Forever His (2 page)

Gaston straightened, but did not flinch from his lord’s wrathful gaze or stormy tone. He could not pretend remorse he did not feel for a war he did not regret.

“You will both be seated,” the King ordered flatly, sweeping off his fur-lined velvet mantle, spattering rain across the small tent.

Gaston moved slowly, reluctantly, but obeyed without a word, as did Tourelle.

The King came to stand at the table, an equal distance between them, glaring from one to the other in turn. “I have sent missives to you both and they have been ignored,” he began in a quiet voice all the more ominous for its softness. “More than a fortnight past, I declared again that there would be peace between you, and yet you fought on. Did you both believe that I hold your past service in such esteem and your present counsel so valued that you could
defy your King?
” He slammed a fist on the table with such force that any lesser wood than oak would have split asunder.

“Sire,” Tourelle said. “My claim—”

“Silence!” Philippe demanded. “I will hear no more of claims and thievery and tournaments gone awry. I have decided the matter, and there will be
peace
.”

“My liege, one cannot make peace with a viper,” Gaston insisted.

“It is the way of these times, Gaston,” the King assured him with a bitter laugh. “One finds oneself making peace with all manner of creatures. I married my own sister to the English King not two years past to seal a treaty of peace.”

“Sire,” Tourelle bit out, clearly displeased at being likened to a viper ... or to an Englishman. “It is
I
who have been wronged in this. I did not start this war. I merely defend myself. This knave attacked my lands without warning!”

“And what would you have done in his place?” Philippe snapped. “A mere knight engaging a
duc
who possesses much larger holdings and more men? His strategy of surprise was his only hope of succeeding. It is not with polite, mild ways that Sir Gaston has earned the name The Black Lion, Alain. And it is no accident that I have come to depend upon his military counsel. You would be wise to remember that.”

Any pride Gaston might have felt at the King’s words vanished when Philippe turned his furious gaze upon him.

“But it is the
wise
knight,” Philippe continued, “who knows to stop when his lord so commands!”

“My liege, had you been here, I would have been able to explain,” Gaston said. “I fear you do not fully grasp—”

“Nay, Gaston, it is you who do not grasp this situation. With unrest along the Flemish border but a day’s ride distant, I require strong,
obedient
vassals here in the north, ready to defend my holdings from attack. Men with no quarrels between them.” He glanced from one to the other, then drew himself up to his full regal height. “We can no longer be Aquitaine and Orleans and Touraine and Artois, each region for itself, each man for himself. It is time for us to put aside the old ways and old wars and stand together as France. To fight together as France!”

Silence followed his declaration, broken only by the pounding of the rain overhead. If his words were meant to replace hatred and enmity with loyal fervor, Gaston thought darkly, they failed.

The King’s expression hardened. “It is not necessary that either of you understand. It is only necessary that you obey my commands. And
there will be peace
between you!” He folded his arms over his chest. “I have decided it thusly: you, Alain, shall have a portion of the lands that you claim through your mother’s line—those bordering the Oise River and westward.”

Gaston bit back an oath and clamped his hands on the arms of his chair to keep from surging to his feet in outrage. That amounted to half of his brother, Gerard’s, holdings!

“You, Gaston”—the King shot him a quelling glance—“will have returned to you your rightful inheritance: the chateaux that belonged to your father and brother, with all the lands and vassals entailed to each, but for that portion which I have just transferred to the Duc.”

Gaston found but small satisfaction in that—though he did enjoy the strangled sound of protest that Tourelle couldn’t quite contain.

“My liege!” Tourelle sputtered. “Varennes is not capable of managing such holdings! Nor is he deserving of them. The only chateau he possesses now is one that he
stole
during a—”

“And to seal this peace and assure that there shall be no future trouble between you,” Philippe continued calmly, talking right over him, “Gaston will marry your nearest female relative, Alain.”

Both men leaped to their feet with vehement protests before the King had even finished his sentence.

“Nay, my lord, you cannot ask this!” Tourelle cried.

“It is impossible,” Gaston declared, stunned by the unexpected command. “My liege, you have already promised me the hand of Lady Rosalind de Brissot.” He slanted a scornful look toward Tourelle. “Precisely so that I may join her lands with mine and protect my holdings and my people from the marauders who plague our region.”

“Aye, Gaston, I did promise her to you, along with her dower lands. Half the Artois region, if you will recall. Mayhap you should have given some thought to that before you disobeyed my order to end this war.”

Gaston felt his gut clench. He could not lose Lady Rosalind! He needed her lands and her knights now more than ever. His father’s and brother’s chateaux lay far to the north; he could not hope to hold them unless he had the reinforcements and the power that the de Brissot lands would bring him.

“Sire,” Tourelle said patiently, “it pains me greatly to agree with this barbarian, but he is right in this instance—it is impossible. He cannot marry a maiden of my house because there are none available. My daughters are married. My sister died years past. I’ve no unmarried cousins—”

“ ‘Twas your ward I thought of, Alain. Christiane de la Fontaine.”

 Tourelle flinched as if he’d been struck. “Not Christiane!” he spluttered. “She is an innocent, sire. Raised from the age of three in a foreign convent. She is soon to take her sacred vows and join the cloister. I cannot hand her over to this ... this—”

“This
barbarian
wants naught to do with a woman of his enemy’s house,” Gaston said tightly. “Especially some impoverished novice fresh from the cloister without a blade of grass to her name. Sire, you must believe me. Tourelle is
not
what he pretends to be, and you are placing a weapon in his hands. He will only use this girl to accomplish what he has wanted all along—the death of the last male heir of the Varennes line. I will no doubt find her blade in my back as soon as the wedding vows have been spoken!”

“Enough! Both of you!” the King snapped. “Alain, you will send for Lady Christiane immediately.”

Shaking with suppressed fury, Tourelle replied through gritted teeth. “The convent is many weeks distant, sire. In Aragon. With the snows hard upon us, by the time a messenger can be sent, I—”

“You will go there and fetch her yourself,” Philippe commanded. “Mayhap a journey through the snow will cool your anger and give you time to consider the wisdom of obeying your King without question when next he gives you an order.”

A deafening crack of thunder sealed his words. For a long moment, the pounding storm made the only sound in the small tent.

“Sire,” Gaston said at last, his determination no less fierce than before, “I will wed this Fontaine girl because it is what you command, but I vow to you, I will have done with her and marry—”

“You savage son of a cur,” Tourelle hissed. “If you harm so much as one lock of Christiane’s hair, I will—”

“I’ll not harm her. I’ll not even
touch
her. I’ll not consummate the marriage and I will
prove
to the King that you are the murdering knave I have claimed!” Gaston turned back toward Philippe. “And when I have done so, my liege, I ask that you grant me an annulment, that I might marry Lady Rosalind. And that you return to me the rest of my brother’s lands.”

“Enough!” Philippe looked exasperated and disgusted with them both. “You may seek to prove whatever you wish. You may bed your wife or not as you wish. But from this moment onward, neither of you will raise so much as a dulled table-blade against the other!” He bestowed a royal glare upon each of them in turn. “You, Alain, will forfeit all of your lands
and everything you own
if Gaston is harmed in any way—and the same holds true for you, Gaston, if aught befalls Alain or Lady Christiane!”

His expression would have turned lesser men into cowering pups. The message was clear. The matter was closed.

“As you command, my liege,” Gaston grated out.

“Aye,” Tourelle agreed.

The King gave them a frosty smile. “At last, my two most valued and troublesome vassals have chosen to obey my orders. Pray that I never have to journey all the way from Paris to deliver them in person again!” He picked up his sodden cloak and flung it about his shoulders. “Alain, you will bring the Fontaine girl to Gaston’s chateau by the end of December. The wedding will take place on the first day of the new year—and I shall attend myself to ensure that naught goes awry.”

He spun on his heel and pulled aside the tent flap, muttering under his breath as he stepped out into the storm, “And may God protect the unfortunate maiden who is about to be dropped into this den of wolves.”

Artois Region, France

New Year’s Eve, 1993

C
oming here had been a huge mistake.

Celine Fontaine sat perched on the edge of a crimson brocade Louis XVI chair, a Baccarat crystal champagne flute clutched in one shaky hand, her lungs unable to steal a single full breath. The
grand salon’s
warm air, heavy with the competing scents of Saint Laurent and Lagerfeld and Gucci, seemed too thick to breathe. The crowd ebbed and flowed and chattered around her, but Celine had never felt more alone.

She had been a fool to think she could handle this.

Any second now, it would happen. She would lose control. Give in to the shivers of terror that iced through her and dissolve into a trembling heap on the expensive Kilim rug on Aunt Patrice’s marble floor.

She could imagine her horrified mother dashing to her side, kneeling over her, shaking her head.
Darling, darling
, she would say. She always addressed Celine that way, as if her troublesome middle child needed that second “darling.”
Darling, darling, your doctors said you were fully recovered. They said there wouldn’t be any long-term psychological effects.

Her family would finally be forced to call out the men in the white suits. Or whatever the French equivalent was.

Celine tried to picture what a French straitjacket might look like. Impeccably tailored, she imagined, choking back a hysterical little laugh that bubbled up inside her. Maybe with a Louis Vuitton logo on the lapel or gold Chanel buttons.

She should have stayed home. Alone in her studio on Lake Michigan. Alone with her art and her antiques and her cats and her secret.

She kept telling herself she was safe here. Nothing and no one could hurt her in Manoir La Fontaine. The family’s ancestral chateau, nestled in a small town north of Paris, had always been her favorite place in the world. She had spent all her childhood and teenage summers here, had always looked forward to the annual reunion over Christmas and New Year’s.

The only one she had ever missed was last year’s. Because she had been in the hospital. Because of her headline-grabbing disaster with Lee.

A twinge of hurt mingled with the terror that made her heart beat painfully hard. Thoughts of Lee would only make everything worse. She forced the name to the back of her overcrowded mind.

She had insisted on coming to this year’s reunion despite her surgeon’s protests, not only because she wanted to please her family, but because she thought she might find tranquility in this place.

But she couldn’t calm down. Nothing could soothe her unreasoning panic. That’s what her doctors had called this “unfortunate side effect.” Panic attacks. Quite understandable in the circumstances, they informed her. The episodes would fade eventually, they assured her.

But it had been a year now, and they hadn’t faded. She hadn’t had an attack in weeks, had dared hope she might finally be past them—but the fear that had become her shadow that violent night last December seemed to follow her everywhere. Even here.

Celine kept a carefree smile pasted in place as she glanced down at her watch, at the tiny gold hands moving inexorably along diamond-flecked numerals. Eleven-fifteen. In forty-five minutes it would be midnight. Thank God. She would clink a few glasses, kiss a few relatives, find Uncle Edouard and Aunt Patrice, make her apologies. Make her escape.

Calm down, calm down, calm down.

Her doctors had prescribed tranquilizers, but she refused to take them. She didn’t want to trade one problem for another. Didn’t want to become one of those desperate, high-strung, Valium-popping society women she met too often.

She had always hated pills, and seven weeks in the hospital had left her with a strong distaste for anything medical: sedatives, needles, nurses, IVs, EKGs, and the most dreaded initials of all, PT. Physical Therapy.

She lifted the champagne flute to her lips, took a sip, and tried to swallow past the knot of terror in her throat. She had to make it through this. Slowly, forcefully, she returned her attention to the conversation around her.

The room hummed with French, Italian, upper-class British, and the American accent of her father’s branch of the family. The popular topic among her intellectual relatives seemed to be some astronomical event that was supposed to happen tonight. A lunar eclipse or something. But, seated beside her, two of her cousins were nattering in low tones about their latest romantic liaisons on the Côte d’Azur.

Celine felt grateful that everyone was acting absolutely normal toward her. She had even dressed carefully tonight, choosing a low-cut, form-fitting black Donna Karan dress that practically screamed
I am perfectly fine
. She wanted everyone to believe that.
She
wanted to believe that.