It was shock that made Ena obey her mistress. Never had the girl spoken thus to her, and she could but stare at her.
“Leave me. I don’t wish to see your hag’s face until the morning. Go.”
The old woman scuttled out. Alone once again, Daria stared at the closed door. She felt only a bit of guilt, for Ena had become more and more unstable during their months of captivity. Once she was gone, if she managed to escape, the old woman would be safe enough here. She knew the earl wouldn’t waste his time killing her.
She paced until her leg cramped. She sat down on her bed and began rubbing her calf. What to do? Wait for Roland to appear? She simply didn’t know. She supposed she had no choice but to remain here until he came for her. Or, she thought, rising quickly, she could try to escape herself. The door wasn’t locked. Perhaps she could slip by the guards; perhaps she could race through the inner bailey and no one would attempt to stop her; perhaps—It was ridiculous and she knew it.
She’d nurtured such ridiculous plans frequently during her confinement. There was no escape for her; she knew it. Then, she wondered, how could Roland get her out of here? He’d said tonight. But how? She saw no way, no glimmer of a chance.
She was crying again, feeling again the earl’s callused fingers digging into her flesh, touching her, pushing against her until his finger entered her, probed inside her, and the pain mixed with the humiliation of it caused her to cry out, covering her face in her hands. And Roland had watched.
It was too much. Something inside her gave way and she suddenly felt outside herself; she felt as outside and as gray as the falling dusk, and filled with numb purpose. She rose and walked slowly toward the narrow window. She measured its width with her hands. She climbed up on a stool and tried to stick her head through the opening. It was too small even for her head. She pushed harder, bruising her temples. Staggering pain coursed through her head. She scrambled off the stool, her hands pressed against her temples, and she stared down at it and then at the window and was horrified. She’d wanted to leap through it; she’d wanted to kill herself. She drew a breath and forced herself to suck in air slowly and deeply. She’d lost her reason. Slowly she lay down on her narrow bed. She closed her eyes. She would remain calm. She would wait; she had no choice. The pain in her head subsided.
She didn’t know how many hours passed, if hours indeed did slip by. Perhaps it was a succession of minutes that crept by her, so very slowly, until she wanted to scream. The chamber grew dark with the night; soon the one lone candle
gutted.
There was but a quarter-moon to glimmer in the night sky, and its light cast no shadows into the chamber. It was dark and silent. She heard the door open softly. She heard a man’s step, a man’s steady breathing.
“I cannot wait longer for you,” he said, coming to a halt beside her cot. “I am here to become your husband. I have prayed long in the chapel. God approves my actions. You will take me and accept me and obey me.”
4
She’d known he would come, and strangely enough, she wasn’t paralyzed by fear. She listened to him speak, and some part of her marveled at his ability to bring God to his side, be the matter one of piety or lust. She listened but heard no sound of a key turning in the lock. She knew there was a key, for he’d locked her in the first several weeks of her captivity.
Then he hadn’t bothered this time, for he’d seen no reason to. She heard his heavy breathing, heard his footfall as he approached the bed. She heard him trip over the single stool and curse; then he called out, “Have you no candle? I wish to see you. Where is the candle?”
Very slowly, very deliberately, Daria rolled to her side to the far side of the cot. She eased off the side and came onto her hands and knees on the hard stone floor. Could he see her somehow? Hear her heart pounding?
“Daria?” His own breathing was deep and harsh, and she knew he was feeling for her on the bed. She crawled slowly, silently, toward the door.
He yelled her name, knowing now that she wasn’t lying there on the bed waiting for him. He roared, wheeling about, and he again tripped over the stool. He kicked it from his path and in the next instant he threw the door open. Dim light from the single flambeau in the corridor wall cast shadows into the chamber. And he saw her, kneeling, her arms over her chest, staring up at him, pale and still.
The earl wondered if he should beat her now for her attempt to escape him; then he thought better of it. Perhaps if he struck her he would hurt her and she would not give him her full attention when he took her. No, he wanted all her attention, he wanted her to look at him when he thrust into her, drove through her maiden’s barrier. His heart pounded and his loins grew swollen and heavy.
“Get up,” he said, not moving. He was standing there, his arms crossed over his chest, his legs spread, blocking her, he knew, and there was nothing she could do save obey him. But she couldn’t.
She didn’t move.
“Obey me, now, or you will feel my hand.”
Daria believed him. Slowly she got to her feet. She stood there silent and waiting. He smiled at her and held out his hand. “Come, Daria. Be not afraid of me, sweetling. You will be my wife, after all. I offer you this honor willingly and with all my heart and with our Lord’s blessing. I will visit pain upon you tonight, but you will open to me willingly and you will accept my seed into your womb. Perhaps you will know some pleasure, but I trust it will not be overabundant. I do not want you to forget yourself like some women do. They are not good women; they are unworthy. My first wife was a whore, abandoned in her cries and demands, but you—you will be just what I want.”
His words had held her in thrall, and when he moved so quickly and grabbed her arm, she finally shrieked, “No. Get away from me, I don’t want this.”
Surprisingly, his hold on her arm gentled. “Fear not, Daria. You are blessed amongst women. God and man will it so. It will be my duty to take you as often as I am able, and you will come to wish for me, surely, in your sweet way, and to ask me prettily to take you. Women are to bend to their husbands; it is in your nature to do so.”
He stopped a moment and gave her a look filled with such certainty that she wondered for an instant if she were not somehow amiss in her view of him and the world itself and not accepting something that was truly an honor bestowed upon her. Then she laughed. She’d thought to jump out of that window if only she’d fit through it. She no longer cared. She leaned back her head and spit at him, full in the face.
In the next moment he jerked her to the bed and threw her upon her face. His hand at the small of her back held her still. The chamber door stood open, but he didn’t care. He wanted to see her and he wasted no more time. She was his and he would do just as he pleased. He would honor her in marriage and take her now because he couldn’t bear to wait longer. He’d already waited too long, been too careful in his deliberations regarding her. He ripped up her gown, baring her to her waist. He stood then and looked down at her sprawled legs, the rounded buttocks, the narrow waist. His loins ached and prodded. His breath hitched. He wiped her spittle from his face. He spread his open hands over her buttocks, kneading and caressing, and he marveled at the softness and the whiteness of a woman’s flesh.
She made a sound deep in her throat and tried to roll away from him. It was nothing, this woman’s token resistance of hers. He merely wrapped his hands around her waist and flipped her onto her back. He pulled up her gown and again forced himself to slow, to study this wondrous gift that he had brought to himself. He stared at the mound of dark hair that covered her woman’s flesh. He touched her and felt her flinch. He lifted his hand and said, “Now. Open your legs, Daria. I wish to see you.”
Instead, she lifted her legs, rolled up on her shoulders, and struck him in the chest with her feet. He grunted with pain and surprise and tumbled backward. But he caught her, easily, so easily, and she knew she would weaken soon and there could be but one conclusion.
She was screaming at him, kicking when there was naught but air to kick, for he was standing now beside the bed, watching her flailing, holding his hands over his chest, trying to regain his breath. And he was still staring down at her. Then he laughed, a low satisfied laugh. He was amused by her foolish efforts. Even as he unfastened the knot on his chausses he laughed. As he freed his manhood, he stopped laughing and looked at her. He saw her eyes lower, saw that she was staring at him, and was pleased, for he was hard and erect, his sex thrusting out from his groin. He was a good size, many women had told him so, and he wanted some healthy fear from her, at least that first time.
He came down on top of her, pinning her thrashing legs beneath his weight. She felt his sex between her legs, shoving upward, and she closed her eyes against the awful pain she knew would come when he managed to shove himself inside her. She struck his shoulders with her fists, scratched and pounded at his muscled arms. It did her no good at all. Her arm jerked back for yet another blow, this one to his head, when her hand brushed against the brass candle holder atop the small table beside the cot. A fierce joy went through her. She clutched its rough base, raised it as high as she could, and brought it down on his head.