Chapter Four
‘Wake up, my lord! We have to leave!’
Urgent shouts infiltrated Roger Danby’s dreams, whirling him from the home of his childhood on the heather-covered moors to the battlefields of France. The carnage there came almost as a relief.
He’d been dreaming of Yorkshire again, as he had done nightly since returning to England: the endless, purple moors and deep valleys that he had not seen for almost four years. The people from his past were present, too, which invariably caused Roger’s dreams to darken. Even though he was somehow aware he was dreaming, his stomach twisted with loss. He wondered if they thought of him as often as he had thought of them and if his name was ever mentioned within the pink stone walls of his father’s house.
Someone was still calling his name and a dying archer was tugging at the neck of his cloak. He waved his arms to fend off the man, but the tugging continued. The shouts were not part of the dream and when he opened his eyes it was his squire, Thomas, looming over him, hands on Roger’s bare shoulder.
The young man’s eyes were wide and his hair was unkempt. Thomas had fought beside Roger in France so his presence on the battlefield in Roger’s dream was unsurprising, but it took a moment for Roger to shake his dream completely and return to the comfy bed in the manor house of a Derbyshire nobleman, so strange after months of straw pallets or bare ground.
‘My lord, please. We need to leave,’ Thomas repeated.
Dreaming of home always left Roger’s nerves as tightly strung as a bow. He glared up at Thomas in confusion and irritation from the feather mattress. Soft light peered around the edge of the tapestries covering the window. His breath made a cloud in the cold room.
‘Did I oversleep?’
‘No, it’s early.’
Roger threw himself back with a groan. They had stayed three nights with Lord Harpur at Bukestone and had planned to leave in the morning, but Roger had not intended to start so early. The maidservant who had been his companion the previous night rolled on to her side, still fast asleep. Her bare buttocks rubbed against Roger’s hip as she shifted her position and sent small throbs of pleasure through him. He reached for the wine flagon by his side, but found it empty.
‘It’s barely daybreak,’ he growled. ‘What’s the hurry?’
Thomas was already lurching around the small chamber, gathering possessions and stuffing them into his saddlebag. He threw Roger’s boots and cloak at the foot of the bed.
‘Lady Harpur decided to pay her daughter a visit early this morning,’ Thomas muttered. His face took on a pinched expression, his cheeks turning pale beneath his wispy beard. ‘She discovered Katherine was not alone in her room and hadn’t been all night.’
Roger swore. Katherine Harpur was a maid of sixteen with her mother’s fine, pale skin and her father’s dark curly hair. She was a fruit ripe for picking, but Roger had put the flirtation he’d seen pass between her and Thomas as nothing to concern himself about. Apparently he was wrong. He pushed himself from beneath the covers. The cold blast of air served to wake him fully, but even if the room had been comfortably warm his soldier’s instincts made him alert to the sudden danger they were both in.
‘You bloody young fool! Lord Harpur has every right to cut you down where you stand and I’ve half a mind to let him get on with it.’
Thomas’s round face twisted in panic and Roger was reminded of how young his companion was. Despite having survived the battlefields of Europe, the thought of death clearly terrified him. Thomas had not yet reached his nineteenth year and if he continued to act so recklessly would be unlikely to do so, Roger thought with the disdain that ten years’ seniority granted him. If Thomas was old enough to stick his staff into a willing woman, he was old enough to bear the consequences of unwise decisions.
‘How long ago were you discovered?’
‘I ran straight back here,’ Thomas said miserably. ‘Katherine was entreating her mother not to go straight to Lord Harpur, but I do not know how successful she will be.’
That bought them some time. If luck were on their side they would be gone from the house before the incensed father came searching for them.
‘I hid behind the door and slipped out before my face was seen. Lady Harpur might not know it was me.’
Thomas sounded hopeful. Roger turned away so Thomas did not see the irritation on his face. How many dark-haired visitors were staying in Lord Harpur’s house?
Two, he reminded himself, scratching at the beard that
