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Radulf lifted his hand in surprise, as if noticing the cut on it for the first time. Had he not felt the discomfort? Was he so used to these things that they were normal for him? And, now that she thought on it, his shirt had been damp and his breeches were definitely so.
“As you will, my lady,” he was saying, and watched her curiously as she gave his hand her attention.
To distract herself, Lily clucked her tongue and instructed him. “You should see that your servant keeps you dry and warm. The north of England is different from the south, my lord. Here the cold creeps into your bones and lies there, making them ache. You will become ill if you do not change into warm, dry clothing.”
He laughed, but he sounded pleased. “Enough,” he said, still smiling. “We will eat first, and then you can strip me and rub me dry.” One eyebrow lifted slowly, suggestively. “If you wish.”
Lily knew the color was rising in her cheeks again. “My lord,” she began breathlessly in denial, but the thought was between them, vivid as if it were already a fact. She could not seem to look away from his eyes, and he appeared to be in similar difficulty.
“You must be hungry, my lord,” Lily managed to say through the constriction in her throat.
Radulf lifted his hand and cupped her cheek, his thumb brushing her bottom lip, as it had in the church. Lily felt the earth beneath her shift and tremble, or was it only her own legs that shook? Radulf’s other arm curled about her hips and drew her slowly against him.
Lily looked down into his eyes. “My lord? What are you doing?”
“I am doing what I wanted to do the first moment I saw you,” Radulf murmured. He lifted the long strands of her hair, winding his fingers in them, gently drawing her face closer to his. Lily felt his warm breath on her lips. His eyes really were black, she realized. She could see her own reflection in them, and for a moment didn’t recognize herself. She looked flushed, her lips moist and parted, her gray eyes half closed. She looked seductive. She looked as if she wanted to be kissed.
Lily wasn’t surprised when Radulf did kiss her. What did surprise her were the sensations that went with such a simple act. Her mouth throbbed, her breasts tingled, and the place between her legs felt achy. The tip of Radulf’s tongue followed the outline of her lips, and then slid inside. Lily opened her mouth to him, quite unable to resist, no longer sure she wanted to. In another moment she would have been lost…
The clearing of a throat sent her stumbling backward, the heat draining from her body like wine from a ruptured barrel.
“My lord?”
Stephen’s voice seemed unnaturally loud, and he stomped his feet as he entered the tent, looking everywhere but at them. Lily figured he must have already seen them, left the tent, and re-entered. She put a shaking hand to her mouth, as if to hide the evidence of their kiss.
“What is it, boy?” Radulf sounded annoyed at the interruption, his eyes on Lily. She felt them boring into her back, but refused to turn and meet them. She felt flustered and confused. How Vorgen would have laughed! There had been nothing cold about her a moment ago in Radulf’s arms. Had she lost her mind, to allow her enemy such power over her?
But Stephen’s next words swept all self-recriminations from Lily’s mind.
“We have found the priest, my lord!”
Chapter 3
The priest!
Lily’s heart stopped, and started again. Father Luc! Here was danger in full measure. She had always liked Father Luc, and she thought he liked her. She prayed desperately that he had his wits about him and would not give her away.
“Must I see him now?” Radulf sounded weary as well as annoyed.
“You’ve been seeking him, Lord Radulf; don’t you want to speak with him?”
Stephen seemed puzzled by Radulf’s resistance, and at any other time Lily might have found it amusing. As it was, she watched in tense silence as Radulf reached for his shirt.
“Very well,” he growled, “but he’d best be quick. I’m hungry.”
Stephen’s gaze skimmed over Lily but didn’t linger. He bowed and gestured to someone beyond the entrance to Radulf’s tent. “Come,” he said, the authority in his voice somewhat marred by its tendency to waver up and down the scale. “My lord will do you the honor of speaking with you.”
“He’ll do me the honor, will he?”
Lily stepped back into the shadows and stayed there unmoving as Father Luc waddled into the candlelight. A small, rotund man in a coarse brown gown, his bald melon head was pink with anger, his eyes a vivid blue. Before the Normans came, Father Luc had had a wife and children—the English church saw no harm in its priests marrying. Afterward, Lily heard that the wife and children were sent away to safety, and Father Luc took on a solitary existence more in line with the Norman idea of piety.
“My lord,” he puffed now, “your men are rough and uncouth. What mean you by this disrespect?”
“What mean you?” Radulf growled softly, long legs splayed out before him. He did not bother to get up. “You have been well hidden, priest. I have been seeking you.”
“There have been many people seeking me since you came north, my lord,” Father Luc replied tartly. “Plows and farming tools have been broken, and crops burned in the fields. Animals have been slaughtered. The people are starving. They turn to me and God, and I give them what help I can.”
“I want you to help me, priest.”
