“Here.” He held onto her tightly. This room was rather more luxurious than Liath expected. Frater Robert, who had ministered here before Hugh, had slept on a cot in the nave. The chamber held a finely carved table and chair and a wooden chest inlaid with bright gems and enameling. On the table sat parchment, three quills, and a stoppered bottle of ink. A thick rug covered the floor, an expensive carpet woven with eight-pointed stars. Liath knew better than to let Hugh realize she recognized the pattern as an Arethousan design. A featherbed and a feather quilt lay heaped on the bed. “Here is where you sleep,” he said.
“Never.”
“Then with the pigs.”
“Gladly, as long as it spares me from you.”
He slapped her. Then, while her skin still stung from the blow, he pulled her hard against him and kissed her on the mouth. She got a hand in between them and shoved him away.
He laughed, wild and a little breathlessly. “You fool. My mother has promised me the abbacy of Firsebarg as soon as the old abbot dies. With the abbacy I will have entry into King Henry’s progress, if I wish it. And in a year or five more, there will be a presbyter’s crosier in my hands and I will walk among those who advise the skopos herself. Only give me the book and show me what your father taught you, and there is nothing you and I could not accomplish.”
“You took his books already. You stole them. They would have matched the debt. I would have been free.”
His expression chilled her. “You will never be free, Liath. Where is the other book?”
“You murdered Da.”
He laughed. “Of course I didn’t. Died of a bad heart, that’s what Marshal Liudolf said. If you think otherwise, my beauty, then perhaps you ought to confide in me. Another season and your father would have taken me into his confidence. You know it’s true.”
It was true. Da was lonely, and Hugh, whatever else he might be, could be charming. Da had liked him, had liked his quick mind, his curiosity, even his arrogance, since Hugh had the odd habit of treating Da as if he were his equal in social standing. But Da seemed to expect that.
“Da never had any sense in his friends,” she said recklessly, to shake off these distracting thoughts.
“I know you’ve never liked me, Liath, although I can’t imagine why. I’ve never offered you an insult.” He placed two fingers under her chin and tilted her face up, forcing her to look at him. “Indeed, there isn’t another woman in the village, in this whole frozen wasteland, that I’d ever think of offering my bed, and I’ve slept with a duchess and refused a queen. Once I’m abbot of Firsebarg you’ll have your own house, servants, whatever you wish. A horse. And I don’t intend to stop my whole life at Firsebarg. I have plans.”
“If you have plans, then they must be treasonous.” She twisted out of his grasp. “King Henry and the skopos have never tolerated sorcery. Only the Lady Sabella welcomes heretics into her company.”
“How little you know of the church, my beauty. Sorcery is not a heresy. Indeed, the skopos is usually harsher toward heretics than toward sorcerers. Sorcery is only forbidden by the church when it is practiced outside the supervision of the skopos. I wonder what teacher your Da had. And in any case, you would be surprised how tolerant King Henry and the noble princes can be, if only the means further their aims. Where did you hide the book?”
She retreated to the door and did not answer.
He smiled. “I’m patient, Liath. Lady and Lord, what were your parents thinking, to call their child by an old Arethousan name? Liathano. An ancient name, linked to sorcery. Your Da admitted as much to me once.”
“When he had drunk too much.”
“Does that make it less true?” She said nothing. “Where is the book, Liath?” When still she did not speak he shook his head, but the smile remained on his lips. “I’m patient. Which will it be? My bed, or the pigs?”
“The pigs.”
With a lightning strike he grabbed her wrist with one hand and slapped her hard once again with the other. Then he embraced her and ran a hand up her back. His breath was hot on her neck. She stood rigid, but when he began to move her toward the bed she fought against him. Got a heel behind his ankle and tripped him. They fell in a heap on the floor, and she pushed away and scrambled to her feet. He laughed and caught her by one knee, jerked her down so hard her knees bruised on the stone and the breath was jarred out of her. Then he let her go and stood, breathing hard. He bowed in the most formal, court manner, offered her his hand to help her to her feet.
“You’ll come to my bed willingly or not at all.” He pulled a scrap of white linen from his belt, wiped her right hand clean, then bent to kiss her fingers. “My lady,” he said, perhaps mockingly. She was too dazed to interpret his tone. His golden hair brushed her hand, and he straightened. “‘She is dark and lovely, this daughter of Saïs, touched by the sun’s breath. Turn your eyes away from me; they are as bright as the star of morning.’”
She shoved her hand behind her back and wiped it against her tunic.
“Now. You will feed the pigs and the hens, sweep this room, get me a bath, and then tell Mistress Birta that she no longer need send a meal over twice a day. You can cook, I suppose?”
“I can cook. May I go?”
He stood aside so she could leave, but she had only gotten as far as the narrow passageway when he called her name.
“Liath.” She turned back to see him leaning in the doorway. Even in the semigloom of the little warren of cells, his golden hair and his combed linen robe and his fine, clean skin made him seem to shine as he watched her. “You may even last out the summer with the pigs, but I don’t think you’ll like it so well when winter comes.”
How far she would get if she tried to run away? A useless thought. She would not get far, nor would she have any means to live if she did escape from him. She had seen herself in eight years of running that there were far worse circumstances than these.
Hugh chuckled, mistaking her silence for a reply. “Tell Mistress Birta that she may tally up any food or goods you buy from her, and I’ll pay her each Ladysday. I expect a good table. And you will dine with me. Go on.”
She went. Going outside to feed the animals that were stabled in the shed alongside the storage rooms, she saw a horseman sitting astride his mount, out in the trees. It was Ivar. Seeing her, he began to ride forward. She waved him away, quickly, desperately. For there was another thing she had seen in Frater Hugh’s chamber, resting on the feather quilt. A fine, gold-hilted long sword, sheathed in red leather. A nobleman’s sword. She had no doubt that Hugh knew how to use it and would not hesitate to, even against a son of the local count.