As though a servant were beneath him, the physician turned away, though not to descend to the hall that had been his destination. But as he set foot on the stairs that accessed the third floor, Sir Angus caught his arm.
“Baron Soames waits on you.” The knight’s tone evidenced rebuke. “He would know the state of his mother’s health.”
A flush crept up the man’s neck. “First, I must speak with Lady Raisa.”
To inform her of the identity of her son’s betrothed, Laura guessed.
“Nay, Martin, first you must wait on the Lord of Lexeter, he who pays your wages.”
The man’s jaw clenched so hard Laura heard the grind of his teeth, then he pulled free and started down the stairs.
“Mercy,” Tina muttered.
“I do not like him,” Clarice said, blessedly not loud enough to carry far. “I pray I do not fall ill.”
“Worry not,” Sir Angus said, “though soured by age and circumstance, Martin is accomplished at healing and knows well his medicinals.”
Were he of a mind to minister to one who sought his care, Laura thought.
“Martin has tended my lord’s mother for over a score of years,” he added.
Of course he had.
Grateful for Sir Angus’s intercession, Laura managed a smile. “If you would show us to our chamber, we shall allow you to return to your duties.”
He turned and led the way down the corridor.
The lady of the castle was distraught. Lothaire did not need the physician to tell him that, nor give his opinion on his lord’s betrothed whom he had encountered abovestairs—doubtless, an unpleasant meeting once the man learned the identity of the woman Sebille and he had looked upon from the upper window.
Of course Martin did not like the cuckolding Laura Middleton, protective as he was of Raisa, but just as Lothaire’s mother would not long suffer the barony’s new mistress, neither would the physician. When Raisa moved to her dower property, Martin would go with her, meaning another physician must be found—further expense to make the bellies of Lexeter’s coffers groan. As for Sebille, unless she could be persuaded to abandon the burden of companion and caregiver to their mother, she would also be leaving.
Breathing deep, Lothaire reminded himself his immediate concern was the audience with his mother, which would be more difficult had Angus not insisted the physician report to his lord. Otherwise, Martin would have informed Raisa of who came to High Castle, and she would be beyond distraught.
As Lothaire believed it better he deliver the tidings, he had sent a missive to Sebille and Angus ahead of his return. After informing them to hold close the knowledge of whom he was to wed, he had directed them to prepare the castle folk to receive their new lady, prepare the second-floor room Laura would occupy until the wedding, and move Lady Raisa to the third floor rear-facing chamber to ensure she was not at a window when he returned from court and—of equal import—put distance between her and the lady she loathed.
“This will end your mother,” the physician’s hiss returned the Baron of Lexeter to the man’s presence.
“Not if I am the one to tell her. I shall make her see the good of it.”
“What good?”
Lothaire raised his eyebrows. “You shall remain belowstairs until I send for you.”
“But Lady Raisa—”
“Until I send for you, Martin.” Lothaire gestured at the chairs before the hearth.
The man’s stocky body swelled as if to set upon an enemy, but as ever—excepting when Lothaire was a boy and his offenses earned him a shove, a shake, or a cuff to the ear—Martin acceded with a curt nod.
Lothaire lifted his tankard of bitterly warm ale and drank as he followed the physician’s progress to the hearth. When the man dropped so heavily into a chair it screeched backward, Lothaire turned his thoughts to the meeting to be had after he conferred with Sir Angus. But not for the first time these two days, his mind veered off its path and conjured remembrance of the night at Castle Soaring.
He hated that it bothered so much to discover Laura yet felt for another what he had once believed she would only feel for him. Turn his stomach though it did to admit it—even if only to himself—from the moment he had caught her up in his arms in the queen’s apartment, to the moment he pressed his lips to her palm and she whispered the same memories haunted her, to the moment ere she went into Michael D’Arci’s arms, he had thought they could do better than make the best of their marriage. That they might even reclaim a fraction of the love they had once shared.
“Fool,” he muttered and nodded to the servant who approached with a pitcher of ale.
Shortly, Angus reappeared. Out of hearing of the physician, the knight reassured his lord that though Laura’s encounter with the man had been tense, naught untoward had happened, then he told that the lady and her daughter were pleased with their accommodations.
Next, Lothaire asked after his mother. As expected, Raisa was fitful over her confinement and Sebille bore the brunt of her anger.
That last was told with resentment, a reminder that once Angus had wished to wed Sebille. When Raisa rejected his offer, Sebille refused to go against her mother’s wishes despite Lothaire’s consent. It was many years since the knight had ceased his pursuit of Sebille after exhausting his patience on waiting for Lady Raisa’s wasting sickness to claim her so her daughter was free to wed. Now, even if the tidings the Baron of Lexeter was to wed his former betrothed put his mother in her grave, it would likely change naught.
The Sebille whom Angus had loved was gone. Though she had once been vibrant and joyful, the loss of their father had caused much of the light to go out of the girl deemed a miracle by their parents. One would not know she had once had a lovely lilt to her voice and been quick to smile and laugh. As for her appearance, except on the rare occasion she washed the hair severely braided back off her face, one would not know it was golden-red, and her feminine curves had been lost to an appetite so diminished one sometimes had to look twice to be certain of her presence when she stood in profile. Though thirty and one years aged, it was almost more believable she was Lothaire’s mother.
“I am sorry Lady Raisa was difficult,” Lothaire said.
Angus arched an eyebrow. “I am not the one to suffer for it.”
As ever when his sister rose between them, Lothaire longed to apologize for what Angus and Sebille had lost. But it would only unsettle the knight whose attempts to suppress his anger would turn him silent for days.
Deciding it was time to reveal to his mother who would birth Lexeter’s heir, Lothaire thanked Angus and strode to the stairs. He took them two at a time, continued past the first landing, and ascended the second flight.
Sebille stood halfway down the corridor, face gaunt, hands clasped beneath barely existent breasts.
As he neared, he saw the circlet of rough-hewn stones by which she counted her prayers spilled over her fingers to gently sway against the worn blue of her gown. “Forgive me for being so long in returning,” he said, halting before her.