Taming the Beast (22 page)

 

That evening, soaking in a large, round copper tub before the hearth in her chamber, Michaela smiled at her earlier fear. How like her old self to be wary at a turn of good fortune in her life—there had been so few of them, she saw any change for the better as a bad omen.

Silly, silly girl.

She still had no earthly idea what had marked such a dramatic turnabout in Roderick Cherbon, but at this point she did not care one whit. The entire day had been a dream—riding through the country at Roderick's side, an ecstatic Leo fronting his father's saddle. The man had been busy with preparations beforehand, obviously, because the horses had stood ready at the stables, and Roderick's saddlebag had been filled with provisions for their holiday over the land: skins of wine and milk; bread and cheese and a pudding; a whole, cooked chicken, which Roderick had quartered for them with a small dagger hidden in his right boot; heavy blankets to spread on the ground and guard them from the chilly damp.

They were away the whole of the day, riding and exploring, talking and laughing and taking time down from their mounts for Leo to run wild. Now Michaela's body was feeling the effects from her long hours astride, but she relished each twinge as a souvenir from her and Roderick's first day as a truly betrothed couple. She could not have been happier.

Roderick was off putting Leo in his bed for the night, with a promise to return to her after he'd had his own wash. Although Michaela was more than pleased with this change in the Lord of Cherbon, she hoped to finish her bath and don proper clothing before Roderick appeared—memories of their previous encounter in his chamber still haunted her, and she wanted nothing to ruin what was left of the day.

She had only finished rinsing the last film of soap from her when a soft rap fell on her door. Before she could call out a warning, the door opened and Roderick slipped through the slit of shadow beyond, closing himself quietly inside the room.

Michaela slid down in the tub, until the water touched her chin and the copper rim was her horizon. “It seems you've caught me unawares, my lord.” Her bare knees were poking from the water like stepping stones, but she could not pull them under. She lamented her earlier reckless splashing about.

He didn't seem surprised in the least to find her in the bath. As a matter of fact, he crossed the room as if out of habit and sat at the small table before the hearth, his body comfortably sideways to her, and poured himself a chalice of wine. His hair was damp, long, combed back from his face and down his fresh shirt, leaving a long strip of wet between his shoulder blades.

He wore no cloak at all, and for the first time, Michaela saw that his shoulders really were
that wide
—it was not a trick of the black material he draped himself in.

His pants fit him snugly, his left leg still twisted, but oddly it seemed not as severe a malformation as she'd noticed before. His right leg was perfect in the close black material. He still wore the riding boots.

“Did you enjoy yourself today, Lady Michaela?” He took a sip of wine, admiring the snapping flames to his right, as if giving her time to become accustomed to his presence.

“Certainly,” Michaela said. “And I do believe it was the happiest day of Leo's life.”

Roderick nodded thoughtfully. “He is not difficult to please, is he?”

“No.” The water was growing cool, but Michaela was unsure how to go about lighting from the tub. Would she be embarrassed if he turned to watch her?

Would she be disappointed if he didn't?

She snaked an arm over the rim of the tub for the long length of linen folded on the stool, shook it to its full length in same moment as she stood from the tub with a fall of water.

“If you have no objections, I'd prefer for us to be married right away,” Roderick said, and she held the cloth before her just as he turned his head.

She stood there, unwilling to risk exposing her more private parts by stepping foot over the tub. A chill rushed up her back, both from the coolness of the chamber and his statement.

What had happened to this man after she'd left his chamber last night?

“I have no objections. I'll send for my parents right away.”

Roderick turned back to the fire, as if sensing her need for a moment of privacy, and she hurried from the tub to don a wrapper as he continued to speak.

“I've already taken the liberty. Cope should be returned from his rounds in a day or so. We can be married in the chapel, as you requested, and celebrate the Yule Tide season as a family.”

Michaela knotted the belt of her wrapper, her stomach mimicking the motion at the mention of the fateful holiday that had haunted her since her earliest memory. Her continuing nightmares, too, did little to help, as they stayed with her in all the waking hours, vivid and terrifying, as if warning her. She paused a moment before retrieving the linen once more to address the locks of hair escaped from the knot atop her crown. She stepped her icy feet into her slippers and approached the man at the table, still rubbing at her neck and face with the towel.

When she stood near him, he turned to look up at her. His face seemed to be shadowed by worry, or perhaps it was only a trick of the flames beyond.

She had to know.

“My lord, about last night…”

“Sit down, Michaela. Please.” When she had sat, he continued, his green eyes pinned to her, never wavering. “I am a cripple,” he blurted without warning, and his tone was neither self-deprecating nor defensive. “And there are parts of my body which…which I'd rather you not see.”

Michaela frowned. “I don't understand.”

“I know you don't. My behavior last night…I forgot myself, to put it quite simply.” He shrugged and his gaze skimmed over her thin robe. “You are a very beautiful woman, Michaela. Sensual. Desirable. Giving you pleasure reminded me of my failings, and what I am incapable of as your husband.”

A thread of fear began to twist around Michaela's throat, tiny and cutting. “What are you saying, Roderick?”

“I am saying that we will never make love.”

“What?” Of all the things Michaela feared he might say to her, this had been the very last she expected.

“We have Leo,” Roderick continued in a mild tone, ignoring her shock. “He is my heir, and you will be the only mother he ever remembers. I believe we can be happy that way.”

“This makes no sense, my lord,” Michaela stuttered. “In one breath, you tell me how desirable I am to you, and in the next you tell me you don't want my body?”

“Oh, but I do want your body, very much,” Roderick said without apology. “But I would not expose you to—”

“You look quite fine to me,” Michaela interrupted. “And I myself heard you tell Harliss that there was nothing wrong with your…with your—you know.” She waved a hand toward his waist.

“That is true. But you cannot understand my…scars. My deformities. The sight of them would change me in your eyes, and I cannot allow that. We can pleasure each other in different ways, if you wish. Or, my offer still stands for you to take a lover.”

“If I—?” Michaela shook her head. “You think me to disparage you for your scars? When I think so little of the ones that are visible? You would deny me the full partnership of a marriage? My own children? You would share your wife's body with another man?”

“I want you to be happy, Michaela,” Roderick said. “I want us to be happy. And the scars on my face and arm are but lovely decoration compared to what you do not see.”

Roderick had never hurt her like this. Not in all the harsh words he'd thrown at her since her arrival at Cherbon, not after the way he'd discarded her from his lap last night. To make her feel as though she were so shallow that she would refuse him because of his injuries—what kind of woman must he take her for?

“How can I marry you, knowing that I will never be your wife, in truth?” she asked incredulously. “Our marriage would be little more than a farce! If the king found out, you would lose Cherbon!”

“No,” Roderick argued. “No one need know what does or does not go on in our bedchamber.” He looked down at his left leg. “Mayhap one day…” He shrugged. “But I would that you not get your hopes up.”

“I don't know what to say.” Michaela sat, staring at him, the linen cloth twisted in her fist on her lap. “I am greatly insulted by this.”

“I did not say what I have to insult you,” Roderick said lightly. “Because I enjoyed this day, as well. And would have many more like it. Can you not take this good part of me that has returned? Take it and let us both make the best of it?”

Michaela stood. “I don't want only the good of you, Roderick. I want all of you.”

“I can not offer that. For both our sakes.”

She looked at him for a long moment, but could think of nothing more to say to him. Nothing that would perhaps convince him that what he was asking of her was of an impossible nature. “I need to be alone.”

Roderick stood, not even bracing a hand on the table for support. “I understand. I do hope you will consider it, Michaela. Would you like to go about again on the morrow? I'm sure Leo would enjoy it.”

“Yes. Yes, that will be fine, of course,” she said distractedly. She felt surreal, as if nothing made good sense any longer.

He nodded. “Good night.” Roderick crossed the floor with no noticeable limp at all now, and slipped from her room.

Beneath her robe, the metal link was cold against Michaela's skin, and she felt hunted.

Roderick felt better than he had in years; since before his arrival in Constantinople, since…ever, really. The cold winter sun shone prisms in his frosty breath over Leo's—properly hooded, this time—head, and at his side sat Michaela on her own horse. She was singing them away from the castle wall, down the road that led toward the sea, and her voice was angelic.

She must have sung the song to the boy before, for Leo joined in sporadically. It was a lovely duet. Roderick was mesmerized.

Not a word had been breathed between him and Miss Fortune about their discussion of the previous night, but Roderick could see the faint purple streaks in the delicate hollows of her eyes, and could feel the distance she'd placed between them.

She would accept it. She must.

Because Roderick could feel himself improving. It was madness, he knew. Or magic, or devilish sorcery, mayhap. He didn't understand it, and he didn't care. A maddening idea had seized him that perhaps once day, his entire leg…

But he would not let his thoughts go there in the daylight. He still wore the old brown leather shoe on his right foot, under his own bulky riding boot. He'd not taken it off since first donning it, and he had no plans to.

Walter Fortune would never know the boot still existed, and to hell with his crazed ideas of the fabled Hunt. Nonsense. Impossible.

Isn't what's happening to you now impossible?

The shoe was Roderick's now. It was in his home, had been meant for him to find, he was certain of it.

Miss Fortune finished the last chorus and Leo applauded enthusiastically.

“Here, here!” Roderick added. “Well done, Lady Michaela.”

She gave a dainty bow over her pommel. “You both are too kind.”

“Oh, no, your voice has no equal. I am certain of it,” Roderick argued. “I've traveled quite far, my lady, and I assure you it is exquisite.”

Leo nodded. “Aid-ee Mike-lah sing pity, Papa.”

“She most certainly does.” Roderick cupped the tiny head below his own chin with one palm, rather amazed at how good it felt to carry the boy on his lap. “Where should we be off to, now, Leo? The shore?”

“Find nuts!” The boy pointed over the horse's head to where the road twisted into the heart of the forest, and Roderick's left foot itched madly.

As if she sensed his discomfort, Michaela turned a slight frown to him, her hand going mindlessly to her bosom. “There likely are none left, Leo. Perhaps—”

“Nuts!” Leo said again. “Pees? Ee-oh see skurls!”

Michaela was afraid of the wood, Roderick could tell, and the relentless sensation in his left boot warned him. But his right boot spurred him. There was no need to pander to such nonsense. It was his wood. A harmless tract of forest.

“Just for a little while, Leo,” Roderick said, hoping the confidence in his voice would put whatever worried Miss Fortune to rest. “And then it's back to the keep for your lie-down, all right?”

“All wite, Papa.”

Roderick urged his mount forward with a smile for Michaela, entering the woodland road as if passing into a cave, even though the arching branches overhead were long bare. It was several moments before he heard the clop of Michaela's mount following them.

 

A thousand eyes seemed to be watching Michaela, from every knot of wood, every black mound of soggy leaves. She could hear Leo's carefree chattering to Roderick up ahead, see his short arm dart out from one side then the next of the large man, pointing at this or that with awe and excitement.

But traveling slowly, warily behind them, Michaela's head swiveled at each creak of wood, each rustle in the underbrush, as if she was keeping watch over the males ahead, although what she was protecting them from, she did not know.

Her most recent nightmare bloomed fresh in her mind, more sounds than images: the pounding hooves again; screeches and screams; dogs baying at a hidden, malevolent moon; the growls of some hungry creature, searching for fresh, warm blood….

Michaela's heart thrashed in her chest, and part of her wanted to spur her mount forward to the safety of Roderick's side, even though she was still hurt and angry over his ultimatum of the night before. But another part of her warned her—in her mother's voice, no less—to not get too close to Roderick Cherbon in this deep, quiet wood. It was dangerous, dangerous….

And then the hair on her arms stood up as the rumbling in her head was matched by reverberations in the road itself. Ahead of her, Roderick pulled his mount to a stop, turned his horse sideways in the middle of the road. As Michaela looked at him, she saw her own emotions reflected in his strong, scarred face: alarm, bewilderment, panic.

She was not imagining the hoofbeats. And they were getting closer.

Roderick's horse half reared on its hind legs, causing Leo to squeal with delight, and Roderick had to fight the beast down. “Michaela, go back!” he called, his voice commanding and yet unsure at the same time. “Hurry!”

Michaela's muscles tensed, ready to pull at the reins of the dancing mare, but Leo's small face poking out of his hood caused her to kick the horse forward, calling, “Give me Leo!” even as her mount jumped toward them.

“There's not time!” Roderick cried. “You must flee the wood now, Michaela—”

She skidded her mare sideways and the two mounts crashed together, pinning Roderick's left leg from the knee down between the two barrel chests of the horses.

Roderick did not so much as cry out.

“Give him to me!” Michaela demanded. “Give him to me, now! Hurry!”

The hoofbeats were all around them now, shaking the tree limbs and jarring the bits of detritus on the road. Michaela reached for the boy in the same moment that Roderick was pushing Leo off his saddle by his rump, the little boy looking bewildered and frightened. He landed across Michaela and scrambled up her front to straddle her, his little arms around her neck like a noose.

“Now, go!” Roderick shouted.
“Go!”

But it was too late. Both Roderick's and Michaela's heads swiveled to the bend in the road ahead, as the swelling of hooves broke in announcement of the arriving riders.

Michaela wrapped her arms around Leo and whispered, “Dear God, protect us!”

The sleek muzzle of a jet-black steed strained around the bend, steamy breath snorting from its nostrils, his rider tall and slender and clothed in the garb of a black knight. This craven stallion was instantly joined by its companion: a low, shaggy, white—

Pony
.

“What in the name of fuck?” the black rider cried, and reined his horse to a halt, causing the stallion to scream indignantly. He threw back his coif.

The imposing rider on the dire-looking steed was none other than Sir Hugh Gilbert, Lord of Nothing.

And on the dainty little pony to his side rode young Lady Elizabeth Tornfield.

 

Roderick didn't know whether to kiss Hugh, or strangle him. His heart was pounding so in his chest that he thought it to explode.

Had he expected to be descended upon by the Fortunes' fabled Hunt? And Michaela had been as frantic to get her and Leo away from the road as had Roderick. Did she fear the same? He didn't know, didn't dare ask. But the maddening itch in his left boot had at last faded away to nothing once more.

“Lady Michaela!” the young girl cried, and kicked her pony into a run.

“Hello, Hoo!” Leo shouted, and waved a chubby arm at the black-clad rider.

Still at Roderick's side, Michaela gasped. “Elizabeth! What in heaven's name are you doing here?”

In seconds, the two small parties of riders were joined. Michaela handed Leo, arms already outstretched, to Hugh before dismounting and meeting the Tornfield girl in a consuming embrace. The little girl was sobbing uncontrollably.

“Hello, Pus,” Hugh said to Leo, and returned the boy's embrace with a half smile. “The pair of you out for a jaunt with Miss Fortune, eh?” At these words he turned a raised eyebrow to Roderick. “Very cozy, Rick. How in holy hell did you manage to mount? Surely you didn't have a stable hand help you—Miss Fortune, was it?”

Roderick waved the man's question away with a careless hand, not prepared to answer Hugh now. In fact, he'd given no thought at all as to how he would explain his vastly improved condition to his friend. He dreaded the moment when Hugh would see him walk, or insist on helping him remove his footwear.

“What's the girl doing here?” Roderick growled, glancing at Tornfield's daughter still entangled with Michaela.

Hugh rolled his eyes and sighed. “She followed me, the sneaky little brat.”

“Why didn't you return her?” Roderick asked in exasperation. The sight of Michaela so obviously happy to see the girl caused a nauseous swirl of unreasonable jealousy in Roderick. He wanted Michaela to have naught to do with her damnable Tornfields—especially not now, when they were so close to wedding.

“What? And waste more of my time?” Hugh shook his head. “I would have had to stay on another night, and she would have only followed me again. Persistent thing. I tell you, Rick, she was
determined
to reunite with her beloved Miss Fortune. Any matter, her father and stepmother aren't far behind us. They can take her back themselves. I'm sleeping in my own bed tonight, right, Worm?” Hugh tweaked Leo's nose and the boy giggled.

“Wite, Hoo.”

“Tornfield's on your heels?” Roderick asked. He should
brain
Hugh. “Why could you not simply wait for them to catch up to you, then? Jesus, Hugh—I've no patience for this.”

“Ha! No, thank you.” Hugh laughed. “They've screeched and bellowed after me the entire way. I've dealt with them on my own long enough for my tastes. Besides, Harliss rides with them.” He gave an exaggerated shudder. “They seem to get on with her quite well. Shit-rat mad, the whole lot.”

At the mention of Harliss's name, Leo clung to Hugh's tunic, but his head turned to Roderick. “Her get me, Papa!”

Hugh beat him to answering the boy. “She wouldn't dare, Squid. I'll chop off her head and have it in a stew, first.”

Leo looked unconvinced, and sent worried eyes back to Roderick, as if seeking reassurance.

“She shan't touch you, Leo,” Roderick said, and was certain to look directly into the boy's eyes.

Leo's thin chest gave a great heave and he patted Roderick's shoulder. “All wite, Papa. All wite.”

Ignoring Hugh's look of wary suspicion, Roderick turned his attention back to Michaela and the Tornfield girl—for a mute, she certainly did seem to talk a lot. Michaela was on her knees in the dirt, holding both of the girl's hands in her own while the blond child sobbed and hiccoughed around her words, pleading over something or other.

The sight worried Roderick.

His dread only increased when, again, rumbling hooves echoed down the corridor of the tree-lined road, and in a moment, a trio of riders appeared.

 

“Don't let them take me from you,” Elizabeth begged as the riders came into view. “
Please
, Michaela!”

“Elizabeth, you must go home with your father,” Michaela said, as gently as possible. She sympathized with the girl's dislike of Juliette, but Michaela knew that Alan Tornfield loved his daughter to distraction, and would never let anything bad happen to her.

Well, that's what Michaela
thought
, until she turned her head and saw Harliss accompanying the Tornfields.

“Oh, and they've brought Nurse, too!” Elizabeth sobbed. “She'll be so disappointed!”

“Nurse?” Michaela asked in disbelief, and her head turned to find Roderick. The giant man only stared down at her, his earlier, strange, but most welcome joviality vanished. Michaela looked back at Elizabeth. “Your father has installed
Harliss
as your
nurse?
”

“
Of course
he has!” Elizabeth wailed, jerking on Michaela's hands. “That's what you wanted, isn't it? I know you sent her to take care of me, and she is lovely, but I want
you
, Michaela!”

Michaela knew her mouth was hanging open. She must speak to Alan immediately—and Juliette, as well, if need be. The Tornfields must not allow Harliss near any child, but especially not Michaela's dear Elizabeth.

Good heavens, she and Roderick had sent the evil woman there as little more than a slave—not to be a respected family servant. The very thought made Michaela queasy.

“Elizabeth Tornfield!”
Alan shouted as he brought his mount to a halt and swung down to the road. His face was ruddy beneath his blond hair. “I shall take a
switch
to you, young woman!”

“Papa, no!” Elizabeth cried, and darted behind Michaela, who rose to stand.