LITMIR.BIZ

      Prologue

      Normandy, 1141

      “He rejected me? The Baron of Hawkswell rejected me, Sidonie Gisele de l’Aigle? Is he so rich that he has no interest in wedding an heiress?” Indignation laced Gisele’s voice and sent a rush of heat up her neck to flush her cheeks. By the Virgin, she would never survive the humiliation, the shame!

      Her father, Charles, Count de l’Aigle, smirked. “Nay, he’s but a fool. Not only is Alain of Hawkswell not overwealthy, but he’s spurned you for a lady whose family are adherents of Stephen’s!”

      Gisele felt her jaw drop with shock, and for a moment she forgot the affront to her own pride. For one of the Empress Matilda’s lords to refuse her choice of a bride for him, the heiress of a Norman family whose alliance with the empress was bedrock-solid, was beyond foolish, unless…

      “Is he changing sides, then? Does he now side with King Stephen?” she mused.

      Her father’s brow furrowed, and he rubbed his chin.

      “Nay, that’s the mysterious part. The word is he’s as much Matilda’s man as before, yet he’s apparently married the woman with Matilda’s blessing.”

      Gisele sighed as the pain of rejection mingled with envy in her soul. It wasn’t so mysterious, not to her. Lord Alain had married for love. He had loved this woman enough to risk the empress’s displeasure and had been rewarded by not losing her favor. Ah, to have a man love her, Gisele de l’Aigle, like that! And the name Alain had had such a kind sound to it. Gisele had thought that here was a man who might understand her, who might value her for what she was, and not merely what she could bring him by marriage. Her heart mourned the passing of that dream.

      “There must be more going on there than meets the eye,” her father continued, oblivious of her grief, “but in any case my problem is not solved. Here I am, an old man with no heir for my lands but a mere girl, a girl who’s of marriageable age, and not a husband in sight.”

      Being seen as of no value by her father, at least, was an old and familiar hurt. He had always treated her as if being born female were somehow a fault she could have remedied in the womb if she’d only been industrious enough. I may be but a girl, but I’m worth your love, she wanted to cry, but knew it was no use. He could not love her, would never love her as he would have if she’d been the son he’d hoped for. Now she only represented a pawn he could use to obtain a son, at least one by marriage. Well, she’d have no more of it!

      “Don’t think you can palm me off on some sprig of nobility on this side of the Channel, then, my lord father! I’ll just stay here at l’Aigle and be your chatelaine,” she announced, stalking over to the open window to look down on the swirling currents of the Risle that flowed just beyond the curtain wall.

      “And when I die?” her father interrupted, his face darkening.

      “I’ll be the Lady of l’Aigle in my own right.”

      “Foolish wench!” Her father’s voice was a lash that cut her heart. “Did you just crawl out from underneath a cabbage leaf? No mere female can hold a castle, l’Aigle or any other!”

      “But the empress is her father’s heir to the throne in her own right.”

      “Yes, and you have heard what a merry time she’s having trying to hold on to that throne, have you not?” the count retorted. “England is torn apart while she wrangles with her cousin, Stephen of Blois! And you’d be overrun by our nearest neighbor in a se’enight. Nay, Sidonie Gisele—” he always used both her names, both the one she went by, Gisele, as well as her first name, which had been the name of his despised dead wife, when he meant to make an unpleasant point “—a noble female has two choices in this world—the marriage bed or the convent. I cannot even allow you to chose the latter, for I have no heir and I will not give l’Aigle back to the duchy of Normandy when I die!”

      His last words, shouted so loudly that they echoed off the stone walls, merely strengthened her resolve to be owned by no man. But before she could voice her resistance, her father spoke again.

      “I haven’t given up my dream of having a holding in England, even if only through my daughter,” the count replied in his condescending way, “and actually, the empress has not left me without remedy,” the old man said, joining her at the window. “She bids me send you to wait upon her. As a lady-in-waiting to the empress, you are bound to catch the eye of some powerful and marriageable vassal of hers.”

      “I? Go to England alone?” How could he send her to a country he had just described as torn apart by civil war? Yet, there were advantages to the idea, not the least of which was the pleasure of leaving behind a father who could not love her or even respect her. The empress was a powerful woman, even though she was having to fight to keep the crown her father, Henry, had bequeathed her. Matilda, a woman unhappy in her own marriage, would surely understand Gisele’s wish to control her own fate, and allow her to remain unwed.

      Mayhap, once she was in England, she’d see this Alain, Baron of Hawkswell, and the lady he’d chosen over her.

      “Nay, of course you would not be alone,” the old man snapped. “I believe I know what’s due to the heiress of l’Aigle. I would have to send a suitable escort of my knights along—a half dozen should be an impressive enough number, though I can ill spare them, you know—and old Fleurette to attend you. The knights will return as soon as they’ve delivered you to the empress, while Fleurette can remain with you.”

      Thus ridding you permanently of two mouths to feed rather than one, eh, Father? The idea of her old nurse, now more of a beloved companion than a servant, coming with her was comforting enough to prevent Gisele from commenting on her father’s begrudging her even the temporary use of six of his knights.

      Once she was in England, all would be different.