The Conquest Read online

  "No!" Zared and Tearle said in unison.

  Tearle knew that if she left now, he'd never see her again. "I will see to her," he said quickly.

  "You?" Zared said, sneering. "You, a—"

  "A what?" Tearle asked, daring her to tell Severn he was a Howard.

  Zared looked at her brother. "He's a coward and a weakling, and he can't look after anyone."

  At another time Severn might have been puzzled by his sister's animosity toward the stranger, but he had too much on his mind. "Liana sent him; she chose him." His opinion of his sister-in-law was rising by the hour. He should have listened to her and taken the clothes and left his sister at home, he thought.

  "Liana didn't—"

  "Didn't what?" Severn asked.

  "Didn't know what he was like. He's too weak to protect anyone. If the Howards attacked, he'd probably deliver me to them." That was as close as she could come to telling her brother the truth.

  Severn looked at the man Liana had sent and couldn't reconcile his sister's words with what he saw. The fellow Smith was a bear of a man: big, thick, muscular. While Zared had slept Severn had seen just how strong the man was when he'd helped unload weapons and armor. And twice Severn had seen him hold a sword in a way that told Severn the man had had some training.

  "Will you pledge your life to protect her?" Severn asked.

  "I will," Tearle answered, and there was truth in his eyes.

  "No! Oh, Severn, no, you cannot do this to me."

  "You have done it to yourself," Severn said, rising, feeling much better. "See that she does not let the world know she is female. Keep her out of fights, and for the sake of all of us, keep her out of men's beds. I promised Liana I'd return her with her virginity intact."

  "I will protect her always," Tearle said. "You have my word."

  "Good," Severn said, standing. "She is yours to guard. See that no one knows the truth of her. Now I must watch the jousts. I must weigh my opponents' abilities." He turned and left the tent.

  Zared stood where she was, staring after her brother. Never in all her imaginings could she have conceived of where she was. Her brother had just put her under the care of their family's sworn enemy. A Howard was to protect her from the Howards.

  "Do not look at me so," Tearle said when Severn was gone. "I have told you again and again that I will not harm you. I will protect you."

  "Your family has killed mine for three generations, yet I am to believe that a Howard is now my friend? No," she said tauntingly, "you are to be my husband."

  Tearle winced at her words and again asked himself why he did not leave. Perhaps her words weighed on him, and he felt the sins of his ancestors and his brothers on his shoulders. Perhaps his ancestors had stolen the Peregrine lands.

  "It is time for supper," he said, "and you must serve your brother and his men."

  "I must what?"

  Tearle smiled at her. She carried the title of squire, but she also bore the name of Peregrine. Usually when a boy reached about seven years of age he was sent to foster with a family other than his own. People had known for centuries that a boy would gladly take lessons from strangers but would learn nothing from his own family. Zared, who was used to eating beside her brother, was balking at fetching his meat and wine.

  "I have told your brother I will care for you, and I mean to see that you do your duty. If you have more work to do, you will have less time to make a fool of yourself over Colbrand."

  "I have had more than enough of your orders." She strode to the open tent flap. "I am going to supper by myself."

  Zared had to elbow her way between two squires to get the hunk of meat Severn had told her to fetch for him. She was trying to keep her temper, but it wasn't easy. Severn had very much liked the idea of his little sister serving him, and he also wanted to punish her a bit for having neglected him earlier in the day. He'd point to joints of meat on other tables and command her to get him a piece.

  "Get your brother a napkin," the Howard man told her.

  "Why? He will not use it," Zared had retorted.

  Of course Severn had then decided that the thing he wanted most in life was a napkin, so Zared had had to run and find one for him.

  With every move she made she glared at the Howard man. Severn had seated him at his right hand, and they looked for all the world to be old friends. Friends who had a common enemy, she thought. Me.

  It was a long meal, and Zared was so busy she never had a moment even to look about her. She'd had such dreams about going to the tournament with her brother, and so far all of it had been a disaster.

  At long last the meal was over, and the men, the Marshall family, the king, and the guests began to file out of the enormous hall and go about their evening's entertainment. Some of the young men invited Zared to go whoring with them, but she declined. She tore off a big chunk of beef, took half a loaf of bread and a flagon of wine, and left the hall.

  "I have waited for you," Tearle said as soon as she was outside.

  Zared nearly dropped the wine. Was there no reprieve from the man? "Leave me," she said.

  "I have sworn to your brother to protect you."

  "From what? From yourself? Can you not see that I do not want you near me? Go and find another to inflict yourself upon. Leave me to myself."

  Tearle looked at her, and quite suddenly he wondered why he was forcing himself where he was not wanted. His brother wasn't going to come after her, not while Tearle was at the tournament. He looked around, and there were hundreds of people milling about, and groups of boys teasing groups of girls. There were ladies in their long gowns being escorted by gentlemen in fur-trimmed tunics. There were vendors hawking goods, acrobats climbing on top of one another, singers and musicians.

  "Go," he said. "Go, but do not stay so late that I have to come looking for you."

  Zared practically ran from him, hurrying into the crowd to get away from him as fast as she could. She ate her food as she walked about and looked at what was for sale, at the performers, at a dog baiting a chained bear. The sights were all wondrous and new, and they kept her attention for quite some time.

  But her good mood fled when a pretty young village girl began flirting with her. Zared glared at the girl, but instead of leaving she came up to Zared and asked if she'd like to go for a walk. Zared turned on her heel and left the girl.

  Some other girls, daughters of rich merchants, walked by in their lovely gowns, jeweled headdresses twinkling, and Zared tried to memorize everything they wore. She'd like to wear something like their gowns with their trailing skirts, she thought. She watched the girls glance over their shoulders at a group of boys, and the boys follow like dogs answering a whistle.

  "Come with us," one of the boys called to her.

  Zared stepped back and shook her head.

  "He's one of those Peregrines," she heard one of the boys say, and they all laughed.

  Zared turned away, feeling as though she didn't belong anywhere. She didn't belong with the girls, and she didn't belong with the boys. And their entrance into the tournament had made the Peregrine name a source of laughter.

  "Tomorrow Severn will fix that," she whispered to herself, vowing to help her brother in any way that she could. She wouldn't allow the Howard man to drug her so she slept the next day away.

  The people and the commotion had lost its appeal to her, and all at once she wished she were at home. She would go up on the battlements of Moray Castle and look out across the fields to the trees in the distance. She wished she could sit in Liana's solar and listen to one of her ladies sing.

  She wondered where Severn was. "Probably with some woman," she said in disgust. Her brother never seemed to have trouble acquiring women.

  She kept walking away from the noise until she reached the stream in the trees that ran near the Marshall estates. There seemed to be a couple of grunting people under every bush, and as Zared sidestepped them she felt lonelier than ever. She couldn't go with the girls and didn't want to g