Free By Grace Possessed by Jennifer Blake Page B

strolling about the great hall just now with your…your—”
    “My betrothed?”
    “Oh, Cate! No!”
    “Yes, at Henry’s behest, though it is not yet official.”
    Marguerite shook her hands free of her sleeves, then slid an arm around Cate for a quick hug. “And I am being disagreeable because you didn’t come at once to confide in me. You must be so dazed that you can barely think, or else ready to weep with vexation.”
    “A little of both, I suppose.”
    “Ah, well. Your Scotsman seems too hardy for a fever to take him off, and there is little prospect of a battle where he may fall, yet some disaster will put an end to him. A pity, but he brought it on himself.”
    An odd numbness seized Cate’s chest. “No, no, surely it won’t come to that!”
    Marguerite lifted her head from where she’d rested it on Cate’s shoulder. Her brows almost met above her nose as she scowled. “It sounds as if you might care what happens to him.”
    “Of course I care. He is a decent man who went togreat ends to save me, Marguerite, and did nothing untoward afterward. We have made it up between us to avoid the king’s command, and so we shall.”
    “You did what?” her sister asked, her eyes widening with shock.
    It was necessary to present every detail. By the time Cate was done, she and Marguerite had reached their chamber, kicked off their slippers and settled in comfort upon the featherbed. Gwynne, the serving woman who attended to their needs, was absent upon some task, so they need not watch their words.
    Her sister stared at her in frowning concentration where she rested her back against one of the bedposts. “You think intentions matter where the curse is concerned? You believe your Scotsman will be safe as long as he doesn’t agree to marry you?”
    “Something like that, though I wish you would cease calling him my Scotsman.”
    Marguerite waved that objection away. “But, Cate, that’s wonderful. You may enjoy Dunbar’s company without troubling over whether he’s courting death as he courts you.”
    “May I, indeed?”
    “Only consider! When has any one of us had the freedom to walk with a man, talk with him or simply be with him without fearing he will seal his doom by deciding to take us to wife?”
    “Why, never,” Cate said in dawning discovery.
    “Dunbar has not only given you his word, but knows his father will never consent to a marriage.”
    “Just so.”
    “You need feel not a whit of guilt, no matter what may come to pass between you.”
    Cate narrowed her eyes in sudden suspicion. “What are you saying?”
    “Why, only that— Well, aren’t you curious, Cate? Do you never wonder what it might be like to meet a man in a garden as in the Roman de la Rose, to allow him the caresses that may lead to…to exploration of soft petals and warm centers? Love like that between Isabel and Braesford is so rare. If we are never to have husbands because love is denied, well then?”
    “Marguerite!”
    Her sister’s face turned mutinous. She took a corner of her veil, nibbling at its hem. “Don’t try to tell me you haven’t thought of it, for I won’t believe you.”
    “Well, if I hadn’t, then I will now that you’ve put the idea into my head!”
    “What is wrong with that, pray? Are we to be denied such joy of the flesh because of a stupid curse? Life is uncertain, Cate. We have so little time to gather memories before we dwindle into old age, like the forgotten women in nunneries.”
    “Oh, Marguerite,” Cate whispered, leaning to put her hand on her sister’s bent knee. She had not known her younger sister felt so passionately about what the curse foretold for their futures. “We may be denied the boon of being wives and mothers, but we have also been saved from the grief of being wed to men twice our age, men who will get a babe upon us every year without the least care for whether we live or die. We have avoided brutalmen like our stepbrother, who would give us bruises rather