The Rose of Blacksword (34 page)

When her father joined her, he too appeared in fine spirits. But his old eyes were sharp as he watched his daughter signal the chamberlain to begin the serving. With an occasional nod of her head and gesture of her hand, she orchestrated the meal from her place above the salt.

“The fowl is good,” he commended her as he did justice to the whole duckling before him. “The bread and the sauce also.” He licked gravy from one finger, then grinned at her. “Your husband shall be blessed indeed.”

“Husband!” Rosalynde’s eyes widened in sudden alarm. What did he mean? What did he know?

Her fathers amiable expression dissolved into a frown. “God’s blood, daughter! Can I not speak of your marriage without you staring at me as if I were sending you to your execution? ’Tis your duty to marry. Especially now. And do not think to enter the abbey no matter what the priests may say. Stanwood is held only through you. It is just this choosing of the right man that awaits.”

“I-I do not mean to imply that I would shirk my duties,” Rosalynde answered, recovering from her shock. “I know I must marry, and truly, I do seek it. It is only the choice that concerns me. Nothing else.”

“That is good, then. That is good. And I plan to be generous with you on that account. You shall see any fellow I consider and I will not deny you comment on their merits. The decision, of course, will be mine. However, I would see you happy with the choice.”

“Thank you, Father,” she said with a small sigh of relief.

“To that end,” he continued, after drinking deeply of his wine. “I propose a spring festival. The planting nears completion. The weather has cooperated. I would reward one
and all with a day of feasting and games.” He cleared his throat and gave her a watchful smile. “Several men of my acquaintance have expressed interest in the games.”

“Several men?”

Sir Edward met her dismayed gaze, then looked away. “There will be a small tourney. It will give you a chance to meet several unmarried men and perhaps find one to your liking. Since I’ll not invite any whom I would not also accept, you will have much freedom in the choosing. More than most fathers would allow,” he added somewhat belligerently. Then his tone softened. “Stanwood has not hosted such a gathering in many a year. Until you returned the place was hardly presentable. But you have taken things well in hand, daughter. I have given you leave to manage the household as you will. You must now trust me to do my duty to you with regard to a husband.”

“I-I cannot but agree,” she replied, aware that he asked nothing unreasonable of her.

“Good,” he said, then signaled a page to refill his cup. “You prepare chambers and meals. I’ll see to the entertainments. Oh, but there
is
one matter you could help me with. Pertaining to the new man. Aric.”

“Aric?” Rosalynde echoed. Once more her equanimity was destroyed. “How can I … What do you mean?”

Sir Edward bent toward her, his voice lowered. “That fellow you brought here has me mightily perplexed. Beyond his brute strength, he possesses a shrewd intelligence.”

With that assessment Rosalynde could not but agree. Still, her father’s interest made her wary. “But what has that to do with me?”

“He reveals nothing of himself. Not how he came by his talent for combat, nor how he has spent these past years. Yet I am not one easily fooled. The man fights like one
trained to it. His skill was learned and then tested on the field of battle. He is not a mere brawler. But he keeps his secrets to himself.”

“Perhaps it is for the best, Father.”

“Aye, sometimes that is best. But one of the entertainments at our festival shall be the melee. If he can be trusted he could very well turn the tide in our favor. Sir Virgil of Rising will be here, and I have not bested his men in the melee’s battle games in many a year.”

Rosalynde’s relief at her father’s concerns was so great that she let out a great sigh. Then she smiled brightly at him. “He can be trusted to fight with you. Of that I am absolutely certain.”

“So I thought you might say. But I would nonetheless like to know more of him. You spent time with him before. You saved him from my punishment and probably even tended his back.” His one brow arched perceptively. “You trust him and I wouldn’t doubt he trusts you, at least more than he might trust anyone else around here. Talk to him, Rosalynde. See what you can learn of him. The man has much to offer but I must know more.”

“I must know more.” Those words of her father’s bothered Rosalynde through the remainder of the meal. “I must know more.” And yet there was much that he must never know.

Still, her curiosity about Aric was even stronger than her father’s. The man was a complete enigma. His arrogant attitude was sorely at odds with his lowly station in life. It was no wonder that her father had noticed him. The fact that he was so adept in battle only piqued her father’s interest, for Sir Edward was primarily a man of war. He had not hesitated to back Matilda and her son Henry II in his bid to claim the crown from Stephen. In the two years since that conflict had been resolved, he had clearly been
chafing at the bit. Now that he proposed the tourney and the melee, it was no surprise that he would seek out the best warriors to fight with him. And just like him, she had no doubt that Aric was among the best.

But how had he gotten to be the best? That was the question that puzzled her father and that plagued her as well.

She left the meal early, leaving her father to his own devices and the now well-trained boys to the clearing of the tables. As she made her way past the edge of the crowded tables she saw Edith. Remembering a matter they needed to discuss, she made her way over to her.

“Good ev’nin, milady,” Edith said, starting to rise from her half-completed meal.

“Please, I do not mean to disturb your meal,” Rosalynde said with a smile, pressing her back into her seat. “I only wished to tell you that tomorrow after the first meal I will explain to you which spices go best together. We’ll measure and tie into bundles the prescribed amounts so that you may more easily use them in your cooking.”

“Thank you, milady. I promise you, your faith in me shall not be wasted.”

“Of that I have no doubt.” She patted Edith’s shoulder then turned to depart. It was then that she met Aric’s gaze. He was still sitting at the table, but his meal was done and he was just finishing his cup of ale. Their eyes met only briefly; she quickly averted her face and continued on her way. But in that single moment of contact there was a wealth of communication. Her skin was warm and her heart raced as she made her way out of the great hall. A knot twisted deep in her belly, and once outside she paused to take a calming breath. But she hardly had time to get over that one potent look they’d shared before the very object of her disquiet appeared through the twilight.
As if he knew she were there—as if he expected her to be waiting for him—he crossed to the deep shadows where she stood on trembling legs.

“Come walk with me,” he said in a low and husky tone. His hand reached up and with the backs of his knuckles he stroked down the curve of hair that lay against her cheek.

The ready retort she had for his unseemly invitation died unsaid when his hand met her hair. Instead she only pressed herself harder against the rough stone wall, wishing he would go away, wishing that he would not force her to confront the terrible feelings he roused in her.

“I have missed you,” he murmured when she did not respond. His fingers found the line of her jaw and he traced a path down to her chin. “Have you missed me as well?”

“No,” Rosalynde replied, although she knew it was not the truth. “No,” she repeated the lie in a breathless voice.

She heard his soft chuckle and felt his warmth as he moved a little closer. One of his hands moved to rest against the wall, effectively blocking her escape. With his other he tilted her face up to him. “Such a sweet little liar you are, my Rose. Lips like honey, waiting to be feasted upon. Yet from those very lips spill the most blatant of lies.” He rubbed the callused pad of his thumb across her full lower lip. “You tell me lies; you break vows that were made before God and man. How is it that I still would have you to wife?”

“You want only one thing of me,” she accused him, her voice trembling.

“And that is?” One of his brows arched in mocking question.

“My … my … you know! Your way with me, you horrible beast!”

“My way with you?” He laughed again, then he pressed
up against her and she gasped as all her senses leapt. His chest was hard against her full breasts. His belly was firm and his thighs like iron where they pressed against her soft form. He nuzzled her hair, finding her ear with his mouth. “We both know I can have my way with you whenever I wish,” he whispered hotly in her ear. To make his point he rubbed his loins aggressively against her until she felt she would melt from the heat he inspired in her. “It only remains for me to gain the castle through a proper renewal of our vows.”

“Oh!” Rosalynde tried to free herself of him at that cold and self-serving revelation. “Let me go, you despicable cur!” she ordered as she sought to shove him away.

“From those perfect lips you vow your hatred. But, Rose, your body tells me otherwise. Here.” His hand moved up to stroke the side of her breast. Then his thumb slid to the hardened crest. “And here,” he added as his eyes stared deeply into hers. Despite her wish to deny his abhorrent words, Rosalynde knew with a sinking desperation that in this he had her dead to rights. A frisson coursed through her as his warm gaze held with hers. Then with a shudder of defeat she closed her eyes, unable to fight the truth anymore.

“Ah, my sweet Rose,” he whispered in light kisses on her brow and then down her cheek to her temple. “Tell me once more how much you hate me.”

Rosalynde swallowed hard, then swallowed again when his lips found the vulnerable exposed hollow at her throat. Her arms lifted to circle his neck; in the quiet dark of this corner of the bailey she pressed her entire length to him, succumbing to the desire that simmered so near the surface and that now threatened to erupt and overwhelm them.

“I hate you,” her words came, faint and trembling. “I do,” she insisted on a sigh.

He pulled her away from the wall and gathered her into his arms. “If this is your hatred, then I must work harder to gain your love—”

But before he could complete his statement, before his lips could meet hers, the door to the great hall opened, spilling a slash of light down the three stone steps and into the starlit yard. Instinctively Blacksword turned, hiding her identity with his broad form. His lips touched hers lightly, whispering a mute warning to be quiet. Then on silent feet he turned, moving deeper into the shadows, still holding on to her as two men paused on the step.

Rosalynde was too unnerved by her reaction to Aric to be mindful of the men who stood so near yet were oblivious to their presence. She buried her face against Blacksword’s neck, breathing in the unique scent of his hard-muscled body, intoxicated by the wild feelings he roused in her. Yet when one of the men spoke, her nerves came painfully alert and she was overcome with fear.

“ ’Tis a chance you need not take,” Sir Roger said in his familiar gravelly voice.

It was her father who responded. “He has the talent. You saw him today, Roger. You know he could have made short shrift of Harold if he had but wished to.”

“But there’s the rub! Why
did
he hold back? And who’s to know when he might hold back again?”

Rosalynde sensed Aric’s sudden tension when he realized they spoke of him. In the dark corner formed by the outer wall and the great hall they stood, pressed together, both straining to hear her father’s response.

“He had a reason for holding back, I’ll grant you that. Though I cannot be sure of his reason, however, I am
nonetheless fairly sure that he will not do so in the heat of battle.”

Sir Roger let out a grunt of disapproval. “He is an outlaw. Mark my words, ’tis more than likely he’ll go too far and let serious blood during our sport. Either way, I’d as well not learn you misjudged him on the field of honor.”

With a low chuckle Sir Edward moved down the steps and out into the yard. “ ’Tis only a melee,” he reminded his captain of the guard. “Best to find out now instead of in a true battle.”

“Aye, it is only a melee,” Sir Roger agreed as the men began to walk away. “But Sir Virgil of Rising will be there and I would rather be completely sure of our troops. And ’tis not only Rising’s forces who will be eager to best us. Every man who aspires to your daughter’s hand will want to prove his mettle before you.”

They were soon out of earshot, but Aric did not immediately move away from her. He seemed preoccupied until she shifted in his arms. Then he leaned back and looked down at her.

“Those fools who aspire to your hand will have me to contend with,” he said sternly. Then his expression relaxed. “It appears the father is coming around toward me. So, it seems, is the daughter.” His hands moved down her back as he stared into her eyes. “How soon until we tell your father he already has a son-in-law? How soon until you will be mine, my night Rose?”

More than anything Rosalynde wanted to say “now.” More than anything she wished to complete the passionate exploration they’d begun, to allow the fire they’d started, to build to an inferno until it consumed them both. But the conversation they had overheard had forced reality on her. As she lingered in his stirring embrace all her questions came back to mind, the very same questions her
father had about the uncommon servant she had brought him.

“Who are you?” she whispered, trying to make out the expression in his shadowed face. “Please tell me who you really are.”

There was a moment’s pause before he answered, a moment when she sensed a strange yearning in him, as if he fought a part of himself before replying. “I’m the same man you saved from the gallows. The man you wed. The man who claims you as wife. What more do you wish to know?”

In frustration she pushed against him. “That’s not what I mean and you know it. My father offers you an honorable life. He asks only for the truth of your past so that he may know whether you will truly protect his back. Is that so hard for you to understand?”