Page 16 of Bold Angel
Except for a heavy iron-banded trunk, an oaken table where a half-spent candle sat beside a pewter bowl filled with the sodden remnants of hare stew, and a brazier black with dead coals from the eventide’s fire, the room was empty.
“’Tis a prison, still. I would see the sun, hear the singing of the birds.”
“You are lucky he did not beat you.”
“’Tis worse than a beating.”
Marta smiled, warmed by the young girl’s presence once more in the hall. “You could work on your embroidery. ’Tis certain you could use some improvement.” The child had always been a handful. Three years in a convent had not changed her. She was flighty and irresponsible and too much of a dreamer, yet there was sweetness in her, and always there was caring.
“You know well how much I hate it.”
“I know well you prefer to roam the fields, watching the insects or studying the patterns of bark on a tree. I know you would waste away the hours in some cottar’s hut, learning how he plants his crops or how he would burn off the harrow. ’Tis useless information, I vow. ’Twould be far better should your interests lie in how to please your husband.”
“I want no husband.”
Marta harrumped her disgust. “You would rather have stayed in the convent?”
“You know that I would not.”
Marta shook her head. It had been hard on poor Lady Anne, protecting a daughter who constantly displeased her father. After the lady was gone, dead of a plague, Caryn not yet seven summers, instead of the beatings her mother had feared her daughter would receive, Caryn’s father merely ignored her. She grew restless and even more disobedient—independent her dear mother always called it—yet ever was the child kind and loving, seeking always to be helpful, mostly seeking to learn.
“’Tis as I once told you, Lord Ral is different from the rest.” Marta eyed the little maid now, assessing the beauty she had become. Not as lovely as Gweneth, at least not in that same ethereal way. That one was a raven-haired, fey creature who captured the hearts of all who knew her. But Caryn, with her fiery auburn curls, big brown gold-rimmed eyes, and lush woman’s body could turn any man’s mind to bed sport, and a yearning to render his claim.
“He is no different,” Caryn said. “He is a Norman.”
“He takes you to wife—what Norman would do that? He does it to protect you.”
“He does it to salve his conscience.”
“You have told me what happened in the meadow. You have told me of the soldiers’ brutal treatment… of the rapine of your sister. I would tell you there is a time men are not themselves. ’Tis the bloodlust that comes over them… the fighting and the killing… the nearness they feel toward death. I have seen it among our own kinsman. It should not have happened but it did. You should not have been there, but you were. If the lord wishes to make amends, then ’tis your Christian duty to let him.”
Caryn’s mouth thinned. “By rutting with him in his bed?”
“By the honor of becoming his bride. If you choose not to think of yourself, think of the good you could dofor your people. As a Saxon and the wife of a Norman lord, you could intercede on their behalf. In time, mayhap you could make things better.”
Caryn pondered that. It hadn’t occurred to her that she might somehow make a difference. Being wife to one of William’s barons would be a grave responsibility. There was the castle to see to, the harvest and food stores, clothing, medicines, supplies—to say nothing of the people in the village. Caryn winced just to think of it.
“I will not wed him.”
“Can you not see that this is your fate? From the moment you first saw him, your paths have been intertwined. Surely you were destined for this.”
“My fate is whatIintend to make it—not some Norman blackguard.” Caryn slid down from the bed and walked to the window, setting aside the thin piece of horn that let in the light but served to keep out cold air. “Leave me, Marta. For a time, I would be alone.”
Marta shuffled toward the door, but paused as she pulled it open. “Hear me well, my pet. Lord Ral is not a man to trifle with. He will not be thwarted in this. You must not dare to try.”
Caryn said nothing more, just waited till the heavy wooden door slid solidly closed. Tomorrow she could roam the hall, yet that would not serve her purpose. She needed to survey the bailey, secure a horse and supplies. As soon as she had accomplished the task, she could be gone.
She peered with yearning toward the open fields, newly tilled and ready for planting. She could just glimpse the thatched roofs of the cottars’ wattle-and-daub huts. Below her in the bailey, great gray hounds that often roamed the hall chased a yellow cat into a haystack.
Oh, to be racing there beside them, or riding the small white palfry she had once owned over meadowand moor. Soon, she vowed. Soon she would again be free.
***
Caryn left her chamber early the following morning. Lord Raolfe was just stepping out of the chapel, a small room off the great hall with a tiny stained glass window at one end. He was followed by a short, sturdy priest Caryn had never seen.
“Lady Caryn,” Ral called out, his voice deep and husky, the unwelcome sound goading her temper. “There is someone I would have you meet.” His men-at-arms had finished their early meal—a hunk of bread and a pot of ale—and were heading off toward the bailey for a morning of tilting and swordsmanship.
“As you wish, my lord.” She pasted on a smile and moved in his direction. Standing next to the little man, Lord Ral looked even taller than he had storming into her chamber when last she had seen him. Taller, and in a tunic of embroidered dark plum that set off the black of his hair, even more handsome.
