LITMIR.BIZ

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      And if he won the fair Giselle, Nicholas would finally have to say something good about his younger brother. Nor would he be able to accuse Henry of leading a wastrel existence anymore.

      So why not begin the wooing? Henry thought, spurring Apollo to a slightly quicker pace until he was between the ladies.

      “Have we much farther to go?” he asked Lady Giselle, giving her his most charming smile. “I’m not sure how long the rain will hold off.”

      “Not far now,” Lady Mathilde answered, while her sister nudged her horse forward to ride beside Cerdic.

      Whether that was due to her modesty or not, Henry was slightly disgruntled at being so obviously left behind to ride beside Lady Mathilde.

      That lady immediately fastened her inquisitive brown eyes onto him and asked, “Why do you hate Roald?”

      God save him, she was as bold and blunt as her sister was shy and maidenly.

      “You need have no fear of offending my delicate sensibilities, Sir Henry,” she said when he didn’t answer right away. “I can believe anything of Roald.”

      Despite her curiosity and her confidence that his reason wouldn’t upset her, the explanation was not a tale he cared to share with a woman. “Surely any man of honor would dislike him.”

      She didn’t bat an eye or look away. “He can be charming and sly, and he has more influence at court than we will ever have. Perhaps, if you don’t hate him as much as I think, you may decide it is not worth the risk to offend him. You may even decide you should help him.”

      It was an insult to even imply that he was capable of such duplicitous behavior. “I’ve said that I’ll help you, so I will—and even if I hadn’t, Roald will make no overtures to me, nor would I accept them if he did. He hates me as much as I hate him.”

      “I must assume, then, you quarreled. Over a wager? Over a woman?”

      God’s wounds, she made him sound like a confederate who’d gotten in a bit of a tiff. “I would certainly never wager with Roald and his cronies. For one thing, they probably cheat.”

      She slid him a glance that was both shrewd and appraising, but in a complimentary way. “A woman, then?”

      That was close to the truth, and yet their animosity sprang from a far different cause than she surely imagined.

      Rather than endure her interrogation and who knew what other implications she might come up with, he decided to tell her the truth, if not in complete detail. “When we were both at court, I came upon him trying to force himself on a serving girl.”

      As always, the bile rose in his throat as he remembered the poor girl’s terrified face, and a girl she was. She couldn’t have been more than ten years old, but he would spare even this bold, prying lady that unsettling information. “I made him let her go at the point of my sword, so Roald has no love for me.”

      At first he thought he saw grim satisfaction on the lady’s features, but it was quickly replaced by a piercing, searching gaze that was as uncomfortable as his brother’s. “When did this happen?”

      “Two years ago.”

      “He was not charged with trying to rape her?”

      Henry winced inwardly at the harsh, if accurate, word. It was disconcerting to hear a lady speak so directly of such an act. “No.”

      “So although you caught him in the process of committing a crime, you let him go?”

      Henry flushed, feeling a twinge of guilt at her accusation, although he’d told himself that night, and ever after, that he had done nothing to feel guilty about when he had allowed Roald to leave. “You didn’t see the girl, my lady, or hear her sobs and pleas not to call the guard. She was sure no one would take her word over Roald’s, and that Roald would say she led him on, and then her reputation would be ruined. I could not disagree, so yes, I let him go.”

      The lady tilted her inquisitive head with its pointed little chin. “Many noblemen would not interfere at all, believing a servant’s body theirs by right, whether she was willing or not.”

      “I don’t,” he answered with firm honestly. “I would never take a woman against her will, whether high born or low, and I have never made a woman cry out in pain and anguish, or left her bruised and bleeding.”

      Lady Mathilde looked ahead at Cerdic and her sister, and he regretted speaking with such force. He should have remembered that, no matter her appearance or her manner, she was still a lady.

      “That girl was fortunate you were there to help her,” Lady Mathilde said quietly, and with sincerity and compassion—a hint of gentleness and sympathy that was rather unexpected, and not unpleasant.

      Inspired to be pleasant in return, Henry nodded at Cerdic at the head of the cortege. The fellow had a sword at his side and a rather fearsome battle ax strapped to his back. The shaft of his ax had to be four feet long and the head looked sharp enough to split hairs. “It’s rather unusual to see an Englishman in a position of such responsibility and trust.”

      In truth, he couldn’t think of any Norman nobleman he knew who would give an Englishman that much responsibility, or consider one a friend. It had been nearly two hundred years since the Conquest, but old enmities died hard.

      “Cerdic’s family was royal before the Normans came,” she replied.

      She obviously admired the fellow. Henry wondered just how much, and if that extended to being on intimate terms. Not that it mattered. He had no interest in the bold and brazen Lady Mathilde. “You’re from Provence, aren’t you?” he asked, commenting on her accent.

      “Yes, we were born there and lived there for most of our childhood.”

      Just like the queen Henry detested, the woman he believed was spurring his countrymen to rebellion with her selfish advancement of her own family.

      “The same as Queen Eleanor,” he remarked, wondering how she’d react to that.

      Lady Mathilde looked as if she disliked the queen as much as he did. “If what Papa said about her family is true, it is a pity for England she is married to the king.”

      That was interesting. “What did your father say about her family?”

      “That the only thing they produced was beautiful women, and the only intelligence they showed was in arranging marriages.”

      That was so close to the mark, Henry had to laugh. Then, because he was Henry, he smoothly said, “The queen’s family isn’t the only one capable of producing beautiful women.”

      Lady Mathilde frowned.

      Clearly, he had erred. Obviously, this lady would never be impressed with flattery or, perhaps, reminders that her sister was beautiful while she was not.

      “My father didn’t like Normans, either,” she declared. “He said they always wanted to make war and didn’t appreciate music or art.”

      He had upset her with his comment, and since he was well aware of what it was like to be compared to a sibling and found lacking, he didn’t take offense at her umbrage.

      Her observation was also unfortunately true, at least in his case. He had little appreciation for art or music, except a clever, ribald ditty. Yet never before had he been made to feel that was a failing. “Someone has to defend the kingdom,” he noted.

      “William was defending England when he invaded it? I must have been seriously misinformed.”

      He would have found her remarks more amusing if she didn’t look so smugly superior. “Well, sometimes we get carried away—and sometimes, such men are necessary to defend estates.”

      A blush colored her smooth cheeks, nearly overwhelming the few freckles on her nose.

      “I meant no offense, Sir Knight,”

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