“There can be no question of that, of course, since there are daughters,” Goddard pointed out. “But you—”
Rowland interrupted in an overly harsh tone. “I could take Montville even without the right to it. There is no question of that.”
That told his family more about him than anything else could have done. He was a man of war, a hardened man, a forceful man who was prepared to take what he wanted. These gentle people would have a difficult time understanding such a strong force.
“Rowland is short with words,” Brigitte said lightly, breaking the silence. “He did not mean that he intends to take Montville by force, only that he could if he wanted to do so.”
Rowland frowned at her, for he did not feel his words needed explaining. She pinched him in answer and got an even blacker scowl.
“You should not feel you have lost anything because you are not the man’s son,” Goddard said. “I know nothing of Montville, but you have a large estate in Poitou, given you at birth by my liege, the Count of Poitou. Evarard has managed your lands there with the same care he has given his own. Like your mother, he never gave up hope of your returning to us one day.”
“Well, brother.” Rowland grinned. “Am I a rich man then?”
Evarard was delighted to answer. “You are quite richer than I, since your rents have accumulated over the years whereas I have had to live from my rents. I must admit I live in a grand manner.”
Rowland laughed. “Well then, for the trouble you have gone to on my behalf, I insist you take my rents, those that have accumulated, and keep them for yourself.”
“I cannot!” Evarard protested, surprised.
“You can,” Rowland insisted. “I want nothing that I have not earned. And I would be grateful if you will continue to look after my lands until I claim them.”
“You will not claim them now?”
“Now,” Rowland said darkly, “I must return to Montville.”
“I will go with you to Normandy,” Evarard offered.
But Rowland shook his head adamantly. “I must confront Luthor alone. He will have the devil’s own loathing for you, brother, for were it not for your face, I would never have learned about my family, or known of his sin. Your life would be in danger at Montville.”
“And what of yours?”
“Luthor and I are equally matched. I have no fear of him. It is he who must reckon with me.”
“Rowland,” Evarard began hesitantly, frowning. “Perhaps it would be wisest not to see this man again. Could you live with yourself if you killed him?”
“I could not live with myself if I do not hear from him why he did what he did,” Rowland said softly, his voice calm but his eyes hard.
They talked on through the night, moving to a comfortable room and eating as a family for the first time in twenty-three years. Rowland listened quietly to his family reminiscing, and Brigitte wondered if hearing these things did not add to his sorrow over not having been a part of it all. He was enthralled, and could not take his eyes from them.
Chapter Thirty-six
“Do you realize, Brigitte, that if you had not run off to Angers, I might never have found my family? For years Luthor protested my going there, knowing what I might find. I never asked myself what he had against the town of Angers. This time he failed to keep me from Angers, and he failed because of you.”
They were on the south hill overlooking Montville. Brigitte was worried about the confrontation at hand, for it had been a silent Rowland who had ridden beside her for three days.
He grinned at her. “Each time you have run from me, something good has come of it.”
“What good came of the first time?”
“Were you not mine after that?”
She blushed. “Will you confront Luthor in private?” Brigitte asked, getting back to her immediate fears.
“It matters not.”
“It matters terribly, Rowland. Please, you must speak to him alone. No one else here need know what has happened. I know there is a rage in you, Rowland, but do not let it blind you. Luthor has called you his son all these years. You share a bond with Luthor, a bond of years that weighs as heavily as kinship. Remember that when you face him.”
Rowland did not answer her, but moved slowly on down the hill, leaving Brigitte with her fears unrelieved.
Luthor was in the great hall when they entered. As he watched them approach, there was a wariness about him, as if he already knew.
“So you brought her back once more,” Luthor said jovially, rising from his seat before the fire.
“I brought her back.”
Luthor looked at Brigitte. “Did I not tell you he would relent, damosel?”
“You did, milord,” Brigitte answered softly.
“You were gone a week,” Luthor said to Rowland now. “I suppose she reached Angers?”
“She did.”
There was long silence, and then Luthor sighed the sigh of a broken man. “You know?”
Rowland did not answer. There was no need. “I wish to talk to you alone, Luthor,” he said. “Will you ride with me?”
Luthor nodded and followed Rowland from the hall. As Brigitte watched them go, she was filled with terrible pity for the older man. She had seen Luthor’s shoulders slump, had seen the weary resignation in his face.
Rowland drew up and dismounted on the crest of the hill where he and Brigitte had stopped only a while earlier. He remembered her warning. But there was a rage in him that fought to be released, the rage of a little boy begging for love, the rage of a little boy beaten, scorned, humiliated cruelly. All of it, his rage reminded him, need not have been.
Luthor dismounted, and as he faced his son, Rowland demanded, half in fury, half in anguish, “Damn you, Luthor! Why?”
“I will tell you, Rowland,” Luthor said quietly. “I will tell you of the shame of a man with no sons.”
“There is no shame in that,” Rowland cried.
“You cannot know, Rowland,” Luthor said earnestly. “You cannot know how much I wanted a son until you want one of your own. Daughters I have-dozens of daughters, all over Normandy. But not one son, not one! I am an old man, nearly sixty years old. I became desperate for a son to take my lands. I nearly killed Hedda when she gave me another daughter. That is why she never conceived again, and why she hated you so.”
“But why me, Luthor? Why not some peasant’s son—a child who would be grateful for what you could give him?”
“You are not grateful? I made you a man to be reckoned with, a great warrior. You are not grateful for that?”
“You brought me here to be raised by that harridan, to suffer at her hands. You took me from a loving mother…and gave me to Hedda!”
“I made a strong man of you, Rowland.”
“My brother is a strong man, yet he was raised by loving parents. You denied me everything, Luthor!”
“I have loved you.
“You do not know love!”
“You are wrong,” Luthor replied softly after a shocked silence, his eyes reflecting pain. “I just do not know how to show love. But I do love you, Rowland. I have loved you as if you were my son. I made you my son.”
Rowland steeled himself against pity and said harshly, “But why me?”
“They had two sons, two sons born at one time, when I had none. I was in Angers with Duke Richard. When I saw the Baron and his wife with their twin boys, I was overcome by the injustice of it. I had not planned to take you. Impulse ruled me, an idea came to me suddenly. I felt no remorse, Rowland. I will not say I did. They had twins. One would be gone, but they would still have one. They would still have a son, and I would have a son. I rode for two days, killing my horse, to bring you straight here. You were mine.”
“God!” Rowland shouted to the heavens. “You had no right, Luthor!”
“I know that. I changed your life from what it would have been. But I will tell you this. I will not ask your forgiveness, for if I had to do it again, I would do what I
did. Montville needs you,” he said in a different voice, straightening a little.
“Montville will have another lord after you, but that will not be me,” Rowland said bitterly.
“No, Rowland, you do not mean that. I have devoted nearly half my life preparing you to be lord here. You are not my blood, but I would trust Montville to no one but you.”
“I do not want it.”
“Will you let Thurston have it then?” Luthor demanded angrily. “He cares nothing for the people here, or the land, or the horses we both love. He wants only more property, then more after that. He will bring down Duke Richard’s wrath with his petty wars for more land, and Montville will be crushed between them. Is that what you want to happen here?”
“Enough!”
“Rowland—
“I said enough!” Rowland shouted, throwing himself toward his horse. “I must think, Luthor. I do not know if I can tolerate you now, knowing what I know I must think.”
Rowland entered his chamber a little while later. The warmth of it was like a balm, soothing the raw edges of his anger. The room had never before been a warm place to come to, but with Brigitte in it.
She was watching him anxiously. Rowland sighed, dropping his shoulders and sinking down in a chair, avoiding her probing eyes.
“I do not know, Brigitte,” he said quietly. “I cannot forgive him, but I am not sure what to do.”
“Did you fight?”
“Only with words.”
“And his reason?”
“As you guessed, he was desperate for a son.” Rowland rested his head in her hands and then quickly looked up at her. “I wish to God it had not been me!”
Drawn by his anguished cry, Brigitte went down on her knees in front of him and wrapped her arms around him. She did not say anything.
Rowland stroked her hair tenderly, moved. “Ah, my little jewel. What would I do without you?”
Chapter Thirty-seven
The tightly drawn skins over the windows glowed faintly with the dawn’s first light as Rowland’s pacing woke Brigitte. A tiny flame in an oil cup cast dim shadows around the room. The tallow wick was nearly gone.
Brigitte leaned on an elbow, her hair falling over her shoulders in golden disarray. “You could not sleep?”
He was startled. “No.” He went on pacing.
“Is it so difficult, Rowland? Can I help?”
Rowland came over to the bed and sat down on the edge, his back to her. “I must decide this for myself. It’s Montville that is in question, not Luthor. He still wants me to have it.”
“Why does that displease you? Have you not always known you would be lord here one day?”
“When I left here six years ago, I gave it up. I planned never to return. And now I have given it up all over again.”
“You came home when you were needed. You are still needed. Montville is still under threat. This is what troubles you. You cannot leave, knowing you are needed here.”
“I swear you are a witch,” Rowland said, looking over his shoulder at her.
“You cannot separate Montville from Luthor, Rowland, that is the problem. But they are separate. And Montville will always need a strong lord.”
He stretched out on the bed beside her. “But Luthor is still here. If I go now, when Montville faces war, I will have no right to claim it later. But if I stay, I must stay here with Luthor. That I am not sure I can do. I wanted to kill him, Brigitte. I wanted to challenge him for the last test of strength—a battle to the death. I do not know what held me back—you, perhaps, and what you said to me. But, if I stay, I may still challenge him.”
“Who can say what we will or will not do?” Brigitte spoke softly and laid her head on his chest. “You can let time resolve your problem, Rowland. You can stay and see what happens. If it comes to the point where your bitterness is stronger than anything else and you must kill Luthor or leave—then leave. For now, let the matter rest. Control your resentment and stay here. Is that not what you really want to do?”
Rowland tilted her face so that his lips could gently caress hers. “As I said, you are a witch.”
It was several hours later, when Brigitte and Rowland were below in the great hall, that a knight ran through the hall to Luthor with the news of an approaching army. “Thurston of Mezidon has not waited for the end of winter. He comes now!”
Rowland and Luthor both stood, glancing quickly at one another. “What can he be thinking of?” Rowland demanded. “He knows we can withstand a siege. His army will die from the cold.”
“Is he sure he can draw us out?” Sir Gui suggested.
“Perhaps he is confident of a way in,” Luthor said darkly, looking at his daughter Ilse, who looked down at her lap. “Where did your husband, Geoffrey, really go when he left here three days ago? Did he go to Thurston?”
“No!” Lady Ilse was ashen in the face of her father’s accusation. “Geoffrey went to Rouen to visit his family there as he told you!”
“If I see him outside these walls with Thurston I swear I will kill you, woman. Daughter or not, no one betrays Montville and lives.”
Ilse burst into tears at her father’s heartless words and ran from the hall. Outside, the villagers were pouring into the courtyard, having been warned. The gates were closing, the walls manned.
Rowland turned to Luthor. “We will know about Geoffrey when we see what Thurston does. How close is the army?” he asked the knight.
“Some—probably half of the army—were sighted just over the south hill. The rest have not been seen yet.”
“They will be,” Rowland said ominously. “Thurston undoubtedly plans on making a good showing by surrounding us. To the walls then.”
They ran from the hall. Rowland ordered Brigitte to stay there and not to leave the hall for any reason. “I will bring you news when I have a chance.”
She watched him go with a tightness in her chest. How quickly his problem had been solved. He and Luthor had not spoken that morning. The icy silence between them had caused whispered comments. Yet here was a threat to Montville, and they were instantly joined.
From his position on the high wall, Rowland looked out across the snow-covered hills. Luthor, Gui, and Sir Robert stood beside him. No one could see a soul moving out there, not to the north, west, or south.
“He is mad,” Rowland said confidently. “Look at all that snow. The last storm left several feet. He must be mad.”
“Aye,” Luthor replied. “Or very clever. Yet I cannot imagine his plan. I do not see how he thinks he can have victory now.”
Rowland frowned. “How large was the army?”
Sir Robert summoned the knight who had seen the army on his patrol.
“I counted more than a hundred riders, and at least half of them were knights,” the man answered. “There were two wagons as well.”
Rowland was stunned. “Where in hell would he get so many horses?”
“Stolen, no doubt,” Gui suggested. “From the Bretons he has raided.”
“Yet that is only half his army, or even less, for all we can know now,” Sir Robert pointed out.
“How many men on foot?” Rowland questioned.
“None.”
“None at all?”
“That is right,” the knight said soberly.
“But so many horsemen! We have not half that many trained to ride,” Luthor cried.
“Thurston knows that. It could be the advantage he thinks he has.”
“Look there!” Gui was staring at the top of the hill.
A single rider came into view and stopped, looking down at Montville. He was a knight and in full armor, that much was clear even at such a long distance.
“Is it Thurston?” Gui asked.
“I cannot tell,” Luthor replied. “Rowland?”
Rowland shaded his eyes against the glare of snow, then shook his head. “He is too far away.”
At last the knight on the hill was joined by another and then many more, until a very long
line of horsemen was spread out across the southern hill. But these were not all of Thurston’s men. Even so, the horsemen were terrible to look upon. Nearly all of them were knights, and one knight was worth ten men on foot.
“Now we will see what he has in mind,” Luthor said levelly as the first knight started down the hill toward Montville.
He came alone, and Rowland watched, amazed at Thurston’s boldness. What did he expect, coming alone? A single arrow would put an end to it all.
Rowland began to frown as the knight drew nearer. He was not Thurston.
The knight was directly below. He looked up at the high walls of Montville, and Rowland saw his face clearly. He gasped. It could not be. But it was.
“Be damned!” Rowland growled, his body stiffening.
“What is it, Rowland?” Luthor demanded.
“The devil sent here to vex me!” Rowland rasped.
“Will you make sense!”
“That is not Thurston’s army out there, Luthor. Montville will have to face Thurston another time. That army of knights is from Berry!”
“Rowland of Montville! Will you come out and face me?” the knight cried from below.
Rowland took a deep breath before he shouted down from the parapet, “I am coming!”
Luthor caught his arm. “Who the devil is that?”
“That is the Baron de Louroux, the man who saved my life in Arles, the man who sent me to Louroux with the message that delayed my coming here.”
“Louroux? The wench is from Louroux!”