Warrior's Song (Medieval Song 1)

Lady Dorothy shrugged and said, quivering at that smell she still believed was sex, “No one. I did not like it in that small dark room. I never have. I’ve told your father many times that it is too rude a place for me ever to remain for more than a few minutes. There were rats, the sound of men’s boots clattering overhead, yells and cursing. John fretted. I did not wish him to be frightened. I did not wish to dirty my gown.”

“Because you did not like the room, because you did not want John to whine, because you did not wish to soil your gown, you broke Father’s rule? You actually came out by yourselves, of your own free will? You simply chose to disregard my father’s orders?”

“Your father isn’t here,” Lady Dorothy said. “Even though you like to pretend that you are the one who is important here, you are not. It is my responsibility to see to the castle. Just look at you, a dirty hag, here in your bedchamber with this man, nearly alone with him. Why is there the smell of vomit?”

“I was ill,” Chandra said. “It doesn’t matter.”

“No, it doesn’t. I hope you weren’t ill in front of our guest. Why ever did you bring him to your bedchamber? You should be seeing to his comfort. By all the saints, Chandra, you aren’t good for anything, must less protecting your father’s precious holdings. John, come here.”

The boy, small and slight, moved to stand beside his mother. He was, Graelam saw, looking over at his sister, and there was a smirk on his small face. He looked very pleased with himself. Graelam wanted to pick him up and throw him out one of the narrow windows. What was going on here?

“I didn’t like that room, just as Mother told you,” John said, and he put his hands on his hips, daring his sister to say something. “Who is this man? Is he really a guest and not one of father’s enemies?”

Chandra said, still not wanting to believe what they’d done, “You really came out of hiding because you decided you wanted to?”

“I am the mistress here, not you,” Lady Dorothy said. “I will do as I please. Now, answer your brother. Who is this man?”

Mary made a very small sound in her throat and slowly fell to the floor.

“What is wrong with her?” Lady Dorothy asked to no one in particular.

“She seems to have fainted,” Graelam said. He walked to Mary, picked her up and gently put her on Chandra’s bed, the bed he would share with Chandra this very night. When he straightened, he said, “I am Lord Graelam de Moreton of Wolffeton in Cornwall, my lady. I am here to wed your daughter.”

Lady Dorothy just looked at him.

John said, “Chandra doesn’t want to marry, ever. Everyone knows that. She won’t marry you, will she?”

Lad

y Dorothy said slowly, tightening her fingers on the boy’s shoulder, making him wince, “Welcome, my lord. I am pleased to give my precious daughter over to you, a great lord, who will see that she becomes what she is meant to become, if it isn’t, of course, too late.”

Chandra felt such pain that she wanted to fold in upon herself, but she couldn’t. She heard John say, “It’s about time she was gone from Croyland. It’s mine, Mother, just as you’re always telling me, not hers. I’m the important one here, not her. I don’t want her here.”

“That’s right, my love. Soon you will rule Croyland, as you were always meant to, with no more interference from your sister. Now, Chandra, I will see that the servants prepare a lovely wedding feast. I will see to Lord Graelam’s comfort since you have not bothered. Now, bathe the filth off yourself. My lord, I am pleased that you have come.”

Lady Dorothy actually gave him her hand. He bowed low over it, then watched her walk out of the bedchamber, the boy swaggering beside her. He turned to Chandra, his forehead furrowed in thought, his voice calm. “It is just as well that you will soon be gone from here. I should not have liked to have her for my mother, although my own was just as vicious. Ah, Mary is coming around. I will speak to Father Tolbert now. Then I will go to your father’s bedchamber. Prepare yourself, Chandra.”

He paused at the doorway, saying over his shoulder, “I hope you will now agree to wed me. I should hate to be forced to take that boy back with us to Cornwall, although several good thrashings just might improve him, something it appears your father hasn’t done.”

“My lord, you’ll not believe this, but Croyland has been taken.”

Lambert, tall, skinny as a tent pole, nearly fell off his horse, scrambling not to lose his balance as he ran to Jerval. “I didn’t believe it myself at first, but one of the villagers told me to keep clear of the castle because Lord Graelam de Moreton and thirty of his men hold it now.”

“This is madness,” Jerval de Vernon said slowly, trying to understand. “How is this possible?” He was tired. He and his twenty men had ridden for three days to get to Croyland, and now, Lord Richard had somehow been overcome?

“Lord Richard isn’t there,” Lambert said, still panting from his wild ride back to their campsite in a protected inlet by the water. The waves made a gentle, rolling sound, constant and low, and the sun was brilliant overhead. “It was a trick, a ruse. The villager told me that Lord Richard had caught a man skulking about, and the man finally admitted that he was scouting around for Cadwallon, that Welsh bandit. He was planning a surprise attack on Lord Richard when he and his men left Croyland to hunt. Lord Richard took his men to catch the bandit. But Cadwallon is nowhere about. It was Graelam de Moreton who sent the spy there. Another villager said that de Moreton caught Lady Chandra out hunting with some of her men. It was over then. Another villager said that he held a knife to her back and told them that he would slit her throat if they didn’t lower the drawbridge. It was quickly done.”

“But why would he do that?” Sir Mark asked, slapping his leather gloves against his thigh. “He must know that he could never hold Croyland. Why?”

Lambert said, “He doesn’t want Croyland. He came because he wants Lady Chandra. He plans to wed her this very night, done by Croyland’s own priest.”

“By all the saints’ buried sins,” Jerval said, grinning like a madman, “this is something that will surely invigorate the blood.” Then he laughed and rubbed his hands together. “The little princess got her comeuppance, did she?” He laughed again. “My father tells me that she is known for her pride—bred, he claims, into her very bones. Her valor as well, though that makes little sense. Well, I suppose that we must do something about it. It wouldn’t do to have Lord Graelam wed her, not when we have ridden three days to get here ourselves so I could marry her.”

“You know you don’t have to wed her, Jerval,” Sir Mark said. “Your father just asked you to look her over.”

Jerval just smiled. His father, Lord Hugh, was eager for the alliance. Camberley was close enough to Croyland to provide mutual protection, and his father had raved on and on about her beauty after he’d seen his only son back away when he spoke of her fierce pride, her bravery. No woman, he’d said again and again, was as beautiful as Chandra of Croyland.

Jerval didn’t believe that for a moment, but he had agreed to come and see her for himself. This glorious creature, according to his father, had hair golden as a sheaf of wheat ripening under the summer sun, flowing hair spun into minstrel’s verses, and ah, her eyes—the color of the sky in early July when it was warm and still and so clear it made you weep. What tripe. There was no female in the known world who looked like that. Of course, his father had seen her only once when he had been visiting Croyland some four years before. He shook his head. His father really wanted the alliance. Jerval had a very bad feeling about her.