DEFY NOT THE HEART
Johanna Lindsey
Chapter One
Clydon Castle, England, 1192
.Bang! Again, again—bang! The sound of the battering rarn took precedence over the screaming confusion on the inner battlements, over the death cries below in the outer bailey as arrows struck true, over the thundering headache that pounded inside Reina de Champeney's head. Bang! Again.
It had happened too quickly, the attack. Reina had been aroused from sleep by the cry "To arms!", to find the outer bailey already breached by trickery. The supposed pilgrim she had given succor to the night before had opened the gate on the outer curtain wall at dawn, letting in a small army. Thank God she had not let the cur bed down in the inner bailey or in the keep itself, or she would not now be directing a defense from the battlements above the inner gatehouse. But that was all she had to be grateful for.
The attacking army might be no more than a hundred men, but Clydon was presently grossly under manned for a castle of its size. After her father had depleted the garrison for the army he took with him on Crusade, she had only fifty-five men left, not all of whom were present. Twenty men-at-arms and ten crossbowmen and archers were about. But at least of that number were dead or trapped on the outer walls, which the attackers were not even bothering to secure, since there was no archer of any skill there to cause damage to their flanks.
"Put more fuel on that fire!" Reina shouted at one of the menservants, all having been commandeered to help with the defense. ' 'We need that boiling water now, not after the gate gives way!"
She leaned over the parapet in time to see a fat rock drop at least three feet away from the battering ram, then roll harmlessly into the dry ditch below the wall. She turned a murderous glare on Theodric, her most trusted servant. The gangly youth of eight years and ten had insisted on helping even though Reina had tried to send him below after he brought her specially made armor and dressed her right there on the battlements.
"Idiot!" she snapped at him in disgust. "You are supposed to break through the ram's thick cover, not stir the dust to coat their feet!"
"These rocks are heavy!" Theodric snapped back peevishly, as if that could excuse his wasting their supply of missiles.
"Aye, and you have not the muscle for lifting them, so leave off and do what you can do, Theo. We need more water up here for boiling right quickly, and another fire, too. We are running out of time."
She turned before seeing if he would swallow his prickly pride and do as she ordered, only to nearly knock over little Aylmer, who had come up to stand by her other side. The seven-year-old boy wrapped his skinny arms around her leg to keep from falling, but Reina's heart jumped into her throat, for the fall could have taken him right over the wall, since with his crippled foot he had not the balance or the dexterity to save himself.
"What do you here?" Reina shouted, furious at the scare he had given her.
Tears formed immediately in the brown eyes looking up at her and caused a like moisture to gather in her own eyes. She had never yelled at the child before, never had aught but a kind word for him or a soft shoulder onto which he could cry his hurts. She was the closest thing he had to a mother, orphaned as he was and unwanted by any of the villeins because of his crippled foot. He was only a serf, but she had brought him through so many childhood illnesses that she thought of him as her own—at least hers to protect and care for.
"I want to help you, my lady," was Aylmer's answer.
Reina knelt down before him to wipe the wetness from his smoke-smudged cheek, hoping the smile she offered now took the bite out of her earlier surliness. "I am glad you have come, Aylmer," she lied as she moved him to put her mail-clad back between him and any arrows flying over the wall. "I came up here so quickly there was no time to set my ladies to what is needful inside the keep. Do you go and tell Lady Alicia to cut bandages and make ready for the wounded. Stay with her and Dame Hilary and help them as you can. And, Aylmer," she added with a forced grin, "try to assure the younger ladies there is no reason yet for alarm. You know how silly they can be."
"Aye, my lady. They are only girls."
And you are only a boy, she thought tenderly as she watched him hobble to the ladder, his pride at least intact. Now if only she could think of something to get Theodric out of the way as easily. She saw him about to help another man tilt the large cauldron of boiling water over the wall and opened her mouth to shout him away, only to have an arrow fly past her cheek. In the next second, she found herself tackled to the floor by Aubert Malfed.
"Jesei, my lady, you almost—"
"Get off me, you beef-witted oaf," she growled into Aubert's ashen face.
"But, my lady—"
She cut off his protest furiously. "Think you I want to be here? But with Sir William taken sick last eventide, no doubt poisoned somehow by that false pilgrim, there is no one else to lead the defense."
"lean."
"You cannot," she said with less rancor. How she wished he could, but Sir William's squire was only five years and ten, and she was the one William had dragged up here just this past week for a thorough if quick lesson in defense, not Aubert. " Tis me they want, and I will hold my own fate in hand, thank you. If I am taken, it will be my own fault, no one else's."
"At least stay back from the wall," he beseeched her as he helped her to her feet.
"Aye, I-Theo!"
Her screech caused both lads to jump, Theodric then turning an indignant glance on her after he had to jump back even more to avoid the sloshing water that nearly boiled his feet. Reina lost her temper completely, seeing that.
"To hell with your pride, Theo. Get you below— now! I love you too much to see you scorched or ventilated with arrows because you think you can do a man's job with those skinny sticks you call arms." When he did not move immediately, she yelled, "Now, Theo, or by God, I will have you chained inside the keep! And you, too, Aubert. I need brawn up here, not babes to get in the way. Your sword is useless unless they bring up ladders to scale the walls, or breach the gate. So begone, and not another word, from either of you."
Aubert flushed at this set-down because he knew she was right. His skills, such as they were, were useless without the enemy right before him. But Theodric grinned as he passed her on the way to the ladder. Without that "I love you too much" he would be smarting sorely, but with it he could retreat gracefully, and thankfully. He might be a year older than she, but he would have fainted at the first sight of blood anyway, and they both knew it.
Reina sighed once they were both gone, and turned her attention to watching as the boiling water was finally tipped over the wall. There were some new screams from below, but after only a few seconds, another loud bang. Curse and rot them! They had probably killed her animals for those wet hides that made the improvised "turtle" to shield them as they rammed the gate. The raw hides resisted both fire and water, though the splash of the latter had surely reached some exposed legs underneath the covering. A bridge to span the ditch was a wall ripped off the smithy. She knew they were using one of her wagons they had found in the bailey to support the large tree trunk that was hammering at the gate, a tree they had cut from her woods.
"My lady?"
She turned to see her steward, Gilbert Kempe, offering a chunk of bread and cheese, with a flask of wine. His tunic was soaked from helping to water down the gate and buildings in the inner bailey, though the attackers had not fired any flame-pitched arrows yet.
"Thank you, Gilbert," she said with a grateful smile as she took the food, even though her stomach was too knotted up just now for her to eat anything.
He winced, hearing the ram's noise from this closer distance. "Know you who they are?"
/> "Sir Falkes' men," she replied at once.
Gilbert had not thought of that, and was alarmed to think of it now. "But they wear no colors," he pointed out. "Nor are there any knights among them. And they did not come prepared to give siege."
"Aye, they thought they would have an easy path straight into the keep with their man inside to open the way. And nearly they did. If someone had not seen what the pilgrim was about and given the alarm, there would have been no time to bring in the castle-folk from the outer bailey and secure this gate. But who else, Gilbert, would dare to take me?',' Her voice lowered to add, "Who else knows my father is dead?'
He shook his head. "Anyone could know by now. It has been nigh a year, though we only learned of Lord Roger's death four months ago ourselves. Think you no one else with King Richard writes home as your father did to us? And the earl informed his castellan at Shefford of the loss of his vassal just as he did us. There is no knowing who Shefford's castellan could have told in these past months, and told also that you are not yet wed. Did he not write again just last week for the date of your wedding?"
All of that was true, though it annoyed Reina to admit it. She still found it hard to speak of her father's death at all, or the dilemma it left her in. She had been so undone by grief that nigh a month had passed ere she got around to writing the letters that would secure her future. That month had cost her dear, witness Clydon under attack now. But she still had no doubt that these were Falkes de Rochefort's men trying to get at her, and she reminded Gilbert why she thought so.
' 'Be that as it may, you forget the visit de Rochefort paid us a fortnight ago. Did he not ask me to wed him then? And when I refused, did he not sneak into my chamber that night to rape me to see the deed done in that foul manner? If Theo had not heard my scream—"
"My lady, please, you need not mention that unfortunate night. This could indeed be Sir Falkes' doing, and with revenge in mind, too, after you had him thrown out of Clydon right into the moat. I only point out that he is not the only lord who would risk much to have you."
"I am not a great heiress, Gilbert," Reina said in exasperation.
He frowned at her. "To tempt an earl, mayhap not. But with so many knights' fees yours, there is more than enough to tempt the countless petty barons in the realm, as well as the greater ones. Clydon alone is enough to tempt them."
He said naught that she was not aware of, but again, it was annoying to admit it. She could have been married two months ago if she had not taken so long to write her letters. She knew how vulnerable she was with her overlord, the Earl of Shefford, on Crusade, and half her vassals with him, three now dead with her father. And this attack had come so quickly, to surround her so thoroughly, she had not been able to send for aid from Simon Fitz Osbern, her nearest vassal.
"These could even be those accursed outlaws living in our woods," Gilbert was continuing.
Reina had to force down a laugh to keep from offending Gilbert, but the levity relieved her fear for a moment. "Those pesky wood rats would not dare."
' 'There are no knights below, my lady, nor even a single man in mail," he reminded her.
"Aye, de Rochefort is too cheap to invest his men properly. Nay, enough, Gilbert. It matters not who is knocking on our door, as long as we keep them out."
He said no more, for he would not dream of actually arguing with her. When he went away, Reina's fear returned. And she truly was afraid. If Clydon were merely besieged, she could hold out for months, but that would not even be necessary. Simon would come before then, and Lord John de Lascelles was due sometime next week, finally in answer to her letters to him. But these curs below had to know she was so undermanned. Why else would they have immediately attacked after she refused to give herself over to them? They were determined to get at her with all speed, to win victory before help did come, for their numbers were not that large, though far larger than her own.
She had done all she could, considering the battle was half lost. Her greatest defense, the outer curtain wall with the deep, wide moat that would have taken men days to construct a bridge for the crossing, was already breached. True, she did not have enough men to man such a long wall, for Clydon was no small castle. But the enemy would have lost a good deal of their number in trying to take that outer wall, and mayhap would even have given up. The inner wall was not nearly so long, enclosing only a quarter of the entire area where the keep sat in a corner, and was easier to defend, with four sturdy towers, including the second gatehouse, facing the outer bailey, on which the enemy was concentrating their efforts.
She had had time to prepare after she heard the demands from the wall and had replied to them in the negative. While the ram was being cut down, her buildings torn apart for protection against arrows and a new bridge to cross the dry ditch, her animals slaughtered for the hides to shield the enemy's covers, she had put to use all Sir William had prodded her to learn, having weapons checked and readied, water and sand heated for pouring from the walls, poles found for pushing ladders back, all near flammables wetted down. And with such a shortage of men, every male servant was enlisted, which did double her numbers. The menservants knew naught of fighting but could throw stones, push away ladders, wind crossbows for those with the skill to use them. But they would be of little help once the battering ram did its job, and then all Reina could do was retreat into the keep, the last defense—if there was time.
Chapter Two
The meow woke him, Lady Ella letting him know she did not like to be kept waiting for her morning viands. Ranulf Fitz Hugh stretched a long arm out without opening his eyes and picked up the bundle of scraggly fur to plop it down in the center of his wide chest.
"I suppose it is time to get up?" he grumbled sleepily to the cat, and got more answer than he wanted.
"My lord?"
Ranulf cringed, having forgotten he had taken more to bed yestereve than his pet cat. The light-skirt, one of a half-dozen camp followers who serviced his men, moved closer to rub a bare leg over his. Ranulf was not interested. The whore might have come in handy last night when he felt the need, but this was morning, and he did not like to be bothered when he had work to do.
He sat up and gave her backside a sharp whack, then caressed the smarting area to make his rejection more palatable. "Begone, wench."
She made a moue of her lips that did not impress him. She might be the prettiest of the current lot, but beauties came easily to him. He could not even remember this one's name, though this was not the first time she had warmed his pallet.
Her name was Mae, and as soon as a coin was found and tossed to her, she knew she was forgotten. He was not. It was impossible not to think of him at least a hundred times a day, for Mae had made the mistake of letting her emotions get involved with her livelihood, something she knew better than to do, though it was too late. She was already in love—along with every other woman who had ever set eyes on him, including her fellow camp followers, who despised Mae because she was the only one of them he ever called for. If they knew he sent his squires for "the blonde," that she meant so little to him that he could not even remember her name, they would not be so envious of her. To him, she was what she was, a whore, a convenience, no more.
She sighed as she watched him leave the tent bare-assed naked to relieve himself. Like most men, he thought nothing of his nudity as long as there were no ladies around to be embarrassed by it. Whores did not count. But Mae imagined a lady would not be so very embarrassed to get an eyeful of Ranulf Fitz Hugh. Few men had such presence of height as well as magnificence of form. That Sir Ranulf avoided ladies as he would a shit-clogged privy was their misfortune.
Mae gasped to realize she was wasting time with her musing. Sir Ranulf might have woken with his usual morning grouch, but if he returned to find her still in his tent, his grouchiness could turn much uglier.
Ranulf was actually in what was for him a pleasant mood this morning, a miracle as far as Lanzo Shepherd
was concerned. Instead of the usual foot to his backside to wake him, he got his red hair tousled and Lady Ella dropped in his lap for feeding.
"Think you Mae gave him a better ride than usual?" Lanzo asked his fellow squire, Kenric, who was already busy rolling up his blanket.
The older squire shook his head as he watched Ranulf saunter off into the bushes. "Nay, she always gives him better than the rest of us are like to get," Kenric said without rancor.
They, like the other men, were used to being invisible to women whenever Ranulf was around. And Lanzo, only four years and ten, had not got much yet to speak of, so it made no difference to him.
"He is just glad to have this particular job near done," Kenric continued, turning turquoise eyes back to Lanzo. "Old Brun, who recommended us for this one, said there would be little challenge to it, but you know how Ranulf hates dealing with ladies."
"Aye, Searle said he would not accept the job at all."
"Well, and so he has not, not really. At least he did not take Lord Rothwell's money yet, even if he did allow Rothwell's men to come along with us."
"Slowed us up is all they did. But I do not understand why—"
"Gossiping like little girls again, are you?"
Lanzo blushed and scampered to his feet, but Kenric only grinned as Searle and Eric joined them. Both men were newly knighted, Ranulf having arranged it with the last lord they had hired out to, in lieu of payment.
He could have knighted them himself, but wanted them to have the sense of ceremony involved, as well as witnesses other than his own men. They were both eighteen, Searle of Totnes taller, blond, with light, merry gray eyes, and Eric Fitzstephen with hair as black as Kenric's and hooded hazel eyes that always gave him a sleepy appearance. They had been with Ranulf and Sir Walter de Breaute much longer than Lanzo and Kenric, and yet the four of them had much in common. They were all bastards, born in the village or castle kitchen and denied by their lordly fathers, so lost the hope of ever bettering their lot. Half villein, half nobleman, shunned by both classes. If Ranulf had not recognized them for who they were and bought their freedom, they would still be serfs tied to the land owned by the very men who had sired them. But like recognized like, for Ranulf was a bastard himself.