He told the story of a young boy and a faithless wife without feeling, as if it belonged to another. The room was quiet and Lyonene could imagine the feelings that had been stored so long, the emotions that had changed a happy boy into the brooding man who had earned the name of Black Lion.
They lay together quietly when he had finished.
“That is why you raged so on our wedding night,” Lyonene said quietly.
“I have never raged. I am ever good and kind.”
“You were such a brute I would have left you had I not said vows to you.”
“You said you hated me, but I did not believe you.”
“Aye, you believed all, all Giles said. I am sometimes glad for that Welsh arrow, although the scar it left is most ugly.”
“I love you, Lioness. I do not know how you could have doubted me. I love you more than myself or my yet to be son or… Tighe.”
Lyonene shook with laughter. “Now I know your words are true.”
“I shall keep a list of your insults and repay you properly when this great belly of yours does not prevent me from getting within a cloth-yard of you.”
“I shall look forward eagerly to your instruction.” Her eyes sparkled in the dim light and she moved her leg over his thigh. He was too aware of her skin under his hands, the way her hair caressed her cheek.
“You are a cruel woman. Now be still. There is only a short while before dawn and I must tell you our plan to remove you from this place.” His hand was on her stomach, and a sharp kick from the baby made him frown. “It has been long since the Round Table. Is not the babe due soon? Will you be able to travel?”
“It is a full half-month before he will be born, I am sure.”
“That is soon. Mayhaps we should wait until after his birth. Your Alice will see to you.”
“And then Lady Margaret may decide to move me elsewhere, or other mishaps. I would not like to take a newborn babe into the cold air. Now he is warm and protected inside me. Alice says he lolls about upside down in a nest of liquid.”
“We will go then, on the morrow. I wait for my men to come now.”
“How did you find me?”
“It was not easy. We had to keep our secrecy, so it was spread about that I was at court, that I did not care about my lowly wife and would not pay the ransom. I am glad you did not hear that story or I am sure you would have believed it.”
“Nay, I would not,” she lied.
He gave her a suspicious look for her too-fierce disavowal. “Dacre’s cousins and your father’s have sent spies everywhere. No one thought to look here. This woman, this Lady Margaret, is known only for her lechery for young men. It was not thought she would dare to encourage my wrath.”
Lyonene felt fear, as she always did when Ranulf became the knight who was feared by so many men.
“But what caused you to look here?”
“Sainneville saw your lion belt.”
“But the boy that I gave it to—they found him and hung him.”
“And rightly so. He sold it and gave no thought to helping you. He made a mistake in selling it to one of my men. From there it was not so hard to find you. A few mugs of poor ale and these guards boasted of the lady they held, of the four guards ordered to kill her should any attempt be made to rescue her.”
“How did you get in this room?” she asked, suddenly surprised that she had not asked it before.
Ranulf inclined his head to the shuttered window. “I but threw a rope around a crenel and lowered myself.”
“But what of the guards atop the tower?”
Ranulf gave a half-smile. “Did you not know the Lady Margaret has hired four new knights for her crumbling castle? They are strong, virile men, a little too dark for her taste, but she overlooks that flaw.”
“Your guard!”