The Wild Hunt Part 21

Gilbert de Clare coughed and, after a quick glance at Henry, pretended great interest in the rushes strewing the floor. Henry ignored him and changed into the garments. He and Guyon were of a similar breadth, but whereas Guyon measured around two yards in height, Henry fell a full six inches short of that mark and the chausses had to be extensively bound with cross-garters to take up the surplus material. Consequently, the evening ended in laughter and a deal of good-humoured jesting.

Henry swung to horse in the torchlit courtyard, his face open and smiling, black hair tumbling in an unruly shock over his broad forehead, grey eyes s.h.i.+ning with the remnants of a good joke.

'You are most fortunate in your wife, Guy.' He glanced over his shoulder to where she stood outlined in the doorway. His tunic reached almost to his fingertips in the new style of the court women and the chausses, even with the bindings, were appallingly wrinkled.

'I know, my lord,' Guyon answered, smiling.

'Although, as you have seen, most of her ploys have a sting in their tail.'

Henry chuckled. 'To be expected when she is under the sign of the scorpion,' he said.

Guyon looked up sharply.

Henry leaned down over his saddlebow and said impishly, 'Remember me to Alicia when you next see her. Tell her I approve.'

The horse lunged forward. Guyon stepped back and watched the glossy bay stall ion trot out of the yard. Gilbert de Clare followed on his patchy, raw-boned roan, his brother in tow, and then came Earl Hugh and the bodyguard.

'What was all that double talk about being related?' the Earl asked.

'Nothing,' said Guyon, uncomfortably aware that Hugh d'Avrenches missed precious little. 'A private joke. I am not sure that I understand it myself. What's more to the point, my lord, is Henry's closeness to the de Clares. There was a deal of double talk there, too.'

'Keep your nose out, Guy. Judith was right to drop that cup when she did. What the eye does not see and the ear does not hear cannot be a source of grief in time to come.'

'Oh yes,' Guyon said a trifle bitterly. 'I am an expert in the art of diplomacy.'

'Well then, don't fall foul of the de Clares. They bid fair to be as powerful as the Montgomery line one day, and one day soon at that. Hunting tomorrow? I'll see you there.'

Guyon watched him leave, then, frowning, went to the stables to check his courser which had a suffered a leg sprain during the day's hunt.

Upstairs, Helgund bustled around the bedchamber, lighting the night candle, folding and tidying, setting matters to rights. Judith slowly removed the gold fillets that clasped the ends of her braids and unwound her hair. Helgund helped her unlace the tight-fitting overgown and, after Judith had drawn it off, hung it tidily on the clothing pole and fetched her mistress an ivory comb.

Judith was thoughtful. The evening had not pa.s.sed without incident, but at least a potential disaster had been avoided. A pity that the Prince possessed a sharper vision than Gilbert and Roger de Clare, who both obviously saw her as a muddle-headed juvenile. She had the impression that Henry had been amused because he was already several steps ahead of her and could afford to laugh. It was not a comfortable thought, but then neither were the other ones that jostled for s.p.a.ce and recognition.

Slowly she combed the kinks from her hair until it hung in a glowing, fiery fan to her thighs and tried to coax her tense muscles to relax. In a quiet voice she thanked Helgund and bade her go to bed. The maid curtsied and left. A soft silence descended and was infiltrated by the sounds of the spring night. Judith sat in the stillness and fiddled with the drawstring of her s.h.i.+ft.

When Guyon finally came up to the room, he found Judith sitting on the bed buffing her nails, the candlelight making a golden halo behind her head. She looked up and gave him a strained smile and, rising, padded barefoot across the room to pour him wine.

He took it from her, his expression blankly preoccupied, drank, looked at the delicate gla.s.s and seemed to come to his senses, for suddenly his eyes refocused and he concentrated upon her face.

'What's the matter?' she asked. 'Why are you looking at me like that?'

It was there. You could see it when you knew.

The expressions, the occasional mannerisms, the way her hair sprang from her brow. 'Nothing,' he said, wondering if his father knew. Perhaps. If it became common scandal the results would be disastrous. She was not Maurice of Ravenstow's daughter, therefore the barony was not hers by right of birth but belonged instead to her Montgomery uncles - Robert de Belleme, Arnulf and Roger. He suddenly felt very cold.

'Guy?' Feeling frightened, Judith touched his arm and, when he did not move, his brow also.

He started at her touch and looked at her, but as if she was a complete stranger he had never seen before.

'What's wrong? Has Prince Henry taken offence at me? Did he realise that I ... ?'

'Prince Henry?' He gave a humourless laugh.

'Prince Henry will take no offence. How could he?'

Oh no, it was very much to his advantage. The halter, yoke and hobble of blood. He stared at the cup in his hand, set it down and paced over to the shutters. The catch was loose and he pushed them open. The scent of hawthorn was thick and sweet. He could see the blossom gleaming softly white in the garth. A breeze ruffled his hair and eddied one of the wall hangings.

'Is it something so terrible that you cannot tell me?' Judith asked at his elbow. 'Do we face ruin?'

Guyon gathered his reeling wits and turned to face her. 'I cannot tell you, love. Call it a political secret if you will , or just plain discretion. It is a confidence I think I would rather die than break.'

He kissed her freckled forehead and tugged a burnished strand of her hair.

Judith frowned. Henry had told him something in the courtyard, of that she was sure, and she could only hope it was not along the lines that she had earlier curtailed by her deliberate clumsiness. 'It is not a wise hold to have over a man of power,' she said doubtfully.

He stepped away from her proximity where the scent of the hawthorn had been replaced by the more dangerous beguilement of gilly and roses.

'Henry intended me to know. He deliberately turned a vague suspicion into a certainty.'

'Is it very important that you say nothing to anyone, even to me?'

He picked up his wine, drank it and glanced over the cup's rim to where she stood, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s outlined by the yellow gilding of the night candle. 'Especially not to you, Cath fach.' Putting down the goblet, he moved towards the curtain.

'Where are you going?'

'Below to Walter. There's a pall et made up in an alcove for me and it's getting late.' He picked up his cloak.

'But the bed ...' She gestured around, her heart thumping. 'It's big enough.'

'Not for us both,' he said with certainty.

'Yes it is ...' She drew a deep breath, her eyes enormous.

Guyon looked at her frightened bravery and his heart turned over. 'When I made contract, my love, I did not want you. Now I do. If it were l.u.s.t, it would not matter, I'd either slake it elsewhere, or take you without thought. Being as it isn't, I'll sleep downstairs.'

Judith swallowed, but the lump in her throat did not go away.

'Good-night, my love,' he said to her with a tight smile and, cloak over his shoulder, snapped his fingers at Cadi.

She waited until he had almost reached the curtain, struggling and struggling until at last she forced her voice beyond the choking lump of fear.

'Guy!' she croaked, holding out her hand. He turned. She cleared her throat. 'Before you go, can you do this for me? I've dismissed Helgund and it seems a shame to waken her for a mere knotted lace.'

Guyon hesitated for a moment, then put the cloak down. She padded over to him and showed him the tangled draw-string on her s.h.i.+ft.

'I'm not a lady's maid,' he growled, stooping over the knot. 'Perhaps you should rouse Helgund, or just sleep in it.'

'I would be too hot and I have run poor Helgund off her feet all day. Let her sleep.'

He turned her to the light the better to see what he was doing and began to realise that the task was impossible.

Even the maid's skill would have been unable to undo the knot, so tightly was it pulled. The fact that his fingers, usually so clever and deft, were serving him with as much dexterity as a platter of sausages, did not help matters either, nor the fact that the scent of gilly was drowning him in its spicy waves as it rose from the warmth between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Her hair kept tangling with his efforts.

Impatiently he reached to the sheath at his hip and drew his knife. 'I'll have to cut it. How in h.e.l.l 's name did you snarl it up like this, Judith?'

The blade tugged against the material, jerking her against him. She did not resist the pull , but flowed towards him. The newly oiled and sharpened blade sliced cleanly through the knot and the s.h.i.+ft dropped to cling precariously to her shoulder edges, held up by the merest whim of fate.

Guyon's throat was dry. He was aware that if he did not pick up his cloak and leave, he was going to do something very stupid. 'In G.o.d's name, Judith,' he said hoa.r.s.ely, 'do you think I am made of stone?'

She raised her eyes to his. They were wide and afraid and full of stout determination. 'Show me.'

She set her arms around his neck, craning on tiptoe. 'I want to know.'

The chemise fell from her body, leaving her slender and naked, pressed against him. Guyon closed his eyes, fighting the urge to throw her down flat beneath him and take her there and then. That was l.u.s.t as he had said, not love.

Besides, if the best wine was served, you drank it slowly, savouring it on the palate, not swilling it down your gull et in one fast gulp. Very difficult when you were dying of thirst.

'Hadn't you better sheathe that blade?' she said against his jaw.

The wheel had come full circle. He remembered Rhosyn saying that to him, twined in his arms, only her voice had been ripe with amused experience and Judith's was innocent, devoid of innuendo. The message, however, was the same.

He put up the knife. She buried her face in his neck. Gently he held her away so that he could look at her.

'Well, Cath fach, ' he said quietly. 'I am not sure that this is the right moment, coming to it so intent of purpose.'

'Guyon I ...'

He put his finger to her lips, took her icy hand in his and led her to the bed. He sat her down upon it, then he sought around the room, found her bedrobe and gave it to her. 'Put it on,' he said gently. 'You're too much of a temptation without it.'

Tears filled Judith's eyes, but she did as he bid in order to bring some control to her limbs. 'You say you are not sure,' she sniffed. 'But I am. I've had time enough to think and if I have any more, I will go mad, I swear I will . I feel like an ox on a treadmill and there's only one way to end it!'

Guyon shook his head, torn by doubt and desire, by reluctance and need. 'I do not even know if I can show you,' he said. 'I do not know the limit of my control.

Judith blushed and smoothed a crease in the coverlet. 'We have all night,' she offered timidly.

He laughed and looked away. 'You have a blind faith in me, do you not?'

'What else is there?'

Folding his arms, he sat down on the bed and considered her.

Judith cast round for something to say that would sway the balance or lighten the difficult weight of his stare. The silk coverlet was cool to her touch and as red as blood. She remembered that it had belonged to a bishop. 'You haven't said grace yet,' she reminded him, forcing her mouth to smile.

Guyon let out his breath on a heavy sigh. 'I haven't said any Hail Marys either,' he replied, but after a moment's hesitation unfolded his arms to curve one around her shoulders and draw her within the dim red shadows of the hangings.

At first, stricken by the enormity of what she had done, Judith did not respond except to s.h.i.+ver against him, her breathing swift and shallow with fear. He held her, stroked her gently as he might have stroked Melyn or Cadi, spoke to her of trivia, whatever came into his mind, making of his words a soothing flow.

Gradually, Judith calmed and started to relax, all owing languorous pleasure to filter through her.

The rigidity left her body, and she stopped s.h.i.+vering. She snuggled against him while he brushed his lips over her temple and cheek and the corner of her mouth, twisting his head slightly to trail small kisses along her jaw until he reached her earlobe. He paused there to play and then sucked the small , tender hollow behind it.

Judith gasped and pressed closer. Her loins felt as if they were dissolving. Hesitantly she nuzzled his throat where the tunic parted and moved her arm a little further so that her hand touched not cloth, but the hair at his nape. His hand stopped at her waist and tightened and the molten feelings tingled through her pelvis. She tasted his skin.

When he slipped his hand inside her bedrobe she stiffened, more with surprise than fear, but Guyon stopped immediately and made as if to withdraw. She dug her fingers fiercely into his nape, drawing him down, and lifted her face.

'Show me,' she said again, eyes bright with concentration.

He studied her doubtfully and she returned him a look that was at one and the same time wanton and innocent and full of a strange, wild tension, and then she broke the gaze and leaned into his body. Her lips touched the hollow behind his collarbone and her tongue flickered out. Guyon drew a sharp breath and pulled her close, seeking her mouth with his own. Hesitant at first, Judith quickly mastered the skill and pushed herself forward with a soft, impatient sound, lips clinging and yielding sweetly.

He ran his hand up her side, lightly brushed the small curve of her breast, sought inwards with his thumb and feathered it over her areola and nipple. Judith broke the kiss to cry out at the intensity of the sensation and surged against him, craving, but as yet ignorant of precisely what.

Applying gentle pressure to her waist with his free hand, he drew her down and over until she was lying on top of him. 'You have the advantage, Cath fach,' he said softly. 'Do with me what you will .'

Judith considered him, her swift breathing no longer a mark of panic, but of increasing arousal.

She gave a mischievous smile. 'Do you mean that?' Sitting up she reached to his belt buckle.

'Within reason,' he qualified dubiously as she began slowly unlatching it, her eyes never leaving his face.

He arched so that she could slide the belt from beneath him and drop it with a slithering clink on to the floor. Hearing his breath catch in his throat, watching the expression of pleasure-pain cross his face as she rubbed herself against him, her own sensations were heightened by the knowledge of her effect on him.

He drew her back down, lips replacing his fingers. Judith cried out at the sharper intensity of feeling and wriggled upon him, seeking to ease the core of sensitive pressure between her thighs.

'Wait,' Guyon said breathlessly and s.h.i.+fted her so that he could sit up and pull his tunic over his head and then his s.h.i.+rt. Judith flickered appreciative eyes over his chest and shoulders admiring the lean, toned musculature. They were face to face. Guyon circled her waist and drew her against him, fingers lacing her hair and running over her skin. He kissed her throat, the white valley between her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, found the cord of her bedrobe and gently tugged it undone, pulled her down upon him again, his hands cupping her neat, round b.u.t.tocks, squeezing her against him.

Judith purred and rubbed herself upon him like a cat. She kissed his throat and chest, twisted her head to follow the line of hair that ran from the centre of his breastbone and over the ridges of his flat belly, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s lightly grazing his flesh.

He groaned softly and tightened his hold on her and Judith felt her excitement growing as the knowledge of power triumphantly redoubled. She sought the drawstring of his chausses, continuing to nibble the line of hair as it descended.

Suddenly he gasped, banded his arms around her and rolled her hard beneath him. 'Jesu!' he exclaimed hoa.r.s.ely against her mouth. 'What need have I to show you anything?'

Judith had cried out at his lightning pounce.

Now she shuddered beneath him. The rippling twinges of desire radiating from her loins faltered, for there was the hint of savagery and l.u.s.t in his voice, the threat of what he might do, and she did not know how to deal with it. 'You're hurting me!' she cried, going rigid in his arms.

Guyon stopped and braced his weight on his elbows to look down at her. He drew a deep, shuddering breath, then let it out again slowly while he mastered himself. 'Judith, I'm sorry,' he muttered, brus.h.i.+ng a wisp of hair from her face. 'It is only that I did not expect you to learn quite so quickly. You outpaced me.'

She sniffed and swallowed, rubbed the back of her hand across her eyes and looked at him warily.

'I wouldn't hurt you for the world, you know that.'

He bent his head to kiss her eyelids and then tenderly her mouth, playing with her, stroking and nuzzling until her tension subsided and her body once more began to undulate against his own.

'Trust me,' he murmured, pressing small kisses over her throat, then delicately brus.h.i.+ng lower, deliberately tickling. 'Trust me, Judith?' Laughter edged his m.u.f.fled voice.

'No!' she cried, wriggling. 'Stop it, Guy ... don't.'