The Leopard Unleashed (18 page)

Pain woke Elene with a jolt, and when she tried to escape from it, it only hurt the more. The night candle was still burning on its pricket and the fire in the hearth was a dull red glow through grey logs of ash. Unable to get up, and still more than half asleep, she started to struggle and cry out.

Alarmed, Renard shot up, thus removing his weight from her spread hair and the cause of her pain. ‘What is it?’ he stared round blearily.

Elene gasped with relief. ‘I couldn’t move. You were lying on my hair and I dreamed that I was trapped.’

Renard grunted and lay back down to recover his senses. He glanced at the night candle. It had burned well down on its pricket but not far enough for dawn. ‘Is there any wine?’ he asked. ‘Not the hippocras, something honest and ordinary.’

‘I’ll see.’ Shrugging into her bedrobe, she padded over to the table that stood near the narrow window slit. He watched the heavy swing of her blue-black hair and yawned.

‘It’s watered,’ she said as she poured from flagon to cup and tasted it on her way back to him.

‘No matter.’ Sitting up, he took it from her.

Elene gave him a look from the corner of her eye before stooping to brush the scratchy fragments of dried herbs from her portion of the bed with the flat of her palm until the sheet was smooth and white – an ordinary sheet, its
very blankness significant. By now it should have been stained with the proof of her virginity.

‘I can say with complete truth that this is the first time a woman has ever gone to sleep on my attentions,’ Renard said lightly, trying to dispel the strain he could sense in her.

She bit her lip. ‘I didn’t realise how tired I was. I did not mean to.’

Renard swirled the wine reflectively in his cup. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ he said with a shrug. ‘I suppose I could have been more persuasive, but I didn’t want to frighten you, and besides, I was tired myself.’

Her gaze fell on the telltale bruise marring his thigh and she found herself unable to look away. The remarks de Lorys had made about a bitch biting him fell into place with what Judith had said earlier when they were dressing for the wedding.

Made uncomfortable by the quality of her stare and feeling the sting of guilt, Renard shifted and drew up the covers. ‘Get back into bed, Nell, it’s cold,’ he said.

She cast him a bright, almost challenging look. ‘It was after the hunt, wasn’t it?’ Her voice was raw with pain. ‘You were late returning and I could smell attar of roses on you.’

Renard bit the inside of his mouth, aware that there was no point in denying the accusation. ‘I needed the release,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want to be rough with you tonight.’

‘I see,’ she said in a choked, defensive voice. ‘You were only thinking of my welfare. You are very kind.’

‘Oh, in the name of Christ!’ he muttered as she started to cry. ‘Elene, don’t.’ He turned her face so that he could brush away her tears on his thumb. ‘I admit it was stupid of me, but at the time I thought it was right.’ Slipping his hand beneath her thick sweep of hair, he stroked her
neck, drew her against him, and kissed her gently. Her lips parted, responding even while she wept and her hands came up to clutch at him, fingernails scoring his shoulders. The pressure of the kiss increased at her insistence and when he made to pull away, her hold tightened.

‘Now,’ she whispered against his lips. ‘For the sake of my pride, now, before there is nothing left.’

Renard felt her trembling against him, the rapid shaking of her breath and heartbeat, the coldness of her skin as she shrugged out of the bedrobe. His body responded to the frantic demand of hers, and putting his hand on her breast, he covered her with his warmth.

Elene’s eyes had been squeezed shut against the pain. It had eased a little now, but it still hurt. Releasing her breath, she tried to relax her tense body. She was aware of Renard’s similar tension beside her. He swore, but whether at himself or her she could not be sure.

‘It isn’t always like that,’ he said after a moment, his voice sounding weary. ‘I thought you were ready.’

Elene shivered. The weak pleasure that had coursed through her limbs two days ago had been entirely missing. She had felt nothing at his touch, only a desperate need born of insecurity to unite their bodies, one within the other – and it had been a disaster. She had tried not to cry out as he entered her, but a whimper had caught in her throat and she had tensed at the pain.

At least it had not been prolonged. About the same time, she estimated, that it took a ram to mount and fertilise a ewe. Elene wondered if she had conceived and hoped so. After this he would not want to bed with her again, nor did she relish the thought herself. She raised the covers to
see if the sheet was stained with sufficient proof of her virginity, and discovered the linen damp beneath her.

‘If there’s no blood, I’ll go surety for your innocence,’ Renard said wryly. His foreplay had been met with wild impatience, almost desperation, and she had writhed beneath him, not just inviting, but demanding. It was then that he had discovered she was far from ready; so tight and dry that penetration had been excruciationg for her, painful for him, and after the first few thrusts, he had seen no sense in continuing the torture and had withdrawn, the act incomplete. Elene was too inexperienced to know the difference and he was not about to maim either of them with a demonstration.

Elene grimaced at the red smears on the inside of her thighs, the blotched sheet, and let the covers fall. ‘I suppose I am not a patch on her,’ she said in a low voice.

‘What?’ He looked at her blankly.

‘The other woman; the one at Hawkfield who bit you.’

Renard’s eyes were gritty with fatigue. All he wanted to do was turn over, go back to sleep and pretend that tonight had never happened. It had and he couldn’t. His conscience would not let him. Sitting up, he groaned. ‘I was going to tell you about her before, but I didn’t want to spoil the wedding for you. Skeletons have a way of leaping out of cupboards at the most inappropriate moments, don’t they?’

Elene felt trembly and cold. ‘What is she to you?’ she asked.

Renard grimaced. ‘A thorn in my side.’ He took his half-finished wine from the coffer. ‘If she hadn’t been with child, I’d never have brought her from Antioch in the first place.’

Nausea added itself to Elene’s other discomforts. ‘She’s with child?’ she repeated numbly.

‘Not now. She miscarried on the road from Brindisi, but I couldn’t abandon her in the middle of nowhere, given the state she was in, and she was still determined to travel to England.’ Briefly he told her about himself and Olwen, paring the narrative down to the sparsest details.

‘So you brought her back to England and installed her at Hawkfield,’ Elene said in a dull voice.

‘Would you rather I kept her at Ravenstow?’ His gaze flashed.

‘I would rather neither.’ She busied herself with finding and donning her crumpled bedrobe. That was bloodstained too, she noticed with distaste, and wondered why she was fighting. Leaving the bed she went to sit before the hearth, her back to him, and rubbed her cold shoulders with equally cold hands. Marriages were made for convenience, she knew that. She and Renard were joined for the sake of their lands, and if begetting an heir to those lands was even half as painful as tonight’s experience, then this Syrian gutter-slut was welcome to all his attentions.

‘It can’t be neither,’ he said. She tensed, hearing him leave the bed. ‘It has gone too far for that, Nell. Just don’t read too many portents into it. You are my wife.’

‘Hah!’ she spat bitterly. ‘Bought and sold for a meaning -less vow and a parcel of land!’ She clenched her jaw as his hand came lightly down on her shoulder.

‘I don’t blame you for being angry, but it’s late, and we are both tired. Can we not start afresh in the morning?’

He was used to cozening women, she thought, stiffening herself against the light touch of his hand and the tone of his voice. Staring into the fire, she watched it fall into ashes. ‘As you wish,’ she replied in a blank, dutiful voice ‘… my lord.’

The horses thundered past the onlookers, hooves tearing clods from the moist December grass. Breath smoking from wide-flared nostrils and muscles flowing like fire, they devoured the length of the racecourse crudely marked out on the tourney field. A bright chestnut boasted a half-length lead over a powerful ash-grey with black points. At the grey’s hindquarters a bay strove to gain ground, and a length behind, an ugly brown was fighting to maintain contact.

The fair bearded man in a cloak trimmed with ermine clenched his fists against the fur and muttered anxiously beneath his breath as the chestnut eased further in front. ‘Too soon, he has taken him too soon.’

Beside his king, Ranulf de Gernons twisted the tail of one long black moustache around his forefinger and smiled within himself. It had been a simple enough matter to bribe the boy astride the royal courser to waste him on the first stage of the race. The grey would probably have won anyway, but since several bags of silver were riding on the outcome, Ranulf had preferred to make sure. It was money
that Stephen could afford to lose. The Bishop of Salisbury’s demise less than a month ago had left the King in possession of everything that was in the old weasel’s strongboxes. It was the reason the court was spending Christmas in Salisbury instead of gathering at Windsor. Stephen wanted to take account of and secure the Bishop’s massive wealth for himself.

Robert of Leicester hunched his shoulders against the gnawing wind and watched the coursers swirl around the post at the far end of the designated sprint. Like horse, like owner, he thought. Stephen’s chestnut had the swiftest turn of foot but only in a very limited burst; de Gernons’s grey was powerful, showy and unpredictable. His own bay, an honest worker, had no exceptional talent, and the brown would still be running one-paced long after all the others had dropped.

He glanced across the field at a young nobleman who was holding the bridle of an elegant black stallion and talking earnestly to one of the King’s Flemings. Renard FitzGuyon of Ravenstow. A pity he had not been here earlier when the race was organised. Neither chestnut nor grey would have stood a chance against the black’s pace as demonstrated over Ravenstow’s hunting grounds during the two days of celebrations following the wedding feast.

The thunder of hooves swelled in a crescendo towards the waiting men. Stephen’s horse was sweat-darkened and visibly labouring. The grey pushed its nose in front. Stephen’s disappointed groan was audible. Ranulf de Gernons continued to finger his moustache and say nothing, but his eyes glittered. The horses tore past their owners in a wind of ragged manes, tails and tearing breath, the earth shaken by the force of their speed.

‘Congratulations, Ranulf.’ Stephen said with a tepid smile at Chester. ‘I would have sworn on my life that Soreldor was going to win. A good thing I didn’t, eh?’ It was supposed to be a jest, but it fell tellingly flat.

Leicester was driven to folly by the half-concealed smirk lurking behind Chester’s moustache. ‘It’s a pity that FitzGuyon’s black wasn’t competing, Ranulf,’ he observed. ‘Your grey would have been left standing for certain.’

Ranulf ’s eyes sharpened. He swung his head in the direction Leicester indicated. ‘Call that a horse!’ he snarled. ‘I’ve seen bigger dogs!’

‘Fast though, and the size is deceptive. FitzGuyon’s a handspan taller than you and the beast bears him well.’

Ranulf spat on the grass to demonstrate what he thought of Leicester’s opinion. ‘You’ve been soft on that troublemaking whoreson ever since you went to his wedding!’

‘We’re talking facts, not personal opinions.’ Leicester’s voice was mild, his eyes hard. ‘You want to forget old scores. You’ve got more irons in the fire than Caermoel and Woolcot.’

Ranulf glared but had the good sense to tighten his lips. It was common, if unspoken, knowledge that he only adhered to Stephen’s cause because he desired the return of the former family possession of Carlisle and whatever else Stephen would grant him for his ‘loyalty’.

Ranulf ’s boy dismounted from the blowing but not winded grey and he stumped away to speak to the lad.

Stephen watched his groom lead the chestnut around to cool off and bit his thumbnail, eyes full of disappointment. Scowling, he looked round for the chestnut’s rider, but the lad had made himself scarce. His drifting gaze fell upon Renard FitzGuyon and the horse he was idly fondling as
he talked to the Fleming. It was a courser, glossy pitch-black except for its hind legs which looked as if they had been dipped to the hocks in milk. The stallion was long-boned and rangy with the high-flagged tail and dished face of the eastern horses sometimes brought home by returning crusaders. Stephen thought that de Gernons was right: bigger dogs did exist, but there was plenty of lung room in the well-sprung ribs, and the lean lines suggested speed. His scowl cleared.

‘I’ll make you another wager, Ranulf !’ he yelled over to the Earl. ‘Your grey against FitzGuyon’s black!’ And without waiting for Chester’s confirmation, set off across the field.

Renard left his conversation with the Fleming to make a hasty obeisance as the King strode over to him and clapped a powerful arm across his shoulders. Stephen’s enthusiastic proposal filled him with more than a seasoning of doubt.

‘Sire, there is already enough bad blood between us. Whoever wins, it will only increase the enmity,’ he said.