Secret Thunder Part 15

His expression clouded over. "Orrik. Aye, well..." He grimaced and shook his head. "Orrik is a problem. The only real problem, but a serious one. I can't have a bailiff who's openly impertinent."

"I know. He'll come around, though. I'm sure of it."

Luke raised a doubtful eyebrow.

"Give him a chance, Luke," she pleaded, growing anxious. "I know he has faults, but he's been like a father to me my whole life. If you were to get rid of him, I'd be heartsick. Please, just give him a chance to get used to-"

"Shh." He reached out and stroked her hair. "I have no plans to dismiss him at present."

"Aye, but-"

"Faithe." He lowered his hand to cover both of hers as she twisted her ring around and around. She stilled. He tried for a wry smile, but his eyes were solemn. "You'll think this foolish, but it cuts me to the quick every time I see you doing that to your wedding ring. It's almost as if you want to yank it off and throw it in the river."

"N-nay, I... 'tis naught but a nervous habit."

"I shouldn't make you so nervous," he said quietly, leaning in close. There was something almost wounded in his expression. She saw with startling clarity how needful he was, how much he craved that piece of soul she denied him. "I've done everything I can to make you comfortable with me."

"I'm... I'm comfortable with..."

He chuckled as if at a fibbing child, and lifted her left hand, rubbing the ring with his thumb. "This little nervous habit says otherwise. When you've broken yourself of it, perhaps then I can believe you." Bringing her hand to his lips, he kissed her fingertips, lightly, sending hot chills coursing through her. "It's getting late. We should go back."

She nodded.

He stood without releasing her, then helped her to her feet and held her hand all the way back to Hauekleah Hall.

Chapter 10.

"Milord! Are you up there?"

Recognizing Felix's voice, Luke slammed the last nail into the oaken tile and scooted to the edge of the roof. "Aye. Is she home already?" He'd instructed the boy to let him know the moment Faithe returned.

"Aye, milord. She's out back, tending to Daisy."

From Luke's perch on top of Hauekleah Hall, he had an excellent view of the entire estate. Shielding his eyes against the glaring afternoon sun, he scrutinized the stable and adjacent horse pasture. "There she is."

Faithe had her mare-a splendid chestnut with flaxen mane and tail-under a shade tree at the edge of the pasture. As he watched, she removed Daisy's bridle and draped it over the fence.

"Did she bring Master Orrik back with her?" Luke asked the boy.

"Nay, she came back just like she went out-alone."

Luke hissed a Frankish curse under his breath. Faithe had gone out in search of Orrik because the cookhouse had burned down that morning, and she felt he'd want to know about it as soon as possible. It wasn't a dire emergency-fires happened, especially in cookhouses, and this one had been extinguished before it had spread to the other outbuildings in the croft-but Orrik always insisted on being informed of such incidents immediately. Only it so happened the irascible bailiff had been off on one of his obscure "errands" since yesterday morning. Baldric, as usual, had professed ignorance as to his whereabouts. If he wasn't visiting the Widow Aefentid at her inn on the other side of the woods, then where the devil was he?

"Here." Luke handed his hammer to Dunstan, working alongside him to patch the roof, and descended the ladder.

"Can I come with you?" asked young Felix as Luke strode up the garden path toward the croft's rear gate. He was about to say yes, but then he thought better of it. It was difficult enough talking to Faithe about Orrik without an audience.

"I think not, Felix." The boy nodded, his gaze on the ground. "You look as if you can use an afternoon snack. Go to the kitchen and tell one of the girls I said to give you some bread and honey."

"Aye, milord!" Suddenly animated, Felix sprinted toward the Hall.

As Luke crossed the pasture toward Faithe, he wiped his sweaty face with his shirt and raked the stray hairs off his forehead. She saw him and nodded-a little uneasily, he thought. That was too bad. During the week that had pa.s.sed since their outing by the river, they'd enjoyed such easy, congenial relations. He hated for her to show any sign of discomfort around him, even if it was that d.a.m.ned Orrik's fault and not his.

She had something in her hand-an iron hoof pick. Settling her weight against Daisy's shoulder, she leaned down and ran a hand along her mare's front leg. A light squeeze of the fetlock was all it took for the well-trained mare to lift her foot.

"Did she pick up a stone?" Luke patted the animal's flank.

"Probably. She started limping halfway home." Cradling Daisy's foot in one hand, Faithe used the pick to sc.r.a.pe dried mud from the hoof and shoe. She looked absurdly pretty performing this task, her expression serious, her hair falling in her eyes.

"I take it Orrik wasn't at the Widow Aefentid's inn?"

She shook her head without raising her eyes from her work. "There it is." She tapped the pick against a sizable pebble that had gotten lodged in one of the deep ridges on the bottom of the hoof.

He began undoing Daisy's saddle. "I won't bother asking why a stable boy can't take care of this."

She grinned crookedly. "I'm glad you're trying to ask fewer foolish questions."

He tugged her hair. "Insolent wench."

She looked up and smiled.

He lightly caressed her cheek, hot and flushed from her ride. "Did you ask the widow whether he'd been there?"

Her smile disappeared. Faithe bent her head to her work. "Aye. He hadn't." She gave the pick a twist and the pebble popped out. "There." Lowering Daisy's leg, she dug in her pocket for a chunk of carrot and fed it to the complacent animal. "Good girl."

Luke hauled the saddle and blanket off Daisy and carried them into the stable. Locating a currycomb, he brought it out and started brushing Daisy down where the saddle and girth had been. "Where do you suppose he's been since yesterday morning, then?"

"I have no idea." She drew in a deep breath and let it out shakily. "I asked Aefentid about those other times-all those other 'errands' Orrik went off on when I thought he was with her."

Luke stilled. "He wasn't with her?"

"Only for brief visits. He'd stop on his way back from... wherever he went off to. Sometimes he'd spend the night with her, but only at the end of his trips." She shook her head, her expression miserable.

"Then what's he been up to? Where's he been-"

"I wish I knew. I feel like an idiot for having just a.s.sumed he was with Aefentid. He was always discreet about her, because she's a respectable widow and runs her own inn. I thought this business about 'errands' was just his way of protecting her from gossip. I hate to think he's been doing something he feels he can't talk to me about."

"He'll d.a.m.n well talk to me about it," Luke growled. He must have brushed the mare a little too hard; she whickered testily.

"Here, give me that." Faithe held her hand out, and Luke placed the currycomb in it. She set about brushing down the rest of the horse, her strokes leisurely, her brow furrowed. "Orrik hasn't always been this way-this bad-tempered and secretive. He never used to go away on mysterious trips before Hastings. But since then, he's seemed... haunted. The things he saw there-" She broke off, undoubtedly wary of bringing up such matters with her Norman husband.

"I know what he saw there," Luke said quietly-a tacit acknowledgment that Orrik had been truthful in his account of King Harold's mutilation at William's hands.

"And Caedmon's death affected him, too," she added quietly, without looking at him. She never spoke about her first husband. "Orrik cared a great deal for Caedmon, despite... their differences. He grieved sorely for him."

Luke moved closer to her as she brushed her way across Daisy's side to her rump. "What about you, Faithe? Did you grieve for him, too?"

Faithe glanced up at Luke, her eyes wide in the cool shade. She nodded. "Yes. I grieved for him. I went to the barn and cried into the straw. I cried until I had no more tears."

In a hushed voice, he asked, "Did you love him?"

Her eyes sought out his for a brief, penetrating moment, and then she dropped her gaze and began running the currycomb through Daisy's tail. "In a way. Not like... that is, we weren't... He was my husband. We'd spent nearly eight years together. He was good to me, despite everything."

"Despite," Luke murmured.

"Pardon?"

"You keep saying 'despite.' You and Orrik both cared for Caedmon despite... what?"

She brushed the tail with long, thoughtful strokes. "Caedmon... Well, to understand Caedmon, you've got to understand that he wasn't from the country. He'd been city-bred his whole life. He was brought up in Worcester, the ward of the bishop." She looked up and met his gaze squarely, as if making a point that she was not ashamed of what she said next. "Caedmon was the b.a.s.t.a.r.d son of an important man. A very important man, if you believe the rumors."

Luke followed her as she moved around to Daisy's other side. "How did you come to meet him, growing up in such different circ.u.mstances?"

Her shoulders lifted in a little shrug as she smoothed the brush downward. "I met him on our wedding day. Our marriage was negotiated through the bishop and my former overlord." She glanced briefly at Luke before going on. "'Twas a good match for me."

"I'm sure it was." Luke felt ridiculously pleased that Faithe's first marriage had been an arranged union, and not one of love.

"He was landless, of course," Faithe continued, "but that was just as well, for I'd no desire to leave Hauekleah. His father, although he didn't claim him openly, had provided very well for him. Caedmon's wealth paid for improvements I'd been wanting to make."

"How did Caedmon feel about all this?"

"I think he was content here, despite..." That lopsided grin pulled at her mouth as Luke shot her a look of amus.e.m.e.nt. "Despite his lack of interest in the land. He took up hunting and hawking, and that kept him occupied while I..." She shrugged again.

"Continued to run Hauekleah," Luke supplied.

Another careless shrug. "So you see, he really couldn't help not caring. 'Twas the way he was raised."

"Did he care about you?" Luke asked.

Faithe ceased her brushing and looked directly at Luke. "He was no more in love with me than I was with him. Neither of us expected love when we got married. Arranged marriages aren't like that. They're..." Her face pinkened, and she looked away and began vigorously brushing out Daisy's mane. "They're about other things."

"They start out about other things." He leaned against Daisy's shoulder, his gaze trained on her, not looking away, despite her obvious discomfort. "They don't have to end up that way."

She nodded, color scorching her cheeks as she brushed.

"You're not still in mourning for Caedmon, are you?" he asked, knowing she wasn't, but wanting to hear it from her.

She shook her head. "I came to terms with it. Not that I'm happy about how he died."

"He died for a cause."

"A lost cause," she said crisply. She slipped the currycomb in one pocket and withdrew another piece of carrot from the other, offering it to Daisy, who lipped it off her palm.

"Faithe, the English who fell at Hastings died heroes' deaths. They fought well, for a cause they believed in. You should be proud, not bitter."

She looked at him strangely. "Caedmon didn't die at Hastings."

He blinked at her. "He didn't... I thought..."

"Not during the battle itself. He was captured."

"Captured."

She nodded. "Your army took him prisoner. He died later, of some illness. I'm not sure what kind."

"Ah." Luke rubbed his chin, wondering how to respond to this remarkable news-remarkable simply because no English prisoners were taken at the Battle of Hastings. Those who weren't killed all vanished into the woods. And if prisoners had been taken, their families would have been asked for ransom soon thereafter. Yet Faithe clearly believed her husband had died a prisoner of war.

"Who reported these matters to you?" Luke asked guardedly.

"Orrik. He and Dunstan and some of the others went to Hastings with Caedmon."

It was best, Luke decided, to question Orrik before he spoke further of this to Faithe. He rubbed the back of his neck. "I wish I knew when that... when Orrik will be back."

Faithe slapped Daisy on the rump to send her trotting out into the middle of the pasture, then clasped her hands tightly, her features contracted with worry. "Luke, please don't dismiss him. Please. 'Tis my greatest worry. I couldn't bear it."

He sighed. "I don't want to, Faithe. You must believe that. But he may push me until I have no choice."

"He'll get better," she said. "Give him time."

"How much time? I've been here for a month and a half, and still he treats me with complete contempt. Everyone else, including Dunstan, accepts me as their master. I think some of them are even coming to like me. But to Orrik I'm the enemy, and I'll always be the enemy, and there's nothing I'll ever be able to do to change that."

"'Twas the shock of Hastings," she insisted. "Of losing Caedmon and seeing what happened to King Harold. He'll overcome his anger in time."

"Some types of anger can't be overcome," Luke said gravely. "Sometimes the best one can hope for is to... bury one's rage deep within. Although one always runs the risk that it will erupt without warning." Luke wished he didn't have reason for knowing this so well.

She regarded him curiously. His gaze dropped to her hands, still tightly clenched. Smiling, he reached out and pried them apart, taking one hand in each of his. "This hasn't been an easy conversation, but I haven't noticed you twisting your ring."

She looked down, a little shyly. "I've tried to break myself of the habit."

He squeezed her hands. "I'm glad of it." Releasing one hand, he trailed his fingertips down the side of her face. Her eyes drifted shut.

"Do you suppose," he said softly, "I could get a hot bath before bed?"

She opened her eyes. "I thought you liked to bathe in the river."

"Generally, yes. But I've been a bit stiff of late. Sleeping on the rushes has its disadvantages."

So quietly he almost couldn't hear her, she said, "The bed would be more comfortable."

"That it would." He smiled and ran a thumb over her lips, feeling the fluttery heat of her breath. "I must take it under very serious consideration."