Page 12 of Lord of the Manor

He went very still for a moment. Then he threw back his head and barked out a laugh.

She couldn’t see what was so funny. She pressed her lips together and glared at him.

“I already knew that, Wench. I had every intention of putting the clay back first and filling in the gaps with more. I’m a practical man, you know, as well as learned one. It is possible to be both, though I can tell from your scowl that you don’t believe it. So—what value has your information now? You haven’t saved me any money at all by telling me what I already knew.”

Fury boiled up in her, and her fists clenched. “You lie! That is a falsehood! You didn’t know!”

He stood there, arms still folded across his chest, mocking her. “Prove it,” he said.

Something snapped, and in a rage, she ran at him, hoping to knock him into the muck he’d dredged out of the moat. But he was as sturdy as a rock. He merely snorted, then opened his arms and captured her wrists.

“Whoa, enough. You must learn to control your temper, Maid.” He yanked on her wrists until she was almost chest to chest with him and looked down at her with a half-smile on his face. She could do naught but fume and struggle.

“Don’t treat me like a child,” she spat.

“I shall if you behave like one.” He had lowered his head to hold her gaze as he spoke, and his breath fanned her face. She could feel his strength, his power, pounding into her veins, coursing around her body and bringing her under his control.

This was not how she’d anticipated this conversation would go.

“Unhand me, you villain,” she growled, tugging to break free.

“I’m merely protecting myself from attack. And finding out what you look like up close.”

That stilled her struggles. The sun was full on her face now—her hat had fallen off. She hoped Smythe didn’t intend to do anything more than look. Because if he did, she would be utterly helpless against him.

He released her suddenly and stepped away. “There’s no need to fear me—I would never harm a woman. But I was getting a trifle bored of being threatened. Pray, take yourself and your insults elsewhere, and cool your temper. I do not tell falsehoods, I never break my word, and I won’t have anyone impugn my integrity. Cecily Neville—you have lost the battle. Now, take yourself and your bird off my land, and don’t raise a finger against me again, or you’ll have to face the consequences.”

How quickly his amusement had turned to cold fury. Cecily bent for her hat, slapped it on her head, then collected Charlemagne on her gauntlet.

“I give you good day, sir,” she said, stiffening her spine as she swung away from him. “God forbid that I should ever attempt to offer friendly, neighborly advice again. I shall watch you make error after error, and I shall sit back and laugh.”

She stomped off, refusing to glance over her shoulder, even though she could feel his eyes on her back all the way down the path to the highway.

“Well, Charlemagne, we shan’t attempt to help that vile creature again. He should know better than to make foes of us, my boy, should he not?”

The bird clicked his beak in response, reminding her that he was due to be flown and fed. Good. It always made her feel better to watch him fly, soaring up toward the heavens. She would imagine herself in his place, looking down on the land whose shackles she had escaped. Yet Charlemagne wasn’t truly free. No one was truly free, were they? And she was just a chattel, an appurtenance, something to be used for profit by men like Master Allan Smythe. As her landlord, he virtually owned her, and if he wished to cast her out of her cottage for withholding payment, he could do it—without question.

She had tried to reason with him, and he’d laughed in her face. She hated him and everything he stood for—the grasping, godless, Protestant swine.

She wouldn’t offer him her help again, even though she knew all there was to know about the Temple Roding Commandery and how to get the most out of it. His enterprise would fail. Perchance she could help that failure come a little sooner.

She would fly Charlemagne now. Then after that, when her mind was clear, she would think of a way to bring down the smug, overbearing Master Allan Smythe.

Chapter Six

“Who was that fine-looking wench, Brother-in-law?”

Allan glanced up from his labors to see Kennett looking down at him from the bank of the moat. He laid his shovel down and clambered out.

“Just one of the village girls, come to complain about the rents.”

“Not just one of the village girls, not with that prime falcon on her wrist. I wonder if she’d sell it.”

Allan scowled. “I doubt it.”

“Ah, you still think it’s been taking your doves and their young. That was a stoat, I tell you. Time to let that matter go, methinks. Hmm. I would enjoy going hawking again—it seems an age since I last did any. I will ask if she wants to sell the bird—where is the beauty to be found?”

Allan narrowed his eyes. “Which beauty—the bird or the woman?”