Dreams of Lilacs

Chapter 7



Isabelle sat in a chair near the fire and thought she might like to forget the events of the morning.

It was odd, wishing she could trade the memories she had for ones she no longer had, but being pulled into a relatively deserted part of the courtyard by a man with less-than-chivalrous intentions was something she would have preferred not to remember. Knowing she was responsible for the saints only knew what where Gervase’s guardsmen were concerned was worse.

She’d spent the rest of the day in Gervase’s solar, mending and being quite grateful for a gown that fit and didn’t sport a rent down its front. She’d had her meals brought to her, been escorted to the garderobe as often as she cared to be, and passed the rest of the time doing something she didn’t mind doing. It gave her ample time to watch the goings-on around her.

Brothers had arrived singly or in pairs as seemed to suit them until she had all of them in the solar with her. Even Guy had joined them after supper, having been prevailed upon by his younger brothers to read them something. Isabelle could scarce believe anyone was wealthy enough to own so many folios, but she couldn’t deny what she’d seen.

It was a gathering she was accustomed to, which gave her a strange sort of comfort. It also wasn’t as if she wouldn’t have been sitting at home, stitching as well, which also gave her comfort. Yves had spent the past hour sitting on a stool in front of the fire, moving that stool progressively closer to her until he was leaning against the front of her chair. She ruffled his hair at one point and had a sweet smile in return. It was enough like being with her nieces and nephews that she felt her heart be eased.

Fabien was lying on the rug at her feet, contemplating soldiers someone had carved out of wood. Lucien and Pierre were engaged in chess and Joscelin was sitting to her left, staring thoughtfully into the fire.

Guy set aside the book suddenly and sighed. “Enough for the moment.” He looked at her. “Demoiselle, you needn’t continue to ply your needle. Take your ease.”

She smiled, though she did set down the sheet she was hemming. “I thank you for your concern, but I don’t consider this taxing work. I’ve done it at home often enough.”

Joscelin looked at her carefully. “Are your memories returning, then?”

“I remember how to stitch,” she hedged. “Is that not enough for the day?”

He smiled pleasantly. “I suppose so, for it means my hose perhaps might cease to have holes in the toes. But let’s stretch ourselves to choose a name for you.” He looked at his brothers. “Lads?”

“Marie,” Yves said promptly. “I like that name.”

“Something more elegant,” Fabien said.

“Hildegard,” Joscelin said.

Isabelle shot him a look, but he only laughed.

“Something else, perhaps. Imogen or Catherine or Isolde.” He looked at her. “What do you think?”

“I think I don’t have an opinion,” she said promptly. Actually, she did have an opinion and that was that Joscelin was thinking on a few too many names similar to her own for her taste. Perhaps it made no difference if he did know who she was, but obviously her father’s injunctions about secrecy were too ingrained in her to ignore.

“I won’t pester you,” Joscelin said pleasantly. “Instead, why don’t you pester us? Ask us anything you like and we’ll give you the complete truth.”


She looked at the collection of Gervase’s brothers and wondered why he wasn’t there with him. “Where is your brother?” she asked, before she thought better of it.

Guy laughed a bit. “He is the most interesting of us, to be sure. And I imagine he’s off doing lord-of-the-manor things. I’m happy to see him take over the task, though I was willing to see to it in his stead for a bit.”

“Guy is too modest,” Joscelin said. “The keep would have gone to ruin without him. He is also the one who pulled Gervase from the fire and saved the hall.”

Isabelle shifted to look at Joscelin. “Is the entire tale tellable or would that be asking too much to know it?”

“’Tis freely told as long as Gervase isn’t within earshot,” Joscelin said seriously. “’Twas last fall when the harvest was full on—”

“Nay, you must go farther back than that,” Guy said. “He wouldn’t have been here if Father had been alive, which would have changed the entire sequence of events.” He looked at Isabelle. “Our father died almost a year ago, you see, and our mother—well, let’s say she wanted to pursue her interests elsewhere. At court, as it happens.”

Isabelle had seen the clothing the woman had left behind and even that small glimpse into her trunk had told her perhaps all she needed to know. Things were assuredly more refined in France when it came to fashion, but even the woman’s leavings were sumptuous, far beyond anything her own mother would have thought to have made up. Far too costly.

“Is she still there?” Isabelle ventured.

Guy nodded. “She writes now and again, just to see how we fare.”

“To describe her lavish life,” Lucien said in disgust, “and remind us to see her kept firmly in it.”

Guy shot him a look. “Hold your tongue, brother.” He looked at Isabelle and smiled. “My mother’s family was not wealthy and my father was good enough over the course of his lifetime to see to their needs. Gervase has made a few changes.”

“Be honest about it,” Joscelin said with a frown. “Gervase sees to the care of our mother’s family without hesitation. Our uncles he has cut off, but you must admit they deserve as much.”

Guy conceded the point with a nod. “They are a fine collection of wastrels, true. At least our aunt is seen to along with Mother and Grandmère, so I don’t suppose they have any reason to complain.”

“Nay, they do not,” Joscelin said pointedly.

Isabelle assumed, based on the looks they were exchanging, that they had had this conversation more than once.

Joscelin turned to her. “As Guy was saying, our Father died a year and a half ago. Gervase and I were off tourneying—”

“Again,” Guy grumbled.

“’Tis hardly our fault you don’t care for it,” Joscelin said with a shrug. “You were invited to come along, more than once.”

“I had other things to do,” Guy said quietly. “Here, as it happens.”

“Which was your choice.” Joscelin turned back to Isabelle. “As I was saying, Ger and I were off razing the countryside and plunging cheeky knights into poverty by ransoming them for ridiculous sums when we received word that our father was dead. We hurried—”

Guy sighed but said nothing.

“We hurried,” Joscelin said, “but we were quite far away and by the time we returned, Father was already buried. The only reason the hall wasn’t in complete chaos was because our good Guy here took charge. Very capably done.”

“Thank you,” Guy said dryly. He looked at Isabelle. “Once my brother returned, he of course took his rightful place. He named the day of harvest as was custom, though he has unusual ideas about how that should be accomplished—”

“What Guy means is that Ger went out in the fields and actually picked things off vines,” Joscelin said with a snort, “which Guy finds slightly beneath him.”

“It is good to maintain the boundaries of rank,” Guy said mildly.

Isabelle supposed they had had that conversation more than once as well. It was odd, she had to admit, to watch the men of another family discuss things they had obviously had a lifetime’s worth of discussion over. She could have sat in her father’s solar at Artane, brought up a simple topic, and predicted exactly what her family would say about it. Here, there were undercurrents she didn’t expect and couldn’t anticipate. She wondered what Gervase would say about any of it, if anything.

“He has his reasons to associate with the peasantry,” Joscelin said.

“And see you how those reasons have served him!”

“Guy, he wasn’t in the fields when he was attacked, he was in the hall.”

“Attacked?” Isabelle asked.

Joscelin nodded. “Though there is a bit of confusion surrounding that. Guy isn’t completely wrong when he suggests that Gervase being in the fields contributed to the disaster. The last time I saw my brother that day, he was speaking to his forester. I was distracted by an exceedingly handsome wench who I fear I thought might enjoy a tour of the stables—”

“And did she?”

Joscelin smiled faintly. “I don’t remember, actually. By the time we’d examined the very fine qualities of my brother’s horseflesh, I could smell smoke. I fear I left her behind. I ran to the hall, meeting Guy along the way, and we came inside to find Gervase lying on the floor and the hall on fire around him. If Guy hadn’t been there, we wouldn’t have saved him.”

“How terrible,” she murmured.

“It was Fate,” Guy said. “I found my brother on the floor, unconscious, a bolt sticking out of his leg and a heavy stone from the mantel crushing his right arm. Joscelin arrived just in time and we managed to pull Gervase to safety.” He shot Joscelin a look. “I still say something must have happened to him in the fields.”

“So he could drag himself back to the hall by himself, then set the whole damned place on fire?” Joscelin asked. “Help me understand how that is possible.”

“Men can be carried, you half-wit.”

“Why not let him simply rot in the field—”

Joscelin stopped speaking abruptly. Isabelle looked up and understood why. Gervase stood at the doorway, looking less than pleased. He walked into the solar and shut the door behind him. Guy rose without having been asked and vacated what was obviously Gervase’s chair.

The lord of the hall limped over, then lowered himself with obvious effort into the chair. He leaned his head back against the wood and closed his eyes. Isabelle had no trouble discerning that he was in obvious pain.

If he had been caught in a fire, he was very fortunate it hadn’t touched his face. As for the rest of him, he didn’t look overly damaged save his right hand, which looked as if he’d thrust it into a cooking fire. She supposed it was too late to heal it, though she wasn’t above considering a thing or two. Not that he would have allowed it, likely. If his brothers fell silent about his accident when he entered a chamber, he certainly wasn’t going to want to discuss it with her.

She considered, then looked at Joscelin. “Have you a lute?”

Gervase opened his eyes and looked at her in surprise. “You can play?”

“Ah,” she managed, stalling as best she could. “Can’t everyone?”

“Perhaps she is a jongleur,” Yves said from where he sat in front of her. He twisted around and looked at her. “Are you, mistress?”


“I suppose anything is possible,” she said, “though I’m sure my skills are paltry compared to any of yours.”

“Does anyone in your family play?” Joscelin asked.

“My—” She shut her mouth. “I don’t think I remember.”

“Don’t torment the girl, Jos,” Guy said with a snort. He walked over to a trunk and pulled out a lute. “I’ll entertain you with my paltry skills.”

His skills were hardly that, though Isabelle supposed her brother John was the far superior lutenist. She closed her eyes and found she could bring to mind numerous times when she had sat in her father’s solar, listening in just such a way to her younger brother trot out the songs he had learned from the extremely expensive master he’d studied with. Their grandmother had paid for those lessons and Isabelle had taken her share, so she supposed the gold had been well spent.

She realized almost immediately that playing for anyone would be a very bad idea indeed. Whilst she recognized many of the songs Guy played, she found there were many she didn’t know. If she were to play the things she knew, it was entirely possible someone might make note of them and divine where she had learned them.

“Bed, lads,” Gervase said suddenly, interrupting Guy during a song. “Guy, give Joscelin your lute and see the lads safely to where they belong.”

Guy rose willingly enough and handed his lute to Joscelin. “Put that away,” he commanded.

Joscelin nodded and merely watched his brother gather up the rest of the brothers and leave the solar. Isabelle reached for her stitching, but Gervase shook his head.

“Play for me.”

She bit back half a dozen retorts that came immediately to mind. Indeed, all that time she’d spent writing down her brothers’ most stinging replies had obviously not been wasted. But the man was feeding her, he had rescued her not once but twice. And she had the feeling that he was baiting her for what were no doubt his own perverse reasons. She looked at him narrowly, lest he mistake compliance for acquiescence, then took the lute from Joscelin.

“Anything in particular your commanding self would care to hear?”

“Something in tune, hopefully.”

It was on the tip of her tongue to tell Gervase to go to Hell, but she thought that might be ill-advised. She took the lute, retuned it, then sat and thought for a moment or two before she chose something that John had claimed to have heard the last time he’d been in London. She didn’t watch either of the brothers as she played, preferring to watch the fire so she didn’t have to see their reactions. She was hardly her brother’s equal, but she had sung with him often enough and she could certainly tell when she was out of tune.

She finished and hazarded a glance at her audience. Joscelin was simply watching her with a small smile on his face.

Gervase, however, was gaping at her.

“Out of tune?” she asked sweetly.

He shut his mouth. “Another.” He paused. “If you please.”

“Do you know this?” Joscelin asked and hummed a tune. “I’ll sing it with you, if you like.”

She was surprised not by the offer, but by how it caught her about the heart. How many times had she and John done the same thing to entertain their family in the evenings? It wasn’t so much that which grieved her as it was the fact that she couldn’t remember the last time she’d done the like. After Michelmas? In the dead of winter? She closed her eyes briefly and tried to bring to mind the last thing she could remember. She could see Arthur’s face and felt a sense of urgency about the conversation, but she had no idea what the conversation had been about. It had been at her father’s gates, which wasn’t a surprise given that her father never allowed him inside.

She took a deep breath and ignored her unease. At the very least, she had to get word to someone that she was well, though she supposed she could just as easily walk out the front gates and trudge to Beauvois. She supposed the easiest thing to do would have been to simply tell Gervase who she was and ask for an escort, but something stopped her. For all she knew, she had come to France with the express purpose of accomplishing something at Monsaert, though what that could have been save proving to herself that Gervase de Seger did indeed not have horns, she couldn’t have said.

But word, at least, would have to be sent.

Guy was the most likely choice. He was always leaving the keep for one reason or another. Perhaps he wouldn’t be opposed to a little errand of mercy to the abbey at Caours.

“My lady?”

She looked at Joscelin and smiled. “Sorry. I was lost in thought.”

“Finding any memories in the weeds there?”

She realized what he’d called her, but assumed that was just Joscelin being polite. She shook her head. “Nothing useful. Let’s sing.”

Joscelin had a lovely voice. She was slightly surprised to find there was a third voice as well, humming the occasional octave below where she was, then occasionally adding a more complicated harmony. She finished the last note, then looked at Gervase.

“Very lovely, my lord.”

He took a deep breath, then put his hands on his knees. “You may play again tomorrow night.”

“Very gracious of you, my lord.”

He shot her a look, then looked at Joscelin. “She’ll sleep in my chamber—”

“But, Ger,” Joscelin said in surprise, “she cannot.”

“I wasn’t suggesting she sleep with me,” Gervase said stiffly, shooting his brother a murderous look. “She will take my bed because the chamber is the most secure. I will sleep here.”

“On the floor?” Isabelle said in surprise. “But you cannot.”

Gervase shot her a look. “I do believe, demoiselle, that you, being a servant, are not in a position to tell me what to do. And haven’t we had this discussion before?”

Isabelle considered what remained in her arsenal of feminine wiles. That thought felt very familiar, which left her wondering if perhaps she had considered the same quite recently. She struggled to latch on to the memory, but finally had to simply let it slip away. At least she remembered what she had to use in getting her way, not that she’d had to use that collection of levers very often. The truth was, she had never asked for very much which left her father granting her whatever small request she made of him without hesitation.

She suspected, though, that coming to France without a dozen of his fiercest guardsmen had been something she hadn’t dared even approach him about, which led her to wonder just how she’d managed it and who had come with her.

And where they were at present.

She rose, returned the lute to its place, then walked back to the fire and looked at Gervase.

“My lord, it is not coddling to insist that you use common sense. If you sleep on the floor, you will not be able to rise in the morning and then where will you be? Your people depend on you to protect them. How will you do it if you cannot move?”

He cursed, then heaved himself to his feet. He glared at her, seemingly on the off chance she had misinterpreted his first look, then walked out of the solar without speaking further. Isabelle looked at Joscelin.

“That went well,” she said.

“He’s touchy.”

“He has reason, I daresay.”

Joscelin rose and smiled. “He does, but don’t let him trouble you. If I had said the same thing, he would have acquainted my mouth with his fist. Repeatedly.”


“I can’t believe that.”

He laughed a little. “Very well, he has never struck me. I won’t say, however, how often he has repaid me for some imagined slight in the lists.” He tilted his head sideways a bit and studied her. “What do you know of him?”

“That he’s a warlock who sacrifices small animals when the moon is full.”

“Is that so?” Joscelin asked, his eyes twinkling.

She nodded. “I didn’t believe it, of course, because I don’t believe in ghosts and bogles and warlocks, but his reputation extends . . . ”

“Where?” Joscelin asked. “To where does it extend?”

She shut her mouth and glared at him.

“Your memory fails you, I see.”

“When I least expect it, it seems.”

He shot her a skeptical look, but started toward the door. “You’ll be safe here if you don’t mind the floor. I’ll find you a pallet and blankets. Bolt the door until I return, lady, if you would.”

She followed him to the door, then bolted it. She turned and looked over Gervase’s solar. She had the feeling it looked much as it had during his father’s time.

She rummaged about until she found a quill, ink, and a piece of parchment. She had selected the smallest one she could find, so perhaps it wouldn’t be missed. She had just sat down at Gervase’s table when a banging at the door almost sent her pitching forward onto the pot of ink. She took a deep breath, then went to answer the door.

Gervase stood there with a servant behind him, both of them carrying blankets. Isabelle stood back and watched as the servant laid out a pallet for her in front of the fire, spread a blanket on it, then built up the fire for her. He made Gervase a low bow, then fled the chamber with the alacrity of a man who thought remaining might spell his doom. Isabelle looked at Gervase to find him staring at the things atop his table. She stepped to block his view as unobtrusively as possible.

“What,” he asked, gesturing behind her, “do you think you’re doing?”

“Ah,” she said, because lying did not come readily to her, something she was obviously going to have to address sooner rather than later. “I was thinking that if a name came to me, I should write it down,” she attempted. “Because I can’t seem to hold on to the memories I have currently. Perhaps if I study the list, I might piece my past together.”

He studied her for a moment or two in silence, then shrugged. “Make free with my things, then.”

“I will repay you—”

He waved aside her words. “Nay, the offer was genuinely made. Feel free to scribble as much as you like. May I read the names as well? I might see something you don’t.”

She tried to speak, but what was she to say? Nay, you fool, you certainly shall not read any list, especially given that she had no intentions of making a list. What she was making was a missive to send to her grandmère to let her know details that she surely wouldn’t have any other way.

“I see I have intruded,” he said stiffly.

She looked at him in surprise. “Well, of course you haven’t. I was just thinking about what to say.”

He grunted at her. “You might consider that the next time you’re tempted to tell me how to run my hall.” He shot her a look. “What would your father have said if you had done the like to him?”

She supposed it was best not to answer that. “He preferred that I stay inside.”

“That wasn’t an answer.”

“Nay, my lord, I believe it wasn’t.”

He pursed his lips, then started back for the door. “Thank you for the help with my brothers. Their studies aren’t what they should be.”

“I was happy to aid them in what small way I could.”

He looked over his shoulder at her. “One wonders where a serving girl could possibly have learned so much Latin.”

“Perhaps one shouldn’t,” she said easily.

He turned and leaned back against the wall. “One wonders what else a simple serving girl can do.”

“Perhaps one should go to bed before his curiosity overwhelms him.”

He smiled.

She decided abruptly that too much speech with the lord of the hall was a very bad idea, indeed. She took a deep breath. “I daresay I should be abed.”

His smile faded, then he turned and walked out the door, pulling it closed behind him.

“Bolt it,” came his voice, low but clear through the door.

She crossed the chamber and threw the bolt home. She put her hands on the door and forced herself to take deep, even breaths. Even if she had been looking for a husband, she wouldn’t have chosen Gervase de Seger. He had secrets, he was ill-humored, he was exceptionally bossy to women he was in the midst of protecting. She suspected, after she’d considered that list to her satisfaction, that his worst flaw was his handsomeness when he scowled.

She didn’t want to think about how he looked when he smiled.

She shook herself, hoping to restore some small bit of good sense. She had a quest to be about, obviously, but the first thing to do was determine the lay of the land outside Monsaert. The fastest and easiest way to do that was to communicate without delay with her grandmother so her family wouldn’t think she was dead.

She walked across to Gervase’s desk, putting all thoughts of that desk’s owner behind her.

Not very successfully, but perhaps she could hope for nothing more.