Chapter 10
Keelington Court lay dark and sleeping. Midnight had long passed. Morning could not be more than a few hours away.
Lily woke at the sound of the earl’s ungentle words. “Wake up!” The interminable ride from Glumfell had finally come to an end, it seemed.
Behind them in disciplined lines came the Ravensworth men-at-arms and the earl’s three personal knights. Behind them rode the squires. The company came to a halt at the gatehouse.
The gate guards, Lily realized, would be wary. The Black Raven would need her help to gain entry to the fortified manor. She sighed and wondered if the long, fraught day would ever end.
The earl had plucked her from the claws of her own foolish disaster. Mortified, she hung onto the shreds of her dignity. His disapproval came at her like a blast furnace whose door is suddenly flung open to express its ire with a fiery roar.
Strangely, though, there had been a fleeting moment right after he had lifted her into his arms that utterly amazed her. She dwelt on it still, for she could only describe it in the most chivalrous terms.
The Earl of Ravensworth had most tenderly brushed the side of his face against her temple, a sheltering, poignant touch that quite undid her.
Even now thinking on it, she could not but feel its comforting message.
At the time, she had sobbed with relief, pressing her face into his mail hauberk, clinging to him as if to life.
It had only been a few moments. The work of a minute, before all the woods around them came alive with his men. Then, orders were issued and horses pranced. And right then and there, her rescuer had turned captor once again.
Not that she blamed him, she did not. The blame lay with her. Her belief in John Percy as a worthy man. He’d called her a fool, and that was true enough. How crushed she felt, knowing the fault lay with her. And Lily being Lily, she owned to it and did not lie to herself.
Nor did she look for excuses, as she tried to explain to the earl when she made her apology. One that he clearly found worthless.
He’d looked at her with withering contempt. It still seared her—flesh and bone. Instead of responding, he’d mounted his stallion. Then, without a word, he leaned down and scooped her up, settling her sideways across his sinewy lap.
With one quick movement, he’d wrenched the threadbare cape from her shoulders, as if it offended him, ignoring her gasp of protest. He brought her tight against himself and wrapped his cape around them both.
Lily felt his steel-hard arms envelop her, claiming her as surely as his betrothal contract intended. His heat surrounded her, imprisoning her against the bastille of his body.
He overpowered her like a marauding army. She’d tried to squirm away from his heat. “You are invading me.” The words seemed to have sprung out of her mouth without intention.
“Desist,” he’d told her savagely and tightened his hold for good measure. “You have given me and my men no rest this day. I do not intend to be inconvenienced further. Do I make myself clear?”
Swamped in guilt, Lily remained as rigid as she could. Thinking back on the night’s events, she had to admit a grudging admiration for the earl’s well-ordered company. They worked as a disciplined unit, each knowing their part, each displaying why the Black Raven enjoyed so high a reputation.
Lily had noticed that Sir Lanval and the rest of the earl’s elite guard had not been with him when he’d plucked her out of the darkness.
They’d returned only later, when the troop reached the forest’s edge, suddenly appearing out of the trees and taking their places behind him without any orders that she’d witnessed.
Of John Percy, there had been no sight. Lily could not muster concern over it. Her regret lay in her own failures. John had too easily made a fool of her tender feeling, but he also revealed himself as a knave, unworthy of her consideration. Her family, though, she did have a care for them.
What did he intend? The Black Raven, his symbol, a gatherer of wisdom and the mysterious dark, the watch-warden of the kingdom. Did his symbol reflect his commitment as that warden? Would he seek the king’s revenge? His own?
Would he denounce her whole family because of what she had done? Lily’s guilt would not relent. She had to try and put things right.
“My lord, I would have you know that my father is not at fault, he is bl—” she began, but again his arm tightened around her midriff, almost crushing her.
“I told you to be quiet,” he snapped.
She made a small sound in her throat—that was a mistake.
He jerked her closer; the ridges of his powerful legs tensed beneath her bottom. Lily would have leapt from the horse if she’d not been anchored down so thoroughly.
“I do not want to hear,” he intoned in a dreadful whisper, “one, single, deceitful word from your mouth.”
Lily closed her eyes. In the next instant, she fell asleep.
* * *
For Edward, the journey from Glumfell seemed endless.
To his chagrin, Lily had responded to his reprimand by promptly falling asleep. Like a guiltless child. The impudence almost made him smile.
Not only that, but when he’d looked down to see if she was pretending, he saw to his amusement that his runaway rebel had curled an arm around him and laid her face against his hauberk. The very man she’d only just accused of invading her.
Edward grunted and pulled his mantel tighter around them both. The cold hours before dawn approached. They rode back in silence amid the jingling of harness and thud of hooves.
The manor slept. Only the night watch patrolled the gatehouse.
“Wake up,” he told Lily, his manner deliberately brusque.
As it turned out, the gate guard had been on the lookout for his return, and so Lily’s intervention had not been needed.
“I am awake,” she said, her voice thick with drowse.
They crossed the drawbridge with a clatter and a drum and came to a halt in the courtyard awash in moonlight. The westering moon had a few hours yet to go.
Edward set Lily down and unhorsed swiftly behind her. “Uh-uh,” he snapped as she made to move away, and he took her arm firmly in his grasp. “You’re coming with me.”
Knights and men-at-arms dismounted wearily as sleepy-eyed pages and grooms appeared to assist them.
Someone must have seen them coming, for the great doors were unbarred and slung open even before Sir Mathew had a chance to bang upon them. When he reached the top step, Edward turned briefly to Lanval.
“Give me one hour,” he told the knight. “Find the bishop; hopefully, he hasn’t left yet. I want it done directly after Prime. Rouse Stanbury and his brood. We need witnesses… see to it.”
“There will be no one left abed, my lord,” Lanval assured him.
Edward had Lily’s wrist clasped in his fist as he made his way across the darkened hall toward the stairs, dragging her in his wake.
Lily looked on, scandalized. “What do you intend?”
She was surprised when he answered. “We are going to your bed chamber for a little parley, you and I. Long overdue, I might add.”
“But you can’t—”
He jerked her arm and almost sent her flying.
“Do not tell me what I can and cannot do.”
Lily had few illusions about his temper, but distraught as she was, she dared to prick him. “At least tell me this: why is Sir Lanval waking everyone up? Must you have an audience for my repudiation? Can you not simply disavow me and relinquish your petty revenge, my lord?”
His mouth twitched. “Repudiation? Dramatic, aren’t you, mam’selle? You have our oaths broken before they’re even made. And you have the gall to entreat with me?’
“Would it help? Please, have I not said the fault is mine? Do not shame my family in this public way.”
“Your pleas are woefully inadequate, and your family is so far beyond consideration for clemency where I am concerned you might well ask me for the moon. Or is it the stars? I forget again. Shall we ask Master Percy to name the prize, do you think? For is he not a chivalrous knight?”
“You mock me,” said Lily in a small voice. “It is deserved. I understand your anger, and I am sorry. I misjudged, but—”
He stopped in his tracks and glared at her. His grip on her wrist made her wince.
“Y-you hurt me,” she said.
He released his hold a little, but his anger smoldered.
“You would do well to remember that, Lily. Misjudgments like that could cost not only your life, but mine as well. Do not think I have said all I wish on the matter of you running to Master Percy because I have not. That is simply postponed for another time. For the nonce, I have another pressing issue to discuss.”
“What could be so urgent that you have to waken people from their beds and storm about in a temper?” she asked, almost tripping to keep up with his aggressive strides. His spurs rang shrill across the flagstones.
Edward halted again, towering over her, all his humor flown. He’d lost any interest in her spirited objection to their betrothal. Now he merely found it distasteful.
He could thank a lack of sleep and a niggling lack in his own self-discipline. It had pushed him to a place he did not want to go. The ride back from Glumfell had been sheer erotic torture.
The gold shards in his dark eyes glittered dangerously. He could feel them flickering. He was taking her into the lion’s den. It was beyond time to lay down the law for his lady, and that is what he intended to do.
Lanval could have warned Lily what it meant. Diggens might have alerted her, although it was more likely the boy would feel the need to protect her. The youngling, Edward knew, had developed a crush on her. He’d caught the boy composing songs in her honor.
Lily had no honor he reminded himself. She had promised not to hide away and then promptly fled. Untrustworthy. What did she know of oaths and fidelity?
He was not feeling charitable enough to remember how she had shared her trust with him on several occasions. Not when the murderous rage elicited by John Percy had his blood up. He had not experienced jealousy before, and he was finding it most inconvenient.
“Our betrothal is what is urgent,” he bit out.
“And the witnesses are here to attend our betrothal ceremony. And that is what they’re going to do.
Although I must admit, I find your sudden consideration perplexing.
I remember clearly that you kept them—and the bishop—waiting all afternoon and evening while you cavorted in the forest with your swain. ”
“O-our betrothal?” She sounded dumbfounded.
“You are far too young to be forgetful, Elizabeth. I am certain you recall our betrothal. It was supposed to happen yesterday. It will happen forthwith.”
“B-but—surely, you can’t mean to still wed…”
“Do I not?” he snapped.
“I don’t understand,” she said, mutiny in her eyes.
He felt like shaking her. “Would you care to contest the issue once again?” he asked.
“Please, my lord, can we not just sleep on the matter? We could discuss betrothals sensibly once we’re rested and fresh.”
He stopped outside her bedchamber and unceremoniously threw open the door. It was met by cries and gasps from the women inside. Several ladies shared Lily’s chamber. Some were household women, others, relatives visiting for the festivities. All had been asleep.
Outrage died on their lips as they took in the sight of the armed knight looming over Lily with dark menace. They clutched their blankets and shawls to themselves as if they and not she needed protection.
They need not have concerned themselves. Edward appeared to be entirely unaware of them. All his focus rested on the ragged, exhausted woman standing in his great shadow.
“Explain to me what part of this alliance offends you so?” he demanded.
“I have agreed, your father has agreed, your king has agreed. Is that not enough for you, my lady?” he ended, ruthlessly twisting the last sarcastic knife in her wound, for he obviously did not consider her his lady or anyone else’s either.
Lily drooped. She had been bested, she knew. She’d been outflanked. Anything she had to say would sound futile. In any case, she was exhausted. She could make no answer, and she knew it.
So did he.