The Overlord's Bride

“You will sleep?”

“Sleep? Oh, no, for then I would not know what I was enjoying.”

His lips jerked into another little smile. “As you wish.”

She sighed rapturously. “First the beautiful gown and now this! My lord, I thank you from the bottom of my heart, and I bless you for marrying me.”

Lord Kirkheathe didn’t answer as he strode from the room.

Sighing again, Elizabeth pulled the covers even tighter and contemplated her unusual husband. Seeing him smile, though it be a little one, made her want to laugh.

No doubt he had many cares, being such a rich and powerful lord. She would do what she could to lessen them, especially if she could see him smile more often.

Maybe a child would make him happier, too.

She climbed out of the bed, noting the dried blood on the sheet as she knelt.

“Dear God,” she prayed, wishing she had gone to mass, the better for her prayer, and also that she had been a more humble, obedient person and thus more deserving, “let me be with child. If not already, soon!”

Fearing she had sounded too demanding, she added, “If it be Your will.”

Shivering, she got up. Outside, the sound of horses and jingling harness took her to the window.

Her husband sat upon a mighty stallion. Behind him was a troop of mounted soldiers. She watched as Lord Kirkheathe raised his hand and moved toward the massive gates, his well-equipped men following.

He had not called out an order, merely raised his gloved hand and gestured. All was done with purposeful silence—and the instant obedience of well-trained and disciplined men.

With a grin, she realized the Reverend Mother would surely approve of her husband, and just as surely think he had made a poor choice of bride.

But the Reverend Mother was far away, and she was married, and soon—please, God, soon!—she might be a mother, looking after her children with love and kindness, as her parents had raised her before their deaths from fever when she was but eight years old.

Sighing, she blocked out the memories that came after that, of traveling from relative to relative, never really wanted or cared for. Of the brief respite at Lady Katherine’s, who was strict, but fair.

Then the horrid years at the convent.

She turned and looked at the inviting bed, but there was no point now to go back. Nor did she wish to give the servants any cause to disparage her, despite her husband’s remarks on that point. She might as well dress and go to the hall.

Besides, if breakfast was half so good as the feast…

She slipped her feet into her shoes beside the bed and ran eagerly to the door. “Rual!”

The woman appeared so quickly, Elizabeth thought she must have been waiting on the stairs for her summons. “My lady?”

“I was to call for you when I was ready,” she said jovially. “Well, I am ready. Do you know where my other dress has gone? I cannot wear the velvet gown today.”

“Your old dress is in the chest beside the bed,” Rual said as she came into the room.

“And all my other goods?”

“There, too.”

“They don’t take up much room, do they?” Elizabeth noted as she opened the chest.

“Shall I fetch warm water, my lady?”

“Do not trouble yourself. I am used to cold.” No lie, that, Elizabeth thought ruefully as she put on her warm stockings and then her gray woolen gown. With the speed of years of familiarity, she tied the laces while Rual began to gather up the bedding.

Thinking of the dried blood, Elizabeth hurried to wash her face and hide her silly blush. After all, Rual was a grown woman. She would know what had happened.

Everybody would know.

She splashed the water over her face, again and again, until she felt the heat diminish.

She picked up the small square of linen beside the basin and wiped off her face.

It smelled of him, her husband, Lord Kirkheathe….

“By our Lady,” she muttered. I don’t even know his first name.

“Do you need anything else, my lady?” Rual asked, holding the big bundle of cloth against her broad hip.

“No…well, yes,” she confessed as she went to the chest and found her scarf and wimple. She didn’t want to appear ignorant, but wouldn’t it be worse not to know? “I fear in all the hurry yesterday, I didn’t ask my husband’s Christian name,” she said as she put the scarf over her head and attached the wimple beneath her chin.

“Raymond D’Estienne is his Christian name, my lady, like his father before him.”

“Did you know his parents?”

“No. They both died well before my time here.”

“What do they say about them?”

The maidservant shrugged. “His father was reckoned a good man, although basely born.”

“How did he come to have such an estate then?”

“It was taken from another and given to him by the earl of Chesney.”

“You do not think he deserved it?”

“That is not for me to say, my lady. The earl thought he did.”

“And his mother?”

“She died giving birth to him. His father did not marry again, like he did.”

Elizabeth tried not to look shocked, but she suddenly felt off balance and unsteady, as if she were trying to cross a raging river on a fallen tree trunk.

Yet why should she be so surprised, she reasoned. He was not a young man. Of course he might have been married before, perhaps more than once. “How many wives has he had?”

“Just the one, other than you.”

That was something at least. “Did she die in childbirth, too?”

“No, my lady.”

“Was it an illness?”

“No, my lady. He killed her.”

Chapter Six

E lizabeth didn’t want to believe she had heard aright. “What did you say?”

“He killed her, in this very room.”

Elizabeth went to stand face-to-face with Rual. “Why?”

“He said she tried to kill him, my lady.” Rual shifted the bundle to the other hip. “The tale I heard, he claimed she drugged his wine and when he slept, she put a leather strap around his throat and tried to strangle him. He pushed her off and she fell and struck her head and died.”

“That is why he has that scar around his neck,” she murmured, “and sounds as he does.” Her eyes narrowed as she regarded Rual. “You don’t believe his explanation?”

“He has a temper.”

“Was he brought before the king’s justice for murder?”

“No.”

“So what he said must be considered the truth.”

“He is a lord.”

“There is still punishment for a lord who kills his wife,” she reminded Rual. “Had he struck her before?”

“There were no marks on her, my lady—at least none that people ever saw.”

Which did not mean they were not there, beneath the woman’s gown, or that he was not cruel to her in other ways. “Was he harsh with her?”

“Not that I’ve heard, my lady.”

Again, that only meant not in public. However, considering the open nature of a lord and lady’s life, the servants would know if things were seriously amiss between them. “He has his scar and ruined voice for proof that he was attacked.”

The woman flushed and remained silent.

“Why did she want to kill him?”

“I don’t know,” the woman mumbled.

“Rual, if you don’t believe my husband’s explanation, you must have some reason to think he wanted her dead.”

“Perhaps he suspected her of infidelity.”

“With whom?”

Rual shrugged.

“Does anybody hazard a guess?”

“No, my lady.”

Elizabeth sighed with relief. If there had been infidelity, or more than the merest suspicion of it—or any other hint of a motive on Lord Kirkheathe’s part for wanting his wife dead—rumor and gossip would have flown from one part of this castle to the other. She had learned that well enough.

Rual shifted nervously. “My lady, I think I had best get these linens below.”

“Thank you, Rual,” Elizabeth replied, seeing the wisdom of Lady Katherine’s admonition never to listen to the gossip of servants, no matter how tempting. “Has my uncle eaten this morning?”

“He and his men departed at first light on my lord’s orders.”

Elizabeth stared at her incredulously. “He is already gone?”

“Once Lord Kirkheathe got the dowry, he sent him off, with his men grumbling all the while. Your uncle felt so sleepy and poorly from the wine, he could barely keep his seat.”

“But Lord Kirkheathe was here when I awoke.”

“Came back, that’s all.”

“I didn’t hear a thing.”

Rual smirked. “You were sleeping sound, I expect.”

“I suppose,” Elizabeth replied, paying little heed to Rual’s expression as she wondered how long he had been there, watching her.

“Have you no warmer gown, my lady?”

“No. The hall will have a fire, will it not?” Elizabeth answered.

“Aye, a good one. Lord Kirkheathe insists upon it.”

“Then I shall go there and get warm,” Elizabeth said. “And when you are done with the laundress, will you come back and show me about my new home?”

“Aye, my lady.”

“There, my lord, do you see?” Aiken said, pointing at the footings of the bridge. “It’s rotting. The bridge’ll collapse come spring.”

Holding his tunic up out of the mud of the riverbank with one hand, Raymond noted the decayed wood.

Thank God, he had the money to pay for repairs. Or, to be more precise, thank Elizabeth’s uncle, who had no notion of just how desperately Raymond needed money, or he would have haggled the dowry lower. Now, however, Raymond could afford much-needed repairs to various buildings, roads and bridges on his estate.

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