A Midsummer Knight's Kiss

‘Hold out your hand, Rowenna,’ Lady Danby repeated.

Robbie watched with mounting, impotent fury as Rowenna thrust her hand forward and closed her eyes. The stick swished through the air and snapped down. Rowenna gave a wordless wail and bunched her fist tightly. Tears began to stream down her round red cheeks. She opened her hand again and the second stroke caused her to yelp as blood welled in her palm.

‘I hope this will teach you to behave more like the lady your parents are trying to make you into,’ Lady Danby said. ‘It will be hard enough with the stain on your family to find you a place in society without you doing everything you can to thwart it.’

Rowenna flushed even redder, but to Robbie’s relief she had the sense not to rise to this taunt.

‘Now, Robbie. Your hand, for being so insolent.’

Boldly, Robbie met Lady Danby’s eyes. He clenched his jaw and held his breath and was proud that when the stick met his palm he allowed no sound to escape him. He kept his hand outstretched until Lady Danby had lowered her cane before slowly closing his fist. He bowed deeply and asked to be dismissed, and it was only when he had left the room that he allowed hot tears to fall as he clutched his palm beneath his armpit to stop the pain.

Despite the unpleasant interlude, the evening meal was a merry affair. Robbie’s father, Sir Roger, returned at sunset. He called on Lucy, then visited Wharram Manor, greeting his daughters by swinging them high into the air until they squealed. He enveloped Robbie in a strong embrace.

‘Lucy is going to be vexed with me, I fear,’ he told Robbie with a broad grin. ‘My business was successful.’

Excitement coursed through Robbie. He had told no one of the business Sir Roger had left on, though he had found it hard to keep the secret from Rowenna.

His father named a place and person, but looked solemn. ‘We’ll talk more this evening when we’re in our own home.’

As soon as he was able, Robbie sought Rowenna out and pulled her into Lady Danby’s garden, determined that she should be the first to hear his news. He had been allowed more ale than usual and felt as though his head was padded inside with raw wool.

They sat side by side on the stone bench and listened to the bleating of the sheep on the moors. Rowenna ran her fingers over Robbie’s palm. ‘I’m sorry you got a whipping,’ she said, fingertips tracing the lines on his palm. ‘It was my fault.’

It was intended to be soothing, but made Robbie’s chest tighten. He was becoming uncomfortably aware how even the glimpse of one of the village girls’ legs could make his body do all manner of alarming things. Before today Rowenna had never had such an effect on him and he was unsure he was comfortable with it.

He concentrated on examining her hand, unwrapping the wide blue ribbon she was using as a makeshift bandage. The skin on her palm had broken in three places and was dotted with raised weals across the mounds below her fingers where she had previously scuffed them. They would scab over in time, but were now weeping a little. The fury that had boiled inside him began to rise once more.

‘I’m not sorry,’ he said. ‘But why did you have to be rude to her and earn yourself a second strike?’

‘Why should I keep quiet when she is being unjust?’ She gazed at him, eyes full of rebellion and outrage.

‘Is s-speaking out worth the pain of a whipping?’ he asked gently.

‘Sometimes it is. Lady Stick didn’t have to punish either of us. She just doesn’t like us.’

Rowenna wrapped the ribbon round her hand once more and bunched her fist. Her expression grew fierce. ‘She never tells Anne and Lisbet off the way she does us or John. She dotes on them! Mother says its because my father isn’t her true son so I’m not really her kin. I don’t know why she dislikes you, though. She loves your father and one day you’ll be Lord Danby.’

Robbie’s heart filled with pity. Uncle Hal was a bastard: the illegitimate son of Robbie’s grandfather. He would never hold rank or title and nor would any of his children.

‘She thinks I’m stupid because I s-speak poorly,’ he muttered.

‘But you aren’t at all!’ Rowenna exclaimed. She twisted round to face him. ‘You’re clever and kind and brave. That’s twice today you have defended me. Thank you, Sir Robert.’

Robbie couldn’t contain his excitement any longer.

‘I will be Sir Robert,’ he said, facing Rowenna. ‘Father has secured me a place as a squire. I shall have to serve two years as a page so I’ll be fifteen rather than fourteen before I become squire.’

‘Are you going to go?’ Rowenna asked quietly.

‘Of course,’ Robbie exclaimed. ‘Why wouldn’t I?’

Rowenna pouted. ‘You’ll become Lord Danby anyway one day. You could just stay here.’

‘I can’t just wait here until I inherit my title. I need to earn it. I want to serve in another household.’

‘Then I’m very pleased for you. It’s what you’ve wanted for as long as I can remember!’ Rowenna was beaming, but her smile didn’t reach her eyes. ‘Where will you be going?’

‘Wentbrig. To Sir John Wallingdon, who owes fealty to De Lacy of Pontefract.’

‘That’s so far,’ Rowenna breathed with excitement. ‘The same distance again as from here to York.’

Robbie looked towards the beck, even though it was too dark to see the moor or stream. His whole life had been spent in Wharram Danby or Ravenscrag. The furthest he had been was to York, when Uncle Hal stayed in his town house and invited Roger’s family to visit. When he had to leave, a part of his heart would be torn from his chest, remaining in the home he loved.

Rowenna’s eyes shone with dreams. ‘I wish I could go with you. You’ll get to see the whole country while I have to stay here.’

He took her hand and was surprised by the strength in hers when she gave his a squeeze in response. He cared a lot for her, for all the trouble she caused.

‘I’ll miss you most of all,’ Robbie said. ‘I’ll write to Father and get him to tell you everything I say.’

‘Perhaps I’ll work harder at learning my letters so I can read them myself,’ she replied. ‘Father wants me to read and write as much as Mother nags me to learn to sew and sing. I’ll have to if I’m to ever become a lady and satisfy Lady Stick. “A bastard’s daughter who can’t behave might as well be a dairymaid”,’ she said, mimicking Lady Danby’s cold tones. ‘I’ll have to catch a husband somehow.’

Robbie couldn’t imagine his best friend as a grown woman. She would for ever remain a wild, unruly girl who joined in with the village children kicking a blown-up bladder through the beck, or dirtying her skirts playing Blind Beggar Catch. For that matter he could barely see himself as the knight he hoped to become. He pulled Rowenna to her feet to stand opposite him. She smiled and her hand tightened on his, causing the hairs on his arms to rise. She was quite pretty, really.

‘I would marry you,’ he declared nobly.

She burst into peals of laughter. ‘Yes, we should get married! Can you imagine what fun we’d have?’

Robbie blinked. He didn’t think marriage was supposed to be fun. It should be passionate to the point of mortifying onlookers like his parents’, or serious and prickly like his grandparents’. He couldn’t marry Rowenna. Once more it struck him how unfair it was that she was a bastard’s child. She couldn’t help who her father was.

‘Perhaps I’ll meet a lord who will marry you and you will be Lady Rowenna after all. Lady Dumpling.’

Robbie ducked his head to avoid the playful swipe of her hand and they stared at the sky in silence. The stars pricked the blackness like gems on a velvet cloak. He plucked a rosebud and held it out to her.

‘We’ll always be friends, even if I become a noble knight and you’re still hurling yourself out of trees,’ he said.

She unwound the ribbon from her hand and held it out to him. ‘Here. You asked for a favour earlier. Take this. I hope it brings you more luck than the pear did.’

Robbie coiled it around two fingers, then slipped it inside the pouch at his belt.

‘I’ll be returning to Ravenscrag tomorrow morning with Mother,’ Rowenna said. ‘Will you come visit us before you leave?’

‘Of course.’

Father had said he could leave as soon as he liked, but he might delay for a few weeks. He lifted Rowenna’s hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles lightly in the manner he had been taught, bowing low with a flourish. Her face grew uncharacteristically serious.

‘Promise you won’t forget me.’

Robbie put his sore hand to hers, palm to palm. They linked fingers and another rush of fondness for Rowenna filled him.