LITMIR.BIZ

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       JULIET LANDON

      lives in an ancient country village in the north of England with her retired scientist husband. Her keen interest in embroidery, art and history, together with a fertile imagination, make writing historical novels a favorite occupation. She finds the research particularly exciting, especially the early medieval period and the fascinating laws concerning women in particular, and their struggle for survival in a man’s world.

      Contents

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

      Chapter Eight

      Chapter Nine

      Chapter Ten

      Chapter Eleven

      Epilogue

       Chapter One

       A crust of rooftops edged the distant horizon and, beyond them, a narrow sliver of shining sea suspended the last light of day above the dark, wine-rich tide that wafted its own unmistakable scent across the moorland. The three riders halted, held by its magic.

      ‘Is that it?’ Isolde whispered. ‘The sea? That shining?’

      The young man at her side smiled and eased his weight forward out of the saddle. ‘That’s it. Wait till tomorrow, then you’ll see how big it is. Can you smell it?’ He watched her take a deep lungful of air and hold it, savouring its essence.

      She breathed out on a laugh and nodded. ‘So that’s Scarborough, then. What a trek, Bard.’

      ‘I told you we’d get there in one day. Come on.’

      ‘Only just.’ Isolde turned to look over her shoulder, searching the rosy western sky and darkening wind-bent hawthorns. ‘You don’t think they’ll—?’

      ‘No! Course they won’t. Come.’

      The third rider pursed her lips, holding back the retort which would have betrayed to her mistress a certain distrust of Bard La Vallon’s optimism. A pessimist she was not, but this wild goose-chase to Scarborough was hardly the answer to their problem, such as it was.

      For one thing, she did not believe Isolde thought any more of La Vallon than she had about any of the other bold young lads who sought to make an impression month after month, year after year. Nor was it a yearning to see the sea that had drawn her all the way from York in one day, though she was as good in the saddle as any man. Mistress Cecily stayed a pace or two behind them on the stony track, caught by the pink halo shimmering through Isolde’s wild red curls, as fascinated by the girl’s beauty after nineteen years as she had been at her birth. The stifled retort gained momentum at each uncomfortable jolt of the hardy fell pony beneath her. Of course they’ll come after us, child, once they discover which direction we’ve taken.

      As if in reply to her maid’s unspoken words, Isolde called to her, holding a mass of wind-blown hair away to one side, ‘They’ll think we’ve gone back home, Cecily, won’t they?’

      ‘Course, love. That’ll be their first thought. Unless…’

      ‘Unless what?’

      Sensing that the matronly Mistress Cecily was about to contribute some unnecessary logic to the serenity of the moment, Bard drew Isolde’s attention to the Norman castle silhouetted against the sea over to the left of the town, making Cecily’s reply redundant.

      It had been this same Bardolph La Vallon whose untimely interest in Isolde had caused her father, Sir Gillan Medwin, to pack her off in haste to York and there to remain in the safekeeping of Alderman Henry Fryde and his family. No explanation for this severe reaction was needed by anyone in the locality, for the feuding between the Medwins and the La Vallons spanned at least four generations, and the idea of any liaison between their members could not be evenly remotely considered. As soon as the days had begun to lengthen in the high northern dales and the sun to gain strength above the limestone hills, the reprisals had begun again: the stealing of sheep and oxen, the damming of the river above Medwin’s mills, the firing of a new hayrick and, most recently, the near-killing of a La Vallon tenant.

      On discovering that his daughter Isolde had actually given some encouragement to the younger La Vallon, Sir Gillan had acted with a predictable and terrifying swiftness to put a stop to it, not only because of the enmity, but also because the likelihood of Bard La Vallon’s reputation as a lecher exceeding his father’s was almost a certainty. Between them, Rider La Vallon and his younger son had fathered a crop of black-haired and merry-eyed bairns now residing with their single mothers in Sir Gillan’s dales’ villages. How many were being reared as La Vallon tenants, heaven only knew, but Sir Gillan did not intend his daughter to produce one of them. Though his second wife had died scarcely seven weeks earlier, in the middle of June, he was willing to lose his only daughter also, for her safety’s sake.

      Mistress Cecily sighed, noting how the slice of silver in the distance had narrowed, darkening the sky still more in sympathy with her concerns.

      ‘Nearly there, Cecily. Hold on,’ came Isolde’s assurance.

      ‘Yes, love.’

      She had not expected the young swain to come chasing after them, nor did she believe that Isolde had cared one way or the other until she had come to realise what lay behind her father’s choice of Henry Fryde as her guardian, a choice that took the form of Henry Fryde’s twenty-three-year-old son Martin. Then, Isolde’s need for any form of rescue as long as it came quickly was justifiable: even the motherly Cecily had no quarrel with that. So, when two days ago young Bard had appeared behind them in the great minster at York during one of the Mercers’ Guild’s interminable thanksgiving ceremonies, the hand that had clutched hers had made her wince with the pain of it.

      ‘He’ll take us away from here, Cecily,’ Isolde had whispered to her that night, in bed.

      ‘Back home, you mean? He’d not—’

      ‘No, not back to my father. I’d not go back there now. You’ll never guess what he’s done. Bard told me today.’

      ‘Who’s done? Bard, or your father?’

      ‘My father. I think he’s taken leave of his senses,’ she added.

      ‘Why, what is it?’

      ‘Bard says he’s taken his sister.’

      Cecily

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