Never Love a Lord (Foxe Sisters) Read online

  But Edward was not done. “In addition, you shall supply the Crown with half of Fallstowe’s armed men, fully outfitted and paid, mustering at Midsummer for a campaign of unknown duration. How do you answer?”

  Sybilla nodded. “As my king wishes. It will be done.”

  “Very well,” Edward said. “All other charges against you are hereby dropped, found to be without cause.”

  Julian felt the breath go out of him, but he had no real time for relief, for Edward then turned to him.

  “Lord Julian Griffin, stand,” the king ordered.

  Julian steadied his sword and gained his feet before bowing once to the monarch.

  “You have also been insubordinate in the duties set upon you some months ago by my own word. How do you plead?”

  “I am guilty, my liege,” Julian said, then added quietly, “and I am very sorry, friend.”

  “Let it be recorded as such,” Edward said. “As of this day, you are hereby charged with the demesne of Fallstowe Castle, as vassal to the Crown. What you do with its current occupants”—Edward glanced at Sybilla—“is at your complete discretion. How do you answer?”

  “I would—” Julian was forced to stop and look down at his feet while he cleared his throat. At last he was able to look at Edward again. “I would marry the current occupant, my liege, if it pleases you.”

  Edward nodded slowly. “I think that it does please me, Lord Griffin. Someone must keep that woman in check, and obviously I am not up to the task.”

  Julian smiled at his king. “It shall be done right away, my liege.”

  “Very well. Lord Griffin, the other charges levied against you are hereby dismissed.” The king held up his hands briefly before slapping them back onto the arms of his chair and rising. “I’m finished here.”

  The king made his way from the dais through his private door, prompting the mustachioed barrister to step forth.

  “Court is adjourned,” he called out solemnly, to no one but Julian, Sybilla, and the soldiers still ringing the room.

  Julian looked down at Sybilla where she still stood, her arms hanging at her sides, and smiled. Then, too late, he remembered the protocol after a private court was held, as the soldiers threw open the double public doors, and the droves of nobles and commoners ejected from the room earlier flooded the chamber like a tempest at sea. In moments, Sybilla was surrounded by the angry whirlpool, Julian stranded helplessly on the island of the dais.

  Sybilla spun on her heel to face the crush of people who were roaring toward her like a rogue wave. The soldiers had obviously not expected such a response in a usually civilized venue, and so their shouts of restraint toward the bloodthirsty crowd were late, and nearly lost beneath the thunderous footfalls and voices.

  But Sybilla was not afraid. She lifted her chin and stared boldly at the first wave of common and noble gawkers. And as they drew impossibly nearer, when from the outside it would seem that they would overtake her with her next breath, trample the life from her, Sybilla held up her right hand.

  As if a wall had been thrown up, the crowd stopped short, the sudden cessation of motion causing a silvery ripple to race back through the crowd still pushing their way forward, even as a musical sound, like the tinkling of small, crystal bells fell upon the hall from the rafters.

  And then the crowd was completely, utterly silent, staring at her wide-eyed, some with a furious look of impotence and others with a sort of confusion. The footfalls of the soldiers increased in volume as they at last reached her, and as they placed themselves between Sybilla and the would-be vigilantes, she lowered her hand.

  No sooner had her arm reached her side than it was seized from behind, and Sybilla found herself turned round in a sudden, forceful fashion, to face the intense expression on Julian Griffin’s face.

  “Sybilla,” he whispered. “We’ve won.”

  She felt a smile trying to come to her mouth, the muscles creaking, the expression hesitant to show itself. “Have we?”

  “Have we?” he repeated incredulously. “You can’t be serious!”

  “It only seems so . . . unfinished. Incomplete,” she said with a slight frown.

  “You have retained Fallstowe,” Julian insisted.

  Sybilla quirked an eyebrow at him. “If I agree to become your wife.”

  Julian Griffin took on a pained expression of forced patience. “Do you wish to become my wife?”

  Sybilla blinked coolly.

  Julian sighed, rolled his eyes, and tried again. “Sybilla Foxe, will you marry me?”

  And then the smile did come to her mouth, and although slight, Sybilla felt the sincerity of her happiness all the way to the core of her soul.

  “Yes,” she said quietly, simply.

  His smile matched hers, and he began to draw her closer to him.

  “Sybilla!” a woman shouted. “Sybilla!”

  Sybilla turned from Julian’s arms to try to locate Alys’s form in the pressing crush still being held off by the king’s soldiers. She spotted her youngest sister’s blond hair and round form on the fringe of the crowd near the wall, being blocked by a guard. Piers was beside her, and behind them both, Sybilla saw Cee and Oliver. She held up a hand toward them, signaling that she had seen them.

  She turned back to Julian. “I have to go to my sisters,” she explained. “I need them to meet Lady de Lairne. Right away, I feel.”

  Julian stared at her for a moment. “I understand,” he said. “But Sybilla, I must—”

  “Lucy. I know,” she interrupted. “I don’t know when I will get away. Not tonight, at any rate. I would try to convince Lady de—my aunt,” she corrected herself, “to come back to Fallstowe with me. To see the place where her sister lived, the home where we grew up. Perhaps . . . perhaps she would even stay.”

  Julian smiled down at her. “I think that is a most wonderful idea. I will have Erik accompany you back when you are ready to depart.”

  Sybilla looked askance at him. “He’ll not try to murder me for corrupting you?”

  Julian laughed and shook his head. “He is the only one I would trust with your life, save me.”

  “Very well,” Sybilla said, anxious suddenly to be away, not from Julian but . . . away to somewhere very important.

  He saw her impatience, and Sybilla could not help but notice the way his eyes lingered on her mouth, as if he wanted to kiss her but was hesitant.

  “Yes, well . . . we shall be waiting for you at Fallstowe.” He touched her face gently. “Safe journey.”

  Sybilla’s heart melted inside her chest at the tenderness showing through his stoic reserve. Julian should know by now that she did not give a damn what anyone thought of her. She reached up with her right hand to grasp his neck and then rose on her toes even as his arms went around her back.

  And she kissed him before all those who were gathered in the king’s court. Thoroughly. It would be talked about for years.

  Sybilla had made her wishes known immediately to the guard holding her sisters and brothers-in-law in check, and now, with Piers and Oliver having gone to help Julian outfit for the return journey to Fallstowe, Sybilla, Cecily, and Alys raced through hidden corridors, on the heels of the soldier, to the section of rooms where Lady de Lairne stayed.

  “But how did she know to come?” Cecily was asking, even atop Alys’s own questions.

  “Is it truly over, Sybilla? Are you free?”

  “It’s over, and yes, I’m free,” she said absently, her eyes on the soldier’s back in the shadowy corridor. “I don’t know how she knew. It’s one of the many questions I hope to have answered shortly.”

  “But what of Evesham?” Alys insisted. “You must tell us! We don’t know anything.”

  “I will tell you,” Sybilla promised. “I’ll tell you everything very soon. But now we must hurry.”

  “Why?” Cecily asked. “Sybilla, slow down, please!”

  Sybilla didn’t answer, only chased the soldier around a sharp corner, her slippers hissing
against the stone. The man stopped suddenly and stood to the side of a nondescript door.

  “Lady de Lairne’s rooms, my lady,” he said solicitously.

  “Thank you,” Sybilla breathed, although her eyes were on the thick wood of the door as her sisters came to a breathless halt to either side of her.

  “At His Majesty’s request, I shall wait for you to emerge to lead you on to a guest chamber.”

  “We might be a while,” Sybilla said faintly, raising her right hand to let her fingertips lightly graze the door.

  “No matter,” the guard said, stepping a respectable distance away to give the room’s occupant privacy when the ladies entered. “This is my duty.”

  “Sybilla, Cee,” Alys whispered suddenly. “Listen!”

  All three women inclined their heads toward the door to better hear the faint notes wafting weakly through the thick wood.

  It was a woman’s voice, singing a song the sisters were familiar with from their childhood.

  Cecily turned to look at Sybilla and Alys, her eyes wide with surprised pleasure. “She sounds just like Mother!”

  “Exactly like Mother,” Sybilla said faintly, and felt the frown crease her brow. She raised her fist and rapped on the door.

  There was no answer after several heartbeats, and yet the singing continued. Sybilla reached for the door latch.

  “Sybilla,” Cecily hissed, disapproval clear in her tone.

  But Sybilla did not heed her sister, engaging the mechanism that held the door shut and pushing. It was unbolted and swung open soundlessly.

  The volume of the tune increased minutely as the three women stepped inside the chamber. They were faced with a curtained bed jutting into the room, perpendicular to the door. The side drapes were closed, but Sybilla could see one footpost, indicating that the end of the bed had been left open to the hearth ablaze before it.

  “I’ve got gooseflesh,” Alys whispered, rubbing briskly at her arms. “Is she hard of hearing?”

  Sybilla led the way slowly, cautiously, toward the foot of the bed. “Lady de Lairne?” she called calmly, although inside her chest her heart thrashed against her ribs like the splintering of a great tree. “It’s Sybilla Foxe. I’ve brought my sisters, Cecily and Alys, to meet you, and to talk with you.”

  “Should you really be calling her Lady de Lairne, though?” Cecily wondered aloud on a whisper.

  Sybilla paused to look down at her usually meek younger sister. “Would you rather I shout ‘old woman’?”

  “I see your point,” Cecily conceded.

  They rounded the bedpost then, and no one was prepared for the sight that greeted them on the mattress. Sybilla reached out instinctively and found the hands of her sisters, just as they in turn were reaching for hers.

  Lady de Lairne lay on her side facing the middle of the mattress, her elegant and matronly skirts arranged just so on the coverlet. Her soft gray hair was uncovered, caught at her nape in a short plait. Her eyes were closed in her pale, still, wrinkled face. Her hands lay slightly away from her chest on the bed.

  And she was not alone. A silvery mist mirrored the old woman on the bed, and as the sisters stood and stared in the gloom of the chamber, the mist began to take clearer shape: a young woman in a long, plain gown, with hair the color of old, well-oiled wood. She was holding both of the old woman’s hands in her own, smiling at the still countenance, and singing so quietly that it would not have disturbed the flame of a candle.

  “Mother?” Alys said in a choked whisper.

  Sybilla’s body went ice-cold.

  The child was of the village wise woman.

  We looked enough alike that no one could tell us apart.

  What do I care now? I am an old woman. I have no family save you to know the truth.

  I will save you, as your mother saved me.

  “Mother?” Alys asked again, still quietly but with a hint of desperation in her voice as the song finally came to an end.

  The sparkling young woman at last turned her head slightly on the pillow to acknowledge the three sisters standing at the foot of the bed, peering in.

  “Shh, girls,” she said with a smile. “My lady sleeps.”

  Sybilla felt her knees twitch as if they would buckle, while at her side, Cecily gasped.

  “Forgive me,” Cecily pleaded quietly. “Forgive me the terrible things I have said and thought of you.”

  “I miss you so, Mother,” Alys wept quietly.

  “Shh, shh, girls,” Amicia Foxe admonished again gently. She looked to Sybilla. “Well done, my own.” Her voice had an echoey quality, as if coming up—or down—from a great distance. And then her eyes landed on all three sisters in turn. “Take care of each other.”

  And then Amicia Foxe sparkled away into nothing in the quiet room, to be followed in only an instant by the sound of the chamber door swinging open behind them.

  All three women turned, realizing that none had closed the door behind them upon entering. And yet they had heard the click of the latch, a squeaking of old hinges, and now the giggling of what could have been two very young girls sneaking out of the chamber to find a bit of mischief. A door slammed, causing them all to jump, and yet they could still see the corridor clearly through the doorway.

  Sybilla looked back at the bed once, and the figure on the mattress seemed somehow hollow now, deflated. And on the coverlet next to Sybil de Lairne, directly where Amicia Foxe’s ghost had sparkled only a moment ago, lay the missing miniature portrait.

  “One of you fetch the guard,” Sybilla said, telling herself that her voice was firm, not at all shaky, as her eyes found the corpse of Sybil de Lairne once more. “Hurry.”

  Chapter 29

  He rode from London alone, through the night, and had stopped only once for a short meal and to change horses.

  Now, Julian forced himself to pause some distance away from Fallstowe’s great drawbridge, giving his mount a chance to catch its breath, and taking the time himself to look at the imposing stone castle with new eyes. Inside those formidable walls, Lucy waited for him—the rest of his life waited for him.

  And everyone would be waiting for Sybilla. It seemed to Julian that the castle itself was poised in anticipation of her mistress’s return, the stones sparkling bright enough in the midday sun to guide Sybilla all the way from London, if need be. Julian fancied he could even feel the physical pull of the castle on his own body, and he realized that although the stewardship of Fallstowe now belonged to him, by the king’s own hand on the parchment tucked over his heart inside his tunic, Fallstowe did not belong to Julian.

  Julian belonged to Fallstowe. He understood now, watching the banners flap and hearing their sharp snap in the breeze, smelling the sweetness of spring emanating from the earth like steam, witnessing the ring of thin clouds like a wispy crown above the tall towers—Fallstowe was more than a hold. It was a legacy rich and dripping with history and emotion, strife and danger, magic and love. It had called to Julian two years ago when he’d begun his investigation of the Foxe family, and once it had gotten its toothed battlements into his flesh, it had never let go.

  Now, it protected the most precious thing in Julian’s life: Lucy. And Julian knew that Lucy had belonged to Fallstowe from the very beginning, when he had imagined her so vividly as a little girl in long skirts, running over the rolling hills, playing at the fringe of the wood, her soft little slippers slapping against the tower stairs as she came up to visit her father at his ledgers. She would forever know this castle as her home. She would forever see it as a place of security and comfort, where she would be surrounded by those who loved her most in this world.

  Julian took a moment to look up into the sky above the castle. “Thank you, Cateline. I swear to you that Lucy will know of you. And I hope that you are still proud of me.”

  He looked back down at his horse’s neck, blinking the brightness away. When he raised his head, he saw one of the soldiers on horseback now, riding toward him.

  Julian s
purred his horse, happy to meet the man more than halfway.

  Julian’s reunion with Lucy was one of the sweetest things he’d ever known. Seeing her little face, looking older somehow even in only four days—the longest he’d ever been away from her—caused a wrenching of his heart and a thickening of his throat that made words impossible things for him. Her big, toothless smile and squeal of surprise and delight as she’d lunged from old Graves’s arms, elicited a feeling of love so sharp as to be painful.

  Now it was evening, after a long and much-needed nap for both father and daughter. Julian sat at the lord’s table with Lucy on his knee as a feast of ridiculous portions was served to them. Sybilla’s ornate chair to Julian’s right was conspicuously empty, and so, after some thought and assistance from Graves in fetching a thick coverlet, Lucy now presided over Sybilla’s table in her stead. The baby pounded regally on the table with an empty wooden cup and screeched her demands, the servants doting on her with little coos and words of praise. Julian could scarcely take his eyes from her, even to glance periodically toward the arch leading from the great hall, hoping with the sound of each footfall that it would be Sybilla come home to join them.

  It was near the end of the meal when the king’s messenger arrived with a missive for Julian, as well as one for Graves, who was standing, ever ready, behind Lucy’s chair. Julian could not help the frown on his face as he split the seal and unfolded his own small square.

  Lord Griffin,

  Lady de Lairne is dead. I shall remain in London while she is readied to accompany me to Fallstowe. Graves will see to the details of her interment. Any plans for the future must be postponed indefinitely.

  S—

  Julian’s frown increased, and he was at once seized by a sadness for Sybilla’s loss, when the de Lairne woman had only just been found to her. But he was also unsettled by her statement referring to future plans. Certainly she was alluding to their wedding. But, postponed indefinitely? He looked over his shoulder to find Graves, but the man had already slipped from the dais unnoticed. Julian wondered what the old steward’s message had said.