He paused, not turning, and grinned. “I will find out soon enough if your curses carry more than the air from your mouth,” he said, and strode back down the solar stairs and into the great hall. He saw Margot sitting close to Northbert. He frowned at the same moment she saw him, for he realized he was wearing naught but his bedrobe. A wondrous smile spread over her round face, making her almost pretty. She jumped to her feet and hurried over to him.
“I wan
t you now,” he said, and Margot smiled a siren’s smile. She followed him outside, then bumped into his back when he came to an abrupt halt. Dienwald didn’t know where to take her. Philippa was bound to his bed. He quivered. Damned female. Where, then?
“ ‘Come,” he said, grabbed her hand, and nearly ran to the stables. He took her in the warm hay in a far empty stall. And when she cried out her pleasure, her fingers digging into his back, he let his seed spill into her, and in that moment he saw Philippa, and could nearly feel her long white legs clutching his flanks, drawing him deeper and deeper. “Curse you, wench,” he said, and fell asleep on Margot’s breast.
She woke him nearly three hours later. She was stiff and sore, bits of hay sticking into her back and bottom, and he’d sprawled his full weight on top of her, flattening her.
Dienwald straightened his clothes and took himself to his bedchamber after giving Margot a perfunctory pat on the bottom. He’d left the single candle lit and it had burned itself out. He could make out Philippa’s form on the far side of the bed as he stripped off his bedrobe and eased in beside her. He untied the cross garter that tethered her to the bed and lowered her arms and pulled her to him. With a soft sigh, she nestled against him. Fortunately for his peace of mind and Philippa’s continued state of innocence, he fell asleep.
When Philippa awoke the following morning, she was alone, which was a relief, and her wrists were free. Her ripped gown was gone, and in its place she found a long flowing gown of faded scarlet, the style from her childhood, its waist loose and its sleeves tight-fitting to the wrists. With it was an equally faded overtunic with wide elbow-length sleeves and a fitted waist. She felt a jolt when she realized that the faded clothing must have belonged to Dienwald’s long dead wife.
The gown was too short and far too tight in the bosom, but the material was sturdy despite its age, and well-sewn, so she needn’t fear the seams splitting.
Her ankles and feet were bare, and she imagined that she looked passably strange in her faded too-small clothes, the skirt swishing above her ankles.
It was thoughtful of Dienwald to have had the clothes fetched for her, she thought, until she remembered that it was he who had ripped the other gown up the front, rendering it an instant rag. She hardened her heart toward him with ease, though the rest of her still felt the faint tremors of the previous night, when he’d looked down at her, then kissed her breast. Those feelings had been odd in the extreme, more than pleasant, truth be told, but now, alone, in the light of day, Philippa couldn’t seem to grasp them as being real.
She made her way to the great hall, drank a flagon of fresh milk, and ate some gritty goat’s cheese and soft black bread. It didn’t occur to her not to go to the weaving shed to see to the work. Old Agnes, bless her tartar’s soul, was berating Gorkel the Hideous for being slow to repair one of the looms. Philippa watched, saying nothing, until Old Agnes saw her and exclaimed as she shuffled toward her, “Gorkel’s complaining of wood mold, but I got him at it again. Prink is threatening to come upon us today and whip off our hides. He didn’t cork it! Mordrid said he ate this morning and was up on his own to relieve his bowels. May God shrivel his eyeballs! He’ll ruin everything.”
“No, he won’t,” Philippa said. She wanted a fight, and Prink sounded like a wonderful offering to her dark mood. She discovered when she called a halt for the noonday meal that Dienwald and a half-dozen men had left St. Erth early that morning, bound for no-one-knew-where. That, or no one would tell her.
Now was the time to escape.
“Ye look like a princess who’s too big fer her gown,” said Old Agnes as she gummed a piece of chicken. “That gown belonged to the former mistress, Lady Anne. Small she were, small in her body and in her heart. Aye, she weren’t a sweetling, that one weren’t. Master Edmund’s lucky to have ye here, and not that one who birthed him. She made the master miserable with her mean-spirited ways. When she died of the bloody flux, he was relieved, I knew it, even though he pretended to grieve.”
Old Agnes then nodded as Philippa stared openmouthed. “The master’ll fill yer belly quick enough. Then he’ll wed ye, as he should. Yer father’s a lord, and that makes ye a lady—and all will be well, aye, it will.” Old Agnes nodded, pleased at her own conclusions, and shuffled away to where Gorkel squatted eating his food.
Philippa walked outside the shed, Old Agnes’ words whirling about in her mind. Wed with the master of St. Erth? The rogue who’d stolen her father’s wool and her with it? Well, it hadn’t quite been that way, but still . . . Philippa shook her head, gazing up at the darkening skies. Evidently he had to get her with child first before such notions as marriage would come to him. She didn’t want him; she didn’t want his child. She wanted to leave, to go to . . . Where? To Walter’s keep, Crandall? To a virtual stranger? More of a stranger than Dienwald was to her?
“It’ll rain and we’ll have to rot inside.”
She turned to see Edmund, his hands on his hips, looking disgruntled.
“Rain makes the crops grow. The rain won’t last long, you’ll see. We’ll survive it.” She grinned down at him. “And aren’t you supposed to be at your lessons?”
He looked guilty for only an instant, but Philippa saw it. “Come along and let’s find Father Cramdle. I haven’t yet met him, you know.”
“He won’t want to see you. He’ll go all stiff like a tree branch. My father ripped off your gown last night and carried you off. You’re only my father’s mis—”
“I don’t think you’d better say it, Edmund. I am not your father’s mistress. Do you understand me? I’m a lady, and your father doesn’t dare to . . . harm me.”
Edmund seemed to think this over for a half-dozen steps before finally nodding. “Aye,” he said, “you’re a big lady. And I don’t need lessons.”
“Of course you do. You must know how to read and to cipher and to write, else you’ll be cheated by your steward and by anyone else who gets the chance.”
“Thass what my father says. That’s!” he said before she could.
Philippa smiled. “Tomorrow you’ll have a new tunic. Also study new shoes and hose. You’ll look like Master Edmund of St. Erth. What do you think of that?”
Edmund didn’t think much of it. He scuffed his filthy toes against a rock. “Father went a-raiding. He’s angry at a man who hates him and who struck last night and burned all our wheat crop near the south edge of St. Erth land.”
“Who is this man?”
Edmund shrugged.
“How long will your father be away?”