Mary Reed McCall (30 page)

“You seem to forget, Camville,” Henry added, “that We have not settled the details of your property’s disbursement. The ancient code of
wergild
that you invoked today requires the man-money be paid
to the victim’s family. ’Tis only if there are no living relatives that the funds go to the
Cyng
himself.

“In this case, two heirs—heirs who already gained possession of Lord Montford’s primary estates at the time of his death—survive him. Under
wergild
, it is they who shall also inherit the sum of your wealth, not Us. Therefore, before you go, We must needs publicly pledge your fortunes to them, so that all of England will recognize and respect their claim.”

Eduard’s heirs
? Catherine’s heart contracted with disbelief as the king spoke. Her breath stilled, and Gray went rigid beside her as he too realized the full import of the king’s statement.

“Aye, that’s right, Camville,” Henry said, breaking into a grin now at his own cleverness. “Montford died unmarried and childless. Not for any lack of effort on Our part, We must say, but unmarried he was, and with no living siblings. His only remaining heirs exist in the persons of his niece and nephew, young Ian and Isabel here.” Henry ruffled Ian’s hair and patted Isabel on the shoulder, before crouching down to look them both in the eye.

“Someday the two of you will possess a very large fortune, the sum total of both your uncle’s and Lord Camville’s estates combined,” the king said gently. He lifted his brows. “We trust that you will choose to wield your power most wisely when the time comes to use it.”

The twins nodded in unison, speechless again before the majesty of their king. But Henry just smiled and chucked them on their chins before standing to
look at Gray, seeming even more pleased with himself than before.

“Of course until they reach their majority, We will entrust the care of their inheritance to your capable hands, Camville.”

Shifting his smiling gaze to Catherine, Henry added, “And to you, as well, of course, lady—though perhaps before anything else transpires, the two of you should seek out a holy father to make your marriage an official one.”

“Aye, my lord,” Catherine murmured, ducking her head under a flush of warmth.

“Indeed, Sire,” Gray added, smiling. “Before the sun sets this eve, I hope to make Catherine my wife in truth, so that no man, woman, or child in England will have reason again to deny our union.”

Feeling the sweet pressure of Gray’s hand on her own, Catherine squeezed back, basking in this new and unaccustomed sense of happiness. There were no more secrets, no more lies between them. Nothing more could harm them or keep them apart.

And so as she prepared to leave with the man she cherished and the children she adored, Catherine felt that their good fortune couldn’t possibly get any better. She thought it couldn’t, that was, until King Henry reached down and picked up Gray’s baronial seal from where it rested on the dais.

The monarch weighed the solid gold disk in his palm, balancing it carefully. After a pause he held it out to Gray and said, “It is Our belief, Camville, that you should resume possession of this seal, posthaste. After all, only nobles of the realm may
serve Us as Sheriff, and it is Our understanding that the region near Cheltenham is in sore and immediate need of someone to assume the prosperous estate there and administer justice to the people. You are Our choice for the post, if you will take it.”

Gray just stared at King Henry for an instant, his face unreadable, his jaw clenched under the force of some strong emotion. Finally he bowed his head, fisting his hand as he crossed his arm over his chest. “I thank you, Sire,” he murmured, his voice rough with feeling, “and would be most honored to accept this gift and duty from your hand.”

Eyes twinkling, Henry looped the chain over Gray’s head, by the act restoring him once more to his position as a powerful nobleman of England.

“Go forward, then, Lord Camville,” the king said quietly, “and continue Our work in this kingdom.” Then he waved his arm in a flourish. “And now, Godspeed to you both!”

They turned to go, Catherine’s heart singing with joy. But as Gray grasped her hand to take her and the children down the long aisle that led out of the palace, she heard the first tiny rumblings. It was a rhythmic sound, a repeated thumping that bloomed all around them, reverberating off the chamber’s thick wooden floor.

In confusion, she looked from one side of the aisle to the other, surprised to see so many smiling eyes and happy faces directed back at her. A tingle went up her spine when she realized that the knights, nobles, and ladies of this assembly were offering her
and Gray tribute, a send-off of great approval with their applause. The crowd stamped their feet or pounded their fists on the wooden benches in front of them, the noise getting louder and faster with every moment.

Gray met her grin with his own and gripped her hand more tightly; they strode forward with the twins clasped secure on either side of them. The applause burgeoned as they passed, growing until it blended with joyful cheers that rose to the rafters.

Soon Ian and Isabel let go, skipping on ahead of them and swinging their arms as they too giggled and cheered in the excited atmosphere.

A few of the knights near the back bellowed “Huzzah!” as they neared the great, arched portal that led from the chamber, and grinning, Gray tugged Catherine to a stop. She gasped when he pulled her to him, and, leaning her over his arm, kissed her in front of everyone—kissed her tenderly and passionately, until the cheers rose around them and she was breathless and laughing in his embrace.

When he eased her back to her feet, they continued the rest of the way through the arched portal. The shouts of the crowd swelled to a deafening roar before finally fading to nothing as the heavy doors swung shut behind them.

Then they just stood there in the quiet, cool hall of King Henry’s beautiful palace, all four of them, hand in hand.

Ian and Isabel still breathed heavily from their exertions in the court chamber, but Ian managed to
lean in to his sister and ask in an exaggerated whisper, “Well, what are we supposed to do now?”

Isabel shrugged and scratched her nose, looking around. Finally she gazed up at her mother and said, “I don’t know. What
do
we do now, Mummy?”

Catherine’s lips twitched; her mouth refused to stop smiling, and she felt like joyful little bubbles had replaced all of the blood in her veins as she in turn swung her gaze to Gray and asked, “Well, my lord champion, what say you? Have you any ideas about what comes next?”

As she spoke, a slow, sensual grin curved Gray’s mouth. He gazed at her for a few moments before he murmured huskily, “Aye, lady. I have an idea. But first I want to make new vows—vows to you, so that everyone will know that the love I feel for you surpasses all, beyond bounds of space and time.”

His eyes seemed to pierce into her very soul, their smoky depths warm with passion and the promise of all that was yet to come. The way he was looking at her made her insides melt, and a delicious tingle shivered up her neck. Touching his finger under her chin, he gently lifted her face to his.

“I love you, my Catherine,” he whispered. “More than life itself and for all eternity, I vow that I love you.” He brushed his lips across hers, and even that light touch called forth an intensity of joy that sent her heart’s blood soaring.

“Say that you’ll marry me now, in truth, with all the secrets of the past behind us.”

“Aye, Gray, I will marry you,” she answered.

“And I will be yours forever, now until the end of time. This I vow with my whole heart and soul.”

She stroked her fingertips over his cheek and along the firm line of his jaw, willing the power of her love to spill into that caress, wanting him to feel the same intensity of joy, the same sense of completion she felt. His smile deepened along with hers and, cupping his face in her palms, she kissed him again.

“Come, my love,” she murmured, still smiling as she took his hand and led him and the children out of the palace, into the sparkling light of a crisp, early winter afternoon.

“’Tis a most beautiful day, I think, for a wedding.”

The Year of Our Lord, 1234

I
am Catherine of Cheltenham. A woman blessed beyond measure. A woman blessed, praise God, with all the gifts that truth and hope can bring.

I am surrounded by the love of a man who carries my heart in his hands and cherishes it as the most precious of jewels. I bask in the affection of my darling children and the devotion of many dear friends—loyal friends, like Sir Alban, who is recovered now, heaven be thanked, from his terrible wounds. My family feels the warmth of true acceptance, given by the countless good people who live with us and around us on this prosperous estate granted us by King Henry.

My life is truly happy. Gray is my soul, as I am
his. We share a bond that cannot be broken, neither by man nor by the ravages of time. ’Tis eternal. He rejoices in me, and I in him. The days of darkness are gone forever, banished by the force of our love.

And, then, of course, there is the babe…

I can still see Gray’s face on the day that I told him the glad news that I carried our child. ’Twas a moment of joy that I shall never forget. Our babe has grown steadily, blooming in my belly, gaining in size and strength in preparation for arrival into the world. It will be sometime within the next fortnight, I think.

I dream often of our child during the long, peaceful nights cradled in the warmth of Gray’s arms. In my dreams she is a little girl, dancing about with her pink cheeks aglow, her hair a sable cloud floating around her, her sapphire eyes laughing as she dips and twirls with delight, free from life’s cares.

And we have named her Gillian….

I pray now only that God will hear my words of thanksgiving for this child that is to come, the child of Gray’s blood and mine, mingled together in that most sacred and mystical of ways.

May everyone’s life be filled to overflowing with the same kind of happiness and love that has been granted to me.

Amen.

T
he concept of
wergild
, alternately spelled
wergeld
, was indeed an ancient institution dating back to pre-Anglo Saxon times and developed as a legal instrument by the Germans to support the idea that family solidarity was a basis of law and order; in the case of a crime, it was the family or clan’s responsibility to translate the individual grievance into some kind of resolution. This “man-worth” was a value attached to every person on the basis of status, age, and gender—and as you might suspect, a woman’s worth, as well as the amount that might be collected for a crime against her, was usually far less than a man’s. However, use of
wergild
to settle criminal disputes had largely disappeared by the twelfth century, when the manorial and royal courts, such as the kind in which Gray participated, became the rule.

The ancient code of
wergild
is also connected to the slightly more long-standing tradition of “bride-price” or the amount the groom’s family would pay to the family of the bride or the bride herself for the privilege of marrying her and having her bear his children. However, this morphed again, in later centuries, as the number of available husbands decreased, while the supply of brides rose; then the “bride-price” became a “dowry”—or monies and goods paid to the
groom
or his family for their agreement to take on the care and responsibility of the bride. Medieval women generally seemed to get the short shrift in matters of personal value and the law!

And finally, this brings me to the most difficult topic of all in terms of this story and my writing of it: violence against women. While there were penalties “on the books” in medieval times for certain types of violence against women, such as rape, the laws were difficult to access and rarely enforced. More often than not, the victim, unless she could prove the rape by bringing in male eyewitnesses who would testify in court for her, was actually fined for having made the charge in the first place, and the man who’d violated her was publicly acquitted. Most women learned, early on, simply to remain quiet about such transgressions against them.

More perversely, both Church and secular law in the Middle Ages permitted the “correction” of women on a regular basis, to be legally dispensed by the male guardian, be he father, husband, brother, or any other variation thereof. The severity of this abuse differed from man to man, with some
men, like Gray, completely abstaining from the practice, though there are many cases written of women who were beaten, starved, imprisoned, or poisoned, sometimes unto death, by the men “in charge” of them. Versions of this continued, unfortunately, mostly sanctioned by law, until the end of the Victorian Era and the advent of the Women’s Rights movement. So giving Catherine both her own voice and a champion who would assist her in reaching her full potential as a valued person—as a valued
woman
—became of the utmost importance to me as I wrote her story.

I hope that you have enjoyed the tale of Catherine and Gray’s love as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thanks for coming along on the journey.

MRM

My sincere gratitude:

To the members of Central New York Romance Writers, for always listening, lending support, offering critique, and just being great friends—particularly Kathleen Simmons and Theresa Kovian, whose help in brainstorming during one long car ride back home resulted in the ending to this book.

To Lyssa Keusch, who took a chance on an unknown writer’s work and helped to turn a dream into reality.

And to the exquisite Ruth Kagle, my agent, whose expertise and guidance have been invaluable. Thanks for believing in me.