thing, just as if it might understand her. His sister was beyond him now, as was everyone, everything, everyplace…His stomach twisted, reminding him that he ought to eat something, but food held no interest. Instead, he focused on the giant blond man who would call him brother.
“Nicholas!” Piers greeted him with the warmth that continued to annoy him. How dare the Red Knight eye him with that knowing look, as if seeing right through Nicholas’s skin to his hollow insides? How dare he tender advice, when his keep was shabby compared to Belvry?
Dunmurrow was old, and its residents were far from wealthy, and yet they seemed to possess some treasure that Nicholas lacked, which only frustrated him further. The ache in his belly clawed at his vitals until he nearly winced, but he did not waver under Piers’s steady regard.
“I came to find you, brother,” the older knight said. “A messenger from the king has arrived, seeking you.” Nicholas glanced quickly behind his sister’s husband, to where a man sporting Edward’s device stood not far away. How had Nicholas missed him? His attention had been diverted by babes and amorous displays, that was how! Deflecting his anger inward, Nicholas calmly placed his cup upon the great table and stepped forward to greet the stranger.
Finally. It had been a year since Hexham had made war upon neighboring Belvry, and all this time the fate of the bastard’s lands had remained unresolved. Piers claimed that Edward would decide in Nicholas’s favor and award the property to Belvry’s heir in reparation, but Nicholas had a deep-seated mistrust of kings and princes, gained in a folly called a holy war. It would not surprise him if Edward confiscated Hexham’s demesne for the crown.
Nor did it matter to him. Hexham had no issue, so either way, the land would leave the man’s line forever. That was small satisfaction for Nicholas, but he took it. It was all the revenge left to him.
“You are Nicholas de Laci, baron of Belvry?” the king’s man asked.
“I am,” Nicholas said.
“I have a message for you from your sovereign.”
Nodding, Nicholas gestured for the man to take a seat on the long bench beside the great table. As the messenger found a place, Nicholas caught a glimpse of Aisley’s anxious face and realized that his sister and her husband wanted to hear the news, too. Their interest startled him. Was it curiosity? He supposed they had little enough excitement in their dreary keep.
“Shall I fetch some refreshment for you?” Aisley asked hopefully, and Nicholas was again amazed by the transparency of her thoughts. The Aisley he had known would never have shown emotion—or felt it, either. ‘Twas the birthing, no doubt, he thought again. It had changed her, and not for the better.
“That would be most welcome, my lady,” the man said. “But my message is brief. Care you to hear it first?” he asked Nicholas. His gaze traveled from Nicholas to the lord and lady of Dunmurrow, and Nicholas felt a smart of annoyance at those who sought to know his business. He had kept his own counsel for years, and had learned to rely solely upon himself, because it was necessary. It was the only way to survive.
To hasten his audience’s departure, Nicholas gave Piers an inquiring look, but he received a flash of warning from the Red Knight’s blue eyes in response. Piers coddled his wife, and he seemed to feel that Nicholas owed Aisley something for her wardship of Belvry. Nicholas did not care for the debt, nor for the reminder of it, and he stiffened slightly. He had the feeling that someday, for all Piers’s attempt at friendship, the two of them would come to blows.
This time, however, Nicholas gave way. What was the harm in them hearing, after all? It was a matter of little enough importance to him. “This is my sister, and you have met her husband, Baron Montmorency,” Nicholas said with cool disdain. “You may speak freely before them.”
The man glanced again toward Aisley, as if seeking the resemblance between the delicate lady with the silver-blond hair and Nicholas’s tall, dark form, but he said nothing. Presumably he was too eager for his supper to care.
“I have come about the dispensation of the lands adjacent to Belvry, property of Baron Hexham, now deceased,” the man said, and both Piers and Aisley nodded, worry apparent in their eyes. Did they hide nothing from the world? Nicholas thought with contempt. And what did it matter to them what happened to Hexham’s land? Had they not had the pleasure of watching the villain die?
Nicholas felt the familiar clenching of his stomach at his lost vengeance, and pushed the thought aside, concentrating on the messenger instead. He was reading from a royal decree, couched in fancy wording, about Edward’s desire to bind people to their lord with strong ties and to cement loyalties through marriage whenever possible. Yes, yes, Nicholas thought, impatiently. Getonwithit!
“As Baron Hexham has been found to have a living female relation, a niece, it is our wish that you take this woman, Gillian Hexham, to wife, thereby joining the two properties and taking lordship over all.”
Although the man continued reading, Nicholas heard him not, his interest focused solely on one piece of information: Hexham had a living relative. Nicholas’s blood, long dormant, surged through him at the knowledge, and the hatred he had nursed so bitterly sprang to life once more, filling the emptiness in his soul with renewed purpose.
“A niece? Hexham has a niece?” Aisley’s voice, oddly strained, pierced the haze of blood lust that gripped him. “I knew of no niece.”
“Apparently she is the daughter of his younger brother, long dead,” the messenger said. His words fell into a silence so heavy with tension that the very air seemed to vibrate with it, and he shifted uncomfortably, glancing anxiously at the stunned faces that surrounded him.
Nicholas paid him no heed, for he was consumed once more with thoughts of the revenge he had been forced to abandon. It was Aisley who broke the quiet, a soft sound of agitation escaping from her slender throat. “Nicholas…” she whispered. “Oh, Nicholas, please…”
He glanced over at her in surprise. She was still standing, her daughter in her arms and her husband beside her, and she wore a stricken expression at odds with her cool beauty. “I know what you are thinking, but do not even consider it,” she begged.
“You know what I am thinking?” Nicholas echoed, his tone heavy with contempt for her audacity, his eyes daring her to go on. But he had forgotten how strong she was, and she reminded him by meeting his cold glare and holding it until he turned away, revolted by her entreaty. Even that outright dismissal did not stop her, however.
“This poor woman is not to blame for her blood,” she said. “Indeed, she has probably already been punished for it, by Hexham himself. Think of how he would destroy all those he touched. Think of his own wife, locked away in her tower!”
His sister was babbling now, and even through the primitive heat raging through him, Nicholas noticed it. So unlike Aisley, he thought dispassionately, and vowed that he would never display himself so openly.
“Why, this innocent girl has probably been locked away, too, else why would I never have met her?” she asked. Growing desperate now, she whirled toward the king’s man, and the baby in her arms began fussing. “She cannot have stayed with him, for we would have heard something of her. Where has she been all this time?”
“She has lived in a convent for many years—since her youth, I believe,” the messenger answered.
“A convent?” Aisley gasped. “By all the saints, she is a nun?”
Aisley
