bones. “You cannot part the reflected sky with your feet either, child,” he said gently. “You know that really, don’t you?” The boy sucked his lower lip and nodded.
“She would want you to grieve for her like a good son, but wouldn’t she also want you to go on with your life and become a big, strong man who cares for others?” 225
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Another nod and a shy look upwards from big dark blue eyes.
Will gave the child an assessing look. “I have a task for you,” he said. “I have a mind to gift my lady the queen with a guard dog for her chamber door, but he is still only a pup and he is missing his own mother. I want you to be responsible for taking care of him while he is still very small. Do you think you could do that?”
Adam stared at him, his gaze growing round and wide. “Do you have him here now?”
“No, but I will send him from the kennels before the week is out, I promise you. One thing you should know about me is that I always keep my promises.” He looked at Adeliza as he spoke and she looked back at him with moist eyes. He lifted a warning forefinger. “It is a very important duty; I would not give it to just anyone.”
The boy nodded and straightened his spine in a soldierly fashion. Will responded to the gesture with a firm nod of his own to seal the matter. An instant later, a plump woman bustled up to them and began clucking over the boy like an agitated mother hen. This, then, was Hella.
After she had hurried him away to be cleaned up, Adeliza turned to Will. “That was kindly done.” He gave an embarrassed shrug. “Something to care for helps to take one’s mind away from grieving—or so I have found.” He knelt to her again, rose, and turned to his horse.
She watched him mount the beast: a handsome pied animal, powerful and solid like him, with a kindly eye.
“Thank you,” she said. “…for everything.” He made a gruff disclaimer and, with another salute from his saddle, rode out.
Adeliza watched the porter close the gates and listened until the clop of hooves and the jingle of harness faded to birdsong. Then she returned to her chamber. William D’Albini’s 226
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vigorous masculine energy had disturbed the air, and it had a completely different scent and feel now, as if the season had changed in a moment.
ttt
Stephen eyed the golden bundle of puppy squirming in Will’s arms. “This is a gift for the dowager queen?” He looked both dubious and amused. “It will chew her shoes and piss on her dress and you know how finicky she is. I would think there are better things to take her if you desire to win her favour.” Will raised his chin and the dog followed him with a fast pink tongue, destroying all his dignity. “It is a gift I promised to a child under her care at Wilton,” he replied.
Stephen raised one eyebrow. “A leper child?” Will shook his head. “He’s an orphan my lady has taken into her household.”
“I see.” Stephen gave him a keen look. “But you are taking the whelp yourself, not entrusting it to a servant?” Will put the pup down and it immediately attacked his shoes.
He drew a deep breath. “Sire,” he said, “I ask your permission to court the dowager queen with a view to making her my wife.” Stephen’s eyes widened. “God’s blood, you are ambitious!” His amusement remained but mingled with wariness now. “Just how long have you been brooding on this notion?” Will gave the puppy a gentle side shove with his foot and it growled at him. “I have always honoured the dowager queen and thought highly of her, sire. She has been in mourning for two years and it seemed to me that if she was not set on the cloister, I could offer her an honourable marriage.”
“And the way to a woman’s heart is through deeds of kindness, especially when you cannot hope to compete with what she had as a queen?” Stephen said with a knowing smile.
Will was uncomfortable with that assessment because while it was partly true, it also made coarse cloth from fabric he 227
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considered very fine. There were many things he could give her that had not been hers as queen of