The Unveiling (20 page)

“Garr?”

He followed the voice to the chair alongside the bed. His mother’s smile, that never quite met her eyes, greeted him.

Wafting the scent of roses, she stood and laid a palm to his forehead. “The fever has passed,” she pronounced as she had less than a quarter hour ago when he had first awakened—spoken once more as if to convince herself the danger was over.

She bit her lower lip. “I feared.”

“You feared wrong, Mother.” He had not been going to die, and certainly not from an arrow to the shoulder, regardless how much blood and infection it had let. He looked to his bandaged wound. It was clean and dry.

His mother stepped back. “You are right, of course. God would not allow it.” She who had given all of herself those first four years of his life to make him a godly man, lowered to the chair’s edge.

Garr shifted his gaze to the ceiling that was patterned with fleur de lis, closed his eyes, and sent thanks heavenward. His arm was spared, the fear of awakening and finding it severed having haunted his dreams. Then there was Annyn who had come in and out of them...

“Abel told me of Lady Annyn,” his mother said, “and the reason for her and her man’s imprisonment in the outer tower.”

It was to be expected, and likely Abel had left nothing unspoken. Determining he would not be drawn into a conversation about the woman, Garr flexed his shoulder. Though it pained him, it was no longer agonizing. He would be swinging a sword within a fortnight, would gain back what was lost—he prayed.

“I went to see her.”

“For what?” Garr demanded.

“To speak with her, of course.” She frowned. “The woman is not as expected.”

Garr felt his anger swell. “What did she say?”

“Little. Though, forsooth, I did not give her much leave to do so.” Isobel sank deeper into the chair. “What she did say was that she would not have had happen to you what did. Curious, hmm?”

Garr chafed. Though the physician had warned him not to move from his back, he pushed up to sitting and drew a deep breath against the pain.

“You should not.” Isobel protested. “The physician—”

“I know what he told, Mother, and I tell you: Annyn Bretanne is a deception. You shall not speak to her again.”

She narrowed her gaze, a portent of things to come as when Drogo had lived. Though deeply religious, she had often been at heads with the husband she had not wanted and who had made seven children on her, of which five had survived to adulthood. For all the warrior Drogo had been, and though he had never put his Scottish bride first, she had often come close to turning him from his purpose. And all dissension had begun with her incessant wearing of black to witness the darkness cast upon her by a forced marriage when her heart was given to another. Though Drogo was dead, she continued to wear the color.

Still, for all the years of having borne witness to his father’s bitterness, for which none could fault Drogo, Garr felt for Isobel Wulfrith. She had been a good mother those few years before her husband had, in turn, taken each of their sons to Wulfen, the love she denied Drogo given all to her children.

Nevertheless, in the deepest reaches of Garr where the boy had been banished, dwelt resentment, and not only toward her. Though it was customary for a boy to begin his page’s training at the age of seven, Drogo retaliated against Isobel by taking their sons from her upon their attainment of four years and made them train alongside others far older. And no quarter had he given.

“She ought to be moved from the tower,” Garr’s mother returned him to the present.

He laid a hand on his bandaged shoulder and applied pressure to its throbbing. “Nor would I have you speak
of
the Bretanne woman.”

Isobel clasped her hands in her lap. “I have prayed about this. Though by this woman your life was beset, she is still a lady and, it seems, given good reason to seek revenge.”

Abel
had
told all. “Enough!”

“The outer tower is no place for her. ’Tis chill, damp, and abounding with sickness.”

“I say again, speak no more of—or to—her.”

Isobel’s lips parted, but she quickly pressed them inward.

“We are of an understanding, Mother?”

She lowered her lids, raised them. “As far as my son can be understood.”

Garr ground his teeth. “Do not test me.”

“I would not think to.”

Aye, she would.

She stood and heaped the pillows at his back. “If you insist on disregarding the physician’s orders, you ought to at least be comfortable.” She turned away. “I shall send for your sisters. They are anxious to see how you fare.”

“First I would have you send for Abel.” Gaenor and Beatrix, whom he hardly knew, could wait.

His mother did not look around until she reached the door. “I have done so. He shall be here soon.” As she pulled the door open, puzzlement creased her face. “Several times during your fever, you spoke her name.”

Why did his mother persist? “To curse her, I am sure.”

“It did not sound a curse to me. But as you wish.” She stepped into the corridor and closed the door.

Garr clenched his jaws and leaned back against the pillows, but as he closed his eyes, he heard a murmur of voices from the corridor. The one that answered his mother belonged to Squire Warren.

The young man entered a few moments later. “Is there anything you require, my lord?”

“That I be left alone!”

The squire’s eyes widened. “Aye, my lord.” He hastened from the solar.

Garr lifted his aching arm and opened and closed his fingers. Though he knew the greater fault of the injury lay with him for having allowed Annyn Bretanne to distract him, Sir Merrick had much to answer for. Regardless whether it was his loss of breath that had made his guard vulnerable to Rowan’s presence, or a case of negligence, the man could no longer serve as a senior knight. But then, what was left to Merrick? He could not take up his lands, for upon attainment of knighthood he had relinquished them to his younger brother. A knight-errant, then. There were worse things.

The outer tower is no place for her,
his mother’s voice came again,
chill, damp...abounding with sickness.

Garr raised his hand before his face—open, close, open, close. His arm but needed healing and exercise.

She is still a lady...given good reason to seek revenge.

As he had concluded, but that was before he had taken an arrow for her—when she had turned him from his purpose.

The door opened. “Lo!” Abel exclaimed, a smile large on the face he stuck around the door. “You are returned to us.” He stepped inside and closed the door. “And from what Mother tells”—he leaned a shoulder against the curtained post at the foot of the bed—“you are as a hungry bear too long at slumber.”

Abel had been tumbling a wench in the stables, as evidenced by the scent of hay and the fibers overlooked in brushing off his clothes.

Continuing to flex his hand, Garr lowered his arm. “Mother tells too much, as do you.”

“Ah, Annyn Bretanne.” Abel’s smile turned chagrined. “I told her. If she were to lose a son, it seemed she ought to know the reason.”

“Then you did not expect me to live.”

“Of course I did, the same as I expected to win my wager with Everard.” Abel chortled. “Mayhap my lot is changing, eh?”

“In this. Still, were I you, I would guard my coin. Now tell, are there tidings of Lavonne or Duke Henry?”

“All is silent.”

Still, one or both would come, not only for Annyn Bretanne, but the alliance England’s future king sought with the Wulfriths. And for that, Garr must make a swift recovery.

“Sir Merrick seeks an audience.”

As Garr had known he would. “Later.”

“I told him so.” Abel slapped a hand to his thigh. “Now you wish to speak of Annyn Bretanne.”

Did he? Though piqued that his brother knew him so well, Garr said, “Mother tells that she and her man, Rowan, remain in the outer tower.”

“They do, and are most comfortable with the pallets and blankets she ordered delivered there. And the foodstuffs.”

Not even a curtained bed and the finest venison would make comfort out of that place. The outer tower of Stern that stood reinforcement for the castle’s exemplary guard was a warning to any who thought to come against the Wulfriths. Though most nobles kept their captives better, some even in luxury, Stern was known throughout England as a place one did not wish to be taken prisoner. Thus, its enemies were content to hate from afar—excepting Annyn Bretanne and her man.

“Four days,” Garr said. “How do they fare?”

“The jailer tells they are quiet. Indeed, they do not even speak one to the other.”

Garr’s first thought was that they were plotting, but realization thrust it aside. “They share a cell?”

“You surprise me, Brother. If I recall correctly, and I do, you said she was but a troublesome woman. Mayhap she is more?”

Garr clenched his hand on an illusory hilt. “Regardless of the wrong she did, she is still a lady, and a lady does not share quarters with a man who is not her husband.”

Abel’s eyes sparkled. “A lady? One could not tell it from looking at her.”

But one knew it to hold her—

By faith! Why did he allow Abel to draw him in? More, what did he care whether Annyn slept alone or made a bed with Rowan? It was his sword arm he ought to set his mind to.

He met his brother’s waiting gaze. “Our conversation is done.”

Abel pushed off the post. “I quite agree.”

He lied. There was more, and upon reaching the door he said, “I shall have her brought to the donjon.”

Grudgingly, Garr inclined his head. “Her man, Rowan, remains.”

“Of course.” Then Abel was gone, leaving his grin hanging on the air.

Garr berated himself for whatever allowed his youngest brother to know him. It was a mistake to release Annyn, but it was one he would have made regardless of whether or not Abel had taken it upon himself to do so. The outer tower was no place for her. But neither was the donjon.

Sleep pressing him down, he closed his eyes. But then Gaenor and Beatrix entered. Fifteen and thirteen respectively, they twittered their way into the solar and hovered on either side of the bed until he opened his eyes.

He sighed. Though he was nearly a stranger to them and certainly did not invite their attention, they were fond of him. He drew the coverlet up his bared chest.

“Gaenor,” he acknowledged the older one who had grown taller since his last visit and appeared more awkward than before. For this had her betrothed’s family broken the betrothal six months past? Or had that been Isobel’s doing? She had not liked the young man Drogo had chosen for their eldest daughter.

Gaenor dimpled both sides. “Greetings, Brother.”

He inclined his head and looked to his younger sister who was impossibly delicate in comparison. “Beatrix.”

She grabbed up her skirts and hopped onto the mattress. “At last you are returned.”

And, it seemed, would be staying longer than the three or four days he usually kept at Stern.

Gaenor shifted foot to foot and eyed the empty space beside Garr.

Reconciled to foregoing sleep, begrudging that a woman had once more turned him from his purpose, he said, “Sit, Gaenor. You are causing me to strain my neck.”

Hurt flitted across her face, and too late he remembered how it bothered her that she should be so tall.

He forced a smile. “Come, I am certain you have much to tell.”

“She does,” Beatrix exclaimed. “Another has offered for her—Lord Harrod of Banbrine.”

With measured movement that bespoke of Gaenor’s effort to appear less awkward, she lowered beside her brother. “He is forty and three years aged!” Tears sprang to her eyes.

More than old enough to be her father. Garr knew he should not care, as such marriages were made every day. Still, he said, “Aye, too old.”

With a trembling smile, she said, “I thank you, Brother.”

“Still you shall wed, Gaenor.”

Her smile flattened. “And who will want me other than old men whose eyes are dim?”

Where was Mother? This was not something a man should have to deal with. “There will be many. You shall see.”

As though he had made her a promise certain to be kept, she smiled again, a pretty smile that gave him hope he had not told her wrong.

The light of day blinded greater than the torch that had delivered her from the tower.

Annyn halted, fumbled the musty hood of the mantle over her head for the shade it offered, then took a deep breath of a day that was approaching noon. How sweet the air, how pure the taste!

“You are coming?”

She peered at Sir Abel who stood strides ahead, an impatient bend to his mouth. It was the first he had spoken to her since the jailer ushered her from the cell. “Where are you taking me?”

“To the donjon.”

She longed to ask the reason but knew her question would go unanswered. Was Wulfrith improved? She prayed so. Was it he who had summoned her? If so, would he see her? He must, for there was pleading to be done for Rowan who had thus far been spared retribution by Wulfrith’s illness. Of course, Wulfrith had but to leave Rowan where he was and the end would be the same. He was ailing, the cough that began yesterday growing more raw in the dank cell. Then there was the wheezing.

“I grow impatient,” Sir Abel snapped.

Of course he did. He was a Wulfrith. Swallowing, she winced at the sting that had begun in her own throat hours earlier and stepped forward.

He led her across the outer bailey to the inner drawbridge. She was watched, and when she followed the strongest of the sensations, her squinted eyes found Squire Charles where he paused outside the stables. A moment later, Squire Samuel, leading Wulfrith’s destrier, appeared.

Nose running, Annyn sniffed and turned her eyes forward as she passed beneath the portcullis.

The inner bailey provided her first view of Stern’s donjon lit by daylight. Though simply designed, it was majestic and more immense than any she had seen. Indeed, two of Castle Lillia’s donjons could fit into it.

The steps were treacherous, though not because of disrepair. Rather, her eyes continued to struggle with the light she had been too long denied.