Entreat Me (2 page)

CHAPTER ONE

372 Years Later

“Isn’t there anything else he should be doing besides bothering Cinnia?  Has he no duties?”  Louvaen Hallis Duenda scowled at the couple seated together on the garden bench outside the kitchen door.

For the fourth time in as many days, her sister Cinnia entertained the young swordsmith newly hired at Monteblanco’s armory.  Like every male in a six-league radius, Gavin de Lovet, only son of Lord Ballard de Sauveterre, had been taken with Cinnia’s beauty and set to courting her.  To everyone’s surprise—and no small amount of envy in some cases—Cinnia had enthusiastically accepted his courtship.  For three months they’d spent every free moment together, usually under Louvaen’s watchful eye.  People already made bets as to when they’d hear a betrothal announcement.  Right now the pair huddled in their cloaks, heads bent, too engrossed in each other to notice the light drifting of snow powdering their shoulders.

Mercer Hallis left his seat at the table to join his oldest child at the doorway.  His low chuckle made Louvaen scowl even harder.  “By the look of her, I’d say he’s more of a pleasant distraction than a bother.  He’s a decent enough lad, and he makes her smile.  What don’t you like about him, Lou?”

Louvaen abandoned her post at the door to put a kettle on the hot grate for tea.  “I never said I didn’t like him.”  Were he not sniffing at her sister’s skirts, she’d be very fond of him.  Over the weeks, de Lovet had impressed her with his honest manner and polite interaction with her family.  She especially admired his steady gaze, the green eyes calm and unflinching, even under her most intimidating stare.  Only a few years older than Cinnia, he was as breathtakingly handsome as Cinnia was lovely.  Tall and muscled, he had a face that sent the ale wenches at the Bishop’s Knickers pub into a swoon every time he walked by.  Like Cinnia, he was blond and wore his hair in a simple queue tied with a black ribbon.  Were they to marry and have children, their offspring wouldn’t just be beautiful; they’d be ethereal.

She shuddered at the thought.  Such beauty wrought its own misery, and Louvaen’s fear for her sister’s future didn’t lessen, even at the idea of a good match.  “He’s as any other male who’s laid eyes on Cinnia—knocked stupid.  However, she’s as fond of him as he is of her, and it scares me.  We know nothing about him except what he’s told us.”

“I’ve asked at the Guild Hall.  A promising young man with a talent for swordsmithing,”  Mercer said.  “It’s a highly-paid skill.  He’d provide well for Cinnia.”

“True, but why is the only son and heir of a lord working as a swordsmith?  Has anyone heard of the de Sauveterres?  Dame Mona hasn’t, and she knows every family, rich, poor and in between in a dozen towns.  She doesn’t recognize the surname.  He’s a criminal for all we know.”

Mercer resumed his place amidst a scatter of open ledgers and receipts.  “A well dressed one then.  If his clothing is anything to go by, his family isn’t hurting for silver.”  He sighed and raked a hand through his thinning hair, all humor gone.  “I wish we could say the same.”  He shuffled pages of ledger accounts.  “I can’t churn these numbers any better than you’ve already done.  Jimenin will call in his markers, and without the cargo from that last ship, we’ve no way to clear them.”

Despite her own feverish, late night calculations which pointed to absolute bankruptcy, Louvaen had hoped her father might find something she’d missed—anything to bring down the debt.  No such monies had appeared, and she mourned the inevitable loss of her home and remaining livestock that would be sold to help pay her father’s outstanding accounts.

A series of sharp knocks broke the kitchen’s tense quiet.  Louvaen peered down the hall to one of the parlor windows that looked onto the street.  The tell-tale ripple of a black cloak fluttered beyond the glass.  She growled.  “Speak of a devil, and it appears.  Jimenin’s at the door, Papa.  Keep him busy.  I’ll get Cinnia.”

The cold air cut through her shawl, and she blinked lacy snowflakes from her eyelashes as she trekked across the garden.  Cinnia didn’t notice her, but Gavin did.  He released Cinnia’s hand and rose, bowing to Louvaen.

“Mistress Duenda.”  Those wary green eyes watched her.  Louvaen suppressed a smile.  She’d never exchanged a cross word with de Lovet but suspected he’d heard plenty from the townsfolk, and even Cinnia, about her sharp tongue and ferocity where her sister was concerned.  More than a few would-be suitors had come away bloodied from an encounter with her, figuratively and once in a while literally.

She acknowledged him with a brief nod.  “Sir Gavin.  You need to leave.”  She interrupted Cinnia’s rising protest with her next statement.  “Jimenin is here.

“I wish to stay.”  De Lovet crossed his arms and planted his feet in the snow.

Louvaen frowned.  Heroics had no place in business affairs, and devious subtlety was the only way to battle Jimenin.  Besides, this was Hallis business, not de Lovet’s.  Handsome he was; rich he might be, but she owed him nothing more than an abrupt “No.”

He didn’t move, and his mouth thinned and firmed.  Louvaen tried to recall where in the stables she’d placed the pitchfork when Cinnia came to her aid.  She sidled up to Gavin and laid a delicate hand on his arm.  Her great brown eyes, which had slain a thousand hearts and made an equal number of enemies, implored him.  Louvaen inwardly counted the seconds until Cinnia reduced her victim to a quivering heap.  “You must go, Gavin.  Jimenin is a serpent but one we can handle.  If you stay, you’ll just make it more difficult for us.”

To Louvaen’s surprise—and growing admiration—de Lovet didn’t fall so easily to her sister’s persuasion.  Then again, like recognized like, and she wondered if he’d used a male version of that same seduction on others and was immune to its power.  He glanced at her then back to Cinnia, his handsome features revealing the conflicting need to protect and his wish to appease Cinnia.  For her part, Cinnia hammered the last nail home by stroking his arm.  “Please, Gavin,” she begged in her soft voice.  “We’ll see you tomorrow?”

Louvaen knotted her fingers together to keep from applauding her sister as de Lovet wilted and surrendered.  “As you wish.”  He clasped Cinnia’s hand and brought it to his lips in a polite kiss.  “Until tomorrow, sweet Cinnia.”  He bowed a second time to Louvaen.  “Mistress Duenda.”  He glanced once toward the house to catch a glimpse of the Hallis’s latest visitor before letting himself out the back gate.

Cinnia’s gaze followed him until he disappeared from view.  She turned to Louvaen who frowned.  “What?”

“When did you become just ‘Cinnia’ and he just ‘Gavin’?”

Cinnia’s chin jutted out in a stubborn angle.  “It isn’t improper.”

“It’s certainly familiar.”

The girl peered into the kitchen’s open door and changed the subject.  “Doesn’t Jimenin have something else to do besides lurk around here?”

Louvaen’s lips twitched at the similarity between Cinnia’s complaint and her own about Gavin.  “Not until he can squeeze every last farthing out of us.”

Cinnia sighed.  “What am I sick with today?”

“Take your pick.”

“Leprosy.”  She grinned.  “Wait.  Scurvy.  We haven’t used scurvy yet.”

This time Louvaen laughed.  “I think he’d believe something a little less dramatic.  A headache should suffice.”

Cinnia headed for the door with a long-suffering sigh.  “I seem to get a lot of those lately.”

Louvaen followed her inside as far as the kitchen and watched as she tiptoed up the back stairs to her room.  Jimenin didn’t believe a word of their tales regarding Cinnia’s many illnesses, but he hadn’t challenged them yet, and Louvaen happily played the game for as long as necessary to keep him away from her sister.  She brushed the wrinkles out of her apron, took a calming breath so she wouldn’t succumb to the temptation of strangling their visitor with her bare hands and marched into the parlor.

She found both men seated near the small hearth appearing like two friends enjoying each other’s company on a winter’s day—at least until she looked closer at her father’s expression.  Pinched, hunted, and pale with desperation, Mercer caught sight of her.  His shoulders slumped in relief.  “Louvaen, my dear, Don Jimenin has been kind enough to stop by and inquire about Cinnia’s health.”

Louvaen inclined her head to their guest who stood and offered her a courtly bow.  Dressed in elegant garb of embroidered blacks and grays, Don Gabrilla Jimenin cut an impressive figure.  A wealthy landowner with investments in everything from caravans to ships, he was Monteblanco’s most influential citizen.  Men courted his favor and women his interest.  His was a regular face, saved from banality by a sensual mouth and an oddly entrancing pair of eyes that looked out upon the world with cool hauteur.  He styled his brown hair in the latest fashion of tight curls confined in a neat queue.  Louvaen loathed him and knew he heartily returned the sentiment.

His gaze swept over her before he glanced past her shoulder to the empty kitchen.  His lips quirked in a cold smile.  “You’re looking well, mistress.”

She suspected she looked murderous, but this man had a knack for bringing out the anger in her.  “Most kind, sir,” she said in a flat voice.  “May we offer you tea?”

He dashed her small hope he’d refuse and leave when he resumed his seat.  “Thank you, Mistress Duenda.  I humbly accept.”

“Of course you do,” she muttered and stalked to the kitchen to add another teacup and prepare the tea.

By the time she returned and set the service on the small table between the chairs, tension had thickened the air to a soup.  Jimenin helped himself to one of the cups and sipped.  “A fine brew, mistress.”  When Louvaen didn’t respond, he continued.  “How is Miss Cinnia today?  She was feeling ill and had taken to her room during my last visit.”

Louvaen seethed at his familiar use of her sister’s name.  “Mistress Hallis,” she bit out between clenched teeth, “is still poorly I’m afraid.  Headaches and fatigue.  Change of seasons I think.”  Snakes in men’s clothing more like it.

Jimenin glanced at Mercer.  “Your lovely daughter has a delicate constitution.”

Mercer nodded.  “Yes she does.”  He downed his tea in a single gulp.

“Any news of the third ship?  I hear wreckage from the first two has started washing ashore.”

Mercer slumped even further in his chair.  Louvaen, who’d taken up guard duty behind him, squeezed his shoulder with one hand and clenched her skirts with the other.  The bastard taunted her father.  Everyone knew the loss of those ships had made the Hallis family nearly destitute.  The hope the last ship had survived the storm which destroyed the others was fast fading.

“None, but with a little luck it will arrive in harbor any day now.”

Jimenin stretched his legs toward the fire.  “You’re an optimistic man, Mercer.”  He gestured with his teacup.  “It’s been nearly four months since we had word the ship might have made it through the storm intact.  I suspect it sits at the bottom of the ocean with its sister ships.”  He bared a set of yellowed teeth in the parody of a smile.

If her house wasn’t at risk of burning down, Louvaen would have wished for a back draft of flame to rush out and consume him.

“I think a little more patience and we’ll...”

Jimenin straightened in his seat and slammed the cup down hard enough to make the service rattle and tea slosh in the teapot.  His pale eyes reflected back the hearth fire, reminding Louvaen of a wolf’s gaze caught in a sliver of moonlight.  “My patience is done!  I want the balance on the investment and the accompanying interest.”

Mercer raised his hands in surrender.  “We have nothing left,” he babbled.  “Only Louvaen’s house and a draft horse.”

“We’ll sell the house, Papa.”  She glared at Jimenin.  He wasn’t here for money, but he’d use their debt to strong-arm Mercer into giving him Cinnia.  Louvaen vowed they’d live wild in the woods before she let that happened.

Jimenin’s gloating laughter scraped across her ears.  “You could sell six of these houses, and they’ll only cover a portion of the debt.”

She fisted her hands on her hips.  “Liar,” she spat.  I check the accounts.  I know the numbers.  There’s no way we owe you such a sum.”

He cocked one eyebrow.  “Oh?  Didn’t your father tell you about his venture with me into a caravan of saffron?  All documents signed, witnessed and stored at the Merchant House.”  He shook his head in mock sorrow.  “An unlucky year for many of us, I’m afraid.  Bandits attacked the caravan.  Our goods were a total loss.”