Fair Border Bride (6 page)

He cursed the whim that took him in this direction. She was an attractive girl, and would make some country gentleman a suitable wife one day soon, but the wife of his dreams must be a rich heiress. He had wasted two whole days when he should have concentrated on his mission. Frustration beat hard within him.

Alina, he noted, said nothing. She obviously wanted rid of him.

Come full dark, she would have her wish.

***

Mid-afternoon, Lance pounded across the hall and burst around the solar door. “Father’s riding in!”

Mama dropped her spindle with an exclamation of joy. “Thank the Lord! Come Alina!” Rising, she crossed herself and hurried towards the door.

Alina rose more slowly. She was relieved by her father’s safe return, but doubts gnawed at her. It was much too soon. Harry had not yet left. How was she to keep him secret with her father’s men swarming over the place?

Lance checked that his mother was out of ear-shot. “Lionel’s strutting all over the place like the farmyard rooster, but Father’s ill-tempered.”

Alina anchored her spindle and faced her brother. “Why? Did he not bring back the cattle?”

“Some of them, but not all.
I don’t know why. I haven’t asked Lionel yet.”

“Lance, is anyone in the hall?”

He peered around the door and shook his head.

“Then I think you should sneak out of the postern gate, and warn Harry. Be very quick. Tell him to go at once. I’ll make sure no one notices your absence.”

While her brother sped off on his mission, Alina walked out through the hall to greet her father. “I am glad you are safe home, sir.”

His face held the haunted, harassed look that had become habitual of late. He favoured her with a brief smile. “Thank you, Alina. How does my brother Reynold?”

“Little changed, sir, since you saw him last.”

A grunt was his only answer. He swept by her, one palm holding his sword flat to his thigh as he leapt up the staircase two at a time.

Alina stared after him. Was it possible Father grieved more over his brother’s illness than he ever admitted? She glanced around, saw Matho and smiled, glad to see him safely returned. Matho winked and lifted his hand in salute.

Lionel, his face streaked with mud splashes and his hair flattened to his skull by his steel cap, bent and kissed Mama’s brow. “The men called it a runabout raid,” he said. “There wasn’t one trail to follow, but dozens. They must have split up the beasts and gone in different directions once they got beyond the wall.”

Alina listened, mildly amused at his nonchalant attitude. How he had changed in the last few months! A flash of movement caught her eye. She looked back and caught sight of Lance as he darted through the gate.

Lionel excused himself and stalked toward the stables. Cuddy trotted after him.

Alina hesitated. If she did not hurry down to the field now, she may never see Harry again. She glanced at her mother, slowly mounting the steps to the hall. Her duty lay there, but Father was home now and surely it would not matter if she stole a few moments for herself to see Harry one last time.

Turning toward the field gate, she heard her name called.

No, oh, no, not now, Mama. She glanced back, and caught her mother’s cheerful gesture, and reluctantly headed back into the hall.

When Cuthbert Carnaby entered the solar that night, Alina looked at him with newly awoken appreciation. No wonder Mama adored him. Bathed and splendid in clean linen and crimson velvet, pale hose and round-toed shoes, he was still a handsome man with a fine length of leg. Firelight accentuated his dark hair, high cheekbones and hooked nose as he paused at the hearth, then turned and warmed his backside before the flames.

The evening sun shone through the west window behind Lionel, who had taken up his place in the window seat. The golden glow warmed the stone walls to a soft grey and streamed across the floor to reach Alina, tucked up on the opposite window seat. Barring a catastrophe of some kind, the servants would not interrupt them here.

Feeling her father’s gaze, she looked up and found him studying her in the same calculating way he gazed at a prize ram in September. Almost as if he gauged the quality of the progeny to come. Unease prickled along her spine and turned her mouth dry. It wasn’t her gown of brown velvet with a russet underskirt that caught his attention, nor was it because she had wound her hair in plaits around her head before joining her mother in the solar. He was used to those things. No, there was something else in his mind.

She looked across the room at Lionel and raised her brows in exaggerated query.

He had also bathed and changed into his favourite old blue velvet doublet, now shabby with age, and he frowned and shook his head in response to her question.

That was a bad sign.

Her sense of unease grew with each heartbeat.

“I spoke to Errington today.” Her father paused, easing his heels off the ground, always a sure sign that he was pleased about something. “I rode home by way of Sandhoe,” he added, and glanced at his two younger sons. “You know who lives there, boys?”

“The Erringtons, Father.” Seated on wooden stools by the hearth, the flames turned their cheeks rosy and glistened on the moist whites of their eyes as they chanted the answer in unison.

Lionel stared at the floor and would not meet her gaze. Alina’s skin prickled and crawled beneath her gown.

“Correct.” Father beamed at the two boys. “It is a large family, related to the Lords of Langleydale. Do you remember where Sandhoe is?”

“On the other side of Dere Street,” Lance said. “It’s the tower house that looks down on the river, Father.”

Alina mouthed one silent word in Lionel’s direction. He offered a turned down mouth in a gesture that said all too clearly she wasn’t going to like what was coming.

Her father swung to her. “It is a family of some standing, and they have made an offer for you, daughter.”

It was not exactly a surprise, but with her head full of dreams of Harry, Alina had no idea how to react. Her fingers grasped the edge of the stone seat while Father’s dark eyes regarded her with something close to satisfaction.

“They have made a good offer that makes up for all the time lost with the Woodringtons.”

“Happy news at last.”
Mama spoke from her chair by the fireside, and exchanged pleased glances with her husband.

Alina stared at her father.

He waited for her to bow her head and thank him.

She remained silent, words locked in her throat.

“Well?” The one harsh word warned Alina he grew impatient.

Her mother rose, held a spill to the fire, and then moved slowly about the room lighting candles in the darker corners of the room.

Alina moistened her lower lip, and cleared her throat. “Will it be Thomas, or John, Father?” It surely could not be Ralph, for he was far too young.

“John. As you will remember, he is much the same age as Lionel.”

“But younger than me, Father. Thomas is five years older—”

“Thomas is betrothed to an heiress in York. While we wasted time with the Woodrington boy, the match was made for Thomas.”

Lance shuffled on his stool. “Does this mean a wedding, Father? Here, in our hall?”

The boy’s question relieved the growing tension. Mama, satisfied with the soft, shifting light of the newly-lit candles, retreated to her chair.

Carnaby beamed once more. “It does indeed, son. Your mother will arrange things, and it will take place soon.
As soon as can be arranged, in fact.
Probably within a month.”

Mama’s gaze contemplated her embroidered slippers. “The hall must be lime-washed to hide the stains and soot marks before we have important guests. This would be a good time for a pattern to be painted on the plaster, husband.”

Carnaby glanced at his silent daughter. “Would you like that, Alina?”

“It would make the hall look better, Father.”

If he thought a pattern of vine leaves painted on a wall would make up for being married to John Errington, then he had no idea of her feelings. She glanced at her mother. Mama would never openly oppose her husband, but she might be persuaded to delay things.

“I hoped to be married from Grey House, where I grew up.”

“You can forget that notion,” her father snapped. “There will be tenants in there soon. Now that I have so many more duties I need a man to work the farm for me. This will become our home and I shall continue Reynold’s improvements.” A slow smile spread over his swarthy face. “John will come a-visiting tomorrow, so you’d better look your best, daughter.”

Alina tried not to let her dismay show. “Yes, Father.”

She swallowed hard against the constriction of her throat and looked out of the window. A rabbit nibbled grass in the orchard. Where her father was concerned, she felt as defenceless as the rabbit. It was no good pleading with him, and she was not stupid enough to say she wanted to wait and to see if Harry came back after completing his mission.

***

“Come, daughter, let us go into the hall.’ Mama tucked her arm through Alina’s as they left the solar. “I am so happy now they’re both safe home, though I’m very much afraid we may never stop Lionel talking about the Trod.” She cast a critical glance at Alina’s gown. “Why did you not wear the amber pendant I gave you? It would match so well to that gown.”

Alina’s hand went to her bosom. At dinner it was customary to wear a lighter chemise under a gown, which usually left an expanse of exposed skin on view. “I forgot it, Mama. Should I go back?” Alina summoned a smile. At least one of them was happy.

Her mother shook her head. “No time now. You know how your father hates to be kept waiting.”

Long boards on trestles ran alongside both north and south walls of Aydon hall, and servants not engaged in serving were already seated. Logs blazed in the large fire basket on the raised stone hearth in the centre, and the scent of pine and smoke mixed with the honey scent of thick beeswax candles.

Candle stands as high as a man, each bearing a dozen candles, stood by each end of the cross table, for Cuthbert Carnaby liked to see what he was eating. Two round pottery bowls on the table held short, fat candles to give additional light. The red and blue wall hangings behind his tall carved chair, enhanced by so much light, brightened the otherwise bare stone of the walls.

Carnaby stalked in, sat down and glared around the hall. His wife took her place at his side without a word, and Alina slid onto the stool next to her mother’s chair. Lionel sat on his father’s right while the younger boys sat at the head of one of the two side tables, wedged on the bench between the boys’ sword-master and their grey-haired tutor.

Servants brought in food and everyone smiled, chattered quietly and kept a wary eye on their master. Carnaby ate a few mouthfuls of mutton, and glared around the room.

“It was a run-about raid,” he said to the room at large. He swallowed half a cup of rich red Bordeaux wine in one gulp. “Tynedale
men,
and the ragtag and bobtail of the Borders hanging on for whatever they could get.”

Men sipped ale, and smiled cautiously.

“You got most of the cattle back, dear, and everyone is safe.” His wife’s warm tone showed her relief.

Cuthbert’s dark head swung round to her. Candlelight caught the tight, frizzled curls and dark eyes that betrayed his Norman origins. “Robert Cooper might take issue with you on that. He got a nasty slash across his arm.” His harsh tone softened. “His woman will take care of it.”

“Was it a sword?” Cuddy’s piping voice caught everyone’s attention.

“Indeed it was, son.”

“How big was the cut?”

“From there to there.” Carnaby touched his elbow and midway along his lower arm.

Cuddy shuddered.

“Is this boy going to be a warrior or a weakling?” Carnaby grinned at his wife, and turned back to Cuddy. “Am I going to have to hand you over to Father John for the Church, boy?”

“No,
thir
.”
Cuddy’s eyes became huge with worry.

“He is but a few days beyond his sixth year, husband. Time enough for him to become a warrior.”

“Cuddy doesn’t like the sight of blood, sir.” Lance stuck up for his brother. “But he’s good with a sword for his age. Even Harry says so.”

Alina stopped chewing and stared across the open space between the two tables. Lance didn’t realise what he’d said. There was a sudden lull in the conversation as everyone tried to remember who Harry might be, and she saw comprehension dawn in her brother’s eyes. In sudden frightened realisation of what he’d said, he swung round and met her wide frozen gaze.

Carnaby frowned. “Oh, well if Harry says so, then Cuddy must be good indeed.” Enjoying his own sarcasm, he looked around the hall. “Who is this Harry?”

The lump of half-chewed, tasteless meat stuck in Alina’s throat. She spat it quietly into her palm, and fed it to one of the dogs nosing beneath the tables. The boys must have visited Harry without her. How else could he know of their prowess with a sword?

Lance squirmed on his bench.
“Just a lad who lives in the village, Father.
He’s older than us.”

“Then we’ll take no notice of what he says, eh? You have a sword master and I pay him a good deal of money for his services.” The sword master opened his mouth, but Carnaby cut him off. “I’ll listen to what he tells me of young Cuddy’s progress in the morning.”

“I’m sure you’ll hear a good report, sir.” Margery Carnaby smiled at her sons. “The boys work hard at their lessons. I hear them at practice every morning.”

Alina knew that was a lie, for the simple reason that the stonemason’s work drowned out the sound of the boys’ sword play these days. She shot a glance at her mother, and sent up a prayer of thanks that her parents enjoyed a warm relationship. Would Mama’s defence sway Father?

Carnaby grunted, speared a slice of mutton and ate it with relish.

Lance stopped squirming and let out a soundless whistle of relief. The incident seemed to be over. Alina stared down at her platter and wondered where her appetite had gone.

“Harry doesn’t live in the village, Lance.
He
sleepth
in the stable with Dragon.”
Cuddy’s piercing treble filled the small silence.

Alina’s heart leapt against her breastbone. Oh, Cuddy. Her skin turned cold and her mind went blank. Disaster was upon them. Everyone looked at the boys and then, because Lance stared at her, at Alina. Always one to voice her thoughts, tonight she could not think of a single thing to say that might avert what was about to happen.

“We have a stranger living in that wreck of a stable, Alina?” Father’s voice was quiet, but she was not fooled. His anger was merely contained. He looked from Cuddy and Lance to Alina.

She smiled, but could not stop her mouth trembling. Blood prickled as it flowed into her face, and out of sight, beneath the table, she gripped the heavy cloth of her skirts and scrunched it into a ball. She looked at Lance and nodded towards the door, hoping desperately that he would have enough sense to slip out unnoticed and warn Harry he’d better leave at once if he hadn’t gone already.

“Alina!”

She jumped and met her father’s hot brown glare.
“Yes, sir?”
From the corner of her eye she saw Lance push up from his bench. Good, he was going to warn Harry.

“Don’t play silly games with me, girl. Who lives in the stable with that old horse of yours?” He saw Lance stepping over the bench. “Sit down, and finish your dinner, boy.”

Lance looked uncertainly at Alina.

“Sit, boy!” Carnaby roared.

Lance’s eyes flickered as if he considered mutiny. Red faced and sulky, he slouched back onto his bench and stared at the table.

“I don’t know what Cuddy means, Father.” Her voice sounded shaky, and she cleared her throat. “Perhaps this is another of his imaginary friends. You know—”

Cuddy shook his head. “Harry’s my friend, and he’s real. You like him, too.” He looked at her as if she betrayed him.

Cuthbert Carnaby flung down his knife and bellowed to his Steward, stationed at the hall door. “Send down to the old stable. Bring anyone you find here immediately.” He glared around. “We’ll soon see if any one threatens the hall tonight. I refuse to be surprised by raiders twice in the same week.”