Page 13 of The Captive Knight
“My father was away.” She pulled an earthenware bowl from the sack and peeled off the cloth cover. “He was lending his sword to an aristocratic family in Florence. Is it chivalrous to wait until the shepherd is sleeping to steal the sheep?”
No more chivalrous, he thought, than abandoning a castle and its people. He wouldn’t easily forget the way those hungry villagers fell to their knees before him, as the first person who’d staked a claim. As she slathered some unguent across the wound on his leg, he wondered if she knew how bad the situation was. He suspected she didn’t. A woman who would nurse her worst enemy in the hope of recovering her dowry wasn’t the kind of woman who would suffer such negligence.
Then a new thought pinched him. “Is your father bargaining to find you a husband yet, with my lands as your dowry?”
She drew into herself like a whelk into its shell.
“So he is,” he murmured. The viscount was ill-informed if he thought Jehan would give the castle up so easily.
“He has sent out messages.” She dipped her fingers into the unguent again.
“Who is he considering?”
She canted her head at him, eyes narrowing in suspicion.
“It’s been a long war between our kings,” he explained. “I’ve met many Gascon knights loyal to the French king during truce negotiations with the prince. Over those weeks, a lot of wine is swilled and a lot of stories swapped. I might be able to tell you if your father’s choice is a fool or an ogre.”
“Are those my only choices?”
“Be glad youhavechoices.” He gestured toward the damp walls of the cell. “Some of us have none.”
“Oh, but you do have a choice, Sir Jehan. You can buy your freedom by giving me my castle.”
“Well played.” He felt the corners of his lips twitching. “As for these potential husbands…?”
She gave her head a shake. “The only reason you’re asking me is so you will know who to battle to steal my castle away again.”
“Your father didn’t raise a fool.”
“It won’t be so easy next time.” Her satiny shoulder pressed against the neckline of her kirtle. “I’ll be at Castétis, securing it along with my future husband.”
“Who will be…?”
“Persistent, aren’t you?” She scraped her glistening fingers clean against the edge of the earthenware bowl. “I suppose there’s no harm. My father makes no secret about what families he wishes to make alliances with. Theobald de Coysset is one possibility. So is Bernardi d’Aure.”
“I’ve met them both, briefly.”
“What about the Viscount de Baste?”
“He’s old.”And lecherous.
“He has three sons. I suspect I’ll be offered a younger son, but my father has pinned his hopes on Guy, the oldest. Are you acquainted with the family?”
“I know Sir Guy, yes.”
He did his best to mask his surprise. Theobald and Bernardi were good men, strong knights, with the same loyalties to King Jean as Aliénor’s father. But Guy de Baste was another matter. Though the current Viscount de Baste was loyal to the French king, his son Guy was actively, if surreptitiously, seeking better relations with the English crown.
Jehan wondered if Aliénor’s father was aware of this shifting of allegiances and realized, just as swiftly, that he couldn’t be.
“Struck dumb, are you?” She set the pot aside and unfurled a clean length of linen. “Is Guy de Baste such a formidable opponent, then?”
“The ladies think him handsome, but he’s an indifferent fighter.”
“You’ll forgive me if I doubt you.” She slipped the linen under his leg to begin the winding, exposing a shadowy gap between her neckline and the lovely breasts beneath. “Knights seem to enjoy diminishing other knights’ valor, if for no other reason than to glow in comparative virtue.”
He didn’t answer. He was still contemplating Guy de Baste’s many insufficiencies. The man preferred to talk and bargain rather than to fight. He was glib with words, wore a cut of clothes straight out of court, and had all the slippery charm of a peddler of looted goods. Worst of all, he could be a conspirator of the worst sort, playing a very dangerous game. Any woman deserved a better fate than to bed a traitor.
It was an unsettling, fever-bidden thought.
