“What is it, Grandfather?”
He didn’t readily speak, and his eyes grew even wetter from tears welling in the corners. Only after he heaved a ragged sigh did he reach up to caress her cheek. “You look so much like your mother…your dark hair, your violet eyes. I miss my dear daughter-in-law still—and your father and brother. Those damnable Scots, slaughtering them in their beds. If you hadn’t hidden in that armoire, they would have taken you from me, too! I curse them all,curse them!”
Another fit of coughing overcame him and he grabbed for Julianna’s hands, the strength of his bony fingers making her gasp.
“I’m going to die soon, child—and I will not have you left here alone to fend for yourself. Charles de Montfort visited me today and I’ve agreed to a marriage between you. He’s almost twice your twenty years, but I know he’ll take care of you. He says he loves you—happy news, yes?”
Julianna somehow found the will to nod, not because she was happy but that her grandfather looked so hopeful, staring into her eyes.
“Our lands together will make up one of the largest estates in Cumberland. You will never want for anything…nor your children. A messenger is already on his way to London to seek approval of this match from King Edward, though I know he will not dissent. His father Longshanks, the late King Edward, wrested these lands back from the accursed Scots and awarded them to our family, and to Charles’s family—and we’ve held them ever since. There is no better alliance to keep them safe for generations to come, yes, Juli?”
She nodded again, so hard a lump in her throat that she didn’t dare try to speak.
Her life decided for her seemingly within the blink of an eye—though she had long known of Charles’s intentions. He had made it quite plain that he wanted her for his wife ever since his first wife had died of smallpox two years ago, though her grandfather had held him at bay at her request.
She wasn’t ready for marriage. She wanted to stay with him at the manor where she had been born and where she remembered happy years with her parents and older brother that had ended so cruelly just after her tenth birthday.
A night of terror when those Scots warriors—some of William Wallace’s Highlanders—had come upon their home so suddenly in the deep of night and murdered her family, servants, and men-at-arms before anyone had a chance to fight back. It was a wonder to Julianna to this day that they didn’t burn the house to the ground with her in it, barely daring to breathe for fear that she might be found cowering in the armoire.
Instead, the murderers had returned to the north as silently as they had come, their vengeance won against Claude de Vescy, Julianna’s father, who had helped the late King Edward win back the disputed lands from Scotland.
When word was sent to her widowed grandfather living near London that she had been found unharmed, the only survivor of her family, he had moved to Cumberland to stay with her, and so they had lived contentedly ever since.
He had even nurtured her interest in the healing arts…though there was nothing she could do to save him from the lung disease consuming him—and she knew it.
She didn’t dislike Charles de Montfort, but she didn’t love him, either. Julianna had so hoped for a love match like her parents’, tears filling her eyes that at once made her grandfather change his hopeful expression to one of distress.
“My news displeases you, Juli? I would never give you over to a cruel man. De Montfort may appear hard and unrelenting, yes, but he’s one of the king’s most trusted warriors after all. What am I to do now? I only want you to be happy—aagh, God help me!”
He had started again to cough, this time so violently with frothy blood upon his lips that Julianna feared she was witnessing his demise.
She jumped up from the stool to pour him a glass of spiced wine and then held it to his mouth to help him drink, some dribbling down his chin.
“No, Grandfather, I am satisfied with your choice for me, truly! Ease yourself,please. There now…there now…”
His face flushed red from the strain of struggling to breathe, she could also see that her lie had comforted him, his coughing gradually lessening.
So grateful to see his color returning to normal, too, Julianna set down the glass and threw her arms around him to hug him tightly…tears welling in her eyes again when he weakly hugged her back.
“Then I will die content, child. Love will grow in time, you’ll see.”
“Lady Julianna, Lord de Vescy, forgive me!”
The bedchamber door had burst open to emit the steward of the house, Chester, the older man as flushed as her grandfather had been as Julianna spun around to face him.
“Lord de Montfort has sent guards to protect the manor! A host of Scotsmen have been sighted a half league from here and he’s gone with his men-at-arms to attack their camp—oh, God, what are we to do, my lady?”
“We’re to stay calm, Chester—and meanwhile, alert the servants to close all the shutters in the house and bolt the doors,” Julianna bade him in as steady a voice as she could muster, though her heart was pounding. “Tell them as well to gather any weapons in case we have need of them. Now go. Grandfather and I will remain here and await word from Lord de Montfort.”
“Yes, Chester…go,” echoed her grandfather, reaching up to grasp Julianna’s hand with shaking fingers. “You, too, child. You must hide—”
“I’ll not leave you,” she tried to soothe him, sinking to her knees beside his chair. “Chester said there are guards to protect us. All will be well, I’m certain of it.”
Her grandfather’s weak nod pained her heart, which still raced in spite of her determination to remain calm. She enfolded his hand in both of hers and leaned toward him.
“Shall I tell you about the red fox I found with a thorn in its paw? No more than a pup, really, and as gentle as a spring lamb. As soon as I removed the thorn, he licked my hand and then scampered off into the woods…”
CHAPTER2
