He rubbed his hands over his face. By the saints, he wanted nothing to do with this. He had affairs of his own to see to, affairs that would require all his attention. He had no use for a pair of helpless lassies who were from . . . well, he had no idea where they were truly from, but he couldn’t deny that something akin to magic had been involved with their arrival.
The saints preserve him from it.
“I’ve another one to fetch,” he said, turning suddenly to Phillip. “Guard this one, please.”
“Of course, my lord.”
Montgomery left his bedchamber, avoided an encounter with a rather inebriated Gunnild of Sedgwick on his way through the hall, and escaped into the courtyard unscathed. He walked swiftly through the gates, fully prepared to again see that very odd shimmer at the end of the bridge, but he did not.
He also didn’t see any sign of either Everard or that poor, fragrant faery.
He cursed himself succinctly, then turned and ran back along the bridge. There was no sign of either of the two in the cesspit, so perhaps Everard had found sense and brought the gel inside the keep. Montgomery could only hope the man hadn’t dumped her in the well to have done with her.
He found her lying on the floor in front of the fire in the kitchens, apparently senseless and obviously the recipient of a recent bucket. Montgomery caught his cook’s arm before he upended another bucket of water on her.
“Do not.”
The cook looked no less disgusted than Everard had, but he at least refrained from commenting. Montgomery looked about him but saw no sign of his companion in the night’s events. He supposed Everard had retreated happily to where he might strip off his clothes and have a wash. Montgomery wasn’t entirely sure he wouldn’t do the same thing before the night was through.
He lifted the maid up in his arms, giving up the thought of not touching her sodden clothing. He was filled with less disgust than pity, but he also had no desire to wear more of his cesspit’s filth than necessary.
He was favored with lewd suggestions and other unpleasantness on his way through the great hall, but he ignored it and continued on his way. It was only as he reached his bedchamber that he realized he hadn’t covered the gel’s wings. The saints be praised the revelers below had been too far gone to realize that.
Or so he hoped.
“Another one?” Phillip squeaked.
“To my surprise,” Montgomery said shortly. “I imagine I’ll remain here in the passageway to guard these two since they aren’t able to lock the door. I don’t dare leave them to trouble they might not want.”
“I understand, my lord.”
Montgomery imagined Phillip did. Artane was not without its own share of odd happenings. He smiled briefly at his squire. “Find Sir Ranulf and send him to me, then bolt yourself into my solar so I’ll know you’re safe. We’ll resume our duties in the morning.”
Phillip nodded, wide-eyed, then turned and trotted off down the passageway. Montgomery watched him go, looked up and down the short passageway to make certain he hadn’t been observed by anyone else, then let himself into his bedchamber and shut the door behind him with his foot.
Well, the first thing to do was to see to the most pressing issue and that was ridding the poor wench in his arms of her clothing. Montgomery wasn’t completely untried in the matters of removing women’s gowns, but he had to admit, as he laid her on the floor in front of his fire and looked at her garb, that what he saw gave him pause.
Her wings were crumpled and ripped in a place or two, and he wondered with no small bit of alarm if that pained her.
He rolled her over gently, then realized to his great surprise that her wings were simply fastened to her gown with small round bits of bone. He was tempted to linger over that discovery, but the stench of her clothing was truly difficult to bear. He would see to that first, then turn his mind to the other riddle. He was quite grateful that his cook had done her the favor of ridding her hair of most of the filth. Her gown, however, had not fared so well.
He left her wings alone and worked on the laces that held the back of her gown together. They were easily undone and in short order he had her gown removed. He steadfastly ignored the fact that her wings were fixed not to her skin but to the cloth and that she wore the most alarming undergarments he’d ever seen in his life.
He supposed ’twas fortunate for them all that he had a strong stomach for things of an otherworldly nature.
He studiously ignored looking at her lithe form, then lifted her into his arms and carried her to his bed. He laid her down, took off her slippers, then covered her quickly with an extra blanket to preserve what modesty she had remaining her. He then happily went about the more pedestrian business of washing her gown as best he could in the basin of water standing on a table beneath the window. He tossed the water out the window, hung her gown over a chair near the fire, then paced in front of that fire for far longer than he should have before he could even think about turning around to look at the two women in his bed.
He considered the very sensible thought that he should go downstairs, find a wall sturdy enough for his purposes, and bang his head against it repeatedly until good sense returned.
The alternative was to believe what his eyes told him.
He turned away and looked for someplace to sit. He rubbed his hands over his face, then wondered what in the hell he was going to do now. He didn’t want to believe in the fables he’d given credence to in his youth. He was almost a score and eight, far too old to be beguiled by tales told by his mother to entertain small children.
He couldn’t deny, however, that he had seen things earlier that evening that had been nothing less than magical. If he’d been a more gullible lad, he might have believed what all signs pointed to.
He had the Queen of Faery and her handmaid in his bed.
He rose and began to pace, only because he thought better when he was moving. If the women were faeries, then why had the maid’s wings not been attached to her flesh? Was she merely a servant who had not earned any privileges, or were there rites of passage in her world that he knew nothing of? He had no idea, but he certainly wasn’t going to examine the queen to see if the answer lay on her back.
He found himself longing for nothing more taxing than a morning spent in his solar, listening to his very capable steward scratching on his parchment, tallying up numbers that continued to march across the page thanks to that steward’s diligence.
He stopped at the foot of his bed and looked down. The queen, if that’s what she truly was, was still an angel of perfection. Her maid, if that’s who she was, continued to be lovely in a way that he couldn’t lay his finger on. She seemed almost familiar, if such a thing were possible. And he continued to be just as baffled as he had been not half an hour ago.
Where had these gels come from, if not Faery?
He took a deep breath, then walked around to the side of the bed and looked down at the maid. He leaned over to make certain she was still breathing, then reached out to touch the bump on her head.
She hit him so hard he staggered back. He realized only then that she was still unconscious and her arm had fallen off the bed. It had to have been a reflexive reaction to the pain. He picked up her hand, settled her again, then smoothed the hair back from her face. She was very lovely, true, but there was something about her—
He stepped back and shook his head sharply. It had been a very trying handful of days and he needed nothing so much as sleep. Unfortunately, he suspected that wasn’t to be found that night. But before he took up his vigil in the passageway, he would go make certain Phillip was seen to and the hall as secured as it was going to be. He took one last look at the women in his bed, shook his head, then turned and left the chamber.
He ran bodily into Ranulf before he realized his captain was standing in the passageway, waiting for him.
“My apologies,” Montgomery said with a weary smile. “It has been a very long day.”
Ranulf waved aside his words. “Not to worry, my lord. Our young lord Phillip told me you’d wanted to see me. Forgive me if I took the time to make one last check of the hall.”
Montgomery was profoundly grateful for the lads nearest him who were consistently diligent beyond what he could reasonably ask of them. “And?”
“Most of the guests are snoring where they’ve fallen, Lord Phillip is safely ensconced in your solar, and the gates are secured.” He paused. “Lord Everard seems to be looking for someone to tell questionable tidings to, but there are none sober enough to listen to him. I had no interest in them, if you’ll forgive my saying so.”
“He has a vivid imagination,” Montgomery said slowly. “I’m not sure I would give credence to what he says, either.”
Ranulf shrugged. “The world is full of inexplicable happenings, but there is no purpose in discussing them overmuch.”
Given that Ranulf had squired for Montgomery’s brother-in-law, Jackson, Montgomery supposed Ranulf had seen more than his share of inexplicable happenings and had acquired the good sense to leave them alone.
Would that he himself had had the same good sense.
“I’ve arranged for the watch, my lord,” Ranulf continued, “and will take my turn when appropriate to see that all is well. Is there aught else you require?”
Montgomery shook his head. “You’ve done more than enough, Ranulf. Thank you.”
Ranulf made him a bow, smiled briefly, then went off to see to his duties. Montgomery made himself at home against the opposite wall from his door. He was beginning to wonder if he hadn’t so much stumbled into a dream as a nightmare. He had a hall full of drunken guardsmen, cousins, and neighbors. He had holes in his walls and rats in his cellar with no cat in sight. And now, if his own eyes were to be believed, two faeries in his bed. He was half tempted to ask Fate what else it was she planned to throw at him, but he decided he’d best not, as he was quite sure he didn’t want to know.
Magic.
Despite how thoroughly he had shunned any mention of it for years, he’d known it would catch him up eventually.
He could only hope it wouldn’t be the death of him.
Chapter 6
P
ippa
fought her way out of what was without a doubt the most unpleasant night’s sleep of her life. She couldn’t quite call it a nightmare because there had been no monsters in it besides her sister, but it could definitely be classified as a very bad dream. Obviously she’d indulged in too much British chocolate the night before. Tess had warned her it was powerful, but she’d ignored her sister, trusting in her own ability to ingest vast quantities of it and remain unaffected. Never again. If her head ever stopped killing her, she would swear off the stuff for good.
She lay still for quite some time, then opened her eyes.
And she rather wished she hadn’t.
The light in the room wasn’t all that great, but perhaps that was just as well. She couldn’t understand why Tess would have kept one of the bedrooms in such a, well,
rustic
state, but what did she know? Maybe people paid good money to sleep under scratchy sheets and wake up to a canopy that looked as if it had been carved with a woodsman’s axe. And what was that horrible smell—
She realized, with a start, that it was her.
She would have given that a bit more thought, but she was too distracted by the noise. She carefully turned her head and found her sister lying next to her so profoundly unconscious that Pippa might have thought she was dead if she hadn’t been snoring like a trucker. Why she herself was in her underwear and her sister was still wearing her party clothes was something she probably didn’t want to know. Maybe Tess had rescued her from the moat and decided taking off her dress was enough and been too exhausted after the fact to mess with Cindi. Maybe Cindi hadn’t wanted to let go of that small fortune in crystals she was wearing and had kicked up a fuss, beating Tess with the wand she still held in one of her traitorous hands.
When she could see straight again, Pippa fully intended to check the scene of battle and collect more crystals. If she was feeling particularly feisty, she just might start cutting them off Cindi’s dress while she was passed out. She could probably start her own bead store with the plunder.
She lay there for another minute or two until the smell—which was definitely coming from herself and not Cindi—became just too bad to endure any longer. She pushed herself gingerly to a sitting position. She was going to find a robe, then go get in the shower before she went immediately back to bed. Maybe Tess had a friendly family doctor who would come look at her head and give her something for the pain. She was a little surprised her sister hadn’t done that already, but maybe things had gone too crazy to. She wouldn’t have blamed Tess for wanting a little rest. In fact, that sounded like a very wise idea. Pippa lay back down, vowing to get back up when the stars stopped swimming around her head.
Once she could think straight again, the events of the night before came back to her in a rush. She had gone swimming in Tess’s moat, which was definitely not as clean as advertised. She suddenly remembered with perfect clarity the events leading up to that, all of which were overlaid with a nagging annoyance directed toward her sister for once again hogging the spotlight. She remembered standing at the end of the bridge, talking to Stephen de Piaget and having Cindi repeatedly try to come between them. She wasn’t entirely sure someone hadn’t pushed her once or twice. She actually wasn’t entirely sure that someone hadn’t been Cindi herself doing that pushing, especially given that the final shove had landed Pippa in the moat.
No, that wasn’t right. Stephen had grabbed her hand and kept her from falling into the moat, only he had let go. That had probably been thanks to the fact that Cindi had passed out conveniently close to his outstretched arms and he’d had no choice.