Chapter Five

“A word with you, Mistress Edwina, if you will.”

Edwina, who had just entered the hall, started and turned to find Lord Julian at her elbow. Her ragged nerves jumped wildly. Following last evening’s pageant and her stolen moments of pure romance, she had slept little. Julian’s was not the voice she longed to hear.

But one sweeping search of the hall failed to locate the jester. Her heart fell. Where could he be? Surely he would not leave without a word to her?

She turned to the man at her side. He at least looked hale and well. Had he taken nothing to drink last night?

“Good morning, Lord Julian. I hope you are enjoying your stay with us.”

His cool, gray eyes looked impatient. But he said with a smile that barely touched his lips, “Who could fail to enjoy the comforts your father provides?”

“Who, indeed?” Edwina returned gloomily.

“But I was hoping you and I might dispense with all the nonsense, mistress, and solemnize our agreement.”

Edwina lifted her brows at him. “What agreement might that be?”

“Come sit with me, please, and let us discuss it.”

Another search of the room told Edwina that Thorstan still had not appeared. Again the hall stood mostly empty save for those who slept there, now arising, and the servants who hurried to set out the breakfast.

She nodded toward the head table. “Then come.”

It could not be denied Lord Julian made a fine sight, Edwina acknowledged as he took the place beside her. His severe, well-formed features had the chilly perfection of a carving. The gray eyes were well set and his hair held a glint of dark gold. But she had yet to see those eyes warm to a merry sparkle, and she doubted he would recognize a spot of delightful nonsense if it strode up and bit him in the behind.

“Speak as you will,” she invited. “I am not one to stand on ceremony.”

“Nor I, mistress. Just as I am not the man to waste time with songs, dances, or pageants—entertaining as they might be. The future is most earnest, and ’tis that I would have settled between us.”

Edwina nodded, her gaze now as serious as his. “Let us be honest with one another, then, sir.”

“You know as well as I you will not accept the suit of any of these woeful specimens who have come to compete for your hand. I make the best—the only—choice.”

“Do you, indeed?” Edwina’s back stiffened.

“To be sure. I have studied upon it these many days past.”

“Have you!”

“Let me give you the facts: I can bring to you the most advantageous match. Our estate, aye, has been reduced of late, through no fault of our own, but our prestige remains unimpeached. Why, Queen Mary herself has welcomed my family to her court. That is precisely the kind of connection your father seeks.”

“How do you know what my father seeks?”

Julian shrugged. “Both my father and I have spoken with him. He says,” Julian’s tone implied his unspoken opinion, “this must be your choice. Now, I cannot but find that entirely foolish, and you a lass not yet a score of years in the world. We are speaking of the welfare and continuance of a very wealthy estate, a grave matter, to my mind.”

“That, Lord Julian, I do appreciate.”

“Do you? I confess, I begin to wonder.” A gleam entered Julian’s eye. “What with you trifling with your suitors…”

Edwina drew a breath. “I have not—”

“…and,” he added deliberately, “dallying with fools.”

All the air left Edwina’s body. Her eyes widened, and she swept the hall again.

“Do not bother looking for him,” Julian said in satisfaction. “He is gone.”

Edwina’s throat went dry. “Gone whence?”

“Let us say he was persuaded to take his nonsense elsewhere. This, Mistress Edwina, is not about nonsense. It is deadly earnest. Deadly.”

Edwina would have surged to her feet, but Julian snared her wrist, his grip like iron. He lowered his voice to a growl. “Did you think I would not see? Are you an empty-headed wench who can only think of kisses? Tell your father you have made your choice, and end this absurd business. We will announce our betrothal this day.”

“I would sooner kill myself than bed you.”

His cold eyes examined her as he might an ill-favored brood mare. “This is not about bedding. Oh—I shall need to get some sons upon you, if only for the benefit of the estate. Your father will expect that much. Apart from that, I assure you, you are little enough to my taste.”

“Take your hand from me.”

Julian did not move.

“Take your hand from me, or I will have my father run you off the place.”

“Do not be so hasty. You know very well I am the best on offer. Would you rather bed young Edelbert, who likely cannot get up for the job? Cormac, who thinks only of his lute? Angus, who would ride you like one of his sheep? Should you marry me, I will afford you a cordial and civilized union for the benefit of all.”

Enraged and very fearful, Edwina demanded, “What have you done with the fool?”

“Is that all you can think on? Best you come with me to your father now and make our announcement—or do you want me to finish the job, and see your buffoon dead?”

Edwina broke free and leaped to her feet. “Sir, you forget yourself!” Heads turned all over the hall.

Julian, his face like a thunderbolt, arose and stalked away.

****

Thorstan awoke to pain and freezing cold in all his limbs. He struggled up and found himself sitting in a ditch filled with half a foot of water, along a lonely stretch of road, and with dawn’s light tinting the eastern sky. He shook his head in an effort to clear it, and groaned.

Desperately he struggled to remember: last night after the pageant ended, following those wondrous, stolen moments with Edwina, he had returned the wench’s costume to Alfred and reacquired his jester’s suit. Snow had still been falling as he made his way back to the hall after a visit to the privy. A group of men had jumped him there in the darkness. Two had seized him, while a third pummeled him mercilessly. He had fought—he was certain he had marked at least one of them. But he had not succeeded in escaping, and when he was nearly senseless he heard the voice of an observer say, “Take him out and dump him somewhere—and good riddance to rubbish.”

He swore now, flexed arms stiff with chill, and attempted to draw a deep breath. Pain flared in his chest, hot enough to tell him he sustained some damage there. It took him three attempts to hoist himself out of the ditch and onto the frost-rimed road.

He had lost his hat of bells and torn his fool’s costume. No matter—it had been a poor costume, at best. A quick check assured him his dagger still nestled in his boot, overlooked by his attackers.

Who were they? Thorstan felt convinced he knew the voice he had heard at the last, but could not place it now. Where was he? And how might he stop shivering? For deep, dangerous shudders took hold of him. But the anger that licked up inside held heat enough.

Someone had seen him with Edwina and wanted him out of the way. Thorstan could not fault the man for that; it was, more or less, what he had done to Kenweth. One of the nine suitors, then. Which? It scarcely mattered. If the man thought an attack by his servants would keep Thorstan from Edwina, he had another think coming.

He scrutinized the horizon and the position of the sun, turned about in the road, and began walking.