The Wise Woman

by Philippa Gregory

  'Is it fear, Sister Ann? Are you afraid to travel this road with me?' Mother Hildebrande asked, and her voice was filled with pity. 'Tell me if it is so and we will find you another way, a safer way.'

  There was a long silence. Then Alys shook her head. 'No, Mother,' she said slowly. 'I have been your daughter from the moment I first saw you. Where you lead I have promised to follow. If it is God's will and your belief that we must risk this, then I cannot refuse.' Mother Hildebrande put her hand gently on Alys' head in a silent blessing. 'Then why is it I feel that you hesitate?' she said softly. 'Is it the young lord, Sister Ann? Has he become dear to you?'

  Alys shook her head in denial but Mother Hildebrande never shifted her gaze. 'Are you in sin, Ann?' she asked gently. 'Have you looked at a married man and forgotten his vows to his wife, and your vows to Our Lord? God forgive me, but when I saw you first in that red gown I feared you had become his whore.' 'I am not!' Alys said in a whisper. 'He is young and handsome and they say that he loves lust and young women. If he forced you, Ann, or even if he seduced you into consent, you can tell me, and we will find a penance for you. You can expiate your sin. Our Lady is merciful, she will intercede for you.'

  'I have done nothing,' Alys said defiantly. She looked up at Hildebrande and for one moment the old abbess saw the hungry child of the herb garden who swore she had no kin and no one to prevent her coming to the abbey.

  The old woman paused a moment longer, searching Alys' clear, open face. 'I pray that it is so,' she said at last. 'Go now, Alys, and tell them you are not returning to the castle with them. We have to start our new life here at once. God is not to be delayed with excuses. His call comes before that of a lady in a castle – whoever is her husband.'

  Alys rose reluctantly. 'Do you have enough food?' she asked.

  The abbess smiled. 'I feasted like a prince on your gift,' she said. 'There is plenty, and when that is gone Our Lady will send plenty once more. We will not hunger here, Sister Ann. We will not be cold and lonely.

  The Lord will guide us. I trust Him to set a table for me, and my cup will run over.' 'I'll light the fire,' Alys said.

  'You can do it when you come back,' the abbess said. ‘I’ll do it now. The cottage needs airing. The sooner the fire is lit the better.'

  The abbess let her go inside, closed her eyes to the sunlight and murmured a prayer of thanksgiving that Sister Ann was found, the finest child of the abbey, found and restored to God once more. Whatever her sins – and there must have been many sins during ten long hazardous months out in the world – the girl would confess them and expiate them. It was a joy as great as that of a holy conception to have the child, her beloved daughter, returned to her. 'Like the prodigal son,' the abbess whispered softly. Under her closed eyelids she could feel the prickle of tears. Sister Ann had been spared the fire and been spared rape, and had been led home.

  'It's alight,' said Alys tersely, coming out into the sunshine again with dirty hands. 'In a few moments you can put some of the wood on. Put only one piece at a time, it's damp.'

  The old woman nodded, smiling. 'I shall walk along the river to meet you as you come back from your escort,' she said. 'The river here flows underground, you can sometimes hear it as you walk along the banks, Ann, did you know? It made me think of our faith -sometimes underground and sometimes above, but always flowing.'

  Alys nodded. She could not look at the caves uncovered by the drought without thinking of Morach's drowned body trapped and rotting in the crooked darkness of one of the holes. She could not sense the deep, secret, wetness of the water under the rocks. All she could see was the glare from the limestone slabs. All she could feel was their merciless aridity. 'I won't be long,' she said.

  Twenty-eight

  Alys rode towards Castleton without looking back.

  Mary, mounted on the pony again, rode behind her.

  The soldiers, rested after their dinner in the wood, stepped out blithely. The leading soldier whistled softly through his teeth. The fine weather was breaking up, there was a mist lying in swirls along the river, clumping over the still pools. The air was colder in the west, behind them there were long thick strips of cloud gathering.

  'Best make haste,' the soldier in front said over his shoulder. 'It's going to rain and you have no cape.'

  Alys nodded and the man broke into a slow, steady run. The mule trotted behind him, the dust beneath its hooves as white as salt. Alys, watching its long, doltish ears, jogged uncomfortably along. Behind her she heard the rapid, light sounds of her pony cantering, held in on a tight rein by Mary. Alys could taste the dust of the road in her mouth, could feel its stony dryness on the skin of her face, in her hair. She felt its crystalline deadness all around her as she rode away from Hildebrande and left her alone on the high moor.

  The horses' hooves rang hollowly on the Castleton bridge. The soldier slackened his pace as they walked through the town. The market traders were gathering up their goods, a sharp flurry of wind whipped the cloth on a weaver's stall into a dozen flags. The pony shied but Mary, sitting easily in the saddle, moved with it; the mule waggled his long ears at the sight. 'Just got home in time,' the soldier said. The guards at the gates barred their way with pikes and then lifted them up in a salute to Alys. Behind them came the dull rumble of thunder.

  'Here comes the rain,' the soldier said. 'You were lucky to get home dry, Mistress Alys.'

  Alys nodded and let him lift her from the saddle under the shelter of the gateway.

  'Someone lend me a cape,' she said abruptly. A scud of rain raced across the courtyard before them. Mary put a soldier's cape around Alys' shoulders and Alys pulled it up over her stiff gable hood. Ducking her head against the driving rain she ran across the yard, through the second gate, across the inner manse and into the great hall.

  She paused inside the hall as a crack of lightning made the hall as bright as midday and then a loud peal of thunder exploded outside. A soldier at the fire jumped and crossed himself. 'Christ save us!' he said. 'That was right overhead.'

  'Where is the young lord?' Alys asked him. 'Where is Hugo?'

  'With his father, Mistress Alys,' he replied. 'A messenger came from the King and they are reading the letters.'

  Alys nodded and went through the hall, through the lobby, to the round tower. As she climbed the tower steps her way was suddenly bright as the lightning exploded again. Alys stumbled and clung to the wall as the thunder rocked the building. ‘I will do it,' she said through her teeth.

  Her gown had been soaked in the brief run across the courtyard and now it clung to her thighs, dragging her down. It was as cold and wet as the gown of a drowned woman. 'I will do it,' Alys said again.

  She went up a dozen more stairs into the circular guardroom below the old lord's room. There were two soldiers playing at dice. 'Is the young lord with his father?' Alys asked them.

  'Yes, Mistress Alys,' said the younger, standing to speak to her and pulling off his cap.

  Alys nodded. The thunder rolled dully as if it had sped away to rage around the other tower, the prison tower.

  'The storm has gone,' the lad said. 'What a clap that was just now!'

  'It's not gone yet,' Alys said. She turned from the room and went up the next flight of stairs, clinging to the stones at the side of the stairs as if her knees were weak.

  She had been right about the storm. As she raised her hand to the latch of the old lord's door a knife of white light sliced through the arrow-slit to Alys' feet and then a great angry roar of thunder shook the stone tower. Alys, flinching back, almost fell into the room.

  Hugo, his father and David were seated at the fireside.

  'What a storm!' the old lord said. 'Are you wet, Alys? Are you cold?'

  'No, no,' she said. She heard that her voice was too sharp, too alarmed. She took a breath and steadied herself. 'I had to run across the courtyard but we were home before the rain started,' she said.

  Hugo looked up at her. 'You should change from your wet c
lothes,' he said. 'My father and I are busy with messages from the King's council.'

  'I won't disturb you then,' Alys said. 'I shall be ready to come and clerk for you, if you wish, my lord.' Lord Hugh nodded.

  'I just thought I should tell you,' Alys said. 'The new wise woman at Morach's cottage on Bowes Moor. She is very strange. I met her in the woods when I was fetching the elm bark. She talked very wild. She frightened me.'

  Hugo looked up. 'Did she do you harm?' he asked.

  Alys shook her head. 'No, but I would not have her near me when I am at my time,' she said. 'I had sent her some goods and thought she might be of service to me. But she talked so wild and looked so strange. I don't like her. I don't like her being in Morach's cottage.'

  The old lord was watching Alys curiously. 'Not like you to be fearful, Alys,' he said. 'Is it your condition?'

  Alys shrugged. 'It must be,' she said. 'But the woman mistook me for someone else. She called me Ann and conjured me to go and live with her. She ordered me to go to the cottage and she said I would be in danger if I did not join her. She made me fearful.'

  'Was she hexing you?' the old lord asked.

  'No,' Alys said firmly. 'Nothing like that. I suppose it was nothing more than my foolish fancy. I do not swear against her, I make no accusation. But I cannot like her living here so close to us. Nor living there – where I like to collect my plants. And it was old Morach's cottage and now it is mine. I don't want her living in my cottage.'

  'Move her on?' the old lord said, cocking an eyebrow at Hugo.

  Hugo laughed shortly. 'We'll dump her over the border into Westmorland,' he said. 'They have enough mad old women there for her to merge into the crowd.'

  Alys put her hand on her belly. 'I would not do her harm,' she said. 'I would not cause her to be hurt. I want you to move her gently, Hugo. I am only nervous because of my time and I do not want ill-wishing around me.'

  'Oh aye,' Hugo said. ‘I’ll send a half-dozen men out tomorrow. They can put her on a horse and send her over the border. You'll not see her again. She'll not trouble you.'

  'Tell them not to hurt her,' Alys said. ‘I feel it would be bad luck for me if they hurt her.'

  Hugo nodded. ‘I’ll tell them to be gentle with her. Don't fret, Alys.'

  She nodded. ‘I’ll leave you to your business then, my lords.' There was another flash of lightning as she put her hand on the door, and a deep rumble of thunder overhead.

  'This storm will do your work for you and blow the old hag across the border,' Lord Hugh said.

  'Going the wrong way,' Hugo said briefly. 'It'd blow her to Yorkshire and I'd wish that on no one.'

  The old lord chuckled and Alys closed the door behind her softly.

  The storm did not cease circling the castle all night. Alys went down to supper with her way lit by flashes which made the candles into sticks of black with flames of shadows. Catherine stayed upstairs, whimpering with fear at the storm and cringing when the thunder rolled. Her window was barred tight shut, with the hangings drawn, but still the quicksilver brightness of the lightning drew a rapid silver line around the curtains for one sharp second before the thunder crushed the world into blackness.

  Alys' colour was high, she sparkled as if she had been brushed with lightning herself. She was wearing a bright yellow gown and her hair combed loose over her shoulders. She laughed and leaned towards the old lord, smiled across him to Hugo, nodded at the soldiers at their table at the back of the hall who gave her a ragged cheer. She drank deep of the dark red wine the old lord urged on her. She ate well.

  'The elm bark settled your belly then,' the old lord said approvingly. 'The baby will do well with you, Alys. No jade's tricks of miscarriages, eh?'

  Alys gleamed at him. Outside the lightning smashed the darkness and the thunder roared in reply. A woman down in the body of the hall screamed.

  'No, my lord,' she said brightly. 'Not if my skill can prevent it. You will have a fine babe on your knee when the spring comes in.' Hugo nodded. 'I'll drink a toast to that,' he said. There was a sharp flash of lightning and a loud clap of thunder. One of the serving-wenches screamed in fear and dropped a tray of meat, and the dogs, who had been cowering beneath the trestle-tables, dashed out into the hall, snatched up the bones, and cowered back into their shelters again. Alys laughed gaily.

  'This rain will beat down the wheat,' Hugo said gloomily. 'We may lose some unless it blows over swiftly and the wheat can recover and stand tall again.'

  The old lord nodded. 'Summer storms never last long,' he said encouragingly. 'This one will blow out overnight and in the morn you'll see a bright yellow sun to dry out the wheatfields.'

  'We must go out when they cut the wheat,' Alys said. 'And celebrate harvest home.'

  A page stepped up to the dais to speak to the old lord. He leaned back in his chair to give an order. Hugo spoke across him to Alys.

  'Perhaps you had better stay home,' he said. 'You were not pleasantly greeted last time you went out to the fields.'

  The lightning flashed like a sword into the hall. Alys met Hugo's narrowed judging gaze with a brilliant smile which did not waver even when the roll of thunder drowned out his words.

  'I care for nothing!' she said, her voice very low. 'Not with the storm raging all around us! Come to my room tonight, Hugo, come to my room and I shall take you for a ride in the storm which you will never forget. My sisters go out to play on nights like this and I would be with them. You have forgotten my power, Hugo, but when I stretch my hand out there is nothing which can stop me. I do not fear these village people with their patches of land and their pig in the sty and their hive of bees. I do not fear anything they say nor anything they can do. I fear nothing, Hugo. Come to my room tonight and see how it is to play with a thunderstorm.'

  Hugo lost his hard, critical look and was breathing swiftly. 'Alys,' he said longingly.

  'After supper,' Alys commanded. She turned her head from him. David was at her side and the server of meat bent his knee and proffered the silver plate.

  'Give me plenty,' Alys cried over the rumble of the storm. 'I am hungry. I shall eat all I need. Give me plenty!'

  Supper was concluded swiftly, the noise of the storm made talk impossible, and even the least superstitious were edgy and fearful. For a little while the thunder slackened as it rolled off up the valley. But at the head of the valley by the great waterfall it turned and came raging down the river's course again, gathering speed and blowing the waters of the river out of course, flooding over their banks. The women did not choose to sit in the gallery where the windows rattled with the wind and the fire spat and hissed with falling rain. They went early to their beds, Ruth sleeping on a truckle bed in Catherine's room, holding her hand against her night-terrors. Alys laughed openly at the thought of it, flung open her door to Hugo, and then barred it behind them.

  He had caught her mood, his eyes were shining. He waited for her to command him.

  'Drink,' Alys said, handing him the wine with a small pinch of earthroot. She drained her own glass. 'And strip, Hugo, my sisters will only take you skyclad.'

  Hugo dragged his clothes off slowly, the earthroot spreading through his body, making his limbs heavy and uncontrolled. Alys could see his dark eyes go blacker yet as the pupils dilated with the drug. 'Alys, my witch,' he slurred.

  'Lie on the bed,' she said in a whisper. 'They are coming, my sisters. They will come at the next roll of thunder. Listen for them, Hugo! When the lightning splits the sky they will tumble down from the clouds, screaming and laughing, their hair streaming behind them. They are coming now! Now! Now!'

  Alys stood naked before the arrow-slit window, her arms outstretched. ‘I can see them,' she said. 'Across the brightness of the sky they're coming, Hugo! Here, my sisters! Here I am! Take me out in the storm to play with you.'

  The wind gusted through the arrow-slit. Alys, burning up with guilt, with desire, with feverish excitement, laughed madly as the rain lashed her body. 'Oh, that is go
od!' she said. The cold, hard rain stung her nipples, in a thousand prickling blows. 'Oh, so good!' she said. She turned to Hugo, driving herself beyond caution. 'Let's go outside,' she said recklessly. 'To the top of the round tower.'

  'Outside,' Hugo said thickly.

  Alys threw her dark blue cape around her nakedness, and put a blanket around Hugo's shoulders. He stumbled as she led him across the gallery, down the stairs and across the lobby to the round tower. The old lord was still in the hall, there was no one in the guardroom. Alys and Hugo slipped through, and up the narrow dark stairs, past the old lord's room, past Hugo's chamber above it, and up the stairs and out to the top of the tower.

  In a sheltered corner the pigeon coops were battened down to keep the messenger pigeons safe. Alys wanted to release them – to fling the precious birds out into the random winds so that they would be tumbled and lost and never find their way home. Apart from the coops, the roof-top was empty, slate-floored and inhospitable, a tower pointing upwards into the very vortex of the storm. The air was howling around them, the wind buffeting them so strongly that their words were whipped from their mouths and they were deafened with the hurrying gale. Alys stepped across to the parapet and looked down.

  The walls were high and straight as a plumb line. Alys could barely see the foot of the tower where it grew, like some strange crag, from the sheer rock of the cliff above the river. As the lightning flashed, Alys could see the cliffs, shiny and wet in the darkness as they fell away, in a sheer drop down to the river bed. Each crag was as pointed as a pike, and below them the river crashed and foamed over more sharp rocks, breaking in waves of black water and white spume. Alys let her cape fly out behind her and turned her face up to the drenching rain.