In the eleven months since Yolande’s death,
Piers had not touched a woman. He had not wanted to, and he did not
want to kiss Rohaise now, but kissing her seemed the only way to
keep her quiet. He expected her to fight him and she did, though
only for a moment. He held her firmly against the wall, but he was
not rough with her, knowing she was at a disadvantage when pitted
against his greater strength. Rohaise had only one hand free to use
against him, her left arm being wrapped around the pile of clean
linen towels. Still, she could have slapped him or scratched at his
face with her right hand. She did neither. Instead, she stood
quietly, letting him cover her mouth with his. Then, very slowly,
she opened her lips.
Piers
felt the first faint warmth of masculine interes
t. He became
aware of her hand twining
into
his hair. After a while she pulled back a little, and at once he
let her go. The talking men were well past them now and had not
noticed the embracing pair, nor paused in their stride.
“I beg your pardon,” Piers whispered,
forgetting to use his accent. “I thought you would not want to be
discovered here, alone with me.”
“Did it not occur to you that if we had been
discovered with you kissing me, it would have been far worse than
if we had merely been seen talking?” The words should have been
angry, but they were spoken in a dreamy voice that made Piers think
she might be ready to talk freely.
“Lady Rohaise, I have a few questions. Will
you answer them?”
She hesitated, and he sensed the tension and
the fear in her. But she nodded her head. They were standing so
close together that her forehead rubbed against his chin. Before
she could change her mind he opened the bath house door and pushed
her inside.
The cold winter air stirred the steam into
whorls of movement pierced by the dim yellow light from the oil
lamps. Rohaise put the clean towels down on the shelf next to the
soap and the washing cloths. She picked up one of the oil lamps and
held it near Piers’s face so she could see him better. She moved
the lamp this way and that, and Piers began to be anxious.
“Put down the lamp,” he said in a low
voice.
“
I will
not.” She moved the lamp again, casting the light directly on his
face. He heard her catch her breath and saw her hand tremble. The
yellow li
ght wavered, then steadied. To his great relief
she did not cry out.
“Sir Piers. It is you.”
He did not answer, hoping she would decide
she must be mistaken.
“The man with you, the one you call Sir
Lucas: Is he Sir Alain?”
Still Piers did not reply to her questions.
He waited, fully expecting her to give the alarm, wondering if he
could bring himself to kill her before she did so and knowing he
could not.
“
Lady
Samira is much like you,” Rohaise said. “She has your hair and kind
eyes. Her questi
ons
made
me suspicious, but it was your eyes that gave you away, Sir Piers.
After all these years I still remember them.”
“Lady Rohaise.” He got no further. She raised
her right hand and brushed her fingers along his cheek, across his
beard to his lips. There she lingered, looking at his mouth and
touching it with her fingertips while her own lips parted.
“Never has anyone kissed me so sweetly or so
gently,” she said, taking her hand away from his face. “Was it your
intent to seduce me into betraying Radulf?”
“I only wanted to protect you from those men
walking by, lest they recognize you and report to Baird that you
were talking to me. Lady Rohaise, I must ask you not to reveal my
presence here.”
“Why have you returned?”
“To find justice,” he said.
“From Radulf?” She gave a bitter laugh. “You
will never have justice from him.”
“Do you know anything about the night when
Crispin was killed?” Piers asked.
“Only that Radulf did not stab him, because
Radulf was sitting at the high table until he was called to the
entry hall and told that Crispin had been attacked,” Rohaise said.
“I have never believed either you or Alain had anything to do with
Crispin’s death, though I have no information that would prove you
innocent. I know nothing more about that night, but I think Joanna
may know what really happened.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because she will not talk about it. At first
she would weep when Crispin’s murder was mentioned, and it seemed
natural enough for her to do so. But after William Crispin was born
her tears ceased, and whenever her husband’s death was mentioned
she grew very still and would not speak. Again, it seemed natural
that her grief should end when her child was born, and natural,
too, that she would want to put that terrible night behind her and
think instead of her son’s future.
“Sir Piers, I believe you and your friends
are here not only for justice’s sake, but also to rescue Joanna
from her confinement.”
“If that should be true,” Piers asked, “would
you help us?”
Rohaise looked hard at him, holding up the
oil lamp again so it illuminated not only Piers’s face but her own.
In her eyes, on her face, he could see the struggle within her, and
he knew it when she made her decision. She swallowed hard, pressed
her lips together, and nodded.
“
There
was a time when I was completely loyal to Radulf,” Rohaise said. “I
had been raised to submit myself to the man who would be my
husband, and I believed if I could but turn myself into the kind of
wife Radulf wanted, he would learn to love me. I thought if I gave
him a son he would care for me and treat me kindly, so I permitted
indignities from him that I will not describe to you. Now I know
Radulf will never love me
– no, not if I were to give him ten sons. Radulf does not
know how to love.”
“
I am
sorry for your unhappiness,” Piers said. His conscience was
prodding him for the way he was using her to obtain the information
he sought, and for tempting her into betraying her husband. If
Radulf learned what she was doing, Rohais
e would be in grave
danger.
“Men are often unkind to their wives,”
Rohaise went on. “There is nothing exceptional about it. But even
the most ruthless of men care about their own offspring. Radulf has
been cruel to Joanna. She does not deserve to be locked away, to
waste her life in that tower room. For Joanna’s sake more than for
my own, I will help you, Sir Piers. How shall I begin?”
“By not telling Joanna that we are here.”
“
Not tell
her? I must! Think what hope it would give her to know that
ther
e is someone trying to rescue her.”
“Which is exactly why you cannot tell her,”
Piers said. “Give her hope of freedom and she will look happier and
speak with renewed confidence, and the change in her will give her
away. And us. Who does she see each day?”
“
Myself,
Lys, and Baird,” Rohaise answered. “Radulf when he is here. Her
son, of course. In good weather she is allowed to walk upon the
battlements for an hour while the midday meal is served in the
great hall, so she is seen by the guards on duty
then,
though she never speaks to
anyone.”
“She leaves her room?” Piers asked, delighted
by this information.
“While most of the castle folk are in the
great hall,” Rohaise said, her next words dashing Piers’s hope of
an easy rescue. “We seldom have company at Banningford, but when we
do Radulf does not allow Joanna to leave her room. Nor do I think
Baird will let her walk while you are here.”
“Then we must find some other way for Alain
to reach her.”
“Not by the stairs,” Rohaise cautioned.
“I know, I’ve seen the guard outside her
door,” Piers said. “He could be overpowered, but he would probably
give the alarm, and then we’d have the entire castle down on us,
and we’d be no help to Joanna.”
“Her door is fastened by both lock and key
and a heavy wooden bolt,” Rohaise told him. “If Sir Alain were a
bird, he could fly in the window to his love. It’s wide enough to
admit a man willing to squeeze himself through. Sir Piers, I must
leave you now. I have been gone too long, and if Lys becomes
suspicious at my absence, she will report it to Baird. I can deal
with the questions Lys will ask, but I am afraid of Baird.”
It occurred to Piers that Rohaise needed
rescuing every bit as much as Joanna did, but he did not say so. He
did, however, do something utterly unforgivable, and not just
because he thought it might induce her to continue to help him and
Alain. He caught her face between his hands and bent his head and
kissed her again, very gently, letting his mouth linger on
hers.
“Go, then,” he whispered. “I’d not put you in
danger. We will talk again, Rohaise.”
“I will help in any way I can,” she said, her
eyes soft and shining. Then she was gone in a breeze of cold night
air, and Piers stood looking after her.
“
It’s
your fault, Yolande,” he murmured into the drifting steam. “’Twas
you who taught me to respond to a kind and loving heart. But
somehow I do not think you would blame me for kissing her once to
keep her safe from discovery and scandal
– nor the second time, either, because I wanted to
feel her lips on mine again.”
*
* * * *
Having
finished her bath and dressed for the evening, Samira sent her
maid, Nena, to the kitchen to listen a
nd learn what she
could while pretending she could not understand a word that
was said. When Nena had gone
Samira called Alain into her room.
“I have been thinking,” she announced.
“I’ve noticed that you do it quite a lot,”
Alain teased. “You are just like your father. What is it this time,
child?”
“
I wish
you would not call me a child.” But she was too interested in her
new idea to remain annoyed with him for long. “Theo Alain, I have
been trying to imagine why Baron Radulf would keep his daughter
c
onfined for so long.”
“And what have you concluded?” Alain appeared
amused by her earnestness, but he soon sobered as he listened to
her.
“Have you considered the possibility that
witnessing her husband’s death might have permanently affected
Joanna’s wits?” Samira asked. “Radulf might have been forced to
lock her up to protect her from herself. She might have been
confined out of love.”
“You have been raised too gently, Samira. You
have never met a man like Radulf. Whatever his reason for keeping
Joanna in that room, it was not love; of that I am certain.”
“Nevertheless,” Samira paused when her
chamber door opened. Seeing it was Piers, she smiled at him and
waited until he closed the door again before she continued. “Theo
Alain, you do not know what you will find when you finally gain
entrance to Joanna’s room. You ought to be prepared for a woman who
will not know you, even after you have revealed yourself to her. Or
a woman who does recognize you and begins screaming for help and
calling you a murderer. Or even a woman who is chained to her bed
to prevent her from harming herself. You must consider the
possibility that Joanna is kept in that room because she is
mad.”
“
Though I
am forced to admit that Samira’s theory is not terribly
farfetched,” Piers said to Alain, “I can tell you that Lady Rohaise
has a far more pleasant assumption to suggest
– if pleasant is the correct word to use
in this case.”
“I would be very glad to hear Rohaise’s
opinion,” Alain responded, “since I find Samira’s idea profoundly
disturbing. What does Rohaise have to say on the subject?”
“She thinks Joanna may have information that
Radulf does not want spoken in public.”
Alain greeted this pronouncement with a long
whistle. He thought for a moment after Piers had spoken.
“If Rohaise is right,” Alain said, “then
Radulf may be implicated in Crispin’s death. I know Ambrose has
always believed it might be so, but he had no proof.”
“Rohaise insists that Radulf could not have
done it because he was sitting in the lord’s chair, in full view of
all his guests, until he was called out of the hall after Crispin
was stabbed,” Piers said.
“Radulf could have ordered someone else to do
the killing for him,” Samira noted.
“
You
asked me why Joanna has been confined,” Alain said to her. “Now I
also ask why
– why would
Radulf want Crispin dead when his purpose in arranging the marriage
was to get himself a strong ally who would see to it that Joanna
produced the grandchildren Radulf wanted and needed for heirs? It
would
make no
sense for
Radulf to kill Crispin, or to have him killed.”
“For the last hour I have been thinking about
the marriage contract,” said Piers. “Crispin did mention to me that
Radulf asked for a last-minute change in it. Unfortunately, I
cannot remember exactly what the change was, only that Crispin said
Father Ambrose approved of it. So much happened shortly after
Crispin and I talked about it that the conversation was driven
right out of my thoughts.”
“Perhaps Uncle Ambrose can remember.” Within
one day of meeting the abbot of St. Justin’s, Samira had begun to
call him by the familiar name her father and Alain used for him.
They had spent a few days at St. Justin’s, resting after their long
journey and discussing their plans with Ambrose, and Samira had
grown fond of him. “He might even have a copy of the marriage
contract. It may have been given to St. Justin’s for safekeeping,
as important documents frequently are.”
“
You are
almost as clever as your father,” Alain told her with approval.
“We
can ask Ambrose
when
next we see him.”