Page 52 of Saxon Blade Norman Blood
“You don’t need to—”
“Please,” he interrupted. “Don’t say anything. I can’t bear to think of what you’ve been through when it’s all my fault.”
With those words, he left the room.
18
“Why did it take you so long to come to me for your revenge?”
Rowena was not surprised to see William appear behind her. She had guessed that once the shock of her revelation faded, he would want answers. In truth, that was why she had stayed in the bailey this morning, even though she ached to run to the forest and be on her own.
But after a miserable night alone and cold in bed, she could not spend another moment without seeing him. He would need explanations, and she needed… well, she needed to be with him. She’d missed him all night and tortured herself with the notion he might have gone to another woman to forget about her terrible revelations.
“I wanted to be ready. I wanted to be older, better prepared.” She scoffed. In the end all her preparations had come to nothing.
“How old are you?”
“Twenty. I was born the year your Duke William came from Normandy. I don’t know what my country was like before the conquest. Imagine that.”
“Twenty. So young…” he murmured to himself.
“It is not so young. You told me yourself you killed a man aged seventeen, even if it was an accident.” That had been ten years ago, which meant he was now seven-and-twenty. Inexplicably, Rowena trembled. He was so much more experienced than her—in every sense of the word. “I wanted tolearn to speak your language better before I attempted anything. And for a while I could not find any trace of you.”
It was odd to talk about it all with him, but at the same time it felt good. During long months, she had not mentioned her plans to anyone and felt so lonely.
“I went back to Normandy for a while last year, that will be why.”
She nodded. “Yes, I had guessed that much. Then one day, I heard the Norman barons were to assemble at Old Sarum to pay homage to King William. I guessed you would be there. In the hive of activity, I approached one of the cooks and asked for a position in the kitchens. Because they needed all the help they could get, she agreed. I could not believe how simple it had been in the end.”
“How did you imagine you would gain access to me?” He sounded curious rather than mocking. “I do not exactly spend my time in the kitchens when I am invited somewhere.”
“It was a first necessary step. I knew if I was patient enough, I would find the opportunity to get within reach of you. And I was right.”
Indeed, they had been within touching distance of each other. Literally. Rowena’s body heated in remembrance, but thankfully he did not pass any comment.
“You would have been stopped immediately had you had the audacity to make an attempt on my life in view of everyone. My men would have captured you, if not killed you outright,” he said matter-of-factly. “The place was teeming with Normans. Even if you had only wounded me, even if you had only drawn a blade on me, you would have been stopped. Surely you must have known that?”
“I did. But it did not matter, I would have fulfilled my promise to my mother at last.”
“You were ready to be captured or killed in the attempt? To sacrifice yourself?”
“Yes.”
There was a pause. Then William raised the issue she had always refused to address. “Did you promise your mother to do it? To avenge both her and your stepfather?”
“I… No.”
That was the most terrible thing of all. She had never actually given her word. Her mother had assumed she would carry out her dying wish without question, and Rowena had not allowed herself to think she might have a choice and allow the man to live.
“You set out for me armed with a simple dagger, intent on stabbing me in the place where all the Norman barons in the land were assembled. I don’t know whether to be impressed or appalled,” he said slowly. “I could—and should—have stopped you myself of course. I am rarely caught off guard, and I am not so easy to kill. A few have tried, but none have yet succeeded.”
“I always knew it was a risk, but I could not consider failure.” The prospect had been daunting enough without thinking of the potential dangers, so Rowena had always refused to dwell on it. “In any case, you made matters easy for me by asking me to your room that night, and you took your sword off as soon as you saw me on the bed. So much for never being caught off guard.”
Asmile bloomed on his lips at the deliberate provocation. Her heart began to beat twice as fast. Things had definitely changed between them. They were no longer enemies but… But what exactly? She had no answer.
“Well. As I told you, my other potential murderers were men, and I have never had to feign an interest in them in order to get them out of a lecherous man’s clutches,” William said withmock sternness. “But you are right, it was ill-considered of me. I unwisely gave you access to me in my most vulnerable moment.”
“You failed to learn from the lesson, though. You are here alone with me, and you have allowed me to sleep next to you every night since,” she pointed out.
