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  Forever His

  Shelly Thacker

  FOREVER HIS (Stolen Brides Series, Book 1)

  An enchanting time-travel romance for fans of Jude Deveraux and Diana Gabaldon.

  Sir Gaston de Varennes wanted a docile bride who would fit into his plans for vengeance and justice, but a trick of time finds him married to a thoroughly modern American lady who turns his castle, his life, and his heart upside down. Will her desperate secret tear them apart after only a few bittersweet weeks of stolen passion—or will they conquer mistrust, treachery, and time itself to discover a love that spans the centuries?

  Winner of the National Readers Choice Award: Best Historical Romance of the Year

  “Irresistible, right down to the surprise at the end ... One of the best romances of the year.” The Detroit Free Press

  “A Desert Isle Keeper. Touching, ingenious ... I love this book. I’ve read it time after time, and even if I haven’t waited quite long enough between readings to forget all the details, I always get drawn back into the story so intensely that I can’t put it down. Grade: A (highest rating).” Ellen Hestand, All About Romance

  “Moving, riveting, magical. Forever His is destined to become an all-time favorite in medieval and time-travel romances.” The Mediaeval Chronicle

  “A masterpiece! Forever His is time-travel romance at its very best. Five stars (highest rating).” Affaire de Coeur

  A full-length novel of 125,000 words

  Adult content: explicit love scenes

  Originally published by Avon Books

  This Author’s Preferred Edition e-book includes bonus content: “The Making of Forever His: The Story Behind the Story,” plus sneak previews of upcoming Shelly Thacker books.

  The Stolen Brides Series

  One falls through time and finds herself married to a dark stranger ... one may never reach her royal wedding if she can’t resist her rugged protector ... one is abducted by a mysterious swordsman and swept away to a secret island paradise. Three regal brides are about to discover that falling in love with a warrior is the most dangerous adventure of all.

  Book 1 Forever His: Gaston and Celine

  Book 2 His Forbidden Touch: Royce and Princess Ciara

  Book 3 Timeless: Hauk and Avril

  And coming soon, an all-new edition of the prequel, Falcon on the Wind: Connor and Laurien

  About the Author: Shelly Thacker’s bestselling romances have won numerous national awards and lavish praise from Publishers Weekly, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Locus, and The Oakland Press, who have called her novels “innovative,” “addictive,” “memorable” and “powerful.” Find out more at www.shellythacker.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, business establishments, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Publishing History

  First edition published by Avon Books

  Copyright 1993 by Shelly Thacker Meinhardt

  Second edition published by Summit Avenue Books, 2011

  Copyright 2011 by Shelly Thacker Meinhardt

  ISBN: 978-0-9847646-3-1

  All rights reserved. No part of this book, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews, may be reproduced in any form by any means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without prior written permission from the author.

  The scanning, uploading, and distributing of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the copyright owner is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  Cover design by Kim Killion of Hot DAMN! Designs www.hotdamndesigns.com

  Digital formatting by A Thirsty Mind www.athirstymind.com

  Publishers interested in foreign-language translation or other subsidiary rights should contact the author at www.shellythacker.com.

  Dedication

  To Marjorie Braman,

  the best of the best.

  Time is too slow for those who wait,

  too swift for those who fear,

  too long for those who grieve,

  too short for those who rejoice,

  but for those who love,

  time is not.

  ~Henry van Dyke

  Prologue

  Artois Region, France, 1299

  Rain pelted down from the iron-gray sky, choking the first tentative rays of morning sunlight and turning the trampled battlefield to treacherous mud. Unarmed and unescorted, Sir Gaston de Varennes walked slowly past the two assembled armies, his dark mood matched by the clouds overhead, his pace slowed by pain from the freshly bound wound in his side—and by the agonizing knowledge that the action he was about to take would haunt him for the rest of his life.

  He stopped a few paces short of his destination, his body tensing as he stared at the hastily erected tent and its drooping white-and-blue pennant. The downpour deepened the autumn chill in the air, sluicing off his helm and soaking through his surcoat and chain mail until he felt the cold to the raw depths of his soul. The drenching rain could not wash away the scents of smoke and blood that hung heavily in the air.

  He turned a narrowed gaze on the men gathered around—his own forces on the right and his enemy’s on the left. The tent’s festive colors struck a sharp contrast to the somber, grit-smudged, determined faces of these warriors whose weapons lay at their feet. The steady ping of raindrops upon discarded blades and shields and battle-axes made strange music in the uneasy silence.

  As he studied his own ranks—loyal knights who had served his family for years, men who had fought valiantly beside him these two months—Gaston saw the message vivid in each pair of eyes: despite the fact that they were badly outnumbered, despite their almost-depleted supplies, they would fight on if he but said the word.

  One word and they would battle until the death of the last man. Until they had claimed some measure of justice from the soulless whoreson who had by treachery taken lives and land from the house of Varennes.

  Gaston felt as if he were being ripped in half. His warrior’s heart was one with theirs, pumping fire through his veins, searing him with a longing for steel and vengeance. Never had he felt more like the symbol emblazoned on his surcoat: a black lion on a silver field. A dark predator stalking the shadows.

  But the leader in him knew the foolishness of continuing this battle with winter’s bite in the air, with his forces and his food stores already dangerously depleted. He could not so heedlessly spend the lives of those who depended upon him.

  Nor could he defy the man who had called him to this place. The one man in all the realm who could force a halt to this war.

  Clenching his jaw, he turned, thrust aside the tent flap, and entered the torchlit darkness where unwelcome peace would be met.

  It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the flickering light. He removed his helm and straightened to his full height, his dark hair brushing the top of the tent. A rough-hewn table and two chairs had been placed in the center of the small pavilion.

  The table, he noted, was round, traditional symbol of honor among knights, a table to be used for the making of noble bargains and the sealing of vows of friendship. The sort of table that he himself found use for only rarely. On the far side of it stood the Duc Alain de la Tourelle.

  Gaston fastened a murderous expression upon him and saw his own hatred mirrored back tenfold.

  By nails and blood, how many weeks had he fought to get within blade’s reach of this cur? In every melee, Gaston had ba
ttled like a madman, trying to win a clear path to that pale visage with its keen blue eyes and wild crop of red hair. He had never quite managed it.

  Now his palm itched for the pommel of his sword and his muscles went taut with ready violence. The deep slash in his side throbbed, but he barely felt it through a haze of frustrated fury.

  Holding his enemy’s gaze, he stepped closer to the table, ignored the chair that had been provided for him, and tossed down his helm. It landed with a clatter.

  “Varennes,” Tourelle said with a humorless smile, leaning forward and bracing his arms on the thick oak, “as our host has not arrived yet, mayhap you and I might come to an understanding, without his interference. The claim I have upon the chateaux and the lands I have taken is—”

  “Your claim is a lie.” Gaston yanked off his mail gauntlets and threw them down beside his helm. “The lands you took by treachery mark you as a thief, and the lives you took mark you as a murderer.”

  Tourelle sneered. “You are a strange one to accuse another man of knavery, Blackheart.”

  Gaston ignored the familiar gibe. “Is that why you dared attempt such blatant theft?” he asked scathingly. “Did you truly believe that the arrant son would offer no resistance?”

  “It is surprising that you could tear yourself away from dicing and comely wenches long enough to lead men into battle,” Tourelle shot back. “But we waste time. The claim I have through my mother’s line is both ancient and valid. As for the tournament which went awry—”

  “Tournament?” Gaston snarled. “It was not a tournament but an ambush. Exactly as you planned it to be. You lured my father and brother with your challenge to tourney for glory and ransoms—and they never suspected that a lord who had sat at our tables and broken bread with us and spoken of honor and friendship for years would so suddenly prove himself a knave!”

  “They knew the risks when they agreed to the tournament,” Tourelle countered. “You all did. With a hundred men on each side fighting over a ground of fifty miles for three days from morning until dusk—it is to be expected that there may be breaches of the rules. ‘Twas a fair combat.”

  “My father and brother were too skilled and experienced to be killed in a fair combat. What you hoped was to wipe out the entire Varennes male line.” Gaston narrowed his eyes. “How long had you been planning it, Tourelle? Years?”

  Tourelle straightened, his mien all innocence. “Had it been my intent to kill every last one of you, Varennes, you would not now be standing before me.”

  “Aye, how disappointed you must have been when I did not arrive.”

  “And where were you, Blackheart? Why did you not join them? Why did you break your word?”

  Gaston’s temper slipped its leash as Tourelle’s barbs found their mark and brought an unwanted rush of grief and guilt. “Allow me to make clear one vow that I will keep,” he said with a feral smile. “The souls of my murdered father and brother demand justice. My brother’s widow demands it. The villagers whose homes and fields were ransacked and burned demand it. The women who were brutally raped demand it.” Gaston thrust himself away from the table. “I vow that I will reclaim all the lands you have stolen and make you pay for the blood upon your hands!”

  Tourelle reached for his scabbard, only to find it empty. With an oath, he launched himself over the table. Gaston crouched into a fighting stance.

  “Hold!” A booming voice rang out behind them before they could land a single blow.

  They froze, turning to find that their host had arrived at last—and his expression at the moment reflected naught of the name his features had earned him: King Philippe the Fair.

  Slowly, Gaston dropped to one knee, bowing his head. “Sire.” Beside him, Tourelle did the same.

  “Rise, Sir Gaston,” the King commanded, his voice deep with anger that rivaled the thunder outside. “Rise, Duc Alain.”

  Gaston straightened, but did not flinch from his lord’s wrathful gaze or stormy tone. He could not pretend remorse he did not feel for a war he did not regret.

  “You will both be seated,” the King ordered flatly, sweeping off his fur-lined velvet mantle, spattering rain across the small tent.

  Gaston moved slowly, reluctantly, but obeyed without a word, as did Tourelle.

  The King came to stand at the table, an equal distance between them, glaring from one to the other in turn. “I have sent missives to you both and they have been ignored,” he began in a quiet voice all the more ominous for its softness. “More than a fortnight past, I declared again that there would be peace between you, and yet you fought on. Did you both believe that I hold your past service in such esteem and your present counsel so valued that you could defy your King?” He slammed a fist on the table with such force that any lesser wood than oak would have split asunder.

  “Sire,” Tourelle said. “My claim—”

  “Silence!” Philippe demanded. “I will hear no more of claims and thievery and tournaments gone awry. I have decided the matter, and there will be peace.”

  “My liege, one cannot make peace with a viper,” Gaston insisted.

  “It is the way of these times, Gaston,” the King assured him with a bitter laugh. “One finds oneself making peace with all manner of creatures. I married my own sister to the English King not two years past to seal a treaty of peace.”

  “Sire,” Tourelle bit out, clearly displeased at being likened to a viper ... or to an Englishman. “It is I who have been wronged in this. I did not start this war. I merely defend myself. This knave attacked my lands without warning!”

  “And what would you have done in his place?” Philippe snapped. “A mere knight engaging a duc who possesses much larger holdings and more men? His strategy of surprise was his only hope of succeeding. It is not with polite, mild ways that Sir Gaston has earned the name The Black Lion, Alain. And it is no accident that I have come to depend upon his military counsel. You would be wise to remember that.”

  Any pride Gaston might have felt at the King’s words vanished when Philippe turned his furious gaze upon him.

  “But it is the wise knight,” Philippe continued, “who knows to stop when his lord so commands!”

  “My liege, had you been here, I would have been able to explain,” Gaston said. “I fear you do not fully grasp—”

  “Nay, Gaston, it is you who do not grasp this situation. With unrest along the Flemish border but a day’s ride distant, I require strong, obedient vassals here in the north, ready to defend my holdings from attack. Men with no quarrels between them.” He glanced from one to the other, then drew himself up to his full regal height. “We can no longer be Aquitaine and Orleans and Touraine and Artois, each region for itself, each man for himself. It is time for us to put aside the old ways and old wars and stand together as France. To fight together as France!”

  Silence followed his declaration, broken only by the pounding of the rain overhead. If his words were meant to replace hatred and enmity with loyal fervor, Gaston thought darkly, they failed.

  The King’s expression hardened. “It is not necessary that either of you understand. It is only necessary that you obey my commands. And there will be peace between you!” He folded his arms over his chest. “I have decided it thusly: you, Alain, shall have a portion of the lands that you claim through your mother’s line—those bordering the Oise River and westward.”

  Gaston bit back an oath and clamped his hands on the arms of his chair to keep from surging to his feet in outrage. That amounted to half of his brother, Gerard’s, holdings!

  “You, Gaston”—the King shot him a quelling glance—“will have returned to you your rightful inheritance: the chateaux that belonged to your father and brother, with all the lands and vassals entailed to each, but for that portion which I have just transferred to the Duc.”

  Gaston found but small satisfaction in that—though he did enjoy the strangled sound of protest that Tourelle couldn’t quite contain.

  “My liege!” Tourelle sputt
ered. “Varennes is not capable of managing such holdings! Nor is he deserving of them. The only chateau he possesses now is one that he stole during a—”

  “And to seal this peace and assure that there shall be no future trouble between you,” Philippe continued calmly, talking right over him, “Gaston will marry your nearest female relative, Alain.”

  Both men leaped to their feet with vehement protests before the King had even finished his sentence.

  “Nay, my lord, you cannot ask this!” Tourelle cried.

  “It is impossible,” Gaston declared, stunned by the unexpected command. “My liege, you have already promised me the hand of Lady Rosalind de Brissot.” He slanted a scornful look toward Tourelle. “Precisely so that I may join her lands with mine and protect my holdings and my people from the marauders who plague our region.”

  “Aye, Gaston, I did promise her to you, along with her dower lands. Half the Artois region, if you will recall. Mayhap you should have given some thought to that before you disobeyed my order to end this war.”

  Gaston felt his gut clench. He could not lose Lady Rosalind! He needed her lands and her knights now more than ever. His father’s and brother’s chateaux lay far to the north; he could not hope to hold them unless he had the reinforcements and the power that the de Brissot lands would bring him.

  “Sire,” Tourelle said patiently, “it pains me greatly to agree with this barbarian, but he is right in this instance—it is impossible. He cannot marry a maiden of my house because there are none available. My daughters are married. My sister died years past. I’ve no unmarried cousins—”

  “ ‘Twas your ward I thought of, Alain. Christiane de la Fontaine.”

  Tourelle flinched as if he’d been struck. “Not Christiane!” he spluttered. “She is an innocent, sire. Raised from the age of three in a foreign convent. She is soon to take her sacred vows and join the cloister. I cannot hand her over to this ... this—”

  “This barbarian wants naught to do with a woman of his enemy’s house,” Gaston said tightly. “Especially some impoverished novice fresh from the cloister without a blade of grass to her name. Sire, you must believe me. Tourelle is not what he pretends to be, and you are placing a weapon in his hands. He will only use this girl to accomplish what he has wanted all along—the death of the last male heir of the Varennes line. I will no doubt find her blade in my back as soon as the wedding vows have been spoken!”