Chapter 3 #2
She blinked but did not look away.
So, my beauty, you have kept something of that verve, after all, he said to himself.
That pleased him, although why that should be he didn’t know.
He had two mistresses at the moment, both skillful court ladies who knew how to play without subterfuge.
He was perfectly content, although rumor had reached him that the ladies in question were not.
Still, Lily held his gaze, flitting from his jaw to his brows as if taking inventory of his face. The impudent minx.
“Just so, sweet maid, you pick up that gauntlet I have thrown down,” he murmured and then stopped himself.
What the hell was he doing? He gave himself a mental shake. Stop behaving like some wet, mewling swain, he told himself with a good dose of disbelief.
He was busy investigating her father. Moreover, it had been years since he’d indulged in what he’d call troubadour games.
He disdained poetry and minstrelsy, the inane trappings of courtly love.
He would marry for dynastic reasons when he must and had no thought beyond that on the subject.
Love he reduced to its rightful place—a good physical romp.
The ceremony continued, and still he watched her. He could tell from the color in her cheeks that she grew more agitated. It flooded the shapely column of her neck. Still, she did not turn away.
Their visual duel amused him, although he rather thought it meant something different to him than it did to her. What exactly that was, though, he could not guess; the workings of a woman’s mind being generally unknowable.
But it intrigued him. Was it innocence, or had the charming Elizabeth Keeling been initiated into the art of coquetry?
* * *
Lily was flustered. She had seen the Black Raven, the knight who had so unnerved her that dreadful day when Edgar died. That terrible time had changed her father and brothers. It saddened her to think about it.
Her father bitterly rued the day he had capitulated to his son’s demand and invited Prince Henry to Keelington Court for the hunting. He still complained to one and all, but her brothers insisted that it was the only way to get their confiscated lands back from the crown.
Only later had they discovered that a good portion of their lost estates were in the Earl of Ravensworth’s hands, and that had infuriated them even more.
The Black Raven. He’d upset her today, as he had then.
Her family blamed the Prince’s entire party for Edgar’s death. Especially, though, they reserved a particular hate for Ravensworth. Everything had become more bitter and dark with Edgar’s murder, as her father called it.
She was expected to blame those her father named enemies, but Lily’s sense of justice had been altered that day.
She knew in her heart that Rig’s murder could not be justified. An honest man and a good man was Rig, and she would not have the word thief put on him. While she felt sad about Edgar’s death, she could not find him blameless in the business of Rig’s murder.
That episode had never made any sense to her. She had witnessed it herself and knew that there were hidden things going on that never came to see the light of day. It was a miracle that the charge of sedition had not been levied against them. Or worse.
Bee told her to ignore her qualms, that obedience to their father was more… how did she put it? More practical. “It does no good to gainsay him, especially if you wish him to agree to other things you want.”
In all things, Lily deferred to Bee, who had, like all her siblings, demanded nothing less from her.
She missed Bee, who had recently married Thadius Lampton, Earl of Mowbry, a man she did not love.
For what reason Lily could not work out, but Bee had begged her father to agree to the marriage, and he had.
Lily’s dreams were far too deeply rooted inside her heart to give them up for practical things. In her mind, she still cavorted in the flower-lanes of Camelot. There her desire dwelt, lyrical as a love poem and just as bright as a moonlit night.
She intended to marry for love. Nothing else but what the shining ladies of King Arthur’s court demanded, to wed with a seemly and chivalrous knight.
In that once and future land, anything was possible. Lily intended to emulate those gracious and high-minded women. And perhaps she had started out on that path?
She raised her fingers to her lips to hide her telling smile. Mere weeks ago, (five weeks and two days to be precise), everything in her mundane world had changed.
Finally, she might have met her very own most chivalrous knight, John Percy. And, if hope did not cheat her, tomorrow she would meet secretly with him—her very first assignation. “Feels like a flutter-by inside me!”
Gentle, kindly John, who professed his admiration for her in the most eloquent, romantic missives he sent with his squire, who in turn gave them to her maid.
So exciting.
Last time, he’d sent not a single word but instead a red rose. “As good as a kiss on my fingertips. Surely that means he loved me?” she whispered to herself.
How gallant he was. The very image of the handsome knights of her imagination. Fair-haired with soft brown eyes, so he had told her. He needed no description of her, he had said, for he had seen her from afar. Kind and gentle, John.
Just the opposite of the hard gaze that had so mercilessly skewered her in place today. The Black Raven. That dark image suddenly imposed itself on her. Lily forgot to breathe. John did not intimidate or dominate as he did.
It had been a shock to see him at Westminster. Well named he was, the Black Raven.
So men called him. In Chester, they had other harsh names for him, like brute and thief. Even so, common knowledge had it that few could withstand him on the battlefield. He had wealth and power few could match. He was, in any case, reputed to be Prince—no, make that King Henry’s—boon companion.
Then today, his silent challenge. Outrageous!
It brought to mind the conflicted feelings she’d had that day in the forest. She had not forgotten how frightening he had been, but she could not forget his chivalry either.
With a shudder, she forced her thoughts to more comfortable ones.
No, no, think not of him, she told herself. Forget his too handsome face.
John suited her far, far better than the arrogant Earl of Ravensworth.