Medieval 03 - Enchanted

eyes.
    “Lady?” Meg asked.
    “No,” Ariane said reluctantly.
“The road was harsh, and the weather foul, but Simon was no
worse than necessity required.”
    “Then why do you think him cruel?”
    “He is a man,” Ariane said simply.
    “Aye,” Meg said smiling.
“’Tis usual for a bridegroom to be a man.”
    Ariane kept speaking as though she hadn’t
heard Meg’s words. “Beneath that flashing smile and
sun-bright hair,he is waiting only for the most
telling moment to reveal his cruelty.”
    Meg’s breath came in with an odd sound.
    “’Tis no special disparagement of
Simon,” Ariane added. “All men are cruel. To expect
otherwise is to be a fool.”
    Abruptly Meg looked at Ariane in the Glendruid way, seeing the truth in her.
    Ariane, the
Betrayed .
    “Simon would never betray you,” Meg
said. “You must believe me.”
    A single bleak look was Ariane’s only
answer.
    “He would never take a leman,” Meg
continued earnestly. “He and Dominic are alike in that. They
expect no less honor from themselves than they do from a
wife.”
    “Simon may have lemans and concubines with my
blessings. Better he loose his cruelty and rutting on them than on
me.”
    Meg tried to hide her shock, but
couldn’t.
    “Lady Ariane, you have been misled as to the
nature of what passes between man and woman in the marriage
bed,” Meg said urgently.
    “You are mistaken. I have been well prepared
for what is coming.”
    Each word Ariane spoke was clipped, precise, and
cold.
    Even as Meg opened her mouth to argue the point,
her Glendruid eyes saw the futility of further words. However
Ariane had been betrayed, the act had wounded her too deeply for
mere words to heal. Only deeds could touch her now. Only deeds
could heal her soul.
    “In a fortnight or two,” Meg said
quietly, “we will speak again of cruelty and betrayal. By
then, you will have had more experience of Simon’s
gentleness.”
    Ariane barely repressed a shudder.
    “If you will excuse me, Lady Margaret,”
Ariane said tightly, “my bath grows cool waiting for
me.”
    “Of course. I’ll send Blanche with more
hot—”
    “No,” Ariane interrupted.
    Hearing the curtness of her own voice, she took a
deep breath and forced a smile.
    “Thank you, Lady of Blackthorne,”
Ariane said, “but I much prefer to see to my own needs in the
bath.”
    Ariane left the room without looking back, for she
was very much afraid she would see speculation in the Saxon
girl’s shrewd green eyes. Ariane didn’t want that. She
didn’t want to know what Meg would do if she discovered that
the bride intended to take a deadly silver dagger to her wedding
bed.
    How can I possibly kill
Simon ?
    How can I possibly not kill
him ?
    And failing all, can I kill
myself ?
    The conflicting questions raged through Ariane as
she bathed. There was no answer to her wild thoughts save one.
    She could not lie beneath a man again.
    Any man.
    Even one who called to her from deep within an
uncanny amethyst dream.

6
    T he marriage toasts from the
assembled knights grew more and more unrestrained with each mug of
ale and goblet of wine that was consumed. While the wedding
ceremony itself had been elegant, brief, and reverent, the feast
was making up for the previous restraint.
    Lord Erik, son of Robert of the North, watched the
newly married couple from his seat at Duncan’s table at the
head of the great hall. Nothing Erik saw stilled the uneasiness
that was growing within him. Simon was courteous to his bride and
no more. If he were anticipating the bedding of his Norman heiress,
it didn’t show.
    But it was Ariane who truly disturbed Erik’s
peace of mind. Though the bride wore Serena’s complex,
fabulously beautiful weaving, there was no joy in Ariane’s
face or gestures. Rather there were hints of terror and rage barely
contained. Her magnificent amethyst eyes were shrouded by shadows
that owed nothing to the night that had wrapped coldly around the
keep.
    Through the ceremony and the celebration that
followed, the bride’s fingers had kept moving subtly, as
though seeking the harp to speak for all that was unspeakable
within her.
    “Ariane. The Betrayed. But by whom, and in
what way, and why?”
    No person turned away from the feasting to answer
Erik’s words. They had been spoken too softly to be overheard
by any of the revelers at the lord’s table at the head of the
great hall.
    But Cassandra heard Erik clearly. As soon as the
feast had ended and the rounds of