‘Brice said he returned there and searched it after placing you in Emma’s care and could find nothing.’
Pray God, Edmund had escaped first! She slipped her hands under the table and clenched them tightly. She must give him some answer and then she remembered the last task she did and nodded at him.
‘I found a parcel of fabrics my father had bought at the summer market. I had not seen them before, but they were stored there and I came upon them. It upset me more than I expected.’
‘Would you rather I withhold my permission for you to go there? Would you rather I order Brice to see to things in the village while you oversee the keep only?’
Yes! Her mind screamed out the word. If she could not go to the village, she would not be forced to make the decisions that seeing Edmund would force on her. Like a tempted soul, she would not sin if she had not opportunity to do it.
She must be strong. She must find out the truth from Edmund and she must help those of her people that she could and if that meant giving them some spare food to get them through the coming winter, then so be it.
Even as she opened her mouth to say the words, her heart was not in it. Her heart saw this man trying to see to her comfort. This man being a better one than those higher in rank and wealth. This man who terrified her and frightened her and at the same time made her feel alive and valued.
‘I would not shirk my duties because they’re difficult, my lord,’ she answered. ‘We are almost done there and should only need another day.’
‘Very well, then,’ he said, rising from his chair, his gaze still intent and yet different.
‘Brice and I will be working in the yard when you are ready.’
‘I have some numbers to add to the records before I return there,’ she said. ‘It may take me some time.’
‘Worry not,’ he said as he gifted her with a smile that spoke of wicked plans. ‘By the time you are ready, he will beg you to remove him from my swordplay.’
She watched as he strode off, intent on besting his friend in practice. Fayth noticed the fraying edge of his tunic and the torn sleeve hanging down. She had been remiss in seeing to his care and his needs since he’d given her duties back to her. Planning to inspect his clothing chest to see what he needed later, she turned her attention and efforts back to the task at hand—the scrolls.
An hour or more had passed as she worked on completing the inventory of foodstuffs and supplies within the keep and those she’d found in the village. Other than a few cheers coming from the yard that shook the keep’s wall, she worked in the silence of the hall. Then a commotion in the yard began. Not knowing, she gathered up the records, carefully rolling and binding them before returning them to the steward’s closet. By the time she’d finished, Roger was leading a small group into the hall.
‘My lady,’ he said with a bow of his head, ‘these are Lord Huard’s men and Lord Giles asked that you see to them until he can arrive.’
With a nod, she called to the servants for ale and then watched the four men approach. They did not walk so much as swagger, all the time saying things under their breaths to each other that she was certain she did not wish to hear. One even had the audacity to touch her as he passed her. Soon, they were seated at the table, drinking ale and talking amongst themselves.
They did not realise or care that she could understand their Norman tongue. She felt her face flaming at their lewd and vicious comments and just when she thought she could not stand another word Giles entered from the yard. Tempted to run to him, she stepped away from the table and allowed him to greet them on his own.
‘Sir Eudes, welcome to Taerford Manor,’ he said. ‘How can I be of service to your lord?’ Giles’s greeting seemed appropriate to her, but the men at the table guffawed loudly instead of accepting it.
‘Oh, how the lowly have stepped up, eh,LordGiles?’ Sir Eudes said. ‘Stepped up too high, if you ask me.’ Shocked, she waited for Giles’s reply.
‘Ah, but the duke asked neither you nor your lord for their opinions in this, did he,SirEudes?’ Giles took a cup of ale and drank it down. ‘So, what is it that you or your lord wants of me?’
Like a group of young boys who lost their concentration and rolled on the floor like puppies, these men did the same. They seemed to take notice of everything in the hall, or every person, and commented on it to Lord Giles instead of answering his question. Then they all turned and looked at her.
‘Looks like you got yourself one of the pretty ones, did you not, Lord Giles? Lord Huard was left with two old Saxon cows with teats down to their waists and one too young to be ridden well yet, if you gather my meaning,’ Sir Eudes leered.
‘But how can you tell when they cover themselves like that?’ He pointed at her and she backed away until she reached the wall and could go no farther. ‘If you take them in the dark, you do not need to see them or their faces to plough them deep, do you, my lord?’
Because she was looking away, she did not see Giles move, but the crash of the knight to the floor and the movements of Roger and the other soldiers into the hall drew her attention. With his knee on Sir Eudes’s chest, Giles held his dagger at the man’s neck.
‘That is my wife and you will not speak of her, or like that, in her presence,’ he demanded. At the knight’s hesitation to agree, he pressed harder until he succumbed. Giles pushed him away with his foot and placed his dagger back in his boot. Fayth noticed that many of Giles’s knights and men now surrounded the group at the table.
‘As I said, tell me your business here and be gone.’
Sir Eudes stood then and brushed himself off, holding on to any answers he would give. When Giles took a step towards him, he started to speak.
‘Some of the serfs bound to Lord Huard’s lands are escaping and he wants your word that you will not allow them onto your property. He sent me to make certain you understand what’s expected of you, with you being a—’ the knight paused then and Fayth wondered if he would have the nerve to use the word ‘—a bastard knight, and not raised to know how a true lord behaves.’
Stunned by the audacity of such rudeness, Fayth held her breath and waited for the fighting to begin. Instead silence filled the room as the men waited on Lord Giles’s signal, for surely he could not let the insult go unanswered. He walked alone over to the other knight and stood so close she could almost not hear his words. His knights closed the circle around the others, significantly outnumbering them and making certain they knew it.
‘A Breton, did you not mean to say, Sir Eudes? I may not know Norman ways because I am aBreton?’
