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  To Jennifer

  for melting wax and double Fridays

  Velvet Promise

  Prologue

  JUDITH REVEDOUNE LOOKED ACROSS THE LEDGER AT HER father. Her mother, Helen, was beside her. Judith felt no fear of the man in spite of all he’d done over the years to make her fear him. His eyes were red with deep circles beneath them. She knew his ravaged face was due to his grief at the loss of his beloved sons; two ignorant, cruel men who were exact replicas of their father.

  Judith studied Robert Revedoune with a vague sense of curiosity. He didn’t usually bother with his only daughter. He had no use for women since his first wife died and his second, a frightened woman, had merely given him a girl. “What do you want?” Judith asked calmly.

  Robert looked at his daughter as if seeing her for the first time. Actually, the girl had been kept hidden most of her life, buried with her mother in their own apartments amid their books and ledgers. He noticed with satisfaction that she looked like Helen had at that age. Judith had those odd golden eyes that some men raved about, but which he found unsettling. Her hair was a rich auburn. Her forehead broad and strong, as was her chin, her nose straight, her mouth generous. Yes, she would do, he thought. He could use her beauty to his advantage.

  “You’re the only one I have left,” Robert said, his voice heavy with disgust. “You will marry and give me grandsons.”

  Judith stared at him in shock. All her life she had been trained by Helen for life in a nunnery. Not a pious education of prayers and chanting, but one of high practicality, leading to the only career open to a noblewoman. She could become a prioress before she turned thirty. A prioress was as different from the average woman as a king from a serf. A prioress ruled lands, estates, villages, knights; she bought and sold according to her own judgment; she was sought by men and women alike for her wisdom. A prioress ruled and was ruled by no one.

  Judith could keep books for a large estate, could make fair judgments in disputes, and knew how much wheat to grow to feed how many people. She could read and write, manage a reception for a king, run a hospital; everything she would need to know had been taught her.

  And now she was expected to throw all of this away and become the servant of some man?

  “I will not.” The voice was quiet, but the few words could not have been louder if they’d been shouted from the slate rooftop.

  For a moment, Robert Revedoune was bewildered. No female had ever defied him with such a firm look before. In fact, if he didn’t know she was a woman, her expression would have been that of a man. When he recovered from his shock, he hit Judith, knocking her halfway across the little room. Even as she lay there, a trickle of blood running from the corner of her mouth, she stared up at him with absolutely no fear in her eyes, merely disgust and a touch of hatred. His breath caught for a moment at what he saw. In a way, the girl almost frightened him.

  Helen was over her daughter in minutes and, as she crouched there, she drew her eating dagger from her side.

  Looking at the primitive scene, Robert’s momentary nervousness left him. His wife was a woman he could understand. For all her outward look of an angry animal, he saw weakness deep in her eyes. In seconds he grabbed her arm, the knife flying across the room. He smiled at his daughter as he held his wife’s forearm in his powerful hands and snapped the bones as one would break a twig.

  Helen never said a word, only crumpled at his feet.

  Robert looked back at his daughter where she still lay, not yet able to comprehend his brutality. “Now what is your answer, girl? Do you marry or not?”

  Judith nodded briefly before she turned to aid her unconscious mother.

  Chapter One

  THE MOON CAST LONG SHADOWS OVER THE OLD STONE tower which rose three stories high and seemed to scowl down, in a tired way, at the broken and crumbling wall that surrounded it. The tower had been built two hundred years before this wet April night in 1501. Now was a time of peace, a time when stone fortresses were no longer needed; but this was not the home of an industrious man. His great-grandfather had lived in the tower when such fortifications were needed, and Nicolas Valence thought, if he sobered long enough to think, that the tower was good enough for him and future generations.

  A massive gatehouse looked over the disintegrating walls and the old tower. Here one lone guard slept, his arm curled around a half-empty skin of wine. Inside the tower, the ground floor was littered with sleeping dogs and knights. Their armor was piled against the walls in a jumbled, rusty heap, tangled with the dirty rushes that covered the oak plank floor.

  This was the Valence estate; a poor, disreputable, old-fashioned castle that was the butt of jokes throughout England. It was said that if the fortifications were as strong as the wine, Nicolas Valence could hold off all of England. But no one attacked. There was no reason to attack. Many years ago, most of Nicolas’s land had been taken from him by young, eager, penniless knights who had just earned their spurs. All that remained was the ancient tower, which everyone agreed should have been torn down, and a few outlying farms that supported the Valence family.

  There was a light in the window of the top floor. Inside, the room was cold and damp—a dampness that never left the walls even in the driest summer weather. Moss grew between the cracks of the stone, and little crawling things constantly scurried across the floor. But in this room, all the wealth of the castle sat before a mirror.

  Alice Valence leaned toward the mirror and applied a darkener to her short, pale lashes. The cosmetic was imported from France. Alice leaned back and studied herself critically. She was objective about her looks and knew what she had and how to use it to its best advantage.

  She saw a small oval face with delicate features, a little rosebud mouth, a slim, straight nose. Her long almond eyes of a brilliant blue were her best feature. Her hair was blonde, which she constantly rinsed in lemon juice and vinegar. Her maid, Ela, pulled a pale yellow strand across her mistress’s forehead then set a French hood on Alice’s head. The hood was of a heavy brocade, trimmed in a wide cuff of orange velvet.

  Alice opened her little mouth to once again look at her teeth. They were her worst feature, crooked and a bit protruding. Over the years she had learned to keep them hidden, to smile with her lips closed, to speak softly, her head slightly lowered. This mannerism was an advantage, for it intrigued men. It gave them the idea that she did not know how beautiful she was. They imagined awakening this shy flower to all the delights of the world.

  Alice stood and smoothed her gown over her slim body. There were few curves to it. Her small breasts rested on a straight frame with no hips, no indentation to her waist. She liked her body. It seemed clean and neat compared to other women’s.

  Her clothes were lush, seeming out of place in the dingy room. Close to her body she wore a linen chemise, so fine it was almost gauze. Over this was a luscious gown of the same heavy brocade as the hood. It had a deep, square neck, the bodice fitting very tightly to her thin frame. The skirt was a gentle, graceful bell. The blue brocade was trimmed with white rabbit fur; a deep border along the hem, and wide cuffs around the hanging sleeves. About her waist was a belt of blue leather set with large garnets, emeralds and rubies.

  Alice continued studying herself as Ela slipped a rabbit-lined brocade cloak about her mistress’s shoulders.

  “My lady, you cannot go to him. Not when you are—”
/>   “To marry another?” Alice asked as she fastened the heavy cloak about her shoulders. She turned to gaze at herself, pleased with the result. The orange and blue was striking. She would not go unnoticed in such an outfit. “And what has my marriage to do with what I do now?”

  “You know it’s a sin. You cannot meet a man who isn’t your husband.”

  Alice gave a short laugh as she adjusted the folds of the heavy mantle. “Do you want me to ride out to meet my intended? Dear Edmund?” she asked with great sarcasm. Before Ela could reply she continued. “You needn’t go with me. I know the way and, for what Gavin and I do, we need no one else.”

  Ela had been with Alice for too long to be shocked. Alice did what she wanted when she wanted. “No, I will go. But only to see that you come to no harm.”

  Alice ignored the elderly woman as she had all her life. She took a candle from the heavy metal holder by her bed and went to the iron-banded oak door. “Quiet, then,” she said over her shoulder as she eased the door back on its well-oiled hinges. She gathered the brocade gown in her hand and threw it over her arm. She couldn’t help but think that in a few short weeks she would leave this decrepit keep and live in a house—the Chatworth manor house, a building of stone and wood surrounded by high, protective walls.

  “Quiet!” she commanded Ela as she threw an arm across the woman’s soft stomach and pressed them both against the damp wall of the dark stairwell. One of her father’s guards walked clumsily past the foot of the stairs, retied his hose, and made his way back to his straw pallet. Alice hastily snuffed the candle and hoped the man did not hear Ela’s gasp as the pure black stillness of the old castle surrounded them.

  “Come,” Alice whispered, having neither the time nor the inclination to listen to Ela’s protestations.

  The night was clear and cool, and, as Alice knew they would be, two horses waited for her and her maid. Alice smiled as she threw herself into the saddle on the dark stallion. Later, she would reward the stableboy who took such good and proper care of his lady.

  “My lady!” Ela whined in desperation.

  But Alice did not turn because she knew that Ela was too fat to mount the horse by herself. Alice would not waste even one of her precious minutes on an aged and useless woman—not when Gavin waited for her.

  The river door in the wall had been left open for her. It had rained earlier and the ground was wet, yet there was a touch of spring in the air. And with it came a sense of promise—and passion.

  When she was sure the horse’s hooves would not be heard, she leaned forward and whispered to him. “Go, my black devil. Take me to my lover.” The stallion pranced to show he understood, then stretched his front legs long and straight. It knew the way and ate up ground at a tremendous rate.

  Alice shook her head, letting the air blow against her face as she gave herself over to the power and strength of the magnificent animal. Gavin. Gavin. Gavin, the hooves seemed to say as they thundered on the hard-packed road. There were many ways that the muscle of a horse between her thighs reminded her of Gavin. His strong hands on her body, the strength of him that made her weak with desire. His face, the moonlight glinting on his cheekbones, his eyes bright even on the darkest night.

  “Ah, my sweet, careful now,” Alice said lightly as she pulled back on the reins. Now that she was nearing the trysting place, she began to remember what she had so carefully tried to forget. This time Gavin would have heard of her impending marriage, and he would be angry with her.

  She turned her face to catch the wind directly. She blinked rapidly until the tears began to form. Tears would help. Gavin always hated tears, so she had used them carefully during the last two years. Only when she desperately wanted something did she resort to the trick; thus it did not grow thin from overuse.

  Alice sighed. Why couldn’t she speak honestly to Gavin? Why must men always be treated so gently? He loved her, therefore he should love what she did, however disagreeable to him. It was a useless hope and she knew it. If she told Gavin the truth, she would lose him. Then where would she find another lover?

  The memory of his body, hard and demanding, made Alice push the heels of her soft shoes into the horse’s side. Oh yes, she would use tears or whatever else was needed to keep Gavin Montgomery, a knight of renown, a fighter without equal…and hers, all hers!

  Suddenly, she could almost hear Ela’s needling questions. If Alice wanted Gavin, why then was she promising herself to Edmund Chatworth, a man with skin the color of a fish’s belly, with fat, soft hands and an ugly little mouth that formed a perfect circle?

  Because Edmund was an earl. He owned land from one end of England to the other, estates in Ireland, Wales, Scotland, and, it was rumored, in France as well. Of course Alice could not know exactly the extent of his wealth, but she would. Oh yes, when she was his wife, she would know. Edmund’s mind was as weak as his body, and it would not be long before she controlled him as well as his property. She would keep him happy with a few whores and tend to the estates herself, unhampered by any man’s interfering demands and commands.

  Alice had a passion for the handsome Gavin but that did not cloud her judgment. Who was Gavin Montgomery? A minor baron—not rich, but poor. A brilliant fighter, a strong, handsome man, but he had no wealth—not compared to Edmund. And what would life with Gavin be? The nights would be nights of passion and ecstasy, but Alice knew well that no woman would ever control Gavin. If she married Gavin, he would expect her to stay home and do women’s work. No, no woman would ever control Gavin Montgomery. He would be as demanding a husband as he was a lover.

  She pushed the horse forward. She wanted it all—Edmund’s fortune and position and Gavin’s passion. She smiled as she straightened the gold brooches, one on either shoulder, that held the flamboyant mantle in place. He loved her—Alice was confident he did—and she would not lose his love. How could she? What woman came close to her in beauty?

  Alice began blinking rapidly. A few tears and he would understand that she was being forced to marry Edmund. Gavin was a man of honor. He would understand that she must uphold her father’s agreement with Edmund. Yes, if she were cautious, she would have them both; Gavin for the nights, Edmund’s wealth for the day.

  Gavin stood silently—waiting. The only part of him that moved was a muscle in his jaw, flexing and unflexing. The silver moonlight glinted off his cheekbones until they looked like knife blades. His straight, firm mouth was drawn into a severe line above a cleft chin. His gray eyes were black with anger, almost as black as the hair that curled about the neck of the wool jacket.

  Only long years of strenuous training as a knight allowed him such rigid outward control. Inside, he was seething. This morning he’d heard that the woman he loved was to marry another; to bed with another man, her children belonging to him. His first impulse had been to ride straight to the Valence keep and demand that she deny what he’d heard. But his pride held him back. This meeting with her had been arranged weeks ago, so he forced himself to wait until he could see her again, hold her again and hear her tell him, from her own sweet lips, what he wanted to hear. She would marry no one but him. Of that he was sure.

  He stared across the emptiness of the night, listening for the sound of hoofbeats; but the countryside was silent, a mass of darkness broken only by the darker shadows. A dog skulked from one tree to the next, eyeing Gavin, wary of the silent, still man. The night brought back memories of the first time he and Alice had met in this clearing, a wind-sheltered place open to the sky. In the day a man could ride past it and not notice it, but at night the shadows transformed it into a black velvet box, only big enough to hold a jewel.

  Gavin had met Alice at the wedding of one of her sisters. Althought the Montgomeries and the Valences were neighbors, they rarely saw each other. Alice’s father was a drunkard. He cared little for his estates; he lived—and forced his wife and five daughters to live—as poorly as some serfs. It was out of a sense of duty that Gavin attended a wedding there, as a repres
entative of his family actually, his three brothers having refused to go.

  Out of the dung heap of filth and neglect, Gavin saw Alice—his beautiful, innocent Alice. He could not at first believe she was one of the family of fat, plain daughters. Her clothes were of the richest materials, her manners delicate and refined, and her beauty…

  He’d sat and stared at her, as several of the other young men did. She was perfect; blonde hair, blue eyes, a little mouth that he ached to make smile. Right then, before he’d even spoken to her, he’d become infatuated with her. Later, he had to plow his way through men to get to her side. His violence seemed to shock Alice and her lowered eyes, her soft voice had mesmerized him further. She was so shy, so reticent that she could hardly answer his questions. Alice was all and more than he could hope for—virginal yet womanly.

  That night, he asked her to marry him. She gave him a startled look, her eyes like sapphires for a moment. Then she lowered her head and murmured something about needing to ask her father.

  The next day Gavin went to the drunkard and asked for Alice, but the man gave him some nonsense about the girl’s mother needing her. His words were strangely halting, as if he’d been coached and spoke a memorized speech. Nothing Gavin said could make Valence change his mind.

  Gavin left in disgust, furious at being thwarted from having the woman he wanted. He had not ridden far when he saw her. Her hair was uncovered, the setting sun making it glow, the rich blue velvet of her gown reflecting her eyes. She was anxious to hear what her father’s answer was. Gavin told her, angrily, and then he’d seen her tears. Alice tried to hide them, but he could feel them as well as see them. In minutes, he was off his horse, pulling her from hers. He didn’t remember how it happened. One minute he was comforting her. The next, they were here, in this secret place, their clothes removed and in the throes of passion. He did not know whether to apologize or rejoice. Sweet Alice was no serf to tumble in the hay; she was a lady, someday to be his lady. And she was a virgin. Of that he was sure when he saw the two drops of blood on her slim thighs.