Free His Captive Lady by Carol Townend

edge of her veil and prepared to push past him.
    Hrothgar shifted to block the hall doorway. 'You may no longer enter.'
    'I...I beg your pardon?'
    'You cannot return to the hall.' A pause, then, as an insolent afterthought, 'My lady .'
    'I need to speak with Thane Guthlac.'
    'He is busy. Get you into the bailey.'
    Erica blinked. 'But...I do not understand. Our agreement...'
    'What agreement?'
    Gripped by a return of the nausea she felt whenever she stood in close proximity to Hrothgar, Erica swallowed. 'Th...that our people should come to terms. If I...' She shot a sideways glance at Wulf, whose blue eyes were fixed intently on Hrothgar's, and collected herself. 'Guthlac said that once the affront to his mother had been avenged...'
    Hrothgar shook his head. 'Thane Guthlac has changed his mind.' Glancing at Wulf, he gave a thin smile. 'Perhaps my lord thought one night with a low-born bastard who had openly claimed he would not touch you was not enough disparagement.'
    The nausea rose in Erica's throat and for a moment she could not speak. 'No! No! Thane Guthlac said--'
    Hrothgar lifted his massive shoulders in a careless shrug. 'He changed his mind.'
    Rage took her and she lurched forwards. 'You are loathsome!' Curling her hands into claws, she resisted the urge to rush at him, but Wulf must have read her first impulse, for he caught her arm.
    'My lady.' Wulf's voice was calm and restraining, but Erica was not to be restrained.
    'I must speak with Guthlac!' She shook Wulf off.
    Hrothgar reached behind him and shut the door with a bang. 'I repeat, he will not speak to you.' He jerked his head towards the bailey. 'Go, Erica of Whitecliffe, there will be no collaboration between Thane Eric's housecarls and Guthlac Stigandson's.'
    The blood thundered in her ears, her head throbbed. He meant it. She had lost her reputation--oh, Wulf Brader had not laid a finger on her, but it was as he had warned her: Wulf had not had to touch her for her to have been despoiled. When word got out that Lady Erica of Whitecliffe had spent the night closeted in a storeroom with a virile young warrior like Wulf Brader...and add to that the fact of his lowly birth, his illicit , lowly birth...
    Briefly, she closed her eyes. No man of honour--she managed not to look at the prison hut across the yard--no, not even Ailric, would have her now. Stiffening her spine, reminding herself whose daughter she was, she glared at Hrothgar. 'Do you mean to tell me that what happened last night was for nothing ?'
    'Exactly so, my lady. You made a tactical error when you agreed so easily to your disparagement.'
    Erica blinked. 'An error?'
    An infuriating smile lifted Hrothgar's lips. 'Let me give you a hint. You should have struggled a little, or perhaps screamed--you weren't seen to suffer enough.'
    Erica put her hand to her head. 'This is insane. Hrothgar, step aside. Let me speak to Thane Guthlac.'
    'No.'
    She darted a glance at Wulf, no, at Saewulf Brader. He was no friend of hers if he was complicit with this...this...
    It was one thing to agree to be humiliated if it ensured that her warriors could at last unite with Guthlac's against a common enemy; it was one thing to have been humiliated if it brought the rest of her people to safety--but for it to have been for nothing, nothing ...
    She chewed the inside of her cheek. But that, of course, was what Hrothgar was saying. For Guthlac's mother to be truly avenged, Erica's humiliation had to be complete, her degradation absolute. Even though she had not wanted to be degraded, the fact that she had agreed and had chosen Wulf, this had in some way diminished Thane Guthlac's act of revenge.
    Wulf's face was unreadable, but the knuckles of his hand were white on the hilt of his sword. The tension in the air was palpable--Guthlac's two housecarls had a hearty dislike of one another and made no secret of it. But this was not the moment to dwell on the petty jealousies of Thane Guthlac's housecarls...
    She sucked in a