Liana was so angry she could hardly speak. “Your…your brother was in bed with three women this morning,” she spat at Rogan.
Rogan looked at Severn in wonder. “Three? The most I’ve ever had was four. I was worn out the next day.”
“When was that?” Severn asked, as if Liana weren’t there.
“A year ago at the tournament at—”
“Not him!” Liana shouted. “Zared! Your little brother, that child, spent the night with three women.”
The two men just stared at her stupidly. She doubted if they had any idea what was wrong with Zared’s being in bed with three women. “I won’t have it,” she said. “Rogan, you have to stop this.”
To further increase her fury, Rogan’s eyes began to twinkle. “Yes, I will have to do something.”
She advanced on him. “Don’t patronize me. That boy looks up to you. He idolizes you. He thinks the sun rises and sets on you and I’m sure he’s merely imitating you.”
Severn grinned and slapped Rogan’s shoulder. “Just imitating his big brother,” he said, laughing.
Liana turned on Severn, her anger at him coming to the surface. “At least Rogan is making an effort. But you! You, with a married mistress living in the same house as that innocent child.”
Severn was on his feet and glowering down at her. “My life is none of your business,” he shouted at her. “And Zared is—”
Rogan stood, cutting his brother off. “We will take care of Zared.”
“As you take care of everything else—including your wife?” Severn sneered, then slammed from the room.
Rogan watched his brother go, then sat down heavily in his chair. Severn’s words had upset him.
“That man needs a wife,” Liana said.
“A wife?” Rogan said. “Iolanthe would tear the woman’s eyes out.”
He looked so dejected sitting there that she wanted to say something to amuse him. “We’ll have to find a woman strong enough to handle Severn and Iolanthe.”
“There is no such woman.”
She caressed his forehead. “No? I have handled you, and you are stronger than twenty Severns and Iolanthes.” She meant her words as a jest, but Rogan didn’t seem to take them as such. He looked up at her with eyes glittering with anger.
“No woman controls me,” he said under his breath.
“I didn’t mean—” she began, but he stood, his expression still angry.
“No woman controls me or my family. Go back to your sewing, woman, where you belong.” He left her alone in the room.
He left her alone all that day, that evening, and that night. She was frantic with worry and she was sure he’d gone to another woman. “I will kill her so slowly she will pray for death,” Liana seethed as she paced their chamber.
At midnight she went to Gaby, woke her from Baudoin’s arms, and had Gaby find out where Rogan was. It didn’t take Gaby long to return and tell Liana that Rogan was getting drunk in the Great Hall with half a dozen of his men.
Somehow the news made Liana feel very good. He was as upset about their argument as she was. No more was he the man who ignored her, who couldn’t pick her out from a group of women.
When at last she went to bed, if she didn’t sleep soundly, she did sleep.
She was awakened before dawn by the unmistakable sound of steel on steel. “Rogan,” she said, her heart tight with fear. She threw a robe over her nakedness and began to run.
The Howards had tried to sneak into the Peregrine castle before dawn. They tossed great hooks over the parapets and started climbing up the ropes.
It had been so many months since the Howards had attacked, and the Peregrines had been so involved in their own internal squabbles, that there had been a feeling of safety. Watchfulness had lulled; senses were no longer as alert.
Twelve of the twenty Howard attackers were over the wall before the sleepy guards on the parapets heard them. Two Peregrine knights died without ever waking up.