Dauntless by Tamara Leigh

Chapter Four

Castle L’Épée upon Solitaire

Normandy, France

Further she had shamed herself, dragging on the reins, sliding down the mare’s side, and dropping to her knees while the man who rejected her was pitying enough to stand alongside as she emptied her belly.

For a time, there was good in that shaming. Her nausea was mostly relieved, Godfroi had taken her up on his mount despite one of his men warning there could be more heaving, and they had resumed their course at a slower pace.

But now a different sort of churning. With the breaking of dawn, she was home where home should no longer be, and though the castle guard received permission to admit Godfroi and his party, neither sire nor stepmother greeted them before the donjon. Robine’s return would not be welcome, but it boded worse they showed her husband no respect.

As they began their ascent of the steps behind the captain of the guard, Godfroi’s men being allowed only as far as the stable to water and feed their mounts, once more Robine was tempted to beseech her husband to take her back to Valeur and promise whatever was asked of her. But if he truly intended to return for her, further protest could cause him to leave her here longer.

“Hear me, Robine,” he said low.

Grateful for his hand at her elbow, she looked up and pain lanced her breast when she saw how weary he appeared. When had he slept last? If the night before the contest, likely not well.

“Husband?” she intentionally named him in the hope he would not forget her as easily as he wished.

“I shall try to visit.”

It was of little comfort, but it was something.

“Once a year, mayhap twice,” he added.

That something reduced to nearly nothing, she swallowed a sob. “I am glad, but it sounds a very long time ere I will be Lady of Valeur.”

“As I have much to occupy me to secure my future, I cannot say when you will take your place, but I am certain it is best you remain here for now.”

My future, not ours.

But there all conversation—could it be called that—ended as one of the doors opened, granting them admittance.

“Hold to me!” Robine rasped when his hand loosened.

Though she regretted pleading that once more made her sound less than a woman, at least he did not refuse. Firming his hold, he drew her inside and led her toward the dais upon which her father reclined in a chair and her stepmother stood alongside. No others were here, not even her older brother who was a few years from completing his warrior’s training.

“This bodes ill for our alliance,” her sire called when they were halfway across the hall. “Dare not tell me you found my daughter lacking virtue, for she was closely watched these years to ensure purity.”

It was him Robine kept her eyes on, no easy thing for how florid his face, but he was the one in power—or mostly, his failing health seeing her stepmother given some command over matters beyond those of the household.

Godfroi drew Robine to a halt. “Baron L’Épée, Lady Delphine.”

The older man thrust his legs out before him. “Young D’Argent, now Baron of Valeur and my daughter’s husband.” He jutted his chin at Robine. “For what do you return her? Are you not man enough to make her your wife?”

Godfroi had been tense, but now more so.

Though she knew her sire could not resist baiting his former adversary, she wanted to scream. And great that desire, as if he insulted one for whom she had a good care.

Godfroi released her, drew her pack off his shoulder, and set it on the dais. As he returned to her side, so did another. When the feline slipped beneath her hem and rubbed against her lower calf, it took all her will not to snatch up the creature and bury her face in his fur.

“I believe when Robine is older she will serve well as Lady of Valeur,” Godfroi said.

Her stepmother gasped. “Older? She has flowered, and not of recent.”

“That does not mean she is ready to be a wife in full, Lady Delphine.”

“Of course she is! I was ready at her age, and her hips are nearly as wide as mine were to begin birthing children.” She looked down. “I stand by what I determined months past, Husband.”

He nodded. “She is a woman of good breeding—pretty, of pleasing shape, healthy. Her teeth could be straighter, but she will grow into them.”

“Thatis the thing,” Godfroi said. “She has more growing to do.”

Robine’s sire narrowed his gaze on her, poked his tongue in one cheek, then the other. “You say she is only a girl? That sounds an excuse to cover your deficiencies, D’Argent—to cast shame on my family rather than yours. Non, if the marriage bed does not please, it has naught to do with this woman, all to do with this…” He looked Godfroi up and down. “…boy who appears a man. Now take her home and do your duty.”

“Lord,” Robine breathed, and fear leapt higher when Godfroi stepped forward.

Hands clenched, one against his sword’s scabbard, he snarled, “No woman I know plays with dolls.”

Delphine’s gasp was like cold water in Robine’s face, and the eyes pinning her made her shiver. The same as she was required to leave behind her cat, she was to have left the doll.

“She stays with you until she is a woman,” Godfroi said. “When I determine she is that, I will take her from here.”

“Delphine?” Baron L’Épée said reproachfully, causing his wife to bend and speak something in his ear.

Momentarily, he closed his eyes, and when she straightened, once more he considered Robine. “We have much to discuss, Daughter.”

He was not looking for a response, and she was grateful, emotion over what lay ahead tempting her to wrench her purse from her belt and find a good hiding place for the doll before she could be overtaken.

“You want more of a woman, D’Argent?” her sire said. “We will see it done, and quickly so less our family suffer the shame of this.” He flung out a hand. “Go.”

Was the still of Godfroi hesitation? Might he reconsider?

As if wishing not to look upon the misery dealt her—wanting only to be gone from her—he turned and strode opposite.

Hearing the door close, feeling the cat turn its body around her other calf, Robine said, “Sire, I defied Delphine in taking my doll, but I was not playing with it when Godfroi saw it. It was my wedding day, and for a few moments I needed to…feel Mother’s presence.”

“Presence, Robine? Your mother is years dead, that doll but stuffed material.”

Nearly trodding on her cat, she hastened forward, ascended the dais, and pressed a hand to her purse. “I watched her make it for me, stood beside her as she gave it blue eyes just like hers. You watched as well, remember? You said it was a good likeness and hugged—”

“Delphine was with you on your wedding day,” he spoke over her. “She is mother enough.”

“She is not—” Robine jerked, not from a blow but a wrench that tore the purse from her girdle. “Non!” She grabbed at it, but her stepmother swung toward the curtained solar. “Pray, do not!” Robine cried as she sprang after Delphine.

“It is done!”

“As should have been done long ago,” her sire agreed.

But Robine was not done. Determined to regain what was lost, without permission she entered the solar.

* * *

Leave her,Godfroi counseled as he gripped the saddle’s pommel and set a foot in a stirrup. She is where she needs to be. They will rid her of the soft…the silly…the fragile. While you attend to matters of import, they will put away the girl of her.

But how? asked a voice he did not wish to hear. And will you want even less the woman she becomes? It does matter how it is done, just as it matters how a warrior is made.

“My lord?” prompted one who was more a friend than most, being a few years older and having received much of his training alongside the D’Argent brothers.

Godfroi removed his foot from the stirrup and turned to the chevalier who drew his horse near. The D’Argents were men of substantial height and breadth of shoulders, but possibly none were bigger than this man. And few as sharp of intellect, he confirmed when he saw understanding in those eyes. Though he wanted to ignore it, he ventured as never done, “What should I do, Olivier?”

The man chuckled. “She did not spew on you as feared. That is something.” He jerked his head toward the donjon beyond the outer bailey. “How did they receive her?”

“As expected, poorly.” And you made it worse, he reminded himself of anger that caused him to reveal the doll.

Olivier nodded. “Though it is for you to determine whether she of much import to your line should be in the hands of so great an enemy a marriage alliance was needed to end the warring, I would not leave her.”

Godfroi saw again the rage in Lady Delphine’s eyes, her set teeth and straining neck muscles.

“Though the young lady will oft be underfoot as you establish yourself as baron,” Olivier continued, “best your people are assured of stability with a L’Épée wife at your side—and best the woman of her is shaped by Lady Maëlys.”

His mother who needed more rest than he. That consideration nearly swung Godfroi into the saddle. However, the chevalier’s reasoning was so true, he was embarrassed he should need someone to work it through for him. Though it made him feel less a man, he was grateful for the counsel—and humbling of pride to seek it.

“You are right, Olivier. I should not have returned her.” Striding toward the stable doors, he called to the others, “Remain mounted. We depart as soon as I retrieve my wife.”

This time when he was admitted to the hall, only one was present. As Baron L’Épée watched the younger man advance, his only expression was a slight smile when a cat bounded from the dais into the visitor’s path, humped its back, and hissed.

Cats!Godfroi silently scorned as this one sprang beneath a trestle table. Were they not so efficient at keeping vermin from overrunning a castle, he would expel them.

He halted before the dais. “Where—?”

The baron shot up a hand, raised a finger, and turned his head as if listening for something.

Godfroi heard it—soft weeping beyond the curtains.

“She is there, receiving correction as you require,” L’Épée drawled.

Anger shot through Godfroi, and though surely it shone from him, the man but shrugged. Half hoping he would try to stop his son-in-law so these fists could be satisfied, Godfroi ascended the dais and thrust aside the curtains.

What he saw halted him. At the opposite end of the room near a brazier, Robine was on the floor hunched over her knees, hair curtaining her face. Standing before her was Lady Delphine who snapped her chin around and lowered the hand thrust toward her stepdaughter.

“I will put her away,” Robine spoke tear-soaked words. “I promise. And I will become a woman very fast so you suffer me no longer.”

“Baron D’Argent!” her stepmother found her voice. “It is inappropriate for you to be here.”

Robine thrust back on her heels, and holding something to her chest, landed bright eyes on Godfroi where he stood before swaying curtains.

Only tears,he thought, having expected a face flushed by slaps. But that did not mean it would not be so had he come later.

“We have accepted the burden of further educating her,” said Lady Delphine. “Now leave.”

He strode forward. “I shall—with my wife.”

“Godfroi?” Robine gasped and began rising.

As he caught her up beside him, he saw she held the doll. Though tempted to snatch it from her and cast it on the brazier’s coals, he turned his girl-wife from the gaping Delphine and urged her across the solar.

“My purse,” she rasped.

He swept it from the floor, then they were through the curtains. When he paused to shoulder her pack beneath L’Épée’s watch, he noted the man’s slight smile was less slight than before. Because he liked the weakness shown by his former enemy?

“Sire?” Robine entreated as if seeking his blessing.

He inclined his head. “Fare thee well, Daughter.”

Godfroi kept hold of her all the way to the outer bailey now striped with morning light. At his pace and that she continued to clasp the accursed doll, his support was needed.

Halting between inner portcullis and stables, he said, “Give it to me.”

With dread she said, “Why?”

“Do you wish my men to see it? To know what I know?”

Her eyes swept back to his, and with surprising defiance, she snapped, “What you think you know.”

Argument threatening to further delay their departure, he sighed. “I wish only to put it away, Robine.”

Her eyes all over his face, he thought she would refuse, but then like an offering, she extended the doll in both hands.

“Lord,” he growled, not because the plaything’s gown was burned, but that Robine’s right hand was inflamed thumb to wrist.

“She tossed it on the coals,” he bit, more disgusted with himself than Delphine since he had considered doing the same. “And the little fool of you retrieved it.”

“Do not be angry, Godfroi. It is much more than a toy to me.”

Her explanation would have to wait, though he did struggle between using the time between then and now to sooner depart or return to the donjon and do something he would regret.

“You are more trouble than you are worth, Robine L’Épée,” he muttered and took the doll.

“D’Argent,” she said as he shoved it and her purse in the pack. “I am Robine D’Argent, your wife.”

Far sooner than I wish, he thought as he drew her forward, then certain he would never wish such a wife on himself, corrected, Far sooner than necessary.

They should have departed immediately. However, when he started to lift her atop her mare and she snatched back the hand set on his shoulder, he took the time to salve and bandage her injury, giving his men more cause to be in accord with L’Épée who thought their baron weak. And since that injured hand would make it difficult to handle reins and stay astride, once more he decided she should ride with him.

“My cat!” she exclaimed as he passed her mare’s lead to Olivier.

Was the slinky little creature in the stable’s doorway the same as the one in the hall? Godfroi wondered, then urged his mount forward.

“Godfroi, can we not take—?”

“You have your doll! That is enough to ask of me.”

He heard her swallow, then she said with what had to be courage drawn from the deep, “It is.”

He hoped those would be her last words until they reached Castle D’Argent, and it seemed possible since she had to be nearly as weary as he. But as he and his men guided their horses across the drawbridge, she asked, “Why did you come back for me?”

“We will speak later.”

“I cannot be more grateful, Husband.”

“Oui, you can.”

Her head came around, and he saw tears had become eagerness. “How, Godfroi? Tell me!”

“By putting aside all things childish to become what is required of the wife of the Baron of Valeur.”

Feeling her disappointment, he was glad she turned forward again lest once more her eyes moistened. “I will do that, Husband.” However, her good intentions slipped after they began their journey in earnest. “Look! I think that my cat!”

She was observant, Godfroi having caught its movement just ahead of her. He had thought it a fox in flight, whether pursued or being pursued, but though it remained mostly a blur, something fatalistic told him it was her cat.

“It is a fox,” he said.

“Non, it—”

“A fox, Robine. Now settle and sleep.”

Though she did neither while the animal remained in sight, she went silent.

Two hours later, when they paused to water the horses and he led her to a fallen tree and gave her a wineskin and dried meat, she appeared fairly composed.

“Will you not sit with me?” she asked as he turned away.

“I must speak with my men.”

“But I would tell of my doll.”

Grudgingly accepting that since there was naught of import to discuss with his men, it was best she explain now, he lowered. “I listen,” he said and took the wineskin from her.

There shall be my lips as well, Robine thought as he put the spout to his mouth. Wheresoever Godfroi D’Argent goes, so shall his wife. And sooner than he thinks, that I will be in all ways.

She closed her eyes and, remembering his appearance in the solar when all hope was lost, forgave him for not allowing her cat to accompany them. And prayed if the creature seen beyond her sire’s walls was her pet, it returned safely.

“I wait,” Godfroi said.

“Apologies,” she said and took the skin he offered. After a swallow of watered wine that reminded her of all the drink imbibed on the night past, she recapped the vessel and set it between them. “My mother made the doll when I was little and we were happy—or mostly. Since her blue eyes were much prettier than my grey, I asked her to paint the doll’s that color and make all of it look like her.”

Seeing Godfroi draw a breath of patience, she continued, “As a girl, I did play with the doll and for a time after my mother…” She moistened her lips. “…died. But then Delphine took her place, and when babes started coming, I was told to put away my cloth baby and help with real ones. Though I have not played with it since, I brought it to Valeur—for memory only.”

Godfroi set his elbows on his thighs, clasped his hands between his knees, and turned his attention to them. She bored, hopefully not so much he began yawning.

She cleared her throat. “Ere the contest, I overheard a conversation between Lady Herleva and Duke William in which I learned my sire could be responsible for the death of my future husband’s father, then of the lady’s concern that if peace proved impossible, I could pay for that rumor. It so distressed I took the doll from my purse. When my stepmother discovered me beneath the stand where I had gone to be alone, I ran, unaware still I held to it until I happened on you and your brother in the gatehouse.” She set a hand atop her husband’s. “It was not for play, Godfroi. It was for the comfort of being near my mother on a day she was greatly missed.”

He turned his head slightly, raised his eyebrows as if to ask if she was done.

Her heart sank. Did he see a girl still? If not one who played with dolls, then one who hid and ran and could prove incapable of becoming the confident wife he required?

A chuckle drew her attention to his men farther down the stream. Seeing one avert his gaze, it occurred her explanation would have been better received outside the presence of those who now counted Godfroi their lord—all older than he and having witnessed the seemingly impulsive return of his bride then her retrieval.

She was not the only one who must prove herself. Her husband must do so as well, and if she made that burden heavier, more he would regret wedding her.

She removed her hand from his. “I am a woman,” she said. “It is true I am not yet the one you need at your side, but I will become her, and sooner if your mother aids me.”

“My mother,” he rumbled as if that was the wrong thing to say.

But how could it be wrong for her to seek the guidance of the lady whose household would become Robine’s? Surely she would want to train up her daughter-in-law to best serve her son and their people. And Robine had sensed no dislike of herself. Indeed, the lady was almost kind while putting her son’s bride to bed.

Seeing a muscle convulse at Godfroi’s jaw, she said again, “I will become who you need me to be.”

He nodded and stood.

A nod. Only a nod!

Better that than a shake of the head,she tried to talk down anger that could give him reason to toss her back over her sire’s walls. She had to believe she would have succeeded, but it could not be known for the sudden commotion among the men toward whom her husband strode.

The chevalier named Olivier was the cause, shouting something that made his companions laugh, lunging downstream, jumping to the opposite bank, and going from sight. How such a big man could move so fast was shocking, but more shocking was what he had by the scruff of the neck when he returned.

“Cat!” Robine sprang off the log, whipped up her skirts, and ran toward Olivier who had returned to this side. But as if she were a child going into danger, Godfroi caught her back.

She looked around. “But my cat is—?”

“Composure, Wife!”

Determinedly, she pressed her lips.

“Your cat, indeed, Lady Robine,” Sir Olivier said, “and I would not want to be near when he—” Without breaking stride, he turned the suspended animal toward him and verified it was male. “Oui, I would not want to be near when his strength is recovered.”

Then her cat was merely exhausted from keeping pace with the horses, which surely would have been impossible had they ridden hard as not done in consideration of Robine.

The chevalier halted, and as she reached for the limp creature whose eyes were dull and tongue protruded, he asked, “My lord?”

Godfroi was not pleased. She felt it in his hand on her, but he said, “Is it safe?”

“Easily I ran it to ground, and it put up little fight. Methinks there no harm in passing him to your wife, especially since he must be fond of her.”

“Pray, Godfroi, the poor thing needs me,” Robine entreated.

“Another cat,” he muttered and released her.

When Robine drew in her pet, it swung its head toward Olivier and hissed half-heartedly.

“Graceless in defeat,” the chevalier pronounced.

“See it bundled tightly, Robine,” Godfroi ordered, “else it will travel the remainder of the way in a pack.”

Without argument from her nor the listless creature who took only a little water, it was done, then Robine’s husband lifted her and her armful into the saddle and swung up behind.

As he urged his horse toward the others, she peered over her shoulder. “I begin to like you, Godfroi.”

He did not respond, but better that than he voice the displeasure in his eyes. Robine sighed. With Godfroi, would it ever be better one thing than another?