He hadn’t been perfectly continent, but he was not going to tell her more of the grinding inquisitions he received on the matter, not when the worst crime she was required to acknowledge appeared to be excess adornment.
"Is true, then," she asked, "that those things be not sin in marriage?"
"Some say yes, and some no." He remained staring between his knees.
"You’ve studied much on this matter?"
He nodded.
She rocked back on her hips and laughed. "In truth, we’ll send you to confession very often, monk man, for your further instruction!"
He let his gaze wander up to the window, to the chimney—to her, as she sat curled with the warm firelight on the curve of her back. He smiled slowly. "As God and my liege lady command me."
EIGHTEEN
The first thing Melanthe knew was the roar of a voice and the chime of rings sliding as the bedcurtains swept open and gray light poured over her. "Baseborn whore!"
A monstrous black outline flashed, and something came hurtling at her. Through the blankets a blow smashed into her neck and shoulder.
The black flashed again. She heard a shout, the thing came at her, and suddenly another weight bore down atop her, between her and the assault. A sound like an ax on wood cracked through her head. The weight on her jerked, and jerked again under another hit. Through a daze she realized that it was Ruck above her, his body pressing her down as someone beat him, raining blows on his naked back.
"High morn is it!" their attacker howled. "Rise, boy, or lose your hide! Your commoner is killed; base whore you took to wife, and I’ll slay her bastards to clean the nest! She was unworthy of you! Adaw, the swords await." His weapon cracked down again. "Up! Will you mount a bloody corpse? Get up!"
The hits had lost a little of their energy. Ruck lifted himself. He raised his arm; she saw a grizzled man beside the bed—the descending wooden sword whacked into the palm of Ruck’s hand. He held the weapon off and jerked it from their assailant’s double grip as he rose, hurling it away. It struck the open door and woke a thunder of echoes in the spiraled stair beyond.
"Cease off!" Stride-legged and naked, his back reddened by beating, Ruck glared at the savage old man. "Take heed and stand back."
The man didn’t even glance at Ruck. "Stinking bitch-clout, do you breathe still?" He came for Melanthe, gray and powerful, his beard an untamed mat. "Hey and ware, I’ll soon strangle you!"
Ruck sprang to prevent him, ramming him back, holding him with an arm across his chest. "No, sir, it’s folly! Heed to me!"
"Heed you!" The man fought, big and strong enough in spite of his years to force Ruck to arm’s length, but none of his struggle could break him free. "Heed you, you pillock, while you degrade your mother, God forgive her! While you corrupt your father’s line with common blood!" He spat toward Melanthe.
"Enough! Cease off this blundering!" Ruck caught him by the shoulders. With a grunt of effort he forced the old man to his knees. "Get down!"
The man made wild efforts to rise, but Ruck held him down. "I have no children," Ruck said fiercely. "You know this. I’ve said you many times. Now listen to me. Isabelle is dead years ago. My lady’s grace is the Princess Melanthe, of Monteverde and Bowland. And my wife. I’d have you understand it clearly, and repeat my words, that I know I may release you."
The old man ceased his combat. Melanthe clutched the sheet and her hand over her bruised shoulder. He turned pale, lifting his face to her. "Bowland?" he said, his voice suddenly atremble. "The daughter of Sir Richard?"
Ruck let him go. The old man’s body shook. As he bowed down his head to his knees and began to weep, Ruck looked quickly toward Melanthe. "My lady—are you hurt?"
Her arm throbbed, but the quilts had muffled the impact of the sword. She was more stunned than in pain. Wordlessly she shook her head. He turned, kneeling to embrace their groaning attacker, holding him tight, as if he were a child.
"Who is this?" Melanthe exclaimed.
"Sir Harold." He did not say more, but gently urged the other man up. "Come, you must depart now, sir."
Sir Harold pulled himself away. "Sir Richard? You’ve wed Sir Richard, boy?"
Ruck touched his shoulder and indicated Melanthe. "His daughter," he murmured. "The countess."
The grizzled knight twisted and pulled at his hair, possessed with frantic mumbling. He seemed to lose his strength, falling with his forehead to the floor, begging mercy, muttering in confusion of her father and Bowland and killing. Melanthe watched Ruck try to coax him away with no success.
"Come forward, Sir Harold," she said curtly. "Now speak plain words as a good trusty knight, or take yourself off."
The sharp command seemed to reach his scattered wits. He stopped his moving and mumbling, and crept to the bedside, his scarred hands knotted together. He raised his face to her. "My noble lady’s grace," he said, "I have a demon!"
"Yes, that is clear to me, Sir Harold."
"My lady," he said hopelessly, "methinks I must slay myself, to kill it."
"No, you will not. Neither I nor Lord Ruadrik give you leave. It’s against God, Sir Harold. And would deprive my lord of his rights to aid and counsel of you," She softened her voice. "When the demon tries to seize you, you must remember to ask God for counsel and solace, for He comes to the aid of those who wish to do good and act faithfully."
The old man gazed at her, dawning adoration in his face. "Blessed be you, my lady. Oh, my lady, you be the wisest and worthiest of the world’s kind."
"This is not my wisdom, but my honored father’s, God give his soul peace. I only mind you of your duty."
Sir Harold gave a little sigh. "Gentle lady, truly the Lord God blessed this house on the day your lady’s grace wed my lord. It was the unworthy bitch-mare I designed to slay, to keep clean my lord’s noble blood."
"God has saved you from that mortal sin," Melanthe said. "Take your near escape to heart."
He bowed his head. "My lady."
"Lord Ruadrik will adjudge your punishment for striking me, but if it be heavier than a day in the tumbrel, then I’ll try to intercede for you."
"Thank you, my lady," he said humbly. "I beg my lady’s favor."
"You have my favor. Leave me now." She held out her hand from beneath the sheet to be kissed. He reached for her so quickly that for a moment she regretted the move, but he took her fingers gently, only the rough pads of his palms touching her as he made a courteous gesture of bending over her hand.
"God preserve your lady’s grace." He rose, falling back from the bedside with his shoulders squared and his head lifted. Ruck had stood all the time beside him, as if ready to drag him out at any moment. Sir Harold gave him a deep bow, pronounced himself at his lord’s mercy whenever he should be pleased to devise a just punishment, and strode from the room.
Immediately Ruck closed the door and barred it. Without speaking, he took up his shirt, pulling it over his head, covering the fiery marks on his skin. For the first time Melanthe became aware of rain that pelted against the window glazing and the cold dimness of the room.
"In God’s name!" She sank back into the pillows. "What next in this place?"
"You’re not hurt, my lady?"
His cool tone warned her away from jesting. Her shoulder throbbed painfully, but she held the silken quilt up close, watching him. "I live."
"He is maddened, my lady," Ruck said. "He can’t help himself when the fits are on him."
"Who is he?"
"My master in arms. In his prime he took a blow to his head that lay bare the brain, and since then has no command of his rage. But he’s a great knight, my lady, and taught me the best that I know of fighting."
"The secret of your prowess. You fight like a madman because a madman instructed you."
He shrugged. "It may be." He bent over a chest and took breeches from it, dressing himself without service. "Sir Harold esteems gentle blood and pomp above all things. Isabelle he despised, though I never brought her her
e. Only to hear her name enrages him. He’d have had me take a princess to wife."
With a little twist of his mouth and a glance at Melanthe, he acknowledged what he’d said, as if he’d just heeded his own words.
"Then I shall crush him with my magnificence, so as to gladden him," she said.
He took clothes from the chest and shut the lid. "You delighted him greatly, my lady, with your noble talking."
"It’s a talent of mine, noble talking."
"Clearly," he agreed. "Enough to make a man’s head spin."
"That is the purpose of noble talking. It’s saved many a prince from certain death."
He rested one foot on the ornamented and embellished settle, lacing his hose. The gear was of gray silk, a fitted tunic embroidered in black and set with jet stones, trimmed in sable fur. She was pleased to see that amid his many-hued retainers, he alone went uncolored. It set him apart as no fantastical finery could, and did his comeliness no hurt at all, but underscored it.
"Will you rise, lady?" he asked when he was done. "Or sleep away all your lifetime?"
She slipped down and pulled the sheet over her head. From beyond the white warmth she heard him move. The door bar made a grating slide.
She sat up. "Wait."
He stood at the door, his hand upon it. Melanthe held the blankets up to her.
"I don’t wish you to go," she said abruptly.
He made a slight bow and waited at the door, as if for an order.
"I don’t wish you to go," she repeated.
"My lady, they expect me in hall. Long I’ve been absent, and many matters will await." He scowled down at the hasp. "Though it seems a strange place to you, I’m master of it."
She understood a lord’s duty as well as she understood how to breathe. But some imp inside her—it didn’t even seem to be herself—made her plump her body on the mattress like a spoiled child. She turned over with her back to him.
"When you rise, my lady," he said, "I’ll be below."
She heard the creak of the door and rolled over, flinging a pillow at him. It hit his shoulder. As he turned, she hurled another that struck him full in the chest.
She dropped down into the bed and yanked the coverings over her, curling facedown, her hands gripped together under her chin. She heard the door close. The sound of the boards beneath the carpets traced his coming to the bed. Then she was miserable and angry, not even knowing what to say, beyond a bare demand for his company and his indecent embraces. Too low to sink, to ask for what she had always denied; and too terrible if she should be refused, chosen over, and he went to his minstrels that he loved.
It was not sensible to feel so. She herself would have gone to her duties first. She said into the mattress, "You’re discourteous. You haven’t even bade me good morn before you depart."
"Good morn, then."
"Good morn. And I hope you break into boils and die."
She felt his hand on her back, then both hands sweeping aside the sheet and kneading her bare shoulders. He buried his face in the nape of her neck, his weight bearing down the mattress. With a whimper of relief, she turned up to him, ignoring the pain where he pressed her bruised shoulder, eager for his kisses.
"I don’t hope for it," she said against his skin, against his cheek rough with new beard. "I don’t. I would perish without you."
"Melanthe." His fingers gripped her. "My sovereign lady," he whispered, and gave her freely what she wanted, without the asking, company and unchaste embraces and his body deep in hers, until she perished another way, blind with delight.
* * *
Ruck felt her sleep—always sleeping, this wife of his—this drowsy miracle, slumbering in his arms as if she were in some enchantment. He pressed his cheek to her loosened hair and listened to the rain and thought of her, how she masked and dazed him. In her easy arrogance she did not confound him; no, not her commands or noble talking. She was meant to be so, born to be so—it was only what was right.
But she threw pillows at him. A woman full grown, as old as he, a princess in one look and a looby the next. He’d known court ladies to play the child, to pose and flutter and speak in small voices for to draw the men, but she was so awkward and left-handed at it, and so abrupt. He would have thought her more smooth and artful in dalliance. In good faith, he was more comely with love-sporting himself when he tried.
Sometimes it was as if there were another soul inside her. Or by chance it was all false leading, to mock him. He’d allowed her in, carried her through the woven thorn-wood: she knew Wolfscar now. She would go out, speak of it to the world, mock him and rob him of what was his. There was only Sir Harold left alive to say that he knew Ruck without misgiving or doubt. One mad old man to bring in favor of Ruck’s claim, against the richest abbey in the northwest. And all hope of Lancaster’s esteem and support with the king lost.
He had shown her through the thorn-wood, but she hadn’t slipped so quietly through the thickets that he’d raised about his heart. She burned them down to find him, and then left him smoking ashes.
It was too late. She was here. He was at her mercy, as he had been from the moment he had beheld her.
* * *
"You have no choice, if you hold any hope for this sister of yours," Allegreto said, low and harsh. He leaned across the table. "You’re a bungler, Cara. You’re hopeless. You haven’t got the nerve to work alone."
In the miserable little alehouse, the light through a barred window fell on his face. Smoke from the open fire in the floor permeated every crevice and flavored her ale. She drank a sip, forcing herself to swallow the sour brew without looking down. It was cloudy and cold, like everything in this godforsaken northern land. Outside it snowed, when it wasn’t raining. She put down the vessel and stuffed her hand back in the muff he’d bought for her.
A week she’d been with him. Once, she’d tried to steal her silver as he slept—a futile chance, and almost fatal. She had a cut the length of his stiletto on the side of her neck, where he’d nearly impaled her throat as he overturned on her.
"How can I go in there?" she whispered desperately. "She said she’d have me killed!"
"If she’d wanted you killed, you would be dead." He leaned back, draining his ale. "She would have told me to see to it."
"So she said, that she’d loose you upon me—only she would not say when, but she wouldn’t make me suffer to wait long!"
He laughed. "Naturally. And what did you do, goose? Bolted, just as she designed."
Cara glared at him. "As did you, Navona."
He nodded, his grin becoming a sneer. "Yes. I did. And I’ll pay for it in full, if I don’t remedy the matter."
His eyes slid away. He stared into the dark corner. Twice, when they had slept in barns and cow-byres on the journey, she had heard a faint sound in the night. He wept, she thought, but she was not certain. Perhaps he only dreamed.
"Well," he said, "she has outwitted herself. She never meant for her escort to leave her to a man, of that we can be sure. I wager even the green fellow deserted her in the end—or died for her when the bandits fell on them, more like, as these love-drunk champions are wont to do. So we’ve only to see to her ransom, and she’s delivered back to us tied up in silk ribbons."
"Perhaps they killed her," Cara said, feeling guilty and hopeful.
"They’re a foolish lot of brigands if they did. She’s worth their wildest dreams, and I’ll wager they know it. We’ll have her back for the right price."
"Mary, if you’re so anxious to save her, you should have gone to the prince of that Chester city and begged his aid."
"The cities don’t have princes here, or patricians. I don’t know what they have, but you can be sure that whoever rules so close to that nest of outlaws is like a hand in their glove. No, we’ll work from out of the princess’s own hold, where we can have some command of matters."
"I can’t go in that castle!" Cara kept her voice low, watching the alewife who watched her. No one here spoke a civi
lized language, only a few words of broken French, but they didn’t seem overly surprised at foreign travelers. She feared that meant the Princess Melanthe’s retinue from London had already arrived. Her stronghold of Bowland was but an hour’s ride from here, if the alewife’s nods and babble could be depended upon. "What if the others have come?"
"Hah! Who did she leave in charge of them? Sodorini, that fluttering old buffoon! They’ll go in such circles they won’t be here for weeks. And why should you fear them anyway?"
"I—" She stopped herself suddenly.
Allegreto smiled in the barred light. "Who is it, Monteverde goose?"
She took another gulp of her unpleasant ale.
"Cara," he said patiently, "do you suppose I don’t know there’s a Riata among them? You have no choice, I tell you. Come to us—we serve and keep our own, not like the Riata dogs—and Monteverde is gone forever." He leaned forward across the table. "I’ll speak to my father. We’ll even get your sister back, if she’s still alive."
"You can’t promise that," she said.
He shrugged. "No, for she may be dead already."
"You can’t promise for Navona." Her lip curled. "He broke my family. My father—"
"Was a foolish man," Allegreto said soberly. "If he’d cared for his family, he’d have done what was asked of him. And your mother didn’t fare so badly when she married again."
She turned her face away from him, so full of hate that she could not even speak to defend her father. She didn’t know what Gian Navona had asked of him; she only knew that he’d been tortured to death on a false accusation, and Navona had caused it.
She pushed away from the table and stood up, flinging her muff onto the smoky fire. "My mother was terrified to be wed to Ligurio’s brother. She lived the last days of her life in dread that she would bear a son and see him killed by Gian. I cannot deal with Navona."
He rose as quickly, at the same time that the alewife darted forward and snatched up the muff. The woman held it uncertainly, and then retreated to the far corner like some stray dog with a scrap.