Lady At Arms (11 page)

His speech might be as fine as his clothes, but he remained the villain of four years past who had pillaged and wounded and murdered.

And yet you lie untouched when there is naught to prevent him from stealing your virtue. Indeed, he has not so much as raised a hand against you when none of his men would think it untoward for him to beat you.

“Quiet,” she whispered. And winced.

But though Wardieu surely heard, he said naught.

For what seemed hours, she lay unmoving and listened to his breathing, but it never changed—as if he were also awake. Only when the candle went out, taking with it the small measure of comfort, did she close her eyes.

It was growing light when Lizanne opened an eye and peered at her shadowy surroundings. She sighed and turned her face into what should have been a pillow but was not. Raising her head, she frowned at what appeared to be the ground. She scraped her fingers across it and confirmed it was, indeed, dirt upon which she had made her bed. Why? And how?

Memories of the night past returning in a rush, she looked to the left and saw her empty pallet. To the right, Ranulf Wardieu slept on his own pallet, the five feet that had separated them reduced to two.

Had she truly forced him to take up the rope’s slack to such an extent? More, how had she slept through it?

Mayhap the same way he now sleeps through your awakening.

Had his watch over her through the night so exhausted him? Or 
did
 he sleep? She studied his face that seemed less familiar than before. His chiseled features appeared softer, hard mouth fuller, lips retracted slightly to reveal even white teeth.

She frowned as something tugged at her memory, allowed a frustrating glimpse, and receded. What was it?

Squeezing her eyes closed, she tried to retrace her thoughts, but the answer was gone. When she looked again at the man who was too near for comfort, it struck her that he had kept his word that he would not violate her. The enemy she had known would suffer no remorse in breaking his vow. He would not even have given his word in the first place. Had Ranulf Wardieu truly changed? If so, what force was so great it could turn a man from a path as evil as his? Faith?

It did not matter. What mattered was that he slept and she did not. Of course, neither did those outside the tent sleep, the sounds of their stirring growing louder.

Though this was not the time to attempt another escape, it did not mean she could not put distance between herself and Wardieu. Five feet was hardly acceptable, but two?

Slowly, she raised herself and eyed the rope around her waist. It was not taut, but neither was it slack. She followed it to where it looped several times around Wardieu’s hand. When had he last moved to draw her near?

Again, it did not matter.

Careful to disturb the rope as little as possible, she eased onto her side and pushed up to sitting. She considered the knots Wardieu had tied, reached up, and traced them. They were tight and would not easily be loosened, but—

“Once again you test me.”

Lizanne yelped and jerked back, but gained only inches before the rope stretched tight.

“What was your plan this time?” Wardieu asked in a voice not fully shed of sleep.

Suppressing the urge to slap a hand to her heart, she met his gaze. “I but wished to return to my pallet.”

He sat up, and when the blanket fell away, she was relieved to see he not only wore an undertunic but chausses. “I am to believe you, Lizanne Balmaine?”

“’Tis not my custom to be dragged through the dirt, nor to sleep in it!”

“I took up the slack as I warned you I would. Unfortunate for you, it seems you are a restless sleeper.”

She stiffened. Had she been visited by a nightmare? She did not remember having had one, but if so, had she cried out and jabbered as her maid, Mellie, told she was wont to do? Had she revealed anything about that terrible night?

She searched Wardieu’s face, but it was unreadable. Forcing herself to relax against the straining rope, she shrugged. “Mayhap I was merely working trickery on you.”

He raised his eyebrows. “I considered that, but you were unawares.”

“That is what you think.”

“That is what I know. Twice, near thrice”—he jutted his chin at where she sat in the dirt—“you were close enough that I was tempted to pull you into my bed that I might gain more sleep.”

Lizanne caught her breath.

“But”—

She did not like the slant of his smile.

—“there was also the possibility I would gain even less sleep with you in my bed.”

Meaning he would have ravished her. He had not changed, after all.

“Therefore, both times I carried you to your pallet.”

She startled. Did he lie? It was difficult enough to believe she had slept through the pulls of the rope, but that she had not known his arms were around her?

“And,” he continued, “on neither occasion did you object. Indeed, you were most receptive to my embrace.”

“Indeed not!” Lizanne burst. “Though I yield that I may have been unawares when you returned me to my pallet, I would 
never 
be receptive to you.”

He released the rope he had wound around his hand and shrugged. “Then I know you better than you know yourself.”

She struggled against anger that aspired to outrage, fearful of how far it might push him. After all, they were both clad in little more than undergarments.

Determined she would not further fuel the fire, Lizanne sealed her lips and lowered her gaze.

She felt Wardieu’s stare, but finally he rose from his pallet and she heard the crack of his stiff joints.

“In one thing you spoke true,” he said.

When he did not elaborate, she hurried her gaze to his to avoid looking too near upon the rest of him. “More than one thing, but to what do
you
refer?”

“That you would not make it easy to hold you.”

As evidenced by the fatigue written in the lines of his face. “And still I will not.”

He considered her, nodded, and thrust out a hand. “We must make ready to depart.”

Lizanne ignored his offer and started to rise, but he closed his fingers around her arm and pulled her to her feet. To her surprise, he immediately released her. To her further surprise, he grasped the rope at her waist and began to free the knots.

Staring at his bent head, she struggled to suppress her response to each brush of his fingers across her midriff for fear he would misinterpret any quake or tremble. However, when he dropped the rope from her waist, she could not keep her breath from coming out in a rush.

Wardieu lifted his head. “For someone who professes to loathe me, I am surprised I should so deeply affect you.”

Though there was nothing holding her to him now, she could not move. “You affect me only insomuch as I do not like you near.”

“You are certain?”

“I am.”

His gaze fell to her mouth, and once again she could not breathe. “Should we test if you are, indeed, receptive to me?”

It had to be a game he played, advancing one moment, retreating the next, looking for the right moment to pounce. It made her want to scream—and gave her back her breath. “If you intend to ravish me,” she hissed, “pray have done with it that I might sooner return home.”

Her words doused the amusement in which Ranulf had foolishly indulged. “Ravish?” he bit.

She stared at him out of eyes that had gone so dark they could no longer be called green. “‘Tis the only way you will ever know me, for I care not what your men think of you. I will not come willingly to your bed. I will not be your leman.”

“I would never take a woman by force,” he growled.

Her laughter was cold. “Would you not?”

Once again distrusting himself so near her, he took a step back. “I would know the reason you think so ill of me.”

As if she could breathe more easily with the added space between them, her rigid shoulders eased. “I can say only that you have given me good cause.”

Lord, grant me patience! 
“And I am to defend myself knowing only that?”

She raised her chin. “I have not asked you to defend yourself, for you can have no defense that will satisfy me.”

Denied his request for patience, Ranulf took back the step he had allowed and looked down upon her. “Tell me of that first meeting, the one you spoke of when you held me at Penforke.”

She looked up. “I will not, but this I shall tell you—I would rather slip a blade between your ribs than suffer your touch.”

Ranulf would have liked to laugh, but his insides were too tightly wound. “I know it, just as I know you could no more do it than you could cut me down when you had me at sword’s end.”

She opened her mouth as if to deny her lack of resolve, closed her mouth, and averted her gaze. “I should have cut you down,” she whispered.

“And yet, you could not. What does that tell you, Lizanne?”

Slowly, she shook her head.

Hoping he might finally reach her, he said, “You are not entirely certain I am guilty of whatever sins you have laid at my door.”

When she did not respond, he curved a hand beneath her chin and lifted it. “What do you see when you look at me?”

She searched his face. “I…” She raised her gaze to his hair and frowned. A moment later, she jerked her chin free. “I fear you would not be pleased by my observation.”

And so they were back to where they had started.

“I will discover what you hide from me,” Ranulf said and strode past her.

“My secrets are my own,” she called after him. “I share them only with those I choose. I do not choose 
you
, Ranulf Wardieu.”

He turned. “I weary of your mockery. Henceforth, you will address me as ‘my lord,’ for that I am now. Do you understand?”

She glared. “’Tis not a matter of understanding but of compliance, and I am hardly of a mind to comply.”

He knew he ought to let her defiance pass but could not. However, as he once more moved toward her, she sprang to the side, skirted him, and darted toward the tent flap. He could have lunged and caught her before she slipped outside, but reason prevailed and he let her go.

At his leisure, he stepped from the tent.

She had not gone far. Ranulf’s men, who had paused in the dismantling of camp, gawked at the barely clothed woman in their midst.

Dawn’s light falling softly around her, Lizanne stood unmoving with her arms crossed over her chest. And there was Geoff, bearing a tray surely meant for his lord, his jaw nearly upon his chest.

Ranulf turned a hand around her arm. “Methinks you have forgotten something,” he said. He drew her back into the tent, led her to her pallet, and pushed her down onto it. Though he intended to berate her for behaving without a thought for modesty, he saw tears in her eyes before she lowered her chin.

Frustration at finding her escape thwarted was what he expected, not…

What? Mortification over her state of undress? Was she truly so troubled? Regardless, it was of her own doing.

“That was not well thought out,” he said and reached for a blanket.

“’Twas not thought out at all,” she muttered. “I am sorry.”

He paused. An apology was the last thing he expected from a woman who wielded weapons and challenged men to duels. Would he ever make sense of her? And why did he care?

He draped the blanket over her shoulders, and she gripped the edges and clasped them closed.

Shaking his head, Ranulf crossed to the tent opening and beckoned Geoff inside.

“Greetings, my lord.” His face yet flushed from his unexpected encounter with Lizanne, the young squire kept his gaze turned from her as he carried his burden across the tent. Deftly, he removed last night’s supper tray and replaced it with the smaller one.

Ranulf retrieved the belt and dagger Lizanne had taken from his squire and handed them to the blushing young man before sending him on his way. When he turned back, he saw that Lizanne stared at the food. Meaning she was coming back to herself.

Though he sensed she would be easier to handle in her shaken state, he was strangely relieved by her return.

He broke off a piece of bread, grabbed a small apple, and returned to her pallet.

She accepted his offering. “Thank you.”

And still she was civil. Of course, it could not last. As she bit into the apple, he turned and crossed to the chest. Though it was Geoff’s duty to keep the contents in order and to make ready the garments his lord wore, it seemed the squire had been remiss. After some rummaging, Ranulf extricated a clean undertunic, tunic, braies, and chausses. And became aware of the silence at his back.

He looked over his shoulder. Lizanne leaned forward, gaze intent on the chest, though only for that moment before she realized she was watched.

“You will find naught in here to 
slip 
between my ribs,” he warned.

She shrugged and took another bite of the apple.

Ranulf lowered the lid, dropped the clean garments atop it, and whipped off the undertunic he had slept in.

As he reached for the fresh undertunic, he heard a terrible wheezing. He turned and found Lizanne bent forward, a hand to her throat.

In three strides, he was beside her. He wrenched her upright, spun her about, and thumped her on the back.

She wheezed, coughed, coughed again, and expelled a piece of apple.

Drawing a deep breath, she straightened and looked over her shoulder. “Bad apple,” she said and smiled.

Ranulf nearly informed her he saw no humor in the situation but that smile dispelled all thoughts of a reprimand. It lit her face, turning her eyes a shade of green shot through with gold, bringing a glow to her cheeks, curving her mouth into a bow that showed pearly teeth, and revealing for the first time a single dimple in her left cheek. He was mesmerized. Who would guess that such a canted smile could be so lovely and captivating?

“I would have you smile more often,” he murmured and reached up and touched the indentation.

She startled, and when her eyes shifted to his bare shoulder, he heard her breath catch as it must have done when he had removed the dirty undertunic—hence, the apple she had sucked into her airway.