Read Online Hellion by Bertrice Small - Free Book Online

grain to the swans. When they pressed themselves around her, Hugh worried, for swans were notoriously mean and could bite cruelly. Belle, however, stood unafraid. The swans were obviously old friends. Hugh understood the patience needed to gain the trust of such feral creatures, for he had raised, tamed, and trained hawks and falcons his entire life. He had sensed from the beginning that Belle herself was such a creature. Now, seeing her with the geese and swans, he realized that if wildbirds could be brought to eat from her hand, there was, for all her willfulness and temper, much good within the girl who was to be his wife. He had seen enough. Turning, he followed the almost invisible path through the fields back to the keep.
    “Will it snow?” Alette wondered aloud that evening as they gathered in the Great Hall.
    “By morning,” Belle answered her mother. “The damp was almost visible in the air. It has been quite cold for several days now, and there has been no wind all day, madame. The beasts have been brought from the fields. I saw them being driven in as I returned home this afternoon. The serfs know the weather almost as well as I do.”
    “Are the snows heavy in winter here, ma Belle?” Hugh inquired.
    “They are mostly light, but sometimes great,” she answered him. “Why did you follow me today, my lord?”
    “You saw me?” He was surprised. He had been careful.
    “First I heard you. You are a big man, and move noisily. Then I saw you,” she answered him, “out of the corner of my eye as I fed my flock.”
    “I wanted to see where you went,” he answered honestly.
    “Did you think I went to meet a lover?” she demanded, an edge to her voice. “I do not like being spied upon.”
    “I did not think you had a lover,” he said quietly.
    “ What ? Am I not desirable enough, then?” Her tone was sharper.
    “I think your sense of honor is far greater than any passion you might feel,” Hugh told her. “In our short acquaintance you have not appeared to me to be light-skirted, ma Belle.”
    For the first time since they had met, she smiled at him. There was no doubt his reply had pleased her. She said nothing more on the matter.
    “Do you play chess?” he asked her.
    “I do,” she said, “and I am very good. Neither of my brothers could beat me, my lord. Can your masculine pridestand the thought of being beaten by a woman? I neither ask nor give quarter.”
    “Fetch the board, ma Belle,” he told her with a smile.
    The table was brought, and the pieces taken from a carved ivory box to be set up upon the board. They began to play, silently at first, then jibing at and mocking one another as each took an opponent’s piece. Belle swiftly won the game, but Hugh only laughed, demanding an immediate rematch, which she willingly agreed to give him.
    “Do you think he is making any headway with her?” Rolf quietly asked Alette as they sat together by the fire, sipping wine.
    “My daughter is an enigma to me,” Alette replied frankly. “I admit that I have never quite understood her. She has her father’s bold spirit, not mine, I fear, and what is good in a man is not perhaps good in a girl.”
    “You are so fair,” he said suddenly, surprised by his own boldness.
    “ What ?” She was not certain she had heard him aright.
    “I said you are so fair,” he repeated with more assurance. “Has no one ever told you that, my lady Alette?” Rolf de Briard had brown eyes, and they warmly surveyed her. “I am of good birth,” he said, “although mayhap I do not have the right to speak to you thusly.”
    “I do not know if you do or not,” Alette replied. “No one has ever called me fair, although my aunt once told me I was pretty enough.”
    “Did not your husband say how lovely you were?” He was astounded. How could Robert de Manneville look at Alette and not acknowledge her beauty, her sweet face, her gentle voice? She was pure perfection in Rolf’s eyes.
    “Robert married me for