Sword for His Lady (22 page)

“I do not ride out for vengeance, yet only to make arrangements for the harvest festival. I wear my armor because Jacques is a coward and I have no wish to spend the festival day nursing another wound.”

She shuddered with relief and failed to keep him from feeling it. He rubbed her arms, his breath warm against her ear.

“I value your concern, Isabel.”

But he didn't return it. She didn't have any right to wish for it. Love was something only the insane felt.

And still, when he'd left, she found herself weeping for the lack of response to her admission.

It seemed that her marriage still had its share of hurt.

Harvest festival was a time of joy.

Isabel tried to smile but the sides of her lips felt heavy.

You
are
asking
for
too
much. Being greedy.

It was true, and yet she struggled to stop thinking about what Ramon had
not
said.

What she should be doing was concentrating on how warm her marriage bed was. No more dreading her husband's step outside her chamber door. The winter would be far more comfortable with Ramon sleeping beside her.

“Here now, you need to be wearing something finer than that today,” Mildred said as she came into the chamber. She pulled one of the keys from her girdle and fit it into the lock on the chest. Two other maids had followed her and helped close the chest's lid. Its hinges squealed.

“The auburn one, I think,” Mildred continued.

The maids lifted up the over robe and smiled approvingly. Isabel lifted her arms and the robe settled down, but got stuck at her bust line. She tugged on it but she was too large for the garment.

“It seems marriage agrees with you this time,” Mildred observed before waving her hand at the maids to have them lift the over robe away. Mildred did not look for another robe. Instead, she eyed Isabel, inspecting her body for a long moment with a critical eye.

The maids came back with another robe that slid into place. It was a blue only one shade darker than her eyes. Once it was laced closed, Isabel decided that she would spend some of the winter making a new robe or two. Her breasts were larger, no doubt due to Ramon's attention to them.

The keep was almost empty. Everyone was on their way to the harvest festival. There would be feasting and entertainment. Music to dance to and other traveling entertainers to watch. Several little girls waited on the steps for her, holding a harvest garland made with stalks of barley and dried flowers. They giggled as they set it on her head and eagerly grasped her hand and robe to pull her across the yard toward the festival.

The music was inviting. Many of the monks went to the festival, enjoying the last of the fall weather. Some of their brethren would stay inside the church, refusing to take part in such a pagan display, but the brothers who did go smiled as they moved toward the vendors selling cheese and sweets.

People wore garlands made of scarlet leaves and berries. They danced in long columns that turned into huge circles as drums and flutes played merry tunes. The girls spun so fast that their robes rose up to their bare knees, and Ramon's men encouraged them with lusty cheers. The ground shook from so many feet pounding it in the same rhythm.

Perhaps it was a touch pagan.

Or at least carnal.

But it was exciting.

Two stags and a boar were roasting over open pits. The cook reached in to slice off the meat as it roasted and handed it out. On harvest festival day, the lord fed his people to thank them for their loyalty. People drank much cider and short beer, making the long hours to prepare it worthwhile. Little boys sat near the cook, rubbing and comparing their distended bellies before letting out loud belches in a competition to see who was loudest.

It was gluttony. An entire day devoted to naught but pleasure seeking. Girls let their hair loose, many linen caps left behind in the keep. Even the widows uncovered their heads and danced merrily.

Everyone was excited, the scent of the roasting meat bringing smiles to even the most forlorn faces.

Who knew what the winter might bring?

Isabel accepted a drinking bowl of cider but wrinkled her nose at the scent. Her stomach clenched and she set the drink aside quickly.

“No taste for cider, lady?” Ambrose asked.

“It seems not.”

He grinned and picked up her discarded drinking bowl and poured the contents into his. “More for me!”

Isabel smiled and went off with the girls to see a man with two trained dogs. She danced with the other women, but by the afternoon, the single women left on the arms of Ramon's men. Most of the entertainers were finished and taking their turn to sample the meat now that they had earned what coin the locals were willing to part with.

Down the hill, though, the men were still celebrating loudly. A cheer rose, and another, and then a hard sound. Mildred tried to pull Isabel away but she looked toward the group of men and tried to decide what they were doing.

“It's no place for you, my lamb,” Mildred warned.

She heard a roar. The men were all clustered around something, intent on watching.

Isabel walked in their direction, but Mildred blocked her path.

“They're fighting for sport. It's no place for a lady.”

“Fighting?”

There was another cheer and the crowd parted as two men fell to the dirt where the spectators had been standing. They were locked in battle, their chests bare as they grunted and tried to tear each other apart with their hands.

And one of them was Ramon.

He staggered to his feet and lifted his arms high into the air as he roared with victory. Isabel put her hands on her hips, her temper flaring. He came full circle and ended up facing her. He stopped and his men looked up at her.

The moment they saw her they hooted. Their laughter increased until several men fell over from their amusement.

“Your wife is displeased!”

“Better soothe her temper else she'll turn you away!”

“A sour woman will leave your cock hard!”

“There is a field that is always in season to plow!”

Mildred pulled on Isabel's arm. Isabel finally tossed her head and turned her back on them.

They were drunk.

The men kept joking with one another. Isabel turned around in time to see her husband bearing down on her. He jumped onto the back of his stallion and rode toward her. She shrieked, backing up and grabbing the front of her robes to run, which delighted his men.

She only ran a short distance before he scooped her up. His men roared with approval.

“Put me down!”

“Not likely,” he declared as he gathered her against his bare chest and leaned over the horse's neck. “I've a mind to ravish my vixen.”

“You stink,” she declared, teasing him.

He was sweaty and had the scent of the earth clinging to him, but there was something about the scent of his skin that pleased her. Her belly clenched with need, her passage feeling empty.

“If you want me bare, Wife…all you must do is ask.” He dropped her to the ground and she realized they'd made it to the bathhouse. Her robes were settling when he tossed her into the air again and dropped her over his shoulder. The doorway was so low he had to duck to carry her through it.

“I will be happy to free my member for you.”

When he put her on her feet again, she smelled the cider on his breath. There was a happy smile on his lips that she'd never seen before, as well as a swollen eye and dark spot appearing on his jaw.

“Do you think I'm impressed with your rough ways?”

He smiled wide enough to show her his teeth. “I think you are impressed when I move you to ecstasy.”

“Enough.” She put her hands on her hips. “I've no care for your rough entertainments.”

She started to leave but he stopped her.

“Bathe me.”

His tone was demanding and far too much like her last husband's to suit her. She took another step toward the door.

“Wife,” he insisted. “Bathe me.”

She turned around, seething, but she stopped because she'd been raised to obey such demands.

The look on his face wasn't one of arrogance. His dark eyes sparkled with enjoyment that touched the tenderness of her heart.

But when she looked at his face, her temper flared. His eye was swollen shut and his jaw had at least three bruises on it. When he grinned at her, there was blood in his teeth.

“Have you no more sense than a boy?” She stomped over to the trough and let the water flow into his tub. “Why do you put yourself at risk? Age will take your teeth soon enough.”

“'Twas naught but good celebrating.” He flexed his arms, the muscles bulging and sending a surge of heat through her.

“You were fighting,” she corrected.

He shrugged. “I like to fight.”

“You like to fight?” she demanded. “Well, sir, I liked to fly my hawk in the mornings, and it was you who told me to adjust to marriage and not place myself at risk. Shall I set my nurse to clinging to you so you will not brawl?”

He laughed so hard his eyes became glassy.

She was furious. Ramon grinned and watched her through his good eye. He walked over to the tub, dunked his head, and tossed it back so that water flew across the bathhouse.

“It pleases me to hear the concern in your voice.”

“I am not concerned,” she insisted as she lifted the kettle and poured the water into the tub. It hadn't truly boiled but she decided the brute deserved a cool bath.

“You are,” he insisted as he tugged his tunic off and dropped it. There was a splash as he settled into the tub. “Admit it.”

“Not unless you admit how foolish you have been behaving.” Her neck was hot and her clothing felt too tight across her breasts.

“I'll admit to how much I crave your thighs wrapped around me.”

She gasped and threw the square of linen she'd been ready to scrub his back with at him. “You are besotted.”

“Of your sweet charms,” he declared.

“Enough,” she said. “Your squire can tend to you.”

Her emotions were rolling in thick waves that made no sense; they simply overwhelmed her. She turned around, seeking the doorway, but there was a whoosh behind her, and then Ramon grabbed her.

“Stop!”

“You need cooling off more than I do, Wife!”

He dropped her into the tub as she shrieked. “My robes—”

“Now you may take them off.” He reached behind her and jerked on her laces.

“Stop it, Ramon.”

He didn't listen to her but kept at her laces. She tried to avoid him but instead spilled most of the water onto the floor. It splashed over the edge of the tub in huge waves as she tried to escape. Her husband was relentless, tugging and pulling on her garments until he was able to hold them up like a prize.

She sank down to her knees inside the tub to hide. “Have you no shame?”

“With you?” He stood firmly in front of her, naked, without flinching. “None. I confess it freely. You should as well, for you are quite brazen in my embrace.”

She cupped a handful of water and threw it at him. “Knave.”

He ignored her insult and his dark gaze lowered to her breasts. “I adore your tits.”

She suddenly stiffened, the memory of Jacques using the same word. But at the same time the memory moved through her, stoking the horror of the event, tears flooded her eyes. There was no way to stop them. Big, fat, wet drops ran down her cheeks as she fought to swallow a sob.

Ramon's eyes widened.

He'd leave now for certain. No man ever dealt with a weeping woman. And that only made her cry more tears as she looked away, humiliated by her loss of control.

“Leave me,” she muttered.

“Nay.” He scooped her up and trapped her against his body. “Forgive me,” he offered as he kissed her temple. “I have never had a woman who loved me.”

She slipped free of his embrace. “I never said—”

Yet she did love him.

She knew it as the lie got stuck on her lips. She couldn't finish saying it because his expression made her want to weep again. It was so full of hope and need. Two things she'd never have suspected he craved.

“Oh…let me be.”

He chuckled softly and captured her again. This time he wrapped her in a towel, trapping her arms against her body.

“I should not have worried you. Men fight. It has been the only way I have known. Forgive me.” He buried his head in her hair and drew in a deep breath. “There is not a single other person I would have apologized to.”

It wasn't an admission of love.

But it was a concession of caring.

That knowledge didn't soothe her bruised feelings much.

You
are
asking
too
much…

She was, but she couldn't stop. The hope was there inside her heart, nearly killing her with how bright it was burning. She feared it would consume her if he didn't love her in return.

What a different sort of torment her marriage was proving itself to be. Maybe it was true what the church said: There was no true happiness in this life. Only glimmers.

So she'd take the opportunities that came to her.

She shifted and stroked her hand down his chest, delighting in the feel of his hard body. He made a low sound of approval and cupped her breasts as she found the hard length of his swollen member.

She stroked it, trailing her fingers around its head and all the way to the sac where his seed was.

“You are truly a vixen, Isabel…fiery.” He cupped her nape and held her steady as he kissed her. It was a hard kiss that set something loose inside her. All of her anger transformed into passion with just the touch of his mouth against hers.

Her thoughts scattered and she willingly let them go.

But Ramon pulled back and finished disrobing. He lifted his leg and climbed into the tub. “I do stink.”

He was washing himself so quickly, water sloshing against the sides of the tub and splashing up as he hurried.

“Ramon,” she admonished with a soft laugh.

He looked at her with an expression that hinted at the boy he'd once been. “Can I not be eager for your attention? Do you not find the compliment in my desire to please you?”

She laughed again, only this time it was a sultry sound. His expression changed, captivating her with the flare of excitement brightening his eyes. It set loose a confidence she didn't realize she had.