“Raine,” Judith began, “you know exactly what I mean. I would like for you to play for me.”
Raine smiled down at her, the firelight gleaming on her auburn hair, the wool dress showing off her tantalizing body. But her beauty wasn’t what threatened to drive him insane. Beauty was sometimes found even in the serfs. No, it was Judith herself. He had never met a woman with her honesty, her logic, her intelligence. If she were a man…He smiled. If she were a man, he wouldn’t be in such danger of falling hopelessly in love with her. He knew he had to get away from Judith soon even though his leg was only half-healed.
Raine glanced over her head and saw Gavin leaning against the door frame, watching his wife’s profile illuminated by the flames. “Here, Gavin,” he called. “Come and play for your wife. I find this leg pains me too much to enjoy anything. I have been giving Judith lessons, but she is no good at all.” His eyes twinkled as he looked down at his sister-in-law, but she merely stared at her hands which were clasped in her lap.
Gavin strode forward. “I’m glad to hear there is something that my wife doesn’t do to perfection,” he laughed. “Do you know that today she had the fishpond cleaned? I hear the men found a Norman castle at the bottom of it.” He stopped when Judith stood.
“You must pardon me,” she said quietly. “I find I am more tired than I knew, and I wish to retire.” Without another word, she left the hall.
Gavin, the smile gone from his face, sank into a cushioned chair.
Raine looked at his brother with sympathy. “Tomorrow I must return to my own estates.”
If Gavin heard, he made no acknowledgment.
Raine signaled to one of the servants to help him to his chamber.
Judith glanced about the bedchamber with new eyes. No longer was it hers alone. Now her husband had come home, and he had the right to share it with her. Share the room, share the bed, share her body. She undressed hastily and climbed beneath the sheets. She’d dismissed her maids earlier, wanting some solitude. Although Judith was tired after the day’s activities, she stared at the linen canopy with open eyes. After a long while, she heard footsteps outside the door. She held her breath for a long moment then hesitantly the footsteps retreated. She was glad, of course, Judith told herself, but that didn’t warm the cold bed. Why should Gavin want her, she thought as quick tears came to her eyes. No doubt he’d spent the last week with his beloved Alice. No doubt his passion was completely spent and he wanted no more from his wife.
In spite of her thoughts, her fatigue from the long day eventually conspired to make her sleep.
She awoke very early. It was still dark in the room; only the faintest light came through the shutters. The entire castle was still asleep, and Judith found the silence pleasant. She knew she could not sleep longer, nor did she want to. This still-dark time of the morning was her favorite.
She quickly dressed in a simple gown of finely woven dark blue wool called perse. Her soft leather slippers made no sound on the wooden steps or as she walked through the sleeping men in the great hall. Outsi
de, the light was dark gray but her eyes quickly adjusted. Beside the manor house was a little walled garden. It had been one of the first things Judith had seen at her new home and one of the last she felt she could give her attention to. There were rows of roses, a great variety of color, their blooms almost hidden beneath dead stems on the long-neglected bushes.
The fragrance in the cool early morning air was heady. Judith smiled as she bent over one of the bushes. The other work had been necessary, but the pruning of the roses was a labor of love.
“They belonged to my mother.”
Judith gasped at the voice so near her. She had heard no one approach.
“Everywhere she went, she collected slips of other people’s roses,” Gavin continued as he knelt beside Judith, touching one of the blooms.
The time and the place seemed otherworldly. She could almost forget that she hated him. She turned back to her pruning. “Your mother died when you were small?” she asked quietly.
“Yes. Too small. Miles hardly knew her.”
“And your father didn’t remarry?”
“He spent the rest of his life mourning her, what little time was left to him. He died only three years after her. I was only sixteen.”
Judith had never heard him sound so sad before. Truthfully, she had heard little in Gavin’s voice except anger. “You were very young to have been left with the running of your father’s estates.”
“A year younger than you, yet you seem to run this property well. Far better than I did, or have done since.” There was admiration in his voice, yet a bit of hurt also.
“But I was trained for this work,” she said quickly. “You were trained only as a knight. It would have been harder for you to learn what to do.”
“I was told you were trained for the church.” He was surprised.
“Yes,” Judith said as she moved to another bush. “My mother wished for me to escape a life such as she has known. She spent her girlhood in a nunnery and was very happy there. It was only when she married that—” Judith stopped, not wanting to finish the sentence.
“I don’t understand how life in a nunnery could prepare you for what you’ve done here. I would have thought you spent your days in prayer.”
She smiled down at him as he sat in the gravel path beside her. It was getting lighter now, the sky beginning to turn a rosy pink. She could hear the clatter of the servants in the distance. “Most men feel that the worst thing that could happen to a woman would be to deprive them of a man’s company. I assure you that a nun’s life is far from empty. Look at St. Anne’s. Who do you think runs those estates?”
“I never thought about it.”