A Knight's Pledge, page 5
“But we must see the king right away,” Effie protested to his back, and it was not lost on her that Lucan Montague was in his element here, and it showed in his demeanor.
“Not looking like this, we mustn’t,” he said over his shoulder. “We’ve been traveling for a fortnight and smell it, I’m sure. Look it, I know. We’d not make it as far as the courtyard in this condition, I’m afraid.”
“Lucan, they have my son,” Effie argued. “They must let me in.”
“You don’t yet know whether they have your son or not,” he replied smoothly. “Besides, we must have a place for Chumley to safely sleep it off and Winnie and Gilboe to stay. Unless the good friar has a desire to visit the Bishop?” He craned his head further to look pointedly at the man, whose face was now hidden by his deep hood.
Gilboe cleared his throat within the shadow. “Ah, I think not.”
Effie hated the knight’s smug expression as he turned back around. He thought himself so smart.
“I do doubt any of you wish to spend the coin required to put yourselves up in a reputable inn. A cheap one would see you departing in your own corpse wagon. Unless it was first stolen and sold before they killed you. Which is actually quite likely.”
“Lucan—” she began again.
But Gorman reached across with his open hand. Effie took it. He squeezed her fingers.
“He’s right.” Gorman released her as he was forced to maneuver his horse around to let a tall, top-heavy merchant cart bumble through the crowd. The horses sidestepped and tossed their heads. A moment later, he looked at her as they continued on. “Sir Lucan knows London. Isn’t that why he’s with us? We have to trust him.”
Effie pressed her lips together but raised no further arguments.
They turned right at last, onto a street that held nothing of the crowds they’d just accomplished—no merchants lined this thoroughfare, only the figures of servants and soldiers and horses. Children played here—both the well-dressed and those of obviously lesser means. Between the shoulders of the stately dwellings, so unlike the timbered structures they’d passed through, Effie caught glimpses of boats and could smell the river. The road was no better though, marked with so many pits and ditches that Effie had to keep alert. They stopped before a white stone, three-story dwelling, and a servant appeared at once from the arches of a gate house.
“Sir Lucan,” the man said, snapping his fingers to the side. A pair of boys came running from around the edge of the arch, their caps askew, their bare feet bluish through the grime. “It is a pleasure to see you again.”
“Stephen.” Montague swung down from his horse. “I’ve just come from Darlyrede House, which has suffered a great tragedy. Her steward and some of the other servants accompany me. We hope to see the king on the morrow. Lady Margaret hasn’t returned yet, has she?” He handed Agrios’s reins to the older boy. “He’s tired lad.”
“Aye, Sir Lucan,” the stable boy acknowledged.
“No, lord, she is yet in Greece, as you likely suspected. She will be disappointed to have missed you. I’ll see that the servants are shown appropriate quarters, with your steward’s assistance.”
Lucan and the well-dressed servant looked to Rolf expectantly, and Effie felt her teeth grit together.
“Rolf?”
“Of course, lord.”
The knight nodded. “Very good. I shall call for you in the morning, when I am ready to depart. Good night.”
Then Lucan Montague turned and limped up the walkway to the painted wooden door, where a footman waited. He threw the door wide well before the man’s actual arrival on the threshold, and Lucan disappeared inside the house, leaving the rest of them in the street.
Effie felt like her heart would burn out of her chest as she swung down from her horse. How dare he abandon them all like rubbish?
Gorman hefted Chumley from the wagon and carried him over his shoulder as the six of them followed the prissy steward along the down-sloping pathway beneath the arch. By the time they reached the rear, more young boys were leading their horses and one was driving the cart up the wharf alley and into a damp stable yard. They ducked into an open doorway in the house’s stone foundation.
It was a kitchen, low-ceilinged and furnished smartly with workbenches and shelves along one long wall. The opposite of the room was comprised of a large, open hearth; a small fire was banked, the spits and pot-arms empty. Stephen led them through this room and into a narrow passage where the stones were whitewashed. He stopped beside a planked door, painted with the same finish as the stones.
“The majority of the house servants are abroad with my lady. You may have use of their chambers.” He nodded toward Effie. “This one shall be yours. There is warm water in the cistern in the kitchen. The servants’ privvy is across the alley. Cook will fetch you to help prepare the meal.”
Effie’s gaze found Gorman’s as the snooty man dismissed her by turning and heading further down the corridor. His steady gaze said patience, as usual. Effie bit her tongue and shoved at the door with her shoulder. It stuttered roughly across the packed dirt floor and opened to pitch darkness.
The meager ambient light filtering in from the doorway was enough for Effie to locate the candle. She had to carry it out to the kitchen to catch a flame and then make yet another trip to fill a pitcher for washing and hunt down a cake of soap and rag. Once back inside the room, she closed the door and surveyed her cell.
Her arms nearly spanned the breadth of it. The bed was little more than a wide rail against the wall, and the single small table was hardly large enough to hold the pitcher and bowl next to the candle. The only other appointments to the room were a row of hooks. It smelled stale and damp, and the chill seemed to seep up through Effie’s boots, not unlike the dampness of the caves in the Warren, but the stench of the city pervaded everything, and Effie couldn’t seem to blow it from her nostrils.
She prepared to wash, loosening her plait and then the ties of her vest. She had nothing else to put on, and she couldn’t bring herself to strip down entirely in the depressing cell which had no bolt on the door. She washed inside her billowing shirt, her face and neck, and then soaked and soaped her hair, scrubbing at her scalp until it tingled. She squeezed the water from her hair and replaited it, then brushed at her vest and trousers with the spent rag. She was chilled to her bones by the time she was completely dressed again.
She looked at the narrow cot against the wall. Exhaustion suddenly seized her, and she thought she might burrow down under the thin blanket and—
Her door scraped open, causing her to spin around and reach for the blade on her belt. A short ogre of a woman with a massively bloated underchin more than filled the narrow rectangle, framing a gigantic floor length white apron and a matching kerchief topping a seemingly tiny head.
“On yer feet, slut,” the woman growled. “The meat shan’t make itself.” A ham-sized forearm squeezed past the swollen abdomen to toss a long white cloth through.
Effie let the apron land on the ground and her exhaustion disappeared as her ire was sparked. She tried to keep hold of her temper—the cook was only doing her job. “There’s been a mistake—I’m no kitchen maid.”
“Oh,” the woman gasped dramatically. “I beg your pardon, my fine lady!” Then her thick brows lowered. “In case you’ve not noticed, this isn’t a country house, nor is it a charity. You don’t work, you don’t eat, and I’ve no cock for you to suck.” She glanced down at the white swath on the damp, black floor. “And you’ll be washing that as well, now. Be quick about it.”
Any empathy for the crude woman’s responsibilities vanished; what must it be like to work beneath this woman’s oversight day after day? Effie was in such shock at being spoken to in such a manner that she could only stand and stare while the cart of a woman squeezed off down the corridor to the kitchens. She hadn’t been spoken to so crudely since…
Since the night Castle Dare burned and she’d been mistaken for a servant.
The tears and fury in his young, blue eyes, the feel of the leather on her cheek.
I don’t ever want to see your face again!
Effie purposefully trod across the apron as she quit the chamber, but instead of turning left toward the kitchen, she entered the corridor to the right, her hand on the hilt of her blade lest anyone thought to stop her.
She’d already had quite enough of the hospitality of London’s nobility.
* * * *
The manservant left the toilette accessories on Lady Margaret’s vanity table and Stephen himself brought Lucan a suit of clothes.
“From your last stay with us, lord,” he said.
Lucan stared for a moment at the red velvet tunic laid out carefully on the bed. He’d forgotten the costume he’d been wearing the day Thomas Annesley had been sentenced to the gallows.
“Will there be anything else?” Stephen asked.
Lucan started. “Actually, Stephen, my boots need to be replaced. Is it possible…?”
“I am certain I can find you something suitable. Anything else, sir?”
“No, Stephen, thank you.”
“Very good, sir. I shall call you for dinner.”
Lucan began jerking his ties free as the chamber door shut. He couldn’t wait to be quit of the filthy clothes, which felt melted to him after a fortnight of rough travel. They’d only taken shelter at roadside inns a handful of times, and Lucan feared his black gambeson was hopelessly stained with road dust. He sat on the bed to remove his ruined boots, then his trousers and hose. He looked down at his left foot which bore a terrible purple and red scar, and flexed it appreciatively. He was all but healed.
All but healed, and back in London.
He had just finished washing when he heard the door open and close quietly behind him—that Stephen. He was naught if efficient.
“Just set them inside,” he groaned mid-stretch—his lower back was in knots. “I’ll fetch them after I’ve dressed.”
The lack of response caused him to turn partly around.
Effie Annesley leaned against the closed door, staring at him as he stood naked before her.
“What the hell are you doing in here?” he demanded.
“You told them I was a servant,” she said. “And now the cook thinks me to brown your gravy.”
“I couldn’t very well tell them that you were a wanted fugitive now, could I?” Lucan rejoined, acutely aware of his manhood in the cool chamber.
Effie shrugged and then looked around the well-appointed room appreciatively, her demeanor so calm that one might suppose happening upon naked men was common for her.
“My, my,” she said. “I can see why you were in such a rush to leave the peasantry behind.”
Lucan felt justifiably exposed in naught but his skin, but as Effie Annesley didn’t seem at all disturbed by his lack of clothing, he was loathe to scurry to cover himself like some nervous adolescent.
He ignored the idea that he was disappointed that Effie wasn’t interested in looking at his body.
She pushed away from the door to leisurely stroll about the perimeter of the room, taking in the rich hangings and ornate woodwork. Lucan reached for his trousers and sat on the bed to quickly slip them on. By the time he stood again to fasten them around his hips, Effie had reached his end of the chamber and turned at last to face him.
“Finish dressing. You’re taking me to Westminster.”
Lucan couldn’t stop the huff of incredulous laughter. “I beg your pardon?”
“Get. Dressed,” she repeated calmly, with a slight inclination of her head. Lucan noticed her plait was dark—wet—and was leaving a damp patch on her vest. “You wished to bathe and change; you’ve done so. I’ll not play housemaid in your little charade. I’ve come here to retrieve my son.”
Lucan sighed and turned to face the bed while he picked up his shirt. “The king won’t be seeing anyone this late in the day. Better that we arrive first thi—” His words stopped, his arms in both sleeves, the material stretched between his elbows as he felt the point of a blade to the left of his spine.
“Put your goddam shirt on and take me to the king. Now.”
Lucan turned slowly, deliberately, the point of the blade dragging across his shoulder blade, his biceps, until it was positioned over his heart, and he was looking slightly down into Effie Annesley’s sparkling eyes.
“Upon my honor,” Lucan said gravely. “You don’t want me to do that, Effie.”
“Now, Lucan.”
He moved quickly, twisting the shirt around the hilt of the short sword and yanking, pulling his arms free and sending the linen-wrapped weapon flying across the room. He reached out and grabbed her arm when she went after it, and she immediately ducked and twisted, bringing up a knee toward his groin. Lucan dodged the blow and spun Effie by her arm so that her own fingertips reached up between her shoulder blades. She gave a little cry of pain and so he relented a bit but did not release her.
“Hmm,” he mused near her ear. “Interesting position I find myself in. Would you agree that one is deserved of revenge upon the woman who nearly cost him his foot?”
There was a rap upon the door then, and Stephen entered the chamber with the promised boots in hand.
“Forgive me, sir,” he said, raising his right hand to shield his eyes while he trotted at a crouch to place the tall footwear on the edge of the carpet. He turned at once and fled, closing the door behind him.
Lucan leaned down toward Effie’s ear again, ignoring the warm smell of her skin that seemed to envelop his head like a cloud. “Don’t ever point a weapon at me again unless you mean to kill me straight away.”
“Let go—”
“If you do, I will leave you and your son to rot.” He pushed her away from him and then went to retrieve his shirt, tossing the blade to the floor at Effie’s feet. He snapped the folds from the linen and slipped it on. “I’ve enough complications of my own to contend with in London without you mucking things up further for me than you already have.”
“Oh, mucked things up for you, have I?”
Lucan ignored her goad as he slid his arms into the red velvet and attended to the hammered clasps. “I will take you to Westminster—yes, right now—if only to be rid of you. But know this: if Vivienne Paget and—however unlikely I find it—Caris Hargrave have indeed taken your son to Henry with their claims, should you show up there tonight demanding audience at dinner, he will absolutely have you arrested and imprisoned until he is ready to deal with you. And once he knows where you are, he will be in no hurry. On this you can depend.” He walked past her toward his boots and could feel her gaze burning holes in the velvet. When he had retrieved them and turned, he found she was indeed glaring at him.
He sat in a carved chair to don the boots.
“You don’t understand,” she said quietly. “You don’t have a son…”
Lucan finished the lacings and looked at her from across the rug. He sighed. “You’ll do George far less good locked in a cell there than getting a much-needed night’s rest here. I’ve already sent word to the king of my arrival in London. He’ll be ready for us. Well, me, anyway.”
He could tell the moment when his reasoning reached her by the ever-so-slight fall of her shoulders. Perhaps no one else would have noticed, but to Lucan it was a raised flag of surrender. The light of combativeness behind her eyes went out, like a candle flame snuffed behind a milky pane of glass, and a ridiculous urge to comfort her rose in Lucan.
“Whose house is this?” she asked suddenly.
“Margaret Stanhope, Lady Towsey.”
“Is she your lover?”
“At one time, yes,” he answered honestly. “How did you know?”
“The servants are well familiar with you,” Effie said. “And those are obviously your own clothes, by the way they fit you.”
“Keen observation, Euphemia,” Lucan said. “You’d make a fine investigator should you ever choose to give up your criminal ways.”
“Don’t call me that,” Effie snapped, but there was little bite in the bark. “I haven’t managed to survive this long by ignoring details.”
“No, I don’t imagine you have,” Lucan mused.
“And I’ll have you know that I shan’t be passing the night in that scullery hole in the cellar. Whether you want to admit it or not, we are still of equal station, you and I.”
“I see,” Lucan mused. “So you’re petitioning me to place you in a chamber above floors? I believe the one next to this is prepared.” He wondered at the little thrill of anticipation that ran through him at the idea of Effie sleeping next to him in the house. It was absurd—she’d slept closer to him during their fortnight on the road, and he hadn’t cared one whit.
Perhaps he was only interested because she’d threatened to kill him. Again.
Effie shook her head. “That won’t be necessary—I’ll share Gorman’s room.”
“Of course,” Lucan said quickly, feeling the fool. “In any case, I do insist on employing Stephen to locate something else for you to wear for our audience on the morrow. While I don’t personally disapprove of your”—he paused—“garments, I do expect the king to be less likely swayed by the maternal pleadings of a woman entering his court in trousers.”
Lucan thought she might have blushed, but he didn’t know if it was embarrassment for not thinking of her clothing, or the fact that his statement was alluding to the sight of her shapely rear-end.
“And while I didn’t personally disapprove of your own… display,” Effie said, “you might have wished to don your hose before putting on your trousers and boots. I’ve found them to be terribly chafing without.”
Lucan looked down instinctively, realizing just then that his feet were bare in the stiff leather.
He looked up at the sudden sound of the door closing.
She had noticed he was naked.
