The Mistress of Normandy. Susan Wiggs

off your questioning. The fault doesn’t lie with you.” Lazare’s eyes raked her shrouded form. “You are magnificent, with your hair of silk and sweet, soft skin of cream. Were I a poet, I’d write a song solely on the beauty of your silver eyes.”

      The tribute stunned and confused her. He laid his hand, dry and cool, upon her cheek. “You’ve the face of a madonna, the body of a goddess. Any man would move mountains to possess you!”

      The stillness between them drew on. A faint crackle from the fire and the hiss of the ever-shifting river pervaded the chamber.

      Lazare jerked back his hand. “Any man...” He laughed harshly. “Except me. One of the wenches downstairs will have to do as a receptacle for the unslaked lust you inspire.”

      Lianna shivered. “Lazare, I don’t understand.”

      He leaned against a bedpost. “This marriage is one of mutual convenience. No children must come of our union.”

      “Bois-Long needs an heir,” she said softly. And in her heart she needed a child. Desperately.

      “Bois-Long has an heir,” said Lazare. “My son, Gervais.”

      A cold hand took hold of her heart and squeezed. “You can’t do this to me,” she said, clutching the sheets against her as she sat forward in anger. “The château is my ancestral home, defended by my father, Aimery the Warrior, and his kinsmen before him. I won’t allow your son to usurp—”

      “You have no choice now, Lianna.” Lazare smiled. “You thought yourself so clever, marrying in defiance of King Henry’s wishes. But you overlooked one matter. I am not a pawn in your ploy for power. I’m a man with a mind of my own and a son who deserves better than I’ve given him. My life ended when my first wife died, but Gervais’s is just beginning.”

      “My uncle will arrange an annulment. You and your greedy son will have nothing of Bois-Long.”

      Lazare shook his head. “If you let me go, no one will stand in the way of the Englishman who is coming to marry you. Your uncle of Burgundy has been known to treat with King Henry. He may force you to accept the English god-don. Besides, you’ve no grounds for annulment. We are married in the eyes of God and France.”

      “But you yourself have decreed that it is to be a chaste union!”

      “So shall it be.” With a smooth movement, Lazare drew a misericorde from his baldric. Shocked by the dull glint of the pointed blade, Lianna leapt from the bed, shielding herself with the coverlet. Lazare chuckled. “Don’t worry, wife, I’ll not add murder to my offenses.” Still smiling, he pricked his palm with the knife and let a few ruby droplets of blood stain the sheet.

      Lianna bit her lip. In sooth she’d never quite understood where a maid’s blood came from; it was destined to remain a mystery still.

      “Now,” he said, putting away the misericorde, “it is your word against mine. And I am your lord.”

      She clutched the bedclothes tighter. “You used me.”

      He nodded. “Just as you used me. I’m tired, Lianna. I’ll pass the night on cushions in the wardrobe, so that no one will look askance at us. After a few days I’ll be sleeping in the lord’s chamber—alone.”

      “I’ll fight you, Lazare. I won’t let Gervais have Bois-Long.”

      Giving her a long, bleak stare, he left the solar. A river breeze snuffed the lamp. Lianna crept back into bed, avoiding the stain of Lazare’s blood, and lay sleepless. What manner of man was Lazare Mondragon, that he would not take his bride to wife on his wedding night? Her wedding night.

      Moonlight streamed into the room, casting silvery tones on the pastoral scene painted on the wall. Beyond the woman and her children, a richly robed knight knelt before an ethereal beauty, gazing at her with a look of pure, mystical ecstasy.

      An artist’s fancy, Lianna told herself angrily, turning away from the wall. An idealized picture of love. But she couldn’t suppress her disappointment. The whimsical dreamer she so carefully hid beneath her armor of aloofness had hoped to find contentment with Lazare.

      Instead, she realized bitterly, the sentence of a loveless, fruitless marriage hung over her. No, she thought in sudden decision. Lazare was wrong to think she’d relinquish her castle without a fight. She wrested the wedding ring from her finger. “I am still the Demoiselle de Bois-Long,” she whispered.

      * * *

      The chaplain’s rapidly muttered low mass was sufficient to satisfy the consciences of the castle folk who attended the morning service. Grateful for the brevity, Lianna sped to the great hall.

      After nudging a lazy alaunt hound out the door, she stopped a passing maid. “It smells like a brewery in here, Edithe. Fetch some dried bay to sweeten the rushes.”

      The maid bustled off, and Lianna crossed to the large central hearth, where Guy, her seneschal, stood over a scullion who was cleaning out the grate. Guy, a gentle giant of a man, ruffled the lad’s hair and chuckled at some joke. Both came to grave attention as Lianna approached.

      Once, she thought, just once I wish they’d share their mirth with me. But her aloofness, cultivated to augment the authority she so feared to lose, did not invite intimacy. “Are the stores in the kitchen adequate?” she asked Guy.

      He nodded. “We’ve yet a side of beef, and fresh eels, too. Wine’s a bit diminished after last night, but it’ll suffice.”

      “Are the stables cleaned and stocked?”

      Another nod.

      She took a deep breath. “Gervais and his wife?” Her tongue thickened over the name of Lazare’s son. Did he know of his father’s plan?

      Guy’s face was expressionless. “Stumbled abed not an hour ago, my lady.”

      Fine, she thought. Gervais would have no part in running the castle. “My...husband?” She faltered over the word.

      “Out riding the fields with the reeve, my lady.”

      He would be, she thought darkly. Inspecting his new acquisitions, no doubt. Stifling a feeling of despair, she turned and spied Edithe returning. The maid dropped a handful of bay leaves onto a fresh bundle of rushes. “Nom de Dieu,” Lianna snapped, “they must be spread out, like so.” She took a twig broom from the girl and scattered the leaves.

      Sulkily Edithe took the broom and set to sweeping. Spying the scullion staggering beneath a bucket of ashes from the grate, Lianna hastened to propel him out the door before he spilled his burden on the new rushes. He made it as far as the stone steps; then the ashes fell in a gray heap. A stiff breeze blew them back in again. Catching Lianna’s look, Edithe hurried over to ply her broom.

      Lianna leaned her head against the figured stone of the doorway and sighed, thinking again of her mother. It was said that Dame Irène, singularly unattractive but beloved by her handsome husband, had been a gifted chatelaine. Guy, who was old enough to remember her, often said Irène’s success stemmed from the devotion her sweet nature inspired in the castle folk.

      Lianna knew she possessed no such endearing quality. She directed every task with immutable logic, her manner distant yet implacable. Her thoroughness amazed the devoted members of the château staff and dismayed those who tried to shirk their duties. Yet no one, perhaps not even Chiang, understood that beneath her cool mien lived a lonely soul who did not know how to spark warmth in others.

      * * *

      Troubled by Lazare’s duplicity and seeking answers for her dilemma, Lianna rode out alone that morning. She crossed the causeway that spanned the Somme, then paused to look back at the château. The quiet impregnability of the stone keep, stout curtain walls, and limewashed towers comforted her. A month ago she had no adversary save droughts and hard freezes that threatened her crops. Now she had enemies within, enemies without.

      She vowed to contend with each. Never would she let the castle fall