“I hate you!” she cried in the throes of her desire for him.
“Liar!” he mocked her, kissing her hungrily until her mouth was bruised.
Elizabeth struggled to restrain her tears. Then she realized he had not gone yet. There was still time, and she would handfast with him to bind him even closer. She let the passion they shared sweep over her like a great wave of water, and cried out with her satisfaction at the same moment he cried out with his.
What had begun in secret between them was now an open affair. There was no one at Friarsgate who did not know the lady was in love—and in bed—with the Scot. Maybel fretted to Lord Cambridge, who was preparing to return home to Otterly.
“She has wantonly thrown away her virtue, Tom. Who will have her now?”
“She wants none but him, my dear,” Thomas Bolton said gently.
“A Scot? What will Rosamund say?” the old woman worried.
“She encouraged Elizabeth to it, so relieved was she that her daughter had finally found a man she could love, and share Friarsgate with, Maybel.”
“Even now he plans to return to Scotland,” Maybel said. “I have heard him say it. Now that Edmund can take up some of his duties again he will go.”
“Aye, he will go,” Elizabeth said coming upon them, “but you and Edmund will go to your cottage to live, for my great-uncle can no longer bear the burden of this estate. I am not such a fool that I do not know that. If Baen leaves me, I will manage my lands without help. Have I not trained all my life for this role?”
“And who will take care of you?” Maybel wanted to know. “You are strong even for a woman, my child, but you are not invincible.”
“Nancy takes care of me, thanks to you,” Elizabeth said, hugging the older woman warmly. “And Jane has directed the housemaids while you nursed our Edmund. You trained her yourself, Maybel, and she is quite competent, you must agree.” She turned to Lord Cambridge. “When will you leave, Uncle?”
“Two days after Michaelmas,” he said. “Will writes that my wing is now ready for habitation, and my books have arrived from London. But I do love Michaelmas here at Friarsgate, dear girl. So I will not go until October first.”
“I am sorry you must go at all,” Elizabeth told him, “for I do enjoy your companionship, Uncle. Soon I shall be alone with only myself for company,” she said seriously. “But I shall be so busy I shall probably not notice my lack at all. Is Edmund awake, Maybel?”
“Aye, and anxious to see you,” Maybel replied.
“I’ll go to him now, and tell him of my plans,” Elizabeth said, and departed her hall.
“What is to become of her?” Maybel said, shaking her grizzled head. “The land consumes her. She loves the Scot, but she will let him go from her. And what is the matter with him that he would leave her when he loves her too? His sire must be a monster to demand such loyalty of the lad.”
“I think,” Lord Cambridge told Maybel, “that both Elizabeth and Baen are confused. She cleaves to Friarsgate as if it were the most important thing in her life, and he clings to his sire for the same reason, when the truth is they should be pledging their loyalty to each other. I do not think the master of Grayhaven would forbid his son a rich wife. Even a rich English wife. But I suspect Baen, in his misguided loyalty for his father, will say naught of Elizabeth to the fellow. Still, I do believe that love can surmount much that is foolish in this old world, dear Maybel. Let them be parted for the long, cold winter months. If the spring comes and neither has overcome their stubbornness, then we must do something ourselves to bring about this happy union for everyone’s sake, but most especially for Elizabeth and Baen.”
“Why is it that you always make problems that are difficult seem so simple to correct, Thomas Bolton?” she asked him wryly.
“It is a gift, dear Maybel,” he told her with a grin. “It is my fate to bring happiness to all who surround me, all whom I love.” And Thomas Bolton chuckled.
“You mock yourself, Tom Bolton, but you speak the truth,” Maybel told him. “Never have I known a kinder and more generous man than you are. What a shame that the Boltons should die with you.”
“That too is fate,” Lord Cambridge said quietly.
Michaelmas, celebrated on the twenty-ninth of the month, was a perfect late-September day, with bright sunshine and clear blue skies. A pole was set up before the house, and atop it Elizabeth had set one of the beautiful kid gloves with its pearl embroidery that she had worn at court. Around the pole visiting merchants would set up their booths to ply their wares. In order to participate they had to swear before Father Mata that they would give a portion of their profits to the church. Elizabeth paid her servants for their year’s labor, warning them not to lose their wages in careless gambling or purchasing shoddy products from the fair’s booths.
In midafternoon, as the fair was at its height, she found her lover and led him away from the festivities to stand beside the lake. “It is time,” she told him quietly, taking his hands in hers and facing him, “for us to handfast ourselves to each other, my darling Scot. In God’s presence beneath the blue sky I gladly take thee, Baen MacColl, as my husband for a year and a day. May Jesu and his dear Mother Mary bless us.”
“And in God’s presence beneath this canopy of blue sky I gladly take thee, Elizabeth Meredith, for my wife for the term of a year and a day,” he replied. “May Jesu and his sweet Mother Mary bless us.”
“There, now that was not so difficult, was it?” she teased him.
“Nay,” he agreed, “it was not.”
“And we will tell no one of our handfast,” she said. “Will you swear it?” Now when he remained with her they would all know it was because he loved her better than his father, and not because she entrapped him into a handfast union, Elizabeth thought.
“Aye,” he said. “I swear it.” He was already ashamed, knowing that soon he would depart Friarsgate for Grayhaven, and it was unlikely he would ever see her again. And in a year and a day she would be free to wed a man who was worthy of her. His heart was breaking with this knowledge, but he had warned her, hadn’t he?
William Smythe had returned to Friarsgate the day before Michaelmas to escort his master back to Otterly. Now, on the morning of October first, the two men and their escort prepared to take their leave of Elizabeth.
