The Hostage Bride

Chapter 4

“This is to be your chamber.” Olivia opened the door on a small bastion room. “It’s n-not a very nice room,” she said apologetically. “But D-Diana says you’re to have it.”

Portia stepped into the chamber. The stone walls were softened by a few threadbare tapestries, and there was rush matting on the floor. A sullen fire burned in the hearth, and tallow candles flickered from a double pewter candlestick. The high window recessed into the thick stone was sealed with oiled parchment that rattled under the gusts of icy wind. Apart from the low, narrow bed, there was a stool, a small table and washstand, and a linen press.

Portia absorbed all this in a sweeping glance. The bare furnishings told her much about her position in this household. “Am I to share it?”

“Oh, no!” Olivia was shocked. “No, of c-course not.”

“Then it’s a palace,” Portia declared cheerfully, pulling off her gloves. “A deal more comfortable than I’ve been accustomed to, I can tell you.”

Olivia looked doubtful. “I expect they’ll be bringing up your b-baggage in a minute. It’ll be c-cozier when you have your own things around you.”

Portia laughed. “What baggage? All I have is what I stand up in. Oh, except for my little box that was strapped to Patches’ saddle. I wouldn’t want to be without that.” Her smile faded for a minute. “It’s little enough to show for seventeen years in the world, but it’s all I have.” All she had to prove who she was, she thought. Those little keepsakes, pathetic though they would seem to some eyes, were her only anchors to the life she’d known and the only parent she’d known.

“You don’t have any other clothes?” Olivia stared.

Portia shook her head, saying with a return to her previous cheerfulness, “Only what I’m wearing. And they’re a vast improvement on what I was wearing before Sergeant Crampton found me.” She unclasped her cloak and tossed it on the bed before bending to poke at the sullen smolder in the grate. “The wood is green,” she observed. “Maybe I can find some seasoned logs when I’ve learned my way around.”

Olivia frowned. She suspected that the servants who’d prepared the chamber had been given the impression by Lady Granville that they need not put themselves out to make the new arrival particularly comfortable.

“I should t-take you t-to D-Diana.”

Portia straightened. Olivia’s stammer seemed to become worse at the prospect of her stepmother.

“Is she a gorgon?”

Olivia nodded. “She’s quite horrid.”

“Oh.” Portia nodded. “I suppose she doesn’t want me here.”

Olivia nodded again.

“Does Lord Granville know?”

Olivia shook her head. “No! D-Diana never shows him her b-bad side. He thinks she’s wonderful and k-kind.”

“Men are always so blind,” Portia observed with weary knowledge. “Even the nicest ones don’t see what’s under their noses. Well, let’s go and brave the gorgon, then.”

Olivia’s smile chased away the shadows on her pale, composed face, and her black eyes lit up, transforming her countenance. “I’m so glad you’re here.”

Portia was reserving judgment in the light of what she’d learned in the last few minutes, but she said only, “Castle Granville is a vast improvement on St. Stephen’s Street.”

Diana was waiting for them in her parlor. She set down her tambour frame and regarded Portia with sharp, unfriendly eyes. “Olivia has shown you your chamber.”

“Yes, madam.” Portia curtsied politely. “I am most grateful for your hospitality.”

“Yes, I believe it’s rather above the call of family duty,” Diana said coldly. “I expect you to repay my husband’s generosity in kind.”

Ah, thought Portia. Now we’re coming to it. “I don’t believe you’ll find me lacking in gratitude, madam.”

“Your chamber is very close to the nursery. You will be able to hear the babies if they cry in the night and be on hand to give the nursemaid any help she needs. Do you sew?”

“I’m not unskilled in the domestic arts, madam.”

“Good, then you’ll be able to take care of Olivia’s wardrobe. My own seamstress is really too busy to give it adequate attention. Also, there will be household mending. I’m sure you’ll be glad to make yourself useful wherever you can.”

Portia merely curtsied again. She could feel Olivia beside her thrumming with the desperate need to speak out and the dreadful frustration of knowing that she would not be coherent. Portia gave her a quick sidelong look and allowed one eyelid to drop in an almost imperceptible wink.

The door opened behind her with a vigor that set the logs blazing in the deep fireplace, and Cato Granville entered, stamping the snow off his boots and pulling off his gloves. “Christ, but it’s cold out there! I’m sorry you had such an eventful journey, Portia.” His smile was pleasant enough, but there was a question in his eyes.

“Eventful?” Diana inquired, smiling, her gray eyes shuttered.

“Decatur,” her husband said shortly. He turned to the oak sideboard and picked up a decanter of sherry. “A glass of wine to welcome you, Portia?”

“Thank you, sir.” Portia accepted the offer with another polite curtsy.

“My dear?” Cato handed his wife a glass, poured a small measure for Olivia, then hesitated for a second over the amount to pour in the third glass. But the girl was full grown, three years older than Olivia. He filled the glass to the brim and offered it to Portia.

“So, welcome to Castle Granville, Portia.” He inclined his head as he drank to her, but his eyes were still sharply questioning. “You must be exhausted after the journey. From Giles’s description, it was a nightmare.”

“The blizzard didn’t help matters,” she agreed. “But your men had the worst of it, sir.”

“Yes, so I gather.” He refilled his glass, examining her carefully, eyes slightly narrowed. “Giles assures me you were unharmed.”

“Yes, sir.” The simple response seemed best. The sherry on her empty belly was going to her knees, and she set down her glass.

“Goodness me, whatever happened?” Diana sipped delicately from her own glass, regarding her husband in wide-eyed alarm.

“Decatur ambushed my men and robbed them,” Cato said. “He abducted Portia for a short while.” He turned back to Portia, eyes still narrowed. “What happened, exactly?”

“Nothing of any particular interest, sir,” Portia said judiciously. “He obliged me to go with him, although I tried to kill him with my dagger, and – ”

“You did what?” Cato stared in disbelief.

Diana’s glass slipped from her suddenly inert fingers. Tawny liquid splashed onto the carpet at her feet. She gave a gasp of annoyance.

“Oh, forgive me, madam. I didn’t mean to shock you.” Portia was all apologetic concern. She dropped to her knees, pulling out her handkerchief to mop up the spill. “I don’t believe it’s stained your gown.”

“For mercy’s sake, girl, leave it alone!” Diana pushed her away. “Rubbing it like that will only make it worse. Olivia, ring the bell for Clayton.” She fanned herself vigorously. “I cannot have heard you aright.”

“I threw my dagger at Lord Rothbury, madam, but he was wearing a buff coat and it didn’t penetrate far enough to kill him,” Portia explained with an air of frank innocence.

Olivia choked back her laughter. She was as astounded as Diana, but she also guessed that Portia was having great fun at the expense of Lady Granville.

“Where did you get this knife?” Cato demanded, waving a hushing hand at his wife in a most uncharacteristically impatient gesture.

“Jack gave it to me. To protect myself against unwanted advances,” Portia said with yet more devastating effect. “Although you wouldn’t think to look at me that I’d be on the receiving end of too many of them, would you?” She smiled serenely at the marquis and his wife. “But I’ve had a few unpleasant encounters, I can tell you.”

Cato struggled to take control of the situation. He said repressively, “I don’t think that’s a topic for my wife’s parlor. To return to Rothbury. Did he question you?”

“He wished to know who I was, sir, and why I was traveling under Granville protection. He took me to a crofter’s cottage where the mistress of the house offered us both dinner.”

“How considerate of him,” Cato observed sardonically. “He must have had some ulterior motive.”

Diana had recovered herself and now said, regarding Portia with the deepest distaste, “Olivia, why don’t you take the girl back to her chamber? She can sup there alone. From the tone of her conversation it’s clear she’s not accustomed to polite company, and we don’t wish for her to feel out of place. I imagine her baggage has been brought up by now, and she’ll be able to unpack.”

“As to that, ma’am, I’ve no baggage to speak of,” Portia said swiftly, unable to help herself. “But I’ll own I’m fair clemmed and me belly’s cleavin‘ to me backbone.”

Olivia shot her a startled look. Portia’s voice had taken on the broad cadences of a Yorkshire alley. Diana’s nose wrinkled with disgust but Cato’s eyebrows climbed into his scalp. Their visitor had been speaking in perfectly accentless tones a minute before. He wondered if perhaps she’d been trying very hard to impress them before and had accidentally slipped back into her more customary mode of speech.

And then, as he looked more closely at her, he was suddenly forcibly reminded of his half brother. The girl’s slanted green cat’s eyes were narrowed, but they were sharp and bright and shrewd, and he realized that for all her impecunious youth, Jack’s daughter was no one’s fool. The girl was answering Diana’s unpleasant condescension in her own fashion.

He glanced at Olivia. His somber, withdrawn child was unmistakably grinning.

While he was still trying to decide how he should react to this, Olivia plunged into speech. “Come, Portia. I’ll sup with you and tell you about everything. That will be best, sir, d-don’t you think?”

Portia took up her cue, her speech once more impeccably moderated. “Thank you, sir,” she said, as if he had agreed to Olivia’s suggestion. “I own I’m fatigued. Unless there’s anything else you wish to know about my meeting with Lord Rothbury?”

“In the morning,” he said, waving her away even as he was wrestling with this strange feeling that the ground had just been swept from beneath his feet.

She curtsied again and turned with Olivia to the door. Then she paused and looked over her shoulder. “He did give me a message for you. It was not very polite but he was most insistent that I remember to deliver it.”

Cato was very still, one hand resting on the carved mantelpiece, the other holding his glass. His eyes fixed on Portia’s pale freckled face. “Then deliver it.”

“He sends his regards… and that he’ll see you in hell.”

There was a gasp of anger from Diana and a quick dart of fury flashed across Lord Granville’s steady brown gaze.

With a little nod of farewell, Portia departed the room, Olivia on her heels.

Later, Portia lay awake in her narrow bed watching the firelight on the arched ceiling. The wind rattled the oiled parchment at the window and she huddled closer under the thick quilts, relishing the warmth and security of this private chamber behind a securely locked door. She didn’t know why she’d locked the door, except that it was a habit acquired over the years of traveling with Jack in frequently insalubrious places, where one was as likely to get one’s throat cut for a farthing as spend a peaceful night.

She was unlikely to get her throat cut in Castle Granville, but if Diana, Lady Granville, had anything to do with it, she’d be swiftly cut down to size.

Olivia had taken her to see the two baby girls asleep in their cradles. Hitherto, Portia had had little to do with infants and even less interest in them. But she could tell immediately from the nursemaid’s somewhat patronizing attitude that she was expected to perform as a maid-of-all-work in the nursery, at the disposal of Miss Janet Beckton.

Portia curled on her side, drew her knees up to her narrow chest and hugged them vigorously. She was warm and dry and well fed, a reasonable exchange surely for loss of independence. This castle in the desolate Lammermuir Hills was too far from urban civilization to afford the opportunity for work elsewhere. And while in the depths of winter the fighting was in abeyance, the uneasy truce wouldn’t last long. Once Lord Leven and his Scots reinforcements joined up with Parliament’s army under Lord Fairfax, then the royalist cause would be greatly threatened by an outnumbering enemy. A kinless woman roaming the battlefields would have but one way of supporting herself And that way was one Portia had long ago rejected, even when it had offered the only possibility of bread and a roof over her head.

Of course, if she were a man, she could go for a soldier and follow the drum. Food and pay would then be forthcoming. A reluctant smile touched her lips as she remembered that once upon a time such a plan hadn’t seemed unreasonable. But then she’d been a mere child who hadn’t quite lost a child’s belief in magic.

Portia yawned as a wave of overpowering weariness broke over her. Her body ached in every limb. Things would look better in the morning. They always did.

Portia yielded to sleep, unaware that she was still smiling. Her last waking thought was of the big redheaded Rufus Decatur, slicing bread with all the neat expertise of a housewife…

She awoke to a banging on her door and sat up, instantly awake but disoriented. She blinked around the unfamiliar chamber, lit palely from the recessed window.

“Portia!” The banging was repeated and memory returned in full.

“Just a minute.” She slid out of bed, shivering in the freezing air, drawing a quilt around her as she padded barefoot to the door and turned the key. “Lord, what time is it?” She yawned.

“Gone eight o’clock.” Olivia pushed past her. “The most amazing th…” She struggled desperately for what seemed to Portia to be an agonizing eternity as she tried to get out the word. “Thing,” she managed at last. “Amazing thing has happened!”

Portia jumped back into bed, pushing her freezing feet deep down into the night’s warmth of the blankets. “What?”

“My father!” It was hard to tell from her wide-eyed excitement whether Olivia believed her news to be good or dreadful. Portia waited patiently as the other girl mastered her thoughts.

“He… he has d-declared for P-Parliament!” Olivia finally got out. “He’s raising the standard this morning.”

“Now, that is interesting,” Portia said thoughtfully. The Granvilles were the most influential noble family in the north. Their allegiance to Parliament’s cause would be a big blow to the royalists.

“My stepmother has taken to her bed.” Olivia took a deep breath, then said all in a rush, “She does that when something’s happening that she doesn’t like.” She exhaled noisily at the end of that effort and regarded Portia with the air of one who had done all that could be expected of her.

“Well, that should give everyone a little relief,” Portia observed and was rewarded by a chuckle from Olivia. Portia pushed aside the covers again with an air of resolution. “I should get up.”

“J-Janet was wondering where you were.”

“The nursemaid?” Portia pulled a face as she unraveled herself from the quilts and stood shivering for a minute in her shift. “I think that lady and I are going to find it difficult to get along.” She dressed rapidly, her fingers turning blue in the cold. “But first I need wood for the fire, and washing water. Where can I find it?”

“Summon a maid.”

Portia shook her head. “I don’t think anyone in Castle Granville is going to take kindly to waiting upon me. And I’m quite capable of looking after myself.” She slung her cloak around her shoulders, muttering, “I wish I didn’t feel the cold so dreadfully.” She hurried to the door, Olivia trailing behind her.

“Let’s go to the kitchen first.”

Olivia shrugged agreeably and followed the whirlwind who had entered her life, as Portia half ran down the corridor, her cloak swirling around her. In the kitchen, Olivia watched as Portia in a relaxed and easy fashion made herself known to the servants and the cook toiling amidst bubbling kettles and turning spits. In a matter of minutes she was provided with a jug of steaming hot water to wash with in the scullery, and on her return to the kitchen sat down to a dish of veal collops and eggs.

“Have you broken your fast, Olivia?” she inquired, hungrily spreading golden butter on a hunk of barley bread. “These eggs are very good.” She gestured with her knife to the bench beside her.

“Goodness me, Lady Olivia can’t be eatin‘ in the kitchen!” the cook exclaimed. “Off you go, m’lady. This is no place for you.”

“But I don’t wish to go,” Olivia declared with a stubborn air that Portia noted with interest. Olivia sat down beside Portia and looked defiantly around the room.

“Lord love a duck!” muttered a servitor from the pantry. “ ‘Er ladyship’ll ’ave a apoplexy!”

“Not bleedin‘ likely!” laughed a rotund, red-cheeked pastry maker. “Not that one. She’s all ice. She’ll freeze us all like Lot’s wife. That’s what ’er ladyship’ll do.” She slapped the rolling pin onto the sheet of pastry, sending flour rising into the air in a fine mist.

“Now, you ‘old yer tongue!” the cook chided, gesturing significantly to Olivia, who didn’t appear to be listening anyway. However, a somewhat uneasy silence fell, disturbed only by the sounds of pots and pans, until the kitchen door burst open, letting in a blast of icy air, and Lord Granville came in with Giles Crampton.

“How many kegs of ale have we in the scullery, Garsing?” Cato inquired cheerfully of the castle butler, a man distinguished from the other servants by the heavy cellar keys attached to his belt. “I want at least half a dozen in the outer ward tomorrow morning.

“And we’ll have barons of beef, suckling pig, and a couple of sheep on spits over the bonfires. Can you take care of that, Mistress Quick? There’s some celebrating to be done.” He stamped his feet and blew on his hands, his cheeks reddened with cold. But his eyes were bright, his whole body radiating energy and purpose.

And then his eye fell on the two girls at the table. He frowned. “What are you doing in here, Olivia?”

Portia jumped up and answered for her. “She was keeping me company, my lord, while I broke my fast.”

“And why are you breaking your fast in the kitchen?” His frown deepened.

“I didn’t consider it seemly that your servants should wait upon me, sir.”

Cato glanced around the kitchen, and his servants avoided his eye. He returned his gaze to his daughter, his frown deepening. “Where is your stepmother? Surely she would not have approved your presence here.”

Olivia pinkened with the effort of gathering the sounds together. Cato waited, slapping his gloves into the palm of one hand. Portia, without resuming her seat, surreptitiously chased the last mouthful of veal collop onto her fork.

“Madam my m-mother is abed, sir.”

Cato frowned. As he’d feared, Diana was seriously upset by his decision to change allegiance. But she was his wife. She’d support him once she’d become accustomed to the idea.

He lost interest in his daughter’s presence in the kitchen and turned back to Giles, who was waiting patiently by the door. “Giles, declare tomorrow a holiday for the men and tell them to bring their families to the feast. Open the gates and bid the villagers welcome, too. All those, at least, who’ll stand up for Parliament with their lord,” he added, but in a tone that indicated any dissenters would surprise him. “If it doesn’t snow again, we’ll find some music, have dancing. A holiday feast for all who choose to join us.” He gestured expansively.

“The men’ll be right glad of it, sir.” Giles beamed. “They’re in ‘oliday spirits already. Ye’ll not find any turnin’ their back on the standard.”

“Good.” Cato nodded his satisfaction and headed for the door again. Then he paused and glanced across at Portia, who, no longer the focus of attention, had resumed her place at the table and was finishing her breakfast.

Cato examined her pale freckled face as intently as if he could read the thoughts behind the clear green eyes. Why did he have the impression that this newcomer to his household was as unreadable as a cipher? With a sudden decision to catch her off balance, he asked abruptly, “What personal impression did you gain of Lord Rothbury, niece?”

The question took Portia completely by surprise, but she answered calmly enough, “I don’t think I gained one at all, my lord. At least, I didn’t find him very interesting.”

Cato raised an eyebrow. If his niece had not found Rufus Decatur interesting, she was a most unusual member of her sex, if rumor was to be believed. It was said the man rampaged around the countryside like a rutting stallion, leaving a trail of broken hearts and bastard children in his wake. But then, judging by the dagger-throwing episode, Jack’s daughter was a most unusual creature.

He turned again to the door. “Olivia, you should visit your stepmother without further delay. She may have need of you.” He drew on his gloves again and banged out of the kitchen in another icy blast.

Outside, he strode to the parade ground, where the men were falling out after the morning’s drill. Cato paused to look back up at the castle battlements where the pennants snapped, flying the colors of Parliament. They made a brave show against the ice blue sky. The air was so cold it hurt to breathe deeply, and the sun was a pale yellow round hanging low over the hulking Lammermuir Hills without a thread of warmth to it.

Where was Rufus Decatur at this moment? Holed up in his private fold of the Cheviot wasteland? The earl of Rothbury had known since the previous afternoon that Cato Granville was declaring for Parliament. The information had been pricked out of one of Giles’s less stoic companions during their ordeal at the hands of Decatur moss-troopers while the robber baron himself had entertained Granville’s niece by a cottager’s fireside. Cato was in little doubt that the attack on his men had been primarily designed to produce the information.

Not that it made any difference, since the information was now as public as it could be, flying for all to see for miles around from the battlements of Castle Granville. But Cato would have dearly liked to know which way his enemy was going to jump. Was Rufus still sitting on the fence, watching the turmoil unfolding across the land with an ironical observer’s eye, planning his own entrance into the anarchy where it would bring him and his band the most benefit?

Cato could not believe that Rufus would make his decision based on anything other than self-interest. If Decatur allied himself with the winning side, then he could expect rewards. He could expect that the house of Rothbury would be returned to its former position of wealth, influence, and prestige.

If indeed that was what he wanted. Rufus Decatur was a born outlaw, and a born leader. He attracted men like bees to pollen. Good men and bad. Men in search of excitement. Men unwilling or unable to live within the ordinary laws of society. Would such a man ever be able to return to the civilized world?

But there was a war to be fought before such questions could be answered. And for all the excitement among the men leaving the parade ground, for all Cato’s own jubilation, the marquis of Granville saw the shadow of a bloody death across all their futures.