emotions. She tore her mouth away with a hoarse cry of anguish. ‘Let me be…no…please…go away. Leave me! Leave me!’
At once, he released her, catching her elbows as he had before when the ground had lurched beneath her feet, waiting for the inevitable questions and reproof, feeling the trembling anger through her arms.
‘Who are you?’ she said. ‘Do you insult Norman women so freely, sir?’
‘Judhael de Brionne,’ he said, adjusting the linen head-rail over her hair. ‘I am Count Alan of Richmond’s vassal, and I came with him in the king’s retinue. And I don’t think it would help matters for you to know what I do with Norman women, my lady. More to the point is that you should see how some Normans are more skilled than others. You may have been sold to de Lessay for the moment, but that will have to change.’
‘I can scarce believe I’m having this conversation,’ she said, intending to cow him with her wide blazing eyes. ‘You are telling me, are you, that as well as being married to that…that boor, you want me to take you as a lover? Is that it?’
He placed a hand on the wall behind her and lowered his face to hers so close that she could see only his eyes making inroads into hers, reading far more than she wanted to reveal. ‘No, my lady, that is not it. I am telling you as clearly as I know how that you will be mine. Understand? Mine.’
‘Ah, so it is the property. You saw it. You wanted it, and now you see a way to get it. Well, that didn’t take too much effort on your part, did it? So now all you have to do is to offer the king more, which he’ll not refuse, of course, and then you can add my estates to those you hold from Count Alan. Well done. But if you think you’ll get any co-operation from me, knight, then you’ll be wrong. You won’t.’
His nose almost touched hers, so close did he look into her heart. ‘I don’t need your co-operation, Rhoese of York. I thought I’d already demonstrated that. And I also believe that your protests are a mite too strident to be sincere. Would you like me to show you what I mean?’
‘No,’ she whispered. ‘No…no, don’t. You do not know…’
‘No, there’s quite a lot I don’t know that I intend to find out. But you had better know this, my lady, that you are on the losing side. Your snarling and snapping and keeping yourself chaste will get you nowhere. What I set out to take, I get. Now, I shall take you in and I shall return tomorrow to escort you back to the king. He’ll want you to make your mark before witnesses, I expect. But I shall have spoken to him by that time.’
‘You’re very sure of yourself, knight. What if he refuses?’
He smiled and levered himself off the wall. ‘You can begin by using my name. I’m known as Jude.’
‘And I’m known as the daughter of Lord Gamal,’ she replied sharply, ‘and I’m capable of making my own plans. English women are not so biddable as your Norman dames.’
‘We’ll see,’ he said, still smiling. ‘Come, show me your hall.’ He held out a hand, closing his strong fingers around hers and leading her out into the light. And this time Rhoese saw no point in depriving him of the last word.
Chapter Three
S o, the squabbling over possession of her estate had already begun before the decree was barely out of the king’s mouth, and Rhoese’s short-lived attempts to maintain her independence had gone for nothing. It would never have happened before the Normans came. There had been laws to protect women’s rights then, she told her brother.
‘It’s no good chastising yourself, love,’ Eric said. ‘It would have happened eventually, one way or the other, whether you’d shown yourself or not. The king had already trawled through the records to see who owned what. It was only a matter of time.’
‘I know,’ said Rhoese, pulling a fistful of brown seed-heads off the sorrel, ‘but if that woman hadn’t got to Archbishop Thomas before me with her offer of a wealthy ward, then I might have stood a chance. She’s capable of anything, Eric. And the new king is a monster. How dare he treat me like a cow for sale to the highest bidder and allow his man to handle me so coarsely? I was never so humiliated in my life. Never.’ They sat side by side on the low remains of a Roman wall that ran along one side of the croft where nettles, sorrel and dock hung heavily with seeds between the stones. She had given the news to Hilda, Bran and Neal, to Brother Alaric and the household servants, watching the silent shock on their faces turn to consternation and fear for their own positions about which she was unable to comfort them. Not since her father’s death had she felt so helpless or so fearful for her future.
But underscoring everything else in her mind was the way in which the Norman, Judhael de Brionne, had seen Toft Green during his visit to York and had instantly decided to acquire it, despite the king’s first choice of recipient. He had told her so, knowing that his kiss would be far more to her taste than de Lessay’s bungling attempt, and that she would file it away amongst ‘things to be savoured again’ in the dark privacy of her bower. And, like a fool, she was already doing it, regardless of her determination never to let a man into her dreams.
He had entered her hall, impressing those within by his civility, his courteous greetings to Eric. And to Neal, who could almost guess the result of Rhoese’s visit to the king, if her angry expression was anything to go by.
‘So there’s to be a higher bid, you think?’ said Eric. ‘That man?’
Instead of an answer, she took his hand and held it on her lap. ‘I’m going to speak to Father Leofric,’ she said, ‘at St Martin’s. I can’t just leave it like this, love. I’m not going to let them walk all over us and let that woman take over my house without putting up a fight for it. She’s taken everything I had, so far, and I’ll be damned if she’s going to get this so easily.’
‘I can’t see that he’ll be able to do much to help. An English priest.’
‘It’s worth a try. I’ll be back before supper.’
‘You’re taking Els with you?’
‘No.’ She smiled for the first time. ‘She prefers to gawp at you.’
He stood up to go with her. ‘Then I’d better not deprive her of that pleasure before I join the monks. What’s that man’s name? Judhael Debrion?’
‘Yes, love. Something like that.’ Jude, he had told her. Jude. She held a hand to her mouth and pressed gently, feeling the warm skin with her lips and the quick surge of something vibrant within her belly. ‘The house martins have almost gone,’ she said, ‘so we shall not have their protection from thunderstorms now. Come into the hall, love. Mind that bucket on your left.’
Whilst not expecting a miracle from Father Leofric, Rhoese felt that he might have been the one to offer her something more positive than Brother Alaric, her chaplain, whose position in her household was principally to lend an air of respectability to her masterless menage, and to keep the accounts. She had, in fact, already put the idea to Brother Alaric that the best way for her to avoid the king’s command would be to enter a nunnery, but his response had been guarded rather than sympathetic, and he had advised her to ask Father Leofric what he thought about it. Whether the chaplain had an inkling of what the priest’s reaction would be was debatable but, if so, he had the wit to keep it from showing when Rhoese returned to Toft Green an hour before supper.
He laid down his quill as her shadow fell across his doorway, rising to his sandaled feet to invite her into his hut. A flurry of leaves swirled round the threshold and rattled away as the chaplain drew up a stool to the door where they could be seen, careful for her reputation.
‘He’s shocked,’ she said. ‘Very shocked.’
He made a small sound of agreement. ‘Understandable. What’s his answer to the convent idea? Concerned about Eric, is he?’
That, indeed, had been a consideration. For Rhoese to commit herself to taking the veil before they knew whether Eric had been