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the winding stairs to her room. It was while she was before her door arguing with Lucy that Ranulf approached his chamber.
    “May I assist in any matter?”
    Lyonene gave him a look of desperation. “Lucy’s sister in the village is ill, but Lucy fears to leave me alone for even one night. I promise her I shall not come to harm surrounded by so many guards.”
    Ranulf took the old woman’s plump hand and kissed it. “Will it put you at your ease if I swear on oath to protect the lady with my life?”
    Lucy sniffed, but Ranulf’s treatment of her had more effect than she would admit—that the king’s earl should kiss her hand! “And who, pray tell, will protect my lady from handsome young gentlemen such as yourself?”
    “Lucy!” Lyonene gasped.
    Ranulf bowed low before the rotund little woman. “I have heard that Lady Lyonene keeps fierce dogs and a great hawk in her room that attack any intruders like a pack of demons.”
    Lucy could not keep from laughing for she knew the story well. “The two of you are a pair—nary a serious bone in your body. I’m off then and…” She threw up her hands. “I hope I do not live to regret this.”
    Lyonene and Ranulf watched as she waddled down the stairs, mumbling to herself. Awkward together in the ensuing silence, they were quiet.
    “I hope you will like your chamber and that everything pleases you.”
    Ranulf ran a finger along her jaw. “I am well pleased by Lorancourt and everything in it.” He knew he could not stand so close to her in the darkened hall and not pull her into his arms. “Good night,” he said abruptly and left her.
    Lyonene went to her own chamber and began to undress. It was a good feeling of freedom to be alone without Lucy. She stood in her chemise before the fire. So much had happened this day. She remembered their laughter over the race, and the story she told, his blush, and then she remembered his kiss and the feel of his skin as she bathed him. She moved away from the fire, for she had grown very warm.
    He had said he could not stay for two days more, and she dreaded his leaving.
    She climbed into the high feather bed, pulling the thick woolen comforter about her. Exhausted, she soon fell asleep.
    Ranulf paced the small chamber for a while, his soft leather shoes silent on the thick rushes. It had been ten and five years since the boy he once was had lain in a girl’s parents’ chamber and dreamed of a happy life. Since then he had changed, convincing himself that what he had once sought was not possible. There were few happy marriages, and he had no longer considered the possibility of such a future. King Edward pressed him to marry a Castilian princess, very rich and very ugly. He had almost resigned himself to the fate of such a marriage. But now there was Lyonene.
    He must consider. Was it love he felt for her or just the sin of lust? He dismissed this. Lust he had felt often, but never had he considered marriage to the woman.
    For a moment a picture formed of Lyonene sitting before the great fire in Malvoisin, a fat, healthy baby on a carpet at her feet. The lights played with her hair, and as he entered the hall, she would rise and greet him. He brushed the picture away with his hand.
    He sat heavily on the edge of the bed. He had learned the ways of war and had often been afraid before a battle, but never had he felt such fear as now. Could he once again turn his life, his heart, over to a young girl? Could he overcome it again if Lyonene betrayed him as Isabel had?
    Silently, he opened his door and just as silently made his way into Lyonene’s chamber. She lay on her back, her face turned toward him, her hair spread in a great waterfall about her. One hand was hidden beneath the covers, the other, palm upward by her face.
    He touched her hair, lifting a healthy strand from where it fell down the side of the mattress, letting a curl wind about his wrist. Her lashes were little wings on her cheeks, her mouth slightly puckered,