Chapter Ten

E yreka could not stop her involuntary cry of anguish when she saw the injured warrior being half-carried into the hall.

“What happened?”

Henri pinned her with an angry glare, “Ask your son’s vassal.”

“Patrick?”

The man didn’t reply. He stared intently at her, then down at the pale-faced warrior at his side and grunted.

Eyreka stood up and limped over to the table. “Not long on words, is he?” Digging into her basket of herbs, rummaging through her supplies, she set out what she needed on the table. “Sara!” she called out. “Bring the heated water!”

Her maidservant entered the room moments later, carrying a tray of steaming bowls. Sara laid the tray on the long oak table and started to sort through the pile of linen strips Eyreka had laid out.

“I thought you were the healer, mistress,” Henri said, glancing at the maidservant.

Mentally cataloguing her most potent herbs, and counting the number of ways she could bring on stomach cramping, calmed her. It felt good knowing she could bring the arrogant warrior to his knees, but now was not the time. Mayhap later, when their two peoples had become accustomed to one another. If necessary, she could exact retribution then.

She soaked the first cloth in the hot water, wrung part of the water out, and began the arduous task of removing the outer layer of dirt and blood from Jacques’s leg.

His eyes never wavered. She could all but feel his heated gaze on the top of her head as she bent to the task. It was almost as if he challenged her to make a mistake. Despite her bid to be gentle, she heard his breath catch in his throat more than once. Each time she heard the sound, she looked up to find him studying the wall six inches above her head. She almost felt sorry for him. He had to be in pain, though he’d probably die before admitting to such a weakness.

Finally, the wound was cleansed and ready for threads. “Would you like a cup of mead, before I begin to sew the wound together?”

Jacques looked at her and then down at the raw, jagged slice that arced across the top of his thigh. “Aye.”

Eyreka nodded to one of the younger servants who brought him a cup. “Drink,” she urged. After he emptied the cup, she talked Jacques through the worst of it while calmly and efficiently sewing him back together. They were both greatly relieved when she tied off the last thread. He tried to stand, but she placed her hands upon his shoulders and chided him, “You are not finished yet. I must wrap the wound, else you will fill it back up with dirt.”

Jacques’s gaze lingered on her for a moment, then he let out a loud sigh of exasperation and commanded, “Get it done.”

Eyreka could barely suppress a snort of irritation. Shaking her head, she realized it was the nature of the male beast to become surly while being patched back together.

She wound the bandage around his leg, then tucked the loose end underneath the wrapped bottom edge to secure it. “Finished,” she announced cheerily.

For the first time since she met the warrior, he addressed her directly. “Milady,” he said in a gruff voice, “you have my gratitude.”

Her eyes welled up with tears at his thanks. Mayhap the task she had set for herself was not insurmountable. She would win the Norman soldiers over, one at a time. She swallowed the emotion… no one must guess how badly she needed the alliance to work, not even her own sons.

“Be careful not to overdo,” she warned. “The threads need a day or so to bind the wound together.”

He nodded and bowed to her before turning around and limping out of the hall.

Henri and Georges filed out behind him, neither saying a word.

“Eyreka!” Jillian called out from the bottom of the stairs.

Something was wrong; she recognized the urgency in Jillian’s voice. “What is it?”

“’Tis William’s wife, Mary. She’s in labor.” Jillian turned around to speak to one of the serving women who was halfway down the stairs.

“Come.” Eyreka limped toward her, urging her up the steps. “We may not have much time. The shock of nearly losing her husband this morning may have brought on an early laboring.”

*

Eyreka wiped the sweat from Mary’s brow with a cool, damp cloth. “Why did you not tell us you were in labor?”

Mary grimaced in pain, struggling to breathe deeply.

“Easy, now,” Jillian soothed, “just a little longer. You’re doing fine.”

“I was afraid of being put to bed, while my husband faced our new lord alone.”

Jillian nodded her understanding, “I would have done the same.”

Eyreka placed her hand on Mary’s taut belly and felt the beginnings of another contraction. “Did your pains begin during the night?”

Mary nodded.

Eyreka silently calculated the hours and the strength of Mary’s contractions. It was nearly time. She looked up at Jillian. “Get behind the birthing chair and brace her if she needs it. She may find it easier to push.”

Mary bit down on the leather strap rather than cry out and disturb her boys sleeping in the next room.

“That’s it, now, push,” Eyreka ordered. “Give it all you’ve got. Almost there—”

The lusty cry of the newborn babe echoed through the solar. Mary lay back, exhausted, but smiling.

“Is it another boy, then?” she asked weakly.

Eyreka’s voice snagged in her throat as her emotions tangled. It was a girl, envy and joy tangled together until she didn’t know whether to give in to the jealousy, or the laughter.

She thought of her own daughter, Freya. Garrick’s twin had been stillborn. While Garrick had been wide-eyed from the first, Freya’s eyes had never opened. While her eldest had cried lustily, Freya’s tiny mouth had been closed, like a tiny rosebud. She never drew a breath. The babe never had the chance to bloom and grow, but her brothers had all come wailing into the world, and as yet fought to find their rightful places in it.

She struggled to dislodge the lump of emotion from her throat to speak, “Nay, lass, ’tis a beautiful daughter.” Eyreka swiftly counted fingers and toes and began the arduous job of cleaning both the babe and her mother. Tears fell unchecked, but Eyreka did not have the time to indulge in a good cry, so she wiped her eyes with the back of her sleeve and whispered a prayer of thanks to her Viking gods, and just for good measure, Addison’s Christian god, for the safe delivery of the babe.

Mary’s eyes were tear-filled when Eyreka handed her the tiny, swaddled bundle. Jillian smiled, then sniffed back her own tears as she rolled up the soiled linens and began to straighten the chamber.

“Eyreka!” Augustin’s voice bellowed loud enough to startle the sleeping babe, who promptly wailed in protest.

Eyreka bent to soothe the babe, before turning back around to face her overloud husband.

“ Mon Dieu , I did hear an infant. What goes on here?” he demanded from the doorway.

She rushed over to him, and grabbed hold of his arm in an attempt to steer him right back out of the chamber. But he would not be budged. She sighed and answered, “If you’ll lower your voice, you’ll see the miracle that resulted from your wisdom earlier today.”

Shaking his head as if he did not understand, Augustin walked slowly into the chamber. His eyes instantly riveted on the mother gently rocking the babe in her arms. When Mary smiled, he smiled. When the babe suddenly let out a lusty wail, he frowned.

Eyreka had to smile at that. Her husband’s actions actually soothed her. Deep down, he was a caring man, one affected by the sight of a newborn babe at her mother’s breast. She started to speak, but he cut her off.

“William is a lucky man,” he said to the new mother. “I must apologize, with all that transpired earlier today, I neglected to ask your name.” Augustin appeared bothered by his oversight.

“Mary,” the woman said hesitantly. “My name is Mary.”

She smiled down at the tiny bundle in her arms, “And my daughter’s name shall be Mercy, for without your intervention, my husband would have forfeited his life, and I would have lost our babe.”

Augustin cleared his throat and looked away.

Eyreka walked to the bed and tucked Mary and Mercy in. “I want you to rest now. The babe will be rooting around for more of a taste of mother’s milk soon enough.”

Mary nodded tiredly and closed her eyes.

Eyreka spoke quietly to Sara and motioned for Jillian to follow her out of the room. On her way past Augustin, she grabbed hold of his arm and pulled him from the room. She wondered how long he would have stood there staring at the new mother and babe had she not roused him from his state of semi-awareness.

“’Tis a beautiful sight, isn’t it?”

Augustin cleared his throat again, and nodded.

“I always wanted a daughter,” Eyreka whispered, not thinking anyone would hear.

Jillian softly answered, “I, too, would love to have a daughter, someone for little Alan to learn to watch over.”

Augustin smiled to himself, he seemed pleased about something. Eyreka was not sure why he smiled, but she thought it had something to do with Mercy’s birth. She took a deep breath to clear her head and felt the energy drain from her body, as the day’s events suddenly crashed in on her. She felt weak with fatigue, but before she could steady herself, Augustin’s strong arm wrapped around her back, as he guided her into the second upper chamber.

“You have overworked yourself, wife.”

“It is my job as the keep’s healer to be where I am needed, when I am needed.”

“What if the babe decided to come in the middle of the night?”

“The hour matters not.” Eyreka’s entire body started to ache. “I just need to close my eyes for a few minutes,” she said sleepily.

Augustin swept his wife into his arms, grudgingly admitting that she was more skilled than he had hoped. Not only had she treated one of his men, efficiently and without complaint, but she had barely had the time to clean up after one disaster, when she was summoned to yet another.

Aye, he thought, she was a skilled healer, but could he trust her with his daughter’s life? Augustin knew that until he heard the truth admitted from his wife’s tempting mouth, that she did in fact plot and plan to trap him into marriage, he could not in good conscience bring his daughter to live at Merewood.

As he laid her down upon the bed, thoughts of another woman bombarded him. Eyreka’s fair hair rippled across the bed linens, but he did not see what was there. He saw beyond to what his mind conjured up… tresses black as midnight framing a petite, dark beauty, so fragile he was afraid to touch her. Fearful that in his awkwardness, he would bruise her milk-white skin; or worse still, that she would break beneath his warrior’s hands.

“Monique,” he whispered reverently, before bending down to brush his lips across her brow.

“Mmmmm, Addison,” came the breathy reply.

The mention of her first husband’s name broke through his vivid daydream of his wife, and Augustin was confronted with the very real woman who lay soft and pliant, lips pursed to receive a kiss. He knew she was not aware it was he who kissed her.

He shook his head to clear it. He had trouble separating his present wife from the one he held in his heart. His new wife was a disturbing distraction. He’d married her to please his king, and to provide a home and mother for his daughter. He brooded over their agreement to wait until they had settled in at Merewood before coming together as man and wife.

Augustin clenched his jaw against the conflicting emotions that raged through him. He did not want a wife at all, yet he had one. He did not want to desire her, yet his body ached with it. He wondered if his wife daydreamed of her first husband, too. When they finally consummated their marriage, who would she be thinking of?

Eyreka rolled onto her side and sighed. Augustin swore under his breath and stepped back away from the bed, disgusted with his lack of focus. Daydreaming of his dead wife would only lead to trouble—his. To be caught unaware while living among the Saxon people of Merewood Keep could very well be the last mistake he made on this sweet earth.

To treat their mistress poorly would not be wise either, his conscience warned. Augustin pulled the woolen cover up over his sleeping wife’s shoulders. She appeared so calm and capable while awake. Yet while she slept, and all of her defenses were down, he would swear that she needed protecting.

Later, in his own bed belowstairs with the guards, Augustin slept restlessly, throwing off the linen covering as the recurring dream began to take hold. He watched as if it were happening to someone else.

The warrior paced the chamber, fury building with each step he took. His wife was in pain and he was helpless to do anything but watch.

The slender wisp of a woman, huge with child, cried out softly from the bed where she valiantly struggled to bring forth the life they had created.

Augustin tossed and turned violently, held in the cruel grip of his tortured dream.

His wife was so small, too small. The babe had been struggling to burst forth for two pain-filled days and two agonizing nights.

“Augustin.” The thready sound of his name drew him back over to kneel at his wife’s side.

“Aye, ma petite ,” he answered, pressing his lips to her knuckles. They were so cold. He could feel himself begin to sweat while a hot churning sensation settled in his gut. He was drenched, sick with the realization that he knew what would come next.

“If I die—”

His huge hand covered her mouth, cutting off the words that had been burning in his mind over and over while they waited for their child to be born.

“Monique, don’t—”

“Promise me that you will love our babe, that you will not blame our babe…” Her sharply in-drawn breath and Herculean grip told Augustin how much pain she was in.

“I promise.”

“Milord, the babe comes!” the midwife called out as his wife’s body was held in the grip of one final contraction.

“’Tis a girl. A beautiful, healthy girl.”

Augustin leaned down and kissed his wife’s forehead. It was cold and clammy. She was pale. Too pale. All of the color had drained from her face. As he watched, her skin went from pale to gray. He knew then that she was lost to him. By the look of sadness in her eyes, he realized that she knew it and accepted it.

“I will love you always,” she whispered, closing her eyes. Augustin’s heart clenched in his breast as she drew in a breath and held it. Before his eyes, the gray cast to her flawless skin changed to a lifeless, waxen yellow.

“Monique!” he cried out, pulling her to his chest, trying in vain to ward off the specter of death that held her in its grasp.

But she was already gone. Mon Dieu , he had lost her!

A voice badgered at him to let her go, but he blocked it out. He would never let her go.

A strong hand clamped down on his shoulder, shaking him. He looked up and saw his devastation mirrored on the face of his second cousin, his wife’s brother.

“Georges… I have lost her—”

His friend shook his head sadly, “’Tis time to let her go.”

The insistent wailing of an infant broke through his heartache, reminding him of his promise to his dead wife. He gently laid Monique back on the bed, pausing to smooth a lock of ebony hair off her forehead. Even in death, she looked too beautiful to be flesh and blood. An angel, he thought, she looked like a sleeping angel.

Sorrow ripped through him at the thought that she did indeed sleep with the angels. His wailing daughter was placed in his arms and quieted instantly, as if comforted by his warmth.

A lone tear appeared and clung tenaciously to the curve of his dark lashes. “Your mother has gone to sleep with the angels, ma petite .” At his soft words, the infant whimpered.

He held tightly to the new life that his wife had wanted so desperately to gift him with. “Angelique,” he said softly. “I am here, and I promised your mother to love you.”

Only the growing realization that he needed to fulfill that promise, coupled with the weight of the infant in his arms, kept him from succumbing to the depths of his sorrow.

His dreams were tortured, but Augustin did not waken. The dark-haired angel seemed to grow and mature before his eyes, until at last she stood before him as she had a few short weeks ago, with her ice-blue eyes flashing with pique, her unbound midnight tresses flowing in a deep velvet wave down her back.

“I will not leave London!” Angelique stamped her foot. Sparks of temper simmering in the air around them. She stood with her back straight and her pointed little chin jutted out, determined not to be cowed by anyone. She was so like the Saxon woman he married, he thought rolling over onto his side, waking.

Now wide awake, he had the gut-wrenching feeling that he needed Eyreka far more than she would ever need him.