A Knight's Vow Read Online Free Page A

were in
the store room by Alyson’s express order. If an assault came
on the castle, the kitchen would be particularly vulnerable to
fire and any left inside easily trapped and burned alive.

    While she busied herself finding a horn lantern and lighting it she was conscious of Guillelm close behind her, prowling around the tables, shelves, cooking pots, spits and
cauldrons. Dreading but expecting more questions, she still
was unprepared for what he did say.
    “Sir Henry has gone, too, has he not? That is why you are
here. My father would not have left you out in an undefended
manor, no more than I would have done. What happened?”
His voice was very gentle. “When did he die?”
    “Just after Easter.” It was easier to admit this without looking at Guillelm. “Not from this sickness and fever that came
at the beginning of summer. He was felled from his horse in
a hunting accident and never woke from it.”
    Abruptly she was back with her father in his small bedchamber behind the comfortable great hall of their manor
house, mopping his clammy face, washing his torn hands,
speaking soothingly to him while her heart pounded in terror
and hopelessness. Memories of that brought more memories-the last few hours of her intended betrothed, Lord
Robert, who in his fever had talked to her as if she was his
first wife, Guillelm’s mother. Guillelm must never know, she
thought, while she knew that this strange, precious time together, in quiet before the dawning of a new day and a likely
attack from Etienne the Bold, would soon be at an end. You
must tell him you were about to be betrothed to his father, her
conscience goaded, while her heart clamored, Not yet.
    “I am truly sorry for your loss.”
    Alyson whirled about, the horn lantern clutched protectively in front of her. “You startled me!” He had come up very close
behind her, his feet silent on the stone flags. “I am sorry for
your loss, also,” she said quickly, meaning the words no less
because she gabbled them.

    “I know. I could see that from the moment I saw you again,
on the stairs.” His face, as beautiful to Alyson in the beams of
the lantern as the carving of the stone angels in their local
church, was earnest. “You always did feel for others”
    For an instant he seemed on the verge of saying more, then
he gave a bark of laughter. “Steady!” He caught the lamp as
it dipped in her hands, the glowing light bouncing over the
sooty beams and rafters. “Mother of God, you are not safe
with that. You wield it like a weapon” He lifted the lantern
from her trembling fingers and placed it on the nearest table.
    “Are you all right?” he asked, watching her closely under
thick blond eyebrows. His deep brown eyes seemed to darken
even more. “Is it perhaps the sickness that has laid the rest
of this place low?”
    Before Alyson could move or speak, he tucked his cloak
closer about her. “Do you wish me to-?”
    “No!” Alyson burst out, afraid that he might offer to carry
her again. She did not deserve his concern, and she was so
tired it would be so very easy to fall asleep in his arms. Their
every touch and embrace made it that much harder for her to
tell him what she must, for it suggested a growing closeness
that would be destroyed soon enough. Let me keep my pride
and not embarrass Guillelm with my unwanted feelings for
him, she thought.
    “No one in this castle has been taken ill with the sweating
fever for the past three days; the worst of that is over,” she
said, trying to sound lively and confident. Her face, tense
with grief and weariness and now trying to mask her response
to the tall, handsome man standing less than a hand-stretch away from her, ached as she forced a brittle smile. “With the
help of the blessed Virgin we have come through,” she said.

    The worst of the sickness might be past, thought Guillelm,
but Alyson looked close to the breaking point. He wanted to
lift all care