It was not an indictment, simply a statement of conclusion, and although Royce didn't turn to face her, she saw his shoulders stiffen as if bracing against pain while he spoke. "I reached the same conclusion the night it happened," Royce said tightly, almost relieved to have it out in the open. "From the corner of my eye, I saw a dagger being drawn at my back, and I reacted instinctively. It was a reflex. I'm sorry, Jennifer."

The woman he had married would not accept his word, nor his love, but, oddly, she accepted his apology. "Thank you," she said achingly, "for not trying to convince me or yourself that he was an assassin. 'Twill make it much easier for us-for you and I to…"

Jenny's voice trailed off as she tried to think what lay ahead for them, but all she could think of was what they had once shared-and lost. "For you and I to-treat each other courteously," she finished lamely.

Royce drew an unsteady breath and turned his head to her. "And that's all you want from me anymore?" he asked, his voice rough with emotion. "Courtesy?"

Jenny nodded because she could not speak. And because she could almost believe the look in his eyes was pain-a pain that surpassed even her own. "That's all I want," she finally managed to say.

A muscle at the base of his throat worked as if he were trying to speak, but he only nodded curtly. And then he left.

The moment the door closed behind him, Jenny clutched at the bedpost, tears streaming from her eyes in hot rivers. Her shoulders shook with violent, wrenching sobs she could no longer control; they tore from her chest and she wrapped her arms around the post, but her knees would no longer support her.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Canopied galleries with chairs placed on ascending levels lined all four sides of the enormous tournament field and were already crowded with gorgeously garbed ladies and gentlemen by the time Jenny, Brenna, Aunt Elinor, and Arik arrived. Flags flew from the tops of each gallery, displaying the coats of arms of all the occupants within it, and as Jenny looked about, searching for her own banner, she immediately confirmed that Katherine had been correct: the galleries of her countrymen were not integrated with the others but were set facing the English -locked in opposition even now.

"There, my dear-there is your coat of arms," Aunt Elinor said, pointing to the gallery across the field. "Flying right there beside your father's."

Arik spoke, startling the three women into near panic with the sound of his booming voice, "You sit there-" he ordered, pointing to the gallery flying the Claymore coat of arms above it.

Jenny, who knew this was the giant's order, not Royce's-which she wouldn't have obeyed anyway-shook her head. "I will sit beneath my own coat of arms, Arik. Wars with you have already emptied our gallery of many who should have been there. Claymore's gallery is packed."

But it wasn't. Not quite. There was a large, thronelike chair in the center of it that was conspicuously empty. It had been meant for Jenny, she knew. Her stomach twisted as she rode past it, and the minute she did, all six hundred guests at Claymore and every serf and villager within sight of the field seemed to turn and watch her, first with shock, then disappointment, and, from many, contempt.

Clan Merrick's gallery, flying the falcon and crescent, was between Clan MacPherson's and Clan Duggan's. To add to Jenny's mounting misery, the moment the clans across the field saw that she was riding to their side, an ear-rending cheer went up that continued growing in volume the closer she came. Jenny stared blindly ahead and made herself think only of William.

She took her seat in the front row, between Aunt Elinor and Brenna, and as soon as she was settled, her kinsmen, including Becky's father, began patting her shoulder and calling proud greetings to her. People she knew-and many she didn't-from the galleries around her lined up in front of her to either renew their acquaintance or ask for an introduction. Once she had longed only to be accepted by her people; today, she was being worshiped and petted like an adored national heroine by more than a thousand Scots.

And all she'd had to do in order to accomplish it was to publicly humiliate and betray her husband.

The realization made her stomach cramp and her hands perspire. She'd been here less than ten minutes and already Jenny didn't think she would be able to endure more than a few minutes of it without becoming physically ill.

And that was before the people who had crowded around her finally moved away, and she found herself the cynosure of nearly every eye across the field on the English side. Everywhere she looked, the English were either looking at her, pointing at her, or drawing someone else's attention to her.

"Just look," Aunt Elinor said delightedly, nodding at the infuriated, glaring English, "at the wonderful headpieces we are all wearing! It was just as I expected -all of us were quite carried away with the spirit of the day and have worn the sort of thing that was in style in our youth."

Jenny forced herself to lift her head, her gaze running blindly over the sea of colored canopies, waving flags, and floating veils across the field from her. There were steeple-shaped caps with veils trailing all the way to the ground; caps that stood out on both sides like giant wings, caps shaped like hearts with veils, like cornucopias with draperies, and even caps that looked as if two square pieces of veiling had been shaken out and hung over long sticks that were standing in the ladies' hair. Jenny saw them without seeing them, just as she was vaguely aware that Elinor was saying, "and while you are looking about, my dear, keep your head high, for you have made your choice-though a wrong one I think-and now you must try to carry it off."

Jenny's head jerked toward her. "What are you saying, Aunt Elinor?"

"What I would have said before if you'd asked me: your place is with your husband. However, my place is with you. And so here I am. And here is dear Brenna on your other side, who I strongly suspect is concocting some wild scheme to stay behind and remain with your husband's brother."

Brenna's head lurched around and she too stared at Aunt Elinor, but Jenny was too immersed in her own guilt and uncertainty to register much alarm over Brenna yet. "You don't understand about William, Aunt Elinor. I loved him."

"He loved you, too." Brenna said feelingly, and Jenny felt slightly better until Brenna added, "Unlike Father, he loved you more than he despised our 'enemy.' "

Jenny closed her eyes. "Please," she whispered to them both. "Do not do this to me. I-I know what is right…"

She was spared the need to say more, however, by the sudden blast of clarions as the trumpeters rode onto the field, followed by the heralds, who waited until there was a semblance of quiet and then began proclaiming the rules:

The tournament was to be preceded by three jousting matches, the herald cried out, the three matches to be between the six knights judged to be the finest in the land. Jenny held her breath, then slowly expelled it: the first two combatants were a French knight and a Scotsman; the second match was Royce's against a Frenchman named DuMont; and the third was Royce's against Ian MacPherson-the son of Jenny's former "betrothed."

The crowd went wild; instead of having to wait all day and perhaps two to see the Wolf, they were going to see him twice in the first hour.

The rules at first seemed perfectly ordinary: the first knight to accumulate three points won the match; one point was given a knight each time he struck his opponent hard enough to splinter his spear. Jenny assumed it would take at least five passes for any knight to accumulate three points, considering that it was no mean feat to successfully level a lance, take aim atop a galloping horse, and strike an opponent at precisely the right spot to shiver a lance-particularly since the smooth surface of the armor was designed to make the lance skid off. Three points, and the match, were automatically awarded to a knight if he actually unhorsed his opponent.

The next two announcements made the crowd roar with approval and Jenny cringe: the jousts were to be fought in the German style, not French-which meant the massive regular lances would be used, rather than poplar ones-and the deadly spear heads would not be blunted with protective coronals.

The bellows of enthusiasm from the crowd were so loud there was a long delay before the herald could finish by announcing that the tournament would follow the trio of jousts and that the remaining jousts would take place throughout the next two days. However, he added, due to the illustriousness of the knights attending, the jousts that followed the tournment would be organized according to the importance of the knight if such could be determined.

Again the crowd roared with enthusiasm. Instead of having to watch obscure knights joust with even lesser ones, they'd have their greatest pleasure served first.

Outside the ring, the constables had finished checking saddle fastenings to make certain no knight intended to use leather straps, rather than good horsemanship and brute strength, to stay on his mount. Satisfied, the chief constable gave the signal, the heralds trotted off the field, and then kettle drums, pipes, and trumpets began to blast, announcing the ceremonial parade onto the field by all the knights.

Even Jenny was not proof against the dazzling spectacle that followed: six across, the knights paraded onto the tourney field wearing full armor, mounted on prancing warhorses decked out in dazzling silver bridles and bells, colorful headdresses, and trappings of brilliant silks and velvets, that displayed the coat of arms of the knight. Polished armor glinted in the sun so brightly that Jenny found herself squinting as before her eyes paraded tabards and shields emblazoned with coats of arms showing every imaginable animal from noble beasts like lions, tigers, falcons, tiercels, and bears to whimsical dragons and unicorns; others bore designs of stripes and squares, half moons and stars; still others bore flowers.