Alinor Read online

  “You think well of me, do you not?” Ian remarked bitterly. “Where am I classed? Too stupid? Too weak? Or too disloyal to be of help?”

  “But Ian,” Alinor exclaimed, “how could I ask you when—”

  “For sweet Mary’s sake, do not rub salt into my wounds!”

  “No, I was not thinking of that foolish argument,” Alinor assured him. “The heat being gone from my head, I would ask you to serve me for love quickly enough, but I have seen that you have some great matter in hand that is weighing on your spirit. Forgive me that I did not ask you to unburden your heart. I knew you wished to tell me, but—”

  “You have seen clearly enough, but not all there is to see.” Ian’s voice was gratingly harsh again. “Will you tell me how you offended the king—I mean, are you willing to tell me?”

  “Of course I am willing, but I do not see that it will be of any use to you. However, it was thus. You know that Simon and I were wed in the Holy Land and that when we came back to England none knew of it. Simon hastened to tell the queen. I remained to make straight all that had gone awry on my lands. By a ruse I was brought to Kingsclere and fell into Lord John’s hands—it was before he was king, of course. He wished to marry me to a man of his own choosing and use my lands as he saw fit. I told him he was too late, that Simon had me already. Then he said,” suddenly Alinor began to giggle like a little girl, “he said that he would not have picked the bud—in deference to the man he had chosen for me—but that since the flower was open, he would sup some of its nectar.”

  Ian had looked away, seeing where the tale was leading and not wishing to embarrass Alinor. His nostrils spread and then pinched with distaste. “Filth,” he muttered. “Did he force you?”

  “Would he hate me if he had?” Alinor laughed merrily, and Ian looked at her, realizing that the little choked squeaks he had heard were not tears. “He called me a frightened little bird,” she sputtered, “and—and he chucked me under the chin.”

  “But how did you preserve your virtue?”

  “Virtue?” Alinor spat. “Virtue had nothing to do with it! Stupid clod! He made me lose my temper, calling me a little bird and chucking me under the chin as if I were a maidservant. I rammed him in the belly with an embroidery frame.” Alinor began to laugh again. “I think I may have caught his upstanding member, and when he ceased writhing with pain, I drove him from the room with a lighted torch and my knife.”

  Ian stared down at her with open mouth and glazed eyes.

  “If only he had not made me angry,” Alinor sighed, shaking her head remorsefully. “It would have been more politic to yield, but he did not give me time to think!”

  “Alinor,” Ian gasped, “have you no morals?”

  First she laughed, which did not really surprise Ian, but then she burst into tears. He bent over her, cursing himself for forgetting that she could be overly sensitive to everything just now.

  “That is just what Simon said,” Alinor sobbed, “those very words. And then we laughed because Simon knew the act itself, without the love that bound us was worthless. A little more pleasure than pissing, Simon said.”

  A flash of rage flicked Ian. Simon said, Simon said. Was he doomed to a life of what Simon had said? “A few minutes since you told me Simon was dead. Now I tell it you,” he snarled. “It is time to stop weeping for him.”

  Surprised, Alinor looked up. “I am not weeping for Simon. Not even I could have wished him to live longer. He hated himself for his illness. I did not try to keep him. That is my comfort. Not once, not once did I bid him rest, or not to climb the stairs, or not to do whatever he wished. I let him go. But—but I am so lonely. I weep for me, for me, not for Simon.”

  “You will not be lonely long.”

  Ian stood before her like a statue, his eyes as blank, his face as set. Shock silenced Alinor. She stared at the expressionless face, trying to make sense of what he had said. Was Ian trying to warn her of a threat to her life, implying she would soon join Simon? The notion that he might threaten her himself did not even flicker through her mind. Alinor did not even think that no one would dare threaten her here at Roselynde, where every man was devoted to her. She simply knew that no matter how he looked, Ian would never harm a hair of her head.

  Then what? Her mind leaped to the talk about King John. Not lonely— King John— Of course a marriage that would punish her for the way she had humiliated him. Alinor’s face became as blank as Ian’s as she considered the alternatives. Her first impulse was outright defiance. She put the idea aside, to be used as a last resort. With her hold on Simon’s property insecure and doubts about her own younger vassals, she was not strong enough. That left acceptance.

  Well, why not? Had she not just said that mating was a meaningless act without love? It was a cheap price to pay for time to gather her forces, and it might not come to that. A fatal accident could easily befall the man before marriage actually took place. No, not fatal, and not before. A glow woke in the depths of Alinor’s eyes. She had a worse fate prepared for any henchman of King John’s who wished to take her in marriage. She would indeed marry him, and she would be a tender and loving wife to the crippled, speechless, sightless hulk that would remain when her men were finished with him. That would be of multiple benefit. She would have her husband’s property to administer, and she would be protected from still another marriage.

  At this point a frown crinkled Alinor’s brow. Would Ian bring such news? It seemed most unlikely, unless the man chosen was respectable. The first supporter John had chosen for Alinor had been a decent man. If that were so… Little, bright sparkles came into Alinor’s eyes to brighten their glow further. If that were so, Alinor thought, I will soon have a willing slave to do my bidding. But that would be too easy. A decent man was not likely, because Ian had asked what grudge John had against her. Unless the king had mentioned the matter, what could have recalled that old, old incident to Ian’s mind? Simon could not have spoken of it recently.

  The idea, which slipped so quickly in and out of Alinor’s mind and which she accepted without examination, led her astray. In fact, the last thing Simon had ever spoken to Ian about was King John’s grudge. Two months before Simon died, Ian had been summoned to serve in the king’s expeditionary force to France. He had offered to buy release from that service so that he could continue to act as Simon’s deputy. The dying man had considered and then refused. It was more important, he said, for Ian to see how King John reacted to news of his death and to be where he could counter any plans to harm Alinor.

  “I do not worry about the men and the lands. They may be safely left to her management.” A wan smile had touched Simon’s lips. “What is ‘hers to her’ is more a part of Alinor than her soul. The king’s spite is another matter. He has a cause to hate her, and he is not the kind that forgets. If you love me, Ian, shield her from the king.”

  There had been no mention of marriage. Had Ian permitted himself to consider it, he would have suspected that Simon could not bear to think of Alinor in another man’s arms. However, Ian himself had not thought of marriage then. Simon had lingered near a year already. Less generous than Alinor, Ian could not bear to let the suffering soul depart. He would rather have Simon alive, no matter how tormented, than let him die and face his own grief and insecurity. Alinor had known nothing about what was said at that last meeting. If she had, she might have been better prepared.

  “Did you hear me?” Ian’s voice grated into the long silence.

  “I hear you,” Alinor assured him calmly, “but I do not understand.”

  “It is clear enough. The solution to all your troubles is to marry again.”

  “To whom?” Alinor asked dulcetly.

  Ian’s rigid stance broke. He clasped his hands and pushed at a bright flower on the carpet with his toe. His eyes no longer met Alinor’s blankly. They were watching the operation of his tone with enormous interest.

  “Me.”

  Surprise rendered Alinor speechless. She was still ca
ught up in her own baseless reasonings, and Ian’s statement was at one and the same time so much part of those reasonings and so far outside them that she could not reorient herself.

  “Do you mean the king has ordered that you marry me?” Alinor faltered.

  Ian lifted his eyes from the rug. He had not been sure what to expect, but an explosive and perhaps revolted refusal had been a strong possibility. He knew Alinor was practical enough to realize that another husband was an eventual necessity, even if only to protect her from overinsistent suitors. Three months was a rather short time, although great heiresses were often remarried within weeks of their previous mates’ deaths. On the other hand, few marriages were blessed with the single-minded devotion Alinor and Simon felt for each other.

  In terms of Alinor’s immediate reaction, however, that had worried Ian less than the fear that she might recoil from marriage to him as from incest. He had never dared probe how Alinor felt about him, and all these months that he had been arguing the question in his mind had brought no clarification. One gesture he brought to memory would seem to betray in Alinor a fear similar to his own—a fear that too great intimacy would lead to attraction. Another, just as clear, pointed to the sexless friendship a healthy man had for another. Still another bespoke the tenderness of a sister to a brother. The last was the most dangerous. There was no sign of revulsion in Alinor’s face, however, merely confusion.

  “Ordered?” Ian repeated. “No. My purpose, in truth, is to have you safe from him before he remembers you are alive. We were fortunate that the news about Simon came just at the height of the siege. The king had no time to think about it. Since then, I have taken good care that no one should bring it to his mind.”

  Alinor’s thoughts were beginning to come straight. “This was something you decided upon yourself?” she asked.

  “Yes,” he replied shortly.

  Alinor put out her hand to him again. “How kind you are, Ian. How very kind.”

  To her surprise he did not take her hand, and the blood rose into his face so that even in the candlelight she could see his swarthy skin was a dark red.

  “I do not know whether it is kind or not. It is simply the best thing to do. I hope you think I am a suitable man to train Adam. I can whip Simon’s castellans into line. And when you summon your vassals to our wedding, they can do homage to you again, which will clear their thinking on the subject of fealty.”

  Alinor looked steadily into the beautiful face. The deep flush made Ian’s eyes more luminous. “I believe you are right,” she said softly, “for me it would be a wise thing.” Then she shook her head. “I do not think it is the best thing for you, Ian.”

  “I am old enough to know what is best for me.”

  So firm a statement of an obvious untruth made Alinor laugh. Her grandfather, who had been over eighty when he died, had only known what was right, never what was best for him. The sixty-odd years of Simon’s life had not been long enough to teach him the difference between what was right in principle and what was best for him. Alinor was strongly of the opinion that Ian was another of the same type. Experience had made her wise. She did not attempt to explain the difference between “right” and “best” to Ian. Long ago she had talked herself hoarse on that subject.

  “I do not see what is funny,” Ian snapped, his voice tight with anger. “If I am no match for you in wealth, I am no pauper either. I am sufficiently a man of my hands to be well respected in tourney and battle. I am not contemptible—”

  “Ian! Ian!” Alinor rose and went to him, gripping his upper arms. “You are all that any woman in her right mind could desire.”

  “Any woman except you!”

  A faint color came into Alinor’s pale face. “My dear, I cannot allow you to make such a sacrifice, nor to endanger yourself by gaining the king’s hatred for my sake.”

  The flush receded from Ian’s complexion, leaving it gray and tired; his eyes went blank and hard again. She had avoided answering him with skill and kindness, but there was no doubt of what Alinor meant in Ian’s mind. “You do not understand,” he said quietly. “I am not asking you to marry me. I am telling you that you must do so. I will take no naysay from you. There is no sense in raging. I do not mind if you do, if the raging will make your heart lighter, but I tell you there is no sense in it. Whatever you do, I will have you to wife.”

  “You are mad!” There was sufficient color in Alinor’s face now, and her eyes were brilliant. She backed off, tensed as if to attack or resist attack. “Do you think I am some delicate court flower, some powerless, poor puppet—”

  “You are powerless against me.” He did not move toward her, and there was no triumph in his expression. “Oh, I have heard you say a dissatisfied wife should search for love in her husband’s heart with a knife, and I believe you would do it—but not to me, not when you know I desire only your good and your children’s good. You can even call your men and have me thrust out of your keep—you can, but you will not. What would Adam and Joanna think when they saw the gates locked against me? What will you tell them? That I wished them ill? Even if you could bring yourself to lie to them, to destroy the love that has always been between us, you cannot stay pent in Roselynde. You must visit your other lands, especially in these times. You have delayed too long already in that duty. The moment you are out, I will have you. Will you order your men to kill me, Alinor?”

  “Do you think I will love you for this?” she blazed.

  “You may well hate me.” His voice was very low. “I cannot help that. I can only do what I know is best for the children and for you.”

  The flat despair beat down her anger. “I will never hate you,” Alinor soothed. “I desire only to save you from hurting yourself. There must be some other way. I have thought already—”

  “You have thought for an hour. I have thought for three long months. I did not come to this decision quickly or lightly, Alinor. It will solve all your problems, and suit my needs also. It is time for me to marry. I need an heir for my lands.”

  “But I am no fecund mare,” Alinor protested. “In all the many years Simon and I were married, I conceived only four children. Of those, one I did not carry long, and one died.”

  Her plain, unembarrassed earnestness made Ian smile. “Simon was not a young man,” he suggested. He shook his head at the indignant rejection he saw rising to her lips. “I did not mean that he was no ardent lover, but it is known that fewer colts are vouchsafed to older stallions, no matter how willing or eager they are. In any case, it will be of less account to me in that Adam will be mine. If I get no brother for him on you, he may have it all with my love and goodwill.”

  That was too practical and reasonable a solution for Alinor to argue against. “The king’s hate is not so lightly put aside. It seems to me it were better to allow him to foist whatever man he wishes upon me. I will settle with any unwelcome husband.”

  “I have no doubt you could,” Ian agreed, torn between anxiety and laughter. “But whatever is said of the king, he is no fool. Do you think he would not notice if husband after husband fell off cliffs, or was accidentally drowned while sailing, or shot while hunting?”

  “I am no fool either,” Alinor snapped. “What would that get me except another husband? I assure you that the man chosen for me by the king would not die. I would care for what was left of him most tenderly, and most assiduously would I pursue those who harmed him.” She paused and added with a half-smile, “I can think of a number of men I would be well pleased to be rid of.”

  Ian swallowed. She was not jesting. She would not only have the king’s henchman maimed, which he would probably deserve, but would put the blame upon some person who had nothing whatsoever to do with it but had happened to incur her dislike. Alinor certainly needed a firm, guiding hand. It was quite useless to reason with her about right and wrong. He knew Alinor. However, she was never impervious to practicalities in a situation.

  “It will not do,” he said more calmly than he felt
. “Who knows what rights or lands of yours the man might swear away in order to have you for a wife? Whatever he promised would be forfeit to the king.”

  Alinor thought about that with narrowed eyes, but it was the horrible truth and one thing that she had not considered. Alinor did not mind parting with money, but she would not willingly give up a stick or a stone of her property nor a tittle of her right to administer it as she thought best. Ian was right. It would be best to marry him. No one knew what was in the strong rooms of Alinor’s castles except Alinor, but she was confident that whatever fine the king set she could pay. Her vassals would contribute, too. She had a right to an aide for being married.

  Having added up the benefits, Alinor raised her eyes to Ian’s face. God help her, what was she thinking of? This was Ian, not a book of accounts. This was a man with whom she had quarreled, with whom she had laughed, a friend who had wept for her when her baby died.

  “Ian,” she exclaimed with real distress, “I would repay you for your help and care with false coin.”

  He did not misunderstand her. With those dear to her, Alinor was always honest. She was telling him she could not love him. Ian shrugged. “There is nothing to repay.” He looked away into the fire. “This will suit my needs as well as yours.”

  For the first time in years, Alinor again wondered why Ian had not married. Certainly he was not afflicted with a love for men. Equally as certain he was not indifferent to love altogether. If he had been, he could have married greatly to his profit many years ago. Between the deaths on Crusade and the deaths in the wars Richard had waged, there were suitable heiresses in plenty. There were also well-dowered daughters of mighty houses that would have been glad of a blood bond with Ian de Vipont. Thus, either he still sought a woman he could love or, more likely, there was already a woman he loved but could not have. As I love and cannot have, Alinor thought. She was moved by sympathy for him who might also suffer the hopeless longing she endured.