“Maybe it is,” Warner said.
“You have sometimes acted as a friend,” Caradoc said. He stared moodily into his empty wine glass. “And I think I have been a fool.”
“We all are, sometimes,” Warner said.
Caradoc took in a deep breath. “Lord Warner,” he said formally. “What is the Lady Gwen to you?”
“Why is that your business?”
“Perhaps it is not. And yet—If she has been more than a friend, without you promising a lawful marriage, I will have your blood. No, hear me out,” he said, raising a hand as Warner opened his mouth to reply.
“I know that if I kill you, the Lord Eqeta Rick will have my head. You are worth ten of me, in his plans for facing the Time. Perhaps he is even right to value you so highly.
“I do know this, however. No lord can ask me to stand by like a capon, while you play the cock with Gwen. I love her. If she does not love me, then let her say so and she can be free to bed any man she wishes. Until she speaks her mind, beware of my sword.”
Warner nodded. Nobly said, he thought. Corny, but noble. Larry me lad, you didn’t think it through. Old Musclebound here isn’t just a rival for a quick roll in the hay. He wants to marry the girl. Come to that, you were thinking about it too— That was when she was right here, and we were about to go in there.
He means it all. He’ll challenge me if he thinks I’ve wronged her. And what the hell, I might not win. He’s good with a sword, and better with that bow. Warner shuddered at the thought of a belly wound. And suppose I win? Captain Galloway would have my hide. And Caradoc’s got relatives and they’ll all want my blood. He’s sure as hell got more relatives than I have rounds. Sooner or later one of them will get me. Unless Captain Rick buys off Caradoc’s family. He might do that, and then lock me in some castle tower and let me have a girl once in a while if I’m a good little wizard…
What was it Samuel Johnson said about sex? “The expense is damnable, the position is ridiculous, and the pleasure is fleeting.” Yep. Just now I can sympathize.
“You’ve no horns from me,” Warner said. “My word on it.”
The look of relief on Caradoc’s face made Warner glad he’d said it. Hell, Gwen was all right, but there were other girls, and Jesus, the archer seems like he’s really in love with her.
Warner poured more wine for both of them. “Caradoc, I like Gwen. I like her a lot. She’s smart and pretty and I can talk about a lot of things with her I can’t talk about with anyone else. I don’t love her. She doesn’t love me. If there is anyone she loves besides her dead husband, it’s you.” He hoped that wasn’t laying it on too thick.
“Nothing has happened between us that you need to worry about. Nothing will, either. If you get her to marry you, I’ll dance at the wedding and take your kids up in my balloon.”
Caradoc’s face twisted. He was trying to talk, but nothing happened.
“You mean that—” Caradoc said finally.
“Sure do.”
“But—” Caradoc sighed. “And yet it is too late.”
“Why in the name of Yatar’s pissoir is it too late?”
“I have betrayed my trust—”
“Not by me,” Warner said. “If anybody has you on charges for that, it’ll be the lady.” He laughed. “Go to her, you Yatar-damned idiot!”
Gwen sat in the chair by her bed, her face buried in her hands. She felt frightened, ashamed, and guilty all at once, and she wasn’t sure which was the worst.
She’d done wrong by her own standards, never mind those of Tran. She’d as good as played the tease with Larry Warner, and that was something she always’ tried not to do. Usually she succeeded too, particularly when she liked the man as much as she did Larry.
She’d hurt Caradoc even worse, and more stupidly. She’d never played off one man against another. Nobody deserved that, not even some of the real turkeys she’d met the summer she worked as a secretary. Certainly Caradoc didn’t.
So much for her own standards. She’d done an even worse job by the standards of Tran, and right now they were what really counted. A woman was a wife, daughter, or mother of some man on this planet. She could also be a widow for a while, but her time for that was running out. Even if it wasn’t, being a widow didn’t give her the right to play around after a respectable man had made an offer of honorable marriage. Noblewomen here had more rights than she’d expected, but this wasn’t one of them.
If she went on this way, she would soon be considered to have lost her rank. She would no longer have a chance for an honorable marriage. Instead, she’d be getting one proposition after another, none of them honorable. If she accepted, she’d be hardly better than a common prostitute. If she refused, she’d need Rick’s protection from the angry man, and Tylara might not let him give it.
I could retreat. Be something like an abbess of the University.
The thought almost made her laugh. She wasn’t likely to take any vows of celibacy, or even pretend to have. And without that, the University might be wrecked and her own life would certainly be miserable.
So would Caradoc, the man who loved her.
Well, ducks, said the voice in her mind. It’s like this. You can’t be your own woman here.
Tell me something I don’t know.
All right, but if you can’t be your own woman, what about being the woman of the best man around?
Can I get him?
There was a knock on her door.
Maybe you’ve got him, she thought. She knew what she’d say if that were him— Caradoc came in, kicked the door shut, and promptly knelt. Everything she’d planned to say went right out of her mind. For a man to kneel to a woman was to place himself totally at her mercy. He would listen to any insult from her, carry out any command, abandon kin or honor or life itself at her word. He was giving her absolute power over him, trusting that she would not abuse it.
He started to talk when she wound her fingers into his hair. She didn’t remember most of what he said, because she was trying too hard not to cry. All she remembered was a phrase about “my kin are beginning to wonder where my wits have gone.”
“Caradoc,” she said, and repeated it until he looked up.
“Yes, my lady.”
“No lady. Just Gwen.” She took a deep breath. “Caradoc, you know they never found my husband’s body, after the battle where he was killed.”
“Yes.”
“That is why I have not felt free to take another husband. I have not been sure that he was dead.”
“But—more than a year?”
“Caradoc, he was—so full of life. Like you. If you died but no one found your body, how long would your kin go on wondering about you?”
He smiled for the first time. “Quite a while, I think. Particularly my aunt, who is sure I am doomed for hanging.”
“It is the same for my husband. I have not until now been ready to think of another man.”
The smile faded. “But—now?”
“I am ready.”
Then she did cry. Fortunately Caradoc was there, with his arms around her and a shoulder for her to cry on, even if it was clothed in muddy sweat-fouled wool. Being in his arms felt so comfortable that before long she knew that if he led her to the bed she would go happily.
“No.”
“No what?”
“No, I shall not ask for my betrothal rights tonight, or until I return from the war.”
“But—you might not return.”
“All the more reason for us to sleep apart until we know my fate. You are the mother of one child who will never see his father. Do you want to be the mother of a second?”
He was right, of course. But—”The priests of Yatar are said to know—”
“I will let no priest tell me when I may bed my wife!” He kissed her. “It will be enough to ride against Flaminius as your betrothed husband. My kin will swear to guard you if I do not return, or I will know why!”
Ah. This alliance made sense, more than any other. There was no man on Tran to whom Tylara owed more. While Gwen was unmarried Tylara could object to Rick working at the University; but Tylara do Tamaerthon wouldn’t risk offending the man who’d rescued her from Sarakos.