“Well?” Hedda demanded as she reached them. She placed her hands on her bony hips and eyed Goda harshly. “Answer me, girl!”
Goda blanched, well aware of the consequences of being singled out by Hedda. “I… I…”
She could not finish. Brigitte felt her temper rising at seeing her friend so cowed. “She was accompanying me to my lord’s chamber,” Brigitte told Hedda curtly, not bothering to hide her dislike for the woman.
“Why? He does not need my servant. He has his own servant now.”
The woman’s scorn was not lost on Brigitte, and the tittering of the other three women standing behind Hedda made her furious. But she fought the urge to let her temper loose.
“It is not Sir Rowland who has need of Goda but I who requested her help.” Brigitte spoke calmly.
But she was stunned by Hedda’s reaction. “You!” the woman exploded. “By the saints! By God—”
“Madame, you need not carry on as if a crime has been committed,” Brigitte interrupted sharply. “I merely asked Goda for a moment of her time. Her task was finished. I was not taking her away from her duties.”
“Silence!” Hedda shouted furiously. “Goda’s duties are never finished. Her time is not her own. She serves me and those I bid her serve—but certainly no bastard’s whore!”
Brigitte gasped. She could not have been more surprised if Hedda had slapped her. The snickers of the other women grew louder and louder inside her head, and she saw that they were thoroughly enjoying the scene.
“Goda!” Hedda snapped. “Get back to the workroom. I will deal with you later.”
Tears welling in her eyes, Goda hurried away. Brigitte watched her leave, knowing that if the girl was punished, it would be her fault. Yet what had she done that was so terrible? Hedda had been watching for an excuse to inflict her cruelty.
“And you!” Hedda turned her attention back to Brigitte. “Get out of this hall. I am forced to tolerate your presence when the bastard is around, but not otherwise.”
Brigitte drew herself up proudly, wanting desperately to strike the old witch. Keeping her voice level, she said, “You, madame, have the manners of a cow.” Hedda turned a shade darker, and began sputtering, but Brigitte added, “And anyone who calls you lady does so only to mock you!”
Brigitte turned her back, but before she reached the first stair step, Hedda’s clawlike hand bit into her shoulder and swung her around. The woman slapped her, hard, and Brigitte’s head snapped to the side. Her cheek burned with the imprint of that cruel hand, but she did not move. She stood still, smoldering, and defied Hedda with the contempt in her eyes.
Brigitte’s disdain brought a cry from Hedda, who was used to servants cowering at her feet when the rage was upon her. She turned livid and raised her hand again, but her hand was suddenly caught in a grip from behind. Then Hedda was yanked off her feet and thrown into her group of ladies. All four women fell back into the rushes from the impact of Hedda’s falling body.
Sprawling on the floor, astonished, Amelia was the first to rise and back away. Ilse and her maid scrambled to their feet next and ran from the hall without looking back. Hedda rose laboriously and tottered to her feet to face Rowland, in a towering rage.
“If you ever lay a hand on her again I will kill you, old hag!” Rowland said in a voice that turned her blood cold. “I will choke that putrid life from your body with my bare hands! Is that clear?”
In answer Hedda began to scream her loudest. In moments knights, squires, and pages came running in from the yard, and servants appeared from every corner of the hall. Brigitte backed nervously up the stairs and hid in the shadows, terrified. Was this happening because of her?
No one came near the two combatants once they saw who was standing over their mistress. If it had been anyone else, they would have protected their lord’s lady with their lives. But they would not go against the lord’s son. All knew on whom the lord’s favor fell.
“What in the devil’s name?” Luthor pushed his way through the crowd and came forward, scowling when he saw Hedda and Rowland glaring at one another.
“Luthor!” Hedda whined. “He tried to kill me!”
Luthor looked at Rowland and met his furious gaze. “If I had tried to kill the hag she would be dead,” Rowland growled. “I have warned her that I will kill her if she ever lays a hand on Brigitte again. No one touches what is mine, no one! Not even you,” he told Luthor firmly.
The silence in the hall was complete. Everyone waited tensely to see how the lord would react. Rowland’s statement would have brought a blow from Luthor not too many years before.
“He is not lord here,” Hedda spoke up. “By what right does he tell you what you can and cannot do?”
“Shut up, woman!” Luthor turned cold eyes on his wife and then roared. “Out! Everyone out!”
There was a rush for the doors, and Hedda, too, made to flee until Luthor growled, “Not you, woman!”
The cavernous hall was quickly emptied except for Luthor, Hedda, Rowland, and Brigitte, who was forgotten on the stairs, too afraid to move. She held her breath. Would Rowland be banished? How dare he speak to his father that way before everyone?
But Luthor’s fury was not for his son. He caught Hedda a vicious blow that sent her sprawling into the rushes once again, then came to stand over her, his face crimson.
“You forced Rowland to make that statement, woman. He was within his bounds, for I have nothing to do with that girl. She belongs only to him!”
Luthor turned away in disgust, then continued coldly. “You were warned, Hedda, that the girl was none of your affair. She is bound to Rowland and he is sworn to protect her. You think because you are my lady you need not heed his warnings? Wife, if he kills you because of the girl, I will do nothing about it. He will be ridding me of a cankerous sore I should have rid myself of years ago.” At Hedda’s gasp, he added, “You can be thankful I did not shame you with these words before the others. But this is the last consideration I will give you, Hedda.”
With that, Luthor left the hall.
Chapter Twenty-nine
Two days had passed since Brigitte had crossed words with Hedda. They were calmer days, as Hedda and her maid did not venture into the hall while Brigitte was there. She had not seen either of them since and was grateful for that.
They were dour days, however, with purple-tinged clouds ever present. Another storm was brewing. The last snow had yet to melt, and a new storm would soon thicken the white carpet that stretched as far as the eye could see.
Brigitte did not mind the dark days, though. She was happy. She didn’t understand it and she didn’t try to. She just felt gloriously happy. Everyone noticed the change. Her soft, bubbling laughter was heard frequently. Her smiles brought comment, at times shy, secretive smiles, as did the way her eyes met and held Rowland’s.
The old lord saw it and was pleased. The young rascals are in love, he thought wistfully, remembering his own first love, lost to him before he had met and married the shrew who was now his wife. Luthor had never forgotten his Gerda. Nor had he ever loved another woman. If she had lived, Gerda would have given him sons.
Sons. A mist always gathered in Luthor’s eyes when he thought of sons. A man of his bearing, a man of his strength, had to have sons. But Luthor had daughters, damned daughters just like their damned mother. Hedda had conceived no more after Ilse, nor did any of his other bedmates.
But Luthor had Rowland, and Rowland was a man to be proud of, the answer to his prayers. What Rowland did not know of his birth could not hurt him. No, the secret would die with Luthor, and Montville would have a strong lord after Luthor died. He had seen to that.
Rowland quickly brushed Brigitte’s cheek with a feathery kiss. They had just finished the morning meal, and he laughed at her embarrassment before he sauntered out of the hall, leaving her smiling after him, embarrassed yet pleased by his parting display of affection.
Rowland walked briskly to the stable, where the Hun was s
addled and waiting for his morning exercise, which Rowland rarely denied his prized steed. The darker clouds to the north still hovered low over the horizon, moving east, then west, then east again, as if undecided in which direction to unleash their storm. Rowland hoped those dark clouds stayed north. He could do without being bound in, and this storm promised to be a violent one.
The Hun greeted Rowland, blowing a cloud of steam in his face, and Rowland talked to the animal cheerfully as he led him out of the stable. The horse was jittery.
Sir Gui met Rowland at the entrance, as he was returning his own mount to the stable. They both stopped to speak, but there was an uncomfortable silence between the two old friends.
“You are the early one, eh?” Rowland remarked casually, hoping Gui would respond genially for a change.
He was disappointed by Gui’s curt “Yes.”
Rowland stared at Gui’s back, shrugged irritably, and began to mount the Hun, then changed his mind abruptly and followed Gui back into the stable.
“What is wrong, old friend?” Rowland demanded. “Did you not believe Brigitte that night?”
Gui did not want to answer, but as he saw Rowland’s pain and confusion, he relented. “If it had been between you then as it is now, then I might have believed her. But I was not fooled, Rowland. She did a noble thing, lying to prevent the death of one of us—my death,” he conceded. “I am well aware that my skills cannot compare to yours.”
“Be damned!” Rowland said in exasperation. “Then why did you not challenge me again?”
“And have the lady’s efforts go for nothing?” Gui asked, astonished.
Rowland was most uncomfortable, for Gui was bitter. “I do not mistreat her, Gui. You can see she is happy. Can you not see that I damn myself and our love if I admit she is who she claims to be? But you do not know the circumstances. I took her from Louroux, and no one stayed me. She was given to me, forced on me. If she were truly a baron’s daughter, do you think that would have happened? Be damned, the whole of Berry would be here demanding I release her!”
Gui’s eyes narrowed angrily. “Who is to say that will not still happen? And who is to say the lady’s happiness is not because she is sure that will happen soon. She is, you know, under the misconception that you sent a messenger to Berry. But I know you did not!”
Rowland gasped. “How do you know that?”
Gui shrugged, delighted to see Rowland upset. “Knowing the way servants gossip, it’s a wonder the lady herself has not learned of your deception. I wonder how she will react when she finds out. Do you think she will still be so happy?”
“She has no wish to leave me now,” Rowland said stiffly.
“Are you so sure?”
For a moment, Rowland wanted to connect his fist with Gui’s taunting mouth. The urge was strong, but he let out a low growl of anger and threw himself onto the Hun, desperate to put as much distance as he could between him and the man who voiced his own doubts.
He charged out into the bailey, causing a knight and page who had been practicing with swords to leap out of the way and fall, sprawling, into the snow. Rowland spurred the Hun cruelly, heading for open fields.
But, for the first time in his life, Rowland lost control of the Hun. The stallion swerved sharply and Rowland could not turn him back. The steed passed the servants’ huts, spewing mud over rough plankings, galloped back into the yard, disrupting the exercise there as warrior and servant alike fought to get out of the path of the huge animal, and then tore crazily across the yard, pulling left and then right in an erratic path.
Rowland was beside himself. He could not stop the animal, and the horse seemed blind to its path as it charged straight for the stone wall at the side of the manor, turning only at the last moment to gallop madly toward the rear yard. As soon as the Hun burst into the open yard behind the manor, he began to buck wildly in a desperate attempt to unseat his rider. And unseat him he did. Rowland went flying over the Hun’s head, landing on his side in the mud. He then rolled as fast as he could out of the animal’s path, as the Hun’s forelegs came close to shattering his shoulder.
Rowland sat up slowly, aching, and stared after his horse as the animal continued to buck wildly for several more minutes before it finally slowed to a halt. Rowland felt no anger at being so shamefully unseated. He felt only a terrible loss as he realized that the Hun was crazed and would have to be destroyed. The notion tore at Rowland’s gut. That horse was his pride, the finest steed ever sired at Montville. There would never be another like him.
Men came running from the front and side yards and gathered around Rowland as he eased himself to his feet. Grooms warily approached the Hun, but Rowland barked them away. A knife would have to be taken to the Hun’s neck, but he himself would be the one to do it, no other.
Sir Gui came to his side and offered him a cloth to wipe the mud from his face and hands. “Are you injured?”
Rowland shook his head. “A little sore is all.”
“My God, what could have caused this? I have never seen the horse so possessed. Dogs and wolves, but never a horse and never this one!”
Rowland’s bewilderment equalled Gui’s. “He is possessed.”
The pain in Rowland’s eyes told Gui what had to be done. “Rowland, I am sorry. Would you like me to—?”
“No.” Rowland stopped him. He drew the dagger from his own belt and, with a heavy step, walked toward the Hun.
Gui followed. “At least let me help. You may not be able to hold him still.”
Rowland nodded, and together they approached the skittish animal. The Hun shied away, his eyes rolling wildly, his feet churning the mud, but finally Rowland’s soothing voice calmed him enough that he could grab the reins.
“I will remove the trappings,” Gui offered. “The saddle will be difficult to remove…afterward.”
Rowland glared at him. “To hell with the trappings! The horse…ah,” he cried, his shoulders slumping in defeat. “Do it, then. I will hold him.”
Carefully Gui unstrapped the saddle and pulled it off, handing it to a nearby groom. There was silence in the yard as everyone solemnly watched Rowland brace himself to cut the throat of his beloved horse. In the silence, Sir Gui’s sharp cry was like a thunderclap.
When Rowland saw the blood and all the thorns embedded in the Hun’s back, thorns that had been pushed in deeply by his own heavy weight, relief flooded his being. But the relief was tinged with horror, for he had come too close to killing the Hun. If not for Gui removing the saddle, he would have discovered the thorns too late.
“Roger,” Rowland hissed.
Gui, standing near Rowland, felt his flesh crawl. “Rowland, you do not know for sure.”
But Rowland did not even seem to have heard. He turned on his heel and started for the manor, Gui running to catch up.
“Rowland, listen to me,” Gui said anxiously. “You have no proof!”
Rowland stopped and turned to Gui, barely managing to check himself. There was so much hate to be unleashed, but not on Gui.
“I have no doubts.”
“And if you are wrong?”
“Twice now you have tried to defend that blackguard. You waste your efforts, Gui,” Rowland said darkly. “I was meant to break my neck or to kill the horse I prize. All my life I have suffered at the hands of others, and I am through with it.”
“But if you are wrong?” Gui persisted.
“Truly, I do not care. I should have torn Roger apart long ago.”
Gui did not run after him as Rowland continued to the hall with an unwavering determination. Gui sighed. Even if Roger were not guilty of this terrible deed, he was guilty of so many others.
Chapter Thirty
With her arms piled high with clothing, Brigitte left Rowland’s chamber, closing the door with her foot, and started down the corridor. She stopped short when she saw Roger of Mezidon sitting in the arched window that looked down on the hall. He wasn’t looking down at the hall but directly at her, as if h
e had been perched there waiting for her.
Quickly she looked behind her, then groaned when she realized that Wolff had not followed her out of the room but was shut inside. She wanted to drop the bundle in her arms and run when Roger rose and started toward her, but she reminded herself that Roger had been warned to leave her alone. He would surely not be so foolish as to ignore the warning.
“So, Lady Brigitte,” Roger said in a belittling voice. “You not only pretend to be a servant, but you play the part very well. I wonder why?”
“Let me pass.”
“Do not brush me aside, lady, when I have so diligently waited for you. I had begun to despair of ever finding you without one of your beasts at your heel. The wolf and the lion guard you well.”
“I am sure Rowland will be amused by your description of him,” she replied. “I can just hear his roar of laughter.”
“You toy with me, lady,” Roger said darkly. “You think I fear that lout?”
She raised a brow. “You do not? But I see you do not, since you have not heeded Rowland’s warning. You live very dangerously, milord. They will someday sing ballads of your bravery.”
“Your derision is misplaced, damosel.” Roger did not try to hide his anger. “Save it for Rowland, for he grows soft in your taming of him.”
He reached for her, but she stepped quickly back, a warning in her eyes. “I will scream if you touch me. You are despicable!”
“So I may be, but at least I would make you my wife.”
“Your wife?”
“You seem surprised. Rowland does not think highly enough of you to offer marriage?”
“He does not know—”
Brigitte stopped, amazed at herself for defending Rowland’s treatment of her. Did Rowland not respect her? She had given in to him completely. Was his opinion of her low because she had?
She gave Roger a look of pure loathing for the doubts he had raised in her mind and said, “I have said all—”