Outrageous (2 page)

Wenthaven Castle
Shropshire, England, 1487

The clash of swords echoed
through the long gallery of the fashionable castle keep, and Griffith ap Powel grimaced in disgust. “Dueling?” he inquired of his host. “You’ve brought me here to watch dueling?”

With a receding silver hairline, aristocratic features, and a pack of auburn-coated spaniels yipping at his heels, the earl of Wenthaven was the model of urbane hospitality. “I am but trying to fulfill your request.”

Shrieks of laughter and sham alarm assaulted Griffith as they shouldered their way through the outer ring of spectators. “There is no respect for a warrior in this country,” Griffith said. “In Wales, we fight in battle, to the death, with a good two-handed sword in our grip and an enemy before us. There is none of the so-called sport of dueling.”

With one elegant gesture, Wenthaven dismissed Wales and its customs. “’Tis a French practice, actually, but many youths abide here with me, and they fight on any pretext. They fight for the pure joy of fighting, so I encourage dueling. The swords are light and have dulled edges, and their vigorous spirits are dampened with judicious training. Moreover, if you wish to speak to Lady Marian, the former lady-in-waiting for our uncrowned queen, then you must come here.”

Already aflame with a sense of misuse and a total contempt for his mission, Griffith snapped, “Does this Lady Marian enjoy watching young fools slice at each other?”

Wenthaven mocked Griffith with a dimpled smile. “If you would but look closely, you would see the part which Lady Marian plays.”

Griffith had the height to give him a clear view over the circle of cheering spectators. Two figures danced on the polished stone floor, dulled dueling swords in hand. The skill of both was extraordinary, a testament to healthy bodies and youthful spirits.

Then he rubbed his eyes. “One of the duelists is a woman. That woman is using a sword.”

Like a flame above a slim white candle, her red hair fell out of its coif above her pale face. Her green eyes snapped; her teeth sparkled in a challenging smile. The hem of her creamy silk skirt hung over her arm, giving Griffith a glimpse of muscular, silk-clad ankles and calves. Her light step distracted Griffith from the sword she held in the other hand.

Sweet Saint Dewi, but she was tall. She looked the handsome hulk of a man right in the eye, and she did so boldly.

Griffith didn’t like bold women.

Singing a tune off key, she ridiculed her opponent with the flash of her blade, with her amusement, with her height.

Both his hands were free to fight, and he displayed a skill and an agility that would tempt most men to back away. But he panted in great, billowing gasps, sweat dripped into his eyes, and he slashed with an aggression out of place for a friendly bout.

He was losing.

At Griffith’s side, Wenthaven said, “She’s good, isn’t she?”

Griffith grunted his unwilling assent.

“I taught her all she knows.”

Unable to tear his gaze from the too tall, too bold, too tall beauty, Griffith said, “You’re mad. Why would a man teach a woman to duel with swords?”

Wenthaven chuckled. “A woman like her must have a way to defend herself from…shall we say…unwanted attentions.”

The curved swords clashed, screeching as the blades scraped together in a shower of blue sparks. “A woman like her?”

“Aye.” Satisfied with Griffith’s avid concentration, Wenthaven announced, “That is Lady Marian Wenthaven.”

Griffith turned to Wenthaven, missing Marian’s coup de grace, but the clamor of the crowd brought his attention back to her. She gave a shout of triumph as her opponent’s sword went flying. Glowing with victory, she raised her fists in celebration, and Griffith narrowed his eyes. “Flamboyance is most unattractive in a woman. Most unattractive.”

He only wished his body understood what his mind believed.

Wenthaven clicked his tongue. “I don’t suppose Adrian Harbottle ever stood a chance. He’s just one of those landless knights, scarcely more than a churl.”

Griffith glanced at the man Wenthaven disparaged so quickly. Blessed with golden hair, even white teeth, and sound limbs, Harbottle didn’t look like a churl. He was so handsome, he made Griffith’s teeth
ache, and he reminded Griffith of something. Something familiar. Something reassuring.

Aye, Harbottle resembled the gilt painting of an angel in Griffith’s mother’s
Book of Hours
.

But Griffith would wager Harbottle was no angel. His breath still billowed his barrel chest, and he stared at Marian with fury. Griffith watched him, not caring for the malevolence his clenched fists betrayed.

Wenthaven rambled on. “He was a dolt to imagine he could challenge her—”

Harbottle sprang for Marian’s sword, caught it up, aimed it at Marian. Griffith’s protective reflexes whipped him into the fray before he considered the consequences. With a flying tackle, he landed atop Harbottle. Women screamed, men roared, as Griffith took Harbottle’s wildly flailing body to the floor. Bones and tendons crunched on impact. Griffith rolled away from Harbottle and came to his feet as the sword skittered across stone.

Before he could reach it, another hand snatched it up. Another hand, a slender, feminine hand, pointed it at Harbottle’s throat, and Marian’s contralto voice snarled, “Coward and knave, stand and face the penalty for treachery.”

Harbottle rose to his knees, his angelic face contorted and his breath a palpable heat. “Bitch, you betray not a shred of womanly compassion.”

“Because I don’t allow you to defeat me? To kill me? Must I die at the hands of some misbegotten knight to prove myself a lady?” She pricked at the open throat of his shirt with the shiny tip of the sword. “Get up, I say, and face this lady whom you have wronged.”

She had been magnificent in her triumph, and now she wore her wrath like the robes of a queen. Griffith stepped close. If flamboyance in a woman was unattractive, why did her fire draw him to her?

Harbottle staggered to his feet and glanced at Griffith. “You hide behind your newest lover.”

Without a flicker of interest, Marian dismissed Griffith. “I can kill you without the help of any man, Harbottle.” And she drew back her arm.

Harbottle’s blue eyes grew large. The whites turned red with strain, and fear shattered his facade. “You wouldn’t…you can’t…”

“Who would blame me?”

Her cheeks acquired a pallor, but Harbottle failed to notice. He concentrated solely on that unswerving tip. “I have money, if you want it—”

Her color blossomed again. “If I kill you, the world would be well rid of such vermin.”

She took a deep breath, and Griffith now thought she would plunge the steel into Harbottle’s heart.

“Have pity,” Harbottle whimpered.

Her severity broke, and she gestured with the sword toward the door. “Go grovel before the priest. Perhaps he’ll offer forgiveness. That’s the best you can expect, for these gentlefolk will not forget.”

Harbottle scurried backward, and when he was safe out of range, he cried, “Whore! You shame your family by bearing their name. Your little bastard bears the punishment for your sins.” Griffith stiffened in shock, but Harbottle wasn’t through. “That whelp you bore is an idiot!”

She lifted the sword to fling it, and the gaping courtiers dove for cover. Griffith caught her hand before she could, swung her around, and buried her face in his chest.

A bastard, he reflected grimly. She’d borne a child out of wedlock. No wonder she’d been banished from the court.

A bastard. A child unacknowledged by its father. Marian had brought herself disgrace and exile with her unseemly passion, and that lack of control she now exposed in her useless struggles.

Resembling a half-crushed insect, Harbottle took to flight, limping all the way.

Marian fought the restraint, furious that anyone dared come between her and that foul beast who maligned her son. In her ear a deep voice rumbled, “Anger is the wind that blows out the lamp of the mind, and you are the proof. Never threaten a man with death unless you mean to complete the deed. You’ve made a lifelong enemy, one who’ll be satisfied with nothing less than your humiliation and defeat.”

Wrenching her head free, she looked up, and up, and up.

The man was immense—and ill favored. His black hair, cut chin length, was combed straight back, leaving his face unsoftened and unadorned. His tanned skin had seen too much sun, too many battles, and the lines of experience that marked his brow found mates in the scars that furrowed his cheeks. His thin nose had been broken too many times, and his stubborn chin prickled with a day’s growth of beard. Only his golden eyes betrayed a kind of beauty, and they glowered at her with such disgust that she stiffened even further.

“My thanks to you, but I am none of your concern.”

He exhaled impatiently, and it ruffled the stray wisps of hair that fell over her forehead. She stepped away and heard him mutter, “If only that were true.”

From behind her Wenthaven said, “This great Welsh beast is your newest emissary from the queen.”

Marian swung on Wenthaven. “By my troth, Wenthaven. Why didn’t you tell me at once?”

Spreading his hands in doubtful innocence, Wenthaven said, “I thought I did.”

Dismissing him with a sniff, Marian tilted her head and examined Griffith, paying particular attention to his dull brown, unfashionable clothes. “He does resemble a beast. Does the beast have a name?”

Griffith bowed where he stood, and it brought his face close to hers. “Griffith ap Powel, if it please you.”

He spoke softly, and his name brought a rush of blood to her face. “Griffith ap Powel? Griffith ap
Powel is no emissary from my lady the queen. Griffith ap Powel is the king’s man.”

Griffith straightened, a satisfied line to his hard mouth. “I am the king’s man, and therefore the queen’s, too, for they are wed and made as one by the holy ceremony of the Church.”

Glancing around, Marian saw the crowd that had gathered to cheer her swordplay now hung on every word. Gesturing a page boy close, she handed him her sword and bade him clean it and place it with care. The time she earned gave her a chance to rein in her temper. “How is Elizabeth of York? Is my lady well?”

Griffith, too, noted the press of interested observers and offered his arm. “The king’s consort is well, as is her son and heir, Arthur.”

“The heir to the throne of England.” Marian smiled at the irony of it. “And Henry Tudor is the father.”

“
King
Henry Tudor is the father.”

Marian almost laughed at Griffith’s pomposity, but her years at court had taught her a respect for a king’s power, if not a respect for the men who sought the position. So she took the proffered arm and agreed, “Of course. King Henry, seventh of that name, is the father of this child. Has King Henry let his wife be crowned yet?”

“Not yet.”

“When the archbishop anoints Elizabeth’s head and places the crown on her noble brow in Westminster Abbey, she’ll be lifted above mere mortals.” Marian clung close, content to use Griffith as a wedge to part the crowd. As they left the milling gentlefolk behind, she said, “The king is afraid. Afraid all will say he owes his throne to his queen.”

Griffith corrected her without a blink. “He’s cautious, and rightly so.”

“The throne still totters beneath his royal behind.”

“Totters? No. It does not totter, and only a fool
would say so. But those same fools who claim the throne totters might also claim he couldn’t keep the throne without the support of Elizabeth’s Yorkist kin.”

“You aren’t a courtier, are you?” Marian asked, smiling, more amused than embarrassed by the charge of foolishness.

“I am whatever Henry needs me to be.”

“A lackey, then,” she said, wondering if he would respond to the insult.

“At present, that is true. I am a messenger boy, delivering notes from one silly girl to another.” Without asking her preference, he steered her out a door into the lavish garden, redolent with the scent of new roses basking in the warmth of the spring sun. “My reward for completing this mission is a visit to my parents in Wales.”

The afternoon sunshine did Griffith no favors, Marian noted. It revealed his hair was not black, as she’d thought, but dark brown and shiny. It grew back from a point in the middle of his forehead, giving his narrow face a devilish quality, and it flared out like a lion’s mane, lending him a beast’s menace. The sunlight highlighted his harshness, accentuated the length and breadth of him, and she wondered what madness had encouraged Henry to send him.

Was Henry trying to intimidate her? What did he suspect? What did he know? And had he shared his knowledge with his messenger?

A strand of her bright red hair hung in her eyes, and she tried to tuck it back under her close-fitting cap, with little success.

He watched with a cynical lift to his mouth. “Do you dye your hair?”

Dropping her hands, she glared. In all her twenty-two years, she’d never met such a rude man. “If I did, would I dye it this color?”

He didn’t smile, didn’t twitch, didn’t make false protestations about his admiration. Instead he took
the strand between his fingers and efficiently inserted it beneath the coif. “Can we be overheard here?”

She could read nothing from Griffith’s countenance except a vast distaste for her and for his duty. So much the better, she thought. Wenthaven’s castle was the epitome of lavish country living, but she’d grown used to the excitement of court. Now she relished the chance to match wits with a haughty Welsh lord. “No one can hear us, but that’s of no consequence. Everyone knows I was once the lady Elizabeth’s chief lady-in-waiting. Everyone knows we communicate when possible, although the messenger is usually a little”—she ran her gaze up and down his form—“livelier.” She held out her hand, palm up. “Do you have a letter for me?”

He withdrew a parchment from his belt, closed with the queen’s seal, and picked at the wax. “Shall I read it to you?”

Snatching it, she tucked it inside her sleeve. “I’ll read it to myself. Is there a purse?”

More slowly, he produced the heavy pouch.