Chapter Text
“Of course, Lady Edwards,” Maura called over her shoulder as she strode with swift determination toward the courtyard, hoping her exasperation and ire weren’t quite so clear in her voice as they were in her heart. “Naturally I shall be back in time for services.” She lifted her arm to murmur softly, soothingly to Beatrice, stroked gently along the falcon’s elegant shoulders.
“See that you are, Lady Maura,” Lady Edwards snapped as she hustled after her down the long carpeted hall. “People are already talking.”
“I cannot say I am excessively distressed by that, my lady,” Maura muttered, neither slowing her pace nor turning to face Lady Edwards. “You know as well as I—even better, perhaps—that I have been the subject of gossip since even before I arrived here. It is as it ever was. Ah,” she said, turning a sharp corner into the brightly-lit courtyard, “Mr. Hull. Thank you so much.”
“Good day, Lady Maura. Miss Beatrice,” the horse-master, Mr. Hull, said. “I was obliged to use her Ladyship’s tack this afternoon, as your replacement’s still in the shop with Mr. Latch. I’d say stay out of the thickets, but I know whose ears such words would fall on.” He gave her a wink, Maura returning a warm smile.
“I am sorry,” she sighed. “Kestrel was spooked by something and caught the reins on a remarkably sturdy branch.”
“Ah, I’m only teasing, now,” Mr. Hull said. “Though it do look odd, I admit, sending you out with such frippery.”
“I would have taken something plain, you know that,” Maura murmured, examining the bridle. Each joint and ring and clasp was capped or engraved or trimmed with the personal seal of the Infanta Lady Constance, in Castile for nearly fifteen years but alleged to be returning to Leicester with his Lordship any day, after all his many struggles and concessions on the Continent. It would change things, certainly; already the castle’s craftsmen were adorning everything they could find with the insignia of the Lord and Lady of Leicester Castle, down to every spare bridle, in anticipation of the three-day joust to celebrate their return. Both rather impious and, frankly, tasteless, but Lord John and Lady Constance were her noble patrons, so her opinions were as water, aside from her gratitude for the room and board.
“If the reins hold, it will be perfectly suitable,” she smiled, stepping on the mounting-block to ease onto her horse, the sleek, smoke-colored Kestrel. “Shall we, girl?”
The horse snorted, tossed her head. Maura laughed. Mr. Hull gave a booming chuckle; patted Kestrel on her smooth hip. “Good hunting, my lady.”
“Thank you, Mr. Hull.”
She adjusted her position in the saddle so that she could comfortably direct Kestrel with one hand while holding Beatrice at her resting height. The falcon twitched and purred as the horse set off through the bailey gate and onto the narrow north road away from the castle keep, toward the emerald-green countryside.
As soon as the castle and its bustling little town had vanished behind her she felt the usual tightness in her chest release, replaced by a sense of light, of freedom so pure and joyous she could not suppress the laugh that bubbled up as she urged Kestrel into a smooth gallop, the pace loosing Maura’s fitted mantle, her golden hair flying, the golden sun pouring its warmth over her like thick honey.
It wasn’t that she despised her noble existence; indeed, it was all she’d ever known. She had only faint memories of her infancy in Castile; of a sweet-faced nursemaid cooing to her, of the taste of pomegranates warmed by the sun, their rich red jewels bursting on her tongue. The bulk of her life had been spent in Leicester Castle, where her father had been sworn to John of Gaunt and had spent her entire life riding under his banners—and alongside the Black Prince, until his death—conquering France and northern Iberia, where he’d met her mother, a Princess of Castile who had perished producing her. She’d been quickly bundled back to England, to await the first of her two ill-fated marriages.
It was only by exceeding good fortune that her father had insisted she be educated in the manner of a noble lordling; Lord Arthur had made no secret of his desire for a son, but had privately expressed to some of his intimates his pleasure with his daughter’s unusual cleverness, and his insistence that if she were to bear the family name, she ought to be brought up to bear it honorably. Thus she had been taught sewing and music and court dances with her fellow highborn girl-children, though she had also been assigned to the particular care of the castle’s ancient magister, a wizened creature named Paulus Mercurius who disdained all company save his ravens, and Maura.
He taught her Latin beyond her prayer-book, and other languages besides, so that she might study his vast collection of manuscripts without requiring his constant attendance; her preference for solitary study was something the great master clearly appreciated in her. He taught her mathematics from the Arab masters and the fundaments of alchemy; when she was grown enough to carry pails without spilling them he apprenticed her to Mr. Oppel the surgeon, who instructed her in anatomy and the subtle art of balancing humors, and to Mrs. Hawes, the castle’s midwife.
By age thirteen she was both twice-widowed without having met either husband and better-educated than most of the lords of Leicester and all of the ladies, though her peculiar upbringing made her a figure of murmured disdain, if not outright mockery; she had no playmates, save the magister’s ravens and manuscripts, and spent nearly all of her time in the drafty upper reaches of the keep, swaddled in furs next to the fire in winter, a ponderous volume spread open before her, the ravens quokking and whispering from their perches.
On her fourteenth name-day Magister Paulus had refused her at the door to the workshop rather coldly, saying he had no use for her, and that her efforts would be better-received at the stables. His curt dismissal had stung; she’d attempted to swallow her tears all the way to Mr. Hull’s domain, where, to her great surprise, the horse-master had been waiting with a sleek, smoke-colored yearling filly, holding out the reins to her with a wide, yellow-toothed grin. “Good day to you, my lady,” he’d said. “The magister thought perhaps it were time to use your body as well as your mind. She’s a gentle sort, but only so long as you treat her kindly, so you mind that and you’ll get on very well, I think.”
Maura had been taught to ride from the time she could sit a saddle, but she’d never had her own mount; from the moment she gazed into the filly’s warm, intelligent gray eyes she’d felt a quiet sort of thrill; the thrill of having a companion, and one who could show her things even Magister Paulus’s wondrous books could not: the world beyond the bailey.
It had taken a great deal of wheedling and promises before she was permitted to ride out beyond the castle’s lands on her own; until she was seventeen she’d been obliged to go with both an armed guard and Bethany Leclercq, the daughter of one of Lord John’s local vassals. Bethany was a pleasant enough girl, if rather dull; she was a year Maura’s junior and had been wed to another local lord since she was eight years old, though the marriage had yet to be consummated, as her husband was in London, serving as the squire to a close companion of the King. Bethany regarded her incipient bedding with a kind of resigned terror; she and Maura may not have had much to converse about, but Maura understood the look in Bethany’s cow-colored eyes with perfect clarity—she was seeing her future: wife, mother, and then, nothing.
It was a terror Maura shared; one she had twice escaped, and while with each passing year the threat grew more remote, she was only thirty-two and her womb was still ripe so she knew she was far from free. Indeed, just two months previous she’d been informed that her portrait had been sent to some Duke of Brittany or Rouen, though she had it on good authority that there were at least four maidens on the list a dozen years younger than she; unfortunately none wealthier, or better-titled.
She was so lost in thought that she nearly collided with the low-hanging branch that marked the sharp turn away from the neatly-maintained crownlands and toward the marginally-more-rugged countryside; Kestrel knew the route by heart and ran it without her mistress’s direction, though Maura was obliged to pay at least a modicum of attention, at least at this particular spot. She caught herself just in time, Kestrel huffing her disapproval, Beatrice shifting and chirruping anxiously on her thick leather gauntlet, Maura ducking awkwardly to avoid what would certainly have been an uncomfortable collision, though her clever mount had seemingly recognized her rider’s lack of focus, and had slowed to nearly a stop just before the perilous bough.
“Thank you, sweet girl,” she murmured, scratching along Kestrel’s mane, the horse shivering her appreciation.
She refrained from urging the horse back to her usual traveling pace; the bend in the narrow road was notably picturesque, and she often slowed to appreciate it. On one side beckoned the wide green valley where she would loose Beatrice, the falcon wheeling and soaring high above as Maura and Kestrel rode hard along the rim. Along the other wound a burbling creek of sweet clear water; the bend with its dense stand of oaks and brush obscuring a small rippling pool, almost invisible from the road, where Maura very occasionally stopped to water her horse, and to sit in peaceful solitude for a moment longer before returning to the bustle and noise of the keep.
She nudged Kestrel along at a leisurely pace, enjoying the sound of songbirds, the faint rustling of leaves, the pleasant warmth of the sun on her back. As she approached the pool, however, she tensed, Kestrel clattering to a halt, Beatrice shifting from foot to foot on her wrist.
Entangled in the birdsong, the flutter of leaves, was a low voice, one that seemed to be muttering angrily, punctuated with the splash of water. Maura often saw people on her rides out—other nobles on their horses, traveling to the castle on official business; commoners walking with their baskets of herbs or bundles of coppiced wood—though she had yet to encounter anyone at the pool. The sound of the voice made her anxious; they seemed to be arguing, though as she strained to hear, she heard no answer. Still, despite the charm with which she moved through life, she knew she was beyond the protections of the castle, and there were thieves and bandits on the road, and worse.
“Come on, girl,” she whispered, urging the beast along, spying discreetly through the thick branches to see who she was hoping to avoid without drawing notice—
“Oh,” she gasped, lurching back in her saddle, both Kestrel and Beatrice registering their displeasure with a head-toss and a flutter of wings, respectively.
Through the tangle of foliage, she saw, fleetingly, a long, lean form in the water, back turned to her. Tightly-muscled arms raised over a dark-haired head, releasing a splash of spring water from cupped hands, sluicing silvery and glittering along sun-burnished flesh.
Maura knew she should not stare, particularly at someone who had very clearly sought the same solitude and discretion she herself did, though she was abruptly helpless, captivated by the glistening form as it stretched and twisted and plunged beneath the surface, breaking again to reveal—
“Oh,” she gasped again as the figure emerged, facing her this time; the lean strength obvious in the tight, rippling belly, though the sleek plane was interrupted by the swell of soft, generous breasts, their dark nipples stiff, casting sun-bright droplets back to the surface of the pool as the woman shook her mass of long black curls away from her face.
“Didn’t even want to take the road,” she was saying, her voice low and dark and rasping, almost like a man’s, though knowing it was a woman she’d heard—a woman she was seeing, was watching—made a tremulous quiver spark low in Maura’s belly.
She had always admired the beauty of women; their quickness, their grace. It was natural, even encouraged for young ladies to form such attachments; it was, after all, suitable practice for their futures as wives. Still, something about her own affection for her sex had faintly troubled her without her understanding why; perhaps it was that if pressed, she would have preferred forever to take a woman as her bed companion, as she had when she was a girl; the idea of allowing a man into her chambers had only ever carried with it a sense of anxiety, and, somehow, of dutiful occupation, but it was never a prospect she considered with excitement, or anticipation, or an unexpected slick of wetness between her thighs.
“Might learn something useful on the road,” the woman was saying sourly as she scrubbed at her underarms. “Sure, old man. Something like how to get your purse stolen.”
She plunged beneath the surface again, bursting back up in a prismatic spray as the sun caught the water flung from her long hair. She looked to Maura like some great warrior goddess, fierce and powerful, water sliding down her thickly-muscled shoulders, her lean torso, the unexpectedly soft swell of her breasts, her hips, catching and glittering in the thatch of dark hair at the apex of her thighs.
Maura shifted in her saddle, the change in position making her gasp, shiver; making Kestrel huff and paw. Somewhere on the other side of the pool the undergrowth rustled, a twig snapped; the bather froze, then dropped into the water, her face at once hard, wary, scanning the trees. The disturbance startled Maura as well; she did not wait for the woman to look in the direction of the road before urging Kestrel on as quickly and quietly as possible.
Once she’d entirely cleared the secluded little pond she released the breath she’d been holding, though it came out as a long, somewhat tormented hiss. The quiver in her belly hadn’t subsided; if anything it had increased with the thrill of her near-apprehension. There was something terribly sinful about spying to begin with; to spy upon a bathing woman even more so. That the woman had been so immediately and powerfully captivating was hardly anyone’s fault, though it did cause some rather delicate problems for the remainder of her—
“Well met, my lady,” a voice—unquestionably a man’s—called, nearly startling her off her horse once again.
“Um,” she breathed, clutching tight to both Kestrel’s reins and Beatrice’s jesses as she regarded this new stranger. A man, yes; older, with a kindly face and twinkling blue eyes. He carried a long walking-staff, though Maura could see any attempt at feebleness was mere pretension; the man may be old but he was powerfully built, with the kind of bulky strength usually found in laborers or military men. Still, she did not get any sense of threat from him as he lifted his other arm in greeting—an arm that bore a thick leather gauntlet, upon which was mounted a lean, hungry-looking female goshawk, her face unmasked.
Maura quickly turned Kestrel so that Beatrice was faced away from the she-hawk; the falcon was hooded, but the other bird was not—so rare an occurrence that Maura wondered if the creature was blind.
“Bess won’t strike,” the old man chuckled. “She’s a good lass. Though I must say, she’s usually not so companionable around strangers.”
“You must have her very well-trained,” Maura said politely as Kestrel shuffled and tugged at the reins.
“We get along,” the man nodded. “A fine creature you’ve got,” he said, indicating Beatrice. “Nice day for it.”
“Indeed,” Maura managed, attempting to control her rather uncontrollable response to the woman she’d just spied upon. “Are you out for the hunt as well?”
“Nah,” he said. “Just, uh . . .” he trailed off as he examined her falcon, her fine dress, her elaborate tack. Cleared his throat. “Just out for a walk. Well, good hunting, my lady.” He tipped his crumpled leather cap, though she noted, briefly, that the earlier twinkle in his kindly blue eyes seemed to have been extinguished, though she did not give it much thought; perhaps he had realized her station and was simply intimidated; it would not be the first occasion. Besides, her mind was rather . . . occupied at the moment.
“A pleasant day to you,” she said quickly and, she hoped, courteously, as she nudged Kestrel along with a bit more urgency than she ordinarily would, the mare seeming to notice the change with a ripple of her flanks, though she took off down the path at a brisk trot.
The speed and rhythm of the horse’s gait did nothing to diminish the hot, insistent ache between her legs; if anything the rougher pace caused the sensation to stoke higher as each stride sent her bouncing in her saddle. By the time they’d reached the cut through the undergrowth into the sprawling vale she was trembling, sweating, gasping; her arm burning with the exertion of keeping Beatrice steady as the rest of her body quivered and squirmed and pleaded, the heavy thumps of Kestrel plunging down the embankment into the valley below causing a low moan to escape her lips, causing her to pitch forward hard and abrupt against the pommel, to cling to Kestrel’s neck with her rein hand, fleetingly grateful for the years of close companionship as the horse barely reacted to her change in posture.
At last Kestrel arrived on the wide green platter of the vale, easing at once into their usual routine, Maura reaching over to snatch Beatrice’s hood off, jerking her arm up, the falcon spanning and launching at once, soaring high above in search of prey.
“Whoa, girl,” she managed, the horse coming to a gentle stop, Maura nearly sobbing as she felt herself release in almost the same moment, clinging to her saddle as she gasped and shivered, as her mind was overwhelmed with images of the woman she’d spied bathing in the pond; her long, lean, powerful body glistening in the filtered sunlight as she poured water from her cupped hands down her naked—
“Oh,” she gasped, her hips thrusting against the thick leather pommel, her skirts pulling tight beneath her, nearly toppling her from the saddle.
Once she’d returned to herself—glancing around the deserted vale with a mix of shame and embarrassment, despite knowing with a strong degree of certainty that she hadn’t been seen—aside from the woman and her companion on the road—the woman’s sneering sure, old man had suggested it, at least—she’d encountered no one else, and the pair had looked to be headed the other way, and besides, it had happened so quickly, after all, and so unexpectedly, and she’d managed to remain relatively quiet—
Kestrel shifted beneath her, sending another faint thrill coursing through her, another flash of the woman, of her finely muscled back, her shoulders, her long, dripping black hair—
Kestrel shifted again, and whickered softly, Maura realizing with a jolt that Beatrice was gliding silently back across the vale, something clutched in her talons. She quickly lifted her gloved hand, the falcon landing with a downy flutter, tearing at once into the bloody coney kit held in her sleek, curving grip. “Good girl,” she murmured. “My fine girl.”
The falcon purred and ruffled her feathers as she ripped into her meal.