In fact, William was almost afraid to close his eyes, afraid that something else would happen. Wark had been in chaos since nearly the moment they arrived, so he forced himself to lay down next to his wife on the very large, comfortable bed that belonged to Thomas. This was his chamber, after all, loaned to his parents, William no sooner shut his eye than Jordan was gently shaking him awake.
“English,” she whispered. “Get up. Tommy has returned.”
Opening his eye, William could see that it was now dark outside. That suggested a significant amount of time had passed, but it hardly felt like any time at all.
Rubbing a hand over his face, he sat up wearily, giving a yawn. He could see that the chamber door was open and a soldier stood there, one Jordan quickly sent away and shut the panel. William shook his head.
“I did not even hear anyone knock on the door,” he said. “How long have I been asleep?”
Jordan was running her hands over her pinned hair, smoothing back the strands. “Several hours,” she said. “It is supper time. Tommy just rode intae the bailey, so let us go down tae greet him.”
William stood up, more tired now than he was when he’d lain down. “Nay,” he said quietly. “I will go. You go in to Adelaide and sit with her. I will deal with Thomas.”
Jordan turned to look at him. “I should go with ye,” she said. “Tommy wouldna dare fight back if I’m there.”
William simply shook his head, running his fingers through his mostly-gray hair. He still had a head full of hair, but it had been very dark once, thick and wavy. Oddly enough, he didn’t have a vast amount of wrinkles for a man his age, so it was really the hair color that gave him away more than anything, and it had probably gotten far more white during Thomas’ betrothal.
The situation was aging him rapidly.
“I will go alone,” he reiterated, going to the door. He put his hand on the latch, pausing, and there was some lethargy in his movements. His expression turned wistful. “It is times such as this where I miss Kieran. We look at the situation as Thomas’ parents, but Kieran had the ability to look at it from another angle. It was always the right angle and he was always able to advise me. God, I miss him so much.”
Kieran Hage had been William’s best friend and second-in-command until five years ago when the man had passed away. Kieran had been the most enormously powerful man on the border, a knight of incredible skill and a vast amount of wisdom. Kieran and William, and a third knight, Paris de Norville, had squired together at Northwood Castle and had literally spent their entire lives together. Their children had all intermarried, and the three men themselves had married cousins from the same family– Jordan, Jemma Scott Hage, and Caladora Scott de Norville. They were all first cousins and the marriages irrevocably made the knights family.
The three knights had been closer than brothers, bonded by blood and marriage in the end. While Paris still commanded at Northwood Castle, Kieran had gone to Castle Questing with William when the man assumed his new earldom nearly five decades earlier, and William had come to depend greatly on Kieran.His brother. There were times when he still wept for the loss of Kieran, whom he’d held in his arms as the man died. Ithad been one of the most difficult moments of William’s life and something he still hadn’t recovered from.
He never would.
Jordan knew that. Every time William brought up Kieran’s name, she knew he was feeling particularly emotional and vulnerable. Though she loved her husband deeply and they shared a bond that few couples did, she knew that the bond William had shared with Kieran had also been powerful and deep. When William lost Kieran, he’d lost a piece of his soul. Quietly, she made her way over to him, putting her gentle hands on him in a show of support and sympathy.
“I know,” she whispered, hugging him. “He left a hole with us that will never be filled. Mayhap, ye should consult with Paris about this. Ye know he’ll tell ye the truth.”
William wriggled his eyebrows. “Ihavespoken to Paris about this,” he said. “You know that Paris sees the logical side of things. He believes that Tommy should marry Adelaide. To have Tommy as Northumbria would bring great stability to the region.”
“And he knows that Adelaide is an unstable lass?”
William nodded, pursing his lips irritably as he opened the door. “He knows,” he said. “His solution was to tell Tommy to keep her drunk all the time so she would be easier to manage.”
Jordan opened her mouth in outrage, but that sounded very much like something Paris, the perpetually arrogant and flippant man, would say. In fact, she realized that she had to fight off a grin.
“That isnotfunny,” she said. “And not helpful.”
William stepped through the door. “Helpful enough that I may end up suggesting it to Thomas myself.”
As he walked away, he could hear his wife calling after him. “Dunna ye dare!”
He knew she was smiling.
*
“Tommy!”
Thomas had no sooner dismounted his horse than he heard Caria’s cry. Turning around, he saw her running into the stable yard, heading right for him. Opening his arms to her, he scooped her up.
“What are you doing out at night?” he asked, even though the whole of Wark was brightly lit with torches against the cold spring night and there were people all around. “You should be in your chamber, eating sup.”
Caria’s arms were wrapped around his neck. “I was waiting for you,” she said, and Thomas caught a glimpse of her nurse over by the yard entrance. “I knew you were coming back, so I was waiting. Did you go into Scotland?”
Grabbing his saddlebags with one hand, he carried them in one arm and Caria with the other as he headed out of the stable yard.
