The Baron's Bride. Joanna Makepeace

raised two dark eyebrows that Gisela could just discern beneath the rim of his iron helmet and placed his right arm across the mailed sleeve of his left. To Gisela’s amazement and deepening alarm, she saw that blood was welling between the rings of the hauberk. She would not have believed that Sigurd’s knife could have done such damage and in so short a time.

      “You are hurt,” she blurted out, somewhat foolishly she realised later.

      His reply was typically ironic. “So you have noticed, demoiselle.” He waved away his sergeant, who had been overseeing the pinioning of Sigurd’s arms behind his back by his younger companion with a coil of rope taken from one of the saddle bags and who was now advancing upon his lord to offer help.

      “No, no, man, it is but a scratch, but could have been worse. The knife might well have been buried in my back had I not turned in time.” He regarded the little scene, unsmiling, while Aldith, sobbing, tore a strip from her voluminous skirt and proffered it to him with trembling hands. He thanked her coldly and, using teeth and his uninjured hand, bound it about the wound.

      Gisela now regained her wits and came hurriedly towards him. “My lord,” she said huskily, “I am sure Aldith is right. The boy is beside himself and did not know what he was about. I beg you to take that into consideration when he is brought before you in the manor court. I’m sure my father will speak for him and…”

      Again de Treville regarded her sardonically. “I dread to think what he might have attempted, demoiselle, had he really meant me harm. However, we will give ourselves time to think this affair over when we all have cooler heads. In the meantime, your young protégé can cool his within the depths of my gatehouse guardroom.”

      The sergeant had secured the rope pinioning Sigurd’s arms to the back of his horse and clearly intended to drag the boy behind him on the short ride to Allestone Castle. The Baron nodded to Gisela and Aldith coolly and moved once more to his own horse. Gisela saw he had some difficulty in mounting and was further distressed. Obviously the arm pained him more than he would admit.

      If the injury proved serious, Sigurd could pay for his reckless boy’s temper with his life. Even if it were not to prove so, many lords would not be inclined to mercy, she knew. She was impelled to plead for the boy again.

      “My lord, I beg of you…”

      He turned just once in the saddle. “I see, demoiselle, that you are far more concerned for the boy’s fate than for mine.” He sighed and she thought, with rising temper, that it was an exaggerated sigh, made merely to cause her concern and possibly to taunt her to further outbursts. She controlled her rising irritation with an effort.

      “Naturally, my lord, I am deeply sorry that you are hurt, but you said yourself it is merely a scratch. I beg you to consider that when giving judgement.”

      His good hand caught at the bridle rein. “Usually, demoiselle, I am more concerned to discover what was intended rather than the result and, in this case, you must agree, I would be right to infer that the boy intended to deliver a death blow.”

      Before she could make any reply—indeed, she could not really think of a suitable one—he had bowed again in the saddle and urged his men to mount up and ride from the clearing. The two stricken women and Oswin were left to stare helplessly as the three mounted soldiers rode from their sight, the sergeant relentlessly pulling the gasping, stumbling form of Aldith’s son behind him.

      Only then did the reeve venture a comment. “Demoiselle Gisela, I think you would be very unwise to make any move to anger the Baron de Treville further. I am sure your father, Sir Walter, would be concerned. Indeed, he might infer from what has occurred that we were instrumental in causing this injury…”

      “Do you suggest that I encouraged Sigurd to do that?” Gisela demanded furiously and the old man stepped hastily backwards, knowing the intensity of his mistress’s feelings when she took it into her head to champion the cause of one or other of the serfs upon the manor.

      “Certainly not, demoiselle,” he said hastily, “but—but had we not been here, the soldiers would have managed and—and…”

      Gisela swallowed the sharp bile rising in her throat. She was beginning to believe that, to some extent, Oswin could be right; yet Sigurd had already been furiously angry when they arrived on the scene. She drew a deep breath. She was going to have a very hard job to save the impetuous young fool. She put a comforting arm round Aldith’s shoulders.

      “Come into the cottage. You can do nothing for the moment. I promise you, Aldith, both I and Father will do our best for Sigurd, whatever Oswin says.” Her blue eyes flashed fire at the hapless reeve, who quailed inwardly and then gave way and prepared to wait outside the cottage stolidly until his mistress was ready to ride back to Brinkhurst.

      Gisela persuaded Aldith that she must come at once to Brinkhurst. She could not leave the distraught woman here alone in this cottage.

      It would not be beyond the bounds of possibility for Baron Alain de Treville to send men immediately to oust her and destroy the cottage immediately. Punishment must be fast and severe if discipline was to be maintained on his desmesne and, from what she had seen of him, he would rule with an iron hand and not encased in a soft leather glove, either!

      Aldith, still weeping, gathered up a bundle of her own clothing and Sigurd’s and one or two items she specially prized as being of her husband Rolf’s fashioning, and Gisela briskly promised that she would send two men with a cart later to convey the one or two pieces of crudely fashioned furniture the two possessed.

      Neither woman dared give voice to the fear that Sigurd would not live to require his belongings. Oswin took up the former nurse pillion behind him and they rode back to Brinkhurst in sombre mood.

      Both disturbed and angered by her encounter in Allestone wood, Gisela rode into the courtyard of the Brinkhurst manor, dismounted hurriedly and handed her reins to a young groom who hastened to serve her.

      She instructed Oswin to see to it that Aldith and her bundles were conveyed to the kitchen quarters, where she must be fed and cosseted until Gisela had had opportunity to explain what had occurred to her father and make arrangements for Aldith’s reception into the household.

      She hastened up the steps before the undercroft and into the hall. Her father was seated by the fire, for the November day was chill and raw, and a man seated opposite rose instantly and came towards her with a delighted cry. She almost ran to meet him, her own anxious expression lighting up with unexpected pleasure.

      “Kenrick, how good it is to see you. I didn’t know you were expected or I would not have gone out this morning to see Aldith.”

      “And how is she?” Her father smiled his welcome as his daughter divested herself of her mantle and came to his side near the fire.

      Kenrick of Arcote, their nearest neighbour, only a few years older than Gisela and her friend from babyhood, caught his breath, as he always did at sight of her these days. Gisela of Brinkhurst was now on the brink of womanhood.

      She was not over-tall for a woman, but stately of poise and already her youthful, budding breasts were thrusting tight against the cloth of her blue woollen gown. He was sure he could have encircled her waist, cinched in tightly with her ornamental leather belt, with one hand, so slight of form was she. Her luxuriant tawny braids caught golden lights from the fire as she moved nearer to her father.

      He thought her heart-shaped face with its small, slightly tip-tilted nose, her luminous blue eyes and generous, sensuous mouth with its slightly fuller lower lip, even the remains of the summer freckling on nose and cheeks—for Gisela rode out in all weathers despite her former nurse’s warnings about the ruination of her fair complexion—quite enchanting. Now he saw, as her father had already noted, that something had disturbed her badly.

      Sir Walter urged her down upon a stool beside him and placed a gentle hand upon her bowed head.

      “What is it, Gisela?” His heart thudded against his ribcage as he thought she might well have been accosted, even molested, on this ride into Allestone wood. “You have