LITMIR.BIZ

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      Chapter One

      Grafton, Oxfordshire, England

       February 1645

      The snow had been falling all day. It hung like a shroud between the besieged manor house of Grafton and the army that encircled it a bare half mile away. Now, as the church bell tolled midnight, the darkness had an unearthly glow that struck a chill into the men’s hearts. In the morning they were to do battle, but for tonight they huddled in the byres and barns of the village, around the fitful fires. They drank the last of their ale, talked in low voices and tried not to think of the morrow.

      When the knock came at the door, Simon Greville thought at first that he had imagined it. He had already met with his captains, they had talked of their strategy for the morning and had retired to wait for dawn and get what little sleep they could. He had given specific orders that he should not be disturbed further that night. Yet the knock came once again, soft but insistent, on the barn door. Simon was not angered to have his instructions gainsaid, but he was curious. His authority was such that only in the direst emergency would his men disobey his direct command.

      He strode across the room and flung wide the door. It shook on its hinges and a flurry of wind swept in, bringing with it night chill and a scattering of snowflakes. The candles guttered and the smell of tallow stung the air.

      ‘What is it?’ He knew that he sounded brusque. Even he, renowned for his steady nerve, could be forgiven a certain shortness of temper the night before a battle.

      It was the youngest of his captains who stood there, a youth barely out of his teens called Guy Standish. He was looking terrified.

      ‘Your pardon, my lord. There is a messenger from Grafton Manor.’

      Simon turned away. He might have known that the Royalist garrison in the house would try this last-ditch attempt to beg a surrender and avoid bloodshed. He had been waiting all day for them to try to negotiate a truce. And now it had happened. It was typical of the cowardice of the King’s general, Gerard Malvoisier, to try to bargain for his miserable life.

      Two weeks before, Malvoisier had murdered Simon’s younger brother, who had gone to the Manor under the Parliamentarians’ flag of truce. Malvoisier had sent Henry back in pieces, no quarter given, but now he evidently expected Simon to spare his worthless life. Once again Simon felt the ripping tide of fury that had swamped him when he had learned of Henry’s death. A fortnight had allowed no time for that grief to start to heal. He had had the anguished task of writing to their father with the news as well. Fulwar Greville, Earl of Harington, supported the King whilst his sons were loyal to the Parliamentarian cause. And now Simon had written to tell their father that one of those sons was dead, fighting for a cause that betrayed their father’s fealty.

      Simon knew that his and Henry’s defection had broken their father’s heart. He had the deepest of respect for the Earl, despite their political differences. And now he felt a huge guilt for allowing Henry to die. All he could do was to turn that anger and hatred on to Gerard Malvoisier, stationed at Grafton. There would be no mercy for the besieged army in the Manor house, not now, not ever. It made no odds that Grafton—and its mistress—had once been promised to him. The Civil War had ripped such alliances apart.

      Standish was waiting.

      ‘I will not see the messenger,’ Simon said. ‘There is nothing to discuss. The time for parley is long past. We attack on the morrow and nothing can prevent it.’

      His tone was colder than the snow-swept night and it should have been enough, but still Standish lingered, his face tight with strain.

      ‘My lord…’

      Simon spun around with repressed rage. ‘What?’

      ‘It is the Lady Anne Grafton who is here, my lord,’ the boy stammered. ‘We thought…That is, knowing that it was the lady herself…’

      Simon swore under his breath. It was clever of Malvoisier to send Lady Anne, he thought, knowing that she was the one messenger he would find difficult to turn away in all courtesy. They were on opposing sides now, but it went against the grain with him to show a lady anything less than respect, Royalist or not. Besides, he had been Anne Grafton’s suitor four years before, in a more peaceful time before the bloody Civil War had come between them. There were memories there, promises made, that even now he found difficult to ignore.

      But this was war and he had no time for chivalry. His brother’s brutal death at Malvoisier’s hands had seen to that.

      ‘I will not see her,’ he said. ‘Send her away.’

      Standish looked agonised. Despite the cold there was sweat on his brow. ‘But, sir—’

      ‘I said send her away.’

      There was a clash of arms from further down the street and then the sound of raised voices and hurrying footsteps, muffled in the snow.

      ‘Madam!’ It was the anguished cry of one of the guards. ‘You cannot go in there!’

      But it was already too late. The barn door crashed back on its hinges and Lady Anne Grafton swept past Guy Standish and into the room. The snow swirled in and the fire hissed.

      Lady Anne flung back the hood of her cloak and confronted Simon. She was wearing a deep blue gown beneath a fur-trimmed mantle and looked every inch the noble-born lady she was. Her face was pale, her hair inky black about her shoulders. She looked like a creature of ice and fire from a fairy tale.

      Simon felt his heart lurch, as though all the air had been punched from his lungs. He had not seen Anne Grafton in four years, for their betrothal had been broken almost as soon as it had been made. He heard Standish gasp as though he, too, was having difficulty remembering to breathe properly. Every man who besieged Grafton had heard the tales of the legendary beauty of the lady of the manor, but even so the impact of her appearance was quite literally enough to take a man’s breath away.

      It was not a comfortable beauty. Anne Grafton was small and slender, but for all that she had an aristocratic presence that could command a room. Her face was heart-shaped, with high cheekbones and winged black brows. There was no softness in it at all. Her eyes were very dark, only a couple of shades lighter than the ebony hair that spilled over the edge of her hood, and in them there was a fierce light that reminded Simon of a wild cat. This was no cosy armful to warm a winter’s night.

      At the beginning of the siege Simon had heard his soldiers joke about taming the wild beauty of the Lady of Grafton. They had said it softly, knowing he would stamp down hard on any ribaldry or licentiousness in the ranks and knowing too that the lady had once been promised to him. Now he watched those same boastful soldiers shift and shuffle, held spellbound by Anne’s beauty but utterly unnerved by her defiant pride. Neither of the guards made any attempt to restrain her and Standish looked as though he would rather extract his own teeth than be obliged to confront her. Simon almost smiled. The Anne Grafton that he had known had been an unawakened girl of seventeen. This woman was a very different matter—and an enemy to respect.

      And then he saw Anne press her gloved hands together to quell their shaking. He realised with a shock that she was trembling, and with nervousness, not with the cold. That flash of vulnerability in her made him hesitate a second too long. He had been about to turn her away without a word. Now it was too late.

      ‘Madam.’ He sketched a curt bow. ‘I regret that my guards saw fit to let you pass. It was ill considered of you to venture here tonight.’

      Anne looked at him. Her gaze was bright and appraising and beneath it Simon felt very aware of himself—and of her. No woman had ever looked at him like that before. They had looked on him with pleasure and with lust and with calculation, but never with this cool assessment, soldier to soldier. He could feel her weighing his valour. He drew himself up a little straighter and met her gaze directly.

      Four years had changed her beyond measure; changed everything between them beyond recall. The Civil War had taken all that was sweet and precious and new between them and had destroyed it along with

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