Commanded By The French Duke. Meriel Fuller
that clung to his knees and the lower half of his thighs emphasised the bulky, contoured muscle of his legs. Pinioned beneath his blue gaze, Alinor drew a deep shuddery breath. She hated the way his sheer size made her feel self-conscious, her outer layers peeled away: a quaking shadow of her former self.
‘Then why didn’t you go with them?’ She switched her eyes away from him abruptly, a flag of colour staining her cheeks, annoyed at her reaction. Having lived with the unwanted advances of her stepbrother in the last few years, not to mention the harsh callousness of her father for all of her life, she prided herself on being able to ignore or dismiss most men. They were dispensable, as was this man. She frowned intently at a silver-backed beetle crawling slowly across the coppery leaves on the ground.
‘You were unconscious. It wasn’t right to leave you alone.’
The note of care in his voice startled her. ‘Well, I’m fully conscious now,’ Alinor replied with finality. She fiddled with the plaited strings of her girdle, her leather scabbard. ‘So you can go.’
Laughter blossomed in Guilhem’s chest. Her outright repulsion of him was so blunt, so churlish. ‘I could,’ he replied, infuriatingly, his eyes twinkling. The chit made him curious, keen to linger; she was feisty and obdurate, and not at all grateful for the fact that he had elected to stay and make sure she was safe.
‘Go then!’ she snapped as he continued to stand beside her. ‘I’m fine, can’t you see that? I’m sure your Prince Edward would have something to say about you wasting time over me.’ Shuffling her legs impatiently, Alinor tried to ignore the chill creeping in from the wet leaves on the ground, through her skirts, her silk hose.
‘He’s already said it,’ Guilhem replied. ‘And he’s your Prince as well. You would do well to show him a little more respect. He is in charge of the country now that his father King Henry has been taken prisoner.’
Alinor flinched, pursing her lips. Tipping up her neat, round chin, she flicked her eyes briefly across his lean, impassive face, regretting her runaway tongue. ‘Well, he certainly didn’t act like a Prince!’ Defiantly, she probed the pulpy bruise on the side of her cheek as if to emphasise her point. Throwing her knees to one side, she clambered messily on to all fours, struggling to her feet, clamping her weak arm to her side. Her head swam, shifting unsteadily, iridescent points of light bobbing before her eyes. The knight seized her and, to her dismay, she clung to him, gripping tightly for support as she swayed, fighting for balance.
He pulled her towards him, manacling her wrists. His face loomed close to hers. ‘And you, chit, do not act like a nun. So I would be careful if I were you.’
Her heart quailed beneath the questioning look in his eyes, the suspicion held in those glittering depths. Eyes like the sea. His eyelashes were black and long, almost touching his high cheekbones, silky threads splayed out across tanned skin. Yanking away, Alinor forced herself to breath evenly, making a great play of adjusting her linen veil around her shoulders.
A shout caused them both to look across to the bridge and she sagged with relief. Her scattered senses gathered, her mind clearing, focusing on the need to pull away from this man. There was Ralph, grinning, one arm raised in greeting as he plodded towards them carrying a piece of wood, and what looked like a hessian sack of tools. Thank God.
‘That’s him!’ she almost shouted at the knight beside her. ‘That’s Ralph!’ In her eagerness to reach the lad she charged past Guilhem, jogging her elbow into his forearm.
He watched her go, her step light and purposeful across the grass, flowing skirts dragging brindled leaves in her wake. He smiled softly; why, she had practically shoved him out of the way in her eagerness to reach the boy. A maid half his size, who barely reached his shoulder! She couldn’t wait to be rid of him! He should have been annoyed, furious with her for her lack of courtesy and respect, and yet, he was not. Curiosity chipped the mantle of his soul, dug beneath the impenetrable crust that had lain numb, dormant for all these months. Mounting up, he steered his horse towards the bridge, and up over it, his horse’s hooves clattering over the cobbles, glancing down briefly at the maid and the boy beside the broken cart. They didn’t look up and he had the distinct impression that the little nun was studiously ignoring him. Something else was going on here; it was a pity he wouldn’t be around to find out what it was. Kicking his heels into the destrier’s flanks, he rode off without a backwards glance.
Layers of mist veiled the huge, creamy moon: a harvest moon, full and orange, inching upwards above the horizon. Brilliant stars pinpricked the dimming sky. The chapel bell attached to Odstock Priory tolled slowly for the last service of the day, sweet, melancholy notes ringing out across the flat, undulating land, the occasional screech of an owl disrupting the regular chimes. Crosses swinging from their girdles, the nuns walked in single file, heads bowed, towards the chapel from the Priory; their fawn-coloured veils shone white in the moonlight.
Hidden in the shadows of the gatehouse, Alinor watched them, pale wraiths silent as ghosts, some hunched over with old age, others graceful with spines ramrod straight, gliding across the cobbled courtyard and into the light-filled chapel. At this hour, every windowsill, every niche in the stone walls held a flaming candle, shining on the pewter plate, the jewelled cross on the altar, on the nuns’ faces bent in prayer. Alinor knotted her fingers across her stomach. As an honorary lay sister, she had the choice as to whether she would join them or not; tonight, she would not. As the last nun stepped over the chapel threshold and the great arched door closed against the night, Alinor darted out, skipping across to the main Priory: three double-height rectangular buildings constructed from limestone blocks, arranged around cloisters and an inner courtyard garden. Climbing the wooden steps, she pushed open the iron-riveted door which led directly on to the first-floor hall, open to the roof rafters.
Pausing, she tried to still her quickened breath, the sound from her lungs roaring in her ears. Her keen eye absorbed the sparse, familiar details: glossy elm floorboards, gilded by the light from a single candle burning on an oak coffer; a fire smoking fitfully in the wide, brick-lined fireplace. A long trestle table and benches dominated the hall; this was where the nuns ate and any guests that might join them. But now, the hall was completely empty. All was quiet.
Extracting two lumpy bags of gold coins from her satchel, Alinor dumped them on the carved-oak coffer beside the door, the money earned today from the sale of the nuns’ wheat. After her unwanted encounter with the Prince and his soldiers this morning, the remainder of the day had passed in a blur; she could scarcely remember the noise and bustle of the market, the bartering, of which Ralph had done the most. She had stood by and watched, her body shocked and reeling, her mind constantly playing the moment when a pair of powerful hands had grabbed at her waist and thrown her up against a hard, unyielding torso. The image taunted her, dragged on her senses. She had been useless at the market, no help at all.
Seizing a rush torch from an iron bracket, Alinor held the blazing twigs aloft as she crossed the hall diagonally, moving through a narrow arch in the far corner, twisting down a spiral staircase. She entered the storeroom below, full of earthenware pots, casks, sacks of flour, wriggling carefully through the clumsy towers of hessian bags, the stacked barrels, to reach another door that squeaked on its hinges as she dragged it open. Holding the spitting, crackling light aloft, she descended the steep, rickety steps. None of the nuns came down here; the cellars were a labyrinth of hidden chambers and torturous passageways, formed from the vaulted foundations of the original, much smaller, Priory. Only the hefty barrels of mead which the sisters needed occasionally were situated in the first shallow-arched alcove, close by the bottom of the steps.
Alinor was going further, down into the basement. She knew her way around these cellars. As a frequent visitor to the Priory, the nuns had offered her space in the vaults to hang and store her herbs. Long stalks, tied with bristly twine, hung from iron hooks in the ceiling, crispy flower heads rasping at her veil, scattering seeds as she moved along the corridor, careful to keep the flickering, spitting torch away from the precious harvest above. The nuns’ offer had been a godsend; after her stepmother had ordered a whole roomful of