“What reason can you possibly have for blatantly disobeying my orders?”
“You never ordered menotto leave Castle Airlie,” Laoghaire had the gall to argue while she preceded him into the tent.
“Christ on the cross! ’Twas implied,” he snarled, sorely tempted to reach over and shake some much needed sense into Laoghaire, his lady wife oblivious to the danger she’d courted. “Have you lost the wits God gave you? ’Tis grievous enough that you were apprehended by the sheriff. If the English mongrels had gotten a hold of you—”
“But they didn’t.”
“Only by the grace of God,” he muttered. “And whydidthe sheriff apprehend you? What exactly did you do to merit such treatment?” he demanded to know, having yet to be given an adequate explanation.
Rather than answer, Laoghaire stepped over to the brazier. She pulled off her gloves and, after tucking them under her arm, she held her bare hands over the glowing coals. Long moments passed as she peered around the confines of the tent. Silently appraising the sparsely furnished surroundings, her eyes carefully moved from the folding stool to the leather coffer to the iron-studded chest before landing on the narrow, monastic-looking bed, which was little more than a pallet placed upon a wooden frame. He assumed the lengthy appraisal was to delay the inevitable, for it didn’t escape his notice that she had yet to answer the question put to her.
Hoping to loosen her tongue, Galen reached for the flagon of sweet wine that his squire had earlier set on the top of the chest. He poured a generous amount into his goblet. Because there was only the one drinking vessel—and he was not inclined to summon Piers to bring another—they would have to share. After he took a much-needed drink, he offered the goblet to his wife.
“Although ye look like the man who departed Castle Airlie a sennight ago, ye’re acting like the cur who threatened to besiege my brother’s castle,” Laoghaire remarked, turning the goblet so that her lips would not have to touch the rim in the same place where his had just been.
Despite his annoyance with the antic, he refused to make mention of it. Instead, he yanked on the buckle of his sword belt. “Your tongue, lady wife, could flay a man alive,” he told her, as he carefully wrapped the long leather strap around the sword’s scabbard and placed his weapon under the pallet, where it would be within easy reach while he slept.
“My tongue! Ye are the one who has bid me a most inhospitable welcome,” Laoghaire carped, her cheeks flushed a deep shade of crimson. “Perhaps ye are angry because now that I am here ye will not be able to spend as much time with Melisande. As I understand it, ye’ve taken to riding at her side, which is why that knave of a sheriff believed thatshewas your wife, not I.”
“I do not like the peevish tone in your voice,” Galen chastised, the argument putting him in mind of the tense, early days of their marriage. Days which he’d mistakenly thought they had long since put behind them. “Is that what this harebrained venture is all about, the fact that you are jealous? If so, your lack of trust in me beggars belief. Did I not take a vow of fidelity to you?”
As though he’d just uttered something preposterous, Laoghaire’s brows raised up as she gaped at him. “Do ye actually think that is why I came all this way, because I was motivated by jealousy? Now who’s being harebrained?”
“Do not bait me,” Galen warned. “You may not like what comes of it.”
Suddenly hearing a discreet cough, Galen turned toward the tent’s opening. Standing there, with a discomfited look upon his face, was his squire. Assuming that Piers had come to assist him with removing his chain mail, Galen waved him away.
“My lady wife will attend to me,” he told the squire.
“Very well, milord,” Piers said with evident relief as he backed out of the tent. Clearly, the young man had no desire to be drawn into his and Laoghaire’s domestic squabble.
Galen well understood his squire’s unease; he wasn’t particularly happy himself at being drawn into the tempest.
With a huff, Laoghaire stepped around him and placed the wine goblet on the chest. She then removed her mantle and flung it, along with her gloves, onto the pallet.
“I hope those aren’t my chausses,” Galen muttered, as he eyed her manly apparel.
While he was still incensed at Laoghaire’s reckless behavior, he very nearly groaned at the sight of her long legs encased in the plain grey chausses. Too many nights had passed since they last made love, and he now felt a deep, restless yearning in his lower body. All too easily he could imagine Laoghaire, naked, clinging to him whilst in the heat of passion.
Christ God. I want to make love to her until we are both rendered senseless from a surfeit of lust.
Unaware that she was the object of his prurient thoughts, Laoghaire took up a position directly behind him. “I know that ye’re angry because ye think I should not be here,” she remarked, while she began to help him pull the scaled leather surcoat over his head.
Raising his arms to aid Laoghaire in her efforts, he said, “You should be overseeing my affairs at Castle Airlie. That is your duty as my countess. You should not be roving around the countryside.” He craned his head to peer at Laoghaire, who now stood with the surcoat clutched in her hands. With a jut of the chin, he indicated that she should place it on the chest.
“I know what my duties as the lady of the castle entail,” she was quick to inform him. Having done as directed, she picked up a folding stool before returning to his side. “But I also have a duty as yer wife to see that no harm comes to ye. And it is in that capacity, as yer wife, and not yer countess, that I am here now.”
Pronouncement made, Laoghaire stepped onto the stool. Galen knew without asking that the elevated position would enable her to better remove the chain mail hauberk.
“While I am touched by your solicitude,” he deadpanned, “I think we both know that you have no cause for concern.” He turned his head in Laoghaire’s direction, only to find himself peering directly at her prominently rounded bosom. The sight of which made his fingers twitch, Galen desperate to place his hands upon those wool-clad globes. Gritting his teeth, he once again raised his arms into the air.
“I came because I had a dire vision, one that was sealed with a raven’s caw,” Laoghaire informed him, grunting softly as she hefted the hauberk over his head, the cumbersome apparel weighing more than two stone.
Stepping down from the stool, she placed the hauberk beside his leather surcoat.
Relieved to have the heavy garment removed, Galen rolled his shoulders several times before he turned to face his wife. Admittedly bewildered by her explanation, he said, “Do you mean that you actually put yourself in grave jeopardy simply because you were awakened by a raven’s caw?”
Laoghaire vehemently shook her head. “That is not what happened. Before the raven came to me, I had a vision at the auld standing stone. And I was not asleep when it happened,” she added.
