Margaret Moore - [Maiden & Her Knight 03] Read online

  MARGARET MOORE

  All My Desire

  “Listen to me, my lady, and listen well.”

  Alexander stiffened as if he had turned to stone, then reached out and hauled her close. “Do you think to move me with your talk of honor and knighthood? That is gone from me forever, and you helped make it so. I was willing to overlook your part in it, except to make you the object of ransom, but so help me, my lady, if you do not stop this foolishness and try to escape again, I will… I will…”

  He was breathing hard and so was she, her lithe and shapely body pressed against him with no more barrier than two layers of wet clothing.

  “What?” she demanded, arching her back to get as far away from him as she could. Still defiant, still bold. “What will you do? Kill me?”

  He shook his head, and in the darkness of the night—with her in his arms—the longing he had tried to bury since he had first set eyes on her exploded within him. “I do not want your death, my lady. I would have you alive. And I would have this.”

  He captured her mouth in a fiery kiss.

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  “Listen to me, my lady, and listen well.”

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Other Works

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Chapter 1

  In the early light of a July dawn, two men came down a wooded slope. Despite the risk of slipping on the mud and damp leaves beneath his feet, the short, slender one fairly skipped, as if he really wanted to dance as they made their way toward a village and the castle guarding it. The other—tall, muscular and firm of purpose—strode forward with a more lithe and lethal grace.

  Both wore much mended tunics and breeches of brown wool. On their feet were leather boots that were far from new. Despite the genial summer breeze, they sported dark cloaks and hoods, as if expecting rain to fall from the white puffs of clouds drifting overhead.

  Ahead, the great stone fortress seemed to rise out of the very precipice upon which it stood, making the houses of the villagers look like supplicants huddled around it. To the east of the castle, small boats clustered about the pier and along the willow-shrouded bank of a wide river, which led to the sea some miles away. To the west, farms lay scattered along a narrow road leading further back into the wood. Even at this early hour, smoke curled up from the thatched cottages, and people went about the business of feeding their pigs and milking their cows. Chickens scratched in the dirt, geese squawked in their pens, a dog barked, and somewhere, a baby cried.

  The tall man paid little heed to these sights and sounds. His envious eyes stayed trained on Bellevoire, the fortress that should have been his. The thick wall seemed impregnable, and its many merlons would hide a hundred archers. A series of round towers formed part of the outer wall, high places for keeping watch on the surrounding land and river. Other, smaller towers bespoke an inner wall and hinted at the size of the courtyard contained therein.

  “You are sure about this?” his Gascon companion whispered. “In the broad light of day you wish to do this thing?”

  He spoke as if he feared the very beeches, oaks and chestnuts spied upon them, or the little stream to their right, tumbling over rocks on its way down the hill, babbled a report of their presence to some unseen foe.

  His lean, hawklike face taut with resolve, Alexander DeFrouchette glanced at his friend. “Calm yourself, Denis. The market crowd will make excellent cover for what we are here to do.”

  “It is easy for you, who has the blood of a frozen fish, to be calm,” Denis replied, lightly leaping over a fallen tree branch as he hurried to keep up with Alexander’s long-legged progress. “Me, I am no warrior—and I have never abducted a woman in my life.”

  “I have never abducted a woman, either,” Alexander noted as he sidestepped a large rock, “but this is necessary, so it will be done.”

  His movement startled a pheasant nesting in the nearby underbrush. The bird flew upward in a flutter of wings into Alexander’s face. With a soldier’s curse, he reared back.

  Arms akimbo, Denis grinned. “Perhaps you have not the blood of frozen fish after all.”

  Alexander made a noise that was a cross between a dismissive sniff and a disgusted grunt and continued down the hill toward the road that led to the village of Bellevoire, named for the castle towering over it. “You are sure Lady Allis will come to the marketplace today?”

  Trotting after him, Denis nodded. “Unless she is ill, Lady Allis always comes to the village on market day with her husband. The tavern keeper was most certain. They like to spend time in the village and meet with the people, he says.”

  Alexander scowled. “To be admired and fawned over, no doubt.”

  “Sir Connor and his wife are very popular,” Denis murmured, delicately clearing his throat before adding, “unlike your father.”

  “I do not care what these Saxon peasants thought of him.”

  “The tavern keeper also says that Lady Allis is a great beauty.”

  “It doesn’t matter to me what she looks like. It is enough to know that she betrayed my father and married the man who killed him, and now she can provide a way to retrieve some of what her husband owes me,” Alexander replied.

  The last part of his statement was true; as for the first, he did harbor some slight curiosity about the woman who had so fascinated his father, but there was no need to tell Denis that.

  “Of course I realize that her features are not important to you,” Denis replied as if Alexander had accused him of being stupid. “Still, by her beauty we shall know her.”

  “We shall know her because she will be with him.”

  “It was years ago that you saw Connor of Llanstephan, now Connor of Bellevoire. Are you certain you will recognize him?”

  Alexander’s gaze again strayed to the castle of Bellevoire, the home of the usurper. “I will.”

  Indeed, he would never forget his first sight of the tall, dark-haired man who’d ridden among the Crusaders passing through his village in France. The finely attired and well-equipped knight had been singing in a deep, rich baritone, as cheerful as if he’d had not a care in the world.

  It had been said they were on their way to join Richard the Lionhearted in Marseilles. Whoever they were, Alexander had thought, every one of that merry band had seemed part of a chosen company of God’s favorites, bound upon a glorious adventure.

  How he had longed to ride with them! Away from the women who either sneered at his mother or ignored her completely. Away from the men who came creeping into their cottage at night and made him leave. Away from the boys who called him terrible names and never let him share in their games. Away from the only life he had ever known to one that had to be better.

  He hadn’t guessed then that he was looking at the man who would one day kill his father and be rewarded with all of Rennick DeFrouchette’s possessions.

  Denis slid a wary glance at Alexander.

  Alexander intercepted his look. “A wise man does not ruin the thing he plans to trade. I will take good care of my prize.”

  “I do not doubt you, but
what of the others in this with us? I don’t trust the Norseman and his crew, or Lord Oswald’s son.”

  The stream widened to a little pool. Thirsty, Alexander squatted and cupped his hands to drink the clear, cold water. When he was finished, he straightened and shook his hands to dry them while Denis drank. “The Norsemen are necessary to get the lady to the hiding place Lord Oswald is providing. As for Lord Oswald’s son, Osburn represents his father, so we must accept him as one of our party whether we want to or not.”

  “Maybe we can keep him drunk,” Denis proposed hopefully.

  Alexander’s only answer was a disdainful nod. He did not think much of Lord Oswald’s vain, overdressed sot of a son and would have preferred never to have met him. Unfortunately, it was a condition of his mission that he endure the sot’s company.

  They reached the last line of trees bordering a curve in the road leading to the village. Alexander was pleased to find the lay of the land exactly as Lord Oswald had described. Travelers on either side of the curve were not visible to each other, and it was from here they could surreptitiously join the crowd going to market.

  He scanned the road. At present, only a shepherd ambled along behind a few sheep. If they were to be inconspicuous, they would have to wait until there were more people. Still, it was early yet.

  Denis ran another wary gaze over his friend. “Even in those clothes, I am not sure that you will pass for a peasant, Alexander. Everything about you proclaims that you are a man who fights with sword and lance and mace for his living. You can dress in rags, but you cannot hide those shoulders. Indeed, the very way you walk proclaims you are a warrior.”

  “This is a fine time to say so.”

  “Seeing that shepherd made me realize it. I am used to the way you look. Those in the village will not be.”

  “I cannot change my body.”

  “Maybe you could slouch?”

  “I am not going to slouch into Bellevoire.”

  Denis sighed. “I should have known better than to suggest anything like humility to you.”

  Alexander shot him a look.

  “Well, you are not a humble man and justly so, with your skill at arms. But if you do not round those shoulders of yours, you will stand out like an oak among wildflowers. However, if you wish to take that chance…” Denis concluded his statement with a shrug.

  “If you are afraid, you can go back and wait with the horses.”

  “If I am afraid, it is because one of us should be. Merde! We are about to walk into a lord’s village and kidnap his wife, and here you are as calm as … as … that tree.” Denis gestured at a slim birch. “Sending you alone into that lions’ den would be fine thanks to the man who saved my life. Besides, you need me for the plan. I am to be the bait, or whatever you wish to call it, am I not?”

  Alexander gripped the hilt of the sword beneath his cloak, for in truth, he was not calm; he was more tense than he had ever been in his life, with one memorable exception, for much depended on what happened this day. However, he did not want Denis to know how uneasy he was. “I could come up with another plan.”

  The Gascon put his hand over his heart and assumed the look of a martyr about to be led to his tortured end. “Non! I will go with you, though it means my death.”

  “You won’t die,” Alexander replied dryly. “If I have cause to believe we will fail today, we will leave and try another tactic.”

  When or what he did not know, but one way or another, he wouldn’t leave this land without the wife of Sir Connor.

  “However, Denis, since you are so concerned, I’ll slouch—a little.”

  They both fell silent at the sound of jingling and clanging from the road. Looking through the trees, they spied a man driving a cart with pots and other iron items hanging outside it, moving toward the village. The tinker was a short, stocky fellow who looked half asleep.

  They watched him drive by, then Denis squatted on his haunches, a position he was able to assume for a long time. Just looking at him made Alexander’s knees ache.

  “Did you not say that you are the image of your father?” Denis asked, even more worried than before, it seemed. “If the likeness is pronounced, the villagers might guess who you are, and then they will wonder why you have come, and they might inform this Sir Connor—”

  “Denis, why else do you think I am wearing this cursed hood?” Alexander growled, his friend’s Cassandra-like croaking increasing his tension. “I know the risks of what we’re about to do, and I’ve considered the things that could go wrong. Now either be quiet or go back to the horses.”

  Denis didn’t speak for the next several moments, the quiet proving more disconcerting than Denis’s fearful warnings. “Give me the sack,” Alexander said at last, breaking the silence.

  Denis rose and handed over the large cloth bag he had tucked through his belt. Usually such sacks were used to carry fleeces for measuring after they were cut from sheep and rolled. “You think she will fit in this?” he asked as he returned to sitting on his haunches.

  “She should, unless she weighs over two hundred pounds. That’s how much a wool sack like this will hold,” Alexander replied, sticking the sack through his belt at the back. He had his sword hanging on his left; on his right, a rag with which to gag the lady and some lengths of rope to bind her; and now the sack. He felt like the tinker’s cart.

  Denis laughed softly, and as always when he laughed, his brown eyes became narrow slits in his face and dimples appeared in his cheeks, making him look like a mischievous boy. “I am sure she does not weigh that much.”

  “She’d better not, for I have a long way to carry her.”

  Finally a group of people approached the curve—a family bound for market, by the look of them. A thin, grizzled farmer and his plump wife with a basket over her arm led the way. Behind them came a young woman who had to be the woman’s daughter, they were so alike. Any man who courted her would know exactly how she would look in twenty years. She, too, carried a basket, which she occasionally swung at a lad walking beside her. They were having some kind of argument, but not loud enough to attract their parents’ notice.

  He could see another wagon bearing a load of hay about half a mile back and behind that, what seemed to be another family. Soon enough, they could saunter out onto the road without attracting undue notice and join the general crowd going to the village.

  He waited until the second family passed by. “Now,” he whispered, and they slipped out of the trees and strolled along the rutted road as if they had been there all the time.

  Soon they were in the bustling marketplace of Bellevoire, which was an even more sizable and prosperous town than Alexander had expected. Several of the buildings were stone, like the castle; others were half timbered and plastered with lime, making a sharp contrast between the exposed wood and the rest of the structure. Several had more than one story, too, later additions that hinted at increased revenue for the owners. In many of these, the bottom level had large windows with shutters that became stalls when the shutters were removed. Along with the permanent buildings around the green, which also included a large establishment that had to be a tavern and a smithy, there were several wagons serving as temporary stalls. In and around these, well-fed peasants wandered, the women with reed baskets in their hands for their purchases. Children chased each other, and dogs nosed interesting bits of refuse.

  Keeping his head lowered and his shoulders rounded as Denis had suggested, Alexander peered out from beneath his hood. Pretending to be interested in the merchandise on display in the stalls or wagons, he was really surveying the merchants.

  He also noted several soldiers among the crowd, no doubt from the castle. As he and Denis paused a moment beneath the overhang of one of the two-storied buildings, he contemplated leaving until he realized that the soldiers seemed no more watchful than the gossiping women clustered around the well.

  Sir Connor must feel very secure.

  That thought renewed his purpose, and Al
exander gestured for Denis to follow him. They left the shadow of the overhang and wandered about the green.

  Finally he saw a peddler who would suit his purpose. The man’s goods were set up in the perfect place, in front of an alley between two of the taller buildings. On a small trestle table in front of his covered cart were ribbons and the sorts of little baubles women liked to purchase. The man himself looked on edge, and his red, bulbous nose told Alexander that not only was he a man who drank much, and often, but he was also very thirsty already although it was not even close to midday.

  Alexander went on a little way, then halted near the entrance to the tavern and out of the way of the people walking by.

  “The ribbon peddler is the man we want,” he murmured as Denis joined him. He nodded ever so slightly at the merchant they had passed. He reached into his thin purse and pulled out three silver coins. “Get him as much wine as this will buy, Denis.”

  His countenance serious and sure, Denis nodded. “Oui, mon ami. He will be able to make merry for some time with this.”

  “That’s just what I am counting on,” Alexander said as he gave his friend the money.

  In the lord’s chamber in the southern tower of Bellevoire, Lady Isabelle’s brow knit with concern as she sat upon a delicately carved chair and regarded her sister Allis, who was still abed. Feminine articles were scattered upon a dressing table nearby, while a pair of scuffed black boots lay beside a battered wooden chest bossed with brass studs. A gray woolen tunic had been hastily tossed over it. A colorful tapestry of bright red, greens and blues depicting a Christmas feast covered the north wall.

  The morning sunlight came in through the high, narrow windows that faced south. It lit their faces, alike enough to pronounce that they were related, although Lady Allis was considered the more beautiful. Isabelle, it was said, was pretty and vivacious but lacked the cool poise of her older sister. It was generally accepted that this was why there were, as yet, no serious suitors for the younger sister of the wife of Sir Connor of Bellevoire.