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  He stepped in front of her. “Know this, if ‘tis true the king ordered this marriage, still I will not wed thee.”

  Her shoulders eased. “You don’t know what a relief that is. Not being a history buff, I was worried he might have the power to force the marriage.”

  Edward did. Surely she knew that. What she didn’t know was that the king placed a high value on Fulke’s military stratagem, one that had earned his gratitude and forbearance in matters such as this.

  “No need to make this any more of a nightmare than it already is,” Lark added.

  It was like being struck in the groin. “A nightmare?”

  “You know—it just wouldn’t work out between us.”

  He knew better than to try to salve his man’s pride, but this woman pushed him past all sense. He pulled her against him. “I need not speak vows to have what you so brazenly offer.”

  Her mouth opened, closed, opened. “You mean you’ll rape me?”

  Fulke frowned. “What has rape to do with this?”

  Outrage sprang from her face. “What has. . .?” She exhaled a sound of disgust. “I warn you, if you try to force yourself on—”

  “You speak of ravishment.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “If it makes you feel better to call it that, fine, but I call it rape.”

  How odd. “In England, rape is an act of abduction, my lady. I assure you, this is not that.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Regardless, you are threatening to rape me.”

  “Again, you put sins on me. Were I to know you, Lady Lark, I vow it would be so only were you willing.”

  “And I vow I will never be willing. Now let me go.”

  He should have put her from him as if she were the basest of beings, but he lowered his head and covered her mouth with his, just as he had wanted to do that morn by the stream when the last of night had shone on a face made vulnerable by sleep. Feeling her soften, he drank in the taste of her, the scent. . . And felt the scrape of her teeth in time to pull back.

  Anger flashing from her green eyes, she strained backward. “Try that again and they’ll be calling you old lipless!”

  He stared at her, the images conjured by “old lipless” making his mouth turn a smile he would not have expected to feel. Then he laughed.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “You are funny, Lady Lark. And I thank you, for it seems a very long time since I have truly laughed.” He shook his head. “Mad or no, methinks I like you.”

  She scowled. “Fine, now get your hands off me.”

  He released her. “I yield. This time.”

  “Next time you won’t?”

  “Next time you will come willingly to me.”

  “Of all the arrogant—!”

  “Lord Wynland,” a shrill voice sounded. “Lady Lark!”

  Following Lark’s wide-eyed gaze, Fulke turned to where Jaspar stood in the doorway. She had witnessed what she should not have. And was worse than displeased.

  “I believe this concludes our little talk, Mr. Wynland,” Lark said, her voice tight.

  He looked back at her. “For the moment.”

  Her lips parted as if to retort, but she shifted her jaw and stepped forward. “Might I impose on you, Lady Jaspar, to point me to your kitchen? I’m suddenly hungry.”

  “’Tis belowstairs, of course,” Jaspar growled.

  Without another word, Lark slipped past her into the passageway.

  Fulke knew Jaspar’s inner raging and felt a pang of regret for being the cause of it. She wanted him. Since her husband’s death nearly a year past, she had sent one envoy after another to King Edward to suggest a marriage between her and the man to whom she had once been betrothed. And each time Edward denied her. “My apologies, Lady Jaspar. I should not have trespassed on your private chamber.”

  “As well you know, ‘tis yours for the duration of your stay.”

  So it was, by right of lordship over Cirque. He strode forward. “My thanks, but I do not require such trappings. Another of your chambers will serve as well.”

  “You will stay the night?”

  “Aye, though only that. We ride at first light.”

  “Then I insist you take the lord’s solar.”

  “Very well.” The sooner he started acting the protector, the sooner he would gather the remainder of his brother’s people to his side.

  “I would not have believed you were so eager to bed the king’s trollop,” Jaspar said, “especially as your nephews have yet to be found.”

  Her words struck hard. Though his attention ought to be on John and Harold, it was divided by a woman of ill repute. A woman he wanted. Why had he allowed her to affect him when there were matters far more pressing? Because, deny it though he did, he knew Sir Arthur would do the boys no harm? That the knight was merely misguided?

  “Hear me, Fulke.” Jaspar stepped near. “She is a whore.”

  Why did her words make him want to defend Lark when he ought to agree, to fear what disease he might incur if he laid with one who had been with so many? The answers eluded him, making him feel like a boy of ten and two.

  He narrowed his gaze. “If ‘tis true she is to be my wife, ‘twill be my duty to bed her—after John and Harold are returned to Brynwood.”

  “Not if you do not wish it.” Tears sparkled in her eyes. “Just as you do not wish to wed me, is that not right?”

  Of course she knew, just as she had known of the king’s decree that he wed Lark. “It is Lady Lark the king has ordered me to wed.”

  “She is not a lady!”

  He couldn’t argue that. Wherever Lark came from, she could not be further from English nobility. “She is different, I grant.”

  She gripped his arm. “I tell you, she is not the one King Edward sent.”

  “Mayhap. Now I have important business to attend.”

  Her fingernails bit through his sleeve. “Some say she is a witch.”

  It would surprise him if the whole castle was not abuzz with talk of her disappearance. It boded no good and was cause to be concerned about what such talk might reap. He removed Jaspar’s hand from him. “I had thought you more learned than to believe in witches, my lady.”

  Desperation dug into her face. “Two days she has been gone from Cirque. Now, upon your return, she reappears as suddenly as she disappeared. What else is there to do but name her a witch?”

  “Lady Lark is no more a witch than you,” he said, though he was not entirely certain of it. “Now I must leave.”

  “You will see!”

  He bowed curtly. “’Til supper, my lady.” He started past her, halted. “Until we learn different, Lady Lark is a lady, and the king would have her treated as such. Thus, I trust you will find a more seemly gown to reflect her station.”

  Jaspar’s hands turned into fists. “She is as tall as a man.”

  “I am sure Esther can add length to one of your gowns.”

  “Mine? Lady Lark is thicker than I.”

  Mainly due to generous curves. “Then Esther has a long night ahead of her.”

  Jaspar’s knuckles whitened. “I will see to it.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The dark one had returned.

  Mouth so parched she could barely move her tongue, skin so chilled she knew no moment’s peace from shivering, Lark peered up through the grate at the one who had pronounced death upon her.

  Then a miracle. Rain. It splashed her, left her gasping. But she was allowed only one swallow before it slid over her skin and seeped into the ground. Not rain. Wine. Bitter, but so very wet.

  Though hope leapt within her, she drew on her remaining sanity to push it down. He was playing with her, just as he had done the last time he had come. How long had it been? Days? A week? More?

  “Lady Lark, will you do as I say?”

  For what? Another promise broken? However, as much as she longed to deny him, survival whispered that perhaps there would be an opportunity in what he asked of her. Please, let there be a w
ay out.

  She unstuck her tongue. “Aye, anything.” Through thoughts chased with fog, she heard a scrape and click, then the grate was raised.

  “Get out!”

  It was more than she dared hope. Trembling, she turned onto her belly and levered up on arms that threatened to fail her. When her head was up and out, she looked at the dimly lit cell above the oubliette.

  “Make haste!”

  She dragged herself from the pit onto the cold stone floor and got a knee beneath her, but could go no further. “I. . .don’t think I can.”

  “Then you are of no use to me.” A booted foot struck her ribs, knocking her back toward the oubliette.

  “Nay!” From somewhere, she found the strength to crawl clear of the death pit. “Pray, give me but a moment.”

  “Now!”

  She stumbled to her feet, wove, nearly collapsed.

  The sharp point of steel pressed between her shoulder blades. “Death will take you all the sooner do you think to escape me. Understand?”

  She nodded.

  He thrust something into her arms. “Don that.”

  Struggling to keep her knees from buckling, she worked the mantle around her shoulders.

  The dark one whipped the hood over her head. “Now walk.”

  Feeling fifty years atop her twenty five, she shuffled forward and was prodded out of the cell, through corridors so dimly lit there seemed no end to them, past a guard who hastened to look elsewhere, and up a tightly-turned stairway upon which she stumbled and fell twice. Still the dark one pressed her onward. Not until the third landing did the agonizing climb end. He pushed her from the stairs to a window and threw open the shutter.

  Light poured in, so bright she clapped a hand over her eyes.

  “Look!”

  “I have been too long without light.”

  Surprisingly, he allowed her eyes to grow accustomed until she could squint to peer out the window that afforded a view of the outer bailey of a castle.

  Nay, not bright at all, but an overcast day that had earlier poured enough rain to cause the inner moat to flood its bank and mire the ground so that those who negotiated it were muddied.

  Her captor edged beside her, was silent as if searching for something.

  Stealing a sidelong glance, Lark saw his face was hidden by his hood. How was she to escape him when she was scarce able to stand and he held a dagger at her neck? It would take little effort to leave her convulsing in a pool of blood.

  Though the likelihood of escape was so far out of her grasp it was not worth the effort of thought, Lark could not resign herself to death. She had to try to escape, and if she died, better here than left to rot in a grated coffin.

  “There she is,” the dark one said. “Before the smithy.”

  The one he had brought her to see? Lark put her hands to the sill and leaned forward. Beneath her touch, a stone shifted as she searched out the one of whom he spoke.

  Dark hair unbound about the shoulders of a homespun gown, the woman stood in profile before the smithy’s shop. Lovely, in spite of her garment, and possibly of some import considering the knight who followed her closely.

  “Who is she?” her captor asked.

  She was supposed to know? Either she had lost more of her mind than she realized, or the woman discoursing with the blacksmith was the stranger she appeared to be.

  “Your maid?”

  Hardly. Jillie was not yet twenty, short and round, and cursed with a head full of flaxen hair that defied all attempts to subdue it—as far from this woman as a duck was from a swan.

  Lark started to disavow the woman, but it occurred to her it would mean her return to the oubliette. And death. “Why do you wish to know?”

  She heard his sharply indrawn breath, felt the dagger’s prick.

  “Tell me!”

  Almighty God, give me courage. “Who does she. . .” She tried to wet her cracked lips with the scant saliva in her mouth. “. . .say she is?”

  Pain. The trickle of blood.

  “I ask the questions.”

  “And I. . .will answer them, but only if you tell me what I wish to know.” Would he cut her throat, end it all here?

  The dagger quivered against her skin, promising a speedy end, but that was not all bad considering what awaited her below.

  However, the dark one needed her—for the moment. “That, Lady Lark, is Lady Lark.”

  Lark jerked her head around, once more felt the stone shift beneath her hands. “What say you?”

  “’Tis as the witch claims.”

  Why? And how? Had the woman been party to the attack on the king’s men?

  “Now give me the answer I seek.”

  If she gave it, all would be over. “First, a drink of wine.” She guessed he had a skin on his belt.

  More pain. More blood. “After you have answered me.”

  She should not have left court. Should have refused her father as she had wanted to when he told her of his plan to wed her to Wynland. “The wine, else be done with me now and never know what you desire.”

  The man spewed curses that were so vulgar they called to mind the one who had played at being Lark’s father before she escaped him to go in search of revenge on the king who had planted her in her mother’s belly.

  “I weary of you,” the dark one said.

  Lark looked to the bailey and saw that the one who had taken her name had moved on to the woodworker’s shop. “I will die whether or not I tell you. I but ask for a drink to ease my passing.”

  As the dagger slackened against her neck, Lark turned her head and watched the dark one search inside his mantle. She could almost taste the wine, feel it wet her dry throat, smell—

  Nay! As much as she longed to drink her fill, life was staring her in the face. But how to overpower him? Beneath her convulsing hands, the loose stone grated, answering her as clearly as if it had spoken in her ear.

  She did not know how she was able to move so quickly, to swing the stone, to find her mark, but her captor dropped at her feet. Breath caught in her throat, she marveled at how easy it had been and how still he lay. Was he dead? She shuddered, told herself it was no worse than a murderer deserved and what mattered was that her nightmare was over. Or was it? She could not simply walk out of here, wherever she was, for she did not know friend from foe. She took her first breath since felling her captor and panic rushed in with it.

  Calm yourself! Think!

  She considered the form at her feet. Would she recognize the face beneath the hood? If so, it might help her understand why she had been delivered to this hell. She bent and reached, only to snatch her hand back for fear of being seized.

  Run. Now!

  She dropped the stone and, as she skirted the dark one, caught the glint of steel near the stairway. It was the dagger that had flown from her captor’s hand when she struck him. She lurched forward, retrieved the weapon she prayed she would not have to use, and started down the stairs.

  Behind, the dark one groaned.

  Blood thrummed in Lark’s ears as she plunged down the steps. Please, God, deliver me and ever I will do thy bidding. Now if only He was listening. If only he would forgive her the sin she had thought to commit in the name of revenge.

  Kennedy stared at the tower that stood watch over the outer bailey. Nothing. She put a hand to her neck and smoothed the fine hairs that stood on end. She had been sure someone was watching her.

  Just my imagination.

  She looked back at the man who turned a piece of wood into a table leg. Interesting stuff. She couldn’t begin to guess from where she had culled such knowledge.

  Where to now? The huge cylinder that looked like a silo? The stables? The small building from which came the sound of birds? She decided on the latter as a means to delay her return to the keep—anything to avoid Wynland and what had happened between them an hour earlier.

  Though she tried to slam the door on the incident, images pushed through. She remembered his hands on he
r, his muscled chest against hers, the brush of his hair on her cheek, the graze of his bearded face when he kissed her. She had resisted, but more because she feared his promise that she would willingly give herself to him. She didn’t believe it, but never had she felt anything quite like what she did with him—not even with Graham, her first and only love.

  Why? Nervous? Out of her element? Needless to say, Wynland had thrown her for a loop when he called her on the marriage thing. She had been so certain her talk with Lady Jaspar wouldn’t come back to haunt her.

  “Merely confirmed it,” she muttered the words she had spoken to Wynland.

  Then there was her reflection. The dream had restored her health, but still her image was unexpected. It was such a contrast to the last time she had stood before a mirror that it had been like running into a long lost friend. She had missed herself.

  Was this behind her reaction to Wynland? Had she simply been off-kilter? There seemed only one answer: she was warped to feel attraction for a man like him. For all of her training in psychology, this self-analysis thing was getting her nowhere. She needed her head examined by an objective—

  This is not reality. It was a dream, and though she had been appalled when she put Wynland straight on the matter, it had been liberating. As long as she remembered this for what it was, she had nothing to fear.

  She stepped toward the bird building, and the shadow that crossed hers reminded her of the one who had dogged her steps since she had left the keep—Sir Malcolm who had allowed her to fall from his horse. And he looked no worse for whatever punishment Wynland had dealt. In spite of Kennedy’s annoyance at being followed, there was relief in that. Had Wynland given the knight this assignment as a chance for the man to redeem himself?

  She sidestepped a mud puddle that evidenced the thunderstorm that had been all the talk in Lady Jaspar’s cavernous kitchen. Of course, Kennedy had the impression that, prior to her entrance, the talk had been of her disappearance from Cirque. And more than once she had heard “witch” whispered about.