Lord of My Heart by Jo Beverley Page B

woman’s eyes brightened. “Praise to Golden Hart.”
    It was like a shower of icy water. “ What ?”
    The woman touched the design on his right hand as if it were a sacred thing. “It’s what we call you, Master.”
    Aimery looked down. The male deer which leaped down his right forearm onto his hand was of such an ornate design that many would fail to recognize the animal, but not enough apparently. Done in shades of red, brown, and yellow, it could be called “golden.” But this new name was a disaster. How had anyone ever seen the marks? He’d been careful to hide them with dirt or a bandage, but they were clearly visible now.
    He remembered plunging his hands into the cool stream. The dirt must have been washed off. He had obviously been similarly careless before.
    Had the design become visible when he’d been slaving for d’Oilly? Or on other occasions? How many people here at Baddersley remembered the mark given to Aimery de Gaillard all those years ago? Very few, but one would be enough if he had a mind to betrayal.
    Aldreda would certainly remember. He hoped she was still kind and honest, but his faith in women was at a low ebb.
    “You must not call me that,” he said to the cottars. “Otherwise the Normans will soon find me.”
    “Yes, Master,” they all said.
    His eyes met Gyrth’s, and he saw his own skepticism mirrored there. They would try to keep their word, but they needed a myth these days, and he was apparently it.
    It would be worse than that. Any story of English resistance would be attributed to Golden Hart; the murder of the four Norman guards would be just the first. Golden Hart would be eight feet tall and carry a flaming ax. He would rip out trees by the roots and hurl them at his enemies. Soon the country would be rocking with the myth. And it only needed one Norman to study the design on his skin for the connection to be made.
    His wyrd was likely to be a brief life and a violent end, but he was English enough to accept that. He turned his mind to practical matters and ordered the few remaining cottars to gather their belongings. They must be out of here before Paul de Pouissey organized a manhunt to round up the stragglers.
    But at the last moment he sent them ahead with Gyrth.
    “What are you about, lad?” asked Gyrth. “It’s hazardous in these parts just now.”
    “I need to find out what’s happening to the ones who were taken.”
    Gyrth scowled. “You mean you want to see if the little bitch is as wicked as they say. Have done. She has you spellbound. Cut free while you can!”
    “I thought you wanted me to marry her.”
    “Not anymore. You get close enough to touch, lad, you slit her throat.”

    Madeleine sat in the solar of the old manor house of Baddersley, plying her needle under her aunt’s critical eye and trying to ignore the sounds coming from outside—the crack of the lash, the shrieks, and the constant wailing misery. It had been going on for so long. Her uncle had rounded up nearly twenty runaways and herded them back to the castle. He’d ordered them all flogged.
    Madeleine’s convent-trained needlework was better than her aunt’s, which did not prevent Celia from criticizing. Today, however, the woman had grounds for complaint, for Madeleine’s hands were shaking, and her stitches were all over the place.
    Celia leaned over and gave her a vicious pinch. “Rip it out!” she snapped. “How useless you are. As useless as these wretched Saxons.”
    Aunt Celia was thin and bony, with a mouth that was constantly pursed, as if she had bitten into a green apple. She poked her needle sharply into the cloth before her as if she wished to be poking it into the Saxons, or into Madeleine.
    Madeleine moved out of reach of the woman’s hard fingers and began to undo her stitches. She was working on a new cloak for her uncle, and the worse it was done the better as far as she was concerned. She couldn’t believe the depths of his cruelty.
    She glanced around