
Sir Thomas watched her walk gracefully toward the cooking outbuilding. He admired her. He thought her exquisite.
A week later Daria straightened from speaking to the dairymaid at the sound of horsemen arriving at the keep. She wiped her hands on her gown and walked quickly toward the inner bailey. It was Graelam de Moreton and three of his men. He looked like a pagan warrior, ruthless and overpowering in his black-and-silver mail, astride his huge destrier, and she felt an automatic frisson of fear. And then he smiled and shouted, “Roland. Bring your worthless hide over here so that I may tell you what Dienwald and Philippa have said about you.”
Roland was striding to him, yelling out insults in fine good humor, and clapped his shoulder after he’d dismounted his destrier. The two men embraced, then stepped apart, Lord Graelam saying to his man, “Rolfe, see to Demon. Where is your wife, Roland?”
“I am here, my lord.”
She offered Graelam a deep curtsy.
Graelam stared at her silently for several moments. “My Kassia and I worried about you, Daria. What you did was foolish. My belly curdled with fear when the two grooms returned, red-faced, without you.”
“I’m sorry, my lord. It was thoughtless of me.”
Graelam strode to her and very gently raised her chin in the palm of his gloved hand. He studied her face, not seeming to care that her husband stood not six feet from them, that the in
ner bailey was filled with chattering men and women and scampering children.
Roland said from behind them, his voice irritated, “I sent you a message immediately, Graelam, that my wife was safe and with me.”
Graelam turned then to Roland. He smiled even as he shrugged. “Kassia worries, Roland. She wanted me to come. She wanted me to ensure that Daria was comfortable in her new home and that the babe was settling in nicely as well. Thus you see me here awaiting your hospitality.”
“Oh, dear. Please, my lord, come into the hall. My mother is here with us now and I wish you to meet her. Do you also know Sir Thomas?”
Roland found himself grinning reluctantly after his wife, who picked up her skirts and dashed much too quickly, he thought, suddenly worried, across the crooked cobblestones and up the wide stone steps into the great hall.
“You’ve disconcerted my wife, Graelam. I believe it the unlikely combination of your fierce face and your gentle manner. How do your own lady and babe?”
“She is well, as is my son. I should apologize to you, Roland, but it never occurred to me that Daria was so unhappy at Wolffeton.”
Roland was uncomfortable. He shrugged. “Have Rolfe bring your men inside the hall. By now Daria has provided enough ale to quench the thirst of every man within our walls.”
Roland turned and strode toward the hall. Graelam de Moreton followed more slowly behind him, thinking about what the devil he should do. His wife’s words were still clear in his mind. “I’m worried, Graelam. There is strife between them, but there is caring as well, at least on Daria’s side. Please discover what is wrong and fix it.”
He shook his head. Kassia cherished this peculiar notion that he could fix anything, be it a war between two neighbors or squabbles between a man and his wife. There was trouble between Roland and Daria, no doubt about that. Graelam sighed. He preferred trying to fix the differences between two countries. He foresaw several days of watching Daria and Roland and trying to come up with some sort of solution that would please his wife, whatever the hell that could possibly be.
Daria sat alone in the solar, slowly and carefully grinding herbs just sprung up from her garden. It was a hot day and a line of sweat snaked down between her breasts. The sweet smell of rosemary filled her nostrils. She fanned herself with her hand and wished she could move closer to the window. But she couldn’t. She’d spread the various herbs in small separate piles on the table in front of her, and any breeze or sudden disturbance would send the herbs wafting away in the hot air.
Her mother was likely with Sir Thomas. That was proving to be an interesting development, she thought as she transferred three pinches of rosemary to the fragrant dill. Days before, Sir Thomas had borrowed a dozen of Roland’s men and they’d carried money to Sir Thomas’s daughter and her family. At Roland’s insistence, Sir Thomas had agreed to return to Chantry Hall. He was nothing loath, she thought, seeing her very lovely mother in her mind’s eye, smiling up into Sir Thomas’s weathered face. The man was besotted with her.
Daria added exactly three pinches of coarsely ground foxglove to a small batch of finely crushed poppy flowers. She had very little and must hoard her supply. She wondered how Roland was faring with the dour old farmer who held demesne lands at the northern boundaries of Chantry Hall. Roland had taken four men and ridden from the keep early that morning and should return soon now. She looked toward the window slit. The sun was settling downward. Yes, he should be returning soon now—Just to see him, she thought, just to look at him whilst he spoke, to hear him laugh. I’m naught but a fool, she told herself, knowing that it was true and knowing too that there was nothing she could do about it.
He hadn’t touched her for a week now, not since he’d placed his hand on her belly and felt the slight bulge there. She paused in her work, remembering how he’d been frantic to leave her when he’d finished. He was so distant from her now that he might as well be back in Wales. She shook her head, and wiped the film of perspiration from her forehead with the back of her hand. She wouldn’t think of him now. There were other things to fill her mind and her time.
She began to sing softly as she added just a dollop of basil to a concoction to ease stomach cramps. The afternoon grew hotter and her fingers slowed in their tasks. Suddenly, without warning, Daria froze where she sat, her fingers still, her eyes staring straight ahead. A huge door opened, right in front of her, and she saw herself passing through it into a field of dazzling white. The white was thick like fog, yet pure and dry, and it surrounded her yet didn’t seem to really touch her. And there, as she stood silent and quiet, she saw Graelam. He was working on the eastern wall, dislodging old stone, lifting a mighty slab, turning to heave it away from him, then moving back to grasp another. Men were talking and looking at him as they in turn lifted the stones he’d heaved to them and in turn passed them to others. There was so much stone to be removed so that the wall could be rebuilt. She watched as he yelled something to one of the men, breaking his rhythm as he did so, his back turned to the wall. Suddenly there was a loud rumbling sound and the wall collapsed. Huge slabs toppled downward. She saw Graelam whip about, saw the stones strike his shoulders and chest, battering him to his knees. The stones rained down thick and hard, and covered him. The men surrounding him were yelling frantically, trying to escape danger from the avalanche of stone. Thick dust from the crumbling stone swirled about, filling the air with thick gray debris. And then there was awful silence. Just as suddenly, the white disappeared and she was back in her chair, her left hand still held out in front of her. Daria jumped to her feet, upending all the herbal portions, and dashed from the solar. She didn’t doubt what she saw. It was the same sort of vision she’d had when she saw her father die so many years before.
She saw her mother speaking with one of the wenches in the inner bailey and screamed to her to follow. She raced to the eastern wall, and as she neared, she heard men shouting and yelling.
She ran until she reached the exact spot where Graelam had fallen. Men were hurling rocks aside, on their knees, digging frantically. She shoved several of the men aside and heaved the stones off him. Several smaller stones tumbled against her, striking her hard, but she ignored them, ignored the brief stabs of pain. She knew exactly where his face was and she knew she must clear it so he could breathe. She heard the men arguing, and someone tried to pull her away, but she turned and saw him draw back at the look on her face. She worked until she thought her arms would crumble as had the stone wall. She saw him. Finally his chest and head were clear. He lay on his side, his arms over his head to protect himself. He was perfectly still.
“No.” She screamed the word, and she heard herself as a child screaming the same word over and over after she’d seen her father fall and the horse crush his skull.
“Graelam.” She fell to her knees beside him. The men, speechless and afraid, moved aside for her, making a circle around her. She grabbed Graelam’s arm and heaved him over and onto his back.
“He’s dead,” one of the men muttered. “Dead. There’s naught ye can do, mistress.”
“He’s not dead,” Daria said, and she slapped his face, hard, again and again. “You won’t die. Graelam, damn you. No. You won’t die, not like my father. I won’t let you. No.” Still he didn’t move, and she felt fury flood through her. She’d seen what had happened, yet she was to be impotent again. She wouldn’t accept it. She pounded his chest with her fists, screaming at him, berating him not to die, not to leave his family, not like this. And she struck him again and again. She was trembling with fatigue and fear, yet her rage wouldn’t let her stop. She pounded her fists again and again on his chest.
Then, suddenly, Graelam’s chest heaved, and heaved again. Then he groaned, the most beautiful sound Daria had ever heard in her life.
She yelled with the relief of it. She’d won. He hadn’t died. The vision hadn’t shown her something beyond her control. It hadn’t been a prediction, it had been a warning. She shook his massive shoulders, then graspe
d his face between her hands and stroked his brow, his jaw, his head. No damage as far as she could tell. Then he opened his eyes and looked up at her.
He frowned, his eyes narrowing in pain. “Graelam,” she said very quietly, her face close to his, “you’re alive. My father died and there was naught I could do about it. But you lived. You lived, my lord.” She held him, her cheek pressed against his throat, speaking words, nonsense really, her voice becoming more slurred by the moment.
“What the devil is happening here?”
The men stumbled back to allow Roland through. He stopped cold at the sight of his wife on her knees holding Graelam and speaking to him in a singsong voice.
“Daria, what happened? Graelam, what—?”
She turned then and smiled up at him, tears glistening on her dust-streaked cheeks. “He’ll live, Roland. It happened just like my father, but Graelam lived. It was a warning, not a prediction.” She rose then, and said very calmly, “Please help Lord Graelam to the keep. His ribs are likely badly bruised. Be careful Roland, I shall have Alice prepare a brew for him to ease his pain.”
Without another word, she walked away from him, walked past her mother, her steps brisk and her head thrown back.
His questions would wait. Roland directed his men to lift Graelam. The men grunted and heaved in their burden. “Go easy,” Roland said, and helped in the task. Once Graelam was lying on his bed, bared to the waist, Roland saw indeed that his ribs were bruised badly. He felt them, then nodded. “Daria is right. You will be fine, but sore as Satan for a good week. What happened, Graelam?”
“I was working on your damned wall, Roland. It collapsed suddenly, without warning, and the stone buried me. That’s all.” But it wasn’t all, Graelam was thinking. Something very strange had occurred. It was as if he himself had quit being, but of course he hadn’t. He’d been buried under the rubble—he remembered quite clearly the pain of the striking stones as they’d hit him; then he’d suddenly been separate from the pain, outside of it somehow, and he’d seemed to be surrounded by a very clear whiteness that was blinding yet somehow completely clear—nothing more, just—white, thick and impenetrable, yet clear. And then he’d heard Daria screaming at him, screaming that he wouldn’t die, not like her father had died, that she wouldn’t let him. And then he’d come back into the rawness of his body, even felt the pain of her fists hammering over and over again against his chest. And the white had receded, moving slowly away from him, then whooshing out of his sight in an instant of time, and he was awake and filled with life and pain and she was above him, babbling nonsense at him and stroking his face with her hands.