Castles in the Air (11 page)

Juliana didn’t want to look at him. She avoided looking at him. Even now, when she knew how he’d deceived her with every step, he captivated her.

“Juliana.” Raymond took her hand, threaded his fingers through hers. “Forgive me.”

She looked at Hugh, but his brief frenzy had burned out. As he stared at their twined fingers, his face portrayed loneliness, laced with a resignation only habit could provide.

“Look at Raymond,” Valeska said.

She looked at Felix, but the familiar sickness of the spirit had been distanced by new events and by a new man.

“Look at Raymond,” Dagna insisted.

She looked at Sir Joseph, pale except for two red spots that burned over his thin cheekbones. For the first time in years, his malice was directed at someone else—at Raymond. But that malice was laced with a hearty respect, and Juliana didn’t fear for Raymond.

Raymond was invincible.

“Look at Raymond,” the old ladies crooned.

One glance at him trapped Juliana in his sorcery. He stood coiled beside her, all male beauty and wicked enchantment. Like the jewelled snake of Eden,
he beguiled her until she forgot the pain and humiliation a man visited upon his woman. She forgot the reasons why a woman avoided taking a lover. She forgot that men demanded more than babes, were more unreasonable than babes. She remembered only the promise of pleasure. He made her wish to seek that pleasure. Like the end of a skein of yarn, he dangled fulfillment and she wanted to chase after it.

“Ooh, my lady,” Valeska whispered, quivering with awe at the quiet passion that hummed in the air. “You’ll make fine babes for us to rock.”

“I will not!” Juliana said.

“But my lady—”

A gesture from Raymond stopped Valeska. He turned to Hugh. “Perhaps we should become acquainted. We will be neighbors.”

Hugh nodded. “But first, you wouldn’t be offended if
I
ask to see some proof of your identity.”

“No need, Hugh,” Juliana mocked. “My hindsight is excellent. He snuck onto my lands, prepared to abduct me, saw a perfidious way to insinuate himself into my household, and seized the opportunity. Isn’t that right, Lord Raymond?”

“Hush, Juliana,” Hugh said as Raymond withdraw a small object from the pouch on his belt and handed it over. Hugh examined it and, satisfied, pressed it into Juliana’s hand. “Your intended’s family seal. An old and famous one. Look on it well before you defy him.”

She took it between two fingers and stared at the roaring bear depicted so graphically there. “I’ve seen it before. ’Twas stamped on every message this Count of Avraché sent me, commanding my presence for my wedding.”

“Doesn’t it frighten you?” Hugh demanded.

“Should it?” It was a marvelous bit of bravado, for she had been frightened before she ever gazed at the seal.

“Have you never heard of the strain of wild fighters in Lord Avraché’s family who wear bearskins and transform themselves into berserkers?”

“That’s enough.” Raymond plucked the seal from her and dropped it into his pouch. “Those stories are naught but legends told by my ancestors to inspire panic in their enemies. Let us become acquainted now, Lord Holley, in a friendly manner.” Taking Juliana’s hand, he threaded his fingers through hers and started toward the fire.

Juliana tried to hang back, but he wouldn’t release her hand. He tugged her forward until she complained. “I must supervise the clearing up.”

“Oh, nay, my lady.” Wrinkles overcame Dagna’s face as she smiled. “We’ll do that for you. Won’t we, Valeska?”

And Valeska said, “With the help of your competent maid, Fayette, it will take no time at all.”

Raymond again tugged at Juliana’s hand. She twisted it, trying to loose her fingers until he warned, “I’ll put my arm around your waist and bring you.”

She yielded immediately, following, she thought, like some obedient ewe at the behest of the master ram. Only Raymond didn’t resemble a ram, and she was no bleating ewe. “Your penitence was brief,” she snapped.

“But sincere.” He settled her on the bench by the fire, then despaired that her feet were roasting. She replied she would rather her spine bear the brunt of the heat, and turned her back to the fire. Her features were no longer exposed by the light, but she realized her error almost at once.

Raymond faced the fire. Raymond sat next to her.
By facing in a different direction, he could look at her any time he wished, and he wished to often. But he spoke to Hugh as if he were the host and Hugh the guest. “How came you to Lofts Castle now, so close to Christmastide and through the storms of winter?”

Juliana knew how hopeless her cause must be when Hugh answered with the courtesy due a lord. “I heard tales of the diggings about the castle, and couldn’t imagine such madness.”

“Such madness,” Felix echoed.

“In such weather, who brought tales of my”—Raymond sounded stern—“construction?”

“A message from—” Felix began to say, but Hugh interrupted.

“’Twas a message from a wandering troubadour, nothing more.” Leaning forward, Hugh patted Juliana’s shoulder. “And I wished to visit my old friend at Christmastide. Her wassail is the best in all of England.”

“The best in England,” Felix mimicked.

She tossed Hugh a weak smile, and fought as old memories and anxieties overwhelmed her. Her mouth quivered; she clenched her jaw to stiffen it.

But Raymond noticed, for he slipped a casual arm around the front of her waist and brought her close to him.

He didn’t speak to her—her equanimity would have shattered if he did—but his hip met her hip, and he seemed comforted by the contact. It didn’t comfort her, of course. No man’s touch could comfort her. She really wanted to squirm away. The weight of his arm made her aware of each breath she took, and she concentrated so much on maintaining a slow, even rhythm, she forgot how upset she was. She couldn’t summon any interest in the men’s tales of tournaments
long over and battles long gone, but the merriment of the servants impressed her. Hailing her maidservant, she asked, “Why are the servants singing so heartily?”

“Haven’t ye noticed, m’lady?” Fayette grinned in pure delight. “Sir Joseph’s snuck right out.”

Juliana saw it was so. “He’s been absent from the great hall before, and never have I heard so much mirth.”

“Aye, m’lady, but he’s not comin’ back. Sir Joseph can’t hurt ye no more.”

Staggered by her answer, Juliana stammered, “Hurt me?”

“Did ye think we never noticed when he said those nasty things t’ ye? An’ clapperclawed ye time an’ again?” Fayette hooked her thumb in her rope belt and jutted out her lip. “Made us right angry, he did, but what could we do? He was yer chief knight.” Philanthropy forgotten, she added, “Besides, he can’t hurt us no more, either.”

“Hurt you?”

“He was always aslappin’ an’ abeatin’ on th’ servants, kinda sly-like.” Fayette rubbed her behind in remembered injury.

Juliana blushed. She knew about Sir Joseph’s rages, and she’d tried to force him to temper them, but hitherto none had complained. “I didn’t know…I had hoped he wasn’t so brutal.”

“Ach, no use in complainin’, m’lady. We knew there weren’t nothin’ ye could do t’ th’ ol’ whoreson.”

Juliana glared at the smiling maid. “I banished him.”

“Aye, that ye did, but we didn’t know if ye had th’ strength t’ force him t’ go.” Seemingly oblivious to Juliana’s indignation, Fayette beamed at Raymond. “But now—Lord Raymond,
he’ll
make him go. That
Sir Joseph’ll have no chance against a sure-lance like Lord Raymond.”

Guilt stabbed at Juliana. She’d been so weak, so occupied with her own problems, she hadn’t even been able to control her own chief knight. Another good reason to wed Raymond. Another proof of her own ineffectiveness.

She glanced sideways at Raymond and found him watching her. Immediately her unruly emotions gained sway, and again she concentrated. She wanted no sobbing to disrupt the cadence of her breathing.

A cup presented itself beneath her nose, and a voice said, “My lady, I’ve brought you your favorite wine, well-strained.”

Startled, Juliana took it from the beaming Valeska. She’d been focussed so intently on each inhale and exhale, she’d noticed nothing else.

“And I brought a wrap for your feet.” Dagna laid it across Juliana’s lap, hiding Raymond’s arm and giving him, Juliana feared, tacit permission to caress her as a husband would. They had been betrothed by proxy, and to the servants, the old ladies, the men, the wedding ceremony was a formality. Performed on the steps of the church, it would give their children the shelter of legitimacy.

When those children would be conceived mattered to no one but Juliana.

To the two old ladies hovering over her, anticipating her every need as if she already carried the babe they desired, she whispered, “Go away.”

They retreated, unoffended, still smiling.

Raymond murmured in her ear. “They want only your comfort, and are perhaps overzealous in their pursuit. Don’t be angry.”

“I don’t punish servants for my own bad humor,” she said stiffly.

“I never thought you did.”

“And Sir Joseph learned better. He grew up at my father’s side, and one of the first rules my father taught me was not to abuse my servants or my serfs or my villeins.” She took a breath and wished she could stop talking. She stifled the yawn which struggled from her depths to the surface. The excitement, the fear, the anger of the evening had left her exhausted and unable to cope. She wanted to sleep. But Raymond still pressed close to her. When he spoke, his breath warmed her cheek. She saw his jewelled eyes gleam in the firelight. She absorbed the warmth of his body. Did he, like the rest of the castle, consider the proxy betrothal valid unto the day? Would he expect to join her on her bed?

The thought brought an odd flush to her cheeks. His arm seemed to toast the skin of her belly, and her skin itched beneath its weight. She pressed her thighs together to relieve the sense of pressure, but that only made it worse, and she lost control of her breathing—a double disadvantage.

Scornfully, she labelled this as youthful, immature, lacking in sense. Any woman who reached the mature age of eight-and-twenty should know the insanity of allowing such sensations to control her emotions.

She sipped the mulled wine and considered how she could remove herself from his grasp. Should she stand without explanation and leave? Should she excuse herself to supervise an already efficient household, or explain she must use the garderobe? Should she express concern for her exhausted daughters, check the pallet where they slept, then never return?

She didn’t know. She was afraid she had become
the celebrated whore of Sir Joseph’s ranting. When she looked at Hugh and Felix, she felt as if she rocked in a boat in a fierce storm. When she looked at Raymond, the waves calmed, the wind smelled fresh, and only Juliana and Raymond existed, alone on the sea.

Whatever his true feelings were at being condemned to marry her, he played the faithful lover well. Such kindness when none was required made her resent him all the more. She should hate him; it proved impossible. She found herself wishing she’d met him before, when she had known how to laugh. She’d never been a beauty, but at one time men had flocked to her side for a smile. In her imagination, she saw herself laced into a sky-blue cotte with a sun-yellow chainse peeping out. Men surrounded her, but none of them frightened her. They weren’t important, for she was not only the lady of Lofts, but the wife of a great knight and the mother of brave daughters. Her girls explained they owed their courage to their mother’s example. Her husband—

The support beneath her head gave way, and she blinked. A hand, broad, callused, hovered in the line of her vision. Raymond’s hand. Without thinking, she placed hers in his grasp and let him swing her to her feet.

She stood swaying while he said, “Lord Hugh, Lord Felix, our acquaintance will no doubt prosper, but tonight, Lady Juliana is nodding. The servants are drooping, and your journey has made you wish to seek your own pallet. ’Tis time to sleep”—he wrapped an arm around her shoulder—“and we bid you good-night.”

He hadn’t even kissed her
.

Juliana groaned as stripes of sunlight pressed on her eyelids. It couldn’t be morning. Not yet. Not when so many ordeals faced her today.

It should have been the laughter she dreaded, the laughter directed at the gullible Lady Juliana. She curled into a little ball and dragged the pillow over her ear.

She did dread the laughter, and the merriment with which her household would prepare for their mistress’s marriage. But more than that, she dreaded facing Lord Raymond. Last night he had been so kind, so apologetic, so completely a chivalrous knight. He had helped her climb, fully clothed, up on the bed. He’d sat on the covers and explained how the disastrous masquerade had come about, how he’d lied only to ease her fears, how he had become trapped in his disguise, and how he’d intended to reveal himself.

He’d been a bit vague about
when
he had intended to reveal himself, and he’d invited her to speak her thoughts. She’d wanted to. She’d wanted to badly, but every time she looked at him, she was struck by a sense of vertigo. She’d been imprisoned in this stony,
thorn-edged tower for too long, and Raymond pushed her out on the ledge and was going to make her fall.

Every time she looked at his shaven chin with its newly revealed cleft, every time he leaned close and she inhaled the fresh-washed scent of him, every time she heard the determined rumble in his tone, she felt the surge of air in her face and saw the ground rushing up at her.

But he hadn’t tried to kiss her. He hadn’t even tried to join her under the covers. She was glad to put off that ordeal a little longer. She didn’t mind that she was cowardly, and so stained by her disgrace he dreaded the marriage bed as much as she did.

“Why do you wish to wed her?”

Hugh’s bass rumbled through the great hall, and she closed her eyes and snuggled into the feather mattress to shut him out. To shut the whole wretched day out.

Still loud, Hugh continued, “A man like you—”

Raymond interrupted quickly. “What do you mean, a man like me?”

The knights sounded as if they stood right beside the master bed, and she pulled the warm furs closer about her shoulders.

“A man like you,” Hugh said stiffly, “has lived at court and all over the continent. You have the backing of the king. Why would you want to come to a provincial backwater in England to marry a woman like Juliana?”

“A woman like Juliana?” Raymond inquired.

“You’ve eyes to see.” Juliana could almost imagine Hugh’s shrug. “She’s pretty enough, but she hasn’t lived an exemplary life, and she doesn’t own many lands, not when compared to what you’re used to. She’s jumpy and suspicious, and doesn’t listen to a man when she should. Too much indulged by her father, I guess. When he rejected her, it struck her
down and she became strong-willed and determined. And of course, she’s a snivelling coward.”

She stared at the wall. Sunlight beamed through the arrow slit and told her she’d slept too long. Morning mass was over, morning’s meal cleaned up, morning work had commenced, and she still didn’t want to face the consequences of last night’s events.

Raymond sounded polite. “How can she be a snivelling coward and a strong-willed woman at the same time?”

“That’s Juliana.” Hugh’s voice softened with affection. “She’ll keep a man on his toes.” He cleared his throat, deepened his voice. “But I don’t understand why you want to wed her.”

“Because the king commands it.” Raymond’s answer couldn’t satisfy Hugh, but in a different tone, he asked, “What think you, Cuthbert? Can we build here?”

Ignoring the chill that struck at her skin, Juliana snuck an ear out from beneath the covers. Build what? Where? What mischief was this phony castle-builder making now, and why did he have her carpenter from the village here in the keep?

“Aye, m’lord.” Cuthbert sounded sure, confident, pleased, and close. “’Twill be a pleasant addition fer m’lady’s comfort. An’ yer own, o’ course, when ye’re wed.”

Hugh sighed, loud and exasperated. “Raymond, if you would give me your attention.”

“You have my attention.” Raymond’s voice dipped, became muffled.

Obviously piqued, Hugh said, “Lady Juliana is fragile, unused to the hearty ways of men. It has been suggested you would not realize her delicacy and perhaps use her ill.”

“Who would suggest such a thing?”

Raymond sounded overloud to Juliana, but she lifted the pillow to hear the reply.

“It doesn’t matter.” Hugh sounded chagrined, a man who’d said the wrong thing and achieved the wrong results. “What matters is you and your station.”

Raymond ignored that protestation with the arrogance of one born to power. “Last night you seemed easy enough in your mind about the marriage. What changed it so abruptly?”

Juliana heard a shuffling, and remembered how Hugh moved his feet when cornered. He denied Raymond’s tacit accusation. “No one! No one changed my mind.”

“I asked what changed your mind,” Raymond reminded him, “not who.”

“Nothing changed my mind.” Hugh spoke too rapidly. “I just want to do the right thing for Juliana. Don’t you like to do the right thing for the women you feel responsible for?”

In marked contrast, Raymond drawled as if his thoughts impeded his speech. “I do the right thing for the women I am responsible for.”

“I feel the same responsibility a brother would feel for Juliana.”

“Or a father?” Raymond said.

Hugh plunged on. “But you could easily persuade our noble sovereign to award you a new bride, and it would be advantageous for you to have a wife accustomed to the court’s ways.”

“You want her for yourself,” Raymond accused.

“I want the best for Juliana,” Hugh replied, stiff as any man whose secret has been revealed before all.

Raymond lowered his voice, made it intense and threatening. “Listen to me, Lord Hugh. Lady Juliana is
mine. My woman, my heiress, my bride. No challenge shall go unanswered. Henry gave her to me, and she’s mine.”

What Hugh would have answered, Juliana never discovered. Such a blatant declaration in front of the whole room infuriated her, and she swept back the covers and prepared to leap up.

Raymond stood beside the bed, tall and broad and handsome as she feared. He spoke to her now, not Hugh. “We spent the night in a snowed-in hut all alone, and there I determined she was mine.”

It was a lie, the worst kind of falsehood, one that stole her virtue and reduced her, once again, to status of fallen woman. She bounded up until they were nose to nose—and faltered. His gaze locked with hers and he smiled without warmth.

“Did we wake you, Lady Juliana?”

“What—?” She glanced around, noted in some lesser part of her mind that Hugh stood beside him, her screen had been removed, and on the dais beside her bed knelt her master carpenter. She wanted to attack Raymond for his blatant declaration, demand he explain, but she shrank from the confrontation. If she insisted he clear her name of wrongdoing, would Hugh tell him the truth? Would Felix come from his place by the fire to smirk with his red lips and strut like a little peacock? Would Sir Joseph—?

A quick survey of the great hall confounded her. Sir Joseph was still missing, but such a blessed state could not continue. Her whole life he’d been there, sneering, snitching, so rather than reply to either Raymond’s question or claim, she asked, “Cuthbert, what are you doing?”

Cuthbert scrambled to his feet, bobbed his head, and
beamed. “M’lady, yer new lord cares only fer yer comfort an’ th’ comfort o’ yer people. ’Tis honored I am t’ offer ye congratulations on yer marriage. Honored.”

“My thanks, Cuthbert.” Confused, she shivered as the chill struck her.

“You’re cold,” Raymond said smoothly. “Let me warm you.”

He picked up a fur and prepared to tuck it around her, but she snatched it from him and wrapped it around her hunched shoulders. “I’ll do it.” In a forced, but pleasant tone, she asked, “Cuthbert, do you have enough to keep you busy this cold winter?”

Cuthbert laughed heartily. “Ye jest, m’lady. This winter, me family will have th’ extra they need fer true comfort.” He swung his arm to slap her on the back, realized his error, blushed a painful red. Bowing, he retreated back to his straight edge.

With her eyes, she measured the marks he labored over. Scratched into the oaken floor, they marked an ample area around the bed and they puzzled her. Whatever was happening, she didn’t like it. She knew she didn’t like it. but when she looked up to Raymond, tall, and even taller on the dais, she opted for diplomacy. “My lord, what is your plan?”

He sat down next to her; that didn’t make it better. His weight depressed the mattress, and she had to brace herself to keep from rolling into him. Now he was close enough for her to inhale his essence of smoky fires and sawn wood. He said, “Lofts’s keep is badly lacking in the comforts essential for a lady’s pleasure.”

Her keep lacked comforts? She swept it with a glance. The long, narrow arrow slits let in light but kept out most of the cold. The fire burned continuously on a central tile hearth, and the smoke exited through louvers
in the roof. Rushes covered the floor and the removable trestle tables were easily cleared to give work room. What more could a lady ask for? In discouraging tones, she said, “I’ve heard some castles have their fires close to the wall.”

“I have seen it,” he agreed.

She sniffed. “A foolish idea, to my mind. How can all the folk warm themselves?”

Raymond didn’t act at all like a superior male who’d seen the world and all its wonders. “Some keeps have more than one hearth. Say, one against that wall”—he pointed to the far wall—“and one against this.”

“What a mess that would be,” she scoffed. “How can the smoke reach the peak of the roof without much meandering?”

“A hood is built above the hearth to collect the smoke.” Raymond treated her concern seriously.

“I’ve done it myself,” Hugh added, and flinched when Juliana glared. “It works well, and it seems to heat the stones. My keep is much warmer than this old pile of rock.”

The disparagement in his tones irked her, and she turned her back on him and spoke to Raymond. “I have heard some ladies insist on a place to sit ringed in large windows to let the sun in.”

“Aye, I have seen that,” Raymond acknowledged.

“It saves the eyes of the sewing maids,” Hugh said.

“Do you ruffle the covers with your sewing maids, now?” Juliana snapped, pushed by his championship of Raymond.

He snapped back, “You’ve got a saucy mouth for a lady, and you’ll give Lord Raymond a disgust of you. Besides, what does it matter to you whom I ruffle the covers with?”

Juliana blushed, mortified at being so justly reprimanded and worried the mere mention of bed-time activities would give Raymond a taste for them. “So it saves the eyes of the sewing maids. ’Twould be a fine idea, but what of a siege? My master castle-builder—” She snapped her mouth shut. The devil could fly away with him before she’d quote him to himself.

Raymond didn’t point out her unconscious error. “I told you any opening is a weakness in the defenses, but when larger windows are added, it is usual to add them in an upper storey, above the great hall, as part of a solar.”

“A solar?”

“A place away from your family and retainers, with ample room for your chests and our bed,” Raymond explained. “A place with windows that allow the sun to light your weaving.”

She was horrified. “Sleeping in a separate room from the people of the castle? But—”

“When spring comes, we’ll have the master builder construct a stone structure for a proper solar, but for now Cuthbert will build walls for a makeshift room.” Raymond moved closer to her. “It will be an addition for your pleasure.”

“An addition for my pleasure? Are you mad?” She gripped the covers to keep from sliding into him. “No members of my family have ever so separated themselves from their people. It will encourage sedition, a lack of loyalty.”

“Your words are your father’s,” Hugh said.

She turned on him, her fists bunched. “What’s wrong with that? My father was right.”

Hugh planted his feet, put his hands on his waist, and challenged her. “About everything?”

She wanted to cry, “Aye!” but she dared not. Too well she remembered her father’s coldness as he withdrew from her after her ordeal. She’d needed him badly then. He’d failed her, and she couldn’t help but wonder if he’d betrayed her, too. Not even Sir Joseph’s admission eased the pain of her beloved father’s defection. Her gaze fell; she scraped the furs with her nails and wished they were Hugh’s eyes. “Go away, Hugh,” she ordered. “Just go away.”

Big, brash, and offended, Hugh stomped toward the fire.

“He means well,” Raymond said.

“I know, but he’s been a trial to me.”

“Is he the one who hurt you?” Raymond probed.

“Hurt me?” She laughed weakly. Was she concealing a secret Raymond had already discovered? “Hugh wouldn’t hurt me. Not deliberately. Anyway, I’ve forgiven him.”

Raymond moved closer again, and propelled by a conspiracy of feathers and gravity, she tumbled into him. “Shall I kill him for you?”

Shaken by the offer, she exclaimed, “Nay!”

“I would. I would kill any man who hurt you. Did you hear what I told Hugh?”

Raymond sounded sincere, but men were tricksters all. “I…when?”

“When we stood beside the bed.”

Her gaze dropped to her fingers, frantically groping for an anchor among the furs.

His hand covered hers; he pried the nervous digits from the strands and cradled them. He stroked her palm, tallying each callus with little circles that tickled. “Valeska and Dagna taught me to read palms. Would you like me to read yours?”

“Nay.” But she stared, fascinated, as he traced
the long crease curving around her thumb.

“They would tell you your life line betrays how hard you work.” His half smile brought a dimple straying to his cheek. “Actually, of course, they would be looking at the evidence of the work. You have blisters on your fingertips. What causes those?”

“Weaving,” she answered, hypnotized by the slow dance of his fingers across her palm.