The night at Axminster Castle had settled into a cool but brilliant evening. A smattering of stars brushed across the sky and night birds could be heard in the distance as the soldiers walked the walls with torches in hand, staying vigilant while a great feast went on in the glowing hall. Lord de Honiton had only brought about twenty men to the feast with him, leaving the rest out in the central bailey cooking their supper over an open fire, but the hall was packed with Axminster, de Lohr, and some de Winter men.
It was a full house.
Somehow, Mira couldn’t remember an evening so beautiful. Food smelled better and the light and warmth from the hall was somehow brighter than it had ever been. She’d arrived early to ensure that the visitors were taken care of, but Lady Isabel was already there, so Mira simply made sure the dais was properly set.
She’d never met Lord de Honiton, and as she stood at the edge of the table making sure everything was in order, she couldn’t help but watch the man as he spoke to Isabel. He seemed happy, and congenial, and nothing like the son Mira remembered. Somehow, as the years passed, she had built Raymond up in her mind to be something akin to a monster. She honestly didn’t remember much about him, only the apprehension she’d felt every single day as she went about her duties when he was around.
For quite some time, that had been a nightmare.
But it hadn’t always been that way.
When Raymond was young, he hadn’t been so bold. He was younger than Mira was, a little slip of a boy with a wild crown of dark hair and enormous brown eyes. He was almost angelic looking when he first came, but that quickly changed when his behavior began to come to light. He hadn’t been there more than a few months before he decided Mira was meant for him.
That was when the assaults began.
At first, they had been benign. He was a young boy, so he didn’t have the grasp of a more mature man when it came to wooing a woman. His attempts had amounted to nothing more than leaving her bunches of wilted field flowers or bringing her an egg or something of that nature. Mira had been polite at first, and that had been her mistake because he’d taken that as a sign of interest when there was none. His little gifts had gone on for a year or two, and her second mistake had been keeping any of them. She should have simply given them all back, but she didn’t.
As he began to mature, the situation grew worse.
Mira remembered the first time he pinched her on the behind. She had been so startled that she hadn’t reacted other than to yelp. He had grinned devilishly at her, thinking it was a game or perhaps even that she liked it, and her third mistake had been not stopping that behavior immediately. At first she simply ignored it, and when that didn’t work, she politely told him to stop. He ignored the request and continued pinching her any chance he got. She finally had to tell Lady Isabel, who had to see it for herself before she took action. When the punishment began, that was when the situation turned positively ugly.
The pinching became vindictive. When that wasn’t enough, he graduated to groping her at any opportunity. He would wait for her in the shadows of the keep, where the pages were not allowed, and when she walked by, he would reach out and grabany piece of flesh he could. Sometimes it was her stomach, sometimes just an arm. But there had been times, more than once, when he’d managed to get a handful of her breast. Lady Isabel, who hadn’t been entirely pleased with having the boy around anyway, took the opportunity to force her brother to send word to Lord de Honiton with the threat that the lad would be sent home if he couldn’t behave.
Lord de Honiton had ignored her. It was the worst it had ever been the last year Raymond was at Axminster. Mira hadn’t told Douglas just how bad because, frankly, she was embarrassed that it had gotten so terrible. Raymond, who by this time had gotten quite big and was growing strong, would wait for the opportunity to grab her from behind. More than once, he had pulled her into an alcove and held her so tightly that she couldn’t breathe while one hand wandered over her breasts and moved down between her legs. He never actually went under her skirts, but he would grope her through the fabric. The first time he’d done it, she screamed and Raymond was badly punished, but after that he grew smarter. He would grab her and try to put his hand over her mouth so she couldn’t yell. She took to carrying a dagger with her everywhere she went and finally had cause to use it one night when he grabbed her in the hall and she stabbed him in the hand.
That was when Raymond was no longer allowed in the hall or the keep. Thankfully for all of them, his father sent an escort to Axminster about that time with the news that Raymond would be moving to Kenilworth Castle to be trained by the master knights. It had been quite fortuitous, and the timing could not have been better because Mira was quite certain that she was going to have to kill the man to keep him off her.
And then he was gone.
Nay, she hadn’t told Douglas about any of that because, as she suspected, he was a man who was serious about thedefense of women, and in particular any woman who meant something to him. Douglas was chivalrous to the bone, so she didn’t tell him the depths of Raymond’s debauchery because she thought Douglas might simply go after the man and kill him for those offenses he’d committed those years ago. She didn’t want Raymond’s death anymore, but she did want him to leave Axminster as quickly as he could.
But she had to get through the night first.
Still, Mira felt very safe with Douglas in the hall. He gave her the courage to attend, to be in the same room with a man who had assaulted her in the past. Quite truthfully, had Douglas not been there, she would not have even got into the hall at all. But hewasthere, and she knew that nothing bad could happen to her as long as he was around. Given that she’d only known him a total of six weeks, it was a remarkable and unique feeling.
But one she wholly embraced.
Douglas had shown up to the hall with Eric just as most of the men were arriving. In fact, Lord de Honiton arrived about the same time, and the three of them walked to the dais together. Lord de Honiton was friendly, and good conversation, and he settled down with Douglas and Eric at the head of the table as servants provided them with the fine Burgundy wine. Mira hadn’t been able to take her eyes off Douglas since he arrived, as the man was clean and shaven, his long blond hair neatly combed and flowing free, and he wore a dark blue tunic that emphasized his muscular arms and chest.
Of course she couldn’t take her eyes off him.
Why would she even want to?
But she didn’t speak to him because he was entertaining Lady Isabel’s guest and she didn’t want to interrupt. She had been trained to be a perfectly good hostess, and in Lady Isabel’s world, women were seen but not heard. Therefore, Miraremained mostly in the shadows, watching the head table as well as the room to ensure that everything was running smoothly.
Unfortunately, that had been a mistake.
“Lady Mira?”
Mira heard her name, turning just in time to see Raymond nearly upon her. Startled, she gasped and stepped away, feeling the familiar terror flooding back. Those years of being able to push it aside and eventually forget were gone in an instant as he smiled at her, his brown eyes glittering.
“I knew it was you,” he said before she could answer. “I was told you were still here. I did not believe it, however. Surely some man would have married you by now. But here you are—and more beautiful than I remember.”
That voice. It sent chills of terror through her. Mira backed up, trying to stay out of arm’s length.
“W-welcome to Axminster, my lord,” she said. Quickly, she indicated the dais. “Your father is waiting for you. Lady Isabel has ordered the fine wine brought forth, so I hope it is to your liking.”
She was moving away from him already, but he reached out and grasped her by the arm. In a panic, she yanked her arm free and whirled on him.
