Claire closed her eyes in silent assent. In a voice grown weak from strain and sickness, she told the girl of the secret staircase behind the bedstead. The staircase twisted down to a tunnel that led outside the keep to a hut near the woods. It was but a short distance to the monastery. From there the girl could seek refuge and escort back to Sedgewick.
At last Claire slumped back against the pillows. Elaine lifted her sleeping child from the wooden cradle and gazed down at him. Tears glistened in her eyes.
She touched his cheek gently, marveling that God had given her such a wondrous gift. She buried her face against his unruly dark curls. Peter was the image of Guy, every bit his father's son. He had been conceived on her last night with Guy. This Elaine knew with all her heart. Her one regret was that her beloved husband had yet to see the fruit of their love.
God, how she loved them both! With tears blurring her vision, she drew back to trace the babe's features one by one: winged brows as black as night, tiny nubbin nose, the beautifully shaped mouth that even now held a touch of his father’s strength.
The tears spilled over. She would never see Peter grow sturdy and tall as the oak trees which grew near Sedgewick... as tall and proud as his warrior father. But even as she dried her tears, Elaine refused to think of death. She thought only of life... her son's life.
Very gently she wrapped him in swaddling cloth and gave him over to Gerda. The child slept on, snug against the young girl's breast. Elaine slipped open the hidden panel behind the bed and turned to Gerda.
She clasped her sturdy young shoulders and looked the girl straight in the eye. "I trust you in this, as I have never trusted anyone in my life, Gerda."
Gerda looked ready to cry. "I—I will not fail you, mistress."
Elaine squeezed her shoulders and smiled. "I know," she said simply.
Gerda clutched the babe in one arm, a tallow candle in the other. She stood in the threshold of the secret stairway, frightened for herself, frightened for her lady. Tears streamed down her cheeks. Her shoulders shook with the force of her emotions. "I will pray for you, my lady," she sobbed. "I will pray that what you fear will not come to pass and you will once again grace the hall at Sedgewick."
And she would pray for naught. But Elaine withheld these words; instead she tipped the girl's chin up. "I know you do not understand, Gerda," she said softly. "But I do what I must."
"But you choose to die."
Elaine was already shaking her head, a sad, faintly wistful expression on her face. Her hand came out to rest for an instant on the cloth covering her child's head. "No," she said quietly, "I do not choose to die. I choose for him to live." She gave the girl a gentle shove toward the darkened stairway. "Now go, Gerda. Fly as if the devil himself were at your heels and do not stop until you are safely inside the monastery."
They shared one last hasty embrace. Elaine watched until Gerda disappeared from sight and the echo of her shuffling footsteps became faint and distant. At last she closed the heavy door and slid the secret panel back into place.
When she turned she found Claire's eyes upon her, clearer than they had been for days. She crossed to her quickly and sat down on the edge of the bed.
Claire feebly gripped her hand. "Had I known this would happen," she murmured, "I would never have bid you come to me." She tried to smile. "But I wanted to see you and Peter one last time," she whispered. "And I am afraid I am much like Gerda, for I fear I do not understand why this is happening. I do not understand why Thomas was killed. Why Richard of Ashbury covets this humble keep."
" 'Tis not your fault." Elaine soothed her with a tender touch upon her brow. "King Stephen's rule has been naught but a time of lawlessness and greed. 'Tis said that vassals battle one another throughout the land, while Stephen tries vainly to restore order, to tame the pattern of violence. As for why, I cannot say. To war," she said sadly, "is the nature of men. And Richard is an evil man. He seeks that which is not his, for that reason alone." She could not change the course of events and so she must accept them.
Elaine stayed by Claire's side throughout the long day, listening as the battle drew nearer. . . ever nearer. Dusk crept through the clouds hovering on the dismal horizon. The shadow of darkness—the veil of death—crept within the chamber. Elaine felt the strength wane from Claire's hand and knew that she slipped into sleep... sleep eternal.
Hers was a hurt too deep for tears. Elaine lovingly folded Claire's hands upon her breast, silently praying she would be granted a Christian burial. She was dimly aware that the crush of battle had extended into the great hall below.
She fleetingly thought of following Gerda and saving herself. But the notion had no sooner chased through her mind than fate decreed otherwise.
There was a heavy footfall of steps in the passage outside. The door was flung open.
A great hulk of a man filled the threshold of the chamber, dark and evil-looking. A vile lust gleamed in his eyes. Blood dripped from his sword onto the rushes.
But Elaine drew herself up proudly, quaking inside but determined to show no fear. She was the wife of Lord Guy de Marche, Earl of Sedgewick.
The man stepped forward.
Elaine began to pray. She prayed that Gerda's journey back to Sedgewick would be a safe one. She prayed that the Lord would watch over Guy and keep him safe from the heathens in the Holy Land. She prayed that Guy would soon return home to Sedgewick to love and protect the son he had never seen. . .
May her soul rest in peace.
Chapter 1
Spring 1155
"... may her soul rest in peace."
Guy de Marche, Earl of Sedgewick, knelt before the grave of his beloved wife. The words were the closest thing to a prayer he was able to summon, though his countenance was far from prayerlike. For even as he spoke the words, all the curses of hell sprang forth within him, fighting to be free. His mind was consumed by thoughts of but one man.
Richard of Ashbury.
High above, Ramsay Keep squatted on the hilltop. A melancholy veil of fog surrounded its crenellated towers and jagged outline, a reflection of Guy's dark and somber mood. For two long years Richard had laid claim to the keep, but no more. . . no more. Guy's battle to regain Ramsay Keep had been satisfying short, yet the taste of victory was like dust in his mouth.
He rose to his feet, a powerful figure garbed in the fiercesome trappings of war, his helm tucked under his arm. Behind him, atop the rise that guarded the gravesite, a body of mounted men watched somberly, awaiting his command. The silence was broken only by the occasional snort of a stallion and the gurgling rush of the stream, swollen by early-spring rainwater.
Another man walked slowly to his side. Guy stirred only when a rough callused hand clapped his shoulder. Neither man spoke, yet their very silence was rife with words unspoken.
Sir Hugh Bainbridge gazed solemnly at the other man's profile. His sister Claire was buried but a few paces distant from Elaine, and so he had more than an inkling of the pain Guy felt. He called Guy lord as well as friend. As a boy, Hugh had been page to Guy's squire and served at his side whenever the call to duty arose. Hugh had shared in all his lord's triumphs—both on the battlefield and off—just as he shared this loss as well.
It was Guy who broke the silence. "Why," he murmured in a voice thick with emotions held deep in his heart, "must the Lord see fit to give with one hand and take with the other?"
Hugh gleaned his meaning only too well. Guy's marriage to Elaine was truly nothing short of a miracle. Theirs had been an arranged marriage, and yet the two had fallen madly in love with one another. Hugh and his friends had chided Guy greatly about his adoration of his wife, for no one liked the ladies more than Guy. But lo and behold, Guy found marriage to the lovely Elaine no burden at all and it proved the end of his wenching.