“I would like to believe,” he whispered, and when she parted her lips to speak, he closed them with one fingertip. “I will know. Words are too easy, given too freely. I fear those little hands of yours hold much that is mine.”
She did not know why the simple words caused her to experience such a violent tremor of fear, as if she had been given foreknowledge of some evil to come.
They saw the fire even before they saw the towering walls of the donjon of Bedford Castle. Lyonene was startled at the instant reaction of the men, and she spurred her horse hard to keep up with the thundering black horses ahead of her.
The entire village seemed to be ablaze, and the screams of the serfs and the animals caught in the raging heat tore at her, freezing her momentarily.
“Get to the donjon,” Ranulf bellowed at her, his furious face towering above her.
“I can help,” she screamed as she saw a child tearing across the courtyard. She started to dismount. Ranulf’s steel grip on her arm stopped her. The noise roared and the horrible light shadowed his face into a creature unknown, unearthly, a black devil.
“I have no time for this. Obey me!”
She could but do as he said and turned her nervous horse to the inner bailey, the gates locked in some semblance of protection against the threatening fires.
No one was about except the lone gateman, for all the castlefolk had fled to help fight the fire. She found the stables and paused for a moment, watching the flames leaping, licking above the low stone wall as they sought more fuel, more sacrifice to their gluttony. She turned to the horse to unsaddle it and then to look for a chapel to offer her prayers for the safety of the people.
“I knew he would not allow his precious little jewel so near such destruction,” a voice hissed near her.
She whirled around. “Giles! What do you here?” She looked around her nervously. The roar of the fire seemed deafening even in the stable, or mayhaps it was her own fear and panic that threatened to drown her.
“You did not think me so callous a lover that I would concede the battle so easily? Surely you knew me better.”
“I do not know you at all. Why have you followed me?”
“That is easy enough to answer.” His eyes raked her body as she backed to a wooden stall wall and braced herself there. There was no escape from the boy, once a childhood friend, now a glazed-eyed madman. “I was willing to admit defeat had I been beaten fairly, but how could I compete with the riches of your earl? I placed you second only to the Holy Mother, yet all the while you schemed to betray me.”
“Giles, you are wrong.” She moved even closer to the wall, as if a door might appear by some magic. The heat increased in the stable, and a horse moved restlessly in fear.
“You do not need to be frightened of me. I do not plan to hurt you. Nay, I have learned a great deal from your ways. I have lost what I so eagerly sought.” His eyes went to her breasts, outlined so clearly, heaving in her fright. “But as you sold yourself, so shall I sell what little of me is left. Do you remember this?”
He waved a piece of paper before her face, and she was puzzled.
“It is one of your letters.”
“I wrote you no letters.”
“Aye, that is true, but Lucy once let it be known that you often wrote stories and such. Remember your Gilbert?”
Lyonene was truly bewildered, for she remembered no Gilbert at Lorancourt. Then the seed of a memory stung her. She stared at the paper and the dirty hand that held it. “You started the fire,” she whispered.
“Aye,” he said and laughed. “I am glad you see how far I will go to get what I want.” He stepped forward and ran a caressing hand down her shoulder. “When I am wealthy, I will buy several women such as you.”
“Giles…” she began.
“Cease!” He pulled his arm back, and she turned her head in anticipation of the blow. He stepped back and watched her as he caressed the paper in his hand. “I have five of these letters, and it was an easy thing to change Gilbert to Giles. Shall I read to you what a fine letter of love you have written to me?”
She shook her head, knowing now what he held. She had always been a bit of a dreamer as a child and when her indulgent father had allowed his only child to learn to read, she had studied not rhetoric or even the gospels but, instead, a small book of chivalrous stories, secretly purchased for her in London by her mother. Lyonene had read the stories again and again and begged the jongleurs for more stories. Soon she had begun to create her own stories, sometimes writing them and often setting them to music, singing them to her parents on quiet evenings. But there was a time, not long ago, when she had created a lover for herself, a young man, a knight, strong and brave, and she had written letters to this imaginary man. She knew what the letters said, knew what fate Giles held for her in that hand that had already caused so much destruction. He held the end of her thoughts of happiness with her new husband; the delicate thread that held them together could not stand another blow.
“Lyonene, you are easy to read. Does he distrust you so much?”
“You have yet to say what you want from me.” Her shoulders sank wearily.
“Gold.”
“I have naught but my clothes. He has given me nothing.”