Maiden Bride

“You will stay here tonight, wife,” he said, and she drew in a sharp breath. His mouth curved wickedly, as if promising myriad horrors, and without volition, Gillian’s gaze dropped to his groin. He whirled away suddenly, pointing to a thick straw pallet at the foot of the bed. “There is where you shall sleep,” he snapped, as though angered anew.

The floor was traditionally the repose of servants and squires, but Gillian did not protest. Although the bed was big enough to hold six people, she was relieved that she did not have to share it with him. Better to feel the hard tiles beneath her than his body against hers… naked. She trembled.

As if sensing her dismay, he turned on her again, leering spitefully. “I have been lenient with you, vixen, but our trip is over, and now you will be expected to pay the price for your uncle’s treachery.”

He walked slowly around her, like a cat stalking a mouse, but Gillian lifted her chin, refusing to be intimidated by his threats. “I have thought long and well on my revenge,” he added, his eyes glittering as they always did when he spoke of his one true passion.

“Of course, it would have been better, if Hexham’s brother had sired a son. Then, I could have killed him outright, but since you are a woman, and at the king’s behest my wife, I shall have to devise other methods of enacting my revenge.”

His sharp gaze raked her slowly, and Gillian struggled to maintain her composure under his sly insinuations. “There are many ways to torture a man, but a woman—?” He left the question dangling in the silence, and Gillian’s breath grew short. His lips curled, as if her fright pleased him mightily.

“Get to your pallet, wife, and await me at my leisure,” he ordered, but Gillian could not move. Too busy trying to fill her lungs to heed his command, she could only gasp, and she kept on gasping until the scowl left his face and he eyed her with alarm.

“What the devil?” Stepping toward her, he took her by the shoulders and shook her slightly. His attentions only agitated her further, and Gillian could do naught but stare at him wide-eyed. His face swam before her, hard and beautiful, before dizziness engulfed her. He must have felt her sway, for the next thing she knew she was scooped up in strong arms and laid upon a soft fur on the great bed.

“By all the saints, ‘tis no wonder you cannot breathe in this gown,” he snapped, and, turning her, he began to loosen the ties. Gillian felt his hand, warm even through her shift as he rubbed his palm across her back, and despite all his warnings and her own wariness, it was not unpleasant.

Although his was not the gentlest of touches, neither was it threatening, and Gillian felt her terror ease at the rhythmic pressure. Indeed, to her surprise, she found the sound of his breathing, low and quick, and the sensation of his heavy hand against her, oddly soothing—until his callused fingers slid onto the bare skin above her shift.

Abruptly her comfort fled, for his fingertips seemed to sear her flesh with their heat and incite in her an unwelcome excitement. Starting, she gasped again, and he moved away, muttering imprecations.

When he returned, he pressed a cup of ale upon her, apparently from a flask he kept in the chamber. “Here, sit up and drink,” he said. Although gruff, his voice seemed different to her ears, as if stripped of its usual cool distance. Though conscious of her gown gaping behind her, Gillian let him help her up against the pillows and took a sip.

“Are you all right?” he asked. Gillian nodded, acutely aware of how close he sat beside her, warm and solid and no longer fearsome. “Are you prone to these fits?” he asked, his tone harsher.

“No,” Gillian answered softly. “Only when I am… Only rarely,” she said, catching herself just in time. She would not let him know how well he had terrorized her—or did he gloat in triumph already? Gillian stiffened and glanced up at him, but he avoided her gaze, surging to his feet, with his back toward her.

“Good! Then I shall expect never to see you possessed by such demons again,” he snapped. As Gillian watched, he leaned forward and pressed a hand against his stomach before straightening swiftly to his full, impressive height. The movement was so subtle that she would not have noticed, had she not been eying him so closely. Did her invincible husband suffer some ailment?

Gillian’s concern fled when he whirled back toward her, his handsome face once more composed and cruel. “Rest yourself,” he advised coldly, “for I will not have you die on me, as your traitorous uncle did. I will have my revenge!”

He stalked to the door and slammed it behind him, the loud bang of the wood echoing into silence, and Gillian was aware of a sharp pain in her chest that had nothing to do with her loss of breath.

Slowly she set the cup down upon a coffer and climbed from the bed. Easing the rest of the way from her outer garment, she folded it neatly and set it aside. Then she settled onto her pallet, still clad in her shift, and pulled a fur over herself. Accustomed to sleeping with a roomful of other women, Gillian found the quiet of the empty chamber strange.

The fire glittered nearby, making Gillian realize that this nest was far softer and warmer than her cot at the convent had ever been. And she would not have to rise again at midnight to kneel upon cold stone for lengthy prayers.

But Belvry held dangers that the nunnery did not. Perhaps this evening her husband would leave her alone and she might snatch some badly needed sleep, yet she could not count upon this respite. There were many long nights ahead, and Gilhan knew the mysterious Syrian would no longer whisper to her of safety.

Suddenly, Gillian recalled the brush of warm fingers across her back, rhythmic and comforting and something more. An odd sensation that she had never known before had taken hold of her…