"Sara Douglass - The Troy Game 2 - God's Concubine" - читать интересную книгу автора (Douglass Sara)

refused to permit the couple to wed on the grounds such a marriage would violate the
Church's laws on consanguinity. William and Matilda shared a distant ancestor, Rollo the
Viking, who had founded Normandy, and (as he sat a-counting out the enormous bribes
he'd accepted from a number of frustrated suitors) the pope muttered darkly about the
evils of allowing such "close" blood-kin to wed. Their union, the pope declared, would
offend God to such an extent that doubtless He would smite Christendom with numerous
plagues, floods, and boils in the nastiest of places. Matilda stormed, William argued, and,
gratefully, eventually the protests waned, the bribes dried up, the pope lost interest, the
ban was rescinded (by a lowly clerk within Rome who was sick of the quantity of the
duke's protests he'd had to field over the years), and Matilda and William finally wed.
William smiled softly as he lay watching his bride sleep. He lifted a hand and pushed a
strand of her dark hair back from her forehead. It was tangled, and damp with sweat, and
William's smile grew broader as he remembered
the enthusiasm with which both had (finally!) consummated their union. Whatever
whispers may have rumored, the physical contrast in their heights and builds had made
not a single difference to the ease and joy with which they dispensed with Matilda's
virginity.
He stroked Matilda's forehead again, his touch less gentle this time, and she sighed,
shifted a little in their bed, and opened her eyes.
"I adore you," she whispered.
He leaned down and kissed her, but did not speak.
"And you?" she said very softly, once his mouth lifted from hers.
William hesitated, remembering that other time (so long ago) when he had made
(forced) another marriage. This time, he determined, he would not start with deception
and lies.
"You are my wife, my duchess, and I will honor you before any other woman, but___"
His nerve failed him at that moment, and so Matilda did what she had to do in order to
found their marriage in such strength that it would never fail.
"But I will not be the great love of your life." she said, propping herself up on one
elbow.
"That does not worry you?" he said.
"You and I," she said, tracing one of her tiny hands through the black curls that
scattered across his chest, "will make one of the greatest marriages Christendom has ever
known. What more could I ask?"

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 Sarah Douglass - God's Concubin


"That is not what I expected to hear," he said, laughing softly in wonderment. "That is
not what I had learned to expect from wives." He reached up a hand and cradled her face
within its great expanse.
"You have honored and respected me by telling me," Matilda said. "I can accept this."
She paused. "You will not dishonor me with her?"
"Never!" William said.
"Romantic love can so often destroy a marriage," said Matilda, "when what is needed
is unity of purpose, and unified strength. I will be the best of wives to you, and you shall
be the best of husbands to me, and we will marry our ambitions and strengths, and we
will never, never regret the choice that we have made."
"I wish I had found you earlier," William said, and Matilda could not have known that