Love Above All (15 page)

“Why?” Fionna asked. “You seemed a
near-perfect nun to me.”

“Beards,” Royce said. “Women don’t grow them.
Men do. A man who’s pretending to be a woman must shave twice a
day, which will result in certain nicks and scrapes. The inevitable
bloodshed from those cuts will, in turn, result in embarrassing
questions.”

“Of course.” Fionna began to laugh. “I never
thought of that. I begin to believe I haven’t noticed much of
what’s going on around me.”

“Few people pay attention to apparently
unimportant details,” Royce said. “But if you do pay attention, you
will see and understand far more than other folk do. It’s a skill
that can be learned, and it is remarkably helpful while
spying.”

“Perhaps if I had paid attention, I could
have learned more of what my brothers were about, and learned it
sooner,” Fionna said with a rueful sigh.

“Royce’s ability to notice details that other
people pass over is one of the qualities that make him such a fine
spy,” Quentin said.

“My spying days are over and done,” Royce
responded with a coolness that ought to have silenced Quentin.

“Are they?” Undaunted by Royce’s manner,
Quentin smiled at his friend. “It looks to me as if you are
enjoying yourself right now, as you scheme to send one of your
agents into an abbey to bring out a girl who may as well be a
prisoner there.”

“Now, Fionna,” Royce said, ignoring Quentin’s
words as if he hadn’t spoken at all, “let me see you walk as a nun
does. Beginning tomorrow, I want you to wear the wimple and assume
your role as a postulant. A few days’ practice will stand you in
good stead. For tonight, just use the shawl as a head
covering.”

“Very well.” Fionna stood. She draped the
shawl over her hair as she had seen old women do. Then she bent her
head and shoulders in imitation of Royce’s demonstration. She took
a few mincing steps.

“Good,” said Cadwallon, nodding at her.

“Not good enough,” Royce contradicted.
“Fionna, you are moving like an old woman, but if anyone looks
closely at you, it’ll be immediately apparent that you are not old.
Think of impersonating a young woman, who is trying to learn to be
meek. That way, if anyone does scrutinize you, your appearance will
seem more natural. Try it again.”

“Don’t bend over so much,” Cadwallon
advised.

“Take shorter steps,” Braedon said.

Fionna tried again. And again.

“Better,” said Royce, observing her with
critical eyes. “You mentioned the way your sisters-in-law cringe.
Try a bit of cringing.”

“Cringing is not in my nature,” Fionna
declared, straightening her back to glare at him.

“You are doing this for your sister’s sake,”
Royce reminded her.

“So I am. But I am also supposed to be the
noble Lady Ursula who, being a Norman, will naturally bow down only
to God. And, perhaps, to King Henry.”

“She’s right,” Quentin exclaimed, laughing.
“Fionna, pretend you are Lady Agnes, resigned to entering a
convent, but not entirely by your own free will. Now, try it again,
please.”

“Lady Agnes?” Fionna thought for a few
moments, recalling the elegant posture of the wife of the constable
of Carlisle Castle. “Yes, Quentin, I see what you mean. Is this
better?” With hands folded rigidly before her, with head and
shoulders just barely bent, Fionna walked around the tent, taking
small, reluctant steps.

“That’s it!” Royce declared. “That is exactly
the appearance we want to convey. The abbess cannot doubt you if
you appear at the door requesting entrance. Perhaps your beloved
husband has recently died and you want to quit the world
forever?”

“Since she’s still a bit young to be a
widow,” Braedon said, “perhaps she’s entering a convent in
objection to the man chosen for her by her parents.”

“That is also an acceptable excuse to get her
in the door,” Royce said. “You decide for yourself, Fionna.”

“Why should I need an elaborate background
for an impersonation that will last only an hour or so?” Fionna
asked.

“If you know who the lady you are pretending
to be is, and you are familiar with her family and her friends,
then you will carry out a more truthful deception,” Quentin told
her. “When you are asked questions about Lady Ursula – and you will
be asked, make no mistake about that – you can answer immediately,
and with apparent honesty, as the real Lady Ursula would do.”

“A truthful deception,” Fionna repeated.
“Now, there’s a phrase well suited to a spy. And it does make
sense. I can understand how perfection in a spy’s deception could
save his life.”

“Or her life,” Royce added.

“If I am to wear the wimple and pretend to be
a postulant for several days, I will have to take care to walk as a
postulant walks.” She tried her humble walk again, circling the
tent once more.

“You must also practice speaking as a
postulant would speak,” Braedon said. “Your voice is too clear and
carries too far. Lower your voice and try to sound as meek as you
look.”

Fionna glared at him for the criticism, but
Braedon’s smile was remarkably friendly and encouraging.

“The advice is good,” Royce said. “Speak
softly. Quote scripture if you can. Choose your words
carefully.”

“You can do it for Janet’s sake,” Cadwallon
said.

“Yes.” Fionna smiled at him. “For Janet’s
sake. And once Janet is safely out of Abercorn, I will never bow my
head again except at an altar rail.”

On the sixth day after Fionna and Quentin met
Royce on the old Roman road they rode into West Lothian, bypassing
Edinburgh.

“We’ll stop short of Abercorn tonight,” Royce
decided, “so we will arrive there in midmorning tomorrow. That way,
we’ll have at least a few hours of daylight left after we depart
from the place. Once we have Janet, we’ll want to put distance
behind us as quickly as possible.”

For Fionna, it was a long and wakeful night.
She sat at the table in Royce’s dining tent, picking at her food
and scarcely hearing what the men were saying.

“You must eat,” Quentin admonished her. “We
can’t have you falling ill, or fainting by the roadside. The
journey back to England must be accomplished even more rapidly than
the pace of the last few days.”

“What if Janet is no longer at Abercorn?”
Fionna whispered. “What if my brothers have taken her away?”

“Hush.” Quentin’s hand came down on hers, his
firm grasp conveying his determination to carry out the promise he
had made on the first day they met. “Assuming Janet remains at
Abercorn, we’ll have her out of there by this time tomorrow.”

“And if she’s not there?” Fionna could barely
speak the frightening words.

“Then we will find her, wherever she is,”
Quentin said.

“Have you thought what you and your sister
will do once you reach England?” Cadwallon asked, sending a
sympathetic look in Fionna’s direction.

Having grown familiar with his bluff
kindness, she decided he was trying to direct her thoughts past her
fears of what the morrow might bring and onto a more cheerful
subject.

“During all our time together, and all our
talk about rescuing Janet, you have never mentioned any plans for
the future,” Cadwallon added.

“That’s because I haven’t made any plans,”
Fionna said. “I just want to know my little sister is far beyond
our brothers’ reach.”

“You are welcome to stay at Wortham,” Royce
said. “My daughter would be glad of the companionship of other
ladies who are close to her in age.”

“I cannot think a Norman noblewoman will want
anything to do with a pair of fugitive Scottish girls.” Fionna
spoke more sharply than she had intended.

“Catherine might surprise you,” Royce
responded mildly.

“I am sorry,” Fionna said. “That was
inexcusably rude of me after all you have done, and still plan to
do, in our behalf.”

“We all understand,” Cadwallon said. “The
night before a battle is always a tense time.”

“Do you think a battle will be necessary?”
Fionna cried in alarm at the idea.

“No – no, of course not. Abercorn isn’t an
armed fortress.” Cadwallon bestowed one of his boyish grins on her.
“It’s just that we want to be ready, in case of unexpected
problems.”

“What problems?” Fionna asked in sudden
alarm.

“I have already explained to you that we must
consider every possibility,” Quentin said, “so we can be prepared
for whatever reaction your request to see Janet elicits. Fionna, I
think you should retire now. I’ll see you to your tent.”

As Quentin rose from the table the comforting
touch of his hand over hers changed to a definite tug that urged
her out of her seat. The serious look in his eyes warned her not to
protest his insistence that it was time for her leave Royce’s
table. She went with him quietly.

“Sleep well,” Royce called after her.

“I don’t expect to sleep at all,” Fionna
muttered to Quentin.

When they reached her tent Quentin hesitated
while she entered. Then, without invitation, he stepped through the
flap to join her.

“Yes?” She whirled to face him. “Was there
something more you wanted to say to me? Perhaps another piece of
advice on what and how much I ought to eat, or how long I should
sleep, or how I should walk, or what I must tell the abbess when we
reach Abercorn?” she finished on a shrill note.

“Hush, my dear.” Quentin wrapped his arms
around her stiff form. “I know what you are feeling.”

“You cannot possibly know,” she cried.

“But I do. Cadwallon was right to say this
evening is remarkably similar to the night before a battle. Like a
squire who has never seen combat, you are afraid you won’t acquit
yourself well once the action begins.”

“What I am afraid of,” she declared, “is that
Janet will be gone or, if she is still there, we’ll have to fight
to get her away, and she’ll be injured. I couldn’t bear it if she
were hurt.”

“I hope she knows how much you love her,”
Quentin said. “Let me tell you now what I tell my squires before a
battle. You will be no use to me, or to anyone else, if you work
yourself into a frenzy and use up all your energy before the combat
begins. Fionna, you must rest.”

“I can’t rest.” She clutched at him, dragging
wads of his woolen tunic into each hand.

Quentin felt her violent shaking and knew she
couldn’t go into Abercorn in such a state. Nervous as she was,
she’d commit some impulsive mistake that would surely end in
disaster. And if anything happened to Janet, she’d blame herself
for the rest of her life.

He shifted his grip on Fionna, swinging her
up into his arms. Then he sat down on her cot, holding her on his
lap. As her warm, rounded hips settled onto his thighs he
immediately became aware of his postponed longing to possess her,
to make her his. But, however much he desired her, he couldn’t take
advantage of her while she was in such frantic distress. He decided
he’d hold her for a time, gentling her as he would calm a nervous
colt. He’d distract her from her very legitimate concerns about her
sister, until she fell asleep. He told himself he could bear his
own masculine discomfort, for he was used to celibacy.

“Quentin.” She snuggled against him,
burrowing her face into his shoulder, not questioning his
intentions because she trusted him to protect her.

Quentin set his jaw and tightened his arms
around her, vowing to control his rampant desire. She needed
comfort, not the imposition of a man’s urgent bodily demands.

She raised her head from his shoulder to look
directly at him. Her eyes were wide, and her lips were parted in
expectation.

At that moment restraint was too much to ask
of any man. Quentin took the kiss she offered, delighting in the
way she melted against him.

“I thought you were angry with me,” she
whispered. “I thought you hated me.”

“No,” he murmured with his lips upon her
throat. “I don’t hate you.”

“But you have been angry with me,” she
persisted, while her fingers slid through his hair, the mere touch
sending sensual chills down Quentin’s spine.

“Seldom have I been more annoyed by a woman.”
Or more confused by a woman, though he didn’t tell her so. In her
present frightened state, Fionna needed no reminders of his
lingering questions about her veracity. The movement of his lips
against her breast robbed the words of any hint of rebuke and he
hoped she’d soon forget what he had said.

She was wearing the green silk gown again and
Quentin could feel her nipples hardening beneath the thin fabric.
His own body was hardening, too. He was rapidly approaching a point
at which he’d find it almost impossible to stop himself from taking
what he wanted from Fionna. She wriggled about on his lap, moving
against him in innocent abandon. Quentin groaned.

“Have I hurt you?” She reached down to touch
his hardness. Quentin caught her hand, stopping her just in
time.

It took all of his inner strength to make him
prevent himself from pushing her down on the cot. What he wanted to
do with Fionna, and knew he ought not to attempt, ceased to matter
when, an instant later, he heard Cadwallon calling to him.

“Yes?” he responded in a strained voice. He
listened in mingled frustration and relief as Cadwallon spoke of a
question Royce was raising about their preparations for the next
day.

“As you just heard, I must leave,” Quentin
said to Fionna.

“Very well.” He could hear the regret in her
voice.

“Try to sleep.” He lifted her fingers to his
lips and held them there for a few moments.

He didn’t look back as he departed from the
tent.

That Abercorn was an ancient religious house
was evident in its humble buildings and in the rough stone wall
surrounding it. The abbey church was small, with tiny windows, and
the dorter where the nuns slept was not much larger than the
church. Within the angle formed by church and dorter lay an herb
garden, where the plants were neatly cut back and the soil was
mounded around the plants in anticipation of winter’s long chill.
Outside the wall a narrow swath of fields had been gleaned of the
late harvest. In the empty furrows a few birds pecked at whatever
scanty remnants they could find. No one was working in the fields,
or in the garden. Not a single human figure was visible.