Part 21 (2/2)

Then Avina from the village said, ”She's going t' wash him wi' the water from the sky.”

Alisoun set her teeth in annoyance, but Sir Walter said, ”Of course it's from the sky, you slop-brain. Where else would it be from?”

”That's rainwater.” Fenchel made the distinction precisely. ”Not from the well, an' not from the stream. It'll heal him more quickly because their mating called it from the sky.”

David's eyes popped open. ”What are they talking about?”

He hadn't heard that absurd tale, and Alisoun didn't want him to. She looked to Sir Walter in appeal.

In a loud and companionable voice, Sir Walter said, ”Have you noticed, Ivo, how there is none of the normal jesting with my lady and Sir David that accompanies a newly formed union?”

In his rough way, he was trying to help her by changing the subject, but David scowled. Everyone in the castle and the village had been stricken with delicacy. No one mentioned David's nightly visits to her solar, because David refused to allow anyone to bandy her name about. He both demolished her reputation and protected it.

”I think it's because of that frown.” Sir Walter pointed out easily, as if he expected David to be displeased. At the same time, he inched away. ”When Sir David wishes, he can look ferocious, like a dangerous beast loose in our midst.”

Sir Walter wasn't making things better. He was making them worse. Still he b.u.mbled on. ”We're throwing our lady to him as tribute, fearing to stand in his way.”

David bunched his fists. ”Sew your yap shut,” he ordered.

Fenchel didn't seem to hear David. Instead he gently corrected Sir Walter. ”It's that together, they make the rains come. M'lady yields t' him because she must, t' help her people.”

With a compelling stare at Alisoun, David inquired, ”You yield to me because you must? What nonsense is this?”

It was nonsense, of course. He'd made her a vow when he'd left her sitting on the table, almost naked and almost defenseless. He'd sworn to come to her bed and make her welcome him.

Every night since, he'd kept his word without an invitation, without caring for her mood or her desires. But always, somehow, he made her mood and desires his. She could have told herself she yielded because she had to, but she didn't lie. She yielded because he excited her, because what he taught her she could never learn from another man. Sometimes the hours drifted, one into the other, while he caressed her, kissed her, gifted her with pleasure. Other times he treated her as if he were a conqueror taking her as his right. Always, she fell asleep satisfied, knowing herself treasured above all women.

”Come, come, old man,” Sir Walter said in a jocular tone. ”Lady Alisoun hardly considers taking Sir David to her bed a sacrifice. From the sounds issuing from the room, I'd say it was quite the opposite.”

Alisoun winced, and David leaped to his feet. Striding toward Sir Walter, he said, ”You don't talk about my lady Alisoun in such a familiar manner. She's not yours. She'll never be yours. And I'll kill if you if you ever disparage her again.”

”David!” Alisoun grabbed his arm, but he shook her off.

Sir Walter backed away from David, waving his hands. ”Nay. I meant no harm! I only tried to distract you from that which my lady didn't wish you to know.”

With a growl of animal rage, David grabbed Sir Walter by the chest, then pushed him backward into a puddle.

”Into th' sky water,” Avina commented with approval.

Sir Walter came off the ground in a flurry, ready to attack David. Then he hesitated. David could beat him. He knew it, David knew it, and he had no wish to prove it to everyone in George's Cross. Yet David's blow had stripped him of prestige and authority. Taking one step back, he spat at David's feet, then stalked away.

This wasn't what Alisoun had intended. Lately, nothing made sense. Not Sir Walter and his b.u.mbling attempts to ingratiate himself. Not David, angry that she dared try to keep any possible child from him. Angry about something else, too, and not just that she wouldn't marry him. Although she couldn't comprehend the workings of his mind, she knew that without a doubt.

David looked at her with his blazing eyes and dared her to complain.

She shuddered beneath the impact of his gaze.

Sometimes she imagined she was a gemstone swept along by a relentless river, formed and shaped by the current. It tumbled her along into ever deeper waters, and sometimes she feared to drown. Other times...well, other times she welcomed the turbulence.

She didn't understand it. During the day, her mind controlled her actions. But at night, it was as if another being ruled. A being with urges blatantly opposed to the Alisoun she thought she was. She couldn't help but wonder if it wasn't the same being David called forth when he laughed at authority. Being with David exposed a whole new part of herself, and she had to wonder-and worry-what else he would reveal.

Without a word, she handed him the rag and walked away.

15.

David watched Alisoun leave and didn't know whether to worry or shout for joy. Over and over again, he would think she had grown used to him. Then she would skitter away like a wild bird, and he realized he was no closer to understanding her than before. She was a constant enigma, but lately he'd begun to suspect that G.o.d and all the saints were on his side, and he'd win this battle as he had any other-with a combination of skill, intelligence, and luck.

Standing, he leaned over the bucket and washed until Eudo told him he'd eliminated the worst of his grime. Then, taking the wet rag, he followed Alisoun's trail. He followed her easily. Everyone he encountered indicated where she'd gone. Only after he left the castle walls did he have to use his tracking skills, searching for the bent gra.s.ses into the woods, then seeking the leaves and branches that showed the signs of her pa.s.sing. He caught sight of her as she broke into the woodland meadow, and he watched from the shadows as she spread her arms wide to the suns.h.i.+ne. Then she whirled in circles like some Crusader's heathen bride. He crept closer, fascinated by the open elation she displayed, and when she dropped to the ground, he waited in suspense to see what else she would do.

She did nothing, only covering her eyes with both hands as if worry had overcome her or she'd been drained by the burst of emotion.

She was behaving uncharacteristically, he thought, as he walked to her side. But that was to be expected of a woman in her condition.

She didn't move. It seemed to him she was thinking too hard to notice anything outside of herself, but when he moved to block the sun from her face she came off the ground with her fist up.

”Whoa!” He waved the white rag above his head in mock surrender. ”Don't hurt me, my lady. I'm a peaceful man.”

She let out her breath in a half-laugh and dropped her fist. ”Of course you are.” She sounded as if she didn't believe it, and she sank back to the ground. ”It's those who aren't so peaceful who concern me.” Plucking the gra.s.s, she asked, ”Why did you follow me?”

The truth would not do, at least not yet, so he offered the rag. ”I need my face washed.”

She looked at the rag, then at his face. ”Do you?”

”According to you, my lady, I always need my face washed. Here.” He shoved the rag into her hand. ”Take it.”

She held it gingerly as if she didn't want to touch it, or him, then spread it over her hand and sat up on her heels. He stretched out on the ground and wiggled around until his head rested in her lap, then squinted up at her. ”I like this.”

”You would.”

She stroked the rag over the oozing sc.r.a.pes and David flinched. ”Hey! Be gentle!”

”Being gentle won't get the dirt out of these sc.r.a.pes.” With unusual enthusiasm, she scrubbed at the sore place on his forehead. ”Hugh showed quite a bit of innovation with his use of the ground as a weapon.”

”Everything he knows he learned from me,” David mumbled as she pressed the rag against his split lip.

”You've worked miracles,” she said.

”Enough miracles to justify another month's wages?”

The rag, and her hand beneath it, smacked against his already sore nose, and when he yelped, she apologized in her careful, measured tones. If he hadn't been in pain, he would have laughed-who would have thought, two months ago, that the correct Lady Alisoun would descend to such a petty revenge?

But she said, ”You'll be paid on the day of the accounting, no sooner.”

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