Terri Brisbin - The Conqueror's Lady

But the worst of it was that her body had reacted to the touch of a stranger, a man who had very possibly killed her father on the field of battle. With those few kisses and caresses, he’d made a fool of her and her valiant protests about her honour. Shame poured over her, dampening any remaining desire as she contemplated her weaknesses and the true power of errant desires of the flesh to lead one astray or to aid in compromising their honour.

Lord Giles stood before her, holding out a cup. How long he’d been there, she knew not, for she’d been lost in her thoughts. Fayth accepted the cup and drank deeply from it, hoping to ease the tightness in her throat with the cool wine. She could not meet his gaze and see the triumph there, so she walked past him to place the cup on the table.

Giles saw the shame in her downcast eyes and the way her shoulders slumped. He recognised it well enough, for his mother had carried it most days of her life. He cursed under his breath at his stupidity. Lady Fayth shuddered at his words.

‘My lady, I but sought to show you the control that desire can exert, even on someone who thinks to resist its call.’

‘And it has been a lesson well learned, my lord,’ she answered. When she turned and faced him, he knew from the bleakness in her eyes and the paleness of her skin that they were not speaking of the same lesson.

Giles could not answer, for every word that came to mind would not ease her embarrassment or would undermine the message he wanted to send to her. He nodded at the bed.

‘Seek your rest, my lady. ‘Tis been a long and trying day and much work faces us in the morn.’

She continued past him until she stood at the side of the bed. A glance over her shoulder at him and then at the chair and the floor and back to the bed spoke of her confusion over his place to sleep this night.

‘Lady, climb in and seek sleep.’ He walked to the bed and lifted the many layers of linen sheets, woollen blankets and even thick animal skins that covered the bed and offered warmth in the long, cold autumn nights. He did not ask her about removing her gown and tunic or even her stockings, for the fear within her was palpable to him.

She let out a deep breath and kicked off her shoes, sliding them under the edge of the bed. Lady Fayth lifted her gowns, climbed up and shifted over the bed, rearranging her many layers once she reached the other side. Giles dropped the coverings and let her find her place under them. When she seemed settled, he moved around the chambers, blowing out candles and banking the flames in the hearth, all preparations for the night.

‘Will you sleep here?’ she asked in a whisper.

‘Aye, lady, I will seek my rest at your side.’ He waited for her protests and when they did not come, he tried to explain. ‘If I’d wanted to tup you like the barbarian you think me to be, it would have happened after the battle, when the heat of it yet burned in my veins and control of such passions are difficult. Or when I watched you lie senseless here those nights and could have had you without any protests. When I decide to have you, lady, you will not have a moment to spend worrying over my taking of you. it will happen.’

He blew out the last taper and began removing his tunic and shirt as he moved closer to the bed. He sat and tugged off his boots and then untied his breeches and let them drop. Leaving one layer of sheeting down, he lifted the rest and climbed within, allowing the lady her own clothing and the sheet as a barrier between them.

As he lay next to her in the dark, listening to her low breathing and knowing she was backed up to the wall and as far as possible from him, he knew there were so many more barriers separating them and none were easily overcome. And, as his own body still pulsed with the desire for her that touching her and kissing her and stroking her caused, he tried remembering why he thought it such a good thing to teach her about passion. The blood that rushed through his veins and made his cock stand confirmed that he could be caught in the same trap he set.

So much for lessons to learn.

Fayth knew she’d not slept a wink all night, not with the stranger sleeping naked so close to her. Yet, when she found him gone as the sunlight finally pierced through the veil of night and she had no recollection of his leaving, she knew that sleep must have claimed her unaware at some moment earlier.

Her back ached from being pressed against the hard surface of the wall all night, trying to keep her distance from the very large, very warm body in her bed. If he was troubled by what had occurred between them, his manner of falling immediately into the embrace of sleep and breathing deeply through the long night spoke not of it.

Rubbing her eyes, she allowed a yawn to escape before dragging her body across the bed to its edge. Her cyrtei and syrce twisted around her legs and waist and Fayth tugged it down in place just as the door of the chamber opened, or was moved away from the frame. Fearing another encounter with her new husband, she was comforted when her maid entered instead. Within minutes, a tub and buckets of steaming water were brought into the room and set up in front of a fire in the hearth.

In Emma’s care, her own worries fell away as her maid issued stern commands about placing the door back on its hinges and huffed about the chamber protecting Fayth’s privacy during her bath. Once satisfied that the door, jammed against the frame, would be an able barrier to anyone entering, she turned and faced Fayth. With a frown and grimace at finding her in her gown and barely a pause to acknowledge it, Emma efficiently lifted the outer tunic off, unlaced the long sleeves and loosened the cyrtel and finally the linen shift. Then she lifted all the remaining layers over Fayth’s head. Her maid’s unstifled gasp made her turn sharply at the object of Emma’s concern.

There on her breast was a mark, a bruise of a sort marring her skin. She laid her fingers there, but there was no pain as she would have expected, but her skin felt heated.

‘Did he hurt you?’ Emma whispered, nodding at the mark as she busied herself shaking out Fayth’s clothing. ‘Did he, my lady?’

First waves of embarrassment filled her. Then the realization that Emma thought Lord Giles had done this. The worst was when the truth struck her and Fayth knew that the passionate kiss Giles had placed there, the one when he had used his lips and tongue and even his teeth, had left such a mark. She felt the heat in her cheeks and her breasts even ached as she remembered the pleasure of it and even as she tried to find words to say to Emma.

‘He … I …’ she stuttered, not knowing whether to explain or not.

‘Hush, now, lady,’ Emma said. The old woman guided her to the waiting tub and helped her step inside. ‘The hot water will soothe you.’

Fayth decided not to protest or to explain something so personal as this. Sinking into the bath, she could not meet Emma’s gaze. Inhaling the pleasant scent of the herbs and oil added to the water, Fayth tried to put her fears out of her mind for the moment and it would have worked if not for Emma’s whispered words.

‘How could he do something like this?’ The maid continued her work around the tub and continued her diatribe against their new lord as well, still in hushed tones. ‘I thought he had more sense than to mistreat an innocent.’

‘He does not believe me an innocent,’ she blurted out.

‘Not innocent, my lady? I would swear on my mother’s grave, may she rest in peace, that you are as pure as the day you were born.’ Emma, her nurse, then maid and now friend, too, would be one who knew it.

‘And this new lord would believe you not, Emma. He accused me of giving myself to Edmund and carrying his child.’