Love's Magic (19 page)

“On a rock.”

“A rock?” Was she that naïve? Didn’t she know she could have been eaten by a bear? Or killed by marauders? Fear, more than anything else, drove him to raise his voice. “Were you born daft, or do you just try exceptionally hard?”

Her chin snapped up. “As a reminder, my lord, I happened to be upset over burning your arm. I can see now that I shouldn’t have worried. May I touch your tongue next? Mayhap the nasty thing will fall off!”

Her temper fanned his own. “Are you not even one whit sorry that you had us all worried while you lay like some princess in a fairy tale, lounging in the forest? Do

you not understand what could have happened to you?”

She gave him a sly look and stood on shaking legs before him. She pulled the arrow from her pocket in triumph and shook it under his nose. “Aye, I ken quite well understand what could have happened whilst I was sleeping, my lord. I could have been killed. And where were you, pray tell? Finishing all of your knightly duties so that you can abandon me in your moldering keep without guilt?”

He gritted his teeth.

“I knew it!” She glared at him.

“You are too quick for anyone’s good, Lady Celestia. My life would be less complicated if you were …” he searched for the perfect word that she couldn’t use against him.

“Idiotic? Sheep-brained? Dull-witted?”

He sighed in exasperation and plucked a blade of grass from her tangled hair. “Aye, any of those would suffice.” He held up a single digit before she sliced him yet again with the sharp side of her tongue.

“But since you are none of those things, I suggest that we talk about our future—like two reasonable adults.”

“Ha!” Celestia crossed her arms and stared at him in disbelief. “I’m quite reasonable, but I have serious doubts where you are concerned. If you can give me one good, sensible reason for leaving me behind, then I might listen. But I get nothing from you except that you seem to think it is for my own good.” She stuck her fist on her hip. “That’s very condescending, Nicholas, and I won’t have it.”

“It is for your own good,” he said, wanting her to understand.

“You’re afraid of our desire. Why? That it might lead to caring? Or, God forbid, love? Are you pledged to another?” She fired accusations one after the next, a tiny, righteous cannon, with him as the target.

“Nay!” he shouted, and then winced as his voice boomed around them in the ravine. “There is no other, damn you.”

Petyr’s voice yelled down, “I am most pleased that you have found the missing lady, Lord Nicholas. Might I mention though, that I, along with the rest of the forest, can hear every word that you both are saying? Whilst we would like to listen, we are growing tired. Perhaps you can argue while we walk back to the keep?”

“Oh!” Celestia’s hands flew to her cheeks in mortification. “Why didn’t you tell me we were not alone?”

Nicholas exhaled and slapped his knee in disbelief. “So now this is my fault?”

“Aye!”

Nicholas was in awe as she stomped toward Petyr’s voice, taking steps as large as his own. He hurriedly offered his assistance to regain the hill, but he was not surprised when she refused his help. Instead, she grabbed a handful of wild grass and pulled herself up, as nimble as a mountain goat.

Nicholas, once again openmouthed, could do nothing but follow, ready to catch her if she fell.

She didn’t.

Two solid days of raining misery did little to endear Nicholas’s childhood home to her heart. Not that she was speaking to him—if she was going to lose her touch, so be it, but she was not going to hand her pride over on a gilded platter, as well.

“I never realized how much I would miss home. All it ever does here is spit water. The sun hides its face in shame, more the pity.” She knew she sounded churlish, and so attempted a smile that made her maids laugh. “I wish I could have gone hunting with the men.”

“It’s not that bad, being the lady of the keep, is it?” Viola bit off a piece of thread and tied the end in a knot. “I fancy a nice roasted lamb, with a neat mint jelly.” Her brown eyes grew dreamy, and she licked her lips.

Bess giggled. “It’s been too wet to even fish the stream, oh, anything hot and fresh. I’m tired of pottage and pickled herring.”

Watching Bess put the finishing touches on a lace drapery, Celestia agreed. “We shouldn’t complain, I know, for at least we have a not-so-leaky roof over our heads in this miserable weather. Still,” she shrugged her shoulder, “‘tis hard to remember our blessings. Being a lady of nothing is just that.”

“I even miss Father Harold.”

“Bess! That cantankerous old priest?” Celestia cupped a hand around her ear and glowered as she mimicked the elderly man. “What was that you say? Eh?

Celestia, I told you not to climb trees—when God wants you, he will come to you. I saw you pilfer that hot bun, Celestia. Do you think God wants a thief in his kingdom?” She leaned over as if her back were crooked and shouted, “Seven Hail Mary’s and no meat for a fortnight, young sinner!”

“‘Tis true,” Viola said with a smile, “that you vexed the poor man terribly, ‘Tia. Thank the Lord above that Father Jonas came along. He saved you plenty of harsher penances.”

“Aye, and in return, he has to handle Ela. I think he made a bad bargain.”

Viola and Bess agreed, tittering behind their teeth, then Bess gasped. “Oh, no—Lady Celestia, you’ve done it again. That is the wrong color green thread on that pillow. See, how it is a lighter green at the bottom?”

Bess took the fabric away from her mistress with a mew of dismay. Viola clucked, “I don’t know why you persist in trying to learn to embroider, my lady. I believe you must be color-blind.”

Standing to stretch her sore back, Celestia admitted, “Nay, not color-blind, just disinterested.”

“I don’t blame Lord Nicholas a bit for making you stay inside the keep, my lady. He was wrought with worry when ye got lost in the forest,” Viola said.

“He was only worried about losing face in front of his men. What manner of knight loses his wife in the forest?”

Celestia walked to the arrow slit and peered down. They were in the only habitable room on the second floor of the keep. Though they had all been trapped inside for the past two days, they had only been able to scour through this upstairs solar and the main floor. Though it had been cleaned, they all avoided the kitchen.

She should roll up her sleeves and investigate the north tower and the other two chambers, so long as she stayed away from the holes in the wood, but she couldn’t summon the desire. Even though the sun was sparse, at least it wasn’t drizzling. Celestia tapped her foot against the wooden floor. “I will die if I stay inside. Truly, it should remain dry for at least another hour, do you not think so?”

Viola and Bess exchanged a knowing look. “Why don’t you see if the kitchen garden can be turned, or if it is still a puddle of mud,” Bess suggested.

“Yes, I will—I can go now, before it starts raining again.”

“Vi owes me a foot rub. I wagered ye’d not last ‘til the men came back.”

“Ye like the dirt, my lady, and we don’t. Me and Bess would rather finish the curtains for this room, and then work on the master chamber.”

Caught, Celestia cautioned, “Beware the floor. Nicholas said it needs to be repaired. Are you certain you don’t mind?”

“Me thinks Lord Nicholas would appreciate having his own chamber,” Bess giggled. Blushing, Celestia laughed along, keeping up the charade that she and Nicholas were wed in every way.

The midday sun peeped from behind the ever-present clouds and shone brightly through the loopholes. Joy filled her spirit, and she wished that she could gather the sunbeams and put them in her vials for days when she needed cheering.

She leaned forward on tiptoe, looking to see as far as she could. The magnificent view of the bountiful forest made her grateful that she’d been found at all, and the sheerness of the craggy cliff both amazed and frightened her.

The palisades around the back of the castle served as a boundary for keeping wild animals out, as well as protected them from any human enemy who might come through the thick tangle of trees. She remembered the arrow on the rock and shivered in the brief sunlight.

Viola said, “If ye’re going out, I found some old pelts that you could throw on the fire pit, my lady. Heaven only knows what vermin are alive in those nasty furs.”

“I will take them, then.” Her stomach rumbled, and Bess glanced at her with surprise. Celestia grinned. “Once I knew the men would be able to hunt this morn, I didn’t break my fast with boring pottage. I vowed to wait for fresh meat.” As her stomach roared again, she laughed. “I may regret my hasty decision. What shall I do if they can find naught?”

“All the animals in the forest will be glad of the sun, as well, so I would place another wager that you shan’t starve.” Bess helped Viola gather the musty pelts and furs and rolled them in a large, stained linen sheet so that the bugs living in the furs wouldn’t find a new home on Celestia. “Here you are, my lady.”

“Lord Nicholas will thank you as well … I’ve noticed he has an uncommon aversion to crawling things.”

Celestia smiled and recalled the incident Viola referred to. Being cooped up together below stairs, all of their party had visited and talked in front of the fire for many hours on end, building camaraderie. Nicholas had not said much, and she remembered how tired he had looked in the unkind shadow of the hearth.

An industrious spider, who had somehow escaped the brooms and cleaning of she and her ladies, was spinning a web from the corner of the ceiling to the mantle above the fire. The single strand of gossamer web caught the light from a flame and Petyr had pointed out the spider as it was dangling above Nicholas’s head.

Nicholas had scrambled to his feet as if his hair were alight and begun beating at his clothes. “Spider? Where? Where is it?” he’d yelled.

Everyone had laughed, thinking he was jesting, but Celestia had caught the real alarm in his voice before he covered it with more jokes.

She dragged the rotted furs down the stairs. Nicholas kept himself shaved and trimmed as if he didn’t care for facial hair. Celestia assumed that this habit, and his dislike of bugs, came from his time in captivity, but she didn’t ask him about it. It would lead to an argument, as did every conversation they had lately. The bundle came to rest on the last stair with a thump. He would mock her, which would only anger her, and the last thing either of them needed at this point was her ire.

It galled to know that it was in Nicholas’s best interests to leave her. He’d spent so much time pushing her away, and now he didn’t need to.

If she could just get pregnant before he left, then at least her brothers would win something from this awful game. She’d let him go—for even though she’d come to love him, he dared not care for her. Her powers were already misfiring. If she told him that she needed his love, he would pity her, but even that wouldn’t be enough to satisfy Fate.

Aye, she was becoming a veritable candidate for sainthood. Her heart twisted, but she resolved to cling to her pride. She hauled the load out through the kitchen. Her pride would be all she had to hold on to in the lonely life ahead.

She entered the yard just as Forrester and Willy rode through the gate, shouting victoriously and showing their youth. Her eyes were drawn to her handsome husband as he cantered in behind them, sounding more at ease than she had ever heard. “It was a great shot, Willy! That buck never heard you coming.”

Forrester carried the brown and white buck, which was the size of a small pony, over to the shed to be cleaned and dressed. “It will feed us for a week, and for certes, ‘tis better than the dried fish we’ve eaten so much of.”

Celestia knew a pang of guilt. They had been eating what her father had packed in the wagons, in addition to the few root vegetables they’d uncovered from the kitchen garden.

Then the torrential rains had come, and all had been forced to stay inside. The men sounded so relieved to have something else to eat that she realized she should have been trying harder in her role as mistress of Falcon Keep. She eyed the shed and thought of all of the venison that would be available, then cringed. They would be so sorry if they gave their prized buck over to her inexperienced hands!

Well, she could learn, couldn’t she? She grimaced as she remembered all of the failed cooking lessons she’d had until her mother had finally thrown up her hands in defeat. If it didn’t involve an infusion or a decoction, she was hopeless.

Bess and Viola were lady’s maids, although they had been pressed into other work since their arrival here, and she wondered if either of them could cook something besides toast.

She gnawed her lower lip and carried the furs to the lively fire, which had been steadily burning the keep’s refuse all morning.

Swallowing her pride, she approached the men, who were elbow deep in gore. As a healer, she didn’t mind blood. However, her stomach rebelled at the slaughter, and she had to swallow again before asking, “Do any of you know how to cook that?”

Nicholas, a carving knife in his hand, glowered at her. “I know you are angry with me, but would you refuse to cook meals for everyone out of spite?”