Lady Fortune (20 page)

Isabeau paused, a wise smile on her face. “I am not unused to the ways of men. If he’s feeling violent, I’m sure I’ll be able to distract him.”

Julianna controlled her instinctive shudder. For some reason her mother seemed to view the prospect of her husband’s bedding her with a total lack of disgust. It made no sense to her, unless…

“Do you love him?” she asked abruptly.

Isabeau turned from the window to look at her. “What an odd question, daughter. I didn’t know that you believed in love between a man and a woman.”

“It’s rare,” she replied, “but I’ve seen it. You look like Agnes when she spoke of her husband, but I don’t understand why. Your marriage was arranged. You barely know the earl. How can you have tender feelings for him? For such a… a brute?”

“He’s not a brute, Julianna,” she said. “And love makes little sense. I saw him years ago, when I was younger than you are now, and I remember looking into his eyes and dunking… Well, it doesn’t matter what I thought. I never expected to see him again. I never realized he’d even noticed me among all those beautiful women. I was pregnant at the time, miserable and afraid and lonely. And he was kind.”

“Boys can be kind. Men can be cruel.”

“I would take Lord Hugh over young Gilbert any day,” Isabeau said. “It wasn’t an accident that the Earl of Fortham sought my hand in marriage. He has never mentioned that we met, long ago, but I think he knows. He remembers. And I think he could love me well indeed. He might even love me already.”

Julianna shook her head, half in disbelief at the very notion, half to wipe such absurdities from her brain. “What has love to do with marriage?”

“If you marry again, I promise on my honor that it will have everything to do with it,” Isabeau said. “I won’t let them barter you off to a stranger.”

“How can you stop them?”

“Women have more power than you think, my love. If you marry, you will marry for love.”

And unbidden, the hateful, mesmerizing image of the lying fool danced into her mind.

* * *

Nicholas passed no one as he made his way back to the north tower and his prison-like room, but the door was open when he reached it, and Gilbert was stretched out on the bed, trimming his fingernails with a long, thin dagger. He was alone, and Nicholas closed the door behind him, not moving any closer.

He had no particular fear that Gilbert had come to kill him—the child assassin was remarkably set in his ways, and he preferred doing his work in the dark of night, from the back.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded roughly, no longer interested in playing the fool. The image of Julianna’s shocked, wounded expression was like a rip in his soul, and nothing would have pleased him better than to coax Gilbert into attacking him. From straight on Gilbert was too slight to inflict damage on a much larger man— his particular gift was stealth and trickery.

“You decided to regain your voice,” Gilbert observed lazily, not moving from his position. “A wise move on your part—Lord Hugh seemed to be losing his temper. Do you have the chalice?”

“Do you?” Nicholas countered, only giving him a trace of his attention. There hadn’t been tears in her eyes, surely. Julianna of Moncrieff was not the sort to cry easily.

Gilbert sat bolt upright. “Don’t tell me you let it slip through your fingers! I assumed you knew where it was when you pulled this latest trick. Our time is running out, and the good priest can only be distracted for so long.” He stared at his elegant hands, flexing them.

“Bogo tells me you managed to distract the good abbot quite easily,” he said in an even voice.

Gilbert shrugged. “He has a taste for the whip. He has a taste for young boys as well, but I’m not certain I need to go that far to get what I want.”

“But you would.”

Gilbert’s smile was angelic and chilling. “I do what needs to be done, Master Nicholas. Do you judge me?”

“No,” Nicholas said. “Ijust hadn’t realized that whoring for old men was one of your many talents.”

Gilbert’s expression didn’t change. “I do what I do, and I do it discreetly. Most men are quite taken with my charming innocence. The only reason you see through me so easily is because you too are living a lie. You’re neither the fool nor the madman you purport yourself to be.”

He didn’t bother to deny it. “And you’re certainly not the innocent child.”

“Never have been,” Gilbert said with a wistful smile. “Never will be. Who has the chalice? I presume you’re wise enough to have found it if either of the ladies of the household had taken it. I must admit I have a singular dislike of killing women. It must be my sentimental streak. Perhaps a leftover affection for my sainted mother.”

“ ‘Sainted mother?’ ”

“
A street
whore slashed to death by her pimp when I was five years old,” Gilbert tossed off casually. “My father, however, was of high-born blood. And his blood took precedence in my makeup—I’m far more like him than that pathetic, murdered strumpet.”

“Why are you being so chatty, Gilbert? It’s not like you to be so open about your life. Do you plan to silence me?”

Gilbert shook his head. “There’s no need. We’re in the same position. Killing you would avail me nothing, and I never kill for sport, only for gain. We can help each other. Tell me who doesn’t have the chalice, and I can work from there.”

“I have no idea.” It was nothing but the truth. He’d waited outside Julianna’s door, once she’d shut it behind him, hoping to find where Isabeau had put the chalice. He’d stayed long enough to know that the chalice was once again missing. And that Julianna was to marry again.

Gilbert blinked. “King Henry is an impatient man, Master Nicholas. He wants that chalice, and he wants it soon. Neither of us would like him to lose his temper. And if you happened to have developed any unlikely affection toward the members of dais household, you would do well to keep that in mind. He can be very ruthless.”

“
Fortfiam
Castle
could withstand his assault for a long time.”

“But not forever. He would win, sooner or later, and the revenge he’d take on the owners of this place is not pretty to contemplate. You don’t want her to be given to Henry’s men, do you? As a reward? I don’t think she’d enjoy that very much.”

It was a stab in the dark on Gilbert’s part, the sort of thing he was so good at, but Nicholas didn’t flinch. It was a guess, nothing more, and he wasn’t about to betray anything. “We’ll find the chalice, Gilbert. For all I know, Hugh himself might have it stashed away. It was taken from the women’s rooms, and I have no idea by whom.”

“But not you? And not your man?”

“On my honor.”

Gilbert smirked. “I don’t think either of us are men of honor.” He rose, sauntering past Nicholas’s still figure. “I’ll tell our temporary master that you’ve been cured. That way he might not have your ears cut off and tossed in the fire.”

“Kind of you,” Nicholas murmured.

“And we’ll find the chalice. Soon, Nicholas. Our master grows impatient.”

Soon, Nicholas thought after Gilbert left. “I don’t think either of us are men of honor,” he’d said, and Nicholas didn’t bother to disagree. Most men would fail to understand his own, twisted definition of honor.

He wouldn’t rob from the poor, he wouldn’t hurt anyone smaller than he was, he wouldn’t let a generous impulse betray him, and he wouldn’t promise what he couldn’t deliver, be it a sacred chalice from a martyred saint or a heart that was capable of love.

He had nothing to give a woman like Julianna of Moncrieff, and if she’d ever been tempted, he’d successfully destroyed that softening. She would keep her distance, and he would accomplish what he’d set out to do.

And life was very good indeed.

Wasn’t it?

It was a dark and stormy night. A storm had blown down from the north, bringing chilly winds and lashing rains, and Isabeau was not looking forward to a stroll along the torrent-soaked battlements. Particularly since she knew what she’d find at the end of her journey.

One very angry husband.

She’d considered cowering back in the room she’d shared so briefly with her daughter, but that would hardly answer. After all, Hugh had come to fetch her in the first place—he would have no qualms about doing so again. And she certainly didn’t want Julianna caught in the middle of this mess, even if she was to blame for initially pilfering the saint’s blessed chalice. She seemed to have a very low opinion of men in general, and it wouldn’t do to have her think Hugh would actually hurt her mother.

He wouldn’t, though she only had her instincts to go on. Kinder men than he often beat their wives, and he was already suffering from monumental frustration due to the priest’s edict. It was always possible he could punish her, but she doubted it. He might yell and bluster and threaten, as even the best men sometimes did, but in the end he’d be reasonable. Unlike her previous husband.

She didn’t want to think about Julianna’s father. He’d given her a strong, beautiful daughter, and for that she should be grateful, even if he’d taken that daughter from her early on and sent her away. At least she had Julianna back now, and her husband was long gone, no longer able to interfere with her life and her choices.

She had a new husband to answer to now. And if it weren’t for Father Paulus, she would have answered quite saucily. She was hoping her return of the missing chalice would lower Hugh’s guard just enough for her to find out whether he truly cared for her as she suspected.

But someone had gotten in the way of her plan. She’d been careless, and now she had to answer for it. She just wasn’t certain what she would find to say.

He didn’t know that Julianna had taken it in the first place, and she had no intention of telling him. If he were like most men, he wouldn’t believe her protestations that Julianna hadn’t stolen it once again and would likely storm and bluster her daughter, further convincing her that all men were tools of Satan. No, she’d told him she’d found it, and he hadn’t stopped to question her, satisfied with the knowledge that it would be returned.

But he’d have more than enough time to find any answers he sought tonight. And she’d have no choice but to come up with something reasonable, or pay the price.

It was a wretched way to start a marriage, she thought, staring out into the rain. Too many people surrounding her, too many unwanted guests with unwanted opinions. The priest, the fool, the young boy with the sweet smile and the lifeless eyes. Only her daughter was welcome, and in truth, Isabeau could have chosen a better time to reforge that relationship.

However, fate and Julianna hadn’t allowed for a better time. It wasn’t until the death of Victor of Moncrieff that Julianna was forced to speak to her mother, and Isabeau couldn’t afford to waste her one chance.

The rain wasn’t letting up. Julianna lay curled up in the center of the bed, mourning something she wouldn’t put a name to. The fool had been a fool indeed, toying with her daughter. Not that he was any kind of man for the likes of Julianna, no matter how exalted his master. Julianna needed someone solid and dependable, gentle and understanding in bed. Someone to coax her gently into loving. It seemed as if Victor of Moncrieff had botched the job thoroughly.

No, Nicholas Strangefellow was hardly the kind of man for her daughter, with his odd ways and his strange clothes and his lies and tricks. And Julianna was wise enough to know that.

If only her heart would pay attention.

She was so enamoured of the jester that it broke her mother’s heart. So in love, and so blind to it. They had only to be in the same room together and it seemed as if sparks flew between them. Nicholas would glance over in Julianna’s direction, and his expression would alter, just slightly, enough to betray him to the discerning eyes of a mother.

And Julianna, poor sweet, was totally vulnerable and almost blind to his effect on her. He enraged her, haunted her, tormented her, charmed her. It was love, pure and simple, but Julianna didn’t know it when she saw it. Possibly because she’d never seen that kind of wild, mindless love before.

Nicholas hadn’t taken her yet, of that Isabeau could be certain. If he had, Julianna wouldn’t be able to hide it, either from herself or from her mother. She’d have a dazed, foolish, lovesick expression on her face, and there would be little she could do to hide it.

With any luck at all, that danger was past. Julianna had heard from Nicholas’s own mouth mat he was a liar and a thief, a man who would use her for his purposes and then abandon her without a second thought. If she had any sense, she’d never let him near her again.

Ah, but when did a woman in love have any sense? Isabeau thought bleakly. Her daughter was strong-minded and full of righteous rage, but what kind of defense was that against a man like Nicholas Strangefellow?

She could have Hugh send him away. It wouldn’t take much—he found the fool’s rhymes and riddles to be particularly annoying, and he’d use any excuse to send him back to his royal master.

But tonight he wouldn’t be in the mood to please her. She’d failed him, failed him most miserably, and the longer she put off confessing, the more difficult it would be.

And to make matters even worse, she had absolutely no idea who could have stolen the chalice. She had hidden it so carefully, and the women who served her were not the sort to go searching through her chest. Nor was the abbot the kind to demean himself by rifling through a woman’s bedroom.

However, he might very easily send a minion. He wouldn’t consider it thievery—he believed the sacred chalice belonged to the Order of Saint Hugelina the Dragon, and that Hugh had no earthly right to possess it, nor heavenly right either. Any crime the abbot committed in securing the thing would be no crime in the eyes of heaven.

Would he have sent Brother Barth? It seemed unlikely— the good monk did his master’s bidding but not without a certain calm distaste.

Perhaps it was Gilbert, the boy with the secrets. For no other reason than her usually infallible instincts, Isabeau considered him capable of almost any form of treachery, and stealing a priceless relic would be a simple enough matter. She doubted he would hesitate over any trifles such as honor and loyalty.

But she expected Hugh wouldn’t want to hear that. He seemed fond of the boy, and if she tried to blame him, he’d probably accuse her of lying.

No, she couldn’t come up with a scapegoat. She could only go and prostrate herself before her husband and beg his forgiveness. And hope she hadn’t misread his nature and his feelings for her.

The battlements were deserted—even the sentries had taken shelter from the gale that swept along the walls. Isabeau pulled her thin cloak around her, took a deep breath, and took off, racing through the pelting rain, feeling it bite through the cloth as she ran. By the time she reached shelter she was soaked to the skin, and a wave of cold swept over her. She’d been foolish, of course. There were ways to her husband’s solar that didn’t include dashing out into the pouring rain, but she was too ashamed to ask for directions. A woman should know where her husband slept, even if the priest had decreed otherwise.

The torchlight was dim at the top of the tower, and she felt her way down the winding steps to his rooms, shivering in the damp chill. With luck Hugh wouldn’t even be there yet. She could throw off her soaked cloak, dry herself as best she could, and then crawl into the huge, warm bed. If she pretended to be asleep when he arrived, perhaps he’d be too tenderhearted to wake her and demand the chalice.

No, that was unlikely. Hugh of Fortham was a good man, but not particularly soft-hearted. He wouldn’t distress himself over waking his new bride.

Might he be afraid of temptation? He’d waited until he was certain she was asleep before joining her in the bed, and Isabeau had had no doubts why. Climbing into bed with a woman usually signaled one thing, whether it be wife or whore. And he wanted her, there was absolutely no doubt in her mind about that.

So caution might work to her advantage. Men tended to be more reasonable by the light of day, less prone to strike out. If she could wait until morning to tell him that the chalice was gone, then things might work out for the best. Julianna was right—he may have sent someone to fetch it after all, and all her worry would have been for naught.

The door to the master’s solar was closed, a good sign. Someone would have stoked the fire and closed the door to keep the good heat in. She only hesitated for a moment before pushing it open. The leather hinges made a loud, creaking noise, and she winced. Too late to turn back now, even though her husband stood in the room, clad only in his breeches, staring at her out of dark, brooding eyes.

Despite the relative desperateness of the situation, Isabeau found herself momentarily breathless. The Earl of Fortham was a gloriously handsome man, tall and strong and well built, with broad shoulders and deep chest. Oddly enough, he suddenly looked embarrassed by her frank astonishment and quickly reached for his discarded tunic.

“I wasn’t expecting you so soon, my lady,” he mumbled. “I was planning—”

“Don’t,” she said, as he began to pull the tunic over his shaggy head. The fire was blazing, the room was warm, and he had no need of it. And she wanted to look at him for a moment longer, to savor what she could not have. Would not have, once he learned she’d let the chalice be stolen away from her.

He paused, startled, and let the tunic drop. “Isabeau?” he questioned.

She didn’t dare hesitate. He wanted to touch her, she knew it in every inch of her body, just as she longed to touch him, but if she let him, knowing that she’d betrayed him by losing the chalice, then he would never forgive her, and their future would be lost.

Their future was probably lost anyway. Father Paulus had decreed they must live chastely, and it would be simple enough for Hugh to have the unconsummated marriage annulled. Freeing him to take another, younger, prettier wife.

And she wanted to weep. She didn’t want him to have anyone else—she’d spent so many years at the beck and call of a man she hated. Didn’t she deserve just a morsel of happiness? A brief respite of joy and pleasure?

Not at the price of her honor. “The chalice is gone,” she said abruptly, before she could change her mind. She didn’t flinch, didn’t cringe, even though she half expected him to fly at her in a rage, fists upraised.