The Maiden Bride (18 page)

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Authors: Rexanne Becnel

Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Historical, #General, #Medieval

BOOK: The Maiden Bride
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In the quiet aftermath, when the only sound was their labored breathing, Linnea admitted to herself that this was not as she pictured marriage to be. She’d expected love and not thought at all about the physical part of it. She’d imagined a man who was gentle and kind, more a friend to her than anything else.
Instead, she’d wed a man she must fear and hate, and had discovered a physical joy she could neither understand nor explain. The fact that every least soul in the castle must know what she did with him and how she reveled in it only confounded things further.
Yet for all her mental debate, Linnea remained just as she was. She rested in Axton’s arms, limp from their lovemaking, and still wearing the drenched dress which would no doubt be discussed in whispers for days to come—or at least until he involved her in another such escapade.
God only knew what that might be, but Linnea would not deny that she could hardly wait to find out.
 
Axton watched his bride as she walked away.
The wench was truly amazing.
She was not at all what he would have expected. Not her beauty, nor her fire. Neither had he expected the powerful reaction he had to her whenever he saw her—or even thought about her.
He’d known he would have no difficulty responding to her vibrant beauty. Such a sweetly formed woman would heat any man’s blood. But the desire he felt for her burned with an intensity he was beginning to find disturbing. The plain truth was that he could not get enough of her.
He trailed behind her, down the stairs to the main hall, keeping his eyes on the rounded hips that swayed so enticingly beneath the softly draped gown she’d changed into. The woman was a temptress without even trying to be. At times she made him so angry—so angry that he wanted to throttle her.
He frowned to think how close he’d come to striking her last night, and all because she’d challenged him on account of her family. That she was loyal was commendable. But the fact was,
he
wanted to command that same level of loyalty from her. He wanted her world to center around
him
, not around her family. He wanted to create a new family with her.
It was a need he could never have foreseen.
At the foot of the stairs he halted and watched her walk away. Though it was foolish, he wanted her to look back. She knew he was here. So look back, he silently commanded her.
When she paused near the hearth and did just that, he couldn’t prevent the pleased smile that lifted his lips. She smiled back, a surprised half-smile that revealed more of her feelings for him than she probably knew. She was as confused by the unexpected attraction between them as he. That knowledge pleased him almost as much as anything else. She could not hide her feelings from him. A good trait in a wife. Though he would never have thought it possible between them, he found himself eager for honesty in their dealings together.
“What say you, brother?” Peter’s taunting voice interrupted Axton’s drifting thoughts. “The last I saw of you, you were not nearly so hale and hearty as this.”
Axton stifled a grimace. So Peter knew about last night. No doubt everyone did. Nevertheless, he shot the boy a tolerant smile, then returned his gaze to his wife.
The boy followed his gaze. “Talk is that you were not nearly so well pleased with her last night.”
Axton’s jaw tightened. His brother’s tone was not one of brotherly teasing; in truth, he sounded more angry than jovial. Axton turned to face Peter. “Last night I was drunk. Today I am sober.”
“I take it she has forgiven you.”
Axton frowned. “Not two days ago you despised Beatrix. Yet now I detect an air of protectiveness in you. I hope you do not imply that she needs be protected from her own husband.”
He glowered at his brother, daring him to push the matter any further. But with a mulish light in his eye and a belligerent set to his jaw, Peter pressed on. “If that husband would strike her, then destroy his own possessions when she is not completely submissive to him, then yes—”
“I did not hurt her!”
“But you would have!” Peter hissed. “Had Reynold not prevented it, you would have struck her down. Had she not hidden, you would have trapped her in your chambers and punished her last night.”
“My wife is mine own affair.” Axton bit the words out, cold and clipped. When Peter did not flinch, however, his fury grew even greater. “’Tis a man’s right to discipline his wife. ’Tis his duty. To cuff her when she has erred is no great sin.”
“I never once saw our father strike Mother.”
Axton could not believe his ears. It was not his brother’s words that were so shocking. Axton knew as well as Peter—better even—that their father had never raised a hand to their mother. He had honored her and respected her and loved her. What Axton could not believe was that Peter would bring up such a thing to him, when the circumstances of his marriage were so vastly different from their parents’. He’d wed his enemy’s daughter, not his childhood sweetheart. And the fact remained that he had not actually struck the troublesome wench!
“Your concern is touching, little brother. But Beatrix is my wife and I will deal with her as I see fit. You have only to look at her to see she is well pleased with the role fate has given her.”
“Is she?” Peter asked, giving him a cold smile. “Or is she simply playing the role she believes will keep her safe?”
“Damn you! That is not the way of it. If you value your place here, you will leave this matter alone!”
Under Axton’s blistering glare Peter finally looked away, across the hall to the paired oaken doors through which Beatrix had departed. “I assume she goes to bid her grandmother farewell.”
Axton felt a modicum of satisfaction that his brother had decided to let the subject go—and a considerable relief. Despite his defense of his actions last night, Axton was uncomfortable with Peter’s accusation. He had overreacted. To himself, at least, he would not deny it. But that was over and done with. He would not allow himself to be so provoked again. He answered Peter, “The crone’s departure is for the best.”
“What of Sir Edgar and his injured son?”
Axton sighed. His new wife’s family was a wearisome burden. Most of his life he’d lived hating them and wanting revenge against them. Now he only wanted them to go away. “Henry comes soon. Once he has dispensed his justice, we shall be relieved of the de Valcourt family once and for all. Peace and prosperity will finally be ours and you will not have to worry over my treatment of my wife.”
“Your wife is a de Valcourt. That you can so easily forget that fact surprises me.”
“In that you are wrong, brother. She is no longer a de Valcourt, not from the moment of her wedding oath. She is a de la Manse, now. Beatrix de la Manse. My wife and lady of Maidenstone. You need not doubt her loyalty to me, nor mine to her.”
Then spying Sir Maurice, Axton gave his brother a curt nod, turned, and departed. But Peter’s words left him with an uneasy feeling. He had embarked on his marriage to de Valcourt’s daughter, intending to bind her to him on the strength of her passionate nature. He’d behaved like an idiot last night—he could admit that much to himself. But he’d mended that this morning. That Beatrix had been so willing to forget about last night had only assured him that he was succeeding with his plan to gain her loyalty—all her loyalty.
But Peter’s doubt about the girl’s acceptance of their marriage had set him to wondering.
As the day passed, filled with the business of reacquainting himself with his home and making myriad decisions, he had little time to dwell on his wife. But like a persistent bell ringer, just waiting for a quiet moment to peal forth a memorable tune, Beatrix remained in his mind.
When he accompanied Maurice to inspect the burned storehouses and decide on the rebuilding of them, he wondered if she’d ever visited those storehouses. At the house of Wascom the Weaver, unofficial mayor of the village, they were given cheese and ale as they discussed the possibility of holding a village fair. But all the time Axton wondered whether Beatrix would like a bolt of velvet cloth from the cloth dealer who would surely attend such a fair. Something rich and green, to match the startling color of her eyes when they made love.
By the time dusk approached and he and Maurice were homeward bound, he was resolved. If she were not completely in thrall to him—as Peter seemed to imply—she soon would be. He would bind her to him, using her own fiery passions to do so.
He kicked his mount to a faster pace, anticipating the moment when he would once again have her to himself. The grandmother was gone; the father and brother soon would be. Then she would be entirely his.
 
If Maynard dies, you are our only hope.
Throughout the day, her grandmother’s final words to her before departing for Romsey Abbey had echoed in Linnea’s head. If Maynard dies …
Linnea had gone to him directly after her grandmother had left Maidenstone. Once a day their father visited with him, but he went away each time more shrunken and lost within his own thoughts than ever. Maynard no longer had a guard set on him, only a series of servants to feed him broth and give him the medicines Linnea prepared. But now, as she sat beside him in the priest’s shadowed lodgings, Linnea feared her medicines were not enough.
Maynard lay on the priest’s bed, his skin as pale as the sun-bleached bed linens, only grayer. His breath came slowly, in shallow, irregular rattles. His face was clammy, his eyes sunken shadows, and his cheeks peppered with thin scruff. He had not spoken since the morning before.
Linnea heaved a great sigh and prayed fervently for his recovery. She did not want him to die. She did not want to be the only hope of her family.
She did not want to be Beatrix anymore.
Her face creased with the intensity of her prayers.
St. Jude, I was wrong to do this. Wrong to deceive Axton.
But if she had not, the real Beatrix would have become his wife. Her sister would be the one sharing his bed, not her. In retrospect it seemed she’d not saved Beatrix from so very dreadful a fate.
A slight noise drew her attention. “What do
you
want?” she hissed when she spied Peter de la Manse lurking within the open doorway.
The boy stepped into the narrow room. In the scant light of the solitary candle his young face was solemn, with none of the cockiness she’d come to expect of him. At least he’d not come to gloat over her fallen brother.
“I hoped to have a word with you,” he answered. He stood on the opposite side of Maynard, studying her across the shrunken form of her brother. How fitting that seemed.
“What is it you want to know?” She was in no mood to fight with him. So long as he was civil she could behave the same.
He shifted from one foot to the other and passed the Phrygian cap he held from his left hand to his right and back again. “I, well, after last night and … and then this morning … well, ’tis not my wont to pry, but you … and Axton. Well, I wondered … that is …”
“Everything is mended between us, if that is what you ask,” Linnea responded more curtly than was strictly necessary. Heat stained her face with faint color and she was sorry she’d invited him to speak. Was her personal relationship with her husband always to attract so much attention? She was embarrassed and aggravated all at the same time.
“Well, I am glad of that,” he said. Then his expression turned him from awkward boy to knowing young man. “The furnishings cannot bear much more of such abuse.”
Linnea’s face turned scarlet. “What do you mean?” she gasped.
“The bed, of course. Axton broke it—Oh!” His brows lifted and a grin curved his mouth. For a moment he looked very like his brother—a fact that did nothing to endear him to her.
“Oh,” he continued, the grin firmly in place. “I assumed he’d broken it in a fit of rage. Mayhap it was the two of you in a fit of passion who did cause the carpenters nearly to despair of ever setting the piece to rights again.”
Linnea’s palm fairly itched to slap him. Every time he seemed close to becoming reasonably pleasant, he reverted to the crude behavior that seemed to be at the core of all young men.
“You do concern yourself overly much with your brother’s personal affairs. And mine.”
He shrugged, but his smile faded. He looked down at Maynard a long moment before returning his gaze to her. “If everything is mended between you and him, then that is good. But what if your brother dies? Will everything splinter apart once more?”
As if a cloud had passed unexpectedly over her, Linnea shivered. “I … I pray that he will recover.”
“Will he?”
Linnea bowed her head and closed her eyes. This boy was not the person she wished to confide her fears in. Yet the need to speak honestly with someone—anyone—was simply too overpowering to resist.
“I fear he is not long for this world,” she answered, all her fear trembling within her voice.
After a short silence he said, “I have lost two brothers to war. And my father as well. I am sorry for the grief you will endure.”
Linnea nodded. The lump that had risen in her throat made it impossible to speak. She’d lost far more than merely this brother who had never spared a thought for her feelings. Peter did not know that, of course, nevertheless his plain words were a comfort.
“But I must ask,” he continued. “How you will feel toward Axton when—if—your brother dies? Will everything remain mended between you, as you termed it? Or will the carpenters have to be summoned once more?”
Linnea raised a stricken face to him. His expression was serious. He wanted there to be peace at Maidenstone, she realized in that moment. He wanted her to be content in her marriage, and for the union of the de la Manse family with the de Valcourts to be successful.
How she wished it could be so!
But it could not. Not now. If only she had not interfered. If she had allowed Beatrix to marry Axton as he wished, the two families might have achieved a grudging peace. But that was impossible now. To confess her lie to Axton … She shuddered even to imagine his rage. What anger he did not take out on her he would surely transfer to poor Beatrix, were he ever given the chance. And beyond that, the perverse truth was that she could not now bear the thought of Axton sharing the same relations with Beatrix he’d shared with her. Had there ever been a woman so disloyal as she?
She compressed her lips tightly. No, there was no going back. And there could be no peace between her family and Axton’s.
“You do not answer,” Peter cut into her dismal thoughts. “Will your brother’s death destroy the fragile peace between you and Axton?”
Linnea looked at him—realty looked at him. He was not yet a man, but the day fast approached when he would be as formidable as Axton. He would be as fierce a foe also, and as loyal to his family.
She swallowed down all her regrets and forced herself to remember the role she had elected to play. “It will not be … easy to bury him, should it come to that. It will not be easy to forget who did strike the blow that felled him.” “I do not ask if you will forget, only if you will be able to put it in the past.”
“You mean forgive, don’t you? Can I forgive Axton for murdering my brother?” she said, becoming emotional despite her best effort not to be. She should not be in this terrible predicament. It was not fair.
“It was not murder, only the unfortunate realities of war. Can you forgive him?” he persisted, pushing her further.
Linnea turned abruptly away. To stay here with him as he explored and poked at the troubling emotions she’d rather keep hidden was to invite disaster. “I will find a way to cope. ’Tis what women have always done best, you know. Cope with the life that others choose for them.”
She paused at the opening in the heavy stone wall and looked back at Peter. He was strong and straight, and when compared to the dying Maynard, so incredibly alive. “Were it women who controlled the land, there would not be war. There would not be this eternal struggle for power and control and land and sotdiers—”
She broke off when her voice began to tremble. But before she could escape the boy’s presence, he caught her by the arm. He might be no taller than she, but his grip was strong and determined.
“I searched you out for a reason.”
“Then state it and leave me to … to mourn my brother in whatever peace I can find.”
“My mother arrives.”
Linnea went still. From struggling to control her churning emotions, she veered abruptly into a complete dearth of them.
Their mother, Axton’s and Peter’s. If she had been unsure of herself before, Linnea was tenfold more so now. Would the woman despise her on sight as her own family had despised Axton? Would she plot against her son’s wife in the same way the de Valcourt family plotted against their son-by-marriage?
“She is a good and kind woman.”
Linnea stared at Peter. “Good and kind enough to forgive the unfortunate realities of war?”
Peter frowned at her use of his own words. “This will not be an easy homecoming for her. But if you will resolve yourself to be patient and allow her time to settle her disquieting emotions …”
“Time to grieve for all that she has lost since she was last here. Is that what you mean?” Linnea shrugged off the hand he’d laid on her arm and stared blindly toward the deep window and the narrow slice of sky beyond it. The sky was gray, hiding the sun from view. It was better than if the sky were brilliant and the sun cheerful. This was not a day for cheer. No doubt she and Axton’s mother would agree on that one thing, if nothing else.
She took a steadying breath. “She is here now?”
“Her party arrives within the hour.” Then he added, “She will not treat you unkindly, Beatrix.”
As always, the use of her sister’s name jolted her into reality. She swallowed and straightened up. “I must see to her chamber and call for a tray—” She stopped and stared at him. “You don’t think Axton means also to deny
her
a room in the keep, do you?”
Peter grinned. “Axton may tower over her, but he knows better than to deny the Lady Mildred her due. If you like, I will relay a message to him that you do prepare your new mother-by-marriage a suitable welcome.”
Linnea nodded. She had known the woman was coming eventually. She should have been better prepared. She wasn’t though, and she doubted now whether she ever could have been adequately prepared to face her.
She owed Peter her gratitude for taking the time to forewarn her.
“Thank you,” she said to him, frowning a little, for she did not quite understand this boy. She’d hated him on sight, and he’d felt the same toward her, she was certain. But perversely enough, there were times when he seemed to be her only ally. “Thank you for giving me time to prepare myself.”
He stepped back a pace and turned so that she saw only his profile. “I did not do it for you, but for her,” he replied in a gruffer tone than before. Then he tilted his head and pinned her with a stare disturbingly similar to his brother’s. “I would not have her arrival made any harder than it necessarily will be. I would not want you to meet her as an adversary.”
We are adversaries, though. Adversaries in a battle none of you yet recognize.
But Linnea could not say that. Though it roiled like a sick knot in her stomach, she forced herself to nod acquiescence. “I will try to make myself agreeable to her.”
But she feared, as she hurried away, that making herself agreeable was a worse affront than clashing with the woman outright. No matter what she did now, there was wrong in it. She’d been wrong to start this terrible plan going and she made it worse with every turn she took.
The chain slid along her thigh, but this time she felt more clearly the small thickened birthmark on her calf. The sign of her sin, her grandmother had always called it.
Today it seemed to throb and remind her of that truth. She’d begun this terrible deception. Whether she abhorred the path she’d chosen could not matter to her. She must do as she’d promised, though it made her feel far worse a sinner than she’d ever felt before.
 
Where was he? Linnea scanned the bailey, searching for Axton. His tall, imposing form was generally easy to spot, but not this afternoon. He must be elsewhere, perhaps in the village. That left her with the full responsibility of welcoming his mother.
A chamber was already prepared. Fresh linens, a warm fire, and a fragrant bath even now awaited Lady Mildred. Pray God that she would prefer to retire to her chambers, rather than reacquaint herself with the castle or visit with her younger son in the hall, for good manners would demand that Linnea accompany her in those activities. Though Linnea had no experience whatsoever as lady of the castle, she’d observed her grandmother and also her sister. In the lord’s absence, all responsibility for a castle fell to his wife. Even if the duty was unpleasant, Linnea must rise to it.
Her eyes swept the bailey once more. Where was Peter?
Before she could locate him, the rattle of metal-shod horse hooves sounded from the bridge, and in a moment the yard filled with over a dozen mounted men and two stout wagons. The muddy yard was churned by the weary, circling cattle. One wagon forged on, separating from the others and only halting before the steps that led up into the keep.
Linnea sucked in a bracing breath. A hand parted the stretched canvas cover on the wagon and a woman’s face peered out.
She looked sad and exhausted. That was what first registered in Linnea’s mind. She had expected the woman to arrive triumphant and condescending. To see the apprehension on her face made Linnea reconsider, and in that moment she resolved to extend every kindness she could to this woman. No matter the troubling future that loomed so threateningly, Lady Mildred was a woman who had suffered much loss in her life. That she must lay the blame for it on Linnea and her family was not of primary importance now. This homecoming must be hard for her. Painful. Linnea would try not to add any further to that pain.

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