Epilogue
“Holly Felicia Bernadette de Chastel!”
Holly hid her smile behind the tiny coif she was embroidering as her husband came stalking across the meadow. His handsome face was set in a fierce scowl, but he might have looked even more intimidating were it not for the three-year-old who had secured her perch on her papa’s massive shoulders by tugging at his ears.
He stopped at the edge of the blanket to avoid trampling his infant daughter, who slept in a basket with her thumb nestled between her cherubic lips, and dangled a sheaf of parchment in front of Holly’s eyes. “Do you know what this is?”
Laying her embroidery aside, Holly absently twirled an ebony curl belonging to the six-year-old napping in her lap. “A letter from the Baron of Gloucester,” she speculated. “Ruminations on the weather. A snippet of gossip about the king’s mistress. Complaints about the size of his goiter…”
Austyn snapped open the missive, but had to pry his daughter’s hands away from his eyes before he could read it. “‘Don’t think me impertinent, Gavenmore,’” he read, “‘but it has come to my attention on more than one occasion that your eldest would make a suitable bride for a lonely widower such as myself.’ A lonely widower indeed! A desperate old lech, he means!” Austyn wadded the letter into a ball, growling beneath his breath.
His daughter batted gleefully at his hair. “Papa’s a big ole growly bear!”
“Papa’s not a growly bear, Gwynnie. Since the king restored his title, he’s a growly earl.” He gently disengaged her from his shoulders and sent her off to toddle in the grass with a pat on the rump before sinking down beside Holly on the blanket. His expression was bleak. “It’s starting already, isn’t it? I thought we’d have a few more years of peace.”
Holly leaned her head against his shoulder. “’Twas inevitable, you know. Why Felicia and Bernadette are nearly eight.”
Austyn frowned. “Where are the twins today?”
“They’re off with their uncle Carey, learning how to shoot a bow.”
Austyn shuddered. “I hope he wore his padded hauberk.”
“I’m sure he did. I think he learned his lesson when they dropped the tub of poppies on his head. I’ve not seen him without his helm since. And then there was that little incident when they burned down the north tower while roasting chestnuts on the hearth.”
Austyn shook his head. “I never have figured out how that sheet got stuffed up the chimney…”
Holly bit off a piece of thread and murmured something noncommittal. She much preferred the spacious solar Austyn had built in place of the tower. A solar whose door was never locked unless they wished to steal a few precious hours of privacy away from the inquisitive eyes of their offspring.
Austyn ruffled his sleeping daughter’s hair, then ran a finger along the baby’s downy cheek. “They’re all so beautiful.”
Where once there would have been despair in his voice, now there was only pride and a perpetual sense of wonder that their love had brought such grace into the world. Even Austyn’s father had shared a brief taste of it. After tenderly cradling his first granddaughter in his arms, Rhys of Gavenmore had died quietly in his sleep. He now rested beneath a blanket of anemones at his wife’s side, at peace at last.
Holly reached up to caress the tendrils of silver at her husband’s temples, thinking as she always did how very striking they were. “I fear that in the next few years you’re going to come to learn that there are more vexing trials than possessing a comely wife. Such as fending off the suitors of six lovely daughters. I hope you don’t fancy yourself still cursed.”
Austyn drew her into the warm circle of his arms. “You and the girls will always be my dearest blessing.” He brushed her lips with his, igniting the passion that still flared so quick and bright between them.
The thunder of hoofbeats disturbed their tender reverie.
“Oh, Austyn, you didn’t!” Holly exclaimed as the fully armored rider approached, the celestial turrets and graceful arches of the newly completed castle providing the perfect backdrop for the dainty warrior.
He shrugged, bestowing upon her one of those crooked smiles she never could resist. “Your father donated the armor, but it had occurred to me that one of our daughters should be able to fend off her own suitors.”
The lithe rider brought the horse to a prancing halt, then reached up and dragged off her helm, sending a torrent of raven curls cascading down her back.
An impish giggle bubbled from her lips. “I saw you kissing Papa, Mama. How disgusting!” She tilted her pert nose in the air, sniffing with disdain. “I shall never bestow my kisses on any unworthy man.”
Austyn grinned. “That’s my girl.”
Holly pinched him.
The rider wheeled the horse around and urged it into a canter. Wrapped in each other’s loving embrace, Austyn and Holly shook their heads in wry wonderment as they watched her gallop fearlessly around the outskirts of the curtain wall encompassing their home.
She had inherited her mother’s grace and sense of mischief along with her father’s jousting skills and stubborn courage. Several minstrels and a handful of poets had already pronounced the dark-haired, blue-eyed sprite the fairest lady in all of England. Holly was only too eager to relinquish the title to her beloved eldest daughter, who had been conceived twelve years ago in one of the softest, fluffiest feather beds at Tewksbury…
Lady Ivy of Gavenmore!