Free Hugh and Bess by Susan Higginbotham

did some terrible things and you did nothing.”
      “I should have insisted he stay at Caerphilly. Forced him, somehow. Or gone with him and faced the worst.” He forced the next words out. “Sometimes I think he left me behind there to spare me. He knew they’d kill him and that if I were with him, they’d probably have killed me as well.”
      “If that was his purpose, it was a good one. He loved you, after all. You mustn’t feel guilt for his wanting to protect you.”
      He shrugged and took a sip or two of wine. “My mother will think I’ve been put back in prison. I’d best be gone.” He pulled on his shirt, then turned to face her again. “Marry me, Emma.”
      “No, you oaf.”
      “Well, I’ve heard that somewhere before. But why not, for God's sake? You said you loved me.”
      “I do, too much to let you make a mistake like that. You must marry the daughter of a great lord like you will be.”
      He laughed. “A great lord! Christ! I’m not even a knight, Emmy. I’ve been released only on the king's sufferance, until Parliament decides what it wants to do with me. One ruffle of the royal feathers and I’m bound to find myself back in Bristol Castle.”
      “All the more reason you should not offend the king by marrying me. You are his kinsman, after all.” Emma stared at her hands. “I would dearly like to marry you, Hugh. But it is a step you would regret in time.”
      He sighed. “Yes,” he admitted. “Perhaps you’re right.” Some part of him, he knew, was relieved that she had refused. He glared at Emma anyway. “You always were irritatingly sensible, as I recall.”
      “More so than you, two days out of prison and asking the first woman you lie with as a free man to marry you. I was the first, I hope?”
      “The first and the very best ever.”
      She smiled at him, then wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him soundly. “Hugh, it will be awhile before you find your lady, I think. In the meantime—”
      “In the meantime—”
      “Let us ride toward Hanley Castle together. I want to see if you are as awkward as you say. If you are, then I shall win the race we shall have.”
      Hugh reached for his remaining clothes and grinned. “Don’t be so sure, sweetheart.”
     
     
     
      He and Emma had been lovers ever since that day. Lovers—and, more important, friends. Hugh got on well with his mother and with his stepfather, who was none other than the William la Zouche who had captured his father and who had taken Hugh's surrender at Caerphilly. (His mother was not one to hold grudges.) Those younger brothers and sisters who were at home followed him about like ducklings after their mama. In those early years after his release, however, and especially in the first few months, when everybody but his own family members looked at him as they would upon a dog who might or might not bite at the least provocation, Hugh sorely needed a confidant of his own generation, and it was Emma who filled this void. During the summer and autumn of 1331, he visited her at her own home, during the day, for even if he had been knavish enough to try to sneak her into Hanley Castle under his mother's nose, there would have been no place to put her. His hero-worshipping younger brothers, Gilbert and John, had begged for the honor of sharing his bedchamber when he returned from prison, and Hugh had obliged. (His Zouche brother, William, the youngest of them all, was but an infant and still preferred the company of his wet nurse.) Gilbert and John had built Hugh's single act of valor, holding Caerphilly Castle against the queen, into an epic worthy of Homer. They went to bed earlier than Hugh, of course, but when he entered the chamber and slipped under the covers, whichever brother was lying there would pop awake, snuggle close to him, and whisper something like, “Hugh, was it exciting? Were you frightened?”
      “Not me,” Hugh would say, lying but mindful of the