Silence.
He knelt in front of her and reached for her hands. She shuddered, which was not the reaction that he looked for but it was a reaction of sorts, which was a beginning. ‘Gwenn, please. You can’t cut yourself off like this.’
‘Why not?’ Her voice was harsh, not her voice at all.
‘It...it’s not healthy.’
‘My sister cut herself off when life became unbearable.’
‘Katarin is sick, shocked. She had suffered much.’
‘Am I not sick and shocked? Have I not suffered much? I vow I will suffer no more. If I have to cut myself off to ensure that, then so be it.’ And, as if to illuminate her words, she jerked free of his hold and hunched away from him.
At least she was talking. Alan’s aim was to goad her into relieving her feelings. ‘Katarin’s a child, Gwenn. You cannot retreat as she did.’
‘For God’s sake, Alan!’ Her mouth was angry. ‘My husband has died! You don’t get over something like that in a few minutes, you know.’
‘You loved him.’
She swallowed, and her answer was husky. ‘Aye. Ned is...was very lovable.’
Alan could only agree.
‘Why did Ned have to die, Alan?’
She sounded like a child crying at the night. Alan had no comfort to offer her.
‘I should have been there, Alan. I should have been with him.’
He made a swift, negative gesture. ‘No.’
‘I should. It’s your fault I wasn’t with him. If you hadn’t taken me outside...’
Her voice cracked, and brown, melancholy eyes met his. She was grieving, inwardly and in silence; and her grief hit him like a blow in his empty stomach. To think that he had once wished her and Ned unmarried. They were unmarried now, and just look at her. It wasn’t Ned who was the fool, Alan reflected sourly, but himself. He was a selfish, simple, bloody fool. If he were granted one wish now, it would be that he could master time and turn it back for her. He would do anything to lift that bleak misery from her eyes.
‘Oh, Alan, why did Ned have to die!’ Her control slipped for an instant, and Alan heard a small sob. ‘He swore he’d never leave me! He promised, Alan! And now he’s broken his word! It’s your fault.’
‘No!’
‘It is! I’ve no one now! No one!’
‘You have me,’ Alan said, taking her hands again. They were cold as blocks of ice.
‘You!’ she exclaimed, derisively to Alan’s ears.
He bit his lip and told himself that it was her grief that made her cruel. ‘And there’s Katarin, and Philippe,’ he continued. ‘You are not alone. You have your relatives in north Brittany. They’ll take responsibility for you. Ned wanted me to take you to them. I’ll happily oblige.’
‘I don’t want anyone to take responsibility for me,’ Gwenn muttered, with a flash of her old waywardness. ‘I want to take responsibility for myself. I want to be independent.’
Alan shook his head. Women never took responsibility for themselves, and with the world structured as it was, how could they? Her grief was unhinging her. ‘Take responsibility for yourself? You’re not serious, Gwenn. It is your loss talking. You cannot be independent, it’s impossible.’
Her eyes glittered. ‘Impossible? Why? You’re independent.’
‘It’s different for me.’ Alan smiled. ‘I’m a man. I can fight my own battles.’
‘You’re not taking me seriously.’
‘How can I? Such a notion is ridiculous.’
‘Why? Why is it ridiculous? All I want is to be an island, like you.’
‘An island?’ Was that how she saw him?
‘I like you, Alan. I admit that I don’t know you well, but I probably know you as well as anyone. I’ve watched you. You have no ties. You’re careful to keep your friends at a distance. And I’ve noticed that whatever happens, Alan le Bret never gets hurt. And that is because his feelings are never engaged. I have decided to become like you. I am going to be independent. I have been hurt enough, and Ned’s death is the last blow I shall take. From now on,’ she spoke as solemnly as a nun making her holy vows, ‘I shall be an island. I take responsibility for myself, and myself alone.’
Alan could tell her that that way led to damnation and misery, and he should know, he had trod the solitary path for years. To think that she, in her grief, was taking him for her model... But he had changed. He had rejoined the human race, and was allowing himself to feel. As ever, they were out of step. Would they ever be in step? ‘I think,’ he said slowly, ‘you need to rest. We should discuss this in the morning.’
‘Don’t patronise me! We’ll discuss it now.’
‘You’re overwrought.’
‘I won’t deny that. But I tell you this, I won’t let you cart me back to Ploumanach. Lady Wymark did not approve of Ned, but she would offer false sympathy, and I do not think that I could stand it. She will be glad I am not longer married to a mercenary, and after a respectable time has elapsed, she and my uncle will honour me by finding me another husband. Only this new husband will be respectable – a pot-bellied merchant or some such – because they want someone they can have at their board who will not embarrass them.’
Alan grimaced. ‘You paint a vivid image. But I trust Lady Wymark would not force you to marry against your will.’
‘Force? What is force? I agree that she would probably not drag me kicking and screaming to the church gate. No, she would not do that. But there are other, more subtler persuasions. As her guest, I would feel bound to repay her for her generosity to me and my family. In the end I would surrender, and I would marry the pot-bellied merchant, and I would have to spend my days breeding pot-bellied children, and...’ her voice was almost inaudible ‘...I do not want that. So my thanks, Alan, for offering to escort me to Ploumanach, but I do not wish to go.’
Deciding his best course was to go along with her and hope that by morning she would see reason, Alan said, ‘You will need money.’
Gwenn pointed at Sir Raoul’s purse. ‘Money, I have.’
Alan picked up the purse. The knight’s conscience had obviously pricked him, for it was heavy. ‘It won’t last forever.’
‘It will last long enough,’ Gwenn answered shortly. She had the contents of the Stone Rose and what remained in Waldin St Clair’s wallet, but she did not trust this rootless mercenary as she had trusted her husband, and she would not tell him about that.
‘You’ll need protection.’
She smiled sweetly at Sir Raoul’s purse. ‘I can buy it.’
‘And what will you do, Gwenn, with this independence of yours?’
‘I have a desire to go to England.’
‘To England?’
‘Aye.’ Her hand fluttered delicately to her stomach. ‘I would like to meet Ned’s mother, and tell her what a good man her son was. I want to tell her how brave he was, and that his last thoughts were of her.’
‘There’s no need for you to go to England,’ Alan interrupted curtly. ‘I’m homeward bound myself, and with Duke Geoffrey dead, there’s no reason for me to delay.’
‘Alan,’ gentle, brown eyes regarded him, ‘I’m sorry your Duke is dead. I am not the only one to have suffered this day. Ned was your cousin, and you have also lost your Duke. Do you have work, now Duke Geoffrey is gone?’
‘I can always find work. Gwenn, as I was trying to tell you, after meeting my brother I vowed to visit my father. I shall call on Ned’s mother and give her your messages. There’s no need for you to make the journey.’
Gwenn caressed her flat stomach and a secretive smile softened the contours of her mouth. ‘You are very kind, Alan, but I have another message, one that only I can deliver.’
He raised a brow.
‘I’m carrying Ned’s child. And I think that Ned’s mother would like to see her grandchild in the flesh, don’t you?’
‘You are pregnant? God’s blood, woman! If you’re with child, you’re insane to consider such a journey!’
‘The Duchess tra
vels when she’s with child.’
‘Aye! And the Duchess has a litter, and waiting women, and scores of soldiers to protect her. But you...alone,’ Alan spluttered, ‘why you’d be a sitting duck for every renegade and outlaw between here and Richmond!’
‘No I won’t. I told you, Alan, I’ll hire good protection.’
‘And how will you judge if you can trust your protector, Gwenn? Jesu!’ Alan let fly a string of oaths. ‘You think you know the world, but you don’t. You’re still an innocent. Like as not you’ll hire the first unprincipled thief you run across, and he’ll take one look at that fat little purse of yours and relieve you of it, and you’ll be abandoned in the middle of Christ knows where.’
‘I’ll hire you.’
For a moment he thought he had misheard her. ‘What?’
‘I’ll hire you. We’ll be travelling the same road anyway. Will you take my purse and run off with it, Alan?’ she asked sweetly.
‘You know I would not!’
‘Well,’ she said calmly, ‘I’m willing to risk it. I’ll trust you to take me to Ned’s mother.’ She drew a deep breath. ‘Tell me, Alan le Bret, will you accept my commission, or do I look elsewhere for my protector?’
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Blade honed to shining, deadly perfection, Otto Malait slammed his cleaned sword back into his scabbard with a satisfied grin and flexed his arms. Now for the girl. He had waited two days for the storm caused by the Duke of Brittany’s death to blow over and he did not intend waiting a moment longer.
Yesterday, the area cordoned off by the Bretons had been crawling with messengers and solemn-faced guards, and he’d not had a chance to locate her tent, but at last the traffic had thinned. Otto tugged his trailing yellow beard while he brought to mind Conan’s last words. With his last breath, the pedlar had babbled about the girl’s tent and that of the Captain of the Guard’s, and Otto could only assume that the Fletchers were billeted with the Duke’s personal bodyguard.
Sentries were positioned by the late Duke’s white silk pavilion. Otto walked openly up to them. The points of their spears shifted to rest on his chest. ‘Good day,’ Otto said, and he made his lips smile.
‘Good day,’ a guard responded. He had a shock of unruly grizzled hair which stuck out of the bottom of his helmet like a dirty wad of sheep’s wool. His nose was the colour of old claret.
‘I’m looking for your captain,’ Otto went on.
The guard exchanged glances with his companion, a thin, weasel-faced man with light brown hair as fine as his comrade’s was thick. ‘If it’s work you’re looking for,’ the first guard grounded his spear, ‘you’re out of luck. I don’t know where you can have been hiding, but in case you haven’t heard, our Duke–’
‘I know about that. I’m not looking for work.’
‘Oh?’ The guard’s eyes narrowed while he eyed the burly Viking up and down, dwelling on the heavy sword and the axe that these savage Norsemen favoured. ‘What are you after?’
‘I’m catching up with an old friend,’ Otto thought another smile wouldn’t go amiss, ‘name of Fletcher. Mistress Gwenn Fletcher. I heard she was lodged near your captain.’
‘Fl...Fletcher?’ The guard, a Breton born and bred, had difficulty with the foreign name. ‘Never heard of her, but the captain was lodged–’
‘Was?’ Muscles tensed in the thick column of the Norseman’s neck.
The guard grinned. ‘Didn’t I say? Our captain’s resigned. Left yesterday evening with the funeral procession. Bound for Paris. He wasn’t planning on returning.’
‘Shit.’ Otto was hard put to restrain himself from grabbing the man by the throat in order to shake the information out of him. ‘And Mistress Fletcher?’
‘Like I told you. I don’t know any Mistress Fletcher.’
Stubbornly, Otto held on to the last thing Conan had said. ‘I was told she was lodged near your captain.’
‘It’s important you find her?’
Otto clenched his jaw and his fists. It was very difficult to keep smiling. ‘You might put it like that.’
The guard pointed his spear down the avenue between two rows of canvas. ‘See that large waggon – the cook’s, with the pots hanging off the side?’
‘Aye.’
‘Try over there. Our captain set his tent up past that. Your Mistress Fletcher might yet be there.’
Otto grunted and swung round, and under the curious gaze of the guards stalked in the direction indicated.
‘Love,’ the weasel-faced guard with the thinning hair pronounced knowingly, ‘enough to drive a man mad.’
***
Alan’s last duty to his master, Geoffrey, Duke of Brittany, was a doleful one. He attended his funeral. The Duke was buried in the choir of Nôtre Dame in Paris, and Alan could not but notice that while the late Duke’s wife was dry-eyed, his friend the King of France wept openly. Alan regretted Duke Geoffrey’s death himself. He had been a skilled swordsman and an excellent horseman, and though Henry of England’s third son had undoubtedly been arrogant and spoilt, he had had a lively sense of humour. He had neglected his wife, but Alan had never found any deliberate malice in him. After being employed by Count François de Roncier, it had been refreshing to stumble on an easy-going master like the Duke of Brittany. While Alan had been sworn to him, he had come to the conclusion that the Plantaganet princes’ constant feuding was similar in nature to François de Roncier’s feud with Jean St Clair. At bottom, both feuds were based on a greedy desire for power. Both de Roncier and the Duke had been shamelessly out for themselves. Alan nourished a hearty dislike for de Roncier, but he had liked Duke Geoffrey, something he had never been able to rationalise. Neither man cared much for anyone but himself. What was it then that the Duke had that de Roncier had not? The Duke was a good loser, de Roncier was not. The Duke had charm, and a roguish sense of humour.
Duke Geoffrey had been twenty-eight years old when the life had been crushed out of him, and he had left no male heir to inherit his vast estates. Eyeing the widowed Duchess’s ceremonial ermine bliaud, Alan wondered if the rumours concerning her condition were true. Duchess Constance did not look pregnant, but then neither did Gwenn, and Gwenn was confident that if all went well, she would bear Ned’s child next spring.
Where would Gwenn be by then? The monks’ mournful dirge rose to fill the cavernous space above the cathedral choir. Would she be in England with Ned’s mother? Or back with Sir Gregor and Lady Wymark in Ploumanach? She had set her heart on England, and no amount of argument had persuaded her to change this foolhardy plan. She would, she had informed him coldly, get there with or without his help.
Alan looked at the delicate patterns of Nôtre Dame’s soaring tracery, but was unmoved by their beauty. He looked at the caricatured faces of the people of Paris as they had been immortalised on the monks’ misericordes – works of genius each of them – but today he could not appreciate them. He looked at the cathedral’s lofty coloured glass windows. Light was pouring through them; it tumbled onto the patterned tiles, painting then with God’s brightest hues. Alan was looking at some of the finest of man’s works, but today he could not find it in him to admire any of it.
He would have to go with Gwenn to Richmond, though he was not looking forwards to travelling in her company. It would be nothing less than purgatory. He wanted her, but Ned’s death seemed to have pushed her further away then ever. Her heart had grown hard with this last bereavement. Alan did not think that anyone would storm it again.
He sighed. No, he was not looking forward to the journey north, but he could no more abandon Gwenn to her folly than he could murder her. He would just have to grit his teeth and conceal his feelings.
He watched a mitred bishop lift a clod of earth on a silver trowel, and cast in onto the lid of the Duke’s elaborately painted coffin. Thud. The Duchess’s long white hand reached for the trowel. Thud. And King Philip’s. Thud. Alan’s throat ached. This funeral was a far cry from the humble ceremony provided for Ne
d, but it was no less poignant.
Alan’s feet had gone to sleep. He shuffled them, and wished the interminable service at an end. He hated funerals, and the wearisome thoughts they fostered. He wanted to get back to the inn where he had found lodgings. He wanted to see Gwenn had everything she needed. And then, he supposed, he would have to make preparations for their journey to Richmond.
***
The evening shadows ran along the hoof-scarred surface of the empty tiltyard. The sand had not been raked, and rust-coloured splotches marked the places where blood had been spilled. The white raven had been discreetly removed. On the fencing, knights’ bright flags fluttered forlornly. The swallows had returned. With a clear field, the birds worked the length of the lists as if they feared the crowds might return and they would be driven away.
The tourney field might be deserted, but the camp site was not. It had taken Otto most of the afternoon to verify that Gwenn was not lodged in one of the tents in the Breton section. He had combed the entire encampment, and when he was stopped and challenged as to his business there, he answered with questions of his own. Finally, when he had eliminated the last possible tent from his enquiries, he was forced to conclude that she had gone. And if what he had learned was correct, the concubine’s daughter was proving to be just as much the whore as her mother had been. Ned Fletcher – this had been easy to discover – had been killed. A young woman had been sighted riding off in the company of the Duke’s captain. She had been riding at the back of the ducal funeral train, heading for Paris.
Paris. With a face as black as Death himself, Otto threw his saddle on his horse, secured the girth and vaulted up. The man from whom he had squeezed that little gem had been short-sighted, and he had been unable to describe accurately either the young woman or her mount.
Otto cantered towards Paris, but he could not be positive that he was following the right trail. At present, it was the only trail he had.
Thinking back to his time at Kermaria, Otto recalled being surprised that the pedlar had never returned for his purse. He’d come to the conclusion that Conan must have come to a grisly end wrangling over a bottle of wine. He’d hung onto his purse and forgotten him. Indeed, he’d had had a fine few days spending the pedlar’s money. And when he had arrived at the encampment and spotted Conan hanging around the cookhouse, Otto had kept his distance, his curiosity aroused. He noticed that the pedlar had lost a hand, but that alone would not have prevented him from doing trade with de Roncier. The only circumstance that might prevent the pedlar from working for the Count, Otto reasoned, was if he was after larger game...
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