For Love And Honor Read Online Free Page B

but to
send word and I will come to your aid.”
    “I will have a husband to protect me.” She
spoke sharply so as to hide what she felt. Ah, how she wished he
had kept silent. His words were a temptation, feeding a dream she
should not treasure, just when she had promised herself to think no
more of him.
    “ I meant
the promise for Crispin as well as for you,” he said quietly. “He’s
more than kin; he’s a dear friend, too, and after your marriage,
through him you will be my kin as well. The times are difficult,
Lady Joanna. Who knows what may befall us in the years to come? We
keep a large garrison at Woodward. I have alrea dy said the
same words to Crispin, but I wanted you to hear them too. If you need me, alone or with my
men-at-arms, you have but to ask.”
    The feast
had ended and the guests began to drift out of the hall. There was
to be a hunting party that afternoon that would last well into the
long twilight of midsummer, and men collected in groups, calling to
each other that they would meet at the stables or in the outer
bailey. Alain stood, putting his hand to Joanna’s elbow to help her
rise. On her other side Crispin pushed back his chair, still
talking – or rather,
listening – to her father. Alain’s eyes were on her, and some
recognition of his promise of aid seemed appropriate. In a few days
he would be gone, out of her life for years and possibly forever.
Until then she could keep her feelings hidden.
    “I thank you for your loyal friendship,” she
said, giving him her hand. He held it a bit over-long, until her
father stepped to her side, frowning.
    “Sir Alain has promised support to my husband
and me in time of trouble,” Joanna said to him, hoping thus to
allay the almost certain explosion of Radulf s temper.
    “Armed support is a man’s business and no
affair for a woman to concern herself with,” Radulf growled,
unappeased. “If he has something to say on that matter, he ought to
say it to Crispin.”
    “So I have. And I promise the same support to
you, my lord,” said Alain. With a bow he left the table, joining
Piers and heading for the outer door.
    “Young fool,” grumbled Radulf, staring after
him with a calculating look.
    “He is occasionally impetuous,” Crispin said,
“but he is an honorable man, Radulf. You can always depend on Alain
to do what is right. My lady Joanna, will you ride next to me in
the hunt this afternoon?”
    “Gladly, my lord.” Joanna took his hand and
let him lead her into the entry hall, to the foot of the staircase
that curved along the inside of the western tower, where her
chamber was.
    “Put on your hunting garb,” Crispin said in
his serious way, “and I’ll remove these extravagant silks and also
don more sensible clothes. Do you enjoy the hunt?”
    “ I like
to ride,” Joanna responded, “but I have no taste for the kill. I
always feel sorry for the poor, trapped beasts.” She ended the
words with a guilty laugh, for after every hunt her fa ther
al ways scolded her about her
queasiness at the sight of a dying animal.
    “ I
perceive that you are a kind and gentle-hearted lady,” Crispin
said, pulling her hand upward to rest it against his broad chest.
“This pleases me greatly, since I am not overly fond of hunting
myself. I’ve seen too many lords take unseemly pleasure in the
cruelty of it. I know hunting is necessary – we need the meat it provides to feed our
people – but I will never burn with passion for the spilling of
blood.”
    He opened her curving fingers, pressing them
flat over his heart, and she could sense its steady beating. She
looked up at him with troubled eyes, wishing she could feel for him
just a small part of the dangerous emotion that flamed in her for
Alain. How had she come to this torment within a mere instant of
seeing Alain and in such opposition to what she ought to feel? How
could her heart be so divided and she yet live?
    As she stared up at Crispin, seeing him while
not seeing him at all,