Rogan stopped his thoughts and looked at the shirt again. She’d not wanted to wash his clothes. What she’d wanted was a good tumble in the grass. When she didn’t get it, she’d had her revenge on him, and revenge was something Rogan understood very well.
In spite of his anger, in spite of the fact that he was now going to have to go to the expense of new clothes, he looked at the sunlight shining through the holes in his shirt and he did something he rarely did: He smiled. Saucy wench, she wasn’t afraid of him. She had risked a well-deserved beating when she’d pounded holes in his clothes. If he’d caught her, he would have…He would probably have given her the tumble she wanted, he thought, still smiling.
He tossed the shirt into the air, caught it, then began to dress. He felt better now about marrying the Neville heiress. Perhaps after his marriage he’d find the blonde beauty and see if he could give her what she wanted. Maybe he’d take her with him and maybe he’d fill her belly with the nine brats she claimed to have.
Once dressed, he mounted his horse and rode up the bank to where his brother and his men waited.
“We’ve waited long enough,” Severn said. “Have you built your courage now? Can you face the girl?”
Rogan’s humor left his face. “If you want to keep that tongue of yours, you’ll hold it still. Mount and ride. I go to marry a woman.”
Severn went to his waiting horse, and as he put his foot in the stirrup, something blue in the grass caught his attention. He picked it up and saw that it was a piece of yarn. He dropped it again and gave it no more thought as he rode after his hardheaded brother.
“My lady,” Joice said again, then waited. But Liana made no response. “My lady!” she said louder, but still no response. Joice looked at Liana staring out the window, her mind far away. She had been this way since yesterday, when she’d returned from her ride. Perhaps it was her impending marriage—the messenger had been sent to Lord Stephen this morning—or perhaps it was something else altogether. Whatever it was, Liana was not telling anyone. Joice eased out of the room and closed the heavy oak door.
Liana hadn’t slept during the night and she’d given up all attempts at work. She just sat on the window seat in her room and stared at the village below. She watched people scurrying, laughing, cursing.
The door opened with a bang. “Liana!”
There was no possibility of ignoring the angry, hate-filled voice of her stepmother. Liana turned cool eyes to her. “What do you want?” She couldn’t look at Helen’s beauty without seeing Lord Stephen’s smiling face, his eyes shifting to the gold salver on the mantel.
“Your father wants you to come to the Hall. He has guests.”
There was a bitterness in Helen’s voice that piqued Liana’s curiosity. “Guests?”
Helen turned away. “Liana, I don’t think you should go down. Your father will forgive you; he forgives you everything. Tell him you have seen this man and do not want him. Tell him you have given your heart to Lord Stephen and want no one else.”
Now Liana was indeed interested. “What man?”
Helen turned back to look at her stepdaughter. “It’s one of those dreadful Peregrines,” she said. “You probably don’t know of them, but my former husband’s land was near theirs. For all their long line of ancestors, they are poor as a honey-wagon driver—and about as clean.”
“So what do these Peregrines have to do with me?”
“Two of them arrived last night and the oldest one says he has come to marry you.” Helen threw up her hands. “It’s like them. They don’t ask for your hand—they announce that one of the filthy beasts is here to marry you.”
Liana remembered another filthy man, a man who had kissed her and teased her. “I am pledged to Lord Stephen. The acceptance to his proposal has already been sent.”
Helen sat down on the bed and weariness made her shoulders droop. “That’s what I’ve told your father, but he won’t listen. These men brought two huge hawks as gifts for him, two big peregrine falcons like their name, and Gilbert has spent all night with them recounting one hawking story after another. He is convinced they are the best of men. He doesn’t notice the stench of them, the poverty of them. He ignores the stories of their brutality. Their father wore out four wives.”
Liana looked steadily at her stepmother. “Why do you care who I marry? Isn’t one man as good as another? What you want is for me to get out of your house, so what difference does it make who I marry?”
Helen put her hand on her growing belly. “You will never understand,” she said tiredly. “I merely want to be mistress in my own house.”
“While I must leave and go to some man who—”
Helen put up her hand. “It was a mistake for me to try to talk to you. Go to your father, then. Let him marry you off to this man, who will probably beat you, a man who will take every penny you have and leave you without so much as the clothes on your back. Clothes! Clothes are nothing to these men. The oldest one dresses worse than the kitchen boys. When he moves, you can see holes in his filthy garments.” She heaved herself off the bed. “Hate me if you must, but I pray that you do not ruin your life merely to do what I say you should not.” She left the room.
Liana wasn’t much interested in this new man who had announced he planned to marry her. Men like him had been coming night and day for months now. For her part, she couldn’t see a great deal of difference in them. Some were old, some were young, some had brains, some did not. What they had in common was a desire for the Neville money. What they wanted was—
“Holes in his clothes?” Liana said aloud, her eyes wide. “Holes in his clothes?”
Joice came into the room, “My lady, your father—”
Liana pushed past her maid and ran down the steep spiral stairs. She had to see this man, had to see him before he saw her. At the bottom of the stairs she ran out the door and through the courtyard, past knights lounging about, past horses waiting for riders, past spitcock boys resting in the sun, and into the kitchen. The enormous open fireplaces made the rabbit warren of rooms feverishly hot, but Liana kept running. She pulled open a little door near the slophole and went up the steep stone stairs to the musicians’ gallery. She put her finger to her lips to silence the fiddle player as he started to address her.
The musicians’ gallery was a wooden balcony at one end of the Great Hall, with a waist-high wooden rail blocking the musicians from view. Liana stood in one corner of the gallery and looked down into the Hall.
It was him.
The man she’d seen yesterday, the man who had kissed her, sat at her father’s right hand, an enormous falcon on a perch between them. Sunlight streaming through the windows seemed to make the red in his hair catch fire.
Liana leaned back against the wall, her heart pounding. He wasn’t a peasant. He had said he was off to do some courting, and he’d meant her. He had come to marry her.
“My lady, are you all right?”
Liana waved the harpist away and looked back at the men below, not sure of what she’d seen. There were two men with her father, but to her eyes, she could see only one of them. The dark man seemed to dominate the hall with his sprawling way of sitting and the intensity with which he spoke and listened. Her father laughed and the blond man laughed, but her man did not.
Her man? Her eyes widened at the thought.
“What is his name?” she whispered to the harpist.
“Who, my lady?”
“The dark man,” she said impatiently. “There, that one. Below.”
“Lord Rogan,” the musician answered. “And his brother is—”
“Rogan,” she murmured, not caring about the blond man. “Rogan. It suits him.” Her head came up. “Helen,” she said, then flung open the door and started running again. Down again through the kitchens, past a dog fight the men were laying odds on, across the cobbled yard to the south tower, then up the stairs, nearly knocking over two maids who had their arms full of laundry, and into the solar. Helen sat before a t
apestry frame and barely glanced up when Liana came rushing in.
“Tell me about him,” Liana demanded, panting from her run.
Helen was still smarting from Liana’s remarks of an hour before. “I know nothing about any man. I am merely a servant in my own home.”
Liana grabbed a stool from against the wall and went to sit before Helen. “Tell me all you know about this Rogan. Is he the one who has asked for me? Reddish hair? Big, dark? Green eyes?”
Every person in the solar came to a standstill. Lady Liana had never shown the least interest in a man before.
Helen looked at her stepdaughter with concern. “Yes, he is a beautiful man, but can you not see more than his beauty?”
“Yes, yes, I know, his clothes are crawling with lice. Or they were until I—Tell me what you know of him,” Liana demanded.
Helen did not understand this young woman at all, but she’d never seen her so alive, so flushed, so pretty. A feeling of dread was spreading over her. Sensible, sane, mature Liana could not possibly fall for a man’s beauty. There had been hundreds of handsome men here in the last months and not one of them—
“Tell me!”
Helen sighed. “I don’t know a lot about them. Their family is old. It’s said their ancestors fought with King Arthur, but a few generations ago the eldest Peregrine gave the dukedom, the family seat, and the money to the family of his second wife. He had his eldest children declared illegitimate. After he was dead, the wife married a cousin of hers and the son of Peregrine became a Howard. Now the Howards own the title and the lands that once belonged to the Peregrines. That’s all I know. The king declared all the Peregrines bastards and they were left with two decaying old castles, a minor earldom, and nothing else.”
Helen leaned toward Liana. “I have seen where they live. It is hideous. The roof has fallen in places. It’s filthy beyond belief, and those Peregrines care nothing for dirt or lice or meat covered with maggots. They live for only one thing and that is to revenge themselves on the Howards. This man Rogan doesn’t want a wife. He wants the Neville money so he can wage war on the Howards.”
Helen took a breath. “The Peregrines are horrible men. They care only for war and death. When I was a child there were six sons, but four of them have been killed. Maybe only these two are left, or perhaps the men breed sons like rabbits.”
On impulse, Helen took Liana’s hand. “Please do not consider this man. He would eat you alive for breakfast.”
Liana’s head was reeling. “I am made of stronger stuff than you think,” she whispered.
Helen drew back. “No,” she whispered. “Do not think of it. You cannot consider marriage to the man.”
Liana looked away from her stepmother. Perhaps there was some other reason Helen wanted to keep her away from Rogan. Perhaps she wanted him for herself. Perhaps they had been lovers when she’d lived near him, while her first husband was alive.
Liana was about to say as much when Joice entered the room.
“My lady,” she said to Liana. “Sir Robert Butler has arrived. He asks for your hand in marriage.”
“Accept him,” Helen said instantly. “Accept him. I know his father. An excellent family.”
Liana looked from Joice to Helen and knew she could take no more. She pushed past the two women and hurried down the stairs, Helen and Joice following her as fast as they could.
In the courtyard below stood eleven men, all splendidly dressed, their velvet tunics trimmed in gold, their caps fashionably arranged in the latest extravagance, jewels on their fingers sparkling in the sunlight.
Liana tried to pass them to reach the stables in the outer courtyard. A hard ride might clear her head. But Helen stopped her by grabbing her elbow.
“Sir Robert?” Helen said.
Reluctantly, Liana turned to look at the man. He was young, handsome, with dark brown hair and eyes. He was beautifully dressed and he smiled at her sweetly.
She hated him at first sight.
“This is my stepdaughter, Lady Liana,” Helen said. “How is your father?”
Liana stood there stiffly, listening to the two of them exchange pleasantries and wanting desperately to get away. She had to go somewhere and think, for she had the decision of her life to make. Should she marry a man who smirked at her, who made her wash his clothes?
“I’m sure Liana would love to go with you. Wouldn’t you, Liana?” Helen asked.
“What?”
“Sir Robert has agreed to accompany you on your ride. He will protect you from any harm as well as your own father would, won’t you, Sir Robert?”
Liana hated the way Helen smiled at the man. Was she actually sleeping with men besides her husband? “And who will protect me from him?” Liana said sweetly, looking at Helen. “But then I wear no jewels, so perhaps I’ll be safe.”
Helen gave Liana a quelling look. “My stepdaughter is indeed amusing.” She glared at Liana. “But not too amusing, I hope.” She pushed Liana forward. “Go with him,” she hissed.
Hesitantly, Liana walked through to the outer courtyard, where her horse was stabled.
“I had hoped to win your hand because of your father’s lands,” Sir Robert said in a pleasant voice, “but now that I have seen you, you are a prize in yourself.”
“Oh?” She stopped and turned to face him. “Are my eyes like emeralds or sapphires?”
His eyes widened in surprise. “I would say sapphires.”
“My skin is like ivory or the finest satin?”
He gave her a little smile. “I would say the petals of the whitest rose.”
Her eyes hardened. “And my hair?”
His smile widened. “Your hair is hidden.”
She jerked off her headdress. “Gold?” she asked angrily.
“Sunlight on gold.”
She turned away from him angrily and missed seeing Sir Robert’s repressed laughter.
“Would you allow me to escort you on a ride?” he asked politely. “I swear on my mother’s soul that I will not compliment one part of your lovely form. I will call you a hag if you so wish.”
She didn’t look back at him as she went toward her horse, which the stableboy was already saddling. She didn’t find anything humorous in what he was saying. Of course he’d tell her she was a hag. He’d say anything she wanted him to.
She ignored him as she rode through the outer gate, across the drawbridge, and toward the nearby forest. She didn’t think about where she was going, but she headed for the pond. Behind her, she knew Sir Robert was having a difficult time keeping up with her, but she didn’t slow down for him.
When she halted near the edge of the pond, she sat still on her horse for a moment, remembering yesterday, when she’d seen Rogan lying there. She smiled in memory of the look on his face when she’d slammed the muddy clothes into his chest.
“My lady is as good a rider as she is beautiful,” Sir Robert said as he reined his horse near hers. When Liana started to dismount, he protested that he must help her.
She spent two hours with him at the pond and found him to be an utterly perfect man. He was kind, considerate, pleasant, and learned, and he treated her as if she were a fragile flower that might break at any second. He talked to her about love songs and fashions and assumed she’d be wildly interested in what was going on at King Henry’s court. Three times Liana tried to direct the talk to land management and the price of wool, but Sir Robert would hear none of it.
All the time she was with him she kept thinking about the time she’d spent with Lord Rogan. He was a dreadful man, of course. He was dirty, demanding, and arrogant. He’d ordered her about as if she were his slave. Of course she had been dressed as a peasant and he had known he was an earl—or if what Helen had said was true, then perhaps he was actually a duke. But there was something about him, something strong and magnetic that made her able to think of little else except him.
“Perhaps I can teach you the new dance. Lady Liana?”
“Yes, oh certainly.??
? They were walking side by side down a wide wagon path through the forest. Twice he’d offered to take her arm, but she’d refused him. “How does a man want a wife to act?” she asked.
She wasn’t aware of how Sir Robert’s chest swelled with pride as her words raised his hopes. “Wives were meant to give a man comfort and support, to make a home for him, to bear his children. Wives are to give a man love.”
She raised one eyebrow at him. “And as much land as her father can afford?”
Sir Robert chuckled. “That helps, of course.”
Liana was frowning as she remembered Rogan’s words: “I’ll marry no shrews. I’ll take her only if she’s biddable and soft-spoken.”
“I guess all men like soft, obedient women,” she said.
Sir Robert looked at her with lust in his eyes, lust for her beautiful person as well as for the wealth that came with her. For his part she could be a vixen, in fact he rather liked her spitefulness, but he would never tell a woman that. It was better to tell them to be obedient and hope for the best.
They walked in silence, but Liana’s head was reeling. Why would she even consider marriage to someone like Lord Rogan? There was nothing to recommend him. He had treated her with every discourtesy, but then he’d thought she was a peasant. He’d probably have kissed her hand and murmured pleasant phrases about the perfume of her skin if he’d known who she was. And would lice crawl up her arm? she wondered.
She looked at Sir Robert and gave him a weak smile. He was clean and pleasant and boring—oh so very, very boring. “Would you kiss me?” she asked on impulse.
Sir Robert didn’t have to be asked twice. Gently, he took her in his arms and pressed his lips against hers.
Liana could have fallen asleep. She stepped back and looked at Sir Robert in surprise. So that was why she considered marrying Lord Rogan. She desired him. When he kissed her, her toes curled. When he stood before her with almost no clothing on, her own body grew hot. Right now Sir Robert could remove every stitch of his clothing and she knew she’d feel nothing.