Medieval 03 - Enchanted

bonds and earthly necessity to a woman
who loathes her marital duties.”
    “I was honest from the first,” Ariane
said tonelessly. “I told everyone who would listen that I had
no heart.”
    “I can do quite well without your
heart,” Simon retorted in a savage voice. “It is your
body I want, both for pleasure and for children.”
    Ariane said nothing.
    In a single swift movement, Simon released Ariane
and stood up. For aching moments he said nothing. He simply looked
at the ravishing, unattainable beauty whom he had married.
    Another, different kind of shudder went through
Ariane as she realized that she would not be raped tonight.
    Nor would she be set free.
    “Are you so dead in what passes for your
should that you don’t want children?” Simon asked with
appalling softness.
    Even as Ariane opened her mouth to agree, she knew
it was a lie. Defeated, she turned her head away from Simon.
    From the corner of her eye, she saw his arm coming
toward her. With a hoarse sound she threw herself to the far edge
of the bed.
    Saying nothing, Simon yanked the bed covers from
beneath Ariane, leaving only a single layer over the rustling,
rose-scented mattress. Too spent to flinch, she watched numbly as
he held out his arm once more.
    Blood dripped slowly but steadily onto the
mattress.
    “That should do,” he said.
    Blankly, Ariane looked up at Simon.
    “A substitute for the blood of your
maidenhead,” he said distinctly. “Were the linen not
stained, there would be much gossip in the keep about the man who
was so great a fool as to marry a soiled woman.”
    Ariane made a small sound and looked away, seeing
nothing at all.
    “’Tis a good thing that your dowry is
great,” Simon said, shrugging his mantle about his shoulders.
“It is the only joy I will have of this union for a
time.”
    “Forever,” Ariane said dully.
    “Nay, wife . There
is a fire in you that is great enough to burn stone. I have felt
it. One day you will plead that I take the very thing you refuse me
now. You may look forward to it. I certainly will!”
    Slowly Ariane shook her head, as much in despair as
in response to Simon’s words.
    “Have a care how you mock me,” Simon
said with deadly gentleness, “else I will take what God and
king have given to me, and to hell with your virginal
fears.”
    With that, Simon turned and stalked from the bed
chamber.

9
    D ominic swept aside the last scraps
of the previous night’s wedding feast, dragged a senseless
man-at-arms from the only upright bench, and continued hauling the
hapless man out of the great hall to the forebuilding. When he
returned to the great hall, Meg had revived the fire and was
pouring fragrant tea into clean mugs.
    No smell of baking bread wafted in from the outside
kitchen. No meat roasted on spits. Fresh water had been drawn and
little more. Few of the servants were even up and about. All were
much the worse for drink.
    One was snoring fit to stir the draperies.
    “Ale or tea?” Meg asked as Dominic
walked up.
    “Tea.”
    Dominic looked at the limp men stacked like logs
against the wall of the great hall and shook his head.
Simon’s wedding had been well and truly toasted, until not
one of the knights could raise a goblet or untangle his tongue to
speak.
    “’Tis just as well I brought headache
bane with me,” Meg said. “When these stout men finally
awaken, they could be felled instantly by a child with a shrill
voice.”
    “They may not have to wait that long,”
Dominic said in disgust. “Were they my knights, I would take
them by the ears and throw them into the swine pen.”
    Dominic took the tea Meg offered, sat on the bench
he had cleared, and drank deeply of the transparent, hot brew. As
always, anything from Meg’s herbal refreshed and restored
him. He lowered the cup with a sound of pleasure.
    Six feet away, a knight snored hard enough to
choke.
    “God’s teeth,” Dominic muttered.
“Have Erik’s knights no sense? Don’t they know
that dawn follows a riotous night as quickly as a quiet one? Nay,
more quickly!”
    “Don’t be harsh with them,” Meg
said, refilling his cup. “They but shared Erik’s joy in
a marriage that will bring an island of peace to a troubled
land.”
    Dominic snorted. “Aye. And in their
celebrations, they kept you awake most of the night.”
    “Nay.”
    “Then what did? For you were awake, small
falcon. I know it.”
    “I dreamed,” she said simply.
    Dominic went still. “Glendruid
dreams?”
    Meg nodded