Page 20 of The Raven and the Rose
He looked her up and down and grinned. “You forget, I’ve grown. My clothes would drown you.”
“Dolt! I mean clothes my size from when you were twelve or thirteen.”
“I’ll see if I can find where Kate has them stored. Come back tomorrow night for a dress rehearsal.”
As it turned out, the entire day was like a dress rehearsal for Roseanna. The material for the wedding gown had arrived, and even she had to admit that it was breathtaking. It was white satin with white roses embroidered overall. White on white. It was symbolic of the white rose of York.
Joanna designed the gown along traditional lines with a train and long-trailing sleeves. Roseanna stood for hours, turning this way and that as the gown was pinned, tucked, and sewn. When she finally removed it and handed it over to her mother’s sewing women, she felt a pang of regret that she would not be able to wear it on her wedding day, for it was truly exquisite. Later, in Jeffrey’s chamber she selected a linen shirt, a mulberry-colored doublet, and a pair of tight black hose. She quite looked forward to wearing the nonrestrictive hose for riding. She caught sight of Jeffrey’s cheeky grin as he asked, “But brat, whatever will you do about your hair and your—er, other female accoutrements?”
She snatched a velvet cap from the trunk. “I’m not passing myself off as a man; it will just be easier to travel this way.”
A low knock came on the door, and Jeffrey opened it for Sir Bryan. Roseanna turned to her brother. “Oh, bless you, Jeffrey. I’ll never forget your support and kindness to me. Bryan, what do you think? Should we travel by night and rest by day?”
“Nay, night-riding is fine for a short run, but my home is nearly seventy miles from here. We’ll rest easy there before we go to Scotland.”
“I think we should stay overnight at the abbeys where they take in travelers.”
“Well, it will be cheaper than inns. I haven’t much money,” he apologized.
“I have enough for the journey, Bryan. We’ll be all right.”
He took her hands and gazed at her with loving eyes. “You are a wonder. You risk everything for me.”
“And you do the same for me, Bryan.”
He enfolded her in his embrace. “How am I to wait until we are wed?” he whispered.
She lifted her half-parted mouth to his and wished he would not wait. She wished he were more reckless; then she realized that he put her first and that she must be grateful for it.
Jeffrey produced a ragged map, and the three of them pored over it for long minutes. Finally, after waiting for his decision, which didn’t come, Roseanna said, “We’ll stay at Welbeck Abbey the first night. That’s only twenty miles from here. That way we won’t have to go at first light. If we went very early, they would soon discover me gone and it would give them a full day to search for me. If we leave after the midday meal, they’ll think I’ve gone riding. By the time I have not returned, darkness will be nigh, and they won’t be able to search.”
The two young men exchanged glances. “You are marvelously devious, Roseanna,” said Jeffrey.
“Thank you,” she said, inordinately pleased with the compliment.
“If we can get to Selby Abbey by the next night, that’s only seventeen or eighteen miles from my home,” said Sir Bryan.
Jeffrey wore the doublet with the Black Bull badge of the Duke of Clarence on the sleeve. “When you take service with George, I will join you,” he reaffirmed to Bryan.
“Why don’t you come with us?” asked Roseanna.
“Nay—whoever heard of three on an elopement?” he teased. “I’ll help take suspicion off Bryan. I’ll tell them he’s gone to London; then they’ll search south instead of north.”
She looked up at Sir Bryan and thought for the hundredth time that he was almost beautiful. He looked so open and honest, so sweet and gentle. “I think we should go day after tomorrow, if we are all in agreement.” The two knights once again exchanged significant looks as if congratulating each other; then all three offered their hands in a silent pledge.
Roseanna in doublet and hose rode Zeus north and met Sir Bryan at Newark, as previously arranged. She had not worried unduly that she could bid no one goodbye, for she knew that once she was wed to Sir Bryan and it was a fait accompli, her family would forgive her and welcome her back into its bosom. Then she would pick up Mecca, the Arabian that the King had given her, and a few of the others that she had specially bred. It would be added income to keep on with the horse breeding.
Their hearts high with their daring adventure, they smiled into each other’s eyes every time they looked at each other. The pair of riders who looked like two youths from a distance caused no comment. They covered the twenty miles easily and arrived at Welbeck Abbey long before the gates were closed for the night. They saw to the feeding and watering of their own mounts and were given bread and cheese for their meal; then they were assigned two cell-like rooms that were very small. Each had whitewashed walls and an iron cot.
Roseanna knew Sir Bryan would not come to her. A monastery filled with monks was not conducive to romance. She fell asleep anticipating the adventure that would be theirs on the morrow. She could hardly wait!
As the steel-gray light of day dawned, her heart sank: it was raining. When she looked outside, she realized thatrainingwas not the precise word for it. It was coming down in bucketfuls and the air was icy, making her shiver and shrink into her cloak.
Sir Bryan was hesitant. “Perhaps we shouldn’t venture out in such cursed weather.”
“Don’t saycursedKeep thinking luck is with us. Don’t worry about me,” she said on a cheerful note, “I’ll keep up.”
The day was as dismal as it had promised to be, and the whole of the landscape was the color of a drowned rat. The rain kept on against a sky of lead. Sir Bryan’s horse seemed to flag in the afternoon. Roseanna knew Zeus could stand a faster pace, but Bryan’s horse did not have the stamina, and she schooled Zeus to the slower speed.
