She ignored the young man’s departure to concentrate on Sir Bayard. “I’ve been told that you once met a troubador who begged a horse of you in return for a song. You saw a knight, beat him in an unplanned joust, took his horse and brought it to the troubador before he’d finished his ballad. It was my understanding William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, did that, not Sir Bayard de Boisbaston.”
Sir Bayard didn’t look the least bit nonplused. “William Marshal did do that.”
He must be truly shameless.
“But so did I,” he continued, crossing his arms and leaning his weight on one leg. “I’d heard that tale, you see. I think my mother told it to me even as I suckled. She thought the Earl of Pembroke quite the finest man in the world—certainly finer than her husband, as she never tired of telling him.
“One day, as I was nearing Salisbury to take part in a melee, I came upon a troubador entertaining some ladies as they waited for fresh horses at an inn. He was telling the ladies that story and, braggart that I was, I said that I could do it, too, if ever the opportunity presented itself. At nearly that same moment, another knight, obviously headed for the same tourney, appeared on the road. The troubador immediately challenged me to prove my boast.
“I accepted the challenge and ordered him to start singing as I rode out to meet my foe. I beat the knight in the first pass, took his horse and returned in triumph to give it to the troubador before he ended his song.”
That might be true, or he might be a very glib liar. “I hope the knight you defeated was a worthy foe and not an old man or poor youth hoping to make a name for himself.”
“I regret to say it was my half brother, Armand,” he admitted with a wry little self-deprecating smile that could explain how he’d managed to seduce so many women. “Not the best way to ensure family harmony, especially since I knew it was Armand the moment I saw him. Fortunately, I won some prizes the next day and bought him another horse.
“And then he wrestled me to the ground, gave me a set of bruises the like of which I never hope to have again and made me promise I would never challenge him again, which I very gladly did.”
What sort of family had her sister married into? “You compete and even come to blows, yet you still feel obliged to do whatever he asks of you?”
“We’re brothers, and we’ve been through much together,” Sir Bayard answered. “Don’t you ever quarrel with your sisters?”
“Not with Adelaide,” she replied as she started to put the white pieces back into place on the chessboard.
“Because she’s the oldest?”
“Because she’s been like a mother to us. Our mother was often ill before she died.”
“And Lizette?” he prompted, replacing the black pieces on his side of the board.
She wondered if he could sympathize with her inability to get along with her younger sister. Even she could overlook the reasons Lizette could be so aggravating—when she wasn’t there. “I prefer order and she seems to enjoy chaos.”
“It’s been my experience that those who create disorder are never the ones charged with maintaining it,” he replied. “They don’t care about the disruption they cause, thinking only of their own wishes and desires.”
Apparently he could understand.
“Young people can change, my lady, if they’re treated with patience and kindness. I was no paragon in my youth, but I’m better than I was, thanks to Armand’s tutelage.”
As she lined up the pawns, Gillian wondered if that was really true, and what he meant by better. “I do try to be patient. Unfortunately, my patience doesn’t seem to last very long when I’m with Lizette.”
“Because she doesn’t take anything seriously and laughs in your face.”
Gillian glanced away from his long, slender fingers that moved with such delicate precision to his face, and the scar that ran down his cheek. “How did you know?”
His lips jerked up in another little smile. “Ask Armand.”
All her chess pieces in their proper order, she straightened and regarded him quizzically. “Were you such a holy terror?”
“Indeed, I was,” he admitted as he put his last piece—the king—in its place on the board. “I was spoiled, and selfish, and rash. I suspect I’d have made your sister look like a model of all the virtues.”
Again he gave her that wry little smile, like a good friend sharing a confidence.
She didn’t want him to be her good friend. She already had plenty of friends, ones who didn’t make her feel as if she was fifteen years old again and seeing James smile at her for the first time. She was older now, and wiser, and love had come and gone for her.
Besides, Umbert was waiting to hear what she wanted for the evening meal. “If you’ll excuse me, my lord, the cook is waiting.”
“Of course,” he said, bowing, before she hurried from the dais.
“By all means, we mustn’t upset the cook,” he muttered as he watched her go, her slender back as straight as a lance and her hips swaying like a reed in the breeze.
GILLIAN WAS STILL in the kitchen when Dunstan appeared on the threshold, a scroll in his hand.
She raised her brows in silent query.
“From the court, my lady,” he replied.
She hurried toward him and, as they proceeded to the hall, broke the wax seal.
When they reached the larger chamber, and before she’d had a chance to read the contents, she halted. Something was…different.
And it wasn’t just Sir Bayard standing expectantly on the dais.
“Why are there so many of our soldiers in the hall? It’s not nearly time for the evening meal.”
Dunstan answered quietly. “If that letter should show that the last one supposedly from Adelaide was full of lies—”
“I see,” she interrupted, opening the letter and reading it quickly.
The writing was the same and revealed that Adelaide had indeed written and sent her message in the care of Sir Bayard de Boisbaston. This letter was undoubtedly from Adelaide, for the writer gave answers to Gillian’s questions that only her older sister would know.
In spite of that reassurance, and for the first time since she’d taken charge of Averette, she felt afraid. If everything Adelaide had written was true, she could be in grave danger. Her heart raced, until—and unaccountably—her gaze fell on Sir Bayard de Boisbaston, champion of tournaments, standing on the dais.
As she grew calmer, she forced her attention back to the anxious Dunstan, who was watching her intently. “Everything in the other letter was true,” she whispered. “Adelaide is married, Sir Bayard is her brother-in-law, and there’s a conspiracy against the king that’s put us in danger, too. Dismiss the soldiers. Send them back to their duties.”
His lips thinned, but Dunstan didn’t protest, or say anything to her. He moved away and quietly issued an order to the men, who began to go.
Taking a deep breath and rolling up the scroll, she approached Sir Bayard. “It seems, my lord, that we were wrong to doubt you.”
His shoulders relaxed and a smile slowly blossomed on his face. “So now you believe I am who I claim to be.”
She nodded and took a seat, regarding him gravely. “Which means I must also believe we’re in danger here.”
“Yes,” he agreed, clasping his hands behind his back. “But less than before, now that I am here.”
She tried not to reveal her displeasure at