Fic: To Cozen Fortune - Chapter 6
Title, Chapter: To Cozen Fortune, Chapter 6
Author: roh_wyn
Summary: Guy and Isabella leave Locksley and arrive in France to make a new life for themselves. A pre-series exploration of these two characters and how they become the people we see on the show.
Characters/Pairings: Guy of Gisborne, Isabella, Lambert (of black powder fame), OCs.
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers/Warnings: Spoilers for 3x10, "Bad Blood"; possible (but inadvertent) fudging of canon timeline
Disclaimer: Robin Hood belongs to Tiger Aspect, BBC and legend. All Rights Reserved. No copyright infringement is intended, and no money is being made.
Notes: Many thanks to applebeing for her excellent beta work. Any errors that remain are mine entirely. Thanks to shinysparks for her amazing artistic contribution. Thanks also to kegel84 who kept me company online as I wrote this story, and to railise and thymelady for helping me with the title.
Artwork by shinysparks
Chapter 6. Our Happy Throng
Early Spring 1177
"We should go into town." Lambert announced this with fair confidence, as if he'd already decided to go.
"Why?"
"I don't know. To see how the rest of the world lives, I suppose."
Guy scoffed. "They live in filth and sin, and there is nothing to see."
Lambert frowned, but looked more amused than anything else. "Oh, because that's what they tell us here at the abbey?" He crossed his arms and smirked at Guy, waiting for a proper retort.
"I…" Guy floundered, searching for a way to explain that the world outside held no appeal for him.
"I'm going. If you'd like, come with me. I see no reason to stay here all the time. It's like a prison."
Guy balked. "It is not! It's a haven from all the ills and depravity of-"
"Oh, give over. You're not even a novice, and you already sound like a monk!"
Guy stopped short, detecting a familiar note in Lambert's words. It pricked at the back of his mind and begged for his attention, but he could not put a finger on it, and it left him feeling odd and dissatisfied. In his confusion, he could not think of a proper response to Lambert's accusation. So he sighed and conceded that maybe a trip to town was the thing he needed to clear his head.
It was a blustery day, and they shrunk down into their cowls and wrapped their cloaks tightly around them as they made the short trek into Caen town. Guy was always a bit awed by the sight of the town. For one, it was bigger than any he had seen before, including Nottingham. For another, there was a constant stream of noise and activity, of disorder, that set Guy on edge and made him wary.
Lambert, on the other hand, was perfectly at home, turning into alleys and lanes as if he'd known them his whole life, which of course he had. What was strange, at least to Guy, was that Lambert never stopped to speak to anybody in town: no familiar faces, no old friends or distant kinsmen. As far as Guy knew, Lambert had never known his brethren in Caen, or he'd conveniently forgotten them all in the three years since he'd come to the abbey. Guy had never reflected on it before, but Lambert was even more alone in the world than he was, and he felt great sympathy for him. I'll be there for you, one day, if you need me, my friend…
Presently, they turned into a blind alley that ended in a wider street leading to the town square, and to the chateau, a hulking mass of stone atop a hill that cast a wide shadow over the town. Banners and flags streamed from the towers of the keep, and there were armed guards at every gate. It was more forbidding than the Nottingham castle of Guy's memory, but his curiosity was aroused, and he wondered what it would be like to ride into the place with authority and arms.
He began to head towards it, trying to get a closer look, but Lambert pulled him back. "You can't go in there. They only let knights in these days."
"Why?"
Lambert shrugged. "I don't know the real reason. The rumor is that someone tried to kill the king during a market two years ago. Nobody's really been allowed to go in, except if they're invited.”
He gave Guy a meaningful look. "And it's not the sort of place you want to get invited to, I imagine."
Guy nodded, understanding Lambert's real meaning. "Where did you want to go?"
Lambert shook his head. "I don't know. A tavern maybe?"
Guy was taken aback. "We're not allowed to go to taverns?"
"Why not? We're not novices, we've taken no vows."
"But…it's dissolute!"
"It's dissolute to be drunk, not to drink. There's a difference."
Guy was certain there was no difference, at least not in the way that anyone at the abbey would appreciate. Still, Lambert was at least minimally right. Drinking itself was neither forbidden, nor a sin, and it was not as if there was much else they could do in town anyway.
At length, he gave in and let Lambert lead them to the part of town where the taverns were, nestled between various shops and the homes of tradesmen. But as they neared the place, Guy spied something far more interesting out of the corner of his eye. It was the bay roan he'd been coveting silently for months.
He'd assumed the horse would have been sold long ago, and he'd stopped asking after it, partly out of disappointment, and partly as penance for wanting it in the first place. But here it was, the same wonderful creature, being groomed by a young woman Guy did not recognize. The temptation, now so close at hand, was too much to resist, and Guy decided it was no sin to give in to a desire that was not forbidden to him.
"Um, Lambert. You go on ahead. I'll join you in a while."
Lambert gave the woman and the horse a quick look and nodded in Guy's direction, a smirk on his face as he left. Guy frowned, not quite comprehending, and the confused look must still have been on his face as he approached the woman, because she laughed as she watched him.
"They let you boys out of that place now, do they?"
Guy gaped at her, surprised at being addressed without preamble. "I beg your pardon, I-"
"Yeah, I know. You're one of those novices from St. Stephen's. Can't say we see your kind here too often, but it happens." She was nonchalant, and Guy bristled at being dismissed so easily.
"I'm not a novice. I'm a postulant. A student, if you will."
The woman smiled, the expression both crooked and charming. "And your studies bring you to town, do they?" She laughed, and Guy found himself laughing with her. Now that he was close enough to speak to her, he could see she was quite young, not more than a few years older than Guy. She had a clever pair of blue eyes in a pale face and hair the color of golden wheat. On a different day, he might have thought her pretty, but for now, his attention was on the horse.
"It's a beauty," he said, awed by the animal as much as by this unexpected opportunity to see it again.
"Aye, that it is." She gave him a curious look and handed him a brush. "Here, you may as well help, if you're just standing there."
He took the brush and watched her, copying her movements and speaking to the horse in low tones as she was doing. It only took a few minutes longer to finish the grooming, and after that, they both took the time to pat the horse down and thank it for its cooperation.
"Strange that horses are easier to please than people, don't you think?"
She gave Guy a curious look. "What's your name?"
"I'm sorry. I forgot my manners." Guy bowed his head politely. "I'm called Guy of Gisborne."
"Of Gisborne, eh? And where's that?"
Guy sighed. "It's in…it's nowhere."
"Ah." She nodded in understanding, although Guy was certain she had no idea what he really meant. "I'm called Anne. Of no place other than this one."
"You're the horse trader's wife?"
Anne laughed. "No! His sister."
Guy nodded, not bothering to tell her the trader had never mentioned a sister in the many times they'd spoken. Of course, we only ever talked about horses…
He hesitated, not sure how to carry the conversation further, or whether he was even expected to do so. At length, and after hesitating for several minutes, he turned his attention back to the horse. "I would have thought you'd have sold it by now."
"We have."
Guy tried-and failed-to mask his disappointment. "Do you know who bought it?"
Anne nodded. "One of the knights in the king's service. Vaysey, I think he's called?"
Guy shrugged. The name meant nothing to him, but he hoped the man had a proper appreciation of horses, or else the fantastic creature would be wasted on him.
"I shouldn't be so disappointed. It's not like I ever had any money to buy a horse like this."
Anne smiled, the expression at once amused and full of kindness. "Maybe you will one day."
He guffawed. "Yes, because there is so much money in the business of being a monk."
She laughed with him. "Just so. Maybe there's hidden treasure buried under the church floor."
Guy chuckled, thinking if this were true, Lambert surely would have found it by now. Lambert…
"Er, I'm sorry. But I have to go. I told a friend I'd meet him."
She shooed him off. "Yes, yes. Off with you. But come back and talk to me again."
"I shall. Thank you."
"Until then, Guy. Of Gisborne."
--
Lambert leaned against the wall of the shack, breathing deeply. He was exhausted, of course, having practically run from the town square to the tiny weaver's shack. But he was also relieved. For whatever reason, Guy had decided not to join him on the trek to the tavern, leaving him free to come here and meet Isabella.
They had been doing this for months, sneaking out of their respective dormitories and meeting in town, but no matter how much time he spent thinking about it, Lambert could not discern why. The obvious reason was, of course, too obvious. If this was a tryst of some sort, it was the least romantic and most chaste tryst in the history of mankind. Moreover, his mind would not allow him to think of Isabella in such a way. For one, she was barely more than a girl, and for another, he was fairly certain his feelings did not incline towards her, or at least not in that way. He doubted she had any special sentiment for him either. She seemed to enjoy his company, if only because he was something of a novelty, a man who was like a brother, but not actually a brother.
He enjoyed her company as well, up to a point. Partly, this was because she was sensible and clever, a good listener, even if the things he spoke of were often outside the scope of her mind. But it was also because she made him see himself as he never had before. She would say profound things about him in an alarmingly matter-of-fact manner, and he would dismiss them at first, only to discover later that she was right. She was like a mirror turned on to his soul, and although her knowledge alarmed him, it also fascinated him.
But he was a man of reason, and it seemed to him wholly unreasonable that these meetings had to be so secret. They were doing nothing wrong and nothing of which either of them need be ashamed. So when Isabella had asked that he not tell Guy, he had balked. But later, when she'd insisted, he'd agreed, realizing it was much more important to her than to him.
The door to the weaver's shack creaked open, startling Lambert out of his thoughts. Isabella walked in, all windswept and ruddy from the cold.
"You're very late, Bella."
She turned around and smiled sheepishly. "I'm so sorry. Rose just learnt a new way to felt wool, and I wanted to see it." She laughed nervously as she spoke, still shivering a bit from the cold. "Like a good apprentice, yes?"
"Why are you doing all this anyway? It's not as if you really want to be a webster."
Isabella glared at him. "Maybe I do."
"Really?" He brought a hand to his chin and scratched for a moment, pensive. "Then tell me about the life of a weaver. Whatever you've learned so far."
She regarded him with narrowed eyes and then crossed her arms defiantly. "You go to market, and you buy wool. You get it cleaned and carded. You felt it and weave it into broadcloth. Then you sell the cloth at market.
"I'm not stupid, you know."
He smirked at her. "I know. How much for?"
"What?"
"How much do you sell the cloth for?"
"More than you paid for the wool."
"Ah, a profit. And what do you do with your profit?" Lambert was rather enjoying this little exercise in rhetoric and proving his point. He noted the rise of crimson on Isabella's cheeks and how attractive it made her. On reflection, however, he decided he didn't really like that he had noticed it.
She hissed at him. "Simple. You buy more wool."
Lambert tried to hide his amusement. "And that's what you want from your life? Endless days of haggling with the people who sell wool, the people who buy cloth and all the people in between?"
Isabella opened her mouth to reply, but promptly shut it again. He could tell from the slump of her shoulders and the way she was twisting the fabric of her dress together that she felt defeated. He felt a sudden rush of sympathy for her, an urge to embrace her and tell her he was sorry, but he fought it down and schooled himself to patience.
She sat down and sighed heavily. "What would you have me do, Lambert?"
"Whatever you want, Bella. Your life is your own."
"It's not though, is it? I'm meant to be pious and obedient and grateful. And I am, really. I'm very thankful for Guy, and for my uncle, and even the abbess.
"But I'm also a burden, on all of them, but especially on Guy. I want to be more than just dutiful. I want to be useful."
She paced the floor as she spoke, wearing a rut into the rushes and making Lambert nervous. "This gives me a trade, something to do. So I don't have to sit around and wait for some man to take pity on me and marry me."
"Marry you? Aren't you a bit young for that sort of thing?" Lambert tried to keep the note of alarm out of his voice. He could not understand just why, but the notion of Isabella as a married woman disturbed him more than he had expected.
She shrugged off the question. "I don't think it's too young. There was a girl at the abbey last year who was married at just fourteen."
Isabella stopped pacing and sat down on the floor in front of Lambert, leaning back on her hands and regarding him. "Of course, she had a dowry and a title she'd inherited from her mother. And I've got no dowry, no money and no title. Who would want me?"
Lambert tried to fight off his growing sense of disquiet. "Is that all you think about? Whether someone will marry you?"
Isabella narrowed her eyes at him. "No, but it's all we're allowed to think about it, isn't it?"
"Nonsense! Nobody can keep you from thinking, Bella. That's the beauty of it. What do you really want to do?"
She hesitated, but only for a moment. "I want to fight. For myself. I want to take care of myself, protect myself." She started twisting her skirts under her fingers again, and he was tempted just to clamp his hands over hers to make her stop.
"But nobody wants that for me. Everyone tries to keep me safe, but I think they're just trying to keep me in a cage, until they decide what to do with me."
Overcome with sympathy for her, Lambert reached out and took her hand, regretting the gesture almost instantly. Isabella's eyes grew wide as she watched him and leaned over to take his other hand. Reflexively, Lambert pushed her away and stood up, trying to put more distance between them.
"Bella, I'm…"
She shook her head. "I know. I've always known."
His mind was awhirl, and he could not decipher what she meant. She did not give him a proper chance to reply anyhow. She smiled at him, her eyes bright, too bright. Then, unexpectedly, she stood on the tips of her toes, and kissed him on the lips. It was chaste, barely a brush of her lips against his, and had it come from any other girl, he would have thought nothing of it. But from Isabella, it was a revelation, and her eyes said whatever the kiss had not. He was too flustered to do more than stare after her as she left, a wistful smile on her face.
It was not until later, after night fell and the blustery wind drove Lambert back to the abbey that he realized he'd lost his heart.
--
Previous Chapter | Next Chapter
Author: roh_wyn
Summary: Guy and Isabella leave Locksley and arrive in France to make a new life for themselves. A pre-series exploration of these two characters and how they become the people we see on the show.
Characters/Pairings: Guy of Gisborne, Isabella, Lambert (of black powder fame), OCs.
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers/Warnings: Spoilers for 3x10, "Bad Blood"; possible (but inadvertent) fudging of canon timeline
Disclaimer: Robin Hood belongs to Tiger Aspect, BBC and legend. All Rights Reserved. No copyright infringement is intended, and no money is being made.
Notes: Many thanks to applebeing for her excellent beta work. Any errors that remain are mine entirely. Thanks to shinysparks for her amazing artistic contribution. Thanks also to kegel84 who kept me company online as I wrote this story, and to railise and thymelady for helping me with the title.
Artwork by shinysparks
Chapter 6. Our Happy Throng
Early Spring 1177
"We should go into town." Lambert announced this with fair confidence, as if he'd already decided to go.
"Why?"
"I don't know. To see how the rest of the world lives, I suppose."
Guy scoffed. "They live in filth and sin, and there is nothing to see."
Lambert frowned, but looked more amused than anything else. "Oh, because that's what they tell us here at the abbey?" He crossed his arms and smirked at Guy, waiting for a proper retort.
"I…" Guy floundered, searching for a way to explain that the world outside held no appeal for him.
"I'm going. If you'd like, come with me. I see no reason to stay here all the time. It's like a prison."
Guy balked. "It is not! It's a haven from all the ills and depravity of-"
"Oh, give over. You're not even a novice, and you already sound like a monk!"
Guy stopped short, detecting a familiar note in Lambert's words. It pricked at the back of his mind and begged for his attention, but he could not put a finger on it, and it left him feeling odd and dissatisfied. In his confusion, he could not think of a proper response to Lambert's accusation. So he sighed and conceded that maybe a trip to town was the thing he needed to clear his head.
It was a blustery day, and they shrunk down into their cowls and wrapped their cloaks tightly around them as they made the short trek into Caen town. Guy was always a bit awed by the sight of the town. For one, it was bigger than any he had seen before, including Nottingham. For another, there was a constant stream of noise and activity, of disorder, that set Guy on edge and made him wary.
Lambert, on the other hand, was perfectly at home, turning into alleys and lanes as if he'd known them his whole life, which of course he had. What was strange, at least to Guy, was that Lambert never stopped to speak to anybody in town: no familiar faces, no old friends or distant kinsmen. As far as Guy knew, Lambert had never known his brethren in Caen, or he'd conveniently forgotten them all in the three years since he'd come to the abbey. Guy had never reflected on it before, but Lambert was even more alone in the world than he was, and he felt great sympathy for him. I'll be there for you, one day, if you need me, my friend…
Presently, they turned into a blind alley that ended in a wider street leading to the town square, and to the chateau, a hulking mass of stone atop a hill that cast a wide shadow over the town. Banners and flags streamed from the towers of the keep, and there were armed guards at every gate. It was more forbidding than the Nottingham castle of Guy's memory, but his curiosity was aroused, and he wondered what it would be like to ride into the place with authority and arms.
He began to head towards it, trying to get a closer look, but Lambert pulled him back. "You can't go in there. They only let knights in these days."
"Why?"
Lambert shrugged. "I don't know the real reason. The rumor is that someone tried to kill the king during a market two years ago. Nobody's really been allowed to go in, except if they're invited.”
He gave Guy a meaningful look. "And it's not the sort of place you want to get invited to, I imagine."
Guy nodded, understanding Lambert's real meaning. "Where did you want to go?"
Lambert shook his head. "I don't know. A tavern maybe?"
Guy was taken aback. "We're not allowed to go to taverns?"
"Why not? We're not novices, we've taken no vows."
"But…it's dissolute!"
"It's dissolute to be drunk, not to drink. There's a difference."
Guy was certain there was no difference, at least not in the way that anyone at the abbey would appreciate. Still, Lambert was at least minimally right. Drinking itself was neither forbidden, nor a sin, and it was not as if there was much else they could do in town anyway.
At length, he gave in and let Lambert lead them to the part of town where the taverns were, nestled between various shops and the homes of tradesmen. But as they neared the place, Guy spied something far more interesting out of the corner of his eye. It was the bay roan he'd been coveting silently for months.
He'd assumed the horse would have been sold long ago, and he'd stopped asking after it, partly out of disappointment, and partly as penance for wanting it in the first place. But here it was, the same wonderful creature, being groomed by a young woman Guy did not recognize. The temptation, now so close at hand, was too much to resist, and Guy decided it was no sin to give in to a desire that was not forbidden to him.
"Um, Lambert. You go on ahead. I'll join you in a while."
Lambert gave the woman and the horse a quick look and nodded in Guy's direction, a smirk on his face as he left. Guy frowned, not quite comprehending, and the confused look must still have been on his face as he approached the woman, because she laughed as she watched him.
"They let you boys out of that place now, do they?"
Guy gaped at her, surprised at being addressed without preamble. "I beg your pardon, I-"
"Yeah, I know. You're one of those novices from St. Stephen's. Can't say we see your kind here too often, but it happens." She was nonchalant, and Guy bristled at being dismissed so easily.
"I'm not a novice. I'm a postulant. A student, if you will."
The woman smiled, the expression both crooked and charming. "And your studies bring you to town, do they?" She laughed, and Guy found himself laughing with her. Now that he was close enough to speak to her, he could see she was quite young, not more than a few years older than Guy. She had a clever pair of blue eyes in a pale face and hair the color of golden wheat. On a different day, he might have thought her pretty, but for now, his attention was on the horse.
"It's a beauty," he said, awed by the animal as much as by this unexpected opportunity to see it again.
"Aye, that it is." She gave him a curious look and handed him a brush. "Here, you may as well help, if you're just standing there."
He took the brush and watched her, copying her movements and speaking to the horse in low tones as she was doing. It only took a few minutes longer to finish the grooming, and after that, they both took the time to pat the horse down and thank it for its cooperation.
"Strange that horses are easier to please than people, don't you think?"
She gave Guy a curious look. "What's your name?"
"I'm sorry. I forgot my manners." Guy bowed his head politely. "I'm called Guy of Gisborne."
"Of Gisborne, eh? And where's that?"
Guy sighed. "It's in…it's nowhere."
"Ah." She nodded in understanding, although Guy was certain she had no idea what he really meant. "I'm called Anne. Of no place other than this one."
"You're the horse trader's wife?"
Anne laughed. "No! His sister."
Guy nodded, not bothering to tell her the trader had never mentioned a sister in the many times they'd spoken. Of course, we only ever talked about horses…
He hesitated, not sure how to carry the conversation further, or whether he was even expected to do so. At length, and after hesitating for several minutes, he turned his attention back to the horse. "I would have thought you'd have sold it by now."
"We have."
Guy tried-and failed-to mask his disappointment. "Do you know who bought it?"
Anne nodded. "One of the knights in the king's service. Vaysey, I think he's called?"
Guy shrugged. The name meant nothing to him, but he hoped the man had a proper appreciation of horses, or else the fantastic creature would be wasted on him.
"I shouldn't be so disappointed. It's not like I ever had any money to buy a horse like this."
Anne smiled, the expression at once amused and full of kindness. "Maybe you will one day."
He guffawed. "Yes, because there is so much money in the business of being a monk."
She laughed with him. "Just so. Maybe there's hidden treasure buried under the church floor."
Guy chuckled, thinking if this were true, Lambert surely would have found it by now. Lambert…
"Er, I'm sorry. But I have to go. I told a friend I'd meet him."
She shooed him off. "Yes, yes. Off with you. But come back and talk to me again."
"I shall. Thank you."
"Until then, Guy. Of Gisborne."
--
Lambert leaned against the wall of the shack, breathing deeply. He was exhausted, of course, having practically run from the town square to the tiny weaver's shack. But he was also relieved. For whatever reason, Guy had decided not to join him on the trek to the tavern, leaving him free to come here and meet Isabella.
They had been doing this for months, sneaking out of their respective dormitories and meeting in town, but no matter how much time he spent thinking about it, Lambert could not discern why. The obvious reason was, of course, too obvious. If this was a tryst of some sort, it was the least romantic and most chaste tryst in the history of mankind. Moreover, his mind would not allow him to think of Isabella in such a way. For one, she was barely more than a girl, and for another, he was fairly certain his feelings did not incline towards her, or at least not in that way. He doubted she had any special sentiment for him either. She seemed to enjoy his company, if only because he was something of a novelty, a man who was like a brother, but not actually a brother.
He enjoyed her company as well, up to a point. Partly, this was because she was sensible and clever, a good listener, even if the things he spoke of were often outside the scope of her mind. But it was also because she made him see himself as he never had before. She would say profound things about him in an alarmingly matter-of-fact manner, and he would dismiss them at first, only to discover later that she was right. She was like a mirror turned on to his soul, and although her knowledge alarmed him, it also fascinated him.
But he was a man of reason, and it seemed to him wholly unreasonable that these meetings had to be so secret. They were doing nothing wrong and nothing of which either of them need be ashamed. So when Isabella had asked that he not tell Guy, he had balked. But later, when she'd insisted, he'd agreed, realizing it was much more important to her than to him.
The door to the weaver's shack creaked open, startling Lambert out of his thoughts. Isabella walked in, all windswept and ruddy from the cold.
"You're very late, Bella."
She turned around and smiled sheepishly. "I'm so sorry. Rose just learnt a new way to felt wool, and I wanted to see it." She laughed nervously as she spoke, still shivering a bit from the cold. "Like a good apprentice, yes?"
"Why are you doing all this anyway? It's not as if you really want to be a webster."
Isabella glared at him. "Maybe I do."
"Really?" He brought a hand to his chin and scratched for a moment, pensive. "Then tell me about the life of a weaver. Whatever you've learned so far."
She regarded him with narrowed eyes and then crossed her arms defiantly. "You go to market, and you buy wool. You get it cleaned and carded. You felt it and weave it into broadcloth. Then you sell the cloth at market.
"I'm not stupid, you know."
He smirked at her. "I know. How much for?"
"What?"
"How much do you sell the cloth for?"
"More than you paid for the wool."
"Ah, a profit. And what do you do with your profit?" Lambert was rather enjoying this little exercise in rhetoric and proving his point. He noted the rise of crimson on Isabella's cheeks and how attractive it made her. On reflection, however, he decided he didn't really like that he had noticed it.
She hissed at him. "Simple. You buy more wool."
Lambert tried to hide his amusement. "And that's what you want from your life? Endless days of haggling with the people who sell wool, the people who buy cloth and all the people in between?"
Isabella opened her mouth to reply, but promptly shut it again. He could tell from the slump of her shoulders and the way she was twisting the fabric of her dress together that she felt defeated. He felt a sudden rush of sympathy for her, an urge to embrace her and tell her he was sorry, but he fought it down and schooled himself to patience.
She sat down and sighed heavily. "What would you have me do, Lambert?"
"Whatever you want, Bella. Your life is your own."
"It's not though, is it? I'm meant to be pious and obedient and grateful. And I am, really. I'm very thankful for Guy, and for my uncle, and even the abbess.
"But I'm also a burden, on all of them, but especially on Guy. I want to be more than just dutiful. I want to be useful."
She paced the floor as she spoke, wearing a rut into the rushes and making Lambert nervous. "This gives me a trade, something to do. So I don't have to sit around and wait for some man to take pity on me and marry me."
"Marry you? Aren't you a bit young for that sort of thing?" Lambert tried to keep the note of alarm out of his voice. He could not understand just why, but the notion of Isabella as a married woman disturbed him more than he had expected.
She shrugged off the question. "I don't think it's too young. There was a girl at the abbey last year who was married at just fourteen."
Isabella stopped pacing and sat down on the floor in front of Lambert, leaning back on her hands and regarding him. "Of course, she had a dowry and a title she'd inherited from her mother. And I've got no dowry, no money and no title. Who would want me?"
Lambert tried to fight off his growing sense of disquiet. "Is that all you think about? Whether someone will marry you?"
Isabella narrowed her eyes at him. "No, but it's all we're allowed to think about it, isn't it?"
"Nonsense! Nobody can keep you from thinking, Bella. That's the beauty of it. What do you really want to do?"
She hesitated, but only for a moment. "I want to fight. For myself. I want to take care of myself, protect myself." She started twisting her skirts under her fingers again, and he was tempted just to clamp his hands over hers to make her stop.
"But nobody wants that for me. Everyone tries to keep me safe, but I think they're just trying to keep me in a cage, until they decide what to do with me."
Overcome with sympathy for her, Lambert reached out and took her hand, regretting the gesture almost instantly. Isabella's eyes grew wide as she watched him and leaned over to take his other hand. Reflexively, Lambert pushed her away and stood up, trying to put more distance between them.
"Bella, I'm…"
She shook her head. "I know. I've always known."
His mind was awhirl, and he could not decipher what she meant. She did not give him a proper chance to reply anyhow. She smiled at him, her eyes bright, too bright. Then, unexpectedly, she stood on the tips of her toes, and kissed him on the lips. It was chaste, barely a brush of her lips against his, and had it come from any other girl, he would have thought nothing of it. But from Isabella, it was a revelation, and her eyes said whatever the kiss had not. He was too flustered to do more than stare after her as she left, a wistful smile on her face.
It was not until later, after night fell and the blustery wind drove Lambert back to the abbey that he realized he'd lost his heart.
--
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