said, “I bit him,” and drew the back of a hand across her mouth.
“Of course the little fox did, but methinks it also your blood.”
“Very little.” Hoping to keep him from harming Bjorn, she said, “I am also at fault. In the hope of lowering his guard so I might escape, I have allowed him to believe I like his kisses.”
“That does not excuse what he did.”
“You are right, but you should know that before you entered, he had seen the wrong of it. Now tell, what does trusting you mean, Vitalis?”
As if loath to abandon imaginings of what was due the young Dane, it was some moments before he answered. “It means playing neither vixen nor termagant. It means behaving as you did not during the trade for the abbess though you were gagged and bound in the hope of preventing what still you affected.”
“But—”
“Non, do not speak,” he said, but it was not his command that silenced her. It was his switch from English to Norman-French as if to ensure she understood the seriousness of the matter. Perhaps more, it was his accent being strangely perfect for all its imperfection—so much she imagined blowing out the candles and sitting in the dark listening to him speak her language to her.
“As you ought to have learned this night when whatever you spoke made the lamb of Bjorn into a lion,” he said, “you are to keep your tongue about you. You will sit quietly in this room and let what happens happen.”
Her musings having ventured beyond merely sharing the dark with him and his voice, to resting her head on his shoulder, she resented what he asked—rather, demanded. And for what?
“Is that what you do, Vitalis?” She shook her head. “You do not. In allying with Hereward and the Danes who continue to resist what cannot be resisted, the mighty warrior is far from content with letting what happens happen.”
He lowered his face near hers. “I am a warrior, and no matter what Lady Hawisa taught you that has been of no aid in escaping your captors, you are not a warrior. You are a woman held by her enemy, and that places you in great danger.”
The earl… How quick she was to forget the threat Bjorn’s sire could make good by simply ordering those outside her door inside.
“As for my alliances,” Vitalis continued, “they are in place only as long as they serve you.”
She startled. “Me?”
He inclined his head. “Rather than make the mantle piece a weapon of humiliation, did I not give it to you to see it returned to William?”
“You did.” A moment later, she exclaimed, “Still I have it!” She thrust a hand down her laced bodice and plucked out the cloth. And sensed his unsettling. Realizing what she did was inappropriate, she lowered the cloth. “Be assured, I will pass it to Maël.”
“Just as I did not join Prince Canute weeks past to aid his sire in taking the throne from William,” he continued as if she had not spoken, “I did not join Hereward to overthrow Le Bâtard. Then and now I am where I do not wish to be in order to keep the word given Lady Hawisa to return you to your family.”
Then he was here for her…
“Now you understand, Nicola?”
She nodded.
“You will trust me and do as I say?”
She nodded.
“You realize that requires you behave and be ready when I come for you?”
Another nod.
Amid mustache and bearded chin, his lips curved, making it difficult to be offended though likely he thought her an amusement. “I did not believe it possible to render Nicola D’Argent speechless.”
“I…” She moistened her lips. Unlike with Bjorn, she did not regret that it drew Vitalis’s gaze. Might he—?
“I will speak with Hereward about adding his men to your watch to ensure no Dane trespasses again.”
“Then you know the earl is more to be feared than Bjorn?” she asked.
He inclined his head. “I leave you now,” he said and strode opposite.
“Vitalis?”
He looked around. “Lady?”
She wished he would not title her. Much she preferred being only Nicola to him. “I thank you. Be assured I shall do all I can to assist you in keeping your word to Lady Hawisa.”
His brow grooved. “Just be still and do as told when told. That is all I shall ever require of you, vixen.”
Chapter Six
More Danes had arrived, and these were of greater import, as told by the messenger who revealed all he had witnessed after Hereward granted him permission