“Pray, make haste,” she said and, raising the hem of a gown of homespun cloth, paused over it and her leather slippers. Both had been delivered by the maid who gained this chevalier’s coin to part with her possessions—the same woman who served the usurper’s captive.
“More kindness shown me,” she said as he dropped to a knee before her feet and bent his head.
“I hope both made the uncomfortable more tolerable, Lady.”
“They have.” Staring at the dark hair springing from his crown that would soon require scissors were he to continue looking the Norman, she tried to distract herself from the longing to draw strands through her fingers by attending to his removal of the manacles. But that needed a distraction all its own, the slippers worn so thin his hand cradling her foot to access the lock made her think things she ought never think of a Norman.
Alone too long, she reminded.
“That is one,” he said as the manacle clattered to the floor. Then her other foot was in his hand, and she wanted to curse him as if he were to fault for so deeply affecting her that when the second manacle dropped, it seemed a pity she had only the two.
“Lord,” she breathed.
“Better, I am sure,” he misinterpreted her appeal—until he lifted his face to offer a sympathetic smile that turned wary over the expression she was slow to disguise.
“Forgive me.” He straightened and stepped to the side. “I have been too familiar, but be assured it was thoughtlessly done. I have no desire to make you uncomfortable.”
Fearing he intentionally chose the word desire to kindly slay any hope that what she was feeling could be returned, Vilda said, “’Tis I who seek forgiveness. You have shown yourself to be honorable, and I do you ill by not trusting you wish only to give aid.”
He inclined his head, but she feared she had not fooled him into believing his reassessment of her appeal to the Lord was unfounded.
“As I am sure you wish some minutes to make yourself presentable, I shall await you in the corridor.” He turned away.
“Presentable?” she said with offense though she did wish she had taken better care with her grooming this morn—and not for Le Bâtard.
He came around. “I do not say you are wanting, Lady. As done before, I encourage you to do all in your power to remind your enemy of your high birth.”
She pushed up out of the chair. When no iron sounded nor knocked against the bones of her ankles, gratitude made her close her eyes and forget whatever she had meant to say. Better these words, “I thank you, Sir Guy. Again.”
She raised her lids and saw understanding in his eyes, then he returned and swept up the manacles. “I am glad to be of some assistance. Now while you ready yourself, I shall put these out of sight to increase the chance they stay out of mind.”
“Sir Guy?”
“Lady?”
“You are different from most Normans longer known to us.”
“Would that were not a compliment to me but my countrymen,” he said, then was gone.
He did not lock the door, trusting that however long it took to find a place to stow the manacles, she would remain within. Were he another of the enemy, she would not, but she would be here when he returned since token resistance was useful only when it did no great harm to any besides those being resisted.
When she opened the door shortly after once more hearing boots in the corridor, she saw he leaned against the wall opposite, no manacles on his person. As for what was on her person, she smiled apologetically. “I should not have worn it again, and be assured I have not since your departure, but though it is a man’s tunic, it makes me appear more a lady. And as you see, the gown you sent me serves better as an undergown than my old chemise.”
“I am glad you make good use of the tunic, and as it is yours to keep, I encourage you to continue doing so.”
“To keep? But I heard you say you intended to wed in it.”
“Intended does not a wedding make, Lady.”
That which was said without humor was none of her concern, but she asked, “Did your betrothed die?”
Glimpsing regret in his eyes, she guessed he wished he had not responded, but he pushed off the wall and said, “I am certain you have heard of the resistance leader who gained a great following before the coming of Hereward—he who came to terms with my king at Darfield which otherwise would have become a bloody battlefield.”
“Edwin Harwolfson,” she spoke the name that turned her tongue bitter. “Of course I know of the royal housecarle who traded the chance of ousting the conqueror for land and a misbegotten son made on a Norman lady who accused him of ravishment.”
Guy stared at this lady, so different from the woman to whom he had been betrothed, and wondered what had possessed him to open the door behind which Elan paced. Because much of her had slipped out and away, he thought, and perhaps with the telling, more of her would.
Having learned before returning to collect Alvilda that the evening meal was delayed due to the arrival of a messenger from Normandy, Guy said, “The lady whose accusation was false, as confessed the day she birthed his son, was my betrothed, the child she carried one I wished to raise as my own.”
Her eyes widened. “You speak of Elan Pendery, sister of your friend, The Bloodlust Warrior of Hastings.”
“I do. Instead of wedding me, she joined with Harwolfson—as she should have. Though she had believed she could give her child over and make a family with me, when the time came, she could not abandon her babe.” Guy smiled, not as forced as once
