The husky voice was full of a wry humor that surprised Lily more than if he had struck her with his fist.
“No, my lord.” The boy didn’t seem to notice his master’s amusement, and took his words at face value. “ ’Tis a woman in truth.”
Radulf did not answer him, speaking instead to Lily, at his feet. “Lift your face, woman, and let me see you.”
It was an order. Lily might be gentle, but she was no coward, and she had never yet shown her fear to the Norman conquerors. To them, her reticence appeared as frigid hauteur.
Straightening her slim shoulders, Lily slowly lifted her head.
The man towered over her, all brawn and bulk.
Iron spurs decorated the heels of his leather boots, and dark breeches molded his strong legs, the cloth firmed by leather cross garters. One big hand rested on the hilt of his sword in its scabbard, and Lily noted a scabbed cut across his knuckles. His tunic of chain mail, or hauberk, was dull and stained from the day’s fighting, and there was a rent at his broad shoulder.
Beneath his conical helmet Lily was able to make out his clean-shaven chin and his mouth, full-lipped despite being so rigidly held. To her consternation, her interest remained fixed on that mouth, only slowly lifting to his eyes, which glowed darkly either side of the metal nasal. They stared deep into hers, and there was a quick intelligence in them that once again surprised her.
Perhaps something of her thoughts showed on her face, for the gleam was abruptly doused, the dark eyes narrowed suspiciously, and Radulf demanded, “Who are you? What are you?”
Lily glanced down at her hands to give herself time to concoct a believable story. Her fingers were clasped tightly at her waist, and on her thumb something gleamed gold in the torchlight. A ring.
Her father’s gold ring! Given to him by Lily’s mother, and which Vorgen had taken from his dead finger, and which in turn had been taken from Vorgen’s finger when he was killed. Lily had worn it ever since, for it rightly belonged to her. It was a ring like no other, a symbol of leadership.
Her father’s device, a hawk, was chased on a black niello background, the hawk’s eye set with a bloodred ruby. Around the hawk design an inscription was engraved, the words also filled with black enamel or niello: “I give thee my heart.”
Appreciating the value of symbols, Vorgen had taken the hawk as his own when he killed Lily’s father, and it had flown on flags and banners over every battlefield on which he had fought.
Radulf would recognize it.
Lily lifted her gaze and fixed it on Radulf, not knowing what she would say, only that her life depended on it. Beneath the cover of her cloak her fingers were busy tugging at the one thing that might give her secret away. Her voice tumbled out, breathless.
“My lord, I have been staying with my cousins over the border, in Scotland, during this trouble in Northumbria. When we heard Vorgen was dead, I was sent home with a group of men-at-arms. My father, Edwin of Rennoc, is a vassal of the Earl of Morcar, and lives ten leagues south of Grimswade. We had reached the forest just north of here when we were attacked by outlaws. I managed to escape on my horse. I don’t know what happened to the men.”
The English Earl of Morcar had been King William’s man and had refused to join Vorgen in the rebellion. So any vassal of Morcar’s would also be William’s man, and Lily knew Edwin of Rennoc had a young, fair-haired daughter.
“I was weary and afraid and took shelter in this church. I hoped to find sanctuary. There is so much warring in the north, I did not know who was friend and who was foe.”
“ ’Tis true ’tis sometimes hard to tell one from the other,” Radulf agreed softly. More humor? Lily had no time to ponder Radulf’s strange manner, for his voice curtly demanded, “Do you know who I am, lady?”
She nodded. Beneath her cloak, the ring popped off her thumb, and she nearly dropped it.
“Then you know I am the king’s man. If you are indeed who you say you are, you are safe with me.”
“Yes, my lord.”
Could he believe her so easily? Lily gripped the ring tightly in her slippery palm as Radulf leaned over her, his dark eyes holding a twin image of the boy’s fiery torch. Steadying her fingers, Lily slipped the hawk ring neatly through the tear in the lining of her cloak.
None too soon. Radulf was holding out his hand, palm up, and with the sensation of placing her head in a wolf’s jaws, Lily gave him her shaking fingers. His skin was very warm, and callused where he gripped his sword. As he raised her to her feet, his gaze ran over her face, taking note of her features as if he were making an inventory, she thought in frightened anger. Lily was well aware of what he would see; her face was no mystery to her.
Widely set gray eyes framed by thick, dark lashes and above them arching dark brows. An oval face with high cheekbones, a straight nose perhaps a little long for true beauty, and a stubborn chin. Skin like pearl, growing flushed now from his intense perusal. Once a bard had come to her father’s manor and sung songs in praise of her beauty and of how he wished to melt her heart.
Hers was a cold beauty, and strangers assumed her heart was equally cold.
Lily only wished it were so. In truth her heart was soft and tender, and she had had to guard it all the more diligently to prevent it shattering. The defense came naturally now; she had lost the ability to be open.
Carefully, as if he were afraid of startling her, Radulf reached to slip the hood of her wool cloak from her hair. The pale silk, neatly plaited when she had left Rona’s, was now a wild mass of escaping curls. The sudden flash of heat in Radulf’s dark eyes told Lily more than any words what he was feeling.
“The moon has come down from the sky to light our way,” he murmured. “What say you to that, Stephen?”
The boy laughed nervously.
