A fever took hold of you. I thought you would
die. It was only last night that it broke an
were able to rest.
And you She looked thoughtful, then placed her hand on his chest, over his heart. His skin flamed beneath her touch. Even with the deep sense of unease that had cautioned him to keep his distance, he did not want to discourage her from touching him in
the slightest.
Quite the opposite. He watched her
face to see if she was equally affected. She slid her eyes to his and smiled like a cat watching a mouse and his heart gave a violent thud.
Your heart is strong, monsieur, even though
you are weak. I think you are strong when you
are well, yes?
Jack flexed the muscles in his arms and felt
them tighten easily. He felt weak and ill, but there was strength in his body that would return in time.
His heart was racing, but that was from the
sensation of her hand on his flesh. Perhaps, he agreed. She nodded in the manner of a queen receiving homage from a subject, then left. Jack listened for the sound of the bolt being drawn across, but heard nothing.
He had been a prisoner before, but apparently was no longer. Or perhaps the
woman rightly suspected that even if he had the inclination to roam about, he didn't possess the strength yet.
It was only as he finished the cider and lay
back to try to sleep again that it occurred to him he had not asked her name, nor had the bewitching creature given it.
Blanche walked to the end of the passageway. She took three breaths to regain her composure before she smiled down at Andrey who was sitting on a stool.
That was interesting, she said an understatement indeed.
Andrey grunted and sheathed the sword that was conspicuously wearing.
What did you find out?"
Very little.' Blanche frowned. He claims to
have no memory of who he is or where he is from.
Do you believe him or do you think he is lying?"
Blanche considered the conversation that had taken place. The man's-Jack's--air of confusion and the look of horror that had crossed his face when he had been unable to supply a name had appeared genuine.
The film of perspiration that had arisen across his brow and chest could not have been feigned. Her hand twitched as she recalled the shape ofhis chest muscles beneath her
palm, firm and smooth.
A younger body than she had touched for so long. It had taken control not to explore further down to his belly and beyond and see if everything was as well toned. She shook
her head to rid herself of the image.
I believe him. More's the pity' she said. She
looked back at the door to the storeroom. A
twinge of guilt took her by surprise as she considered what an inhospitable room it was for a man in his circumstances to find himself.
A bare room, little more than a cell. She had not bolted the door, but she wondered if he was aware of that, or if he even suspected he had been confined at all. There were other, better rooms and other beds. She blinked, surprised at the direction her thoughts were taking. It was that kiss which had done it.
She should never have yielded to the temptation on the beach. We'll have to keep him here a little longer.
Why?" Andrey's eyebrows shot up in surprise.
"He has no money, no possessions. Her conscience gave a twinge; there had been a box Somewhere and she had the cross in her room.
He has no name. Assuming he is telling the truth, Andrey said. Assuming that. Blanche sighed, wishing she had never brought him to the castle.
However, we cannot send him out to wander the country side like a vagrant. Who knows whom he might encounter?
Here he is safe from harm. And causing harm, Andrey pointed out.
'Marie didn't like him.
He made her jump, nothing more, Blanche
said. Andrey was protective of his wife to the
point of inanity and Marie's reaction to being surprised would not have helped Jack endear himself.
They walked back up the stairs and out into
the courtyard. The window that was high in
Jack's room was at ground level in the wall of the storerooms so a breeze could keep grain fresh.
If Blanche knelt down beside it, she would be
able to look over his bed. Was he sleeping now or lying awake, wondering who and where he was?
The fever that had almost claimed his life
had been fierce, and his skin had burned even as he shivered. His muscles did not lie-he must be strong indeed to have fought that of.
She decided against looking in case he was
awake and saw her. "Put a guard on his door, she told Andrey. Someone loyal to you.
She straightened her sleeves and thought back to the way Jack had seized her by the wrist. He had moved so quickly, but there had been no panic in her.
The abhorrence she usually felt at being touched without permission had been mild
and she had snapped at him as a matter of course.
When the impulse had clearly filled him to try
to touch her for a second time he had stayed his hand and that had endeared him to her even more.
A pity he has no memory, she mused to Andrey. I would like to know who he is and what he is doing.
She crossed the courtyard from the building
where Jack was being housed and climbed the outside stairs to the main tower of the fort. She paused as she always did and pressed her palm against the door. Compared to the grand home that she had shared with her second husband, Yann, it was small, but it belonged to her and no one else.
Jack had believed the house belonged
to a man, naturally, and the knowledge rankled.
But why would he not? She lifted her head, proud to have done something so few women would dare to try or succeed in doing. There had been times after Yann 's death when her courage to continue down the path she had chosen had wavered.
But she had Continued, and Bleiz Mor lived and fought, her lame a tribute to the wolf pelts that had decorated their walls.
'Brittany will triumph, she whispered Yann's ghost. You did not die in vain. She climbed the stairs to her private room on the top floor of the tower and sat in the high backed chair at the window, shivering a littla in the breeze that crept round the threadbare screens.
Winter had not fully loosened its grasp, but each time she considered spending some of
her plunder on her own comfort she thought of the widowed women who struggled in bare cottages to feed fatherless children, or the men toiling to grow crops in fields turned to battlefields.
She did not need it as much as they did.
She turned her attention to the cross that lay
on the table. Keeping this was an indulgence.
She had examined it over and over in the days before Jack regained consciousness and could picture i with her eyes closed. It was engraved on the back with the initials J and Mon either side.
She had been right to suspect his name might begin with that letter. She wondered who M was and a little jealous flame flickered in her breast. She hoped it was his family name and not that of a wife or lover.
Perhaps he would remember if she showed
him the cross. She would wait until he was well rather than risk agitating him now.
She held the cross tightly and pursed her lips.
That was not the only reason for delaying. If his memory returned and he was proved to be a supporter of Charles de Blois, there were matters she would have to face.
Taking a man's life in combat or on the seas was one thing, but callously executing him in her own home after giving him care
and shelter was entirely another.
She worried she was allowing her sense of sympathy for his injuries and pity for his circumstances to cloud her judgement.
Perhaps he thought a woman would be more easily tricked or cajoled into believing his lies, or that her opinions were of no consequence.
He would not be the first man who had tried to dismiss her in such a way. She walked behind the tapestry sereen and into the shallow alcove of the window and glanced out over the sea, deep in thought. She occupied the
whole of the top floor of the tower as her bedchamber and private solar.
From her window, and hers alone, high on the highest floor of the tower, it was possible to see that the coast with its shallow inlets and jutting rocks dipped in more deeply and curved round behind the cliff in a loop.
It was in this concealed cove, safe from the tides and from passing eyes, where her two ships rested at anchor. She inhaled deeply, tasting the salt air in the back of her mouth and feeling the wind enfolding her. She had not sailed since the night before Jack's shipwreck.