Hers to Desire

This was the first time Maloren had ever spoken of her mother’s fate, and it hurt Beatrice to hear how her mother had suffered. Yet she had always supposed her mother’s life hadn’t been a happy one. Her father had loved no one but himself. He cared only about wealth and power. He’d been pleased his daughter was pretty, because that made her a more valuable prize to offer. She had been a thing to be traded, sold or bartered.

How much worse her life would have been if she’d not had Maloren to love and comfort her in her poor mother’s place!

Overwhelmed with gratitude, she hugged Maloren tightly. “I’m sorry I lost my temper with you, Maloren. I love you as if you were my own mother.” She drew back and looked up into the beloved, wrinkled face and pale gray eyes. “You know that, don’t you?”

“Bless you, my lamb, I do, and I love you as if you were my own daughter.”

Beatrice once again embraced her former nurse, feeling as she had when she was a little girl and her father had shooed her away as if she were nothing more to him than one of his hounds. Maloren’s arms had brought comfort and security then, while her father had brought her only sorrow, heartache and, eventually, disgrace.

What honorable knight would want such a man’s daughter? No wonder Ranulf had left without even saying goodbye.

CHAPTER THREE

HIS ACHING HEAD WAS a just punishment for too much celebrating, Ranulf thought as he rode wearily along the coast of Cornwall over a very rocky road, doing his best to keep his destrier firmly in check. Titan was a lively beast, which usually suited Ranulf. Not for him a stolid warhorse, although there were those who preferred a calmer animal. Ranulf wanted a horse with spirit, one that was ready to fight and willing to attack with the lightest touch of his master’s heels.

Today, however, a less frisky mount would have been welcome.

Ranulf knew he should have retired long before he did, even if Merrick had been in a rare and boisterous mood last night. Henry would never believe the way their usually grim and silent friend had laughed and joked, especially once his grandfather—a fine old fellow—began to toast his great-grandson, the future lord of Tregellas, as well as his namesake. Peder had been justly proud and insisted they salute everyone from the king down to the maid who kept their goblets full, until they’d finally parted, Merrick helping his grandfather back to his cottage while Ranulf staggered up to his spartan bedchamber.

Not that he could remember actually getting to his bedchamber.

Once asleep, he’d had the most devilishly disturbing dreams, too, all featuring Bea. Sometimes she was making merry with him, toasting and eating and dancing, and it was Christmas. Sometimes she was undressed and in his bed, and they were making love. The most vivid dream of all, however, had taken place in his bedchamber. She’d been dressed as she’d been at the evening meal, in a lovely blue gown that clung to her shapely body, and she’d been kissing him. He’d returned her kiss with all the passion she aroused in him.

That one had seemed particularly vivid…

He wouldn’t think about Bea, or what she might have said if he’d gone to bid her farewell that morning, just as he must not think of her as anything other than his friend’s wife’s lively and pretty cousin. To believe otherwise, despite what he thought he saw in her eyes sometimes, was surely only vanity and pride. He was a knight, but a poor one, with no estate and little money. Anything he had he owed to his prowess with a sword and his friends’ generosity. What had he to offer a vibrant, beautiful woman like Bea, who could hope to win the heart of many a better, richer man?

With such disgruntled thoughts to plague him, Ranulf surveyed the windswept moor around him. Over a low ridge, the sea was just out of sight, if not quite beyond smell. In the distance, gulls whirled slowly, white and gray against the blue sky, telling him where the frothy, roiling water surged and beat against the helpless shore.

His thoughts fled from the awful open water back to Tregellas. He hoped Merrick’s injury wasn’t serious. Merrick had assured him before he’d departed that it was just a bad sprain and Constance, being a woman, had overreacted when she sent for the apothecary. No doubt the apothecary would agree when he arrived and examined Merrick’s swollen limb.

Since all the men trained by Sir Leonard had learned something about wounds, sprains and breaks, Ranulf accepted his friend’s opinion and, instead of worrying about Merrick’s leg, envisioned Bea telling everyone about the accident and pestering the apothecary with questions.

Scowling and determined to stop thinking about Bea, Ranulf drew Titan to a halt and twisted in the saddle, gesturing for Myghal to come beside him. Maybe talking about the situation at his new command would help him concentrate on what lay ahead and not what he’d left behind.

“Tell me about Sir Frioc’s accident,” he said as he nudged Titan into a walk after the undersheriff arrived beside him.

“It’s like I told Lord Merrick,” Myghal replied with obvious reluctance. “He was out hunting—”

“With whom?”

Myghal’s brow furrowed. “There was Hedyn, and me, and Yestin and Terithien—men of his household. We often went hunting with him, my lord. Penterwell’s a peaceful sort of place, so there wasn’t a lot for us to do otherwise.’ Twas no different that day— except for Sir Frioc dying, of course.”

Ranulf heard the sorrow and dismay in the younger man’s voice. “It’s never easy to lose a friend, or someone we respect. We all need time to mourn such a loss, but at least we have our memories of better days to sustain us.”

With a heavy sigh, Myghal nodded.

“Sir Frioc must have liked and trusted you, to have you in his hunting party.”

That brought a smile to Myghal’s face. “Aye, sir, he did. He was a kind man, and after my father died, he treated me…well, not like a son, exactly, but very well indeed.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t know him better myself,” Ranulf answered honestly, thinking of his own youth and the man who’d been a better, second father to him.

Myghal’s face resumed its grim expression. “And all because of a rabbit.”

“That does seem a small beast for such a chase.”

“Aye, sir,’ twas. But we’d had no luck that day finding anything bigger, and we were on our way home when the dogs started fussing and Sir Frioc spotted this big rabbit. And he was big! So my lord laughed and said he’d be damned if he’d have fish again for his dinner and spurred his horse to give chase. The rabbit took off like a shot from a bow. By the time the dogs were loosed, we’d lost sight of Sir Frioc. His tracks were easy enough to follow, though, and we come to a dip in the hill, and there he was.” Myghal swallowed hard. “He was just lying there on the ground, his eyes wide open and he looked so surprised….”

Ranulf took pity on the man and changed the subject. “It’s been a while since I’ve been to Penterwell. I assume little else has changed in the past few months.”

Rather unexpectedly, Myghal flushed. “Some things have, my lord.”

“Such as?”

“Well, sir, Gwenbritha went home to her mother.”

Myghal seemed to think Ranulf would know who this was, but no one came immediately to mind.

“Sir Frioc’s leman, sir,” Myghal clarified. “They quarreled and she left him.”

Ranulf didn’t want gossip. On the other hand, a lover scorned could mean trouble. He knew full well that honor and wisdom could be subverted by the need to regain one’s wounded pride. “What did they argue about?”

“I heard she wanted him to marry her, and he wouldn’t, so she left him. She said she wasn’t never coming back, neither.”

“Has she been seen around the village since?”

“No, sir, she’s been true to that. Sir Frioc, well, he, um, didn’t take it too well. He tried to pretend he wasn’t upset, but he spent a lot of time hunting, or sitting in the hall…thinking.”

“Thinking, or drinking?” Ranulf asked. A man in sorrow often imbibed more than he should, as he also knew from personal experience.

“Well, sir, drinking,” Myghal admitted.

“The day he died—had he been drinking then?”

Myghal shook his head. “No, sir, not so’s you’d notice. He’d had some ale when he broke the fast and a few tugs at the wineskin while we tried to find some game, but he wasn’t drunk, if that’s what you mean. He could hold his drink, too. Why, many’s the night I saw him…well, sir, he could hold his drink.”

Which didn’t mean Frioc wasn’t the worse for wine or ale when he died, Ranulf thought. But he would say no more about Frioc now. He would ask the sheriff later.

They rode over a small rise, and there in the distance, close to the turbulent sea, was the castle of Penterwell. Its gray stone walls rose up from the cliff upon which it sat as if they’d grown there, and gulls wheeled in the sky above like pale vultures. Ranulf knew that there was a village on the other side of the castle, where its great walls afforded some protection from the winds that blew off the sea and churned the white-capped waves. Even from here he could hear those waves crashing on the rocks at the foot of the cliff.

Of all the places he could have been given as castellan! This must be God’s idea of a jest—or perhaps a punishment—to have Penterwell so close to the sea.

Realizing Myghal was eyeing him curiously, Ranulf gave the fellow a genial smile. “I’m in need of a warm fire and a good meal.”

A flicker of dread flashed across Myghal’s face.

“You think I’ll not be welcome in Penterwell?” Ranulf asked, his tone deceptively mild, “or do you fear someone might try to prevent my arrival?”

“Oh, no, sir, no, it’s nothing like that,” Myghal hastened to reply. “It’s just that, like I said, after Gwenbritha left, things aren’t what they were. Penterwell might not be as comfortable as you’re used to.”

Myghal could have no idea of some of the places Ranulf had laid his head in days gone by.

“I daresay I’ll manage,” the new castellan of Penterwell replied, and as he did, something on the shore at the bottom of the cliff caught his eye.

“What are those men doing?” he asked, nodding at the group.

His expression puzzled, Myghal half rose in his stirrups. “I don’t know, sir.”

“Can you tell who they are?”

“No, sir.”

“Then I suppose we had better find out,” Ranulf said.

He kicked Titan into a gallop and headed toward the shore.

And the cruel, unforgiving sea.

THE SHERIFF spotted Ranulf, Myghal and the rest of the castellan’s escort as they drew near, recognizing Lord Merrick’s friend at once. Like their overlord, Sir Ranulf was very well trained and a fierce fighter, and his ruddy hair made him easy to distinguish. Hedyn also knew that Sir Ranulf had been made garrison commander of Tregellas and, in the few months he’d been in that position, had wrought an amazing change in the men under his command. They were now said to be the equal of any army in England, and if the lord of Tregellas had any enemies, they would surely think twice before attacking his fortress.

Even so, the sheriff had expected Lord Merrick himself to come in answer to his laboriously written letter, not his garrison commander, so it was with a mixture of respect, disappointment and curiosity that Hedyn approached Sir Ranulf and his party.

“Greetings, Sir Ranulf,” he said, his black cloak fluttering about him in the wind as he bowed. “As pleased as I am to see you again, I wish we were meeting under happier circumstances.”

“As do I,” Ranulf returned as he swung down from his horse.

“Begging your pardon and meaning no offense, I expected Lord Merrick to come.”

“If I were in your place, I would expect him, too,” Ranulf replied. “Unfortunately, Lord Merrick was a little overzealous celebrating the birth of his son and injured his leg. Since I’m to be the new castellan, I’ve come in his place.”

Hedyn’s eyes widened. “Well, it’s a pity he hurt his leg, but it’s good news about a son.” He bowed again. “Welcome to Penterwell, my lord. It’s too bad you’ve got to take command when we’re having some trouble. How’s Lady Constance?”

“I’m happy to report that Lady Constance came through the experience very well indeed.” As Bea had made vivaciously clear before, during and after the evening meal when she made no mention of his imminent departure. Either she hadn’t known— which he didn’t think likely—or she hadn’t cared as much as he thought she might. God help him, it would be vanity of the most deluded kind to hope such a woman would ever consider him for a husband!

Turning his attention to more important matters than his own foolish dreams, Ranulf nodded at the group of men now facing him, their bodies shielding something on the ground. “What have you been looking at?”

All trace of good humor left the sheriff’s face. “It’s Gawan, my lord, a fisherman from Penterwell. One of the lads found him this morning. He’s drowned.”

Drowned.

Ranulf closed his eyes as he fought the pure terror that word invoked. He pushed away the memory of strong hands holding him down while salt water filled his nostrils, his mouth, his throat. The panic, the struggle, the sudden surge of strength as he fought to get away…

Hedyn continued matter-of-factly, not realizing he was addressing a man with the sweat of fear chilling upon his back. “Two days ago he put out like always and when he didn’t come back, nobody ’cept his wife was too worried. And then a boy found his body washed up here this morning.”

“Why didn’t anybody else wonder about his wellbeing?”

The sheriff hesitated, glancing first at Myghal, who was still sitting on his horse, then toward the silent group of men in simple fisherman’s smocks and breeches.

Ranulf could guess why Hedyn didn’t have a ready answer. The man had probably been a smuggler as well as a fisherman. Smuggling tin out of Cornwall had a long history here on the coast.

Ranulf clapped a hand on Hedyn’s shoulder and led him away from the group of men, the corpse and the sea. “I’m well aware that most of the fishermen are also smugglers,” he said quietly. “Lord Merrick is aware of it, too, as was Frioc. So if you’re reluctant to tell me you think this Gawan was meeting someone to exchange tin for money or other goods, you need not be.”

The sheriff nodded. “Aye, sir, that’s what we thought—that he’d gone to make an exchange and been delayed. Like I said, one night didn’t trouble anyone except his wife, who’s heavy with their first child and prone to worry like all women in such a state. In truth, I was more concerned about Sir Frioc’s death and my letter to Lord Merrick. But when Gawan didn’t return after another night, we all began to wonder if something’d gone amiss. He was out alone, too.”

Alone in a boat at sea. Ranulf subdued a shiver, and it was not from the breeze.

“But the weather was clear and there’s no sign of his boat. It’s strange to find his body but not so much as a board or rope from his boat.”

“Are you saying you think his death was the result of foul play?”

Hedyn rubbed his grizzled chin. “Aye, sir. Two other men have gone missing, as well.”

Perhaps this was the “trouble” Frioc had alluded to, but if so, Frioc should certainly have informed Merrick.

“Nobody thought too much about that at the time, sir,” Hedyn said as if in answer to Ranulf’s unspoken question. “Rob and Sam weren’t from Penterwell, you see, and only came to stay in the winter months.”

He gave Ranulf a look, as one worldly-wise man to another. “They weren’t the kind to stay close to hearth and home, or their wives, if you follow me. And there’d been some trouble between them and some of the other fishermen. Most of the villagers thought they’d just sailed off before they were forced to go—and good riddance to ’em. Their wives were as relieved as anybody.”

That might explain why Frioc had not considered their absence important, but taken with this new death… “Gawan was not of that sort?”

“Lord bless you, no,” Hedyn replied, shaking his head. “He loved his wife dear, and she him. They’ve been sweethearts since they were little, and he was looking forward to the child.”

Which didn’t mean he couldn’t have left her, no matter how he acted in public, or what vows of love he swore.

“It may be Gawan took a risk because he thought they’d need more money with a babe on the way.” The sheriff sighed. “Poor lad. It wouldn’t be the first time one of those French pirates has done murder for a man’s tin.”

“I suppose we should be grateful his body washed ashore,” Ranulf mused as they started back toward the men. “Otherwise, we might never have known what happened to him.”

“It’s damned odd,” Hedyn retorted.

Ranulf halted and regarded Hedyn quizzically, taken aback by the force of the sheriff’s words. “How so?”

“Well, sir, when a man drowns in the sea, his body sinks like a stone. It can take days for it to bloat and come up again, and when it’s in the sea…well, it can drift for miles before it washes up, if there’s anything left to wash up by then. This is more like he was killed first and then thrown over the side. But there’s not a mark on him. Come see for yourself.”

Ranulf’s stomach twisted. He’d seen men killed, their faces ruined, limbs torn and bloody. He could deal with that. But to look at a drowned man’s corpse…

Ranulf would not show any weakness. He would give no sign that he would rather face fifty mounted knights while armed with only a dagger than follow the sheriff to the body that lay upon the shore.

A SENNIGHT LATER, Beatrice watched Gaston sprinkle thyme over meat, gravy and leeks in an open pastry shell.

“The secret, my lady, is in the spices,” Gaston explained as he added a pinch of rosemary. “Too much, and you lose the taste of the pheasant, too little and it’s too much pheasant, if you understand me.”

Beatrice nodded as she studied Gaston’s technique. The slim middle-aged man had been the cook for Lord Merrick’s father, too, and had the worry lines in his face to prove it. These days, though, Gaston smiled far more than he frowned. Lord Merrick was a generous master who appreciated good food, and he never once accused the cook of trying to poison him.

As for a lady’s presence in the castle kitchen, Beatrice enjoyed being in the warm room, with its bustling servants and pleasant aromas. In the days since Ranulf had gone, she’d spent plenty of time with Gaston and the servants there. She had also whiled away several hours sitting with Constance, making clothes for the baby and retelling the stories of King Arthur and his knights that she loved, even though they made her think of the absent Ranulf. He claimed he didn’t enjoy those tales one bit. He called Lancelot an immoral, disloyal dolt whose battle prowess had gone to his head, and he thought Arthur much too generous to his traitorous son.

Ranulf had no sympathy for traitors. As for a traitor’s daughter…

Demelza, middle-aged and amiable, and a servant who could always be counted on to have the latest gossip, appeared at the door to the courtyard. She grinned when she spotted Beatrice.

She also noticed Maloren, slumbering in the warm corner near the hearth. Like everyone in Tregellas, Demelza knew that the very mention of Ranulf’s name could cause Maloren to launch into one of her tirades against men, so she approached Beatrice as stealthily as a spy and addressed her in a hushed whisper. “A messenger’s arrived, my lady. From Penterwell. I come the moment I heard, my lady, just like you asked.”

“Thank you,” Beatrice said, trying not to sound overly excited or wake Maloren as she wiped her floury hands on a cloth. “It’s so difficult for Lord Merrick to have to sit all day. Tidings from Penterwell should cheer him up. And I daresay Constance will want to hear the news. I’ll look after little Peder for her, and then they can have some time alone, too.”

She gave Demelza and the other servants a knowing smile. “I’m sure they’ll like that.”

The servants shared a quiet, companionable chuckle. Rarely had anyone seen a couple more in love than the lord and lady of Tregellas.

Beatrice, meanwhile, hurried on her way, glad that Maloren was still sleeping and hadn’t awakened and offered to go with her.

Merrick and Constance would indeed be glad to have news of Penterwell and Ranulf, but not so much as she. In the days since Ranulf had departed, Beatrice had had plenty of time to mull over what had happened the night they’d kissed, and her hopes had started to revive. In spite of what had happened just before they parted, Ranulf had certainly been passionate when they began. He’d surrendered to his desire just as she had. Unfortunately for her, as the yearning flared and the need grew, he must have remembered that honorable men didn’t make love with ladies to whom they weren’t at least betrothed. It could be that, as she’d felt ashamed and humiliated afterward, so had he when he broke the kiss.

If he were still here, she would be able to tell him that he had no need to condemn himself for what she had initiated. She could say she was sorry if he’d been upset, but she couldn’t regret their kiss, not when she cared about him as she did. She would finally be able to tell him how she felt.

But he wasn’t here, and until she could speak to him again, she must keep her desire and her hopes to herself as she had before.

When Beatrice arrived at the lord’s bedchamber, Merrick was seated with his left leg propped on a stool as he perused a scroll in his hand. Constance sat on a cushioned chair beside him, holding their son in her arms. There was concern on her features, and Merrick was scowling.

But then, he’d been scowling nearly continuously since he’d broken his leg.

Beatrice put a smile on her face and tried to act as if she’d just happened to come by because she hadn’t confided her greatest hope to Constance yet, either. Although Ranulf was Merrick’s trusted friend, Constance might not entirely welcome a marriage between her cousin and her husband’s brother-in-arms. Ranulf was more than ten years older than she, for one thing, and, worse, landless. Constance might think she should aim for a richer or more powerful husband, unwilling to accept that her cousin was not the matrimonial prize Constance, with her sisterly love, believed her to be.

“Good morning, Constance. Merrick,” Beatrice said brightly after knocking on the frame of the door to announce her arrival. “A fine day, isn’t it? Spring is surely on its way. I believe I could find some early blooms if I went out walking today, and the air smells so fresh and lovely—well, except if you wander too close to the pigsty.” She held out her hands for little Peder. “May I hold him?”

Constance nodded and Beatrice took the infant in her arms. “And good morning to you, little man,” she murmured as she tickled the baby under his dimpled chin.

“We’ve had another letter from Ranulf,” Constance said, nodding at her husband, who was still reading and still scowling.

“Oh, indeed?” Beatrice replied as if this was news to her, loosening her hold when Peder squirmed in protest. “I trust all is well.”

Merrick shifted, easing his foot into a slightly different position. “There’s nothing Ranulf cannot deal with,” the lord of Tregellas replied, and in such a tone, Beatrice surmised it would be useless to press him further. Perhaps later she could speak to Constance alone, and her cousin would be more forthcoming.

“I hope your leg isn’t bothering you too much, my lord,” she said.

He made a sour face and grunted as he shifted again. “No.”

His wife frowned. “There’s no need to be rude to Beatrice,” she said. Her expression changed to one of sympathy. “You’ll be up and about eventually, my love, but until then, you should perhaps consider this a just punishment for overindulgence in wine.”

Her husband’s only answer was another muted grunt as he set the letter on the table beside his chair.