Chapter Twenty-Eight
Not one game. Not two. Three.
Now, well past middle night, Vilda dragged what felt manacled feet down the corridor in the wake of the monk tasked with returning her to the cell. The light of his torch glancing wall to wall, the drag of his robe sweeping side to side, he spoke no word. And she was glad, being too near the edge of herself to respond.
He halted before the cell whose door was open—unexpected since she had heard him close it when she departed—and said low, “You have a visitor.”
So she did, one who stood center of the small room, back lit by candlelight within, front by torchlight without. Now feeling so near the edge a breath might tip her over, she whispered, “Guy.”
“A quarter hour, Chevalier,” the monk said. “Then I shall return to secure her.”
“A quarter hour,” Guy acceded and reached to her as done in the chapel.
She stared at his hand.
“I go only to corridor’s end, Lady,” the monk prompted. “You are safe.”
“This I know,” she whispered and clasped her hands before her and stepped into the cell.
As the door closed just shy of its frame and candlelight cast a glow over all, she halted and raised her eyes from Guy’s broad palm and fingers she longed to feel against her own. “Why are you here?”
Was that regret on his dim face? Or frustration over ignorance of the outcome of her time with his king? He lowered his hand. “The sooner to give tidings of my man.”
Certain it could bode no good for being delivered so late, emotion flooded her eyes. “I am sorry. So very sorry.”
“Nay, Vilda, those are not the tidings. He is conscious, and the physician believes his chance of recovery better than before.”
“Lord!” she gasped, then face crumpling into ugliness, dropped her chin. And saw Guy reach again.
She wanted to ignore his offer of comfort as done before but could not. Blessedly, this time when he closed fingers over the hand set in his and drew her to him, it was gently and into his arms.
The timing was perfect, allowing her to muffle sobs she regretted all the more for not being the first he must suffer. Just as she did not wish to be so hardened as to be undesirable for having no soft, feminine places about her, she did not wish to be so weakened as to be a burden for having no strength about her. But she could not quiet herself.
“Naught is certain, Vilda,” he said, “but I wished you to know it is less likely William shall pronounce death—that you have much hope.”
Realizing he mistook her relief as something turned inward, she shook her head. “’Tis not for—” Another sob escaping, harder she gripped the hand she could not bear releasing and with her other caught up a fistful of his tunic. “’Tis not for myself I feel relief. It is for your man.”
He hesitated, said, “I am glad you do not wish him dead, but are you truly resolved to the possibility of death?”
She eased back and raised her face. “Though I think I could be, I need not—if your king keeps his word.”
“Leniency only if my man survives,” he reminded.
She shook her head. “I speak of the word given me ere I left him this eve.”
His frown made her long to smooth his brow. “What word? And what result the chess games that must have numbered more than one for how long you were there?”
Answering the second question first, she said, “Three matches.” When his brow lightened, she added, “No imprisonment. No exile.”
From the sudden still of his chest against hers, she felt the depth of his concern over that last match, but when she could not speak it, he did. “You are bound for the convent.”
Her nod felt a drunken bob of the head. “Not a bad life, and more good in that it is guaranteed. If he keeps his word.”
Though understanding leapt in his eyes, he said, “Tell me.”
“Regardless of whether your man lives, your king says he will spare my life so I may live out my days praying for England.”
He thought on that, said, “Though I am sorry you did not win the final game, I am grateful for those you won. More, I am thankful for William’s guarantee that, if ’tis not evidence of admiration, then perhaps token compensation for the wrong done you.”
She laughed curtly. “He is unknowable, just as he wishes it. As for the games this night, my last loss makes me question all my wins. Though I am accomplished at chess, his victory was so quick and subtly ruthless I wonder if ever I truly won. Mayhap the matches in which I prevailed were but part of a larger game to make his ultimate victory more satisfying.”
“It sounds William, but as you say, he is unknowable.”
She should have shook off the question come to mind, especially as she did not know what she hoped to gain from his answer, but she said, “What of you? Are you knowable, Guy?”
“You ask this because of what happened in the chapel?”
“It being very different from what has happened here, that is part of why I ask.”
As if he had not realized how different this was, he released her and stepped back. “I apologize for being rough with you earlier. Though with the injury done my man, it occurred you had been pushed to such desperation as to be a danger even to me, more I did it for the benefit of Taillebois.”
She swallowed. “I hoped it was that, but I do understand how you might have doubted me.”
His jaw shifted. “Tell the other part of why you ask if I am knowable.”
Despite regret inherent in
