The Warrior's Wife (18 page)

Her husband’s touches. Kate’s joy dimmed into a new and terrible ache punctuated by Lady Adele’s distant little voice, screaming that Kate was now ruined for all time. What she and Rafe had just done was wrong, awfully, horribly wrong. They weren’t married and they never would be. On the morrow she and Rafe would be back at Haydon and forever beyond reach of each other.

Kate squeezed her eyes shut. Rules, always rules. Well, no more. She was done with Adele and her constant scolding, because Adele was wrong. There wasn’t just pain for a woman in the act of consummation.

Sighing, Rafe rolled to one side, leaving Kate longing for his return. He propped himself up on his arm as he lay beside her, seeking to study her in the darkness. Apparently, he wasn’t satisfied with his eyes for he used his free hand to trace her cheek, the line of her throat then let his fingers run along the generous curve of her breast. Kate shivered at his play, savoring it, even as the awful knowledge that she’d have no more of him ate at her.

“Wed with me, Kate,” he said, his voice deep and yet warm with the passion they’d shared.

The hopeless longing to be Rafe’s wife rose until it nearly owned her. Not even her desire to have him could change reality. “Would that I could be yours,” she replied, the taste of the words bittersweet in her mouth.

Again Rafe’s fingers traveled around the curve of her breast. Kate’s breath left her in a shaken sigh as her hunger for him reawakened.

“But you can be mine,” he said softly. “We’ll but go to Glevering and be wed. Thus, is marriage accomplished.”

His words were more shocking than any touch could ever be. Kate shoved herself back from him and sat up. The hems of her dresses were yet raised to her thighs. Humiliation tore through her as she slapped them down over her legs. She shifted back from Rafe until the tree trunk would let her go no farther.

Across from her, Rafe sat up. Even in the darkness, she could see the crease that marked his handsome brow. “Kate?” he asked, sounding confused.

“Say it again, what you just said to me,” she demanded, her voice trembling. It wasn’t that she hadn’t heard him, she just couldn’t believe she’d heard it.

Rafe sucked in a quick breath then combed his fingers through his hair. “I said, wed with me, Kate. Let’s do as you proposed at the hunt and end this feud between our families with our marriage.”

Every mote of pleasure left in Kate died, leaving in its place icy nothingness. “Are you mad?!” she cried. “My father would kill me if I wed you.”

Across from her the crease smoothed from Rafe’s brow. “He’d have to kill me first,” he replied, naught but arrogant confidence in his voice.

“Aye, and that he’d happily do,” Kate retorted, still aching over Rafe’s betrayal.

He smiled. It was a cocky grin that even night’s darkness couldn’t hide. “I’m not so easily vanquished. Marry me, Kate, and let me hold you safe from your kinsman.”

How could he persist when each word was like unto a knife’s thrust in her heart? “I won’t,” she cried out. “I’ve just escaped ruin through an illicit marriage to Warin,” she started only to catch her breath as a new pain stabbed through her.

Ruin came in many ways, one of which was to fornicate with her father’s enemy. As the whole of her sin came to sit heavily on Kate’s shoulders the thought woke that Rafe had used her in order to manipulate her into secret marriage. Shame grew.

“Nay, I won’t wed you,” she cried out. “I’ll go nowhere with you save back to Haydon.”

Rafe’s smile died. “You’d refuse me after what we’ve just shared?” he demanded, sounding right angry, too.

His words made Kate’s heart twist. She caught her hands to her chest to stop the ache. It was true. This lovemaking of his was meant only to bend her to his will.

“Nay, you will not,” Rafe went on. “I think me we’ll go on to Glevering where it’ll be me you marry and no other. That is, unless you prefer Sir Warin as your mate. If that’s the case, say so now, and I’ll leave the two of you here to complete your journey as you will.”

Pain ate Kate alive. She gaped at her erstwhile rescuer. He wouldn’t leave her here in Warin’s custody! Her eyes narrowed. Of course he wouldn’t. Now that one manipulation hadn’t worked, he was trying another.

In that instant and with a horrible crack, every one of Kate’s cherished illusions shattered, leaving her staring at a world she hated. Tears sprang to her eyes. Lady Adele and her tales were wrong. There was no such man as a courtly knight, nor should a lady give any man, no matter his appearance or behavior, her heart. She especially shouldn’t give him her body.

Men were all of a kind, every one of them willing to use a woman any way they could if it meant getting what they wanted. All men were like her father and Warin. And like Rafe Godsol.

“You didn’t come to save me from Warin,” she said at last, her voice flat in defeat. “You came to take me for yourself.”

* * *

Dawn found Kate still mounted on that horrid palfrey only now she was surrounded by fifty Godsol men, more than forty of whom had been waiting for Rafe in a hidden dale. Over her yet damp gowns she wore a monk’s habit, the garment Rafe had offered her. It didn’t help. She was beyond cold, beyond exhausted, beyond humiliated and desperately hungry; for pride’s sake she’d refused the oatcakes and smoked meat Rafe had offered whilst they waited for the dawn to come. Most of all, she truly was beyond the reach of any rescue this time.

So deep was her hopelessness that she swayed in her saddle. It hadn’t helped to discover a whole Godsol troop waiting for them in a hidden spot. That his men were so near to Glevering proved Rafe planned her kidnapping long before her sire’s behavior drove Warin to take her.

“My lady,” said the soldier, a plain man, round of face and nose, who held her palfrey’s reins. Dawn’s light made the concern in his blue eyes seem true, although he was a Godsol and she a Daubney. “Are you ill?”

Kate peered at the man from beneath the edge of the habit’s cowl. She was keeping the hood low upon her brow to conceal as much of her as possible. It was fear that her loss of virtue might somehow show upon her face that made her do it. She wasn’t going to give any of the Godsols, who were every one odious men, the chance to judge her a lightskirt, even though Kate now knew full well that’s what she was.

“I’m as well as can be expected, considering I’ve been kidnapped twice in the last day and slept naught at all in that time,” she snapped, her voice as rusty as Warin’s mail.

The soldier blinked then shrugged. “Pardon, my lady,” he said, no rancor in his voice, “but there’s no help for it. Sir William is honor-bound to reclaim Glevering for the Godsols once and for all. If the doing of that means Sir Ralf must take you from your sire, then take you he needs must.”

With the man’s words the wound Rafe’s betrayal had left in her heart opened anew. Despair ran deep, indeed. What a fool she was. She’d conjured up affection in Rafe’s gaze when all he ever wanted of her was Glevering, just as she’d imagined honor in Warin who wasn’t honorable at all. At least Warin was paying for his insult.

She glanced at her sire’s steward, who rode on her left. Rafe’s men had gagged him, bound him by the neck, hand and foot to the saddle of another man’s horse. But at Rafe’s command, Warin wore his cloak to protect him from the elements and his wounds had been bandaged.

Such evidence of Rafe’s kindness tried to temper Kate’s new hatred of all things Godsol. She squashed the sentiment. Better that outlaws had attacked Warin and taken her. Then she wouldn’t have the reminder of her wanton behavior with Rafe scourging her with every breath.

Her gaze shifted to the man she now despised with all her heart. Rafe rode at the head of this troop beside his eldest brother, Sir William Godsol. Proof that her properties were all he wanted of her was in the way he didn’t bother riding near her now that she was his prisoner. Instead, it was Warin’s big black warhorse that walked at his side. The black was livelier now that his saddle was empty. He’d eaten and rested over the last two gray hours before dawn while the Godsols waited for dawn’s light to finish their conquest of Glevering.

Glaring at Rafe’s becloaked back, Kate willed with every ounce of her being that he should die. By God, but she hated every inch of him. The great oaf! The big twit! She’d die before she married him.

Kate’s eyes narrowed. Her mouth tightened. Better yet that she find a way to thwart him at his own game. There was still time. Glevering’s walls had yet to be breached, and that was no certain thing. Every furlong of these lands belonged to her father, and no man who owed him an oath would ever open his gates to a troop of Godsols. By God, but it’d please her to dance on Rafe Godsol’s grave once her father finished him.

Ahead of her Rafe held up his hand to signal a halt just before he and his brother reached the crest of a low hill. Throwing back his hood, he turned to look at those who followed him. Kate’s brows rose in surprise. When had Rafe donned a knight’s helmet?

Beside her Warin made a furious sound deep in his chest and strained against his bonds. Startled, Kate glanced at him. At great cost to himself, Warin glared up at Rafe as best he could with his bonds forcing him into a meek pose. His eyes were bright with fury.

Rafe paid neither of his captives any heed as he scanned those following him. “As all of you know Glevering lies on the other side of this hill,” he announced. Nodding and loosening their swords, Godsol soldiers murmured in excitement as they shouldered their shields.

“Heed me well,” Rafe called out, warning filling his voice. “No man draws a sword or deals a blow unless he’s attacked. I want not a word from any of you until we’re all well within the walls. The first six through the gate will ride no farther than a yard or two from it. Wait there while the others pass you. If there’s any sign of trouble, you’ll storm the machinery and see to it that the gate doesn’t close on us. Adelmar, Rob,” he said to the men that rode alongside Warin, “you’re to take our knightly guest to the back of the troop and hold him there. Should things go awry there’s no sense in giving Glevering a well-trained sword to use against us.”

As he fell silent he handed his eldest brother the reins of Warin’s warhorse, then thrust out his hand toward the soldier who rode beside Kate. “Old John, I’ll take my lady’s horse.”

“I’ll never be your lady,” Kate snapped as her guard led her and her mount closer to Rafe. “And you’re mad if you think Glevering will ever open its gates to you.”

For the first time since he’d halted his troop Rafe looked at her. It was a cheeky wink he sent her way as he shouldered the shield that hung from his saddle. “They’re not opening the gates to me.”

Behind his gag Warin screamed in rage and thrashed against his bonds. Kate gaped. It was Warin’s shield Rafe carried. Only now did she recognize that it was Warin’s helmet upon Rafe’s head. With Warin’s warhorse at his side those on Glevering’s wall might well think he was their steward making an unexpected visit.

“There now, calm yourself,” said the soldier holding Warin’s now fretting horse as he led the straining man and dancing creature back for the troop’s end. “You’ll both only do yourself more damage this way.”

“This is dishonorable,” Kate protested. It was a futile effort, for God knew appealing to Rafe’s honor was useless. She knew full well he had none of that.

“Nay, just expedient,” Rafe replied but his smile was tense and tight. Just as well. To once more look upon the grin she’d so admired would only be salt in her yet very raw wound.

“Now, Old John,” he prodded Kate’s guard.

The Godsol man tossed the palfrey’s reins to him. Rafe caught them with ease then held up his hand to show her that he now controlled her. “Glevering will be mine, just as you already are.”

“Never,” Kate snarled at him, hating him with all her might.

Something akin to disappointment swept across his features, then was gone. “Forgive me Kate, but you leave me no choice,” he said quietly, then gave a nod to the soldier at her side. “Do it, Old John.”

Old John sent Kate a quick, regretful look, then dug into his hauberk. What he pulled out was a length of cloth--another gag. So too, was there a coil of thin rope. She was to be bound and stoppered once again.

“You wouldn’t,” Kate cried to Rafe, only because shouting a warning was exactly what she’d counted on doing. She gave him no chance to respond. “But of course you would. You’re a Godsol. Now I know why my sire so despises your family.”

Rafe flinched at her comment. “Kate, it needn’t be this way between us. Godsol I am, but I vow now before all these men that I’d never be uncaring toward you because you’re a Daubney. I thought you cared for me. So said your kisses and all else that passed between us. Why do you refuse me now?”

Kate squeaked as he exposed her immoral behavior before all these men. Shame burst to fiery life on her cheeks, and she jerked her cowl even further down upon her head to hide it.

“How dare you speak so to me!” she cried out. More to the point, how dared he try to use her idiotic infatuation with him against her? She turned in her saddle to face Old John and thrust out her hands.

“Bind me and be done with it, man,” she demanded. “As you do it remind your master that I’ve no feeling at all for him save the hatred a captive feels for her captor.”

“Kate,” Rafe protested, sounding sorely aggrieved.

Kate did her best to show him her back. A strange sound, something that might have been a laugh, left the soldier beside her. Kate shot him a sharp glance. There was no sign of amusement on the man’s plain face. Instead, he clucked with concern when he saw the raw marks left by Warin’s bindings. Because of that, he didn’t make the rope about her wrists as tight as it should have been. As he reached to tie on Kate’s gag, she pulled her arms as far as she could into the too long sleeves of the monk’s habit, to hide the fact that the rope loops slid far down her hands.

Beneath her new gag a wee, tight smile tugged at Kate’s lips. By his own doing did the chance to destroy Rafe loom before her almost within reach. It was more than possible that Glevering’s defenders wouldn’t be tricked by Rafe’s ruse. After all, the Daubneys and the Godsols met in battle often enough, someone within the walls might well recognize a man or two in this troop. When that happened battle was sure to follow, and while the men fought there’d be no one to watch her. She would be ready to take the advantage.