Chapter 17

Returning home was far more pleasant than riding to Rouen. Oddly enough, for all Conar’s never-ending demands, something had changed between them, and for the better.

He was far more often with her, quick to urge her to race him to one hill or another, and he was even willing to call a halt to their entire procession one afternoon when she found particular pleasure in one of the streams where they had stopped. He sat with her by the water, his feet bared and cooled by it, as were hers.

Yet when they returned home, things were quick to change, fate was destined to step in upon them in a number of ways.

Melisande came down the stairs her first morning home to see that Brenna was slipping from the great hall. She followed her down the stairs to the courtyard below, wondering if Conar had really kept his word.

She shouldn’t ask.

“Brenna.”

The Dubhlain woman stopped, aware that Melisande had been following her.

She turned slowly. “Aye, milady.”

Melisande discovered that she couldn’t simply demand to know the truth.

“The runes,” she murmured. “You plucked up the runes so swiftly the other day. Why? What runes were they?”

Brenna arched a brow to her. “Don’t you know?”

Melisande frowned, shaking her head. “What were they?” she repeated.

Brenna paused a moment, looking at her. “Two runes, lady, Injuz and Jera.”

Melisande shook her head blankly. “Ragwald knows the runes,” she said. “He taught me some when I was young, but I’m afraid those elude me. What are you telling me?”

“You really don’t know?”

“I really don’t know!”

Brenna’s golden lashes swept over her eyes. “Then count back, lady, and think carefully.”

“I—”

“Milady, they are the runes for fertility.”

“I don’t—”

“You’re expecting his child!” Brenna said impatiently.

Melisande felt as if she had been struck, she was so startled. And then she felt so incredibly foolish because Brenna had only to whisper a few words, and she realized how very late she was.

She shook her head. “I don’t—I can’t be! I don’t feel anything.”

Brenna shrugged, a small grin upon her lips. “Then you are lucky, and your labor might well be easy.” She paused a moment. They were both silent. Brenna frowned, and Melisande realized that she must be very white, the blood having drained from her face.

“What is your distress? Your husband will be pleased. Indeed, Odo and half this land will be pleased, for a child is the mortar that holds close many a union.”

“Does he know?” Melisande asked her suddenly. Was that the source of his sudden consideration?

Of the laughter that sometimes touched his hard features, of the tenderness.

“Well, it seems that you have not told him,” Brenna said.

“But you!” Melisande cried. “You’ve known, and you serve him, and I’m certain you think he should know.”

Brenna was quiet for a moment, studying her. “It is your place, not mine, milady, to tell him.”

Melisande started, glad that the building of the keep was near where she stood, for she suddenly discovered herself leaning against it.

“You wouldn’t do so?” she queried suspiciously.

Brenna sighed softly, looking to the ground. Then her eyes touched Melisande’s. “I serve Conar,” she admitted softly. “If you were endangered, or the life of the child were endangered…” She shrugged. She straightened abruptly. “I’m not your enemy, Melisande. I never have been.”

Melisande bit into her lip, studying the beautiful blond woman she had avoided for so many years.

“Have you really…”

“Really what?” Brenna inquired.

“Ceased to sleep with him?”

“Ceased to sleep with him?”

Melisande let out a cry of exasperation. “You mean you’ve never slept with him?”

“Of course I have slept with him. I travel with him constantly. I have slept with him on ships on long sea journeys, beneath trees when we have traveled on land.”

Melisande started to turn, afraid that she was going to be ill after all. She had felt fine until this moment. She wouldn’t have believed her feelings of dismay.

Now she felt desperately ill.

A small hand touched upon her shoulder. “Lady, I have slept with him. But you misunderstand the meaning of what I am saying. Swen has slept with him often enough, too, and I assure you, neither of them has an interest in other men or little boys! I have never made love with him. I cannot cease doing something I was not doing to begin with.”

Melisande swung around again, astounded. “What?”

“Ah, don’t look at me so! I would have done so, had he wished it. And should he ever seek me…” Her voice trailed away. “But that is unlikely. He has discovered what he seeks in you.”

“Indeed,” Melisande whispered softly. “He has discovered a fool!”

“Your pardon?”

“Never mind, Brenna.” She stiffened, feeling wave after wave of fury sweep through her. His magnificent bargaining! Of all the horrid things to do to her. How amused he must have been! She had bartered herself to him in exchange for a promise that he sleep no longer with a woman he had never touched!

“Melisande—”

“Thank you for your honesty,” she said smoothly. She turned back into the tower and made her way up the first flight of stairs. She found a chair in the great hall and sank into it, trying to remember everything he had said that night in Rouen. She had demanded he not sleep with Brenna anymore. And oh! He had sworn that he would not do so.

She had fulfilled her part of the bargain tenfold.

He wasn’t sleeping with Brenna, never had slept with her.

He had taken Melisande again for such a fool. Even if she had walked right into it.

She would never, never tell him about their child. If it really existed. If Brenna wasn’t taunting her even now.

But Brenna wasn’t taunting her. All she had to do was look back and know that she hadn’t had her time since Conar had come to claim her by that stream in Wessex.

She put her head down upon the table. It was what he would want. Exactly what he would want, what he would demand. And as usual, she would give it to him.

But not now, her heart cried out. Not now.

She tried to eat, but found she wasn’t hungry. She reached for ale, then thought she should be drinking goat’s milk. Marie de Tresse had always said it was good for women who were with child.

I don’t believe this, she insisted to herself.

She rose and returned to her room, her father’s room. Conar’s room.

Mine first! she thought.

She lay down on the bed and stared at the ceiling. The child would be blond, she thought, despite her own ebony locks, despite Conar’s mother’s burnished black hair.

Blue-eyed and blond. His. For everything went his way.

No more! she determined.

She sat up. “I am going to have a black-haired girl!” she promised herself, but she found herself rocking and feeling within herself the first flurry of wild excitement and wonder.

A babe.

Hers.

Theirs.

His.

She stood and started pacing the room. Would she tell him? Nay, her heart cried out. Not after that wretched trick he had played upon her!

The child would be hers as well. Her father’s grandchild. If only Manon might have lived.

If Manon had lived, everything would be different.

She stood suddenly, eager to leave the place. Without thought she raced down the stairs and hurried to the stables, not seeking a groom, but seizing a bridle from a hook to slip over her horse’s nose. In seconds she was leaping upon him. The gates were open, as there was no threat in the day and the animals were in the field, the farmers coming and going in their labors.

She rode hard, racing across the fields. She had no destination in mind. Still the spring beckoned to her. She forgot that Geoffrey had come there, she forgot everything.

Yet she had barely reached the water before she discovered herself rudely interrupted. “Melisande!”

Conar had raced after her upon Thor and sat atop the stallion now, staring at her with a raw new fury. His voice shook with his rage. “Lady, you promised me you’d not put yourself at risk so foolishly!”

She stiffened, standing very straight, staring his way.

“You promised!” he thundered again.

She hadn’t thought about breaking her promise, though what promise she really owed him, she didn’t know.

“Jesu, lady, did you come here to meet that fool Geoffrey?”

She had never meant to break a promise, she hadn’t thought about Geoffrey once, she had only longed to escape the tempest and fever in her heart.

“Leave me alone, you Viking bastard!” she cried out. She hurried toward Warrior, but Conar leapt down from Thor, accosting her before she could do so.

“What in God’s name is the matter with you?”

“My promises! My promises! Oh, you bastard!” she cried, slamming her fists against him.

“What?” he thundered, confused. “What promise have I broken?”

“What promise did you ever need to make?”

“I—” he began, and realization dawned in his eyes, and he leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest. “You went to Brenna and asked her about my activities, milady?”

“Aye, I went to Brenna and discovered that you had played me for a complete idiot!”

“You are a greater idiot to ride here after all that happened!”

“Then I will ride back, and you may remain here!” she cried.

“Indeed, you will ride back!”

His hands upon her, he lifted her to Warrior’s bare back. She kneed her mount, causing him to begin racing back toward the fortress before Conar could mount Thor.

It didn’t matter. Not even Warrior’s tremendous power mattered. Conar was right behind her.

She returned through the wall, leaping from the horse before the stables, tossing the reins to one of the boys. She ran up to her room and suddenly remembered the day he had threatened to take the beautiful gilded coat of mail from her, her father’s gift.

She dived for the trunk, determined to hide it before he could come, yet even as her hands fell upon the gold emblazoned sword, he burst into the room.

He stood there, his brows arched. “A sword against me?”

“I am quite excellent with it, milord,” she informed him coolly.

“Are you?”

He walked over to her. She had been hunched down by the trunk. She rose swiftly, the blade extended.

“I’ll take it, Melisande.”

She shook her head stubbornly.

“Don’t come closer. You may be the great Lord of the Wolves, but you are flesh and blood, and I am talented with this weapon.”

“You are talented with many weapons,” he assured her swiftly. “All this!” he whispered suddenly, “because I do not sleep with another woman?”

“All this because you lie!” she cried.

“I never lied.”

“Because you think to command me constantly, because your bargains are ruses, because—just leave me be!” she warned, waving the blade.

He shook his head slowly. “You’ll never take such a weapon against me, Melisande. I swear it.” He suddenly drew his own blade. She jumped back, stunned that he meant to battle her, here and now.

“Set it down, Melisande.”

She could feel the blood draining from her face, but she was good, and she would not back down.

He took a step toward her, his steel suddenly and fiercely cracking down upon hers. She shuddered with the force of it but parried quickly.

She had practiced with his brother. She knew some of his moves.

She fought well, and she fought hard, leaping upon their bed to parry one blow, jumping to a trunk, finding the floor once again. She could combat him! But he was relentless, his eyes never leaving hers, his blows never ceasing.

She could feel the strain in her arms. The effort to keep lifting her sword was an agony.

“Surrender, lady?” he demanded coldly.

“Never, milord!”

There was a sudden pounding upon their tower door.

“Conar!” Swen cried anxiously. “Is all well within there?”

“Aye!” he cried. “We’re fine.”

“Melisande!” Ragwald called next.

She nearly missed the fall of Conar’s blade. “I am well!” she cried swiftly.

“Leave us be!” Conar commanded fiercely. And he smiled, then began to come at her.

She realized that he had baited her all the while. She was good at defense, but he hadn’t been sending his blows half as quickly as he was able.

Now he did so, coming at her with a sheer ruthlessness that was staggering.

She parried a blow, but he caught her sword and sent it flying. She clenched her teeth, staring at him, staring after the blade. He smiled and flicked his blade so that it nearly brushed her flesh.

But it did not touch her.

It rent her gown from her throat to her navel instead.

“Wretched Viking!” she swore, then dived suddenly to retrieve her own blade.

He let her find it, but then he was at her again, showing no quarter. He slammed his blade against hers and for a moment they were locked together.

Then his great strength showed. He forced her arm and blade to the floor.

“Let it go,” he warned her.

At last her trembling, weary fingers lost their grasp.

He bent and picked up her sword, sending it flying toward the trunk. “No more, Melisande. No more swords, no coats of mail. And no more fights against me!”

She could scarcely breathe. She was heaving in great gulps. Her breasts lay exposed, rising and falling in wild beats. She hated him, hated him.

But dear God, she felt so alive! She wanted to keep fighting, pit herself against him, touch him…

She gasped as his sword rose again—she was certain he mean to cleave her in two.

But he only rent the rest of her garment. She backed away, glaring at him.

“It’s a good thing you are the son of a wealthy king who has managed to make a very advantageous marriage, else your wife would walk about naked by now!”

“Naked is what I seek,” he told her, eyes ablaze.

“Nay!” she cried, turning to flee. But his hands were wound into the torn fabric and it slipped from her shoulders. She ran to the door, yet paused, and he was behind her, suddenly laughing.

“Would my dear naked wife run so swiftly to Swen and the rest of that hall of Vikings?”

“Aye!” she cried, but she was going nowhere, and she knew it. And she knew when his hand came upon her that her anger, even her rage, meant nothing. She wanted him now as she had never wanted him before.

But tears welled in her eyes as he lifted her. She slammed her fists upon his shoulders. “Bastard!”

“Because I do not keep Brenna mistress?”

“Because you made me a fool.”

“Should I sleep with you to appease you?”

She tried to slap his face but he caught her too quickly, sliding her down his body. She strained to free herself from his grasp.

He started to kiss her.

“Nay, not this time! Not this time!”

Yet she was already afire. His touch was swift, and it was magic. In seconds they had fallen back upon the bed, and she was impaled with him.

And it was later, far later, when she lay exhausted against him, that she even remembered there was something that she might tell him.

Nay.

Never after today.

He sat up by her side, stroking her hair. His eyes were suddenly hard and concerned and very serious. “Be angry with me, Melisande. Hate me. Loathe me. Call me what you will. But you cannot ride out alone. No matter what other promises we have made and kept or not kept, you must not ride out.”

“Geoffrey was there at the service! He knows that I am your wife, that he cannot seize the fortress,” she protested bitterly.

“Geoffrey is dangerous.”

“How can he still be so?”

“I know that he is.”

She turned away from him. He touched her shoulder. His voice was suddenly soft.

“Melisande.”

“Leave me alone, I implore you!”

“Melisande—”

“I’ve nothing to say to you. You made a fool of me, milord—”

“There was no evil intent—”

“Ah, and what if I had played you, the mighty lord, the same way!” she demanded, she swallowed hard and continued. “What if it were the other way, milord? What if you wondered with whom I slept? Ah, pray forgive me! I may sleep with whomever I choose. There is a difference between sleeping and making love!”

He was up at her side. She was startled when he suddenly swung her around violently, the tip of his sword landing upon her flesh.

“Lady, don’t test me. I would slay any man and would consider the same with you!”

He whirled away from her, reaching for his clothing, pulling on his chausses and then boots in what seemed like a singular motion. She watched him, her heart in a tempest. “Aye, leave it to a Viking!” she cried.

“Aye! Leave it to a Viking.” He pulled a long-sleeved linen shirt over his head.

It was then that a thunderous knocking sounded on their door.

“Go away!” Conar cried furiously.

A small voice sounded. Brenna’s.

“I cannot, milord. Ships have arrived from Dubhlain.”

Conar frowned. Melisande pulled the covers to her chin, aware that he was about to throw open the door.

He did so. Brenna stood there with two tall men behind her. They were not Vikings, she didn’t think, but dark-haired Irishmen. She flushed as they glanced her way, respectfully inclining their heads. She wished she could crawl beneath the bed, yet realized they thought little of her position. If Lord Conar desired his wife by day, it was his right.

Brenna’s eyes remained upon hers for a moment.

“What is it?” Conar demanded.

“Your father sends for your help, milord,” the younger of the two said, bowing deeply. He hesitated. “Your uncle Niall has disappeared in the north, and the kings are gathering at Dubhlain to ride in force to demand his return from Maelmorden, the west coast king who has taken him hostage. He prays that you can sail quickly.”

Melisande watched as Conar stared at the man, inhaling deeply.

“My uncle lives?” he asked softly.

“So your mother believes.”

“And mother?”

“She is strong, she has your father. She watched warfare all her life as the daughter of the Ard-Righ. She is Niall’s sister, and your father must ride in his defense.”

“And so shall I,” Conar said softly. “So shall I.”

“The king will be grateful,” the messenger said.

Conar nodded and closed the door. He stared at her, but absently. “So we shall sail again,” he murmured.

She sat up, holding her sheets tightly. “We? I should remain at home, Conar,” she replied swiftly.

“You will come with me.”

She couldn’t bear to leave home again! She had only just returned!

“I loathe you, remember?” she demanded miserably. Tears were stinging her eyes. They were going to fall again.

She didn’t want him to go. But she didn’t want to spend endless days waiting in Dubhlain again. Not that she didn’t love Erin. Not that she didn’t care.

It was just that home mattered now. The Irish were always at war. She and Conar needed to be here! Odo needed Conar; surely that was evident!

But Conar leaned low over her. He touched her chin, wiped a tear from her eyes. For a moment, just for a moment, it seemed that he might soften.

Then he swore an impatient oath. “Lady, I dare not leave you here, I dare not! Can’t you understand that? You will come with me! There is no choice in the matter.”

He spun away from her. The door slammed, and she was left alone.