CHAPTER 7

IWOULDnot be as brave as you in such circumstances,” Anne Bassett said to Nyssa that afternoon. ”I should want to hide myself away.”

Nyssa, conscientious in her new duties, was carefully cleaning a diamond and gold necklace belonging to the queen. ”What on earth do you mean, Mistress Anne?” she inquired sweetly.

Indeed she had some idea, having been subject all day to the stares, some hostile, some simply curious, of the queen”s ladies. What hypocrites they were. They thought little of their secret meetings with their own lovers—most of which were not secret. Oh well, eventually something else would capture their fertile imaginations. She would be ignored again. Nyssa had no intention, however, of allowing the Bassett sisters to prolong her discomfort. She must bear the mild insults of the king”s daughter-in-law and his niece, and the others of higher rank than she, but not of her former fellow maids.

”Ohh, come now, Nyssa Wyndham,” Anne Bassett began with a knowing smirk upon her pretty face.

”De Winter,” Nyssa corrected her. ”Nyssa de Winter. Her ladyship, the Countess of March, Mistress Anne.” She rubbed with exaggerated diligence at the necklace.

”You undoubtedly invited your fate,” Anne Bassett said waspishly. ”No gentleman, even one with as unsavory a reputation as Lord de Winter, would rape a woman without a certain amount of provocation. That is a very well-known fact.”

I will not slap her, Nyssa thought, struggling to control her outrage. Was Anne Bassett really one of those stupid souls who believed women invited their own rapes? ”What provocation?” Nyssa demanded icily of her. ”When was I even in the gentleman”s presence that you can testify to, Mistress Anne? When have you known me to encourage any gentleman of this court? My reputation for virtue is above reproach.”

”Certainly no longer, I would think,” Anne Bassett replied meanly.

”My cousin, Thomas Culpeper, raped a gamekeeper”s wife last year,” Cat Howard said, coming to Nyssa”s defense. ”She was a very pretty girl. She rebuffed Tom on several occasions that I was witness to myself. I would hardly call that encouragement, but he raped her nonetheless. He waited until her husband was gone from their cottage one day. Then, with three friends holding her down for him, he had his way with her. Men do rape women without cause, Anne. Perhaps you had best beware, for you flirt far too much with the gentlemen for your own safety, I fear. Why, even the king, I am told, is prone to force on occasion.” Cat Howard smiled brightly at the girl, but Anne was not yet beaten.

”A gamekeeper”s wife is hardly a lady,” she sneered, ”and certainly cannot be compared with one. Besides, the girl had probably had her skirts lifted any number of times, and enjoyed it. She but taunted your cousin. As for the king, Cat Howard, beware! You speak treason when you criticize our sovereign lord. It is his right to do as he pleases.”

”You are heartless,” Nyssa told her. ”No woman, no matter her station, should be thought fair game for violence by any man.”

”Aye!” the others agreed, glaring at Anne Bassett and finally silencing her. The Bassett sisters were dreadful snobs, though Katherine was really the nicer of the two, particularly when her sister was absent.

In late afternoon the queen dismissed Nyssa. ”You may haf the next two days for yourself, madame. Even a lady in the qveen”s service should haf a honeymoon. Ya?” She smiled broadly, and Nyssa”s friends giggled while the other ladies looked scandalized.

”Brazen hussy!”

Nyssa heard it as she prepared to leave the queen”s apartments.

”Aye,” was the reply. ”She should be ashamed of herself, yet she holds her head high like a decent and virtuous woman, the slut!”

Nyssa whirled about to see who it was who would dare to pass judgment upon her, but the queen”s ladies were silent now, though smirking. She could not tell who had spoken, for the voices, though plainly heard, had been unidentifiable. She walked over to the queen and curtsied low. ”I thank your grace for her generosity and kind wishes,” she said.

”Go! Go!” the queen answered, smiling.

Nyssa found her uncle dicing with several of his friends in one of the public rooms. ”Will you take me to your house, my lord? The queen has granted me several days” rest, and I would retire now.”

Owen FitzHugh nodded. ”Do you want your aunt for company?” he asked her. ”She is with Adela Marlowe, I believe.”

”Nay, Uncle, I would be alone, I think,” Nyssa said.

”What of your husband?” Owen FitzHugh replied.

”Tillie has told his Toby where I am. He may come or not as the spirit moves him, but I will not live under Thomas Howard”s roof!”

”He is a bad enemy to make,” the Earl of Marwood told his niece. ”Be wary, Nyssa. Remember that your husband is his favorite grandson.”

”If you knew what I did, Uncle, you would realize that I seek Varian de Winter”s best interests, while his grandfather seeks only the best interests of the Howards. My husband is not a Howard. Besides, the duke does not think women of much import other than for marrying off. Varian”s union with me is very much to his advantage. The duke will think me but a silly, temperamental wench for refusing to live beneath his roof. He will be glad when we shortly leave court. We are no longer important to his plans, and I am happy for that!”

Owen FitzHugh laughed. ”You have your aunt”s temper,” he said, ”but your mother”s practical common sense, I am relieved to see. Very well then, Nyssa, I will escort you back to our house. It is fortunate, is it not, that I extended the lease through June, my dear niece.”

Unlike the crowded little house in Richmond that they had rented, the house at Greenwich was a gracious and spacious dwelling set within its own green park. It was a relatively new building, having been constructed in the reign of the previous king, Henry VII. Nyssa had been given a large bedchamber with its own separate dressing room and even a small room for Tillie. From her windows she could see the beautiful park land about the house. She had scarcely used the room since their arrival at Greenwich, but she was pleased to have it now, for it meant she could be free of Varian”s overbearing grandfather.

The walls of the room were done in a linen-fold paneling of richly polished oak. There was a large window with a cushioned window seat upon one wall, and a good-sized fireplace on another. The great bed with its heavy crimson velvet hangings was opposite the hearth. Next to the fireplace was a carved settle with a tapestried cushion. There was a large wood chest at the foot of the bed, and a single nightstand.

”I want a bath!” Nyssa said as she entered the room. ”A lovely, hot bath, Tillie. Use the lavender fragrance in the water. It reminds me of home. We will soon be going home!”

”We”ll be going to yer new home, m”lady,” Tillie replied.

”Nay, first we are going home to RiversEdge,” Nyssa said. ”My parents must meet Lord de Winter before we go on to Winterhaven. The news of my marriage will be shock enough.”

”And who is to tell yer mother and father of this hasty wedding that the king has forced you into, I should like to know?” Tillie fretted. ”Me aunt Heartha will surely find a way to blame me for it, I”m sure.”

Nyssa laughed. ”There is no way Heartha can hold you responsible for any of this, Tillie.” Then she grew thoughtful. ”As for Mama and Papa, I am not certain how they should be told of what has happened. I do not think they should learn of my marriage in a letter. It would be too much, and Papa would come raging up to court. I suppose I should discuss it with my aunt and uncle before I decide.”

Tillie nodded. She agreed with her mistress that a letter would cause more consternation than was really necessary. ”I”ll see to yer bath,” she said, and hurried off to marshal the footmen.

The large, round wooden tub was brought from the dressing room and set by the fireplace. Tillie stirred up the coals and added more fuel until there was a fine, hot blaze going. The footmen moved swiftly with precision in and out of the room with their buckets of hot water. Tillie filled an open kettle and placed it over the flames so she might pour it into the bathwater when it began to cool. When the last footman had finally left the room, she added a goodly amount of lavender oil to the steaming tub, and instantly the room was filled with its perfume.

Nyssa had been gazing out from her comfortable vantage point in the window seat. They were not on the river, but she could see it winding like a silver ribbon beyond the green willows. It made her long even more for her home on the Wye, in England”s Midlands. She sighed deeply, and turning about, arose so that Tillie might help her off with her garments. The warm, perfumed water soothed her soul as she sank gratefully into it. Court had been very exciting. She had certainly accomplished her purpose in coming, although not at all in the way in which she thought she would. But oh, she was so relieved that in just a few more weeks she would be going home! Home to RiversEdge. Home to Winterhaven.

Winterhaven. It had a pretty ring to it. She wondered what it was like. Would it be as beautiful as RiversEdge? Or her own house, Riverside? Poor old Riverside. Was it never to have a family in it again? Her father”s half sister, Lady Dorothy, her stepfather”s mother, had lived there, but she was now almost seventy, and preferred living with the family at RiversEdge.

It must go to my second son, Nyssa thought. Second sons have so little. What a startling idea! A second son? How could she be thinking of a second son already? There was no first son. She was still not at all certain she was satisfied with this marriage into which she had been so suddenly forced. Would there even be a first son? And what if she had only daughters? And should children be born of less than love? She did not love Varian, yet he said he loved her. Ridiculous! How could he love her? He did not even know her, nor she him. She flushed. Well, he had known her in a carnal sense, but only once, and he had said the words before he had taken her. He had said them because he was kind, Nyssa decided. Well, at least it was something in his favor.

Tillie, washing her mistress with cloth and soap, watched the play of emotions across Nyssa”s face. What was she thinking about? Tillie wondered. Was she dreaming about that handsome new husband the king had given her? Ohh, how the gossipy servants had descended upon her this day, desperately trying to ferret out of her all the juicy intimate details of her mistress”s situation. Men and women who had never before had time for her now attempted to draw her out. How long had her mistress been secretly meeting the Earl of March? Had she been a virgin when she came to court? Well, Tillie thought indignantly, she had sent them all packing. What could she possibly know that they didn”t already know? she demanded of them. Did a fine lady like her mistress confide in a mere servant? Because most of them were overweeningly proud, and considered Tillie of low estate, she had been believed.

The upper servants had gone off disappointed, but May, Lady FitzHugh”s tiring woman, had smiled approvingly at Tillie when they were alone. ”Yer aunt Heartha would be proud of ye, girl!” she said, and Tillie realized that May had guessed the truth of the matter. Of course she would have, for like Tillie, she was family too.

The door to the bedchamber opened and both young women gazed up, startled, to see the Earl of March.

”Good evening, madame,” he said quietly. ”I understand that we are to domicile here until we leave court.” He gazed about. ”It is a most charming room. Is there a place for Toby?”

”I am certain my uncle will tell you where he may lodge,” Nyssa said, not knowing what else to say to him. ”I think, perhaps, the bedchamber next to this one would suit you, and your servant. You will need space for your clothing, and my dressing room is absolutely full, I fear. Uncle Owen can direct you.”

”Tillie,” the earl said with a smile, ”will you go and speak with Lord FitzHugh for me. Then help my Toby find his way. We will call you when we need you,” he told the startled servant. Tillie looked to her mistress for guidance.

”I will need Tillie with me to finish my toilette,” Nyssa said.

”I will help you,” he told her calmly. ”I am a most expert maid, or at least I have been told so.” He turned to Tillie. ”Go along now, Tillie, and if you can help Toby get me settled, I should appreciate it.”

”You are to remain, Tillie,” Nyssa said firmly.

”Go, girl,” the earl told her, putting a hand beneath her elbow and escorting her to the door.

”Stay, Tillie!” Nyssa commanded her tiring woman.

The earl opened the door to the bedchamber, and pushing Tillie out, closed the door behind her, locking it. He turned to meet the outraged gaze of his bride of less than a day.

”How dare you, sir!” she raged at him. ”Tillie is my servant, and as such must answer to me first and foremost.”

”Tillie is the servant of the Countess of March,” he replied. ”She is liable to me now, madame, as her master. Would you like me to help you from your bath? You must be finished surely.”

”Get out!” Nyssa glared furiously at him. ”I shall scream.”

”And what, pray tell, madame, will that accomplish?” he asked maddeningly, taking the towel from its rack by the fire, opening it and holding it out for her. ”I am your husband. Who will interfere with me even if I should beat you? Under the law, both God”s and man”s, you are mine.”

”You are despicable, my lord,” she told him tightly.

”If you will not get out,” he replied calmly, laying the towel aside, ”then I shall get in.” Pulling his boots and hose off, beneath her startled eyes he stripped down to his shirt and breeches.

”You do not dare, my lord!” Nyssa said nervously.

He threw her an amused look and unfastened his shirt, drawing it off and laying it aside upon the settle with the rest of his garments. ”No?” he drawled, his hand moving to his breeches.

Nyssa scrambled to her feet. ”The tub is not large enough for us both. It is too full for two people,” she cried. ”The house is rented and must not be damaged!” Why was he staring at her? And then she realized that in her panic she had quite forgotten that she was naked. ”Ohhh . . .” Her soft cry echoed in the room. Desperately she reached for the towel he had tossed aside, rosy with blushes, her eyes wide.

For a moment he couldn”t breathe. His chest felt tight. His eyes hungrily ravaged her form. Wet, it glistened with the oily bathwater. He watched fascinated as a drop of moisture rolled between her pretty little breasts and slid down her long torso. She was all pink-gold in the firelight. Reaching out, he yanked her from the tub and pressed her wet body against him, kissing her deeply. He had never in his life wanted a woman quite so much as he wanted this one.

Nyssa”s head swam dizzily with the sensation of his mouth against hers, with the heat emanating from his hard body. She knew so little of him. She certainly did not know him well enough to love him, but the feeling his actions engendered inside of her certainly was not fear. Raising her arms, she let her palms slide up his smooth chest. His very skin seemed to leap beneath her touch. It was then with wonder she realized that whatever it was he felt for her, she felt it also for him.

He slid his hand up to her head, pulling out the pins that had held her hair up from the water. Her dark mane tumbled free, caressing her shoulders. He kneaded her scalp, with his fingers turning her head this way and that, his mouth never leaving hers. His heart almost stopped as he felt her fingers unfastening his breeches, pushing them down along with his linen drawers. He stepped out of them, kicking them away, his arms still wrapped tightly about the girl.

Nyssa pulled her head away from his, gasping for air. Her eyes met his and she said tightly, ”What is this I feel, Varian? What is it that makes me play the wanton with you? I do not understand. It cannot be love.”

”It is lust you feel, sweeting,” he said low. His big hand slid smoothly down the arch of her back to fondle her buttocks.

”The Church says lust is a sin,” she whispered, unable to restrain her own body, which seemed to want to press itself into his palm. ”Coupling between a man and his spouse is for the purpose of procreating children,” she recited primly. ”I have not heard it said that coupling should be an enjoyable thing, and yet I liked it last night when the pain was finally gone. Is it wrong for me to like coupling?”

”Nay, sweeting,” he murmured against her lips, his finger rubbing sensuously against the very tip of her backbone. ”And lust between a man and his wife is permitted, I swear it! The Church may not publicly say it, but they know it is so, and it is a good thing.” With his palm in the small of her back, he pressed her closer to him.

Daringly she ran the tip of her tongue across his lips. She did not know why she had done it, but she had suddenly wanted to.

His nostrils flared, and then he was pressing his lips against hers again, his tongue wild in her mouth. To his surprise, she did not flinch, but met him kiss for kiss until his head was spinning. Slowly he turned her about so that her back was to him and they could see their reflections, dusky gold and nebulous, in the narrow pier glass she used to inspect her costume. He heard her sharp intake of breath as his hands slipped up to cup her young breasts. He felt her struggle to control the motion of her body.

Nyssa stared, fascinated by what she saw. She had never really gazed at herself naked in a mirror. Was it the firelight that made her body seem ripely lush? His hands were so big. Yet her small breasts seemed to fit nicely within the cups of his palms. She watched as he gently rubbed her nipples with the balls of his thumbs. Then bending, he kissed her shoulder softly, nuzzling the spot where it flowed into her neck.

”You are beautiful, Nyssa,” he said low, ”and you don”t even know how beautiful, do you, sweeting?” While one hand remained clasped about her left breast, his other hand began to caress her belly.

She viewed him through half-closed eyes, tense yet relaxed. A single finger slid between her nether lips and burrowed itself deeply until it found her most vulnerable spot. She ground her bottom into his groin, and he groaned.

”You make me feel so naughty,” Nyssa whispered to him.

She saw him smile in the glass. ”I like you naughty,” he told her, nibbling on her earlobe with sharp teeth. ”I am going to teach you to be very, very naughty, sweeting, and you will like it, I promise you.” His tongue swept up the side of her neck wetly while his finger began to tease at her insistently.

She wanted to close her eyes for this was too personal, but he would not allow it, and forbade her. She saw the subtle changes in her expression as he aroused her. Her face seemed to grow more wanton with each passing moment. Her body was afire with new and very powerful longings. She ached, but pleasantly so. She could see from his look that he did too.

”Let us couple now,” she begged him.

”Not yet,” he told her. He picked her up in his arms and walked to the bed. Instead of laying her lengthwise upon it, however, he placed her so that she lay sideways across the bed, her legs hanging over its edge. Shocked, but unable to move, she watched as he knelt between her outspread legs, his head pushing between her milky white thighs. She felt his fingers opening her, and then to her great surprise, his tongue began to play with her sensitive flesh.

”Ohhh, no! No! No! You must not,” she protested feebly, but for the life of her she could not stop him. It was so delicious, but dear heaven, this had to be wrong! For a moment she struggled against him, but then the sweetness began to possess her and she couldn”t fight him. She just could not. It was too wonderful. And then when she thought her honeyed flesh could bear no more of his torture, he rose before her, his great manhood rampant with his desire for her.

He stood, his legs pressing against the bed, and then leaning forward just slightly, he drew her forward, his fingers digging into the soft flesh of her thighs and buttocks until she was fully impaled upon him. His hands reached out to fondle her breasts; then, steadying himself, he began to slowly pump her with great majestic strokes of his manhood. He suddenly felt incredibly strong.

Her breasts ached and felt hard, yet his fingers dug easily into them, almost hurting her. She felt him filling her, and it seemed that now he was bigger and stronger than he had been last night. Without knowing why, she wrapped her arms and legs tightly about him, gasping as she felt him plunge even deeper within her body. A sound something like a moan came from somewhere in the back of her throat. It did not even sound human. Surely she had never made such a noise before? There was no pain this time, only an incredible tension very deep within her that seemed to be building and rising within her until she was certain that she could not bear it another moment, yet she did.

”Nyssa! Nyssa!” he half sobbed her name into her perfumed hair. ”Dear God, sweeting, I have never desired any woman as I do you!” His thrusts became more and more frantic within her.

She heard his words, and then suddenly she was lost, caught up in a rainbow-hued vortex that was spinning out of control, taking her with it. She was a butterfly, soaring, trapped in a maelstrom of passion so great that she had no control at all. ”Varian!” She cried his name even as the feeling of pressure building within her exploded in a starburst of incredible pleasure at the very moment of his own release.

He could feel his love juices gushing forth in a great discharge of sweetness that overflowed her womb. He fell forward atop her body, exhausted, yet filled with a contentment he had never before known. He struggled to raise his head, looking down into her beautiful face. She was pale and seemed to be scarcely breathing, but then she opened her lovely violet-blue eyes slowly, focusing upon him.

”I love you, sweeting!” he declared passionately, and his look was one of great tenderness toward her.

Nyssa burst into tears. ”Do not say it!” she begged him. ”I do not love you. I do not even know you! It is not fair! Fate has made us man and wife, but I do not know what love is. How can you love me, Varian? How can you love a woman you do not even know? Such things only happen in children”s tales of old. It cannot, does not, happen in our time.”

”I love you, sweeting. I told you so last night. The moment I first saw you at Hampton Court I knew you were the only woman for me, Nyssa. I do not understand it myself, but when my grandfather so coldly suggested giving you to another man, I knew I could not let that happen. I could not allow anyone else to have you, to kiss your sweet lips, to plow a furrow in your love fields, my darling. You are mine, Nyssa. In time I will teach you to love me, I swear it!”

He lay his head upon her breasts with a sigh, and Nyssa gently stroked his dark head. Can love be taught? she wondered. Her mother had certainly learned to love her father. Blaze had not even known Edmund Wyndham when she became his wife. And had not her stepfather Anthony secretly loved Blaze, even when she purported to despise him and held him responsible for Edmund Wyndham”s death? Yet eventually her mother had come to love her stepfather deeply. This was the way of her world. Still, it seemed so strange that Varian should love her when she had not even considered him as a husband.

Suddenly she realized that she was hungry. She had not eaten since early that morning, and then she had had nothing but some bread and wine. ”I am starving, my lord,” she told him. ”Have you eaten?”

He raised himself off of her and then drew her up onto her feet. ”Has my love for you not satisfied your hunger?” He teased her with a smile. ”Thou art a greedy wench, I find.”

”My stomach is hollow, sir,” she told him. ”My aunt keeps a good table wherever she may reside. She has been here for months now, and the cooks are well-trained by her at last.”

”Let us call Tillie and have her bring us a full repast,” he suggested. ”I find making love to you ravenous work, madame.”

”Cover your nakedness, my lord,” she told him, climbing back into bed and pulling the coverlet well up. ”My Tillie is a good girl. You must not shock her.”

He pulled his breeches back on before calling for their two servants. Then he instructed Tillie, who wide-eyed went to fetch them a good meal. Toby was instructed to empty the tub and refill it for the earl.

Tillie returned, two kitchen maids in her wake. The girls could not help but giggle at the sight of Lord de Winter in naught but his breeches, bare feet, and bare chest. Tillie rapped them both sharply on the back of their heads, admonishing them, ”Mind yer manners!” She directed them to lay the food out on a long, narrow oak table which was set along the window wall. Then she placed a decanter of red wine and a pitcher of foaming ale upon the table, slipping the goblets from her apron pocket. With a curtsey to her mistress and new master, she quickly shepherded the kitchen maids from the bedchamber. Toby, having finished his task of emptying and refilling the bath, was already gone.

”Will you bathe first, or eat?” Nyssa asked her husband.

”The water is too hot,” he said, perusing the contents of the table, and then he observed, ”Your aunt does keep a good table. I hope you will do so as well, madame.”

”You will not find me lacking in housewifely skills, my lord,” Nyssa told him. ”Is your home very grand?”

”Nay, ”tis but a modest house. I have scarcely ever lived in it. You may find it old-fashioned, but it is yours to decorate as you will, Nyssa. I want to spend the rest of my life at Winterhaven with you, and with our children. I often think how lonely my father must have been there. He waited until he was practically an old man to marry, and then he lost my mother in childbirth. From the time I went to live with my grandfather, I spent only Midsummer”s Day until Mid-Lammas with my father. After his death I only came in September to hunt.” The earl took his plate and heaped it high with beef, capon, raw oysters, bread, and cheese. Seating himself upon the bed, he asked her, ”What was it like to grow up at RiversEdge? Your father”s hospitality was famous. My father often remarked on what a fine gentleman he was.”

”I do not remember Edmund Wyndham,” Nyssa said quietly. ”I was not quite two when he was killed. My stepfather, Anthony Wyndham, is the father I have known. Growing up at RiversEdge was wonderful. I wonder now why I ever left it. I have five brothers, and twin sisters born six months ago. I will hardly recognize them when we go home. They were but a few weeks old when I left for court. I had ponies, and later on horses, and of course dogs, to play with as a child. My cousin, Mary Rose, was my best friend. We ran barefooted in the summer months, and rode our horses upon the frozen river in the wintertime. There is nothing special about my growing up.”

”You had a family about you, Nyssa,” he told her. ”A mother, a father, and a houseful of siblings. Your aunts and cousins live nearby, I know, for they are my neighbors too, and your grandparents also. You are very fortunate, my darling, in all your relations.”

”Were you very lonely, Varian?” she asked him, suddenly aware of how hard it must have been for him, a small, motherless boy given over to his power-hungry grandfather to raise. There would have been no abiding love in the Duke of Norfolk”s house, or even time for it. Even the duchess had separated from Duke Thomas, and did not speak kindly of him.

”Lonely?” Varian thought a moment, and then said, ”Aye, I was lonely, Nyssa. People never thought of me as the Earl of March”s son and heir. I was always the son of Duke Thomas”s bastard daughter. Nonetheless, being brought up in my grandfather”s shadow was an education in itself. I had no time to feel sorry for myself, sweeting. He is a hard man, but he is also an admirable one in many ways. Still, I am of no real value to him, I realize. I do not like the games he plays, and he knows it. Now that I have a wife, it is time I returned to Winterhaven and took up my own responsibilities. The estate is large, and has not been properly managed in years. I will have much to do.” He looked at her. ”You are not eating,” he said. ”You will need your strength, sweeting. I do not intend to let you off so easily as I did last night.”

”Is that why you swallow oysters so greedily?” she demanded. ”I have been at court long enough to have heard of their restorative powers. Is it true, my lord?”

He grinned wickedly at her. ”You shall soon see, madame,” he promised her. ”I advise you to fill your own belly while you may.”

She flung back the coverlet on the bed, and sliding from the bed, walked naked over to the table where the food was laid out. She smiled to herself, hearing his sharp intake of breath. It pleased her that she was able to affect him so. Taking up a plate, she took a piece of capon, a braised artichoke, some bread and butter. Setting her plate in the window seat, she turned back to him and said sweetly, ”Wine or ale, my lord? Tillie has brought both.”

”Ale,” he managed to croak. Jesu Lord she was tempting, and he knew she was very much aware of it. He was suddenly amused.

She filled a goblet and brought it to him.

”I do not think I have ever been served in such a fashion,” he told her, chuckling. ”Will you always serve me thusly, madame?”

”If it pleases you, my lord,” she answered him demurely.

”Eat your supper, Nyssa,” he told her. ”I am almost through with mine. I have another appetite that will shortly need satisfying.”

”First you must bathe,” she told him. Then she bit into the piece of capon”s breast she had taken for herself.

”Only if you will wash me yourself,” he teased her. ”I have always wanted a wife who would bathe me. And then I will bathe you.”

”You forget, sir, I have already bathed,” she said, smiling at him. She was rather enjoying his teasing. She had never imagined a man and a woman would tantalize each other so. She finished off her capon and licked her fingers before picking up the chunk of bread she had taken for herself. Thoughtfully she smeared the butter across the bread with her thumb, then bit into it. She had certainly not realized that men, like boys, enjoyed playing games. These games, however, were surely of a more dangerous, though eminently satisfying, sort. She swallowed down her bread and then arose to pour herself some wine. He was watching her. She could feel his eyes upon her. It was exciting, and not just a little frightening. Nyssa wished now that she had not been so bold and had wrapped herself in the coverlet. Nervously she pulled the leaves from the artichoke and nibbled them.

What an adorable creature she is, Varian thought. Nyssa. His wife. He could scarce believe it. They had not even been wed a full day yet, and he wanted her more now than he had before. She bewitched him, fascinated him, consumed him not just with her beauty, but with a mixture of intelligence, wisdom, humor, and sensuality. He had not realized that a woman could possess all of these traits, but then, he thought to himself wryly, what had he really known of women other than their lovely bodies? In his own way he was as ignorant of women as she was of men. What a wonderful time they were going to have learning about each other. He wondered if Thomas Howard had really known what a magnificent gift he was giving his grandson, would he have given it? His grandfather was not noted for his generosity, even to those of whom he was fond, and they were few.

”I am ready to bathe you, my lord.” Nyssa”s voice broke the silence of the room. She looked anxiously at him.

Varian arose and slowly stripped off his breeches. He held back a smile at her blush. It was charming that she could still blush, considering their last and recent lusty bout with Eros. Then she bent to check the water”s temperature, and he felt himself becoming aroused. He forced himself to control his randy member, saying, ”Is it comfortable, madame? I do not like too hot a tub. The skin shrivels.”

”I think the temperature perfect, my lord,” she answered, ”but put your hand in and see if it suits you.”

”I will trust your judgment,” he told her, stepping into the tub and seating himself. He held out his hand to her. ”Come, madame. This tub was built for two, and I specifically instructed Toby not to fill it so full that two people would overflow it.”

”You told your servant that we would bathe together?” Her voice was shocked. ”Ohh, my lord, how could you! What will he think?”

”It is not his duty to think, Nyssa,” the earl replied.

”Mayhap not, my lord, but nonetheless servants do think, and they gossip among one another as well. Why, half the gossip at court comes first from the servants. If one wishes to learn the latest bit of scandal, one has but to ask the servants. I cannot believe that you did not know it!”

He looked perplexed, as if such a thing had never occurred to him. Of course, she thought. Men were so damned dense when it came to the practical. They never noticed what was right underneath their noses. He probably never considered that all the information that his Toby passed on to him was but the latest gossip from Toby”s fellow servants. Even dear loyal Tillie, far more discreet than many, was prone to exchanging gossip.

”Since you will be accused of deliciously wanton behavior, madame, whatever you do, come into my tub and join me,” he said. ”I need you to scrub my back for me.”

”I can scrub it from outside the tub, my lord,” she replied.

”But I cannot scrub yours,” he said. ”Come, Nyssa, though I know some people at court who do not bathe from one month to the next, I have not heard it said that bathing twice in a single day can harm you.”

His eyes were twinkling at her, and she found she did not want to resist him. So far his games had brought her naught but pleasure. Besides, if she was to be honest, she had become sweaty during their lovemaking. Her skin did feel quite sticky. He waggled a finger at her, and with a small laugh Nyssa stepped into the tub, sitting opposite him.

”There,” he almost purred, ”is that not nice, sweeting?”

”I think you a most outrageous and possibly dangerous man,” she told him. ”How can I scrub your back from here, my lord?”

”I shall turn about,” he told her, and proceeded to do just that before she might protest about water upon the floor.

Nyssa took a handful of soft soap from the stone jar by the tub and smoothed it over his back. Taking up a soft cloth, she began to scrub him. His torso was very long, and his shoulders broader than she had realized, but then she had had little time to observe him.

”Be gentle,” he teased. ”My skin is delicate, sweeting.”

”Do not play the fool, sir,” she scolded him. Carefully she rinsed off his back. ”There now, you are done.”

He turned so that once again they were facing each other. ”Wash my chest now, madame,” he commanded her.

”You are determined to be spoilt, I can see,” she told him, but dutifully took up a second handful of soap and smeared it across his smooth chest. Her hands rubbed with a circular motion over his muscled frame. She rinsed him, saying, ”Now, sir, are you satisfied?”

”I must wash you,” he told her, and before she could protest, he was rubbing soap over her breasts, fondling them, squeezing them, playing mischievously with her nipples.

”That is not how to properly wash,” she exclaimed breathlessly.

”No?” He feigned innocence as he rinsed her, and then bending his head down, he kissed each pretty breast in turn. ”Now, madame, your back,” he said, but instead of letting her turn about, he slid his hands beneath the water and, cupping her buttocks in his hands, lifted her slightly before settling her down upon his raging member. Then pulling her against him, he began to calmly wash her back.

Nyssa gasped, shocked by his action. She had never heard of people making love in a bath! His hands smoothed soap over her back, while at the same time she could feel him very distinctly deep inside her sheath. He was throbbing. She shuddered with a rising awareness of her own desire even as he drizzled water down her back. Then he was taking her face between his hands and kissing her passionately, his tongue foraging deep within her mouth, making her dizzy with her own longing. She realized that their legs had somehow become tightly wrapped about each other, yet she felt like she was going to fall at any moment.

”Lean back,” he growled in her ear, and when she did, he kissed the slender column of her throat, her chest, and her breasts, all the while thrusting with sharp, little movements within her. He seemed almost deranged in his longing for her, and she felt a strange wildness coming upon her. Her nails clawed at his shoulders and back. ”Vixen,” he groaned, and his mouth fastened about one of her nipples, drawing hard upon it. He suckled her fiercely, and she moaned, her head thrashing.

”Varian!” she managed to cry out. ”This is madness!”

”I cannot get enough of you!” he half sobbed. ”Dear God, Nyssa, why can I not be satisfied?” He was kissing her frantically.

She realized that she could not fight him, that she wanted his passion every bit as much as he wanted to give it to her. Passion, it seemed, was as addictive as sugarplums. She felt her body thrusting back at him, seeking the wonderful pleasure he had earlier given her. When it came, she wept in his arms, shattered by the tremendous lust that had overwhelmed them both, yet contented by the final outcome. She had never realized that married people made love so often and in such a variety of places.

He tipped her face up to him and kissed her mouth softly. ”I adore you, Nyssa,” he told her quietly. ”You are magnificent.”

She blushed. ”I cannot help myself,” she told him. ”When you make love to me, I truly enjoy it. I do not want you to stop, I fear.”

”We have gotten water upon the floor,” he said, his face not quite as repentant as it should have been. ”Shall I call someone to clean it up, or would you rather we dried ourselves off and found our bed, sweeting? A bit of wine to restore us, a little rest, and perhaps we may again this evening find paradise.”

”The water will evaporate, and tomorrow Tillie can remove the stains it leaves,” Nyssa said in practical tones. ”God”s bones, I am hungry again! Does lovemaking always make one hungry, Varian?”

Together they stepped from the tub and dried each other off. Then Nyssa cut several slices of bread, lavishly buttered a piece for herself, and placed a slab of rare beef upon it. Biting into it, she smacked her lips appreciatively, and then held it out to him.

”Would you like a bite, my lord? It is delicious.”

”I shall make my own,” he told her, ”and afterward, I”ll have a sweet. Pear tartlet.”

”I had another treat in mind,” she told him mischievously.

”Madame, I must have time to restore my vigor,” he told her again.

”Can you not . . . well, is it not possible . . . ?” she attempted.

”Not at will since I was seventeen,” he said with a laugh. ”You will not be neglected, Nyssa, for I find you arouse me more than any woman I have ever known, but I am shortly to celebrate my thirtieth birthday, sweeting, and need a bit more time than when I was seventeen to regain my stamina. You are young, and I would have you well-satisfied lest you seek another lover and break my heart.”

”Ohhh, I should never seek a lover!” Nyssa declared. ”I am your wife, my lord. It would not be honorable to betray you.”

Wonderingly he shook his head. ”What loyalty do you have to me, Nyssa? A day ago my family entrapped you into marriage with me, and destroyed your reputation with the king. Surely such behavior is not deserving of loyalty. In time, I hope, you will come to fully love and trust me, but for now I should not blame you if you hated me.”

She sat cross-legged upon their bed, munching on her bread and meat, but she answered him honestly. ”Varian, did you not tell me yourself that when you refused to take part in your grandfather”s scheme, he threatened to put me in another”s bed, so you agreed to help him after all because secretly you loved me? Certainly such action on your part is deserving of my loyalty. You saved me from the Blessed Mother only knows what horrendous fate.”

”But you do not love me,” he answered her.

”Nay, I do not,” she replied frankly, ”but perhaps in time I shall. I cannot promise you that I will, but though we have been wed less than a full day, I find that I do like you. You are kind, and you have humor. I need to know you better, Varian.”

”Then you are not angry with me?” he said.

”Nay, not at you, but at your grandfather. I regret the way in which we were forced to wed. I regret that the king should think badly of either of us, even though we may not be important to him. I value the king”s friendship. I am saddened that he should believe that I betrayed that friendship by wanton behavior. We cannot tell him the truth, however.” She sighed, then continued, ”My mother did not know my father, Edmund Wyndham, when she married him. She had had but a single glimpse of him once from behind a hedge when he came to seek Grandfather”s permission to marry one of his daughters. He did not even know how many daughters my grandfather had, or how old they were. It was most outrageous of him.”

”And how was your mother chosen?” Varian de Winter asked her. He was fascinated by this tale of his unknown mother-in-law.

”She was the eldest,” Nyssa answered him. ”She was not quite sixteen. My grandfather”s flocks had twice been wiped out by disease. He was left virtually penniless with a fine estate, but no gold to dower any of his eight daughters. When the Earl of Langford appeared, and wanted one of his daughters to wife, Grandfather at first was suspicious, but he had never heard any ill spoken of Edmund Wyndham. My father told him that he was newly widowed and that he had no children. My grandmother”s fecundity was well-known in our region. My father reasoned that if my grandmother could bear healthy, living children, then certainly her daughters could as well. That is why he sought out the Morgans of Ashby.

”Still my grandfather demurred, but then Edmund Wyndham made him so handsome an offer he could not refuse him. My father agreed to take Mama without any dowry at all. Indeed he agreed to supply her with everything she needed. He would also dower Mama”s sisters and help my grandfather to restore his estates. Grandfather, of course, consented. He could do nothing else and be considered a reasonable man. Mama was furious. She believed that she had been bartered into marriage. My aunts, however, were simply delighted by their good fortune.

”My father”s nephew, Anthony Wyndham, came to marry Mama as proxy for his uncle, and to escort Mama to RiversEdge. She was furious, and says she detested Tony on sight, but I don”t believe it. She was prepared to hate my father too, but his charm, she says, won her over immediately upon her arrival at RiversEdge. She fell deeply in love with him. When he was killed in an accident, she blamed Tony. I was not even two, and Mama was with child again. She lost the baby, a son, and she hated Tony even more.

”My aunt Bliss brought her to court, and that is when the king saw her and fell in love with her. Tony had been in love with Mama since the first moment he had seen her, and now he followed her to court, and was devastated to learn of her favor with the king.”

”Like I love you,” Varian pointed out to Nyssa.

A sudden comprehension dawned in her eyes. ”Aye,” she said slowly. ”I suppose it is the same, but with Mama there was my father first. Tony would never have spoken up while my father lived. He nursed his passion in solitude, and no one was ever aware of it.”

”What happened when my cousin Mistress Anne Boleyn came?” Varian de Winter asked his wife. ”How did your mother come to marry Anthony Wyndham?”

”Tony was my father”s heir, as there was no living son. When he finally came up to court, it was with a mad plan. He intended to tell the king that my father had asked him on his deathbed to marry Mama and protect us. It was a ridiculous scheme, Mama says, for my father was killed instantly when his horse threw him; but Tony decided the king would not know that. The king, of course, was delighted to have an honorable means of ridding himself of Mama, since he was so fascinated by your cousin Anne. They were married in the king”s own chapel, as you and I were, and departed court immediately. Mama was outraged.”

”To be supplanted by my cousin?” Varian wondered aloud.

”Nay,” Nyssa told him. ”She had never wanted to be the king”s mistress in the first place, but how was she to refuse Henry Tudor? She realized that she would be but a diversion to him until another diversion came along. She is genuinely fond of his grace even to this day, however, and he of her.

”Mama was furious that Tony had been so bold as to claim her with a lie she dared not deny for fear of his life, when she was certain she hated him with all her heart. In time, however, he won her over. They are very much in love to this day.

”I have always called Tony ”Papa,” for indeed I cannot remember Edmund Wyndham. He and Mama always promised me that I should choose my own husband. It was a foolish promise to make, I fear. Marriages among people like us are not usually contracted for love, are they?”

”Nay,” he agreed with her, ”they are not.”

”So I am your wife, Varian,” Nyssa said quietly, ”in the eyes of God, and in those of man. I know how a wife must behave, and I will endeavor to do my duty by you and any children with which we may be blessed. More than that I cannot, nay, I will not promise. I think despite it all that I am fortunate in you as my husband.”

Her honesty charmed him. He could not imagine any other woman sitting cross-legged and naked upon a bed, in conversation with an equally naked man, being so charming. ”Every word you say, sweeting,” he told her, ”and every action you take, endears you to me all the more. I am not dissatisfied with this match, and I pray your parents will forgive me for the way in which it was brought about.”

”I think my uncle already approves of you, my lord. You still have to deal with my aunt, I fear. Then there is the matter of how my parents are to be told of this marriage between us.”

”Can we not wait until we return to RiversEdge?” he asked her. ”I should prefer to tell them face-to-face.”

She liked him for that. It was the action of an honorable man. ”Aye, that would be best, but we shall first have to win over Aunt Bliss. Lady Marlowe has her yet convinced that you are a villain.”

Varian”s face darkened. ”That woman”s tongue should be tied in a knot,” he muttered. ”She is the worst gossip at court!”

Nyssa giggled. ”What a marvelous suggestion!” She chuckled. Then she licked the few crumbs remaining from her meal off her fingers and smiled seductively at him. ”Come to bed now, my lord. You will catch your death of cold, and I shall have to spend our brief honeymoon nursing you with mustard poultices and herbal tea.”

”Do you not wish a piece of tartlet?” he tempted.

”Perhaps later,” she said with a small smile, and tossing back the covers on their bed, she beckoned him to join her.

”What manner of woman have I married?” he marveled at her.

”I do not think I know myself,” she replied, ”but we shall enjoy finding out together, won”t we, my lord?”

He burst out laughing. ”I said earlier that I should teach you to be naughty, Nyssa, but I do not think it necessary that I teach you. You are, I am pleased to say, quite naughty already.”

”You think me naughty because I enjoy your attentions, my lord? I would think you pleased.”

”I am pleased, sweeting. Do not think I am displeased by your actions. Nay, I am very pleased indeed,” Varian reassured his bride.

”If you are pleased with me, sir, then why do you stand halfway across the room by the fire?” she asked coquettishly.

He turned lazily and lay two more logs upon the fire. Then crossing the room, he climbed into bed with her. ”Now, madame,” he said, his look a smoldering one, ”precisely what is it you want of me?”

Nyssa slipped her arms about him and drew him down so that their lips were almost touching. ”Make love to me again, Varian,” she murmured softly against his mouth. ”I want your passion again.”

Gently he caressed her face. He had awakened her to the pleasures of passion, but once the novelty of it wore off, he knew that she would find passion a hollow thing without love between them. She was so very young, and innocent, but he had learned this evening that her heart was a good one. He could but pray God that he could win that heart as easily as he had won her lovely body. Tenderly he kissed her, and then he said, ”You may have my passion, Nyssa. It belongs to you even as my love belongs to you, my sweeting. It is yours forever.”

Forever, she thought muzzily, giving herself over to his kisses. It was a wonderful thought.