Chapter 15
Briar did not think she had slept at all, but she must have, for the sudden banging on the door made her jump awake.
Mary also sat up, her dark hair cascading all about her. “Who is’t?” she gasped, as the two guards sleeping on the floor just inside the cottage struggled to draw their swords.
“I am come from Lord Radulf!” a voice outside informed them.
Mary pushed her hair out of her eyes and looked at Briar. Briar crept gingerly out of bed, wincing from the cold, and moved toward the door. The two guards gestured for her to stay back, and flung it open, swords at the ready.
The morning air crept in. The faces of Lord Radulf’s men looked pinched with cold as they stood waiting, one of them holding a largish cloth-wrapped bundle.
“ ‘Tis a gift,” the hard-faced soldier explained. “To the Lady Briar, from the Lady Lily.”
“Lady Lily?” Briar looked bewildered. “But is she not still in Somerset?”
The hard-faced soldier smiled, and suddenly he did not seem so very hard. “She arrived in York at dawn, lady.”
The bundle was placed on the floor inside the room, and the door was closed firmly. Mary came and stood beside Briar, both women looking down at it in some bewilderment. “What can it be?” Mary asked uneasily.
Briar did not know, but a stab of guilt reminded her that she had wished Radulf and Lily only ill until a short time ago. Perhaps Lily had discovered it. But that was silly—Lily couldn’t read Briar’s mind. Mayhap it was a gift for the home she would make with Ivo?
She bent and slowly, cautiously, undid the ties, and rolled open the cloth to reveal the contents.
It was a gown. Made of the finest velvet, and colored a deep, luscious green—Briar’s favorite color. The skirt and bodice were embroidered with small gold and silver beads, and in the gloomy dwelling, they glittered like distant stars.
“She has sent your marriage dress,” Mary breathed, reaching to touch the luxuriant cloth with a reverent finger. “Oh, Briar, ‘tis so beautiful! You will look like a queen.”
Briar, stunned at the extent of Lady Lily’s generosity, gasped as her sister hugged her tightly in her excitement.
“ ‘Tis a pity you have only your old stockings and shoes to wear with it,” Mary added, practically.
And wondered why Briar began to laugh.
There had been little time to prepare Lord Radulf’s York house for the ceremony, but with the roaring fire in the hall and the succulent smells of a banquet cooking, it did not really matter. The big room spoke of welcome and celebration, a haven against the threatening weather outside.
The priest spoke the words to bind them together, and Briar clung to Ivo’s hand, still a little dazed by all that had happened. And so quickly. Ivo was pale, with shadows under his eyes, but there was no hiding the steady glow of happiness in them.
Radulf and Lily watched on, and although Briar was introduced to Lily, she barely remembered what she said. Afterward, it was always Ivo’s words that she recalled, when he first saw her in her green velvet wedding gown.
“Demoiselle, you are an angel,” he had breathed, taking her hands and staring down at her in wonder.
The gown did suit her well, seeming to capture the secrets in her hazel eyes and causing her chestnut hair to glow where it had been combed over her back and shoulders.
“My heart is too full for words,” he had added, and ‘twas true, for tears filled his dark eyes.
Ivo wore a deep blue tunic with a fine linen shirt beneath, and dark breeches and soft leather boots. With his height and breadth of shoulder, he looked like the knight he had always been, in his heart. A man to be proud of.
When the priest had finished, Ivo drew her to him, carefully, as if he were afraid this were a dream and he might wake up, and kissed her lips, chastely, as befitted the solemnity of the occasion.
There was a smattering of applause. Briar’s sisters were there, their eyes shining, and Sweyn, grinning, as well as two other big men, whom Ivo had introduced as Reynard and Ethelred. They all wished her and Ivo well, and the warmth of their smiles washed over her like a happy tide.
And then Ivo laughed, losing some of his awe, and picked her up in his arms, spinning her around to the delight of the guests, until Briar’s stomach dipped, and she whispered in a soft voice that he had better stop.
“Briar?”
Briar looked into the beautiful, gentle face before her.
Lady Lily was everything the rumors promised and more, ethereally fair, with gray eyes that saw straight to her heart.
Briar had already stammered her thanks for the dress when she arrived at Radulf’s house, but Lily had brushed her words aside.
“Someone did the same for me when I was wed,” she said, with a little smile. “In my case ‘twas not done with the best of intentions, but still I felt special. I wanted you to feel special, too, Briar. I know what it is to be poor and put upon.”
Now the ceremony was over, and the feast had come and gone.
The day was dwindling into night, and still no one wanted to leave.
Ivo was reminiscing with his friends, and Mary was leaning against Sweyn as if she belonged there.
Jocelyn and Odo had retired long since. Tired, longing only to fall asleep in Ivo’s arms, Briar had found herself a quiet place in a corner to wait until she could retire.
It was there that Lady Lily had found her.
She sat down on the bench beside Briar. “Radulf has told me of your troubles,” she said softly.
“Oh,” Briar replied, and could think of nothing else.
The familiar guilt roiled inside her as she remembered what she had planned to do to this woman and her husband.
Of course, her plan had been doomed to fail from the start because, as Ivo had said, Radulf would never have taken another woman in Lily’s place, not even for a moment.
Still, that did not make what Briar had meant to do any less wicked, or make her feel any more comfortable with her own conscience.
Lily was still smiling, but her gray eyes were flinty. “Radulf tells me you hated him for your father’s misfortunes.”
Obviously, Lily did not believe in creeping around the facts. A woman after my own heart, Briar thought wryly.
“My lady,” she said firmly, “I did hate him. ‘Tis true. My father vowed revenge upon Lord Radulf before he died, and I believed that I must take on that vow as my own. For two years I hated Lord Radulf and believed him solely responsible for my family’s downfall. I know now that that belief was false. Lord Radulf was as bound up in Lady Anna’s sickness as my father.
I do not hate him. I do not think, on this wonderful day, that I could hate anybody. ”
Lily laughed. “I am delighted to hear it.” Then she sobered and leaned closer, her gaze intent.
“I wished to give you some advice, Briar, something I have learned over the years.
Trust your heart. The mind is so much more insistent, so much louder.
But listen hard to the soft whisper of your heart, for ‘tis the heart that speaks true.”
Briar smiled, for she had done just that. Followed her heart. “Thank you,” she said softly. “I will try to do so, always.”
“You will never regret it.” Lily glanced across the room to where Radulf was standing, and as if he had felt the brush of her gaze, he looked up. Their eyes met in perfect understanding.
“Wife,” Ivo murmured into her ear, “are you awake?”
His hands slid around her, to cup her breasts, his body aroused against hers. Briar lay half asleep in the warm, soft bed and smiled. She was perfectly content to allow Ivo to wake her.
His hand slid over her belly, pausing briefly, as if he thought of the child growing there, and down to the soft place where her thighs joined. Briar bit her lip on a groan. She was ready for him, and he knew it now. The game was over.
He turned her onto her back and gazed down with hot black eyes into her own loving ones.
“You are awake, wife.”
“I cannot be. ‘Tis too wonderful to be real, and I do not want to wake and find it has been nothing but a dream.”
He kissed her mouth, his hands caressing her pliant body. “This no dream, Briar. Never fear you will awake and find me gone. I intend for us to grow old together.”
She arched against him as he delved deep inside her with his finger, clinging to his shoulders, her eyes closed. He lifted his big body over her, opening her legs with his hard-muscled thigh. She eased herself against him, enjoying the rough feel of his skin on that most sensitive part of her.
“Ivo,” she gasped, and reached down to take him in her hand.
He shuddered, suddenly on the verge of losing control, and settled himself more fully between her thighs. She guided him, urging him to complete their joining. But Ivo didn’t need urging. He thrust inside her, deeply, feeling the tremors of her body as she adjusted to him.
“Wife,” he whispered, and thrust again.
Briar gasped, and gently slipped over the edge into the warm, wonderful sea of completion. A short time later Ivo joined her, and together they lay entwined, dreaming of a life together.
“My love?”
Ivo blinked, too happy to speak.
Briar came up on one elbow, gazing down into his face, her hair tickling his skin. One breast brushed his shoulder and he reached to fondle it, thinking, This is mine. She is mine. Truly mine. Miles will never hurt her, not while I live.
She gasped as he found her nipple, gently tugging at the swollen flesh with his gloved fingers.
Suddenly he did not feel like sleep, and reached to pull her on top of him. But she held her palms against his chest, firm and unyielding, and surprised, Ivo stared up at her.
Her face was uncertain, the smile curving her lips a little strained. As though she did not know how to say what she wanted to say.
“Briar? Is something amiss, my angel?”
She shook her head, but her lips trembled.
“Briar,” he said, more loudly, “you are frightening me. Tell me, what is wrong?”
She put a finger against his cheek, smoothing the stubble that grew dark against his skin. “Nothing is wrong, Ivo. I want... I want to see your hand now. We are wed. Nothing will make me love you less. You must take off your glove.”
Shocked, he said nothing, just stared up at her. Take off his glove? Show her what Miles had done to his hand? It would be like bearing his soul. And then he remembered that he had already done that; she knew the worst of him already. What did one more thing matter?
“ ‘Tis not a pretty sight.”
She laughed and then bit her lip. “I don’t care about that, Ivo,” she assured him, reaching to take his glove in her own warm fingers. “I love you for what you are, and your hand, and all it means to you, is part of that.”
Love. She loved him. Aye, the love was there in her eyes. His Briar loved him, and she had wormed her way into his heart and his life, until she was his life. He could deny her nothing, and she knew it.
Keeping his eyes on hers, Ivo began briskly to unlace the glove, tugging hard on the leather ties. When that was done, he peeled back the leather, loosening it, and then pulling it from his hand.
Her eyes were still on his, as if despite her brave words she didn’t quite dare look down. And then her gaze slid away, toward his naked hand and the scarred, ugly mess that Miles had made of it. And Ivo realized he couldn’t bear to watch her, in case he saw the horrified rejection there.
There was silence. He felt dizzy with doubts, and turned away. “Jesu, Briar, say something!” he cried, his anguish plain in every word.
“Ivo,” she whispered, and her lips brushed soft and healing against his hurt flesh. “My love, my dearest love. Look at me.”
Slowly, he did so. She held his hand in hers, but he looked into her eyes. They were smiling, and there was no disgust in them, no horror and no pity. It was Briar and she was unafraid. He should have known she would accept his hand, just as she had accepted his past.
He sat up, pulling her against him, his mouth hard on hers. She gasped at the suddenness of his passion, but a moment later had relaxed into his kisses with perfect contentment.
“I love you, my angel,” Ivo whispered against her lips. “I love you.”
“And I love you,” she replied.
At that moment, Ivo knew his happiness was complete.