"Who is this?" Melanthe exclaimed.
"Sir Harold." He did not say more, but gently urged the other man up. "Come, you must depart now, sir."
Sir Harold pulled himself away. "Sir Richard? You've wed Sir Richard, boy?"
Ruck touched his shoulder and indicated Melanthe. "His daughter," he murmured. "The countess."
The grizzled knight twisted and pulled at his hair, possessed with frantic mumbling. He seemed to lose his strength, falling with his forehead to the floor, begging mercy, muttering in confusion of her father and Bowland and killing. Melanthe watched Ruck try to coax him away with no success.
"Come forward, Sir Harold," she said curtly. "Now speak plain words as a good trusty knight, or take yourself off."
The sharp command seemed to reach his scattered wits. He stopped his moving and mumbling, and crept to the bedside, his scarred hands knotted together. He raised his face to her. "My noble lady's grace," he said, "I have a demon!"
"Yes, that is clear to me, Sir Harold."
"My lady," he said hopelessly, "methinks I must slay myself, to kill it."
"No, you will not. Neither I nor Lord Ruadrik give you leave. It's against God, Sir Harold. And would deprive my lord of his rights to aid and counsel of you," She softened her voice. "When the demon tries to seize you, you must remember to ask God for counsel and solace, for He comes to the aid of those who wish to do good and act faithfully."
The old man gazed at her, dawning adoration in his face. "Blessed be you, my lady. Oh, my lady, you be the wisest and worthiest of the world's kind."
"This is not my wisdom, but my honored father's, God give his soul peace. I only mind you of your duty."
Sir Harold gave a little sigh. "Gentle lady, truly the Lord God blessed this house on the day your lady's grace wed my lord. It was the unworthy bitch-mare I designed to slay, to keep clean my lord's noble blood."
"God has saved you from that mortal sin," Melanthe said. "Take your near escape to heart."
He bowed his head. "My lady."
"Lord Ruadrik will adjudge your punishment for striking me, but if it be heavier than a day in the tumbrel, then I'll try to intercede for you."
"Thank you, my lady," he said humbly. "I beg my lady's favor."
"You have my favor. Leave me now." She held out her hand from beneath the sheet to be kissed. He reached for her so quickly that for a moment she regretted the move, but he took her fingers gently, only the rough pads of his palms touching her as he made a courteous gesture of bending over her hand.
"God preserve your lady's grace." He rose, falling back from the bedside with his shoulders squared and his head lifted. Ruck had stood all the time beside him, as if ready to drag him out at any moment. Sir Harold gave him a deep bow, pronounced himself at his lord's mercy whenever he should be pleased to devise a just punishment, and strode from the room.
Immediately Ruck closed the door and barred it. Without speaking, he took up his shirt, pulling it over his head, covering the fiery marks on his skin. For the first time Melanthe became aware of rain that pelted against the window glazing and the cold dimness of the room.
"In God's name!" She sank back into the pillows. "What next in this place?"
"You're not hurt, my lady?"
His cool tone warned her away from jesting. Her shoulder throbbed painfully, but she held the silken quilt up close, watching him. "I live."
"He is maddened, my lady," Ruck said. "He can't help himself when the fits are on him."
"Who is he?"
"My master in arms. In his prime he took a blow to his head that lay bare the brain, and since then has no command of his rage. But he's a great knight, my lady, and taught me the best that I know of fighting."
"The secret of your prowess. You fight like a madman because a madman instructed you."
He shrugged. "It may be." He bent over a chest and took breeches from it, dressing himself without service. "Sir Harold esteems gentle blood and pomp above all things. Isabelle he despised, though I never brought her here. Only to hear her name enrages him. He'd have had me take a princess to wife."
With a little twist of his mouth and a glance at Melanthe, he acknowledged what he'd said, as if he'd just heeded his own words.
"Then I shall crush him with my magnificence, so as to gladden him," she said.
He took clothes from the chest and shut the lid. "You delighted him greatly, my lady, with your noble talking."
"It's a talent of mine, noble talking."
"Clearly," he agreed. "Enough to make a man's head spin."
"That is the purpose of noble talking. It's saved many a prince from certain death."
He rested one foot on the ornamented and embellished settle, lacing his hose. The gear was of gray silk, a fitted tunic embroidered in black and set with jet stones, trimmed in sable fur. She was pleased to see that amid his many-hued retainers, he alone went uncolored. It set him apart as no fantastical finery could, and did his comeliness no hurt at all, but underscored it.
"Will you rise, lady?" he asked when he was done. "Or sleep away all your lifetime?"
She slipped down and pulled the sheet over her head. From beyond the white warmth she heard him move. The door bar made a grating slide.
She sat up. "Wait."
He stood at the door, his hand upon it. Melanthe held the blankets up to her.
"I don't wish you to go," she said abruptly.
He made a slight bow and waited at the door, as if for an order.
"I don't wish you to go," she repeated.
"My lady, they expect me in hall. Long I've been absent, and many matters will await." He scowled down at the hasp. "Though it seems a strange place to you, I'm master of it."
She understood a lord's duty as well as she understood how to breathe. But some imp inside her—it didn't even seem to be herself—made her plump her body on the mattress like a spoiled child. She turned over with her back to him.
"When you rise, my lady," he said, "I'll be below."
She heard the creak of the door and rolled over, flinging a pillow at him. It hit his shoulder. As he turned, she hurled another that struck him full in the chest.
She dropped down into the bed and yanked the coverings over her, curling facedown, her hands gripped together under her chin. She heard the door close. The sound of the boards beneath the carpets traced his coming to the bed. Then she was miserable and angry, not even knowing what to say, beyond a bare demand for his company and his indecent embraces. Too low to sink, to ask for what she had always denied; and too terrible if she should be refused, chosen over, and he went to his minstrels that he loved.
It was not sensible to feel so. She herself would have gone to her duties first. She said into the mattress, "You're discourteous. You haven't even bade me good morn before you depart."
"Good morn, then."
"Good morn. And I hope you break into boils and die."
She felt his hand on her back, then both hands sweeping aside the sheet and kneading her bare shoulders. He buried his face in the nape of her neck, his weight bearing down the mattress. With a whimper of relief, she turned up to him, ignoring the pain where he pressed her bruised shoulder, eager for his kisses.
"I don't hope for it," she said against his skin, against his cheek rough with new beard. "I don't. I would perish without you."
"Melanthe." His fingers gripped her. "My sovereign lady," he whispered, and gave her freely what she wanted, without the asking, company and unchaste embraces and his body deep in hers, until she perished another way, blind with delight.
Ruck felt her sleep—always sleeping, this wife of his—this drowsy miracle, slumbering in his arms as if she were in some enchantment. He pressed his cheek to her loosened hair and listened to the rain and thought of her, how she masked and dazed him. In her easy arrogance she did not confound him; no, not her commands or noble talking. She was meant to be so, born to be so—it was only what was right.