Innocent's Champion
To win a knight’s protection.When Gilan, Comte de Cormeilles, dodges an arrow aimed straight for his head, the last person he expects to be holding the bow is a beautiful, courageous woman… Despite her innocence, Matilda of Lilleshall is no simpering maiden. She’ll stop at nothing to protect her land.Believing he’ll never again feel anything but guilt after his brother’s death, Gilan must now confront the undeniable desire Matilda incites. Can he throw off his past and fight to become the champion she needs?
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‘I think maybe you were right, Gilan,’ she spluttered out. ‘I’ve made a mistake. I should go home.’
‘You’re changing your mind?’ he said, incredulous. ‘After all that effort you put into persuading me to bring you along? Why?’
She flinched slightly. How could she tell him? How could she tell him that being this close to him sent her whole body into a flutter of excitement, of anticipation?
‘I…er…well…’ She shrugged her shoulders. ‘I thought it was better if we carried on…that’s all.’
‘That’s not it. You were the one who suggested we find shelter,’ he pointed out.
She pursed her lips and sighed. ‘If you must know, I’m not in the habit of doing things like this. Sleeping in a cave with a man I hardly know.’
He smiled, teeth flashing white in the gloom. ‘Oh, don’t worry,’ he said. ‘I’ll keep well away; you’re safe from me.’
Turning away from her, he returned to his horse, unbuckling the saddlebags. The lie scorched through his conscience—a flare of brilliant light.
My story of Matilda and Gilan originated in a medieval tale of two sisters—wealthy heiresses in their own right, who were ultimately manoeuvred out of their fortune by the powerful men surrounding them. This was a fact of life for most medieval women: to have their lives controlled by their fathers or their husbands.
I wanted my heroine to fight against these male constraints: to be a strong, feisty woman who breaks with convention and attempts to forge her own path. Despite her wayward behaviour and his own initial reluctance Gilan, a knight who has travelled to England with the exiled Henry of Bolingbroke, is the man who helps her. She achieves her goal—and wins a handsome knight at the same time!
MERIEL FULLER lives in a quiet corner of rural Devon, England, with her husband and two children. Her early career was in advertising, with a bit of creative writing on the side. Now, with a family to look after, writing has become her passion… A keen interest in literature, the arts and history, particularly the early medieval period, makes writing historical novels a pleasure. The Devon countryside, a landscape rich in medieval sites, holds many clues to the past and has made her research a special treat.
Contents
Summer 1399—south-west England
‘What is that? On the bottom of your gown? Actually, my gown.’ Katherine’s peevish tones emerged, shrill, from the shadowed interior of the covered litter. Striding alongside, Matilda slackened her brisk pace at the sound of her sister’s voice, glancing down at the hem of her skirts. In the cloying heat of the afternoon, the heavily pleated silk bodice stuck to the skin around her chest and shoulders; the high neck, buttoned tightly around her throat to the pale curve of her chin, made her feel constricted, trapped. Her sister had insisted she wear the elaborate gown, with a light-blue cloak to match, indicating with turned-down mouth that none of Matilda’s clothing were suitable for visiting the Shrine of Our Lady at Worlebury.
‘Well?’ Katherine addressed her shrewishly, peering out from between the patterned curtains. ‘Oh, God Lord, stop bouncing me so!’ she snapped at the servants who each shouldered a wooden strut of the litter, one on each corner, endeavouring to carry their lady as carefully as possible along the rutted track. Katherine sank back into the padded cushions, her face grey-toned and wan, the rounded dome of her stomach protruding upwards into the gloom.
Matilda twisted one way, then the other, trying to spot the problem with the gown. The smooth blue silk of the skirts billowed out from below a jewelled belt set high on her narrow waist. One of the knights in the service of her brother-in-law, riding up front on a huge glossy destrier, smirked beneath his chain-mail hood, before he snapped his gaze smartly forwards once more. Let him laugh, thought Matilda. She was used to being told off by her older sister and paid little heed to it. Katherine was suffering greatly in this late stage of pregnancy and this heavy, torpid heat wasn’t helping matters.
‘It’s nothing,’ she called to Katherine. ‘A lump of sticky burr, snagged on the hem.’ Reaching down, she pulled at the clump of green trailing weed, throwing it to the side of the track. The dark chestnut silk of her hair, firmly pulled into two plaited rolls on either side of her neat head, gleamed in the sunlight filtering through the trees. A fine silver net covered her intricate hairstyle, secured with a narrow silver circlet.
‘Come and sit in with me, Matilda, please.’ A nervous desperation edged her sister’s voice as she stuck her head out between the thick velvet curtains that afforded her some privacy within the litter. Her face looked puffy, skin covered with a waxy gleam that emphasised the violet shadows beneath her eyes. Matilda glanced at the sun’s position, thick light pouring down through the beech trees lining the route. The fresh green leaves bobbed in the slight breeze, lifting occasionally to send brilliant shafts of illumination straight down to touch the hardened earth of the track. It hadn’t rained for weeks.
