“It means simply what I told you,” he said. “I have other things to attend to and a wife is not among them. Hage has been ordered to see to the duchess in my stead.”
William didn’t like the sound of that. He really didn’t know what to make of it. Victor was cagey and he was beyond reproach, as the king’s close cousin. William, too, was a cousin but much further removed and without the great standing that Victor had. Still, something about this entire situation wasn’t sitting well with William. That upset him because he had far too much on his mind to worry about a badly behaved duke.
“I will not argue the point with you,” he said, disgust in his tone. “If you want the men to think that Hage is involved with the new duchess, then that is your business. I have more pressing worries on my mind at the moment. As you know, we will be leaving on the morrow. I will be taking Roger home to Lacock Abbey for burial.”
Victor’s frown left him as he thought on his dear Roger, in the next tent covered with rosemary and salt to prevent him from decaying too badly before they could return him home. He’d spent a few minutes with Roger’s corpse that afternoon and he’d said prayers for the man’s soul. But William had watched himthe entire time, the knowing eyes of a father who was looking upon a man who had sexually loved his son, so Victor had left Roger’s side purely from the discomfort he felt from William’s stares. He couldn’t let on to William, of course, even though the man seemed to know everything. Still, the death of Roger was something he could grieve only to himself. No one else would understand.
“You should have left today,” Victor said, rising from the pillows. “You should have taken your son directly home.”
William shrugged faintly, pouring himself a measure of watered wine. “It would have taken me the entire day to pack our encampment and organize the men,” he said. “Moreover, my men have been looking forward to this tournament with great anticipation. Leaving a day early for home will not bring my son back. It will only put him in the ground sooner so that I should never see him again. Nay, let my men enjoy the game they have worked so hard for. Roger would have enjoyed such a contest, too.”
Victor knew that; Roger had been quite fond of games and competitions. “Have you sent word to Lady Longespee?” he asked.
William nodded. “I have,” he said. “I could not, in good conscience, keep it from her. I will see my dear wife soon and together, we shall bury our son. I am sorry you will never know the bond of a wife, Victor. It can be a thing of beauty.”
So they were back on the subject of a wife again. Victor looked away, silently, but William would not let him get away so easily.
“Victor, for my sake, will you please escort your wife to the lists today and sit with her whilst you watch the games?” he begged quietly. “It would make for a united front and mayhap the men will stop talking. I would also like to speak with your wife; she seems as if she is a kind woman.”
Victor simply wriggled his eyebrows, feeling as if he had no choice in the matter. William was quite upset with him for the way he was behaving as a husband. He did not want to upset his old friend considering how much the man had suffered that day. Relenting, he finally nodded his head.
“Very well,” he said. “I will escort her to the lists and you may sit and speak with her. Will that satisfy you?”
William smiled happily. “It will,” he said. “Do you even know where she is?”
Victor shook his head. “This I would not know,” he said. “Send someone to find Hage. He will know.”
William did just that. They found Annavieve sitting in the armory, watching the knights prepare for the coming bout. She was quite polite and pleasant in accompanying Victor and William to the lists while the knights finished their preparation, but when Hage tried to follow just to make sure they were properly escorted, William called him off and used an escort of Salisbury men instead. Not approving of Victor’s directive to Hage, to keep such close company with the duchess, he didn’t want the man near her any longer. For now, she was where she belonged– with her husband.
Although Kevin pretended not to care when a host of Salisbury men took Annavieve away, the truth was that he cared a great deal. He kept sticking his head outside of the tent, watching the group of them walk towards the tournament field in the distance. It wasn’t the fact that she was out of his sight but more the fact that she was in her husband’s company.
Increasingly, Kevin didn’t trust Victor. But the fact was that he couldn’t stop the man; the duke was her legal husband. Victor, in his experience, was nasty and unpredictable, and he didn’t want Annavieve caught up in the duke’s vitriol. He wanted to protect her from it but the fact was that he couldn’t, not atthe moment. Victor was her husband and could do as he pleased with her. God, Kevin hated that thought. He hated it to death.
Frustrated, and edgy, Kevin finished dressing before anyone else and made haste to the tournament field to keep an eye on Annavieve and Victor. He knew, at some point, his behavior was going to appear somewhat suspicious, as if there was something more from him than mere concern for his liege’s wife, but the truth was that he didn’t care much. Three days with the woman and he was deeply in love with her. He wanted her and, God willing, he would have her. But if Victor made a move against her, or if he upset or hurt her in any way, he wasn’t entirely sure he could control himself.
It was a twisted, dangerous mess Kevin found himself in, now with Salisbury evidently suspicious of his intentions towards the duchess. Not that he blamed the man but he wondered if Victor would tell him the truth. He doubted it.
Forcing himself to focus on the coming mass competition was difficult but necessary. He didn’t want to be embarrassed by being captured and he realized the only way to do that was to pretend Annavieve and Victor were not in the stands. He could not watch her and participate in the mass competition at the same time. He could only do one or the other and since he couldn’t do anything about Annavieve and Victor, he chose to focus on the mass competition. He suspected that men would be out to get him, anxious to say that they were the one who bagged the mighty Scorpion.
Very shortly, he would find out that he was right.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
After Annavieve leftwith the earl and Victor, Thomas and Adonis were the only ones left in the tent with Kevin. Although the conversation continued to flow between the three of them, mostly discussing the upcoming mock battle and strategy, it was clear that Kevin was distracted. He had been the moment Annavieve disappeared from his sight, which was more than concerning to his friends.
“Kevin,” Thomas finally hissed at him when he caught the man peering out of the tent for the fifth time, watching Annavieve in the distance. “A distracted knight is a dead knight.”
Kevin turned around to look at him. “What did you say?”
Thomas rolled his eyes. “I said,” he repeated deliberately, “a distracted knight is a dead knight. Isn’t that what you have always told us?”
Kevin let the tent flap go and returned to his broadsword, on which he had been rubbing a scrape out of the steel. “Aye,” he said, defensively. “What is your point?”
Thomas looked at Adonis. The blond-headed knight sighed faintly. “You do not have to keep your guard up around us when it comes to the lady,” he said. “But you had better get your mindback on what is to come. If you let thoughts of her distract you, someone is going to come up and knock your head off.”
Kevin rubbed at the scratch with a linen cloth and finely-ground charcoal made for such things. “I will not be distracted on the field,” he assured them. “You can understand that I am concerned with Victor’s behavior towards the duchess. He has proven to me over the past few days to be unkind and unpredictable.”
Thomas plopped down on the stool in front of him. “You are going to be angry at me for saying this, but that is none of your concern,” he stressed. “He is herhusband, Kevin. He can behave how he pleases.”
