Tori Phillips (38 page)

Growing? Aye, there was the rub. In the past month, Celeste’s middle had ballooned so that he wondered if she harbored twins. Twins, he mused. Mother would like that. Did twins run in the family?

A muted gasp snapped him out of his reverie. Celeste sat straight in her chair, gripping the lion’s-paw arms. Though the light from the blazing fire turned the room into dancing reds and oranges, Celeste’s complexion had taken on a shade like new parchment.

“My love, is there something amiss?” The stewed eels at supper had been a trifle rich.

She held her breath for a moment longer, then relaxed. A ghost of a smile flitted across her lips.

“The babe,” she murmured.

Guy’s heartbeat doubled and pounded against his chest. “Sweet Jesu!” he murmured. “You mean... now?” His mind, usually so clear in a crisis, befuddled itself. He could only stare at her as if she were some mysterious creature come to rest at his hearthside.

Celeste relaxed against her cushions. Her face resumed its normal look—one that hinted of untapped mischief.

“Non,
our child will not pop out this next minute. But, I think, you will be a father by the morrow.” She giggled.
“Mon Dieu!
I can see you are not quite ready for this blessed event. In truth, you look like a landed trout, my love.”

The impact of her words galvanized Guy as a call of the trumpets would have sent him plunging into the lists in an earlier time. He shot out of his chair, knocking it backward with a crash. “In the good Lord’s name, Celeste! Why did you not tell me before this?”

With one impatient hand, Guy swept the table aside, sending wine, cards and cups clattering to the clean-swept floor. Gaston, dozing on the settle by the fire, jerked awake.

“The devil take it!” he thundered, scrambling to his feet. “Are we attacked?”

“The babe!” Guy responded with a strange hoarseness in his throat. “’Tis time.” He knelt by his wife’s side. How could she possibly smile and look so calm at a time like this, when every nerve throbbed in his body and the stewed eels danced a galliard in the pit of his stomach?

“Sacrebleu!”
With a colorful oath, Gaston lumbered across the hall, calling for Mistress Conroy, maids, fire, water and wine.

Several hounds took up the cry, adding to the growing commotion. Servants peered through several doorways, then scurried off, only to return moments later, carrying all manner of things and heading for Celeste’s lying-in chamber, above the hall. In the midst of this early-evening chaos, Celeste smiled serenely at her husband. Obviously, the pain had unhinged her mind.

“Why did you not tell me sooner?” Guy asked again, gently placing his hand over her tummy. Her full roundness was tight under his touch.

With playful fingers, Celeste brushed a wayward lock of hair from his eyes. “Because, you great loud bear, I was winning. I couldn’t cry off until we had finished the game.”

Guy could only gape at her. He had heard that birthing sometimes turned women to madness. Dear God! Not his own sweet Celeste! He would offer a thousand masses, light ten thousand candles....

“Such a face!” she chided, stroking his cheek. “Are you going to be ill?”

The food inside him considered the question seriously. “Nay!” He swallowed with difficulty. “Can you put your arms around my neck?”

Celeste leaned over and kissed the tip of his nose. “
Oui,
as long as you promise not to drop me.”

“Drop you?” As if Guy could possibly do such a thing. Yet, as he gently lifted Celeste from the chair, he discovered a certain weakness in his knees. “Lean your head on my shoulder, my heart, and I will have you in your bed in no time.”

The rest of his consoling murmurs died in his throat as Celeste stiffened in his arms. Head bowed over her, he held her tight against his chest as her pain peaked and then ebbed.

“My lord?” Pip’s large eyes peered through the mat of his perpetually uncombed hair. “What will you have me do?”

“Get my lady mother!” Guy instructed as he strode toward the staircase. “And my father. Send a messenger to Wolf Hall at once.”

Pip spun on his heel. “I’ll go myself!” he replied, running for the stairs that led down to the courtyard. “I’ll be there and back with them afore the moon rises.”

Guy didn’t trust himself to caution the young scamp about temperamental horses and the holes in the road between Snape and his father’s home. The boy knew the way well enough, and Guy’s only thoughts were for the precious burden in his arms.

“Peep need not hurry to get there,” Celeste murmured as Guy carried her up the winding stairs. “They tell me that first babies take a long time coming.”

“I would share your pain.” Guy kicked open the door, narrowly missing Nan, who hurried in front of him, bearing a large basin of warm, scented water in her hands.

Celeste’s answering laughter sounded like bells on a May maiden’s wrist. “
Non
, my brave knight. I do not think so.”

Guy laid her on the thick feather bed. Was the chamber very hot, or was it him? “I will be with you every moment.” He kissed her fingers, one by one.

Celeste merely rolled her eyes at him before another pain seized her. Guy winced as he watched helplessly. Someone shook him by the shoulders.

“Ye do Her Ladyship not one whit o’ good by being here, my lord.” Mistress Conroy pried his fingers loose from Celeste’s moist hand. “A birthing chamber is no place for a man, Sir Guy. Now be off with ye, and let us get on with our work.”

Stung by the housekeeper’s callousness, Guy wheeled on her, but that good lady merely fixed him with a stare that would have frozen a charging bull on the spot. “Take good care of her,” he managed to mumble. His mouth was dry. Wine—he needed a lot of it.

“Aye, to be sure, my lord, as soon as ye’ve gone. I’ll not be having ye swoon on me and clutter up the floor. Now out with ye!” She flapped her apron at him, as if he were a schoolboy caught red-handed with an almond tart.

“Go on, Guy,” Celeste added as Nan helped her out of her furred
robe de chambre
. “I am in good hands here.”

He leaned over the bed and took her pale face between his hands. How tiny Celeste was! How big his child within her! Too big. He traced each beloved feature with his thumb, trying to memorize every part of her. Sweet angels in heaven! What if he should lose her now? Not that. They had only enjoyed a year together. One scant year of happiness.
Pray, let Celeste live, and I will give up...swearing! Aye! And drinking wine, and...

“Hey-ho, Brother Guy!” Celeste caressed his hand with hers. “If you are planning to prostrate yourself on that cold chapel floor all night, I pray you not to do it naked. It will shock the maids, and you’ll catch a chill. It would vex me sore to have you sick at a time when I need you. Come, give me a kiss to remember you, then go away. All shall be well.”

“I shall kiss you forever and a day,” he murmured as his lips closed over hers, drinking in her sweetness. She clung to him for a moment longer, then pulled away as another pain took hold of her.

Feeling like a craven cur, Guy turned and fled the chamber. Gaston greeted him at the bottom of the stairs with a brimming cupful of unwatered wine.

“You look like the devil’s own whoreson,” the old soldier remarked with gruff affection as he pulled Guy toward the hearth, which the pages had piled high with fresh logs. “Sit down, man, before you fall down. This birthing business!” Gaston quaffed his own generous portion of wine. “It’s slower than a teasing virgin and frays a man’s nerves just as badly. Nay—worse!”

By the time the earl and countess of Thornbury arrived, Guy had his head down between his knees, trying to blot out the piercing cries that came from the chamber above.

“How long has it been so?” Lady Alicia asked Gaston as Pip took her cloak and gloves.

Gaston replied with a crooked grin. “For my lady, I think it has been close to four hours. For your son here, it seems much longer.”

“Eternity,” Guy moaned.

“Pull yourself together, Guy. Babies are born every day.”

Lady Alicia dropped a kiss on the top of his head as she swept toward the stairs. “Thomas,” she called to her husband over her shoulder, “do something with him.”

Guy stared at his father. “Was it thus with Mother when she had us?”

Thomas stretched out his hands to the blaze. “How should I know? I was a-hawking when you were born, and hunting the stag when Brandon came.”

Guy’s jaw dropped. He bit back the disrespectful words to his father that bubbled to his lips. His parents were a most loving couple. How could his father have abandoned his wife so cruelly?

Sir Thomas smiled at his son. “Hunting was invented for fathers-to-be, I think. You did not plan this babe well, son. Night is a terrible time to go thrashing about in the woods. You should have done it like me—labor pains at dawn, and ’twas off with the hounds an hour later. By the time I got back with a buck—and an eighteen-pointer, I confess—Brandon was all cleaned up and howling for his supper. And speak of the devil...” Thomas turned as his eldest son staggered into the hall under the weight of a keg.

“Greetings, little brother!” With a great heave, Brandon placed his burden on the floor. “I see I’ve come in good time with medicine for you.” He winked at Gaston and his father.

“Medicine for me?” Guy repeated dully. Had Brandon gone horn-mad, as well? Was he, Guy, the only sane man among the lot of them? Just then, another one of Celeste’s cries pierced the air. Guy winced.

“’Tis killing her,” he groaned.

“Nay.” Brandon pulled the bung from the keg and poured a stream of amber liquid into Guy’s empty wine cup. “But methinks ’twill kill you. Here, drink this.”

“I’ve had wine enough,” Guy muttered.

“Wine? Wine is for children. This is a man’s drink—whiskey, straight from a goodly shop in Edinburgh. I’ve had it laid by since August, just for this occasion.” Brandon grinned at his own foresight. “Father? Gaston?” He offered to fill their cups.

“Just the thing—if you can’t go hunting,” replied Sir Thomas. Gaston shook his head and mumbled a number of foul things in his best gutter French. Celeste cried out again. The four men shuddered as one.

“There’s no sound quite like it, is there?” Brandon remarked in the silence that followed.

“By Saint Luke, if Celeste lives through this, I swear it will never happen again.” Guy balled up his hands into fists and drove them into his eyes, as if that action could blot out the unearthly, horrific sounds from above. “I will never let her bear another child.”

“Oh, truly?” Brandon poured his brother another drink. “And do you plan to renew your vow of chastity? Forgive me, little brother, but methinks you are moonstruck. I have seen the look in your eye when Celeste smiles at you. You have about as much control as a bantam rooster in a well-stocked henyard, and—”

Before Brandon could continue his observations, Guy leapt at him, hurling them both to the floor. They rolled about on the flagstones, trading blows. Sir Thomas looked on his sons with fond amusement.

“Always thought a little exercise was good at a time like this,” he remarked to Gaston. “If you can’t go a-hunting, that is.”

Night waned, and the new day broke with a rare show of crystal blue sky. Only Guy remained awake, every cry of Celeste’s ripping him apart. The whiskey had only made him chilled, not numb. Brandon, sporting a split lip, slept on the floor in front of the low-burning fire. Gaston and Sir Thomas snored in company on the settle.

Like a terrier sniffing the wind, Guy lifted his head and listened. Nothing but silence. She’s dead! He dropped his head into the crook of his elbow. Tears stung his eyelids. He cried as he had not done since he was ten.

“You are a grand sight.” Lady Alicia’s voice chided him through the haze of his grief. “Drunk and blubbering.” Guy looked up at his mother, waiting for the final blow—her confirmation of what he knew was the truth. Instead, she smiled at him.

“What is your poor little daughter to think, if the first sight of her father is a red-eyed, unshaven giant—with a black eye, no less? How now, Guy?”

Only the word
daughter
penetrated Guy’s consciousness. He moistened his dry lips. “What say you, Mother?” he croaked.

Lady Alicia stroked his hair, as she had done all the years he could remember, when he was in need of comfort. “I say you have sired a fine baby girl this new day,” his mother crooned. “Forsooth, she’s the first dark-haired Cavendish, and—”

“And Lissa?” Guy could barely whisper her name.
Sweet angels, be kind.

“Safe, but tired, as well she should be.”

With a war cry last heard some five years ago, Guy leapt up, grabbed his mother with him and twirled her about the hall, waking dogs, servants and, finally, her husband.

“Unhand my wife, you rascal!” Laughing, Sir Thomas joined in their mad capering. “I take it we have a Cavendish heir?”

“Girl,” Guy blurted out as he kissed each parent in turn. Then he bolted for the stairs, giving Brandon a brotherly kick en route.

“She needs to sleep,” his mother cautioned him as he took the stairs two at a time.

Inside the stifling chamber, Celeste greeted him with a wan smile.

“Have you seen our daughter?” she asked softly, gazing up at him with those huge purple eyes he loved so well.

“Nay,” he murmured, kissing her again and again, each kiss not half enough to slake his thirst for more. “I can only concentrate upon one lady at a time. How fare you, sweetest Lissa?”

Celeste sighed with contentment. “Most marvelously sleepy, and very happy.”

“My lord.” Mistress Conroy nudged him. “Will ye look upon your child?” She held out a small, tightly wrapped bundle to him.

Guy looked from the housekeeper to his smiling wife. “In there?” he asked, pulling back the edge of the swaddling blanket. His new daughter regarded her father with solemn eyes that hinted at a lavender color. A halo of fine black silk crowned her head. Without a doubt, the youngest Cavendish was the the prettiest, tiniest creature he had ever seen.

“Ye won’t break her, my lord.” Mistress Conroy smiled widely, showing a loss of several teeth. “Just hold her head thus.”