Daughters of the Dagger 04 - Amethyst (2 page)

Chapter 2

Marcus hurried across the cluttered courtyard, dodging many workers carrying boards on their shoulders, barrels on their backs, and pushing wheelbarrows loaded down with mortar. His squire, his steward, and one of his knights, Sir Gawain were at his side. He’d noticed the girl taking up his master mason’s time and he couldn’t have this. He needed this castle done before the king’s visit at Christmas. And now he had other worries at hand thanks to the missive he just received.

“Master Mason
, why have you slowed down?” he growled. “And who are you?” he asked, eying up the girl. She was comely, yet held a disheveled, traveled look about her at the same time. She was obviously not one of his workers, but a lady by the way she was dressed. She wore a purple velvet gown with tippets trailing down her arms and past her fingers. Her ebony hair was loose and windblown hanging lazily down past her shoulders, making her seem carefree and wild instead of refined. Her eyes were an alluring shade of indigo, and the corners of her pink little mouth were turned up ever so slightly as if she were amused by something he said.

“I am sorry, Earl
,” said Clement with his head bowed slightly. “I will get back to work anon. I only took a moment to greet my niece.”

“I see.”

The girl looked him in the eye fearlessly instead of curtsying and extending her hand as was proper. And she had the nerve to have her hands on her hips as if she were about to give an order. He already didn’t like her.

“My name is Lady Amethyst de Burgh,” she told him, still doing naught to show him a bit of respect.
“Master Clement is my mother’s only sibling.”

“Then I suggest you go back
to your mother,” he snapped. “As this is a construction site and dangerous, not a place for relaxation and sipping wine while you carelessly chat about the weather. ’Tis no place for a frail young lady.”

“My mother is dead,” she told him. “And
I am not here to relax, nor to chat about the weather. And neither am I frail. For your information, my father is the earl of Blackpool.” She looked at him as if that was supposed to mean something, which it didn’t. He’d never met the earl of Blackpool, nor did he really care at the moment.

“W
ell, we all die sooner or later,” he said coldly, not caring if he was being insensitive. He’d lost his mother as well, and no one ever showed him a bit of sympathy. His own father made sure he’d instructed him not to shed a tear at his mother’s funeral. He’d learned to ignore emotions throughout these past years, because they only made one weak. His father had made sure that was the first lesson he learned. “Now leave Master Mason to his work and be on your way, Lady Blackpool. As I’ve said – this is no place for someone like you.”

He expected her to cry or run to her horse
, or perhaps ask for his forgiveness. But she did nothing of the sort. Instead she fussed with the pouch on her side, dipping her hand inside to retrieve something, and just ignored him.

“Randal,” he said to his steward, “hand me the missive I’ve received this morning.”

“Aye, my lord.” The man bowed his head and handed the missive to Marcus with two hands. Marcus took it and held it out to Clement.

“
Mater Mason, I’ve received word today that my father will be arriving any day now,” he relayed the written message aloud.

Clement hurriedly opened the missive and read it
anyway.

“I want him to see that the
money he so graciously gave me to help fund this castle was well spent. We need to speed up the progress.”

“Of course, my lord,” said Clement handing the missive back to him. “It says he is bringing a boy with him that he wants you to train as a squire
as well?”

“Peter is my squire,” he said pointing to the boy beside him.
He was a tall boy with a good build on him for his age of seven and ten years. He was loyal to Marcus and fought with a vengeance at his side every time they had to chase the Scots back over the border. “And Sir Gawain will be training the new boy as I haven’t the time.” He nodded toward his best knight. Sir Gawain was a good five years older than Marcus’s age of four and twenty, but very experienced in battle.

“I see,” said Clement. “And I am sure ’twill be an honor to have another earl housed in Montclair Castle during construction. I do hope your father understands that the accommodations
will be very rustic, as we are far from completion.”

“
He’ll not understand, I assure you. I will give him my solar for the duration of his stay since it is the most elaborate, as well as completed. I will be staying in the solar I allowed you to occupy, so you’d better make other arrangements until after he leaves.”

“Of course, my lord.”

“I also want you in my solar right after the evening meal, as I am calling a meeting with the master tradesmen. I have an important announcement to make. We need to increase the progress immediately, as it is crucial we have the outside of the castle completed by Christmas.”

“I assure you, everyone has been working overtime
, Earl Montclair. We are way ahead of schedule for a project of this size.”

“And way behind schedule as far as I’m concerned.”

“I have been doing my best,” explained Clement, “but I have been slowed down drastically by the death of my assistant, my lord.”

“Aye,” he grumbled.
“Haven’t you found a replacement yet?”

Marcus
watched as the man’s eyes grew wide with fear and he just nodded. “The archbishop has sent a replacement, just this day.”

“Good,
then have the man join us at the meeting. I would like to meet him and tell him what’s expected of him.”

“I have something I need to tell you about this … replacement t
hat the archbishop has sent,” said Clement sounding a bit nervous.

“Master Mason
, I am not paying you two shillings a day to stand here and babble. Now bring the man and join me in the solar later.” He turned abruptly to leave but was halted by the girl’s voice.

“I am
his assistant,” she said.

He stopped in his tracks and turned back to her. She was standing there holding a missive out to him
with one hand, instead of using two hands to show respect to someone of his position, just waiting for him to take it.

“Master Mason
, is this some sort of jest?” he asked. “I don’t take a fancy to games so early in the morning.”

“You can talk directly to me, instead of
speaking through my uncle,” the girl blurted out. “And I assure you this is not a jest.”

He looked at Clement and the m
an was just shaking his head. Marcus didn’t understand any of this.

“You dare speak to me so boldly, my lady. And I assure you, that I am not a jesting man. Now gather your things and get atop your horse and be out of here anon
, before I lose my temper.”

“
’Tis true, my lord,” explained Clement. “She was sent to be my assistant by the Archbishop of Canterbury himself.”

“I don’t believe it,” he snapped.

“Then read the missive and you’ll see for yourself,” came the girl’s reply, still holding out the parchment toward him, now only using two fingers, almost dangling it in front of him like some kind of lure.

He looked over to his steward and then his knight. They just shrugged their shoulders and it was obvious they had no idea what this was all about
either. Then he looked over to his squire. “Get me the missive,” he said in a low voice.

He
noticed the look of surprise on the girl’s face as the squire stepped forward to gather the missive from her. But she lowered her hand quickly and raised her chin defiantly, instead of letting him take it.

“I do not have leprosy,
that you dare not come near me,” she told him. “And I don’t bite, though I can’t say the same for you, my lord. This missive was to be given to you or Master Clement directly, and no one else. The order comes from the archbishop himself.”

“Did you read it?” he asked Clement, once again denying the girl what she obviously wanted by
not speaking directly to her.

“I did not, my
lord,” answered his master mason, his eyes turned toward the ground. “I did not want to break the seal and thought it better to wait and let you open it instead.”

“This is wasting so much time!” He reached forward and snatched the missive from the girl who didn’t even flinch in the process. Once again, he
r hands were back on her hips as she waited for him to read it. “The archbishop would never send a woman. This is obviously forged.”

“The seal is not broken,” surveyed
his squire, cocking his head to see the parchment in his hand.

“Aye,” added
Sir Gawain, looking over his shoulder. “And that is definitely the seal of the archbishop of Canterbury.”

“I am not blind, I can see that
for myself,” he ground out, already dreading whatever words were on the parchment. He took a moment and ran his finger over the stamped wax holding the missive’s information a secret. Sure enough, it was real. And not tampered with at all. Then he ripped it open and held it up, with his squire, steward, and Sir Gawain all looking over his shoulder to see it. “Do you mind?” he said, lowering the missive, clenching his jaw and looking up toward the sky in frustration.

“We apologize, my lord,” said Sir Gawain, speaking for all of them.

Once they’d stepped back, he held it in front of him and scanned the contents quickly. His heart sank as he realized that what the girl said was true. She was being sent as a temporary replacement to fill the position of assistant to the master mason until a proper one could be found. He only hoped to hell it would be soon, because as much as he didn’t fancy having a woman in this prestigious position, he knew his father was going to have twice as hard of a time with the idea once he arrived. And that was something he didn’t want to have to experience first hand. His father in a foul mood would make his own moods seem quite mellow.

“It says the girl’s father has also sent a donation
to help fund the building of my castle,” he pointed out. “Did she give you the money?” he asked, looking at Clement and ignoring the girl completely.

“Nay, I d
id not,” said the brash girl, walking up to him and standing directly in front of him, her hands still at her waist. “If you’ll read the entire missive you’ll realize that my father put me in charge of his funding to distribute it as I feel appropriate. And if we are going to be working together, Lord Marcus, then you are going to have to speak to me directly sooner or later, and stop acting like I don’t exist.”

That did it. He could no longer ignore the little chit, nor could he accept her inappropriate behavior.
“All right, Master Assistant, then you’ll join our meeting in the solar tonight, and I will need you to prove to me that you are qualified for this job. But your pay will be pittance compared to what I paid the last assistant, as a woman cannot earn the same money as a man, whether she is sent by the archbishop or not. And from now on, you’ll treat me with the respect deserved of an earl. You will curtsy when you meet me, and wait until dismissed before you walk away from me. You will not speak out before being invited to speak, and you will refer to me as Earl Montclair, not Lord Marcus. You will act as is proper. And get your damned hands off your hips already. I will not tolerate inappropriate behavior.”

It was almost as if time stood still, as she stared so deeply into his eyes that he felt an odd sensation in his stomach.
She was challenging him, and though he wanted naught more than to look away, he couldn’t. That was probably his first mistake, as in her eyes he saw determination, power and a bravery that he often only saw from his strongest knights. This stirred him deeply. And though it unsettled him, he found himself intensely attracted to it at the same time. Attracted to her. She excited him and he didn’t understand why. He preferred his women subservient, gentle, quiet and meek. Easy to control and willing to do anything he ordered. Or so he thought, until he’d just met Lady Amethyst.

Her gaze lit the smoldering embers
of his blackened soul, making him feel alive again. It was something he hadn’t felt in a long time. He found himself challenged by her stare and felt as if he needed to show this woman that he was master of the castle and whatever he desired, he received. He truly needed, as well as wanted, to put her in her place.

H
e’d often taken many a peasant girl to his bed for his own needs, every one of them thanking him by the end of the night and begging him to send for them again, as his prowess between the sheets was no secret among the women. And every one of them had bored him tremendously and done nothing to make him want them again. But this girl was different. He finally seemed to find his match, and now the challenge was to bring her to his bed and show her that she belonged under him and on her back, not staring him in the eye with her hands on her hips. He couldn’t wait to do it.

“Of course,” she said softly, holding out
the sides of her gown and showing a grand air of respect as she lowered her head and curtsied.