The Bride Gift (13 page)

The sky blushed early light as they cleared the thicket and approached the keep. The soft pink of the rising sun gilded Lystanwold, bedecking her in an enchanted mantle. Behind him, a quiet murmur of approval came from the men. It was a welcoming sight at the end of a long, frustrating search. The graceful keep soared against the pearlescent sky and bid them welcome.

A sense of belonging surged from deep within him.
His.
The keep, the demesne surrounding it and the lady within. All he had worked so hard to achieve.

The feeling of coming home sank into tired bones and even the horses stepped more lively as they clattered across the bridge.

Geoffrey came running from the practice yards. His wooden sword tangled in his legs and he had to stop a moment to sort it out. Guy rolled his eyes skyward. The only time any of them would be safe was when he taught his squire to wield that weapon with anything approaching competence.

Ewayne had ridden out with them and drew rein beside him. “Not a graceful stripling, is he?” Ewayne laughed softly. Warmth, not mockery, infused his tone.

Geoffrey half fell over a pile of lances, righting himself just in time. Guy liked this ungainly lad. His family didn’t believe they would ever see him knighted. Guy meant to prove them wrong. The boy had improved, if ever so slightly.

“We were all once thus,” he said.

“You?” Ewayne scoffed lightly. “I think not. They say you were birthed with a sword in your hand.”

“My mother would disagree.”

“Even here at Lystanwold we have heard tales of the mighty Sir Guy of Helston, ‘Scourge of Faringdon,’” Ewayne continued, undeterred. “Some of the lads were of the opinion your deeds were greatly exaggerated.”

“They were, were they?”

“Not me, of course.” The older man’s eyes gleamed. “But the others.”

“Do I hear a challenge in there, Sir Ewayne?”

“I argued that there must be truth to the rumours.” Ewayne actually grinned and it took Guy by surprise. Up until that moment, he would have believed the man incapable of such an act.

“Put up your sword and see for yourself.” Guy accepted the offer of friendship with a grin. These were good men at Lystanwold.

“Nay, that would be too easy,” Ewayne replied. “I had something else in mind.”

Guy braced. Here it came.

Ewayne nodded toward Geoffrey. “I challenge you to teach that youngster to handle a weapon without lopping off a limb.”

“How much?” Guy dismounted.

“Ten marks,” Ewayne announced as Geoffrey arrived flushed and apologetic.

“In gold?” It was a princely sum. A murmur of interest spread amongst the listening men.

“In gold,” Ewayne confirmed.

It was a fool’s bet, at best. “Done.” As Geoffrey paled and then flushed with pleasure, Guy added, “Make it twenty and Geoffrey will best any challenger you care to name.”

Helena had risen this morning to find the other side of her bed empty once again. It hadn’t taken her long to become accustomed to sharing her bed. Bridget brought the news that the men had returned at dawn. Helena had been strangely disappointed Guy didn’t immediately seek her out.

She attended prayers with Crispin before making her way into the hall. She expected to see Guy at table and a tight kernel of anticipation lodged behind her breast. Would he be pleased to see her?

Instead, she found the keep abuzz with another sort of excitement.

“What is amiss?” She motioned Willie to her side.

“A wager.” The boy’s eyes lit with mischief. “Sir Ewayne bet Sir Guy he could not teach that clodpole of a squire to handle his weapon.” He looked up at her to share his delight.

The smile froze on her face. Guy was not in the keep at all, but out winning a wager. And poor Geoffrey, to be so clumsy and have them make such sport of him. They were picking on the lad.

Not as long as I have breath.
She stalked across the hall.

Ewayne was seated amongst the men at arms, cheerfully boasting of what he would do with the marks once he won.

“What did you do?” Helena approached so quietly they didn’t hear her until she was right amongst them. Ewayne scrambled to his feet whilst the other men ducked their heads and returned to their meal.

“I wagered Sir Guy he could not train Geoffrey to fight with a sword.” Ewayne met her eyes squarely, but discomfort tightened his expression.

“How very brave of you, to make sport of a young boy.”

“Beg your pardon, Lady Helena.” Colour mounted his face. “It was merely a jest and the boy is as clumsy as a three legged dog.”

That remark angered Helena further. She rounded on all the men. “He is only a boy and he will grow into his limbs.” She fervently hoped she was right.

“Just a jest,” one of the men muttered.

Helena couldn’t spot the speaker. “Mayhap you big knights have forgotten, I knew most of you when you could not tell your arse from your elbow.”

She stormed out the keep into the bailey. She would set them all to rights. Including her absent husband. Making cruel wagers when he should have been seeking his wife. Not that she cared. This concerned Geoffrey.

They had no right to make such mockery of the lad. This was why she wished all fighting men to hell at times. They were a rough, unmannerly, uncouth lot.

Guy leant against a post in the practice yards. He looked up at her approach.

A sharp thud resounded through her chest. Her husband. She drank in the small details such as the lines of exhaustion that marked his face and bruised the skin beneath his eyes. Neither dimmed their sparkle as he turned to greet her.

“Well met, my lady.” A beautiful smile split his harsh features.

She wanted to smile back, but she was wroth with him. Over the wager and not his lack of eagerness to see her, of course.

“Good morrow, my lord.” She gifted him her frostiest glance.

The smile died on his lips. Helena missed it immediately.

“I would speak with you,” she said.

“Indeed.” Guy nodded and returned to his pupil.

Clearly, he had better things to do with his time than speak with her.

Geoffrey manfully swung his sword. The blade whistled through the air and Guy leapt out of the way.

In truth, she had to admit that Geoffrey was a bit of a menace with steel in his hand. Her heart went out to him.
Poor lad.

“Wrists,” Guy said. He leaned toward Geoffrey and spoke so softly, Helena couldn’t hear what they were saying, but observed Guy correcting the position of the squire’s hands. Geoffrey’s face tightened with concentration.

“Bridget said to bring you this.” Willie piped up from beside her. He handed her a half loaf of bread and a wedge of cheese.

“Thank you.”

Willie’s attention was fastened on Guy and the squire. His eyes sparkled with intensity, a red flush staining his cheeks.

“Would you like to learn?” she asked him.

“I could do better than that lummox,” Willie scoffed.

Guy came up behind Willie and cuffed the page lightly about the ear. “Mind your manners and I might just teach you.”

He would teach Willie?
Willie wasn’t even his squire. It was such a generous offer. The ice within her melted, just a tiny bit.

Willie’s mouth opened and shut, as if he couldn’t find the words of gratitude. “Now?” he demanded, his little face awash with excited colour.

“Nay.” Guy shook his head. “Now, I am teaching Geoffrey. Respect comes first, then the sword.”

“Really?” Willie’s eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“Indeed.” Guy cuffed him again. “Respect first.” His eyes met hers. “You would speak to me, my lady?”

“Willie, fetch his lordship some ale.” Helena sent the boy running across the bailey eagerly. “I heard about your wager.” She kept her voice low. It was difficult to nurse a good measure of anger, when he acted thusly with the young boys around the keep.

“Wrists,” Guy called out as Geoffrey almost lost his grip on the sword. “Your pardon,” he said and strode over to the boy and went through similar motions before returning to her side.

He was so patient with his squire. Helena had seen knights strike a lad for much less.

Geoffrey thrust at the stuffed hay bale, the sword bobbling in his fingers. Helena winced as it passed within a hairsbreadth of Geoffrey’s foot.

Guy kept his eyes on Geoffrey, who needed watching as he narrowly avoided impaling the hay bale.

“You think he will win a challenge against any of Sir Ewayne’s men?” she asked.

“Not a chance,” Guy murmured beside her ear. “But a boy needs to know somebody has faith in him.”

Helena’s ire evaporated like mist and she desperately wanted to hug him. How could such a large man be so sweet? One would never know it to look at him.

“Do you have twenty marks or was that my money you wagered?”

“Yours.” He grinned.

His playful mood tugged at her to join in. “I should not be surprised,” she sniffed, but with an answering smile.

“You are not wroth with me?”

“Not too wroth,” she replied.

“Good.” The wariness disappeared from his eyes and he tipped up her chin with a gentle finger. His gaze caressed her face and Helena’s head went giddy as she stared into his pewter eyes. He stroked his thumb across her bottom lip. “Pretty smile.”

“You and your smooth words.” She pushed his hand away, but slow heat crept over her skin. “Shall I have a bath prepared for you?”

He took a careful sniff of his gambeson and pulled a face. He raised one brow in a silent question.

“Verily,” Helena laughed, light-hearted and girlish under the knowing gleam in his eyes. “I could attend you.”

“Aye.” His expression grew slumberous.

Helena’s pulse started to thrum. The touch of his gaze across her lips was as palpable as a kiss. It stirred her blood and her body swayed slightly toward him.

He dipped his head closer. “Three days,” he murmured.

It seemed longer than three days since he’d left. And much longer than that since he’d kissed her. Her eyelids fluttered closed.

“
Jesu
have mercy.” Bridget pierced the bubble around them.

Helena swung around, her face growing even warmer.

The nurse marched in their direction, looking like a spry bunch of twigs held together by sacking, but her eyes were locked on something beyond them.

Geoffrey had managed to embed his sword into the wooden support of a target. He pulled for all he was worth at the recalcitrant blade. Sweat poured down his face as he tried to free the sword.

“Soon.” Guy sauntered over to the red-faced Geoffrey. He leaned over and grasped the sword with one hand. A quick tug and it was free. “Wrists,” he repeated and started adjusting Geoffrey’s grip. Placing his hands on Geoffrey’s, Guy took him through some basic forms. He did it thrice more before he let the boy try on his own.

Helena had tasks awaiting her in the keep, yet her feet stayed planted to the spot.

Bridget gave her a smug smile. “I saw that.”

“What?” Helena crossed her arms over her breasts and kept her attention on the man and the boy. Again, Guy took him slowly through the motions. Correcting his balance, adjusting his grip, praising Geoffrey’s every success.

“It seems to me you are pleased he is back.”

“Watch your mouth, woman.” Bridget was right, not that she would tell her so. “I hear Sir Guy has his saucy serfs beaten. Especially the ones that have not been with him since birth.”

“That soft sod.” Bridget hooted with laughter. “He would not beat a mouldy rug if it needed it.”

Helena returned her attention to Guy. The corners of her mouth tilted upward. “You are most likely right,” she murmured.

Chapter 16

Much more in charity with her husband, Helena wandered back into the keep. She passed Colin just leaving the hall with a satchel over his shoulder, and nodded shortly. They had barely spoken since he’d struck her.

“I see he is back.”

Helena firmed her lips to stop hasty words from spilling out. Just this morn, Colin had been jesting and talking with the men in the hall. Now he was back to a sullen scowl.

“Did you think he would not be?” She had few words for Colin anymore.

His shoulders grew as stiff as the hard expression on his face. “I saw you smiling and laughing with him.”

“He is my husband.” Helena kept her tone deliberately calm. She wouldn’t allow Colin to draw her into a repeat of their confrontation in the corridor. Not that Colin would dare lay a finger on her with a husband hard by. She’d said it right. He was a coward.

“Aye.” Colin gave a mirthless bark of laughter. “How soon you have become accustomed to the notion.”

What did he expect? Helena’s hand twitched with the desire to strike him. It was pointless. No matter how hard she cuffed him, it still wouldn’t unstop his ears. Colin heard only what he wanted. And at this moment, he desired only the sound of his own woes.

“Verily I have,” she said and took a step away from him. “I would suggest you do the same.”

Colin sneered at her. “I am not so fickle.”

Refusing to be further baited, she strode briskly away.

Helena approached her solar to change her garb for the evening meal, a secret smile tilting the corners of her mouth.
Guy is back.
A tiny slither of anticipation unfurled in her chest.

She stopped at the door to her solar. Maids were rushing in and out with buckets.

Mayhap Geoffrey had ordered the water for a bath? It would not be Willie, who regarded bathing as akin to having his teeth pulled. She couldn’t imagine he would think Sir Guy liked it any more. A young maid almost bumped into her, flushed an apology and rushed away.

Then Helena stepped further into the room and her smile died. She must have uttered some sort of sound because Rosalind looked up immediately.

“Well met, Lady Helena,” she called cheerfully.

Guy was seated before the casement, stripped to his braies. He raised his head and nodded in her direction. The rest of the activity in the chamber receded. She didn’t see much past her nearly naked husband with another woman leaning over him tenderly.