The Unveiling, Tamara Leigh [ebook and pdf reader .TXT] 📗

had surely noted Annyn’s presence. “Tidings from Duke Henry.” He mounted the dais and pushed his mantle off one shoulder, then the other so that the garment draped down his back to show his full complement of weaponry.

Garr laid his palms to the table and leaned forward. “When do you intend to deliver these tidings, Sir Drake?”

A flush stole across the man’s cheeks. “Forthwith, my lord. I am to tell you that the future king of England shall arrive early.”

Garr heard Annyn draw the sharp breath he did not allow himself.

“If not this night,” Sir Drake continued, “then by early morn the duke will come before your walls and be well received.”

Well received. An order, doubtless spawned by Garr’s earlier message that granted Henry leave to come unto Stern Castle. “Shall he?”

“If you seek an alliance, he shall.”

Garr straightened and glanced at the windows that were filled with darkening thunderclouds. All day long rain had threatened to loose a torrent. This, then, what made Henry’s arrival uncertain.

Loose the rain, Lord, Garr silently prayed. It was not for lack of a response from the earl, John Newark, that he did so. Indeed, within days of having sent the missive that advised an alliance with Henry, Newark had agreed. It was for Annyn he asked it.

Muddy this land, overrun its banks. Was He listening? Curse all! The silent oath slipped from him and he immediately rebuked the blasphemy that would hardly turn God’s ear to him.

Lesson one, his father’s words came across the years, never allow anger to command your actions.

Still, it turned his insides. Feeling backed into a corner, he struggled for control. Finally, he said, “Your tidings are well met, Sir Drake.”

The man inclined his head. “My Lord Wulfrith.”

What to do? If only those accursed clouds would open up. If only—

A pox on Henry! he once more blasphemed. A pox on Stephen and Eustace! A pox on this crippling war! Fight the answer though he had done all these days, he knew what must be done to assure Annyn was not forced to wed Lavonne. There was no other way, especially now that Henry approached Stern.

“Well met, indeed,” he repeated. “We are pleased you have come to serve as witness for Duke Henry.”

As the man’s brow furrowed, Garr strode the length of the table.

“Brother?” Abel spoke low from where he had sat at table’s end this past hour, feet on the tabletop, though with Sir Drake’s entrance he had dropped them to the floor.

Garr met his brother’s questioning gaze. “Be ready.” He descended the dais.

“Of what do you speak, my lord?” demanded the knight.

He would know soon enough.

As Garr advanced on Annyn, she looked up, her pale eyes questioning, lips pressed, throat muscles straining to contain emotion.

Ignoring his mother’s beckoning gaze and his sisters’ murmurings, Garr halted before Annyn.

She fingered the purple bodice. “I—” Her voice caught, but when she found it again, it was flat as of one too weary to fight any longer. “I fear my bliaut is not yet finished.”

“A pity,” Garr said more harshly than intended. “I would have liked to see you wear it to speak vows.”

“Garr?” his mother said, forgetting that, publically, he was “Wulfrith.”

He waited for Annyn to react, but she kept her head lowered and a drop of glistening light fell onto the unfinished bliaut. The betraying tear darkened the cloth and spread outward.

Either she did not understand, or she found the prospect of marriage to him distasteful. Of course, considering what had nearly happened between them four days past, and for which he had spent hours on his knees, she could not be completely averse.

“What vows, Lord Wulfrith?” Sir Drake halted beside Garr.

“Those that Lady Annyn and I are to speak this eve.”

Her disbelieving eyes slammed into his. She had not understood, then.

“You jest, my lord,” Sir Drake exclaimed. “Lady Annyn’s betrothal was given to Baron Lavonne.”

Just as Isobel’s betrothal had been given to Drogo. The realization that what he intended would make him no better than the man who had tried to steal Isobel from Drogo, gave Garr pause. But only for a moment, for though his father had been a man incapable of showing love, he had never raised a hand to Isobel as Lavonne had done to Annyn. And would not do again.

As Garr stared at Annyn, she pressed her lips inward as if to keep from speaking.

Grateful she understood the urgency that she remain silent, he turned to the knight. “You are mistaken, Sir Drake. Inquiries have revealed that, in all of King Stephen’s England, no such betrothal was made.”

Anger suffused the man’s face. “Duke Henry, who will soon be your king, Lord Wulfrith, has decreed it.”

As Abel moved behind the knight, Garr said, “Be it so, Sir Drake, Henry is not yet king, and I am not yet his man. Thus, neither I, nor Lady Annyn, answer to him. And I have determined ours is a satisfactory union.”

“You cannot do this!”

“Of course I can. The bride is willing. Are you not, my lady?”

Annyn was hardly quick to answer, making him long to shake her, but at last she inclined her head. “The bride is willing.”

As Gaenor and Beatrix took up tittering, a thrill shot through Garr, but he damped it. Likely, she was willing only because this evil was not as evil as the other.

“Nor by this union shall any laws of consanguinity be broken,” he continued. “The lady and I share no relation to at least the ninth degree.” That he did not truly know, but what was one more untruth? “As for a priest, he awaits abovestairs.” Or so Garr prayed, for at this hour of late afternoon, the man might be out among the castle folk.

“What of the banns?” the knight foundered for argument. “They cannot have been read.”

“They were, and none has come forth to oppose the marriage.” An outrageous lie considering they had not been long enough at Stern for banns to be read the appointed three Sundays, but the wedding bed would be marked by consummation before any could prove otherwise. And therein lay the greatest obstacle—to speak vows and undo Annyn before Henry’s arrival.

Sir Drake shook his head. “If you think I am so great a fool to believe any of this, you are mistaken.”

Garr reached to Annyn. “’Tis time.”

Her gaze flitted to Sir Drake, but there was naught that the man could do but spew and sputter over what his arrival had set in motion.

Annyn passed the bliaut to Josse, placed her hand in Garr’s, and allowed him to draw her to her feet. The silver ring on her thumb winked at Garr as it had four days past, and now that he was so near, he saw the band was fashioned as a sword. Though a not-so-discreet inquiry put to Gaenor revealed it was but a trinket bought at market, jealousy had gripped Garr over the possibility it might end on Lavonne’s hand. Now it would not.

“We are ready,” he pronounced. Or nearly so, for he did not have a ring to give Annyn.

He looked to his mother and saw she had risen with his sisters. Isobel inclined her head, answering her son’s unspoken request, and turned to the stairs.

Garr drew Annyn to his side. Though he wished for a moment alone with her to ease her worry, they would talk once they were bound until death. “Come, Lady Annyn.”

As they started forward, Henry’s man placed himself in their path. Immediately, Abel and Warren flanked him, hands on daggers.

“This is outrageous, Lord Wulfrith!” Though Sir Drake’s voice was pitched too high for a man not to cringe, he did not seem to notice. “I vow, ’twill not be tolerated by the duke.”

“Fear not, Sir Knight, I shall deal with Henry. Now, if you wish, you may serve as witness to the ceremony.” He strode forward, forcing the man to step back to avoid being trod upon.

“I shall not be a party to this!” Sir Drake called as Garr and Annyn ascended the stairs.

Garr did not blame him, for his witness would only strengthen the validity of the marriage.

Squire Warren once more at his back, Garr said over his shoulder, “Hasten to the chapel and rouse the priest if he is there. Tell him what has happened and what is required of him.”

“Aye, my lord.” Warren took the stairs two at a time.

Once out of sight of those in the hall, Annyn pulled free of Garr and pressed her back to the wall. “We cannot do this. ’Tis all wrong.”

“We can and shall.” Garr laid his hands on her shoulders. “There is naught else for it.”

Annyn held his intense gaze for as long as she could, then looked down. After all she had done, why did he offer this? Why when it would bring Henry’s anger down upon his house? Might he care for her? Return something of what she felt for him, and over which she had agonized? But if so, he would not be so resentful, would he? And his resentment she had certainly felt when he told Sir Drake of his intention. Naught else for it, he had said.

Aye, he did it only out of a misplaced sense of obligation. Garr Wulfrith was, indeed, honorable, but such a sacrifice she could not ask of him, no matter how her heart cried that she accept.

“’Tis not necessary that you do this, especially as I do not wish to wed you.” Lord, the lie!

His grey-green eyes darkened like the clouds gathering over Stern. “If you had only taken one of many opportunities given you to escape, it would not be necessary.” He pulled her from the wall, and all she could do as she pondered the unexpected revelation was clamber after him.

She had seen the opportunities for escape, but had not recognized them for what they were. Garr had taken his squires off her, but had he wished to hold her, others could have been set to watch from a distance. Ironic that she had eschewed escape for fear of what Henry would do to the Wulfriths, and Garr had offered it for—it seemed—fear of what Henry and Lavonne might do to her. It was no small wonder he resented being forced to wed her.

They reached the first landing, but as Garr urged her up the next flight of stairs, Lady Isobel called out. Followed by her daughters who smiled as if they did not mind their brother wedding a woman who had tried to kill him not so long ago, she hurried down the corridor toward them.

“I have the ring.” Isobel proffered a gold band set with a large sapphire and small rubies.

Annyn could not be certain, but she thought Garr hesitated before accepting it.

Isobel looked to Annyn. “’Tis the ring by which all brides of the Wulfrith heir wed,” she said, then to Garr, “It shall be different for you. I know it shall.”

Now Annyn understood. Isobel had worn the ring upon her marriage to Garr’s father, a most unhappy marriage, it seemed. And Garr was not pleased for it.

He started to turn away, but came back around. “Change, Mother.”

“What?”

“You shall not wear black at my wedding.”

“But ’tis all—”

“Wear sackcloth, if you must. Any color but black. And make haste!” Leaving her gaping, he ushered Annyn up the stairs and down the corridor to the chapel before which Sir Warren stood.

Why did he care what color his mother wore? After all, it was not to be a proper wedding. No great gathering of family and friends, no pageantry, no trousseau,