A Rose in Winter (42 page)

"Madam," he rasped in his hoarse voice, "you are a rare jewel, a rose among the briars, and with each day's passing you grow more beautiful."

Erienne halted before him and saw his eyes flicker downward, giving her cause to wonder if the gown fully displayed her bosom as it had when he had stood behind her chair on their wedding night. She remained pliable beneath his regard, knowing that any attempt to cover herself would only stir his mockery.

"I once said your beauty needs no adornment, madam, and though I am still of that mind, I think a small bauble would not detract overmuch." He withdrew his arm from behind his back and dangled a heavily jeweled necklace before her eyes. "You would honor me if you would wear it, my love."

He looked up expectantly, holding the magnificent piece, and Erienne realized he was waiting for permission to put it on her. She nodded hesitantly, uncertain as to how long she could bear his touch against her bare skin. His hands slipped behind her neck, dragging the emerald and diamond necklace around the slender column. Inclining her head toward him, she waited with thumping heart as he tried to secure the clasp.

"Can you fasten it with your gloves on?" she murmured.

"Hold still a moment," he bade huskily and behind her back drew off first one glove and then the other. Erienne held her breath until his bare fingers touched her, then she almost sagged against him in relief. They were warm, human, masculinely firm.

A faint essence of a clean, manly scent wafted up from his clothing, stirring forth confused memories from the back of her mind and touching her with a strange sense of pleasure. Her mind groped feebly for the logic of the sensation, but the only memory she could recall with any clarity was that first moment when she had found herself in his bed after her fall from Socrates.

The clasp of the necklace was fastened with a barely audible clink, and Erienne, expecting him to step away, was startled to feel his fingers on her back again, this time caressing her bare skin with soft strokes. Slowly she turned her head to look up into his masked face, and the eyes behind the small openings met her inquiring gaze.

"My hands have trembled at the thought of touching you," he whispered raggedly. "But I may have erred in doing so."

Delicately shaped brows lifted in mute question.

"From this moment on, the temptation may prove too hard to resist. Having touched you, I only want you more." He paused, then sighed heavily, seeming to fight an inner battle within himself. When he continued, his words were strained and halting. "Have I been a fool in taking you to wife, Erienne? Perhaps you will only continue to hate me or find another you prefer. Maybe I've been unfair to both of us and it was my own brand of cruel jealousy that could not bear to let you go."

"I entered into the vows with full knowledge and a will to see them out, milord. You are my husband, and I only beg some time to bring my mind to full harness. You understand well enough that there is a barrier between us. My fears are as difficult to me as your scars are to you, but in time perhaps both will cease to be the obstacles that keep us apart. If you will wait upon my adjustment, I have it in my heart and mind to be nothing less than a good wife to you ... in every way."

His hand, as if on its own volition, came upward from her back and hovered out of range of her vision, as if he yearned to caress her cheek but fought against the urge. After a moment's pause, he dropped it over her shoulder again. Behind her back, she could feel him jerking on his gloves, and on impulse she laid a palm against his chest, finding it firmly muscled beneath the crispness of his shirt.

"You see, milord? I can touch you now, and it does not cause me to shudder."

Carefully, so as not to alarm her, he raised his gloved hand and gently rubbed his knuckles along her cheek. "My dear Erienne, beneath this twisted exterior there beats a human heart quite warmed by your beauty. Tis painful for me to wait, but I will endure anything knowing there is hope."

He straightened, and in a courtly gesture offered his arm. "Madam, you must be famished, and I have a great need of a chilly hall to take my mind from the craving lusts that gnaw at me."

With a laugh, Erienne dropped a slim hand on the dark sleeve. "Perhaps I should be the one to wear the mask, milord, or at least a few more clothes."

"If I had my way, there'd be less of the latter," he replied as his eyes dipped to where the largest of the emeralds nestled coyly between the ripely swelling breasts. "But I should keep in mind that there are servants to consider."

Self-consciously she fingered the heavy necklace, aware of his devouring gaze. "When you look at me like that, I feel as if there is a definite dearth of the latter."

Her husband responded with a wry chuckle. "Madam, if looking is a hanging offense, then I'd rather fulfill every facet of my desire and be strung up for a lion than a lamb. I am most anxious to claim my husbandly rights, so if I misread your distaste of me and overwait the moment, be sure to inform me of that fact, and I shall most eagerly respond."

She sensed the smile that must have touched his lips as he stared down at her, and her cheeks grew flushed beneath his unwavering regard. She glanced away, drawing a soft laugh from the dark mask, and his other hand, coming to rest upon her own, squeezed her fingers affectionately.

Erienne knew she was dreaming. She saw her own dark curls as she knelt in rapt attention beside her mother, who was seated at the harpsichord, playing, as was her wont, for the children. The impossibility of this awakened Erienne, and she lay without moving, totally confused, for the twanging tones of a harpsichord still floated eerily through the manse, drifting up from below. The instrument was out of tune, and the notes were struck with such force and intensity that the back of her neck crawled. She could almost feel the rage conveyed in the music.

Several moments passed before she recognized the melody. It was an olden aire, and the words taunted her with their bitter poignancy, drifting through her mind with the haunting refrain, "Alas, my love, you do me wrong to cast me off so discourteously."

Erienne rose from the bed and quickly donned her dressing gown. She could not remember having seen a harpsichord in the house, but there were many rooms still unused, and she had not yet lifted every dust cover to view its treasure.

Following the sound of the violent chords, she was led to a wing where the house had not yet been made habitable. Once in the hall, a soft light guided her to where a door stood ajar, and she carefully pushed it wide. A tall candelabrum sat on a small table in the middle of the room, its yellowed stumps of candles providing the light that had drawn her. The nape of her neck crawled again. The furniture was still draped with the heavy dust cloths, except for one piece sitting across the room, and there the covering had been thrown back. Seated before the keyboard half facing her, head and shoulders mercifully masked in shadows, was the silhouette of a man. The leather helm and black gloves were cast aside on the mantel of the harpsichord, and she could see the wildly tossed hair that must have grown in patchwork locks between scars. He almost attacked the instrument, seeming to rip the notes from it as he vented his frustration with the world at large and, Erienne feared, with her in particular.

As if with a will of their own, her feet moved forward, slowly, haltingly, then of a sudden the music stopped, dying off in an unmelodious chord as the man's head jerked up. The eyes, she thought, gleamed with a half-mad feral glint.

"Lord Saxton?" she queried in a breathless whisper.

"Stand back!" The command was coarse and harsh. "Come no closer lest your sanity depart you, woman."

Erienne halted as his tone brooked no disobedience and realized for the first time that she had left her slippers upstairs. The stone floor was cold beneath her feet, and it sent a chill creeping up her limbs.

Lord Saxton snatched the gloves and hid his hands while he donned them, then he grasped the leather helm and tugged it down, pulling the collar of his robe snug around the base, ignoring the laces that tightened the mask. He braced his hands wide apart on the mantel as he asked, "Do you play?"

Erienne laughed. "Once upon a time, milord, but then only a few simple pieces, certainly nothing with the emotion you display."

With a heavy sigh, he waved a hand in a gesture of impatience. "I can't seem to make it come out right anymore."

"You have too much anger in you," she said softly.

He scoffed. "Are you in addition to your beauty a seer of the ages that you can read me so openly?"

For the first time Erienne felt as if she could understand a small part of him. "No, milord, but I have known grief and anger and hatred, and I have seen them in others around me. Indeed...Stuart"—his name did not come easily in his presence—"I have known precious little else these past couple of years. My mother was the only one to express love to me, and she is many months gone. Though you wear the mask, I can see in you many of those emotions ... and they frighten me."

"They needn't. I mean no harm to you."

Her gaze lowered, and she half turned to stare into the darkness. "However scarred your body might be, I realize that your soul suffers far more, and because of this, I pity you."

He gave a snort of derision. "I urge you to save your pity for a more deserving soul, madam. 'Tis the last thing I want from you."

"Stuart..."

"And I would urge you, madam, to have a care when addressing me. The use of my given name in public could bring about your widowhood in a most untimely manner."

"I will be careful, milord." She moved forward, glancing about the room in curiosity. "Would this be the music room?"

" 'Twas my father's study. He doted on his lady's skill with this."

"You seem to know the manor well."

"Why do you say that, my love?"

"I have wandered about this place for several days," she answered softly, "but I found no harpsichord."

"I am a normal man in the guise of a beast. While you dream upon your pillows, madam, I am pierced with visions of the one my heart would have, and I roam this house in agony. Whatever distractions I find here, I welcome."

"I do not begrudge you anything, Stuart," she said gently.

He rose and with that odd hitching gait, came to stand close before her. "Madam, you would hide in your chambers, trembling with fear, if you knew the full weight of that emotion I now hold in check."

Slowly he lifted a hand, and Erienne fought the urge to flee as he reached out to cup her breast. Her whole body trembled beneath his touch, and it took all of her resolve to stand quietly while his thumb caressed the soft peak. Then his arm slipped about her slender waist as if to draw her toward him, and she broke, twisting out of his embrace, and was gone, flying in sudden panic through the house, never pausing until she was again in her chamber. Gasping for breath and with weak knees trembling beneath her, she rested her back against that solid-paneled door which, though unbolted, had protected her thus far, and from far below came the hollow echo of rasping, mocking laughter.

Chapter Fourteen

THE night was cold and crystal clear. The stars twinkled with a brilliance of their own. With the crisp air, the light snow cover squeaked beneath the feet, and one had to tread softly to pass through the night unheard.

In a small valley near the top of a swelling moor, a camp had been laid, and it bore a feeling of permanency. Lanterns were lit, and a half-score tents were banked with straw and dead leaves as added protection against the cold. At the far end of the valley a shallow cave was stacked with powder kegs, wooden boxes, and other supplies. Near one side of it, a series of rope stalls held more than a dozen horses. In the center of the camp a pair of heavily garbed men half squatted on logs beside a fire.

"Poor ol' Timmy," one sighed. " 'At night rider took him, he did. Skewered him right through the gizzard, then slit his throat."

"Aye," the other agreed, nodding his head before he sucked at a small earthen cup of ale. " 'At blackhearted whelp o' the devil's runnin' too close for comfort. 'At ol' widder woman, she says as how she saw the night rider not more'n two or three miles south o' here."

"The cap'n better be findin' us another hideout. In a trade the likes o' this, Luddie, 'tain't wise ter keep chambers too long in one spot."

"Aye, we've got enough fer a foin spree. Even figgerin' what Timmy took ter lay off on his doxie, 'twould fetch us a high time in Carlisle. Remember, Orton, 'at low street tavern? An' 'at sweet plumpy, red-haired wench what serviced the rooms?"

Orton surveyed the high stone cliffs that surrounded them, then stood up and stamped his numb feet. He jerked his head toward the dark-shadowed opening that marked the entrance to the hidden vale. " 'Oo's on lookout?"

Luddie huddled beneath his dark cloak. "John Turner's out there. He'll be comin' in near midnight and wake ol' Clyde."

"Then I'll be turnin' in," Orton stated, tossing a large log on the fire. Stomping off, he entered one of the tents and soon doused the light.

Luddie watched for a while, then shivered and went to his own tent. The camp grew quiet. The lamps went out one by one, and soon the only light came from the dimmed lantern hanging from the stable cave and the flickering fire. The multitude of snores grew loud, and no one heard the distant grunt as John Turner was struck from behind. A rope swished in the still night air as it sailed over a stout branch of a tall tree. The limp form was dragged up feet first, and in the gentle breezes he swung like a pendulum with the creaking of the branch to mark the passing of time.