“My sister thinks I am still a child.” Her gentle voice came to him from the darkness. “But I am not.”
“No, you are not,” he retorted. He knew well enough, from the feel of her in his arms, that she was all woman.
Mary seemed pleased with his answer.
“I would like a husband one day, and a babe,” she said, her voice carefully, painfully casual.
“Aye,” Sweyn replied bleakly, “I feared that you might.”
Chapter 11
The afternoon shadows were long, reminding Briar that very soon winter would be upon them. They gave a grim cast to this part of York, making it seem far more desolate than it would have been on a fine and sunny day. These buildings had been burned during the last siege of York, either to prevent occupation by the enemy or in one of their raids. Some of them had since collapsed or been demolished, and those that remained standing looked most unsafe.
Briar ran her gaze down the line of abandoned dwellings, until she came to the one she wanted. It was still there, then—or what was left of it, for as they drew nearer she could see that a good part of it had also been burned. Charred wooden beams rose against the gray sky, dark and gaunt, like clutching fingers.
“This is it?”
Ivo had been watching her. He was unobtrusive in his care of her, helping her to mount before him on the horse, making sure she was warm enough, comfortable enough, but nevertheless he was always there to lend her his hand when she needed it. As soon as she had expressed a wish to visit her father’s old home, he had agreed to take her.
If Ivo had been her gallant knight before, then he was doubly so now that she carried his child. To Briar, who was so used to looking after herself, such a state of affairs seemed strange and confusing. And very pleasant, too. She could get used to it, and that worried her.
After leaving Castle Kenton, she had always made certain she did not become too fond of anything. In case she lost it. Now Ivo had asked her to wed him. He had spoken to the priest and they only needed to set the day. But Briar hesitated.
The truth was, she did not feel as if she could entirely trust him. And he knew it. Although it had been Briar who demanded Ivo make a commitment to stay, who had needed him to say yes, it was now she who hovered uncertainly on the brink of the rest of her life. And Ivo had not pushed her; he stood back and waited.
Mayhap he knew her better than she thought.
At night, her dreams were full of him leaving without telling her, or vanishing into the night, back to his home in the south. Or dying upon some lonely battlefield somewhere. Despite all his promises, Briar was finding it very difficult to believe that he would really stay. She could not help it. Filby had abandoned her, Odo had fallen ill and was as much as dead, her father had taken his own life. Her dealings with men, so far, had led her to the conclusion that they were never there when she needed them.
“This is the house your father and Lady Anna lived in, the last time they were in York?” His voice broke through her musings.
Briar blinked around at him, unscrambling her wits. “Aye, this is it. My father built it especially for her—as a gift. I stayed here once or twice, but mostly I remained at Castle Kenton. Jocelyn and Odo spent more time here than I. After my father died the house lay empty for a time, and then it was burned by King William’s men, or the Danes—I forget which. It will fall down one day. I don’t think anyone wants it. They see it as being tainted, like him.”
And me.
“Such things will be forgotten in time,” he said, as if he believed it.
She didn’t bother to answer him. They both knew that her father must remain a traitor, even in death, until the king forgave him. And that seemed unlikely. So Briar, as his daughter, would remain outcast, forgotten. A creature of the shadows.
Did Ivo really want such a wife? Even a man in his position must have some ambitions. Taking a traitor’s daughter to wife could hardly further his career.
She opened her mouth to ask him, but he spoke before her, and the moment was lost. Briar was not sure whether she was sorry or not. Mayhap she was a coward, but despite her own doubts, she did not want to hear Ivo’s.
“Have you seen enough, demoiselle?”
“I would like to walk through it.”
Ivo eyed the building uneasily. The burnt part was mostly to one side, while the remainder appeared reasonably sound. Briar firmed her lips, and gazed at him with big eyes, managing to look mulish and pleading at the same time. She hid a smile when he gave a long-suffering sigh.
“We can look inside without danger, can’t we, Ivo? And you will protect me, won’t you?”
His eyebrows rose cynically. “Very pretty, Briar, but I do not believe that meek pose. You need more practice.” He began to dismount. “Come then! But do not move away from me, and if I say we must go, then go we must.”
“Very well, Ivo,” she murmured, eyes brimming with laughter. He swung her down and she took his hand, and together they moved into the abandoned building.
‘Twas hard to believe this was once an elaborate gift, Briar thought wearily. The shrine her father had built to Anna. The air was acrid. Smoke and damp and neglect caught in her throat. Briar had been here rarely, but she well remembered how the candles had shone and the people had laughed. As usual, Anna had been at their center, glowing and beautiful, for such attention was her milk and bread. And her father had been so happy, in his quiet way, because Anna was happy.
Aye, she had thought at the time, this is love.
