Besieged And Betrothed. Jenni Fletcher

to the English throne, it was increasingly difficult to distinguish who was a traitor and who not. Even the Barons seemed to have trouble deciding, given the number whose loyalties seemed to ebb and flow with each passing month. Personally, he had little interest in politics, had his own reasons for serving the Empress, none of which had anything to do with her right to wear the crown. At least Lady Juliana appeared to have a mind of her own. However surprising her decision, she’d chosen her side and stuck to it.

      Unfortunately for her, it was the wrong one.

      ‘Have you tried bargaining with her?’

      ‘Of course.’ The Baron bristled. ‘I tried negotiating when we first arrived, but she refused my terms.’

      ‘So you’ve been inside the castle? What are their defences like? How many men does she have?’

      ‘I’m not certain. That is, not exactly. She came to my tent.’

      ‘Your tent?’ Lothar narrowed his eyes interrogatively. ‘Whose idea was that?’

      ‘Mine. I offered her a flag of truce and she accepted.’

      ‘And?’

      ‘And nothing.’ The Baron’s gaze slid to one side evasively. ‘She’s a shrew. ’Tis no wonder she’s still unmarried. She wouldn’t listen to reason.’

      ‘Reason.’

      Lothar repeated the word flatly, letting the unspoken accusation hover in the air between them. Over the years he’d come to judge other men on their ability to look him and his scar in the face. Sir Guian de Ravenell most definitely could not. The man’s reputation as a military commander was bad enough, but with women, it was even worse. If Lady Juliana had gone to his tent alone, expecting to negotiate...

      A muscle twitched in his jaw. After more than a decade of soldiering, he’d grown accustomed to all kinds of fighting, but violence against women still made his blood boil, stirring up memories he’d spent most of his lifetime trying to forget. Traitor or not, if de Ravenell had done anything to hurt Lady Juliana, the man would need to find his own castle walls to hide behind.

      ‘She insulted me.’

      ‘Is that so?’

      Lothar restrained his temper with an effort. Whatever she’d said couldn’t be half as bad as the phrases running through his own mind.

      ‘Have you tried negotiating since?’

      ‘No. I gave her a chance to surrender. Why should I offer again?’

      ‘To end the siege, perhaps?’

      ‘The rules of warfare only oblige me to offer once. She made her choice. Now she can suffer the consequences.’

      Lothar ground his teeth, barely resisting the urge to ram a fist in the other man’s face. But the Empress couldn’t afford to lose allies, even ones as ineffectual as de Ravenell. The way her campaign against Stephen was going, she needed every man she could get—and she needed Castle Haword. Modest though it was, the fortress was strategically vital, holding the only bridge over the Wye for thirty miles. Without a safe route across, the Empress’s allies were at potential risk of being encircled, trapped between Stephen’s forces and the river. She needed the bridge, however small it might seem to his eyes, and the sooner the better. That was why he’d come, to end a siege that had dragged on for too long already. Any quarrel he had with Sir Guian would have to wait.

      He forced his attention back to the castle. He hated sieges, preferred open warfare to simply waiting. There was nothing honourable about starving an enemy into submission, still less in fighting men too weak to defend themselves, but he had orders to follow. One way or another he intended to take Haword by nightfall the following day. His duty to the Empress came first, no matter what he might think of her orders.

      Methodically, he scrutinised the fortifications for weaknesses. Judging by the design, the original motte was old, dating back to before the Conquest, though the Anglo-Saxon timber had been gradually replaced and strengthened with stone. Even so, the work appeared to have been carried out section by section over a period of years, each wall seeming to represent the era in which it was built. The overall effect was an oddly patchwork, ramshackle appearance, but on the whole, the structure looked solid. An assault wouldn’t be easy, but not impossible.

      His gaze swept appraisingly back towards the gatehouse and then stilled, arrested by the pair of eyes looking back. He’d been so preoccupied with studying the defences that he hadn’t seen her turn around, but now Lady Juliana was staring straight at him, her face ablaze with a look of such searing, hate-filled defiance that he felt the unfamiliar urge to take a step back.

      He took a pace forward instead, claiming even more ground as he waited for her to drop her gaze and turn away, but she didn’t move, didn’t even flinch at the challenge. What had de Ravenell called her—a girl? No, she was no girl, in her early twenties he guessed, though from the look of her, if she didn’t surrender soon, there’d be naught left but a ghost. The rain was heavier now, casting a murky veil over the space between them, but the effects of the siege were all too evident in her emaciated appearance. Her eyes were too big, the shadowy circles around them too dark against her pale skin, her cheekbones too sharply prominent in her narrow face. Yet he could still feel the heat of her gaze, as if she were channelling all that remained of her energy into that one look of defiance, more eloquent than any words. Something about that look, in the determined set of her jaw and her resolute posture, caught his attention and held it. She looked like a Celtic queen, rebellious and undaunted, the long coils of her red hair tumbling loose over the parapet wall in front of her, the only splash of colour against drab, unrelenting grey. For a fleeting moment, he found himself wishing that they were on the same side of the battlements...

      He tensed, surprised by a stirring sensation deep in his chest. He’d seen sieges enough to consider himself hardened to their effects, but this woman’s wraithlike appearance disturbed him more than he would have expected. He was accustomed to being the observer, not the observed, used to opponents dropping their eyes in front of him, but she held his gaze like the Empress herself. Standing on the ramparts, windswept and buffeted by the elements, she looked as though she’d rather throw herself into the moat below than concede defeat. He had the distinct impression that she’d stand there as long as it took for him to look away.

      Well, he could allow her that victory at least.

      ‘So you have a girl holding the castle.’ He rounded on de Ravenell. ‘Yet you never thought to attack? You have two siege engines. Why haven’t you used them?’

      ‘I saw no point risking men in an assault.’ The Baron looked taken aback. ‘A siege was the safest approach.’

      ‘Under normal circumstances I’d agree, but you were ordered to secure the castle by the fastest means possible.’

      ‘She can’t hold out much longer.’

      ‘That’s still too long for the Empress. Where are your trenches?’

      ‘My...what?’

      ‘Tunnels. Have you tried to dig under their walls?’

      ‘The moat’s too wide!’

      ‘You’ve had four months. You could have dug a tunnel all the way under the river by now.’

      ‘How dare you?’ the Baron spluttered angrily. ‘I’ve done everything that could possibly be expected of me. The Empress knows me and my abilities. Who are you? Nothing but an ill-bred, peasant upstart!’

      Lothar’s expression didn’t waver. He knew well enough what Matilda’s high-born supporters called him behind his back, though he rarely met one foolish enough to say the same to his face. When the time came, he’d have more than one score to settle with Sir Guian de Ravenell. He was starting to look forward to it.

      ‘I’m the peasant upstart sent to finish your job,’ he countered smoothly, ‘but you’re right, the Empress knows all about your abilities. That’s why I’m here.’

      The