Margo Maguire (16 page)

“You!”

The harsh voice startled Kathryn and she stumbled when Father Algar took hold of her and pulled her ’round to face him. She tried to tug away, but his fist felt like iron pincers on her upper arm.

“’Twill be on your conscience if Lord Bryce dies!”

Kathryn almost felt relieved that he did not confront her about sharing Edric’s bed, and she trembled at the thought of what he would do when he learned of it.
“Mon père,”
she said in an attempt to placate him. “I assure you, I mean no one at Braxton any harm. ’Twas I who discovered Robert Ferguson’s plan—”

Algar shook her. “And just how did you know he would sneak into the keep?”

“How did I—I did
not
know!” she cried, surprised at the priest’s implication.

“’Tis just like a Norman to lie! You let him in, then you killed him to gain Lord Edric’s trust!”

Kathryn managed to pull away. The man was certainly deranged if he thought she could possibly have devised such a convoluted plan. There was no point in talking to him, no point in explaining that she’d had naught to do with Ferguson beyond being abducted by him and his clan. And that she was grateful to be quit of the Scots.

He would not believe her.

She hurried away and wondered if he’d convinced anyone else of his improbable theory. Taking her skirts in hand, she rushed up the steps to the keep and let herself inside, only to run into Edric who was coming out. Caught off balance, he caught her by the shoulders.

“Kate, I was just about to come looking for you.”

His words rushed through her and she smiled.

“You’re trembling,” he said. “What’s happened?”

“Naught, my lord. Tell me of Lord Bryce. Is he…?”

“The same.”

“I am sorry,” she said quietly as he drew her
through the hall toward the stairs. He smelled like the coarse soap they’d used at the abbey and she realized he must have bathed. She wanted to press her face to his chest and breathe deeply of him.

“Lora and I will stay with him tonight.”

Kathryn nodded. She’d thought he would.

“Caedmon,” he called to the young groom in the hall, “go to the barn for a fresh crock of milk. Put it in Lord Bryce’s chamber.”

Kathryn climbed the stairs with Edric and followed him into the solar. Closing and barring the door after them, he took the bairn and laid him in his cradle. The room had been turned into a nursery, but Kathryn had little chance to survey all the changes before Edric returned to her, taking her in his arms to kiss her.

Angling his head to deepen the kiss, he opened her mouth with his tongue and slid inside as his hands moved down to her buttocks. Kathryn did not understand how he could arouse her so quickly and easily, but she felt the hard ridge of his erection and knew he felt the same.

Aching for his touch, she pressed her feminine center against him. Without breaking the kiss, he raised her skirts and slipped his hand under them and she knew he would find her needy and hot. Passion flared with one touch of his fingers and
she quaked in his arms, her pleasure culminating in an intense burst that weakened her knees and made her heart flutter.

“You are so beautiful,” he said, breaking the kiss, but touching his lips to her ear, then her neck. He let her skirts down and filled his hands with her breasts, her exquisitely sensitive nipples.

Still breathless, Kathryn unfastened his belt and slipped her hands into his braies. Encircling his cock, she ran her fingers down its length and back up, then dropped to her knees. “Oh,
Jesu,”
Edric said unsteadily when she licked the tip. He buried his hands in her hair and bucked his hips, sliding his erection into her mouth.

She sucked gently, then hard, pleasuring him with her mouth as he’d done to her more than once during the night.

Edric’s breath came out in a halting rasp and she knew she’d pleased him. She became more daring, using one hand to fondle his ballocks as she swirled her tongue ’round his shaft. She nipped at him lightly with her teeth and reached ’round to the back of his thigh, digging her fingers in to anchor herself, and to hold him steady.

His reaction to her attentions caused a quickening in her own loins, an arousal so intense, she shuddered with it. He moaned and she felt a distinct tightening in his flesh. He jerked suddenly,
spilling his seed as Kathryn met with her own fiery climax.

Kathryn sank to the floor and Edric dropped to his knees beside her. Neither of them spoke, but he put his arms ’round her and pulled her close, content in the quiet of the moment.

B
ryce’s fever continued until the evening of the third day. Finally his eyes cleared and he was more lucid than he’d been for half the week.

“You had us worried, brother,” said Edric when Bryce asked for a cup of ale. He’d shaved the younger man to make it easier to bathe him and his face looked gaunt and pale. Edric went to the door and summoned a maid to bring the beer while Lora came wearily to her feet and looked at the wound again.

She wiped the poultice from Bryce’s skin and sighed with relief. “’Tis clean. Finally.”

The redness was gone, and the edges had knitted together. “Will you let me up now?”

Lora smiled. “Aye. If you feel strong enough.”

“What I’d like is a bath to wash the stink of this bed off me.”

“Aye. You’re due for some clean bedclothes,” said Lora, who left to give orders to the servants.

Edric helped Bryce put on a clean sherte and got him out of the bed and into a chair. “I feel as though someone dropped a barrow full of rocks on my head. What’s the news, Edric? Is Drogan back yet?”

“No, though I expect him any day.”

“What of Kate? Is she still here?”

“Aye.”

“No trips to Evesham Bridge, then?”

The maid arrived with Bryce’s mug of ale and he took a sip. Edric did not respond to his brother’s question, unwilling to discuss Kate with Bryce or anyone else, though he certainly hoped she’d put all thoughts of going to the nunnery from her head.

“And Aidan?”

“Growing.” His son had started to fill out, and did not look quite as fragile as he had at first. Kate’s attentions were good for the lad.

During Bryce’s illness, she’d been left to her own devices and Edric had no knowledge of how she’d spent her days. He only knew that when he visited her bed during the night, she responded to him with unrestrained passion.

Thoughts of how he would make amends for his neglect brought a smile to his lips.

When the servants arrived with a tub and buckets of hot water for Bryce’s bath, Edric took his leave and went down to the kitchen. He found Lora there, giving instructions to the cook for a light meal to be served to Bryce after his bath.

“You can rest easy tonight, my lord,” she said to him. “Let one of the grooms stay with him. I am fairly sure the fever will not return.” She yawned.

“Go and seek your own bed, Lora,” Edric said. “Caedmon will see you home.”

Lora nodded wearily and returned to Bryce’s room, no doubt to give instructions to the grooms and to pick up her satchel and anything else she’d left there during the long days of their vigil.

Edric rubbed a hand across his beard. His whiskers were bristly and rough on Kate’s skin. He thought of Bryce’s freshly shaven face and remembered Kate’s remark about the cleft in Aidan’s chin. She had thought it would distinguish him when he grew to be a man.

He took a plate of food with him when he
climbed the stairs, but set it down inside his bedchamber. Lighting a lamp, he pulled off his tunic and took the blade he’d used to shave Bryce’s face. He sat upon the bed and made use of the soap and the water in the basin, and carefully shaved the beard from his face.

Kathryn couldn’t sleep. She gathered her shawl ’round her shoulders and sat before the fire with her knitting. She was not needed in Bryce’s chamber, and though she worried about the young man, Edric had assured her that Lora was doing everything possible.

All that was left was to pray, which Kathryn did. Fervently.

She concentrated on her work, and barely heard the door open when Edric came in. At least she thought it was Edric. His beard was gone and his hair combed back from his face.

His was a breathtaking visage and Kathryn put her hand to her breast as if she could slow her heart’s rapid beating, as if she could contain all she felt for this Saxon lord.

“Bryce’s fever has broken.” He came to her and crouched beside her chair, taking the newly knitted cloth between his thumb and fingers.

A weight seemed to lift from Kathryn’s shoul
ders and she gave a quiet prayer of thanks. “’Tis the news I’ve prayed for.”

“Aye. He will mend now.”

Kathryn cupped Edric’s chin with one hand. “No wonder your son is such a comely bairn.” She touched the indentation in Edric’s chin and ran one finger over his lower lip, wondering if he’d shaved his beard for her benefit. Then she scoffed at her own foolishness. ’Twas likely something he did every few months to keep his beard from reaching his waist.

“What are you making?” he asked.

She held up the small blue blanket. “’Tis nothing elaborate—Elga said I should start with a simple piece.”

“’Tis well done,” he said, though he hardly glanced at the work. He took a seat beside her. “Bryce will be glad to know you are practicing your sewing skills.”

She looked at him aghast, but quickly realized he was jesting. He slid an arm ’round her shoulders and hugged her to him as he laughed.

“You are a fiend, sir.”

“Aye. That I am. Kiss me.”

She did so, dropping her knitting into her lap. ’Twas a long, gentle kiss, and when he broke it, he seemed content to sit by the fire and talk. He
wrapped a short wisp of her hair ’round his fingers, and when he looked into her eyes Kathryn thought her bones would melt.

“How is it you never learned to knit? Is that not a skill most young lasses are taught early?”

She picked up her needles again, her mind racing for an answer that would not give her away. “’Twas just that I had no talent for it then. Or not the patience. Tell me, when will Drogan return?”

“Mayhap tomorrow. ’Tis a fair distance to Dunfergus and there will be work to do once he’s there.”

“The people of the village think he will bring back goods…food.”

“Aye. The fyrd took wagons for the purpose of hauling back whatever they can carry.”

“Then all will be well? There will be enough food to last the winter?”

He shook his head slowly. “I have my doubts. Aye, it will help, but according to Oswin’s reckoning, we’ll need careful portioning to make it last.”

There would be more than enough at Kettwyck. Kathryn had heard the assessment of Kettwyck’s harvest, and it far exceeded her father’s expectations. Kettwyck lands were fertile, and they’d tried a new system of clearing swampland and bogs, making it possible to farm those areas. She
wondered if her father would part with some of his harvest. She could not ask him, not without returning to their Norman society and the ridicule it was sure to mete out.

She and Edric talked a while, but eventually Aidan interrupted, demanding his feeding. Kathryn no longer felt any awkwardness when she lowered her chemise to feed him. The bairn was still uninterested in allowing anyone else to give him his milk, and Kathryn had stopped asking about possible nursemaids to replace her.

’Twas an embarrassment…to realize how weak her resolve had been to resist Edric. She knew it would be best to muster some kind of inner strength and leave Braxton Fell, but she could not bring herself to do it.

When Aidan finished, he fell right to sleep. Edric took Kathryn to bed and made love to her, slowly this time, drawing out their pleasure until she lay limp beside him, her body sated and exhausted beyond mere contentment.

“Now that Ferguson is no longer a threat,” Edric said, “why don’t we ride out among the fells tomorrow? There is more to Braxton Fell than this keep and our village.”

He stroked her hip as they lay together, and Kathryn drifted toward sleep. “Aye,” she mumbled, too sleepy to consider how they would ride
out together without all of Braxton Fell knowing she was his leman.

’Twas dark in the chamber when Kathryn woke him. He came fully awake instantly, and reached for his sword. “What is it?”

“You must go, Edric!” she whispered urgently. “’Tis nearly dawn and the servants will soon be about.”

He fell back to the mattress and turned over. “No. Go back to sleep.”

“Please!” She shook him to rouse him again. “They cannot know…”

Sleep and the weariness of the past few days made her words incomprehensible to him. “Is it Aidan?”

“Edric, please. Listen to me. If the servants know that you and I…If they…”

He pushed up onto his elbows and looked at her, barely able to discern the shape of her face in the dimness of the chamber. “You don’t want them to know we share a bed.”

“Please. They cannot know that I am your…”

“My what, Kate?”

He heard her swallow. “I’m sure there is a Saxon word for what I am.”

“Aye. You are my
mistress,
Kate.”

“It is not what your servants or the villagers
would call me. Please, can you not go and leave me a scrap of self-respect?”

Edric rolled from the bed and pulled on his tunic. Without another word, he left Kate in the company of his infant son, who awoke and demanded his first feeding of the day.

Before going to his own chamber, he looked in on Bryce, who was sleeping soundly. His skin was cool to the touch, so Edric retired to his own chamber, intent upon getting another hour’s sleep.

But sleep eluded him.

He dressed and left the keep, heading to the stable. No one was about yet, so he saddled his gelding and mounted up, intent upon taking the ride he’d planned to share with Kate.

The sun came up as he rode through the gates and headed west, past the mill and on toward the mountains, to the lands that were undamaged by the Scots. He’d hoped to take Kate today if the weather was fair, and show her his domain.

But he knew now that she would not accompany him willingly. Not if she was concerned with what the servants thought of her.

In the past few days he hadn’t given much consideration to her demeanor toward him in public. She was distant and respectful, just as any nursemaid would be expected to behave. But wouldn’t a servant take pride in capturing the interest of a
powerful lord? In the years before his marriage, Felicia had certainly let everyone know she’d taken him to her bed.

He’d suspected Kate was different, and now he was certain of it. Last night he’d asked her an innocent question about learning to knit, but she’d managed to avoid giving him an answer, turning the conversation in another direction.

She did not want to divulge anything of herself.

Oswin had warned him not to trust her. But the steward spoke as one who hated Normans on principle. Kate was no threat to Aidan or to Braxton Fell. She’d killed Robert Ferguson and raised the alarm before the Scots had been able to catch him unawares.

Edric’s shadow shortened as the sun rose. He’d wanted Kate with him on this ride. He’d planned to hold her in the saddle in front of him, her back to his chest, his arms ’round her waist as they wandered the fells and dales of his lands.

Clearly, she was no simple maid. He wondered if her true name was Kate, and whether she was actually from Rushton as she’d said. He should ask her directly. He should return to the keep right now and demand some answers from her. After all, she had the care of his son. He had the right to know who she was.

Instead, he rode hard through the dell until he came to the path that would lead through the wood and up to a concealed perch on one of the fells. ’Twas a place where he and Bryce, along with Siric and Sighelm, had hidden from their parents and dreamed the dreams of youth.

Edric had not been here since his young friends had been killed.

He rode as far as he could, until the terrain became too rough. Then he tied his horse to the same tree his brother and Oswin’s sons had always used, and continued on foot. The path was not so easily discerned here, and that was what the lads had liked about it. They’d thought no one would ever find them if they didn’t wish to be found.

They hadn’t taken into account the evidence of their horses tied at the bottom of the path.

He reached the place where the four friends had sat together and discussed their fathers’ errors and the things they would do differently were they in charge. Sitting on the grassy ledge to look out on his many hides of land, Edric gave a self-derisive laugh when he thought of all that had failed.

He might have other estates, but Braxton Fell was home. ’Twas where he was born, where his parents had lived in the modest keep that stood empty now; where he planned to raise his own
son. Before the Normans had come, the village had prospered, even despite the occasional skirmishes with the Fergusons.

But too many men of the fyrd had been killed or maimed in their required service to King William, and those who’d been left to defend Braxton Fell two years before had failed. Edric and Bryce had been shocked on their return home to find their lands so devastated. There had been little enough they could do to repair the fields and forests, and his other estates had only what they needed to sustain themselves.

Braxton’s viable fields had been harvested in recent weeks and Edric looked over the freshly mown lands. Anson Miller had not been busy enough this autumn, for there was less grain to grind than ever before. Which meant that Edric’s share was significantly diminished, too.

He caught sight of a few goats rambling among the deadwood and boulders on the mountainsides, and some sheep grazing in the dale below. The few cattle at Braxton Fell were kept close by, for the Fergusons had a fondness for beef. In past years, they’d stolen many a cow from Braxton’s pastures.

Edric leaned back against a rock and remembered the foolish notion he’d once had—that one day he’d bring his bride up here to see where he’d
spent the lost hours of his youth, and to survey the bounty of all their lands.

Cecily was not one he’d have shared this with. Norman women did not…

His notion of Norman women had changed with Kate. She was not the same cold and spoiled wench Cecily was, but giving and warm. She was soft-spoken and fluent as a well-bred lass might be. She had a sense of pride that drove her to keep secret her liaison with him. And if Edric learned she was a well-born daughter of a Norman knight, honor would compel him to return her to her family.

That thought gave him pause. He was not ready to give her up, even if she was reluctant to let everyone on the estate know of their affair. She was right. It was an illicit association, and though no one would think badly of
him
for taking a mistress,
she
would be branded a whore.