The Rose Of Lorraine Part 30

Prince Edward brought both to where Bella sat.

He set the cup before her and poured a foamy helping of stout English ale, saying, "Drink this, Lady Chandos. You'll need it."

"Ah, you're a prince of a fellow, Your Highness," Bella said flippantly and reached for the cup.

The youth drew up a bench and sat down beside her.

"Tell me, I'm curious. What are you really doing here? How did you find us?"

Bella heard the question, but as it was actually taking some concentration to make the abused organs in her throat work properly, she concentrated solely on drinking. She set the cup down empty and wiped the foam off her upper lip, then looked at the young man.

His emotions were completely obscured in a way that made her think he'd been taking lessons from Chandos. He'd grown a handlebar mustache since she'd last seen him, as droopy as Sir John's. He had a deep nick at the arch of his right eyebrow, healing. His large hands sported the well battered knuckles of a prize fighter.

Handsome, was the word that came to Bella's mind to describe him, followed by--mature. In a month's time, this startling young man had pa.s.sed into adulthood. Not a trace of soft muscle remained in his youthful face. Everything about young Edward Plantagenet said he was a man. Like his father. Like John Chandos.

"What do you think I'm doing here?" Bella asked.

"Frankly, lady, I am baffled. You crop up in the most unusual places. I feel deeply troubled for you at this moment. You're either going to hang for being a spy or else be beaten to death for disobeying your husband. I heard what he said to you at the watergate. Which fate you rightly deserve I cannot hazzard. I will say you should not be here."

"Hung?" Bella choked back a nervous laugh. Beaten to death? How absurd! Bella knew not to say that. She'd be better off laying some sort of groundwork for getting Geoffrey absolved of all duties and the two of them escorted back to Calais.

"Your Highness, if you have any compa.s.sion at all, I beg you, help me leave here with Geoffrey. I am in great fear for his life on the battlefield tomorrow. Chandos knows this but would not accede to my wishes. That's what I came here for, to take Geoffrey away from the danger. It is only a mother's love that has driven me to do this reckless and desperate act. Why else would any woman risk what I have this night?"

"Why else, indeed, lady?" Prince Edward admitted confusion. "Are you not concerned for your eldest son who is also in the path of danger? Your husband more than they? What demon possesses you to do such a thing? And where, lady, did you ever get the idea that you could countermand the order of a king? Geoffrey but does his duty as every good and loyal son of England is expected to do."

Bella reached for the cup and refilled it. Clearly, she was ill equipped to reason with a warrior. "What's taking your father so long?"

Edward gazed into the night shadows. He cleared his throat and said, "It appears they are drawing lots to see who gets you."

"Very funny, ha, ha." Bella said into the cup of ale.

"I'm curious, milady. Did you really put Sir James on his back and...ah...the other as well?"

"He exaggerated."

"Odd, he isn't given to overstatement."

Prince Edward stood abruptly, clicking his heels as he made a courtly bow to someone who approached from behind Bella's chair. She upended the tankard, determined to down as much of the potent brew as possible. A couple more gla.s.ses and she'd sink numbly under the table out of sight.

She set the cup down empty. The Dutch courage had come too late to help her. She turned around in the king's high backed chair and leaned over the armrest to see who it was that approached Prince Edward.

Chandos.

"Well, well! Look who drew the short straw," Bella deliberately interrupted with her all time favorite line of Mae West's. "h.e.l.lo, Sir John. Is that a gun in your pocket or are you glad to see me?"

"My, my, my, said the spider to the fly..."

ROLLING STONES.

-29-.

No man on earth should ever move so fast. Bella words no sooner left her mouth than she was yanked out of the king's chair and rudely thrown over Chandos' shoulder like a hundred pound sack of potatoes. Carted ignominiously across the whole camp, Chandos dropped her inside his tent.

Bella fell hard onto some low, unidentified piece of furniture inside the close, dark tent. She reckoned the fall had been all of four, maybe five full feet. From the point of Chandos' shoulder, to this...she felt the surface under her...groping for ident.i.ty...this cot about a foot off the hard ground.

Chandos seethed like a Columbian jaguar cheated of its kill. His breath rasped harshly in and out of his lungs, whistling past clenched teeth.

Someone scuttled in the inky shadows. Bella heard a flint strike iron. A spark caught then a small golden glow of light rose from the wick of an oil lamp that Guilamu, Chandos' body servant, lit in the center of the tent.

The servant sported only loose yellow pantaloons, but Bella's mouth dropped open discovering Guilamu's head sans turban as bald as a cue ball. He stuck the lamp into a chain holder suspended from the tent poles, bowed very deeply, and got out. Smart man, Bella gulped as she pressed her elbows into the bedding to raise her head and shoulders.

"Okay, I take it you are not happy to see me."

"Happy to see you!" John shouted. "Woman, have you forgotten what I said I would do if you dared to follow me here or interferred in the training of my sons?"

"Now, wait a minute, they're my sons too." Bella started talking, hoping to gain enough distance so he couldn't kill her. Angry didn't describe him. Livid, yes. "You can't hold a few words exchanged in anger against me. I know I didn't mean what I said at the watergate. So you couldn't possibly mean what you said either."

He spun around and caught hold of a folding chair. yanked it open and slammed it to the floor. "Sit there! So help me G.o.d, woman, you have pressed me beyond the bounds of decency. If you value your life at all, don't you dare get out of that seat."

Bella lurched onto her feet. The wet domino tangled on her legs and arms. On the way to the chair, she dispensed with the cloak. Chandos s.n.a.t.c.hed it out of her hands and sent the rain soaked garment flying to a corner of the tent. It smacked against the tautly-stretched canvas with a loud wet pop. Bella sat abruptly.

Chandos paced from corner to corner with his hands fiercely clenched behind his back. Metal resounded about him. Golden spurs rang with every angry step. His sword and scabbard clanked against silver plating and cabachon stones set into his belt. Bella swallowed nervously.

He stopped abruptly in the center of the tent. The eerie light of the oil lamp cast diabolical shadows under his hardened jaw. "How many men ride with Saint Pierre? Where did they camp?"

"What?" Bella asked, leaning forward, unable to process the true meaning of those questions. He took two steps forward, dropped his hands onto the armrests of her chair and bent intimidatingly close.

"Answer me!" His proud, aquiline nose loomed a scant inch above Bella's. "How many soldiers has Eustace brought to attack us from the rear?"

"None." Bella gulped.

"Lady," he growled in a voice so deep the devil himself couldn't have heard him. "We have played all the games we are going to play. You stand accused of consorting with the enemy. This is the last chance you have to save your neck from the hangman's rope. The king has decided you are more trouble than you are worth. Where has your father and his army camped?"

Understanding his meaning sent a bolt of terror into Bella's queasy stomach. "The comte has no army. This is the week of the wine festivals. I came alone...from Jean Vienne's estate. It's just a few hour's ride across Picardy. In the vineyards, south of Calais."

"You expect me to believe that lie?" he asked in a scornful, mocking voice.

"It isn't a lie. John, you're frightening me."

"Good. The charge against you is treason. King Edward wants the truth wrung from you regardless of the cost." Chandos straightened. His hands moved with deliberate purpose to the buckle of his sword belt.

"Uh oh," Bella whispered as he cast his precious sword and belt to the carpet covered earth at their feet. His cotte hardie flew the way of her cloak.

"Chandos," Bella whispered. She had to do something before he cast off the last shred of humanity. "You can't believe that I'm a spy. You can't."

Bare-chested now, Chandos rounded on her. She stared in horrified fascination at his gloriously powerful chest when she ought to be bolting out the exit. But the truth was she was morbidly frozen to her seat. Just how far could she run? How many Neanderthal's of James Graham's ilk lurked outside?

"Lady, since meeting you I have learned to believe many things. You stretch the realms of credibility over and over again. But I will not believe that you travelled from Jean Vienne's vineyards alone...unescorted."

"Why?" Bella asked. "Why can't you believe that? It's true. I swear on the soul of my son, Iain, I came alone."

"Do you truly want me to think you are that foolish? This province is crawling with dispossessed churls. A woman alone could not travel a mile safely much less twenty."

"That's why I came in a disguise." Bella waved her hand at her costume. "It rained most of the day. I met few people and those I did pa.s.s, took me for a boy. Even your king and James Graham thought I was a boy at first sight. I didn't stop to talk to anyone. I had to get to this valley before nightfall."

"Oh, aye. And you just happened to know in all of France, where and how to find a king's army without the benefit of a guide? You...a stranger to this land and this time...can find your way about foreign soil without benefit of a map. To whit, the army has been on a constant march for days, never staying in the same place two night in succession."

"John, I know dates and I've got a good memory for facts. I came here knowing the battle of Crecy would take place, August 26th, 1346. Calais will fall after a siege of nearly a year, on the fourth of August, next year. What King Edward has started here is recorded throughout history as the Hundred Years War. It won't end until the reign of King Charles the Seventh in 1455. Thousands of scholars have written about these times and the strategies used by the English to win battle after battle."

"Bella!" Sir John raised his voice, shouting her name with the impact of a crack of thunder. "Stop it!"

He kicked an unlocked trunk violently. It fell over, spilling shirts, tunics and his gear across the carpeting.

"I am not going to spend your last hour on this earth listening to fairie tales about some fantasy world where you and only you know everything that will happen."

"It's not a fairy tale!" Bella gripped the armrests of her chair, half-rising from her seat.

"Don't do it!" Chandos warned, pointing an ominous finger at her. "Leave that seat at your own peril. I count four leather straps within the reach of my hand, Bella."

"d.a.m.n you to h.e.l.l, Chandos, if you beat me now, I'll never forgive you. I'm practicing pa.s.sive resistance here, but not if my cooperation means nothing to you."

"Lady, resist or accept. I care not. All I want from you at this moment is obedience and truth."

"You wouldn't recognize the truth if it rose up and smacked you in your face. Look." Bella sat and yanked the gloves off her hands, needing uncovered skin to deal with a blinding rush of tears. "Can I just explain what's at stake here?"

Chandos' hands fisted impotently at his sides. He d.a.m.ned her to h.e.l.l and back for looking so vulnerable. His own throat constricted with the emotions at war inside him. He feared he could kiss her just as easily as he could kill her. It went past all decency that she had willfully put him in this position with his king.

He growled roughly. "Hold your tears until you have reason to shed them. They will not sway me."

"d.a.m.n you! It isn't fair of you to terrorize me just because you're bigger and stronger." She dashed away the tears that streaked her dirty face. "Can't you look beyond your pride this once? I am not defying you. Maybe I have disobeyed you, but I have good reason to do that...if you will hear me out. I'm desperately trying to save the life of one of your sons."

Chandos closed the distance between them and gripped her trembling chin in his hand. "Aye, I am bigger and stronger and for good reason G.o.d has made me so. As to your defying me, the answer is grossly evident. You are here, are you not?"

"Yes, but not because I wanted to defy you." Bella dashed her fingers across her eyes. She cast a quick prayer to heaven that he would listen to reason. "If Geoffrey's birthday hadn't been on August 23rd, I wouldn't be here at all."

Chandos' eyes fairly glittered. For the first time since he'd come inside the tent, the aggression in him diminished. "What has Geoffrey's birth to do with any of this?"

"Everything!" Bella drew a quick breath to explain. "Please, please, let me tell you why I'm here. I'm not trying to interfere with Geoffrey doing his duty to the king or to you. I'm trying to make certain that he stays alive."

"That is the most presumptuous bit of nonsense I've ever heard in my life," Chandos responded, wanting to take his hand away from her soft as silk skin, unable to break the contact between them. She pulled him to her just as surely as iron moved to lodestones.

"No, it isn't," Bella argued fervently, willing him to accept the truth she brought him and hurt by the depth of his rejection. "My son...my Iain...died...on the twenty-sixth of August...three days after his ninth birthday." She swallowed air, choking as she forced herself to continue. "John, I believe Geoffrey is the reason G.o.d sent me here. Iain and Geoffrey are as identical as Lady Isabel and me! Geoffrey can't be anywhere near a battlefield tomorrow. Can you understand that? History repeats itself...over and over again. My son died because...my husband told me I was so overprotective I was smothering the boy. You practically said the same thing."

"d.a.m.n you, Bella!" He dropped to his knees before her and gripped her shoulders hard. "Stop the lies! You know as well as I that the day you claimed Geoffrey was born is a lie."

"What?" Bella got hold of his forearms. "The date recorded in your family Bible is August 23."

"Geoffrey wasn't born in August. I have known the truth behind that lie from the day I returned from the Holy Land, woman!"

"What are you saying?" Bella gulped.

"Geoffrey was born in December."

"What?" Bella asked, confused. "I don't understand. It says in your bible he was born on August 23."

All at once Chandos released her and lurched away from her. Bella stared up at him, afraid of the violence taking over control of him. The man seethed with cold fury that turned more dangerous by the second.

"You don't understand," he mocked her. "Then you are a greater fool than I if you think to pa.s.s off an eight month old infant as one of a full year. Geoffrey will not be nine until December 12th. I care not what date you ordered written in my Bible."

"December 12th?" Bella shook her head. "I don't understand what you're saying."

"You don't understand...how convenient. It was one thing, Isabella, when you play your games against the child and James Graham to control me. It is another when you try to use me to control the king of England."

"Chandos, this is getting out of hand. I am not here to manipulate you or King Edward or James Graham. I am here for Geoffrey's sake. He and Robin and Henri have taken away the emptiness inside me. You can't call that interference. It's love."

He returned to where she sat and put one knee to the carpet. "I can and I do call it interference, woman."

"Listen to me. Please, I'm trying to make this as clear and simple as I can. My son, my real son...the only one I've ever given birth to...died three days after his ninth birthday. It was an accident, a waste, a tragedy. It didn't have to happen. Iain didn't have to die. I'd give anything to have been able to prevent his death. When I realized Geoffrey's birthday was on the twenty-third and knowing that the Battle of Crecy was going to happen August 26th, well, I freaked. I thought history was repeating itself, or that maybe, my whole history started here, with you and Lady Chandos. I am a Saint Pierre. I know you don't want to believe that, but you've got to try to understand what I'm saying, John."

He understood too well and it made his flesh crawl. Witch or sorceress, she was the most beautiful woman he'd ever laid eyes upon. He said nothing, needing to force his concentration on something mundane and tangible. He fixed his attention on her boots. She took his silence for acceptance and continued to blabber like one touched by the gift of prophesy.

"I can prove I'm from the future. I know everything that what will happen tomorrow. I know the battle plan King Edward's going to use, how his forces will be lined up in three division, two in front, one in reserve in the back. The Black Prince is going to take the brunt of Philip of Valois charge.

"One of the earls, Arundel I think, will run to the king, begging him to send reinforcements to help the prince. The king's going to ask if Edward lives, or if he's fallen under the sword. Then he's going to say to let him earn his spurs. Let the victory go to the Prince. John, what are you doing?"

John's fingers probed the buckles of her boots. "What does it look like I'm doing?"

Bella didn't want to respond to that. The gleam in his eyes rattled her. He was determined to distract her, take her off her course. If he knew how great the power he exerted over her physically, she'd be lost forever in this century with him. That thought caught every word in her throat. G.o.d help her, she wasn't in love with John de Chandos, was she?

She gulped and tasted the spicy fragrance of his soap in her mouth and nose. Her fingers itched to reach forward and stroke his glistening black hair. The crisp curls on his naked chest distracted her so badly she couldn't think.

Geoffrey wasn't his son? What had he actually said? Geoffrey was Graham's son? Mother Macree, what kind of a mess was she in here? She settled for making a lame complaint to his sarcastic question about what did it look like he was doing. "Well, one thing is certain, you're not listening to me."

He reached for her other foot. Bella jerked away. He set his teeth after saying, "That's right," caught her left foot and hauled it right back.

"You are the most obstinate and stubborn man I've ever met in my life. I don't know why I love you, but I do. I'm going to keep talking and talking until something I say sinks in, until you believe something I say.

"At ten A.M. King Edward's going to ride a white palfrey over the whole battlefield, personally talking to every man. There's going to be a storm in the forenoon, followed by a full eclipse of the sun."

"We already know that," John said grimly.

Now that he had both her boots unbuckled he yanked them off, throwing each across his shoulder to the pile in the corner. Both crossgarters followed. His fingers slid inside the hem of her britches, catching hold of her stocking, caressing the sensitive flesh inside her knee.