Dauntless by Tamara Leigh

Chapter Six

Just as in the dream, Robine soared. Not as in the dream, her flight was arrested by a loosening hand that suddenly tightened. Though she dropped, it was to her knees before Godfroi rather than face down on the opposite side of the solar. Still, it was a hard landing that made her cry out and Cat spring from beneath the bed.

A hand clapped over her mouth, an arm slid around her waist, and she was yanked onto her husband’s lap. “God’s rood, Woman! You will awaken those in the hall—have you not already and them now of a mind I beat you.”

Woman! she silently gloried, barely feeling ache in her knees as she stared at him above a warm, calloused hand. He named me a woman!

Cat hissed, and when Robine looked sidelong, she saw he was humped up, tail down, teeth bared.

“Silence, rat catcher!” Godfroi snarled and kicked a leg its direction, causing Cat to meow-growl and lunge from sight.

Robine would have been angered had he landed the blow, but though he had more than enough reach, he had not. Also of note was his bared leg evidencing he had shed his chausses.

Returning her gaze to him, she ignored his scowl as once more she clasped close the joy of being named a woman.

“Almighty, what were you thinking, Girl?” he demanded.

A girl again…

As she sighed into his palm, he said, “Has no one ever told you the folly of stealing upon a warrior?”

She nodded, and when he removed his hand, said, “My sire.”

He muttered what sounded a curse. “Either much you defied him, else you do not esteem your husband for a warrior.”

“But I do! How could I not after your magnificent display in the arena?”

His shoulders rose with breath. “Then you are reckless, and that is a bad thing.”

“I am not. I just…” She bit her lip.

“Speak!”

Looking all around the edges of his face and down to his shoulders, she determined that since she had naught to lose, she would be honest. “I wanted to feel it.”

His eyebrows nearly met. “What?”

Though she might provide proof of the girl though she had explained away the doll now lovingly bundled at the bottom of her trunk, she twisted around. Dropping a knee to the trunk on either side of him, hearing her husband’s sharp breath, she rose up before him.

“I speak of the silver.” Face nearly level with his, she pushed fingers into his hair and drew strands out to their ends. “It is as if after the Lord formed all of Godfroi D’Argent, He decided there was too much black about him and painted in bits of silver to remind him there must be light as well.”

She smiled, drew more through her fingers, let it fall to his shoulders. “I feel no difference between your hair and mine, but it is there.”

As if gone very dry, he swallowed, then in a taut voice said, “What is there?”

Wondering at something in his eyes not seen before, she lowered her bottom to his knees. “You have been marked as special. I am certain of it.”

His jaw shifted. “And I mark you as a fanciful girl.”

She did feel small being so near one forever removed from boyhood, but she felt other things as well—intense awareness that both wore the lightest of garments, and a longing to be nearer and once more named a woman as she thought possible he struggled against doing in that moment.

Recalling that the maid who assured her the gifting of a woman’s virtue was not as bad as birthing a child had drawn men to her by way of fluttering lashes, secretive smiles, and moistening of lips, Robine tried all in succession.

For it, his eyes narrowed.

Wondering if that and a frown could be counted as encouragement, she said, “If fanciful, then a fanciful woman.”

Of a sudden, he lifted her off, set her on her feet, and stood.

“Husband?”

“For this, most consider you a woman,” he said, then pulled her around to her side of the bed.

“This?”

He pushed her to sitting on the mattress. “Though you are not without wiles, Robine L’Épée—”

“D’Argent!”

He grunted. “Though my wife is not without wiles, there is much trial and error ahead ere she is capable of tempting a man to abandon good judgment.”

Eyes stinging, she lowered her gaze. Unsettled by his muscled calves beneath the tunic’s hem, she took some moments to compose herself, then raised her chin. “You do not see the woman of me because you do not wish to.”

When briefly he closed his eyes, candlelight on his face revealed lines of fatigue surely responsible for him making a bed of his trunk. “Non, Robine, it is because we are in very different places and there is much distance between them.”

This time when she moistened her lips, it was with little thought. “When will you make me your wife in full, Godfroi?”

“When you are far nearer the place I am to be found. It could be two years, three, four—”

“Four!” she cried and, seeing his hand rise to once more cover her mouth, clapped her own over it.

He sighed. “I know not how long, only that it depends more on you than me.”

She lowered her hand. “Whether two, three, or four years, I will be of an age when most wives have given their husbands at least one child.”

“Those who survive being nearly children themselves when they birth,” he reminded her of the high mortality of women pushing babes from small bodies, and she needed no one to tell her this body, despite developing curves, was smaller than most of her age.

“Until your husband deems you a woman, you will stay on your side of the bed and I on mine, Robine.”

She was on the verge of accepting her argument lost when she recalled another thing that could cause their marriage to be consummated sooner rather than later. “If I do not soon grow round with child, it will be believed there is something wrong me.”

“I know it is hard to ignore those voices, but they matter not.”

“Your mother—”

“Concurs it is best we wait.”

She gasped. “You discussed this with her?”

“How could I not? There were no morning-after sheets to display the purity of my bride and consummation. And of course, neither were we here that morn.”

She longed to point out he was to blame, but held her tongue.

“Too, their absence reflects as poorly on me as you, Robine.”

That had not occurred though it should have, her sire having baited him over not being man enough to make her his wife in full. Others might not dare, but they would think it.

“Well, then…” She glanced at the sheet beneath her. “If we are to wait, can we not…sprinkle a little blood and hang it out a day late?”

Something nearly a smile surprised her. “Better than never, I suppose.” He extended a hand.

She did not understand what he offered—until struck by the length of one of two healing wounds dealt by his brother during the contest. Tending the injuries of menfolk was a duty of as much import as keeping a household in order, but one that eluded her for the rise of bile over sight of what readily flowed from cuts and punctures and glimpses of what lay beneath the skin.

Do it, she silently commanded, or he will count it further proof you are not a woman.

“Non?” he prompted. “You have not the—”

“I do!” She snatched his hand and raked off a scab, and though she wanted to avert her gaze, did not. Then she turned his hand, tugged it down, and wiped it across the sheet. “It is done.”

He pulled free and, bare legged, went to the other side of the bed.

As she peered at him across her shoulder, he cast back the coverlet. When he lowered, his muscled weight caused the mattress to tilt his direction, and as he settled his head on the pillow, he moved his eyes to her.

“Sleep, Robine.”

“I am no longer tired.”

“But I am. If you can find no further rest, occupy your mind with this—pleasing my mother.”

She swung her legs onto the bed and turned to him. “How am I to do that?”

He lowered his lids but said, “She will shepherd you in becoming worthy of replacing her as Lady of Valeur. Though the burden of administering the barony is now mine, since long she has carried most of it, she deserves rest. Thus, do not test her patience. Attend well, show respect, and do not ask of her things your own efforts can see done and made right.”

“I will please her.”

When he did not respond, she guessed he had fallen asleep and set to studying his face.

“Think on my mother,” he growled and turned away from her.

Robine intended to, but the slide of his hair to the pillow exposed something between the lower curve of his neck and upper reach of his shoulder.

A mark of birth? No sooner thought than it occurred it was one bestowed by the hand of man rather than God. Here what was given to differentiate baby boy from baby boy. But what was the symbol?

Wishing for more candlelight, she waited several minutes for sleep to fully claim him, then leaned nearer. “G…D,” she breathed and knew his brother’s read HD.

Though tempted to touch the tattoo as done his hair, for fear this time she would be flung across the solar, she did not.

“You have seen it,” Godfroi grumbled. “Now leave me be.”

“Oh!” she chirped, then asked, “For this, you and your brother keep your hair long rather than in the style preferred by most Normans?”

He groaned. “It makes it more difficult to tell one from the other, but now the contest is done, I shall cut it.”

She gasped. “But I like—”

“Robine!”

Realizing she pestered him, and acknowledging perhaps she was more a girl than believed—though just a little—she said, “Forgive me,” and turned and settled into her pillow.

Lady Maëlys, she reminded herself as she stared at the wall opposite. How best do I please she who shall aid me in sooner becoming the woman her son requires?

A low meow of the questioning sort made her peer over the side.

“Cat,” she whispered. “Come!”

“Do not invite that animal onto our bed, Robine!”

Though Godfroi’s words caused her nearly springing pet to still, once again affront was averted, this time by him acknowledging the bed was also hers.

Still, she wanted to argue, but would a woman do that? Deciding on a tact used by her mother, she said, “Just as this home is new to me, so it is to Cat. Thus, we would but comfort each other. I vow he will stay on my side.”

It had to be good Godfroi did not immediately refuse. And yet strange what he chose as a response. “Is that truly his name—Cat?”

“It is.”

Hearing him turn to his back, she turned to hers and met his gaze.

“If one is going to give an animal a name, why such an unimaginative one, Robine?”

“He had to be called something, and as Lady Delphine said it was barely tolerable giving a dog a name and utterly intolerable bestowing one on a cat, I feared if I defied her she would not allow me to keep him, so…” She shrugged. “Cat!”

As if she had called her pet to her, it sprang onto the mattress.

Robine gasped, not from surprise but anticipation of Godfroi’s reaction to the trespass. Surprise was all for him not immediately loosing aggression, but it was coming as told by the jerk of his body. And surely Cat felt it where he tensed against her arm and rumbled low as if daring her husband to deny him his place beside his mistress.

Robine knew she should push him off, but Cat would be so offended he would bound aloft again—and possibly into the space between her and the man surely believed the trespasser here.

Turning from Godfroi, Robine hooked an arm around Cat, drew his body to hers, and curled around him as her husband ought to be curled around her.

Silence. Lest it was of the dangerous sort, she struggled for a way to break it as well as distract Godfroi from the third body in their bed. What first came to mind was a question that had pecked at her since he acknowledged awareness of that terrible rumor.

“Godfroi, why did you name it only rumor my sire could be responsible for the death of your father? I would think…” She trailed off.

But it was soon apparent he was not going to help her. Because he refused to be distracted from the animal in their bed? Because he did not truly believe it only rumor? Certes, not because he slept. One thing she had learned upon this mattress was he did not soon succumb to that vulnerable state—at least, not in her presence.

Might that be a good thing? she wondered, then yanked herself away from wiles he told were wanting and said, “Considering the ill between our families these years, I would expect you to believe it no mere rumor.”

“I think it more unlikely than likely your sire was involved,” he said, and she sighed over distracting him from Cat and what sounded almost certainty about the rumor. “Did I not, I would not have wed you.”

“I am relieved.”

“You have naught to fear from me,” he rebuked. “Even should it be learned Baron L’Épée did my family great harm, I know you are not your sire—not even a bystander.”

Heart thumping against her ribs, eyes moistening, she peered over her shoulder at where he lay in profile. “I am glad you are my husband, Godfroi.”

His chuckle was scornful. “So says one who alluded to a preference for Hugh.”

“I did. Indeed, I agreed to Lady Herleva’s suggestion we wager on who would win the contest and chose your brother as victor. And lost.”

“What did William’s mother win from you?” he asked.

“A favor.”

“What favor?”

“I know not. She said she would collect it in future.”

“Little fool. Regardless of the game played, do not engage until you know what the victor may gain, whether that victor is you or your opponent.”

“It seemed harmless. And she was very kind.”

“With her, that may be so, but not others. So here a lesson—what appears harmless can prove the most dangerous, leaving one more vulnerable to attack.”

She could have been offended by him thinking to educate her, but he was right. Touched he cared enough to protect her, she said, “I think I start to love you, Godfroi.”

More silence, and not of the pondering sort.

“Have you naught to say to me?” she ventured, not expecting a profession of movement toward great feeling, but thinking he ought to offer some encouragement.

“If it pleases you to believe yourself in love and it aids in keeping peace between us, I think it good. But know this—I will not return feelings of such depth that the fall into them seriously weakens a warrior do they not break him.” Before she could get her head above those hurtful words, he continued, “When you are a woman and we have made children as expected of all good alliances, I believe I will have some fondness for you, and with that you must be satisfied.”

More hurtful words, but though she told herself to ignore them, she said defiantly, “Still I will love you.”

He sighed. “So speaks the girl. Wait until you are a woman in truth to make such professions.” Then once more he gave her his back.

How he angered! But better that than—

She muffled a yelp of frustration, then determined not to think on disparagement of her feelings, congratulated herself on her facility with distraction that caused Godfroi to forget Cat who began purring when she tucked him nearer.

For now, this is affection enough, she told herself. In time, I will prove my husband wrong. Then he will be the one professing love for me.

Unbeknownst to her, he sought his own counsel. Amid the dark behind his lids, he assured himself his actions and words were appropriate, that better his girl-wife be in no doubt about his feelings regardless of how much they hurt hers. And it benefitted him as well, though when first he looked upon her holding the doll, he had no cause to believe the benefit would be so great.

During the return ride from Castle L’Épée, he had become more aware of what lay beyond the girl, but it had not threatened his resolve to delay consummation—until this eve when she came around, rose to her knees before him, and put her hands in his hair. So beautifully tousled was she and so intimate the gesture, his body had sought to persuade him she was fully woman.

However, hardly had he acceded his mother was right about a chaste marriage of great length being difficult if not impossible, than his wife had attempted to work her wiles on him. Thankfully, they had been so awkward, once more he had seen the girl. And a younger one when he seated her on the mattress that made her look very small against the canvas of the bed.

Still, not four years until consummation and likely not even three, he told himself as sleep pulled a soft blanket over him. Two years should suffice.