Her Bridegroom Bought and Paid For

22

22

Konrad rose early the next morning and collected Aimee’s brooch from Bulwark Lane. He swung by the ostler’s on the way back and collected Actaeon. By the time he had returned to Lime Street, Jakeman was in the courtyard loading up his own brown mare and the skewbald packhorse with saddlebags. A fine white mare was stood tethered to another post close by. Once Actaeon was added to the mix, the small courtyard seemed to be teeming with horses.

“They sent around my wife’s horse, I see.”

“Aye, milord.”

“Where’s the boy?” Konrad asked, looking round. “Didn’t I hear tell he used to work in Ankatel’s stable?”

Jakeman shook his head. “The lad is clearly nervous around horses, milord, and better off where he is.”

Konrad shrugged and made his way inside where he found his sister sat at table breaking her fast. She looked up at his entrance. “Ah, Konrad,” she greeted him, almost affably for Magnatrude. “I was hoping I would see you before you departed.”

He dropped into a chair opposite her. “Were you? Are you going somewhere?”

“The palace,” she replied, and he steeled himself for another account of Queen Armenal’s beneficence. “But ’twas not that I was hoping to converse with you about.” She lowered her voice. “It is my hope you will take this opportunity to shore up and fortify the foundations of your marriage. They were badly shaken by your actions at the royal tournament. It is my sincere wish that you will not subject your wife to such an indignity again.”

Konrad stiffened. “I am well aware that I made a misstep there,” he replied brusquely. “And do not require your counsel on the matter.”

“Is that so?” Trude responded with raised brows. “I am still your elder sister, Konrad. You will allow that, if nothing else.”

“You are my elder sister,” he agreed. “But in truth, you know even less of marital accord than I.”

She considered this a moment before inclining her head. “I will own you may have something there. We neither of us had much of an example held up before us.” They fell silent a moment as the specter of their long-dead parents rose and fell between them. “Perhaps,” she suggested. “You should take her north to Bartree Castle after your tournament?”

“It will take months before the place is habitable,” he pointed out.

“It might be an adventure,” she said brightly. “To one such as Aimee.”

“Even an adventurous woman would be daunted by camping out in a soot-blackened shell,” he pointed out damningly. “She is used to every comfort.”

“Perhaps so,” she agreed. “But she has a good deal of spirit, and besides …”

“Besides what?”

“That girl believes herself to be in love with you, Konrad,” she said heavily. “So long as she is by your side, I believe there are few experiences she would not relish.”

Her words struck him dumb for a moment. “Perhaps in the beginning that was so,” he said harshly. “But you heard what she said that day.” To both their surprise, he broke off, his words half-choked. He could not quite bring himself to repeat Aimee’s claim she no longer loved him.

Magnatrude snorted. “She has some pride. What did you expect the poor girl to do? How do you imagine she must have felt in such exalted quarters? She must have been quite sick with nerves, without having to sit by and watch you favor another.” Konrad threw up a hand to stem the flow. He did not wish to hear the words aloud. His sister sucked in her cheeks and paused before proceeding. “Lord knows, the difference in your stations in life is insurmountable enough without you flouting it in front of everyone!”

“You know nothing about it, Trude. That is not what I was doing!”

“Very well,” she retorted. “I will admit my knowledge of tournament etiquette is slim. However –”

Konrad drew back his chair. “You have delivered your lecture, sister,” he said. “I can assure you that I have no intention of repeating the offense.”

She eyed him doubtfully a moment. “I did not mean to lecture you, Konrad,” she sighed. “I am well aware that my own conduct toward Aimee has not been beyond reproach.”

They sat a moment together in awkward silence. “You really want to become a courtier?” he asked gruffly. “It seems an odd choice for you to make at this time.”

“You mean with the estate being restored to you?” she asked. “Your wife will be mistress there, Konrad,” she said almost gently. “Not I.”

“I know,” he answered, though he vaguely remembered a time when he had not thought this would be the case. He had thought it would be in name only. “I could dower you now,” he pointed out. “Handsomely.”

Magnatrude’s smile was wry. “I do not want you to buy me a husband, Konrad, though I thank you for the offer. I have been given an opportunity to make my own way in life. On my own merit.”

Konrad grunted. He wasn’t so sure that bowing and scraping and constantly flattering a monarch would be an easy existence. “You wouldn’t rather be set up in your own household?” he suggested. “Able to call your soul your own?”

“At the constant beck and call of a husband?” Magnatrude asked dryly. He blinked, having never really considered it in that light. “No,” she said shaking her head. “That is not the life for me. You were right about Kimarne,” she said, taking him by surprise. “We would have dealt very poorly together. Things worked out for the best there.”

“You could always remain at Bartree,” he suggested.

She shook her head. “No,” she said resolutely. “Already, Ingrid has started checking my orders with Aimee. It is only natural that she should do so. Your wife is not the sort to be ridden roughshod over. She will be mistress in her own home and rightly so.”

They both lapsed into silence. “If you are sure this is what you want,” Konrad said after a moment. “Then I will support you in it.”

“Thank you.”

A footfall in the hallway alerted them to Aimee’s approach. She appeared in the doorway wearing a plum-colored gown with her new pearls worn in a double-strand and pinned to her bodice by a small brooch in the shape of a portcullis.

“Good morning to you both,” she greeted them brightly before turning to Konrad. “Husband, I am ready depart when you are.”

“You have not yet eaten,” he pointed out with a frown.

“Oh yes, I have,” she assured him. “I took mine earlier with Freda when you were from the house.” She turned to Trude, and they exchanged some small talk as Konrad reached into his tunic to extract the newly restored brooch.

“Here,” he said placing it on the table and sliding it toward her. “I’ll go and check on the horses. Join me outside when you are ready.” He left the room before she had the chance to do anything other than reach for the wrapped package. Twenty minutes later they had set out and were on the road for Beres Caple.

To his surprise, Konrad found that he experienced none of his customary emotions when exiting the walled city of Caer Lyoness. Usually, riding out of the armed gates felt like shrugging a heavy cape from his shoulders. Today, he felt none of the usual relief and cast an uneasy glance back over his shoulder as the city retreated further into the distance.

Was it possible, he pondered, that his feelings toward the place had undergone some sort of miraculous change? The notion that the southern capital could ever be anything other than detested by him was a startling one. He glanced uneasily across at his wife, but Aimee’s concentration was focused solely on staying in her saddle.

His wife was not a natural horsewoman, which perhaps he should have expected in a city girl born and bred. She clung grimly to her reins and stared doggedly ahead as they trotted along. In truth, she would be far happier on an older, placid mare, but Ankatel had purchased her a showy mount with plenty of spirit. Each time the horse tossed its head or kicked out, poor Aimee braced herself and held her breath.

“Your horse could do with a gallop,” he commented, lifting his voice so she could hear him above the horse’s hooves.

Aimee frowned. “She will be tired enough after a five-hour ride without galloping.”

“Aye,” he agreed. “But it might take the fidgets out of her legs.”

Aimee shrugged. “Maybe so,” she agreed straightening her shoulders as though steeling herself to an unpleasant task. He was pleased she did not argue, however little the idea appealed to her. “Why don’t you swap seats with Jakeman for a while?” he heard himself suggesting. “He could ride on ahead for a while and let her stretch her legs.”

“Really?” She looked so relieved by the proposal that he almost laughed. They effected the switch with little bother, and Aimee looked a lot happier on his manservant’s well-behaved mount. “What a sweet horse,” she commented patting the chestnut’s neck. “What is her name?”

“’Tis Ivy, milady,” Jakeman told her cheerfully as he swung up into her own horse’s saddle. “This one’s a beauty.”

“Yes,” Aimee winced. “Deirdre is very headstrong, though I can see she is in expert hands.”

Jakeman grinned and touched his cap to her. At the dig of his heels into her sides, the white horse took off, and they watched as they disappeared into the distance.

“How long has Jakeman been in your employ?” Aimee asked curiously.

“It must be some five years all told.”

“That long?”

“Why do you look so surprised?”

“It is just that,” she glanced down at her hands. “Well, he’s a southerner. When you employed him, the war must not have been long over.” She shrugged. “I suppose it surprised me that you would have taken someone into your service who had been so recently your enemy.”

Konrad considered his answer. “Jakeman was a soldier on Wymer’s forces, it is true,” he acknowledged. Aimee’s eyes grew wider. “But I did not hold that against him. A man fights for his king and country as he is honor bound to do.”

“Did you have no manservant from home that served you?”

“I did,” he acknowledged. “But he was killed in battle. Strictly speaking, I ought to have taken another from the estate, but …” He shrugged.

“You did not wish to uproot anyone from their home?” Aimee suggested.

Konrad dismissed this notion with a wave of his hand. “Most of the servants were scattered to the four winds when the estate was razed. Very few were retained by the Crown to oversee a ruin.”

“Why, then, did you not employ one of them?”

He was quiet a moment. “It seemed easier to just take on a new man. One who had not known me before.”

“Before the war, you mean?”

He nodded and Aimee was silent a moment, likely in deference to his dour tone. When she spoke, her tone was thoughtful. “Ingrid said that one of her sons is happier in his new place than in his old, though the other misses the castle life.”

“Ingrid told you that?”

“She did.”

“She likes you,” he growled. “Has done from the start.”

“Ingrid?” Aimee sounded startled. “Did she say so?”

“As good as. She said if you and Trude were sows fighting for dominance, you would come out the victor.”

Aimee’s mouth fell open, and Konrad felt the absurd impulse to laugh. This time he did not stifle it.

“Did she really say that?” Aimee sounded incredulous.

“She did.”

“What an odd thing to say!”

“She’s an old countrywoman,” he pointed out. “The comparison would be a natural one to her.”

“Yes, but to voice such a thing aloud to her master!”

“That’s the thing with old family servants. They get away with a good deal. Ingrid’s gnarled old hands boxed my ears when I was a lad. She will never forget the fact.”

Now Aimee laughed. “She is fortunate you do not bear a grudge now you are grown.”

“I’m sure I was deserving.”

“What were you like?” Aimee asked impulsively, turning toward him.

“Before the war?” he asked with an edge to his voice he had not intended.

“I meant as a boy, but I confess, that would interest me also,” she answered wistfully.

The sound of approaching horse hooves cut off their conversation. “Jakeman is back,” he said needlessly, and Aimee nodded as though she understood the time for exchanging confidences had passed.

The rest of the morning passed without event. Aimee returned to her own mount’s back, now Deirdre was less inclined to act out. He suspected she would have been happy to remain on the brown mare, for her own horse would never be docile, but she seemed resigned to her fate.

After that, he kept a close eye on her progress, steering Actaeon to her side when they passed carts or wagons in the road and Deirdre shied or caviled. His destrier was steady as a rock, and his example seemed a calming presence. Then, too, Actaeon was so large that when beside him, the mare could not see anything to alarm her around his solid bulk.

They stopped at the halfway point to give the horses water and to briefly stretch their legs. Aimee leaned stiffly against a wooden fence and rubbed her backside beneath her cloak when she thought he and Jakeman weren’t looking. He guessed she would be stiff and uncomfortable by the time they reached their destination, though there was little he could do to spare her that fate.

The idea occurred to him that if she had brought her lotion, mayhap he could rub her limbs for her later. He adjusted his stance and tried to think of something less stimulating. He ought to by rights to ask the Lady Howard who ran things these days for a room at Caple Hall for his wife to sleep in, for Aimee would be unaccustomed to sleeping out of doors in a pavilion. However, it was unlikely she would suffer any ill effects from a couple of nights in such accommodation, especially with him wrapped around her to guard her from the cold.

His aspect brightened considerably at the prospect, and he plucked apples from low hanging branches to feed to the four horses. He gave the pack horse two apples, for the beast was loaded up with the cumbersome pavilion. Actaeon, who was huge, carried his weapons and armor, which left Jakeman’s horse to carry the rest of their things. Only Aimee’s pretty white mare was not burdened with anything additional but for her rider and a set of blue and silver tack.

The rest of the journey passed without event, and they reached the village of Beres Caple by three o’clock. Caple Hall stood on the outskirts of the village, a large manor house, of half-wood and half-stone construction with a handsome, prosperous appearance. They had no sooner turned up the driveway, then they spotted people teeming about the grounds and setting up for the tournament. Their appearance seemed to cause something of a flurry, for there were a series of shouts and hurried footsteps at their approach.

“Do they know you?” Aimee asked with interest. “You seem to have caused quite a stir.”

“It’s the sight of a charger,” he said with a shrug, patting Actaeon’s neck. “They do not get many knights travelling in from out of the county. This tournament is not a well-established one. I am not displaying my banner,” he elaborated when Aimee continued to look unconvinced.

His words were then dashed rather, when he was hailed loudly by a stocky young man approaching from their left. It was the oldest of the Howard sons, he realized, though he could not recall if this was Chaucey or Darby, for there were two of them and both very similar in age and appearance.

“Lord Kentigern! You honor us with your presence!” he called out, beaming all over his face. “We hoped you might, but we weren’t sure you would manage to fit us in after your recent victory in the capital.”

Konrad nodded to him. He had only just growled out a ‘Well met’ when his brother hurried over from the opposite direction. “You might have waited, Chaucey!” he puffed. “So we could greet his lordship together!”

They exchanged some words in a furious undertone before both swung back around again, once more wreathed in smiles. “We have saved you the best spot, my lord,” Darby assured him. “Mother said we ought to have given it to Sir Jeffree, but we stood firm. After all, de Crecy hath only attended once before, whereas you have attended four years out of five.”

“Everyone from hereabouts knows you are a local crowd favorite,” Chaucey added, clearly not wanting to be outdone by his brother.

Feeling Aimee’s eye on him, Konrad cleared his throat. “This is my wife, Baroness Kentigern. Aimee, this is Sir Chaucey and Sir Darby Howard who are our hosts here at Beres Caple.”

The Howard brothers’ eyes nearly fell out of their heads. “You have brought your wife along?” Darby stammered before giving a nervous chuckle. “That seems to be the new custom!”

“Mother will be relieved at all events,” Chaucey said nudging his brother in the ribs.

Relieved, seemed an odd choice of word, but as they were performing their bows with frowning concentration, Konrad let this pass.

“I am pleased to meet you,” Aimee responded amiably. To Konrad’s discomfort, she seemed to be deriving great entertainment from the way the brothers vied for his attention as they were led to a meadow lying to the west of the house.

A few tents were already set up, and Chaucey pointed out one that was for equipment and one for servants use. “This spot is the one we had marked out for your use,” he said with satisfaction. “As you can see, it has the best views all round and is at a clear vantage point if it should rain.”

Konrad nodded, glancing at Jakeman who was already driving a stake into the ground to tether the horses.

“We can send a couple of servants to help you set up,” Chaucey offered generously.

“You will dine with the family, of course, in the great hall,” Darby interrupted. “As our guests.”

“Lord Kentigern knows how we run things, Darby,” his older brother chided him. “He is not new to our ways here at Caple Hall.”

“Aye, but I wanted to make sure he would join us at supper tonight,” Darby persisted. “For only recollect, sometimes he shuns the company of the Great Hall and has his food brought to his tent.”

His brother looked much struck by this, and two pairs of brown eyes were suddenly trained on him in appeal. Why were they so anxious for him to join them at table, he wondered? One of the things he most enjoyed about the smaller tournaments was the usual lack of attendant ceremony.

“I, for one, would like very much to make Lady Howard’s acquaintance,” Aimee said as Jakeman helped her to dismount.

“Excellent,” Chaucey said relaxing. Clearly, he thought Konrad would adhere to his lady’s wishes. “In truth, you will be doing us something of a favor. Poor Mother has been thrown into a serious quandary by the seating arrangements, but with a baron and baroness here, you will clearly take precedence.”

“Take precedence over who?” Konrad demanded, feeling totally at sea by this point. He reached into his saddlebag for a flask to fortify himself.

The Howard brothers exchanged glances. “Oh, didn’t we say?” Darby asked, looking embarrassed. “You’ll have to excuse us, my lord. With so much going on, our wits have clearly gone a-begging.”

“You see,” Chaucey said, lowering his voice and casting an excited look about. “It’s not just you and de Crecy who have graced us with your presence this year. We have another knight of considerable fame. He won the cup at Areley Kings in June.”

Areley Kings? Orde’s words flashed back into his mind. But that would mean …

“De Bussell’s here,” Darby broke in a hushed voice. “And he’s brought her with him. You know.” He nudged Jakeman in the ribs. “The northern princess!”

The flask that Konrad had been raising to his lips slipped through his fingers and fell at his feet, spilling water into the grass.