A Knight in Tarnished Armor (9 page)

But when he pulled back the flaps and she saw all the pillows—stacks of pillows to replace the ones she had lost to the rain, she threw herself into his arms and cried.

He stiffened. "Why are you crying? I had thought to please you."

She sniffled. "You did. You do."

His look was so intent that her breath caught.

"I'll leave you to sleep," he said, then pulled back the flap on the tent. She stopped him with a hand on his arm. "Where are you going to sleep?"

"Outside," he said gruffly. He still wore the mail shirt and other light armor he'd bought.

"This is marshland. There's fog on the damp ground. You'll tarnish your armor."

He gave her a long look, then rubbed his finger over her jaw and across her lips. He tucked a knuckle under her chin and said, "If I stay in here, I think I'll tarnish more than my armor."

She closed her eyes, knowing this decision was hers. She opened them and looked at him. "‘Tis midsummer's eve."

"I know," was all he said.

"A time for magical things to happen."

"Aye."

The silence hung between them. Finally he started to leave.

"William!"

He turned back.

She took a deep breath, then whispered, "I love you."
A moment later she was in his arms, his mouth on hers, a
nd he lifted her off the ground.

"Linnet," he murmured. "M
y sweet bird, Linnet. God, how I want you."

He laid her back in the pillows and joined her. Their clothes fell away, slowly, leaving time to savor each discovery, each soft new touch, each whisper of love against her skin, against his ear. Her name was a prayer on his lips, his name a promise as yet unfulfilled.

For long moments h
e would just look at her and she had
never felt so cherished in her life. When he touched her and kissed her, he did so as if it were the most important thing he had ever done. He used his tongue deeply in her mouth and taught her how to respond, how to touch him. He loved her breasts, her belly and lower with his lips and mouth and sent her to the stars more times than she could imagine. He kissed and stroked her feet and legs, and in between until she was hoarse from crying out.

She wanted William, wanted to spend every moment with him, wanted this powerful loving between them to last forever. She told him, the moment he entered her, after the pain that made her gasp. And as soon as she spoke the words she could have sworn there were tears in his eyes.

He taught her loving, taught her caring, taught her tenderness and patience and spent eternal moments to assure her pleasure. ‘Twas the most profound moment in her lifetime when she cried out and his life poured into her.

And when their breath slowed and their bodies cooled, he wrapped her hair around them and brought his lips to her ear. "You have sunset in your hair, my love. Sunset."

She smiled. "Does that mean it's going to rain?"

He laughed, a sound that was deep in his chest, but they were so close she felt the sound keenly. "That is why I purchased the tent."

"I adore the tent. But I miss the stars. These past nights at the inns were lonely, William. I missed the sound of your breath and the stars above us."

He rose from their bed and grabbed his sword. In a flash he cut a square flap in the top of the tent. Then completely naked, he bowed, "Your stars, milady."

And it was her turn to cry.

They arrived at the abbey late the next afternoon, and a rather sorry caravan they were with the tether of pack mules, twenty-six cats, five rabbits, and two ducks. But William and Linnet cared not, for they rode on the same horse, stopping every so often to exchange kisses and lingering looks of love.

Once a proud castle that guarded the borderlands, St. Lawrence Abbey was perched atop a lush and green English hillside. Guards with crossbows no longer stood sentinel at the battlements. The only things on those crenellated walls were doves cooing at the sunshine and a trumpeter who heralded arrivals.

Now those who came to the abbey sought succor not from men and arms, or marauding barbarians, but from nuns skilled in healing the body, the mind, and the spirit. Ducks and swans floated in the waters of the moat and sheep grazed fields. The armory, built for pounding out weapons and mail, was now just a building used for drying herbs and brewing medicinals. Lush ivy and tansy threaded with pale roses meandered up an iron trellis on the castle tower that was no longer a stronghold, but a peaceful place to find strength of mind.

William and Linnet rode through the curtain wall gates and reined in before the massive abbey doors just as matins were chiming. He dismounted and helped Linnet down, pausing to hold her for a moment longer than necessary.

The abbey doors flew open and a bevy of dark-garbed nuns trotted down the stone steps
.

"Linnet!"

She turned in William's arms and laughed, then ran to a tall and regal-looking woman. "Aunt Bess!"

Just then another person came down the steps.

"Grandpapa?
"

William went as still as stone. His angry gaze met Arden's. Slowly he walked toward the steps until he faced the earl. The tension grew thick and hung like fog in the air. Slowly, the other voices tapered off.

"Arden," William snapped.

"Warbrooke."

"Warbrooke?" Linnet repeated. She spun around and looked at William. "Baron Warbrooke?"

He nodded.

There was a moment of puzzled silence as she looked from him to her grandfather, then back to him. Her face fell and he could see her reaction. "You are not William de Ros?"

"I am William de Ros, Baron Warbrooke."

"How could you? How could you do this? Am I nothing but a foolish woman to you that you would play such a cruel trick?" She looked back. "And Grandpapa? You knew?"

He nodded tightly.

"Why?"

"I had no choice, Linnet. "I had your welfare at heart."

"Ha!" William shouted. "You didn't want me to have her, old man."

Arden cursed and charged. His fist hit William square in the chin and flattened him to the ground. "She's mine!"

"Bloody hell, she is!" William roared up and tackled Arden. They rolled in the dirt, punching and shouting, calling each other names that should have never been spoken on the grounds of an abbey.

Arden jumped to his feet and so did William. "1 granted you that week alone with her!"

"Y
ou sent those knights," William
gritted.

Arden wiped his mouth, panting. "They had instructions not to kill you."

Linnet gasped.

William saw red and flew at him. They tumbled again each trying to get to the other. Arden straddled him and had his hands about William's throat while he shouted.

"Stop!" Linnet screamed. "Stop!"

A wall of water hit them both. Arden released him and coughed. William shook the water from his head and stared at her. She tossed a water bucket on the ground and glared down at them. "I'm not yours, Grandpapa."

William grinned.

"And you can wipe that fool’s smile off your face Baron Warbrooke because I'm not yours either!" Tears fell from her eyes like blood from a deep wound. "I'm not some piece of land for the both of you to wage war over! I don't belong to either of you! Do you hear me?”

Both men stared at her in dumbfounded silence.

"And you can cease your fighting because neither of you will win this battle. I'm not going with either of you. Do you hear me? Neither of you! I'm going to become a nun!" And with that pronouncement she burst into sobs and ran inside the abbey.

William watched the door close behind her and stared at it. He swiped at his bloody mouth with the back of hand. And he felt more alone at that moment than he had ever felt in his hard and solitary life.

"Come, come, my dear. Stop your crying."

Linnet looked up at her aunt through a mist of tears. "I shall become a nun, Aunt. I shall."

"Tell me why would you want to become a nun?"

She wiped her tears. "Because there are no men in a convent."

"Aye, dear one. That is a high point," her aunt said wryly. "You have no idea how very many women feel the same."

Linnet snorted, then said, "The more men I meet, the more I understand."

Her aunt smiled, then her face grew serious. "I'm most concerned with your happiness."

"I could be happy here." She could be happy here. Someday. If she could forget.

"I think, Linnet, that you could be happy anywhere. And I'd love to have you near me, but then if I let you do this I'd be as guilty of coveting your company as my foolish brother and the Baron Warbrooke."

"But I want to be a nun."

Her aunt gave her a long and assessing look. "Could you spend the rest of your life wedded only to God?"

Linnet's gaze dropped to her hands.

"Devoted to Him with all your heart and soul?"

Her heart belonged to William. She had given it to him on a magical midsummer's eve. She sighed. "No. My heart is no longer mine to give."

Her aunt reached a gentle hand and tilted her head up. "I thought as much. The Baron Warbrooke?"

She nodded.

"Can you not find it in your heart to forgive him?"

"He lied to me and played me for a fool. I loved him." She raised her chin. "I have my pride." She paused, then added, "And there is Grandpapa too. How could he do that to me?"

"Your grandfather has always acted before he thought. Old fool. But he loves you. More than any other member of his family. I think perhaps he only wanted to keep you safe. Did he not tell you of the vow he made to your mother?"

She shook her head.

"He is a prideful old fool," she muttered. "He promised her, when you were born, the day she died, that he would never force you to wed. You see, he had forced her, and for all that she loved your sisters and wanted you, she was never happy. He always blamed himself for your mother's death. I think he tried to protect you."

Linnet thought about how her grandfather would deal with his feelings of guilt. Not very well.

Her aunt rose from her chair and said, "You need some time alone. Search your heart and see if you cannot understand why these men act like such fools. Pray. Ask God to help you, my dear. Ask Him to help you forgive."

So you think she t
ruly has given up the idea of joining the convent
?"

"Bess seems to think so." The earl of Arden raised his fifth tankard and leveled a stare at William. He drank deeply before he said, "I don't understand why Linnet is so angry."

William frowned into his mug. "Court a woman. God's teeth, I'm a warrior not a courtier." He was quiet, thinking of all he had done wrong. In a weak moment he began to sing Greensleeves.

The earl dropped his ale and slammed his hands over his ears. "Cease, Warbrooke! Bloodying my nose was enough torture for one day!"

"Can't sing," William declared.

The earl shook his head, then pounded the heel of his hand against an ear.

"I should have written poetry for her," William murmured.

The earl was concentrating on pouring another round and spoke as if William hadn't. "I only wanted to keep her safe and happy. Couldn't she see that she would have to bend to a husband's will? I wanted to keep her happy and free. She is my sunlight."

"I don't kill women and eat children. She bloody well knows my feet aren't cloven."

The earl's eyes narrowed. "How does she know that?"

"Don't ask, Arden. You would just try to choke the breath from my lungs again, and I'd have to break your arm this time. God only knows how she would react if I did so."

"Aye." The earl gently touched his swollen eye and winced. "Never in all her eighteen years has my little Linnet been angry at me."

"She has the patience of a saint."

Arden scowled and tipped his tankard for a large drink, then said, "She must have a wealth of patience. She spent a week with you."

"I'm an ass," William admitted.

"Aye, that you are," Arden agreed. "But a damned fine and determined ass. I had to hire four different knights. They refused to take you on a second time."

"Me or Swithun?"

Arden shuddered. "Don't remind me of that cat. Bites me at least once a day."

Both men exchanged identical looks, then Arden laughed. "If it weren't for Linnet, Warbrooke, I might take occasion to call you friend."

William rubbed his bruised chin and winced. "Aye. You're quick for an old man."

"Who is old?" Arden frowned and puffed out his chest. "I'm as strong as I was when we stopped the Welsh uprising! And the third crusade was a . . ." He raised his fingers and tried to snap them. He couldn't do it. Frowning, he took another drink, then belched. He tapped his chest with a fist. "That's better. Now where was I?"