One Enchanted Evening (10 page)

This, though, was another matter entirely.

He stood at the end of his drawbridge and stared at a spot in front of him where . . . well, the only way to describe the spot before him was that the air was bloody shimmering with some sort of—he had to take a bracing breath or two before he could finish the thought—otherworldly light. Worse still, in the midst of that shimmering he saw what he could only term a doorway opening where no doorway could possibly have found itself.

Damn it, anyway.

He blamed Gunnild. If she hadn’t insisted on entertaining the entire countryside—at his expense, no less—he wouldn’t have come outside to have a bit of relief from the entertainment he couldn’t stand being provided for people he would rather not see again, and then he wouldn’t have been faced with what he was facing.

Which was something, he was sure, that had nothing to do with magic.

Or at least he thought so until through that, er,
magical
doorway came stumbling a woman, slender, squawking, and sporting . . . wings.

He reached out and caught her by the arm before she went sprawling into his cesspit. He hoped, belatedly, that he hadn’t ripped her arm free of its moorings. He started to say something to her, but apparently the gate hadn’t finished with him. To his very great surprise, out stumbled a second woman, easily the most glorious creature he had ever clapped eyes on in the whole of his life—and he had seen quite a goodly number of very beautiful women. This one, however, outshone them all.

He thought he might have heard a splash, but he honestly couldn’t have said. He was far too busy being overcome by the vision in front of him.

The woman, if that’s what she was instead of some creature from a dream, was dressed in a white gown so exquisite, he could scarce look at it. Her hair was so pale a gold, ’twas almost white. Her face . . . Well, angels must have wept over a face such as hers for there was no flaw in it that he could see. Her skirts were voluminous, true, but he could see that her waist was slight and—

He shifted uncomfortably. She was well endowed, to be sure, in a way that made him slightly nervous, though he couldn’t have said why. He averted his gaze, because his mother had taught him decent manners, and concentrated on anything but what he shouldn’t have been looking at.

It was only then that he realized what it was past that perfection that stunned him so.

She had wings as well.

He wondered, with no small bit of desperation, if he’d lost his wits somewhere during the day. He drew his hand over his eyes to block out the vision before him and quickly reviewed the events of the day to see if he could divine the moment when that might have happened.

The day had been interminable, true, beginning well before dawn thanks to the shouts of the lady Gunnild that last-minute cleaning needed to begin. He might not have minded that so much if he hadn’t been up half the night trying to settle on a figure that didn’t seen unreasonable to use in fortifying the castle as a whole. He didn’t care to spend all his gold on stone whilst leaving nothing to use for steel and new horseflesh, but he also couldn’t fill his keep with men and horses and not have a way to protect them. ’Twas going to be damned expensive, but there was nothing to be done about it.

So, he’d risen well before he’d cared to, carried on with ingesting a disgusting breakfast—truly, he had to find a cook who could actually create things that tasted more like food and less like cesspit sludge—before he had retreated to the lists where he felt most comfortable.

The garrison was coming to heel, thanks in part to Everard of Chevington’s willingness to take on the more amenable half of the lads and school them in swordplay whilst Montgomery took on the other half and schooled them in manners. Everard might have been a less-than-desirable companion when one wanted someone trustworthy to take a turn on watch, but he had been trained in swordplay by Rhys de Piaget and had learned his lessons well. Montgomery had been more than happy to use him to intimidate a few of the garrison lads.

The men he’d taken under his wing had been lacking not only in sword skill but in decent comportment. He didn’t hold out hope that they would learn either in the near future, but he would either wear himself out—or them down—trying. It would have helped if his two male cousins could have been counted on to do aught but laze about the edge of the training field and comment loudly about the indignities they were suffering because of Montgomery’s arrival. Montgomery had given them the day to spew their venom and hopefully empty their bellies of it. He had no intention of listening to the like on the morrow.

The only bright spot in the unrelenting gloom had been his steward, Fitzpiers, who had kept meticulous records and managed, obviously unbeknownst to Lord Denys, to lay by a bit of gold for a time of need. There was also a decent bit of income from rents and more arable land belonging to the keep than Montgomery had imagined. He had asked for the names of his people so he might become acquainted with them, a request his steward had agreed to with surprise, as if he couldn’t imagine why Montgomery would want such a thing. Obviously, there was much work to be done in winning hearts and minds.

He had then emerged from his solar to face things he was far less comfortable with, namely Gunnild in the throes of her preparations. He had been very tempted, after an exceptionally tedious half hour of listening to her blather on about why she was better suited to managing the keep than he was, to simply tie her up and send her off to her son’s hall, but he hadn’t. It would take tact and a good deal of diplomatic maneuvering to resettle her without angering her beyond all reason. If her eldest son, Arnulf, required the same, so be it. He wasn’t above convincing her that Wideton Hall was where she would want to pass the glorious autumn years of her life and convincing Arnulf that she would be a suitable adornment to that hall.

In truth, he had no choice. He knew he wasn’t off the mark to imagine that if the opportunity presented itself, Gunnild would stab him in the back.

He had deigned to bathe before supper, then presented himself in the hall for inspection by the neighbors. Gunnild had ignored him, talked over him, and finally gone so far as to try to fight him for the lord’s chair as they sat for supper. He had stared her down until she had relented, though she’d made him suffer for it for the rest of the evening by cutting off his conversation every chance she had. He had been polite and gracious, because his mother would have frowned at him if he’d been rude, but he had begun to seriously question his ability to carry on with those manners for any length of time.

In the end, he’d left the guests in the care of his cousin and departed for safer ground on the pretense of needing air. He had wandered out of the great hall, trudged through the muck still lingering in the courtyard, then walked under the comforting presence of not one but three portcullis gates with their silver spikes glinting above his head. He wasn’t quite sure what they would protect given the deplorable state of his walls, but at least the gates would intimidate anyone who decided to assault him that way.

All of which had left him standing where he was, awash in an otherworldly glow, looking at a woman whose beauty—and wings—left him uncomfortably speechless.

By the saints, was she a faery?

He could hardly believe he was seriously considering the like, but he realized quite suddenly that he was. He also realized with equal abruptness than he was no longer holding on to the first creature who had appeared from the netherworld. He looked to his right and saw her struggling to get out of the cesspit. He reached down and pulled her out, more gingerly than he was proud of. He considered how to aid her—perhaps from a distance—but before he could attempt it, something from the cesspit dropped from her hair into her mouth, which was opened in astonishment.

She began to retch.

He was tempted to join her.

Fortunately, he was distracted by the woman in front of him who turned herself about several times before her eyes rolled back in her head and she fell senseless into his outstretched arms. He struggled to manage not only her weight but the unusual burden of her wings, then found himself distracted by the other gel who had stopped retching long enough to start gasping. She looked at him, then looked at his castle.

And then she began to scream.

Montgomery reached out for her only to have her jerk away before he could touch her. She turned and fled—right into what was left of an outer stone gate. The sound of her head against it was a sickening crunch. Montgomery watched helplessly as she stumbled backward, then twisted and fell against his outstretched arm. She closed her eyes and descended into senselessness, as well.

He was, for the second time that evening, speechless. He was holding two women, two insensible women, who had simply appeared out of nowhere. Sporting, of course, wings.

Just what in the hell was he supposed to do now?

He was tempted to speculate wildly on things he hadn’t considered in years, but didn’t dare until he had the peace for it. He couldn’t stand there all night simply holding the two in his arms, but he knew with equal certainty that he would be a fool to take them inside the keep. His household would take one look at them and either flee in terror or attack him in a frenzy for bringing demons into their midst. He didn’t suppose he dared hope his guardsmen had been too lazy to man the walls and would therefore have not seen things they couldn’t easily explain. He looked up to make certain of that.

Only to find Everard of Chevington was standing not ten paces from him, watching him with absolutely no expression on his face.

“How long have you been standing there gawking?” Montgomery demanded, hoping bluster would take the man’s mind off things he shouldn’t be contemplating having seen.

“I heard a shriek and came to make sure no one had you backed up against the cesspit with his sword to your throat,” Everard said slowly. “I had no idea you were overwhelming not one but two wenches with your considerable charms.” He frowned. “What are those things attached to their backs?”

“Wings,” Montgomery said without hesitation, then he launched into the best lie he could invent on short notice. “These gels are players. Pretending to be faeries.”

“Players,” Everard repeated skeptically. “Where are their companions? Their servants? Their guardsmen?”

“The lassies were on their way to enteratain the king,” Montgomery continued, wishing he were a better liar. He sounded daft even to himself. “Their servants saw something that frightened them and they fled, taking all the gear along with them. The women couldn’t help a shriek or two whilst relating their sad tale.”

Everard frowned. “That little one looks a little bedraggled. Did she have a swim in the cesspit?”

“An unfortunate one,” Montgomery said. “She’ll need aid, lest she catch her death from the ague. She’ll need a bath at the very least.”

“You can’t mean to bring them inside,” Everard said in disbelief.

“What else am I to do?” Montgomery asked shortly. “Leave them out here?”

“I would,” Everard muttered.

Montgomery imagined Everard would, but he would make a different choice himself, though he supposed it wouldn’t go well for him if he carried either of the women into his hall in their current condition. Questions would be raised, superstitions stoked into a raging fire, and he would be trying to protect the gels against his entire household with nothing more than his three guards, his squire, and possibly Everard—though with the way Everard was studying the white-garbed faery, he wasn’t at all sure the man would be standing with him.

“You take the maid,” Montgomery began.

“Are you daft?” Everard said, wrinkling his nose. “I’ll take the lovely one, or none at all.” He paused. “I’d like a closer look at her, truth be told.”

“You’ll have it later,” Montgomery said, though he had no intention of allowing the like. “Help me now by putting your cloak over this fair-haired lass so I can carry her inside. But do it
carefully
,” he added. He didn’t want to say as much, but he wasn’t entirely certain that her wings, if that’s what they were, wouldn’t pain her if they were mishandled.

“I want something dear in return for this,” Everard said, draping his cloak over the woman on Montgomery’s left. “I want something
very
dear.”

“Name it later,” Montgomery said. He suddenly found himself very reluctant to hand over the dark-haired girl, but he knew he had no choice. He couldn’t carry two of them at once. He would simply have to trust that Everard wouldn’t do much damage to the dark-haired lass before he could return. He lifted the blonde up, then paused just the same. “That one’s hardly responsible for her smell, you know.”

Everard only scowled at him and kept the lass at arm’s length.

Montgomery supposed he could ask for nothing else. He took a deep breath, then walked swiftly across the drawbridge and under the gates. He entered the hall to find the occupants too far into their cups to notice him, thankfully, and walked quickly to the stairs that led up to the upper passageway. The stairway was difficult to negotiate with a woman in his arms—especially considering her wings—but he managed it. He gained the upper passageway, hastened to his bedchamber, and found Phillip standing outside the doorway. Phillip was watching him with very wide eyes.

“Don’t ask,” Montgomery warned.

“I didn’t intend to, my lord,” Phillip said, swallowing convulsively. He opened the door, then stepped aside.

Montgomery strode across the chamber and laid the woman down on his bed. He supposed he should have done something to make her more comfortable, but he honestly had no idea what that something would have been. He didn’t even dare pull Everard’s cloak off her, lest he touch something he shouldn’t—such as her wings—and offend her faerylike sensibilities. He could hardly believe he was entertaining the thought of her actually being such a creature with any seriousness at all, but perhaps there were truly things in the world that were beyond mortal ken—