The Silver Rose (5 page)

His eyes shifted and caught Roland’s gaze, then he said, “Call it a family heirloom. If you open the little box, you will find something else.”

She opened a small box. “Oh, it’s another charm.” She lifted out an exquisite silver rosebud; deep in its center glowed a ruby, the rich red reflected in the furled silver petals. This time her response was without reservation.

“How beautiful. It’s perfect.” She looked up at her brother, puzzled. Ranulf had never given her a present before, except the usual birthday and Christmas trinkets. It occurred to her that he was buying her cooperation, but why would he need to? He had only to command it and he knew that while she remained under his roof she would have no choice.

But perhaps he was afraid she might make things difficult for him. She might be forced to obey his commands, but there were covert ways in which she could sabotage his designs, or at least create difficulties.

“My wedding gift, little sister.” He pinched her cheek again in a clumsy gesture intended to denote affection. But Ariel wasn’t fooled. “You will play your part in Ravenspeare vengeance, and when the work is done, then you shall have another charm for the bracelet.”

Dear God, he was bribing her!
Was he afraid that she might slip from his control? That marriage to the earl of Hawkesmoor, even a mock marriage, might somehow affect the balance of power and control? It was a fascinating idea.

“I shall endeavor to earn it, brother,” she said demurely and saw his eyes flash with anger at her clear insolence. The dogs shifted against her skirts and Remus growled low in his throat.

“Take those beasts out of here,” Ranulf ordered. “And you’d best keep them away from me, little sister, if you expect them to live a long and happy life.” He took up his goblet and drained its contents, his gray eyes hard as granite yet filled with malevolence as he stared at her fixedly.

Ariel was not about to push her luck further. She curtsied with every appearance of humility and left the room, the dogs pressed to her skirts.

The men wouldn’t give her a second thought if they didn’t see her again this evening. Ranulf had had his fun for the time being, and they would settle into their usual companionable stupors after another bottle or two.

But there was no way Ariel could keep this disastrous turn of events to herself. She hastened back to the stable-yard, the dogs still trotting beside her. She hailed a groom crossing the yard. “Josh, saddle the roan. I’m going to visit Mistress Sarah and Miss Jenny.”

The man touched his forelock. “You need me to come wi’ you, m’lady?”

Ariel considered. In daylight she wouldn’t risk incurring Ranulf’s wrath by going out unaccompanied, but he’d not want her again tonight, and once the drink took hold it would be out of sight, out of mind. And the last thing she needed was a groom kicking his heels in Sarah and Jenny’s small cottage while she was spilling her news. And she could hardly expect him to sit outside for however long the visit lasted.

“No,” she said. “I’ll go alone.”

It was a relatively bright night; scudding clouds dimmed the moon now and again, but the stars shone clear over the North Sea across the flat fens to the east. Just before she reached the village that skirted the grounds of Ravenspeare Castle, she turned the roan down a marshy track that led to
a narrow drainage cut taking surplus water from the Great Ouse back to the Wash and out to the North Sea.

Her destination, a small reed-thatched cottage, stood on a hillock above the dike. It was a lonely spot. But a lantern glowed in the window, and as Ariel dismounted and unlatched the garden gate, the cottage door opened.

“Is it you, Ariel?” Blind Jenny rarely failed to identify visitors before they announced themselves.

“Yes. I’m in need of cheer and advice,” Ariel responded. On reaching the woman, she kissed her cheek. “I’ll put Diana in the lean-to and then I’ll be in. Don’t stand out here in the cold.”

Jenny smiled, returned the kiss, and went back into the cottage’s one room. “Ariel’s here, Mother. Something’s worrying her.”

The woman bending over a cauldron on the range straightened. Her eyes were sharply assessing but her tongue had been locked for close on thirty years, so her thoughts remained unspoken. The door opened again and Ariel came in, the hounds still at her heels. They went immediately to a corner on the far side of the fireplace and lay down, resting their heads on their forepaws.

“Good evening, Sarah.” Ariel bent to kiss the woman’s faded cheek. One could see that Sarah had once been a very beautiful woman. Her features were regular, her face a perfect oval, her body tall and slender. But the eyes were haunted, the face deeply etched with the lines of endurance, the long hands chapped and rough, the once glossy black hair snow white, the supple slimness of youth reduced to gaunt thinness. But a gentleness radiated from her, and a certain strength belied by her air of frailty.

Sarah reached up and stroked Ariel’s cheek, then she gestured to the chair by the fire and returned to the cauldron.

“You’ll have supper with us, Ariel?” Jenny took three bowls from a shelf above the range.

“It smells like rabbit stew.” Ariel sniffed appreciatively.

“The rabbit was payment for one of Mother’s wart
cures,” Jenny replied, cutting bread, the knife slicing as rapidly and neatly as if it were wielded by a sighted person. “Ginty Greene didn’t want to go to her bridal bed with warts all over her hands. Mother got rid of them for her.”

“Ah. Bridal . . .” Ariel stood up and then sat down again. Sarah lifted the cauldron of stew from the hook over the fire and carried it to the table. She cast a glance at the girl by the fire and began to ladle stew into the three bowls.

“Would you care for elder-flower wine, Ariel?” Jenny asked.

“Thank you.” Ariel came to the table and took her usual place between mother and daughter. She was aware of Sarah’s eyes on her. They spoke as eloquently as any tongue. “Ranulf has decided to marry me off,” she said bluntly, dipping her spoon into the fragrant contents of her bowl.

“Who to?” Jenny stared sightlessly across the table. Sarah paused, her own spoon in her hand.

“The earl of Hawkesmoor.”

Sarah’s hand shook and her spoon rattled against the edge of the wooden bowl, but the two younger women didn’t appear to notice. Jenny’s jaw had dropped and for a moment she was speechless.

Ariel, through her own shock, well understood the stunned effect of her news. She carried her spoon to her mouth and chewed reflectively on a succulent piece of meat while she waited for the implications to sink in for her audience. Then she said, “It’s all to do with dowry and land and the queen.”

She explained as much as she herself knew in the attentive silence. Sarah was now eating with a steady hand, sipping her wine periodically, but her eyes rarely left Ariel’s face. Jenny punctuated Ariel’s narrative with rapid-fire questions on both her own and her mother’s behalf.

“When is it to be?”

“I don’t know, but it can’t happen before Christmas—not with two hundred guests to prepare for.” Ariel put down her spoon and leaned forward on her stool, her elbows
resting on the table. She didn’t think she could tell these women—her closest friends—what Ranulf was plotting for the Hawkesmoor. She couldn’t even make sense of it herself.

Sarah listened to Ariel. Her face was expressionless and the violent tremors were contained inside her now. They were in her belly, in her heart, in her head. Her hands were perfectly steady, her movements controlled. But the questions screamed in her head, fought to find utterance, and died on her locked tongue. They were not questions Jenny could divine with her customary insight, because they related to matters of which Jenny was in total ignorance . . . and must remain so.

This earl of Hawkesmoor was Geoffrey’s heir. Was he Geoffrey’s son? Had Clara finally conceived? Would Geoffrey’s son know anything of that other child?

She had never expected to learn anything of the child. She had given him up to a man who would care for him, would guarantee his future. A man who would ensure that he was never touched by the horror that had befallen his mother. And until this moment, when the name of Hawkesmoor was spoken under her roof, Sarah had buried all thought and all speculation so deep in her soul it had seemed impossible it would ever see the light of day.

And now a Hawkesmoor was coming here. Now, once again, there would be Hawkesmoors and Ravenspeares together a stone’s throw from her door. Her hands trembled again and she clasped them both in her lap.

“What about your horses?” Jenny hung the kettle over the fire and pulled down a sheaf of dried chamomile. She didn’t know much of the science of Ariel’s breeding program, but she did know her friend’s goal.

Ariel’s lips set in a determined line. “Nothing’s going to stop me, Jenny. If I can’t set up my stud here, then I’ll take it away. As soon as I can make a few sales and make enough money to set myself up, then I’ll go somewhere, as far away as
possible, from Ravenspeares and Hawkesmoors. And I’ll be myself. Responsible to and for myself.
They won’t stop me.”

Jenny was silent. Sarah looked at Ariel with her white set face and her fierce charcoal eyes, and pity washed over her. How could the poor child even begin to know what she was taking on? Hawkesmoors and Ravenspeares never let anything stand in their way.

Ariel’s eyes met Sarah’s steady gaze. She seemed to read the woman’s mind. “Don’t forget that I also am a Ravenspeare,” she said softly.

Chapter Three

“I
SHALL MISS
having you to myself, Simon.” Helene moved lazily, stretching her naked body along the length of her lover’s. The soles of her feet arched as she dug her toes into his calves, and her hands palmed his, pulling them above his head. She smiled down into his languid countenance. “You spend months at war, then you come back only to get married.” She pouted in mock complaint, then nuzzled his cheek. “Why must you get married?”

He ran his hands down her back. It had been many months since he’d made love with Helene, but his fingers always held the memory of her body, so that even after prolonged absence it was as if it had been no more than a night. “A man of four and thirty, my love, has need of a wife.” He spoke lightly. “And since the love of my life refuses to marry me, then I must look elsewhere.”

Helene drew her tongue along the sharp lines of his cheekbones. “You know I cannot remarry, Simon. I would lose the children. Harold’s will is as tightly sealed as his coffin. Not even for you will I give up my children.” He said nothing, but his hands continued their reflective caresses.

“Once you could have married me, Simon. Ten years ago you could have married me,” Helene continued.

“Soldiers make poor husbands,” he responded, stroking over her buttocks. “John Marlborough loves his wife, but he leaves poor Sarah to pine for months, even years, at a time. I would not condemn a wife of my heart to months of lonely frustration.”

“Because she would seek solace elsewhere?”

There was a short silence and she felt the sudden tension
in his body. “Let us say that I would not put temptation in her way. No wife of mine will be unfaithful.”

There was a chill to the flat statement with which Helene was familiar. She knew the dark side of Simon Hawkesmoor as she knew his laughter and his loving. From childhood, they had shared dreams. As eager, reckless youngsters, they had initiated each other into the mysteries of lovemaking. And then Simon had gone to be a soldier on the battlefields of Europe and Helene had married the elderly Viscount Kelburn. He had left her a widow with three children, and a will that stated all control of her children would pass into the hands of her husband’s brother if she remarried.

“You would visit the sins of your own father onto some innocent woman,” she said.

Gently he put her from him and sat up. His face was dark, his eyes now cool and distant. “No, that is not what I would do, Helene. I simply will not tolerate unfaithfulness in my marriage.”

Helene drew the sheet over her. She stared up at the canopy overhead. “You will apply that to your own conduct?” “Aye,” he said quietly.

“And when do you marry?” Her voice was flat.

“I go to my bride’s house on the morrow.” He swung his legs over the side of the bed. A raw, red scar twisted up his leg from ankle to groin, like a thin snake of fire.

“So soon!” She turned her head on the pillow, and her eyes were filled with anger. “We make love for the first time in a year, and now you’re going!” She closed her eyes tightly, saying almost to herself, “So this is farewell . . . forever.”

“Aye,” he said as quietly as before. “To our loving, but I hope not to our friendship.”

“Damn
you, Simon Hawkesmoor.” She opened her eyes and he saw the glitter of tears before she dashed them aside with the back of her hand.
“Damn
you! Why didn’t you say so before?”

“I thought you understood.” He grabbed the bedpost and
hauled himself to his feet. “I thought you would know how it must be, Helene.”

“You’re no Puritan, Simon. You never have been for all your sober suits and your family’s allegiances,” she declared, sniffing angrily.