A Lady Under Siege(60)
“She wouldn’t listen,” Daphne whimpered, tears streaming down her face. “I don’t like this horse at all.”
“Do forgive her,” Sylvanne said soothingly. “That boar was as large as I’ve seen, and mean looking, and gave poor Mathilde a nasty shock. It frightened her as much as she frightened you.”
Thomas arrived, his old warhorse panting heavily.
“Are you all right, my darling?” he asked.
“No,” she replied. “I’ve been treated to a nasty shock, thanks to Mathilde.” She slapped her horse’s neck childishly. “Sylvanne says I should forgive her, but I don’t feel like it.”
“I’ll wager she’s sorry to have scared you, and a little embarrassed,” Thomas suggested. “I didn’t expect a stolid old mare like that to spook so readily. Next time try to keep your head, and rein her in when she wants to run wild.”
“I’ll try, Daddy.”
Thomas glanced at Sylvanne astride her saddle. “So much for a lady’s proper posture,” he said to her. “My finest horseman couldn’t have ridden better.”
“Some positions are more expedient,” Sylvanne replied coyly. She stood in the stirrups and lifted one leg over the horse’s back to return to side-saddle, affording Thomas a brief glimpse at her bare calves under her dress. He looked into her face, and saw that she had caught him looking, and despite himself he blushed. In her eyes he saw an unspoken challenge, a mix of confidence, flirtatiousness and bemusement. In his eyes she saw that he was smitten.
BY THE TIME THEY arrived back at the castle Daphne was barely able to stay upright in the saddle, so great was her exhaustion. She showed no interest in food nor drink, so they put her straight to bed, where she fell instantly asleep. Thomas and Sylvanne stood at her bedside awhile, watching her frail chest rise and fall in the soft candlelight.
“Do you think it was too much for her?” Thomas asked with concern. “Her breathing is so hurried.”
“She’s reliving her adventure, that’s all,” Sylvanne reassured him. “Stimulation of that sort can only be good for her. Her blood will be renewed by it.”
“I hope so,” he said. “Certainly her arm is looking much better. It’s healing well, and that’s thanks to advice from the future—clean dressing and vinegar have very nearly banished the infection there. Earlier today I had even considered her fully recovered.” He watched as his daughter’s breathing calmed, and felt some relief at the sight. Then he turned and studied Sylvanne’s face. “I don’t know how to thank you for your quick action on horseback,” he said earnestly. “Once, when I wanted to thank Meghan with a kiss, I was rebuffed by you. Will you accept a kiss for her now, and one for yourself?”
“Perhaps. On the cheek only. Not the mouth.”
“Of course,” he replied. He took her face in his hands, and planted three soft kisses, one on each cheek, and one on her forehead. “One for Meghan, one for Sylvanne, and one for the future,” he pronounced softly.
Sylvanne smiled up at him like a lady in love.
“Sleep well,” he said. “The guard will take you to your chambers.”
She looked into his eyes imploringly. “Is a lady to be thanked, and kissed, and yet still treated as a prisoner here?”
“I’m afraid so,” he replied, his voice tinged with regret. “Everything is strange, I know. But life is change, and if things continue along their course, I’ll soon have you dine at table with me in the Great Hall, as a proper guest should. A guest of honour.”
“I’d like that very much,” she told him. She reached for his hand, and held it in her two hands, playfully examining his sturdy fingers one by one. He let her do it, marvelling at the intimacy of this simple act, until stronger feelings of attraction and desire took hold of him, and fighting them, he pulled his hand away. Without another word, she turned to leave, fixing him with a dazzling, triumphant smile, a smile that kept him awake half the night, for the more he dwelled upon his memory of it, the more he recalled a hint of malice in her shining eyes.
30
Mabel lived for her thrice-daily trips to the castle’s kitchen to collect meals. The kitchen was in an outbuilding in the bailey, so it was quite the jaunt just getting there. First she was brought down from her Lady’s chambers in the castle keep, through the Great Hall, which often as not was crowded with courtiers and visitors, sycophants and supplicants, a lively cross section of folk, from ratcatchers to ropemakers, tinkers to needlers to ploughmen to garlic sellers, all hoping for a word with the Lord on some issue of import to them. Then she skirted the chapel, and exited the castle through a stout gate into the open air of the bailey, past the quarters for the knights in training, where handsome young boys and men engaged in all kinds of simulations of acts of war, past the workshops where the clothiers and embroiderers toiled to keep all the servants and courtiers dressed so well, past the brewery where the ale wife produced as creamy and potent a beverage as Mabel had ever tasted, to the great kitchen with its massive, ever-smoky oven, where a dozen maids busied themselves producing the wheat, rye and oat breads that were the staple of everyone’s diet, and an equal number of butchers and cooks prepared meat and game of all sorts, all of them chattering in that smoky cacophony with a teasing, good natured camaraderie that was to Mabel a blessed and cherished antidote to the dismal hours she spent locked away with her brooding Mistress.