Simon turned away from her to face his servant with the same challenging smile. “Yes, Orlando, I will.” He took Isabel’s hand and kissed it again, much more carelessly this time, and Brautus frowned. “We will be back before your dinner is cold, my lady.” Making her a bow, he left the hall with Kevin behind him.
“Come, my lady,” Susannah urged, hurrying to her before anyone else could speak. “Let us at least change your gown.”
Simon followed Kevin out to the courtyard, still pretending a confidence he wished he could feel. He knew Isabel’s wolf was no danger, obviously, at least not to him, but that was the least of his worries. The men of Charmot seemed ridiculously willing for him to lead them—Kevin had adopted him as “my lord” with a speed that made him feel rather dizzy. Then as he emerged from the castle, young Tom came running to him, carrying a sword. “It was Sir Gabriel’s,” the boy explained, handing it over to him. “Since you’ve none of your own.”
“Thanks,” Simon said, belting it on because he couldn’t think how to refuse. The others nodded or mumbled their approval—“he’s the old lord’s kinsman, after all,” he heard one of them say.
But he wasn’t Sir Gabriel’s kinsman, or even a man at all, for that matter—a lie he could live with on its own. But something else was apparently killing the innocent in the woods around Charmot. Something else like him. The girl who had offered herself to him so sweetly at the Chapel of Saint Joseph had found another monster who had treated her even worse. Had she welcomed her death the way she had welcomed him? He shuddered to imagine it—and who or what had killed her? He actually found himself thinking back over the past day and night, trying to think if he could have done it, as if the murder of an innocent might have simply slipped his mind. But of course he had not.
“Careful, my lord,” Kevin said as they reached the horses, breaking into his thoughts. The groom took the bridle of the same massive black destrier Simon had thought meant to batter his skull to a pulp when he first arrived at Charmot—Malachi, Isabel had called him. “Malachi doesn’t often take to strangers, I’m afraid.”
“That’s all right,” Simon said, making himself smile. “Neither do I.” And besides, he was a vampire; no horse would let him come close enough to touch him, much less mount the saddle. He had told Orlando he would ride this beast, but that had been the voice of stupid pride, not reason. Malachi was watching him now, his great head lowered in warning in spite of Kevin’s best efforts to make him look up. As soon the vampire drew closer, he pawed the cobblestones with one warning hoof, snorting his displeasure. “Easy, Malachi,” Simon said, adopting the low, crooning tone he had learned from his father almost before he could walk. “You should remember me…” He drew closer, still expecting the horse to bolt. “You tried to kill me once already.” He reached out and touched the horse’s velvet nose, marveling as he allowed it. The other horses, a small brown mare and the team hitched to the wagon, had become increasingly restive as he approached, but when the stallion allowed him to touch him, they instinctively relaxed.
“Aren’t you a beautiful boy?” Simon said softly, hardly daring to breath as he caressed the horse’s neck. Malachi tossed his head and nuzzled his shoulder, and the vampire laughed aloud.
“He is,” Kevin agreed with a smile. “You are a horseman, my lord?”
“I was.” Still bracing himself to be tossed over the horse’s head, he swung onto his back, but the stallion allowed it with barely a snort of protest. “I haven’t had a horse of my own in some time.” He took the reins, so elated to be in the saddle again, he didn’t dare question how it could be so. Malachi pranced to one side as if eager to be off, and he laughed again—what would it be like to give this beast its head, to let him gallop as far and as fast as he would? But now was not the time.
“Come,” he said, bringing the stallion about with the lightest tug on the reins. “We promised Lady Isabel we would be quick.”
Susannah helped Isabel out of her muddy gown and shift. “You might be a bit more kind to your cousin, my lady,” she said, going to the wardrobe. “You could marry worse.”
“Don’t stand on ceremony, Susannah,” Isabel said with a laugh. “By all means, speak your mind.” She scrubbed a smudge of mud from her nose as she peered into the mirror. “I think I’ve been quite kind enough to Simon—too kind, in fact.”
“That is Brautus talking, not you.” She took out a gown, looked it over, and put it back. “Listen to him, and you’ll find yourself in a convent.”
“I wish a convent would take me.” She gave her reflection a rare long look and almost laughed again. This was not a woman who should be contemplating marriage. Her nose was red now from its scrubbing; her cheeks were pale and drawn from worry and too little sleep; and her unladylike red hair looked like she’d been nesting swallows in it from her day’s adventures.
“You do not.” Susannah took out Isabel’s best gown and a clean shift. “The last lady I served went into a convent when her husband died, and I thought we would die ourselves.” She loosened Isabel’s ruined braid with expert fingers and picked up the brush. “You might as well be buried in a grave as that.”
“Never mind trying to put it right,” Isabel scolded, reaching for the brush. “Just put it back in the braid.” She noticed the gown her maid had chosen. “And I am not wearing that.”
“Why not?” Susannah held the brush out of Isabel’s reach until her mistress gave up and let her continue. “What are you saving it for?”
“My clothes are the least of my worries at the moment.” She winced as Susannah attacked a particularly stubborn knot. “I want to talk to Brautus before Simon and the others get back.”
“Let him talk to that horrid little wizard—they deserve each other.” She pulled part of Isabel’s hair back into a braid as before but left most of it loose on her shoulders. “You shouldn’t have to worry about wolves and murders—let the men take care of such things.”
“Don’t you think I’d like to?” Isabel retorted. “Here, stop fussing and give me that silly gown.” She stepped into the shift and gown and let Susannah lace up either side. “Why are you suddenly so keen for me to marry Simon, anyway?” she teased. “I thought you wanted him for yourself.”
“I did,” the other girl admitted. “But that was before I saw him shaved and dressed like a proper nobleman.” She turned Isabel toward herself and examined her mistress’s face with an obviously critical eye. “He’s much too fine for me. Besides, it’s you he wants.” She gave each of Isabel’s cheeks a pinch.
“Ouch! Have you gone mad?” Isabel demanded, swatting her hands away.
“You need color—”
“What color? Black or blue?” She turned back to the mirror to look over the damage and stopped, surprised. She did look better, softer and more girlish with her hair halfway undon
e. Even the livid marks Susannah had left on her cheeks had produced their deserved effect, painful or not. “Simon doesn’t want me,” she insisted. “He is on a quest—”
“Oh aye, he does, quest or not.” Susannah laughed, clearing away the other gown. “I’ve had a bit more experience in such matters than you, my lady. You’ll just have to trust me.”
“I will have to do no such thing,” Isabel retorted, turning her back on the mirror. “I need a protector for Charmot, Susannah, not a husband.”
“Isn’t one the same as the other?” the maid said, un-perturbed, as she went to fetch Isabel’s slippers.
“No, it is not.” Her father had thought this way, too, and so did the king, she supposed—he had sent her enough prospects to make her think he did. But it still seemed wrong to her, this idea that she and Castle Charmot were in essence the same, part and parcel of a single prize or burden. “I want my husband to love me, Susannah, not just my castle.”