Brian was probably twenty years old, but his slight build made him appear to be little more than a boy. He walked with a hesitant step, as if one leg were stiff but he’d learned to walk with only a slight limp. He was obviously Roger’s brother, a younger, weaker, more delicate version of his strong, healthy older brother.
“You should be in bed,” Roger said in a kind voice, a voice Bronwyn had never heard from him before. Roger’s love for this boy was apparent in every word he spoke.
Brian eased himself into a chair. “I was waiting for you to return. I couldn’t even find out where you went. Alice said…” He stopped.
“Did she upset you?” Roger asked earnestly. “If she did—”
“No, of course not,” Brian said. “Alice is an unhappy woman. She is miserable over Edmund’s death.”
“Yes, I’m sure she is,” Roger said sarcastically. He changed the subject. “I visited my other estates to see that the serfs were not robbing us blind.”
“Roger, who is the woman who keeps crying?”
Roger’s head shot up. “I…I don’t know what you mean. There isn’t any woman crying.”
“For three nights now I’ve heard someone crying. Even during the day I catch just a bit of the sound.”
Roger smiled. “Perhaps the house has a ghost. Or maybe Edmund—” He stopped abruptly.
“I know what you mean,” Brian said flatly. “I know more about our elder brother than you think. You were going to say that perhaps the crying is the ghost of one of Edmund’s women. Maybe it was the one who killed herself on the night Edmund was murdered.”
“Brian! How do you hear of these things? It’s late and you ought to be in bed.”
Brian sighed, then allowed Roger to help him out of the chair. “I think I will go to bed. Will I see you in the morning? Alice is so much better when you’re here, and I miss Elizabeth already. Christmas is much too short.”
“Yes, of course, I’ll be here. Good night, little brother. Sleep well.” He stood for a moment after the door closed.
Bronwyn didn’t move as she watched Roger. Roger may be a liar, he might attack a man’s back, but he loved his younger brother.
Roger turned and threw the bed curtains aside. “Did you hope I’d forgotten you?” His voice was cold again.
She held the bedclothes to her neck and backed toward the far edge of the bed. “Who is Elizabeth?”
Roger gave her a smirking look. “Elizabeth is my sister. Now come here.”
“Is she older or younger than Brian?” She was talking rapidly.
“Would you like to see my family tree?” He grabbed her arm, pulled her to him. “Elizabeth is three years younger than Brian.”
“Is she—” Her words stopped as Roger pulled her into his arms and began to kiss her hungrily.
She was quite still as he kissed her. His lips were firm and pleasant, his breath sweet even, but there was no fire. He ran his mouth down her neck as his hands caressed her back. His fingers played down her spine, then gripped her buttocks and pressed her to him. He was fully dressed, and the padded velvet of his clothes felt good against her cool, bare skin.
But aside from a pleasant sensation, there was no fire. She felt like an outsider, as if she observed what was happening rather than experienced it.
“You do not fight me?” Roger asked in a throaty whisper, a hint of humor in his voice.
“No,” she said honestly. “I—”
Again he stopped her words with a kiss. Gently he lay her down in the bed and began to kiss her neck as his hands freely caressed her breasts. His lips followed his hands.
“No, Roger, I don’t fight you,” she said, her voice full of honesty. “Truthfully, I find there is nothing to fight. I must admit I was curious about how I’d react to another man touching me. Stephen says I am after him so often he hasn’t enough time to recover.”
She gave a little laugh, stared at the canopy, and put her hands behind her head. “Not that Stephen always told the truth,” she chuckled. “But I find it’s just not the same. You touch me in the same places Stephen touches me, but with you I feel nothing. Isn’t that odd?”
She looked with innocent eyes at Roger, who was bending over her, his hands still, his eyes wide. “I’m really sorry. I don’t mean to offend you. I’m sure some women like you. I guess I just happen to belong to one man alone.”
Roger raised his hand to strike her, and Bronwyn’s eyes turned cold. “I’ll not fight you nor will I react to your lovemaking. Does it anger you that you aren’t half the man Stephen Montgomery is? Either in bed or out of it?”
“I’ll kill you for that!” Roger growled as he lunged for her.
Bronwyn rolled away from him, and he landed on his face in the soft mattress. She jumped from the bed and looked about for a weapon but could find none.
Roger stopped as he started after her. Damn, but she made a startling sight. Her black hair swirled about her like a demon cloud. Her proud, strong body taunted him. She was breathtaking, like an ancient primitive queen, arrogant, defiant, threatening him with her small strength.
Every word she’d said about her husband screamed at him. She knew men well, didn’t she? With each word he’d felt his passion shrink. What man could take her when he knew she laughed at him? If she feared him he would rape her, but this laughter of hers was too much.
“Guards!” he bellowed.
Bronwyn knew he planned to release her from the duty of his bed. She grabbed her clothes and by the time the door opened, she was wrapped in her plaid, the rest of her clothes under her arm.
“Take her to the east room,” Roger said tiredly. “And I will have the man’s head who lets her escape.”
Bronwyn did not breathe easily until she heard the bolt shoot home and she was alone in the room. The guards had released the man she’d locked in the room hours before.
She sank down on the bed and instantly began to tremble. Her body ached from having been tied in a wagon for three days. Her fear for Mary tormented her, and now the episode with Roger further weakened her.
Once when she was just a girl she’d gone riding with one of her father’s men. They’d stopped to rest the horses, and the man had tossed her to the ground and began to undress her. Bronwyn had been extremely innocent and very frightened. The man undressed himself, and when he stood over her he thrust his manhood out at her as if he were massively proud of the thing. Bronwyn, who’d only seen horses and bulls, began to laugh at the man, and before her very eyes he’d deflated. She’d learned several lessons that day. One, to never ride alone with just one man, and two, whereas fear seemed to excite the man, her laughter only crushed him.
She never told her father about the encounter, and three months later the man was killed in a cattle raid.
It should have been good to see Roger hurt as she’d hurt him, but it wasn’t. She fell down onto the covers of the bed, hiding her face, burying her head. She wanted Stephen so badly, needed him so much. He was the foundation of her being. He kept her from doing stupid, impulsive things. If he’d been with her, she would never have left Larenston. Rab would be alive and she wouldn’t be held prisoner by Roger Chatworth.
Stephen was with his king, pleading with the man to stop the raids on her country. Her country! Hadn’t Stephen proved he was a Scot? He deserved the title more than anyone else.
Bronwyn had no idea when she began to cry. The tears just began to flow silently at first, then with deep, wrenching sobs. She swore that if she ever managed to get herself out of this mess, she’d be honest with Stephen. She’d tell him how much she loved him and needed him. Oh, yes! How very, very much she needed him.
She cried for Mary, for Rab, for Stephen, and most of all for herself. She’d had something so beautiful and she’d thrown it away. “Stephen,” she whispered and cried some more.
When her body was dry and she could cry no more, she slept.
Chapter Eighteen
BRIAN CHATWORTH WAS VERY QUIET AS HE MADE HIS WAY
down the stairs to the cellar. The Chatworth house had been built over an old castle, a place his grandfather had conquered and destroyed. Some people said it was bad to have built over the home of an enemy.
Brian thought of his brother’s words about a ghost and smiled. Roger was so protective of his little brother and sister. When they were children, they needed protection from their older brother. But now, since Edmund’s death, there was no need of hiding and lying. There was a woman crying, and Brian meant to find out about her. It was probably a kitchen maid who’d fallen in love with Roger and now cried because Roger didn’t return her love. Brian realized that Roger thought his little brother knew nothing that went on between men and women. To Roger, Brian was still a frightened, hiding little boy.
He paused at the bottom of the stairs. The cellars were dark, full of wine barrels and casks of salted fish. As he listened he heard a roll of ivory dice and a couple of guards laughing and cursing. He slipped between the barrels and went toward the back where he knew a locked cell was. He had no idea why he sneaked about except that he’d learned to be good at it when Edmund was alive. Besides, he’d rather Roger didn’t think Brian had no faith in his brother.
The crying became louder as he neared the cell door. It was a soft, wrenching sound that came from inside a woman’s heart. Now he knew why the guards moved to the far side of the cellar: they didn’t want to hear the constant crying.
Brian looked inside the cell. In a formless heap in one corner lay a woman in a nun’s habit.
Brian could only gasp as he grabbed the key from the nail by the door and unlocked the door. It swung open on well-oiled, silent hinges.
“Sister,” Brian whispered as he knelt beside her. “Please let me help you.”
Mary looked up at him with fear in her eyes. “Please release me,” she whispered. “My brothers will cause a war because of this. Please! I could not bear to see them hurt.”
Brian looked at her in bewilderment. “Your brothers? Who are you? What have you done to make Roger take you as his prisoner?”
“Roger?” Mary asked. “Is he the man who holds me? Where am I? Who are you?”
Brian stared at her. Her oval face was swollen, her soft brown eyes red and irritated. She suddenly reminded him of his sister, Elizabeth. Elizabeth was as perfectly lovely as an angel, and this woman looked like the Madonna. “I am Brian Chatworth and this is my home, the Chatworth estate. My brother Roger owns this house.”
“Chatworth?” Mary said, sitting up. “My brother was once in love with a lovely woman but she married a man named Chatworth.”
Brian sat back on his heels. He was beginning to see some link to this woman’s imprisonment. “You are a Montgomery!” he gasped. “I knew only of the four brothers. I had no idea there was a sister.”
“I am the eldest child, Mary Montgomery.”
Brian didn’t speak for some minutes.
“Tell me what you know. My brothers protect me too much sometimes. Why am I being held captive? Why should your brother hate my family?”
Brian immediately felt a kinship with Mary. “My brother also protects me. But I listen and I hear things. I will tell you what I know. A young woman named Alice Valence was once in love with your brother, the oldest one, Gavin is it not?”
Mary nodded.
“But for some reason I do not know, they did not marry. Alice married my eldest brother, Edmund, and Gavin married—”
“Judith,” Mary supplied.
“Yes, Judith,” Brian continued. “My brother was murdered one night.” He stopped a moment. He did not tell of the evilness of his eldest brother, the way everyone lived in terror of him. He didn’t mention the lovely young girl who cut her wrists the night Edmund was killed.
“And Alice was a widow,” Mary said quietly.
“Yes, she was. She, I believe, made some attempt to win Gavin back to her. There was an accident and hot oil spilled across her face. She was scarred badly.”
“Do you think there is some connection between this and why I am here now? Where is this Alice now?”
“She lives here. She had no one else.” He thought of the kindness of his brother Roger. “This fall Roger had a public fight with another brother of yours. They fought over a woman.”
“That could only have been Stephen. Bronwyn…never said a word.” Mary rubbed her hand across her face. “I had no idea this was going on. Oh, Brian, what are we to do? We cannot let our families war with each other.”
Brian was startled by her words. What did she mean “we”? How could she assume that he was on her side? Roger was his brother. Of course, he’d take Roger’s side. There must be a good reason why Roger was holding this quiet, gentle woman a prisoner.
Before Brian could say a word, Mary spoke again. “Why do you limp?” she asked quietly.
Brian was startled. No one had asked him that in a long time. “My leg was crushed by a horse,” he said flatly. Mary just looked at him as if she expected more, and Brian found himself transported back to a time he didn’t like to remember.
“Elizabeth was five,” he said in a faraway voice. “Even then she looked like an angel. One of the woodcarvers used her for a model for all the cherubs in the chapel. I was eight. We were playing in the sand in the jousting field. Our brother Edmund was already grown then, twenty-one years old.”
Brian paused a moment. “I don’t remember everything. Later, they said Edmund was drunk. He didn’t see Elizabeth and me as he charged onto the field.”
Mary gasped in horror.
“We would have been killed if it weren’t for Roger. He was fourteen and big and strong. He ran right in front of Edmund’s horse and grabbed both of us. But the horse’s hoof hit his left arm and he dropped me.” Brian looked away for a moment. “The horse crushed my leg from the knee down.” He gave a weak smile. “I’m lucky I didn’t lose it. Elizabeth said it was Roger’s care that saved the leg. He stayed beside me for months afterward.”
“You love him very much, don’t you?”
“Yes,” Brian answered simply. “He…protected both Elizabeth and me all our childhoods. He put Elizabeth in a convent when she was six.”
“And she’s there now.”
Brian smiled. “Roger says he’s looking for a man fit for her but he’s not found one yet. How can you find a husband for an angel?” He laughed in memory at something Elizabeth had said. She’d suggested Roger find her a devil. Roger had not found Elizabeth’s statement humorous. Too often, Roger didn’t laugh at Elizabeth’s sharp remarks. Sometimes her tongue was at odds with her sweet looks.
“We can’t let our families fight,” Mary was saying. “You’ve shown me that your brother is a kind, loving man. He’s just angry at Stephen. And no doubt your sister-in-law is angry too.”
Brian almost laughed at that. Alice’s half-crazy rages were more than anger. Sometimes she was totally insane and sleeping herbs had to be given her. She screamed about Judith and Gavin Montgomery constantly.
“You’ve said so little about yourself,” Brian said quietly. “Here you are held prisoner, you’ve been crying for days, yet you ask about me. Tell me, why have you been crying? For yourself or for your brothers?”
Mary looked at her hands. “I am a weak, cowardly thing. I wish I could pray as I should, but my brothers have taught me realism. When they find I am gone, they will be so angry. Gavin and Stephen will calmly prepare for war, but there will be nothing calm about either Raine or Miles.”
“What will they do?”
“No one can tell. They do whatever seems good at the moment. Raine is usually so gentle, a great bear of a man, but he can stand no injustice. And Miles has a horrible temper! No one can guess what he will do.”
“This must be stopped,” Brian said, rising. “I will go to Roger and demand that he release you.”
Mary stood beside him, shorter than he. “Do you think demands will make him angry? Shouldn’t you ask?”
Brian looked at her, her soft roundness, her
great liquid eyes. She made him feel as strong as a mountain. He’d never asked Roger for anything—except his very life. She was right. How could he make demands of someone he loved so much?
He touched Mary’s face. “I will take you from this place. I promise you that.”
“And I believe you,” Mary said with great trust. “You must go now.”
Brian looked about the small, damp cell. There was straw on the floor and it was none too clean. The only furniture was a hard cot and a bucket in a corner. “This is a foul place. You must leave with me now.”
“No!” She backed away from him. “We must be careful. We cannot anger your brother. If he is like mine, he may say things he will regret later, but then he will be forced to hold to them. You must wait until morning when he is rested and then talk to him.”
“How can you concern yourself with my brother when it means another night for you in this hell-hole?”
She answered him only with the look in her eyes. “Go in peace now. You needn’t worry about me.”
Brian stared at her a moment, then grabbed her hand and kissed it. “You are a good woman, Mary Montgomery.” He turned and left her.
Mary looked away as she heard the door locked once again. She hoped she hadn’t let Brian see how very frightened she really was. Something scurried across the floor and she jumped. She shouldn’t cry, she knew, but she was such an awful coward.
Roger looked at his little brother with shock.
“I want her out of that cell,” Brian said quietly. He’d done as Mary’d said and waited until morning to confront Roger. Not that Brian had slept any, nor had Roger from the look of the dark circles under his eyes.
“Brian, please…” Roger began in that voice he used only for his younger brother and sister.
Brian didn’t relent. “I still haven’t heard why you have her prisoner, but whatever the reason, I want her out of that cell.”
Roger turned away from Brian so the pain in Roger’s eyes couldn’t be seen. How could he explain his humiliation at the hands of the Montgomerys? It had hurt him when his sister-in-law threw herself at Gavin and was rejected by him. Later Bronwyn had chosen him and he’d felt redeemed. But Stephen had gotten in a lucky blow that had sent Roger sprawling. He’d been so angry, he hadn’t thought but had attacked Stephen’s back. Now he wanted to let the Montgomerys know he couldn’t always be beaten.