“My lady Joanna! My sweet lady!” He fell on his knees before her. “My dearest dreams and wishes have come true, now you are returned!”
“The alchemist woman who was with Hugh?” Sir Yves was slowly walking round the table, his earlier pleasure fading quickly. “She is here? What is happening?”
“And your sons, Sir Hugh and Sir David!” Mercury winked at Joanna, jumped to his feet, gripped Hugh’s arm, and brought David off his knees. “My former comrade in captivity!”
He made it sound a great adventure, Joanna thought, as Sir Yves stared at Hugh.
“You are a mess, sir!” he barked, his mouth a rigid line of distaste.
“Nothing changes,” said David, speaking for the first time in an age. “I am home and nothing changes.”
“But the kin that is true stays true,” said Hugh, and now David finally stretched out a hand to him and shook Hugh’s: a silent compact of reconciliation, Joanna guessed, and one she was glad to witness.
Still, she wanted more and wanted to know more. “What should we call you?” she asked Mercury directly.
Mercury again dropped to his knees before her and kissed the hem of her gown. “You, lady, may call me your slave.”
“And to the rest of the world?” Joanna asked, determined not to smile.
“I am Lord Roger-Henri Angevin of Aquitaine, a son of King John of this proud country.”
The whisper, “The king’s son!” rustled through the great hall like a flood of water. Joanna’s own heart was racing again. She had guessed him to be noble, but a son of the king, even a bastard son of the king, as surely Lord Roger-Henri was, changed everything.
“How came you into the bishop’s tender care?” Hugh asked. Of all of them, he seemed the least alarmed by this revelation.
Lord Roger-Henri snapped his fingers for wine and only replied when he had taken a sip. “My main estates, you understand, are in France.”
Which perhaps accounted for why Sir Brian de Falaise knew him, Joanna thought.
“The journey to my English holdings is not one I wish to make: I do not like the sea.” Lord Roger-Henri sighed. “But then I thought in good conscience that I should come, and so I ventured from the places I knew best.”
There was doubtless more to this pretty tale, Joanna thought, but they would never know it. She listened intently as the prince explained a little more.
“I chose to come with a modest escort. I wished to travel discreetly, you understand.”
Everyone in the hall nodded and no one dared ask why.
“Coming into the barbarous west, we were set upon by bandits. These ruffians wished to take me hostage for gold and coins, but then I and they were swept up together by the bishop’s men, and I was deposited in the bishop’s donjon as a likely hostage.”
Where it was prudent for him to lose his memory, Joanna thought, and where he was content to remain unknown, at least until Bishop Thomas decided that this noble stranger might be too dangerous to keep.
“But my lord,” stammered Sir Yves, coming late to the threat that he was now under, “you have never been a hostage here! You have been my guest!”
“I know that and I thank you for it,” said Lord Roger-Henri. “You and yours have ever treated me with kindness and respect. And you will be rewarded.”
He smiled, and the whole hall, including Hugh, thought it best to applaud and kneel to him. Joanna would have also knelt, but the prince stopped her. “I do not forget your care for me, my lady,” he said in a low voice, as the men and women in the hall tried to outdo themselves in clapping. “I will help you in return.”
“Thank you, my lord.” She inclined her head so he would not read her face, or her rebellious eyes. Over and over, a question beat in her mind.
If Sir Brian had not come with them, for long how would this prince have kept up the pretense of his lost memory? And what of his men, still languishing in the bishop’s cages? Or were they free now? Whichever, it was clear that Lord Roger-Henri did not care. If he was in comfort and safety, then the world could go to the brink of hell, that much was plain.
He will do nothing for Hugh or me. Nothing.
Chapter 42
“Are we right to come here?” Joanna asked. They had ridden through the night from Castle Manhill, but she was not weary. Too much was going on for her to be tired.
First Lord Roger-Henri had sent out messages. Then he ordered a feast. Next he embraced David and Sir Brian, calling them “my dearest brothers-in-arms” and praised Hugh lavishly, calling him “a true champion, better than William the Marshal.”
Under this SirYves had merely observed that he should send word to his eldest son, Nigel, so he might come to show honor to his great guest. He had seemed dazed throughout the feast and scarcely spoke a dozen words to either of his sons.
“No grief to me,” David had said, using Hugh’s words as he tossed a candied fruit at his brother with a little show of his former lightheartedness.
Late on in the feast Lord Roger-Henri called for musicians and dancing. At that point, Hugh lifted his eyebrows and caught Joanna’s eye.
They had slipped out of the hall at different times and met on the stairs.
“Will you come with me?” Hugh had asked her.
“I will.”
So they had gone to the stables and taken Lucifer and left Castle Manhill. Joanna’s mood lifted more as they rode away without looking back. Where they were heading, she did not greatly care, so long as they were together. It was not a cold night, but Hugh asked if she wanted his cloak to wear and she said yes, because it was his.
On the road they did not speak much, although Joanna did ask once, “Are you and David friends now?”
She felt Hugh kiss the top of her head and sensed him smiling.
“We are, and more: he admits he was a fool over you. I think David will do well enough now, especially as Sir Brian has offered to be with him when he returns to the Templar house at Templecombe.”
“Good!” Joanna snuggled more deeply into Hugh’s cloak. She and David would have years to make peace between each other, so for now no more needed to be said.
“Should I guess where we are going?” she said later, as the full moon winked at them through gray clouds.
“If you like.”
“The village of the bees.”
Hugh tapped her thigh lightly with a finger. “Almost.”
“There is more to tell?” She twisted round and almost fell off Lucifer. Hugh grabbed her back and steadied her till she had caught her gasping breath.
“You are a half-wit on a horse.” He was chuckling: she could feel his laughter roll against her ribs.
Joanna agreed but she was not about to admit it. “I think I should teach you to read. Then I can look down my nose at you for a change.”
“I am a bad pupil.” Hugh lifted her hair and kissed the back of her neck. “My old teachers could tell you much.”
Joanna wriggled her hips against his thighs to distract him. They rode past a darkened hut, then an orchard, then a field of some crop too dark to see.
“Enough,” Hugh said then, and he rode Lucifer off the track into the field. In another moment they had stopped, Lucifer was grazing the crop, and Hugh had pulled her, and his saddle, off the stallion’s broad back.
Before she could speak, Hugh had dropped the saddle off into the darkness and was kissing her.
“You will marry me, or I will tie you over this saddle and use you thus until you beg that we are wed.” He cupped her backside as he had earlier that day and lifted her off her feet. “I know your passion, harem girl, and I will use it in my favor.”
His hands were where she most liked them, caressing, scooping, lifting, tickling. His manhood rose like a standing stone between them and all Joanna could think of was of ripping back his clothes. “Use me, Hugo,” she moaned, barely aware that she had spoken aloud.
He had bared her breasts but now he paused. “Say yes.”
The night air pe
aked her nipples but she felt as warm as the summer. “Yes?” she whispered, tonguing his chest through his tunic.
“To our marriage. Yes?” He lowered his head and sensation flooded her as he kissed her breasts, first quick and darting, then slowly.
Her legs buckled but he had her safe. Caught in his arms he floated her safely down amidst the sweet-smelling crop of hay.
“The priest will marry us at his house. The churches may be closed by the will of the pope and King John, but he will see us truly wed.”
He was drawing off his cloak and lifting her skirts and she was saying nothing. When he dragged the saddle out of a nearby ditch and rolled her onto it, facedown with her rump in the air and her head cushioned in his arm, she said nothing.
He did not enter her, as she hoped, but stroked her flanks and her bottom, kissing down the length of her spine.
“You are a little more plump, my lady,” he drawled. “A little rounder here and here. I think you are in lamb.”
“You are the expert when it is we women who bear?” Joanna gasped, not as keenly as she would have liked, for Hugh was caressing her more intimately. Even as a nightingale burst into midnight song from the nearby hedge, she was singing and soaring herself, in her head.
“I have seen mares in foal.” Hugh drew her more over the saddle, wrapping an arm about her middle. “You are in foal to me, and I will have your answer: Do you say yes?”
“But my father—”
“I spoke to him at the start of that never-ending feast. He is happy we wed and says I must do as I will. I will this.”
His stroking hand had quickened, his fingers questing more deeply. Joanna clenched her teeth and tried to ignore the building pleasure within her. She wanted to tell him first of Elspeth’s generous gift.
“I have a dowry!” she gasped out.
“From the lady Elspeth? I guessed as much. And when were you going to tell me that, eh? Wicked wench.” He smacked her lightly and said in a more urgent tone, “Good girl, rise yourself to me. Come now.”
The moon broke through another bank of clouds and Joanna raised her hips, feeling the delicious reward of Hugh’s fingers exploring, fondling, playing between her thighs. With her face half smothered by the cloak and half on hands and knees over the saddle, she raised herself again to follow Hugh’s caressing hand.
“Yes!” she cried, as the silver moonlight seemed to change to rose about her and the sweetness of her yielding was richer than gold.
“Marry me, Joanna.” Hugh had turned her again and now they were face-to-face and he was in her, deep within her. “Say you will.”
“Yes.”
“Say you will.” He began to move.
“I will.”
“Say it!” He was kissing her and staring at her, his eyes fierce with possessive tenderness.
“Yes, yes, yes!”
He caught her rhythm and moved with her, their joining suddenly urgent yet luscious, honey of the body and spirit. As he reached his climax he roared her name; as she crested her second she was beyond speech, but that no longer mattered. In this they had their own language, their private language, one they were constantly learning and re-shaping.
As one they flew into slumber, rocked and locked tight into each other’s arms. When the new day dawned, it was only the alarm call of a blackbird and Beowulf’s baleful howling that roused them reluctantly from sleep.
“To the priest’s house?” Hugh asked.
“To the priest’s house,” Joanna agreed, privately hoping that the holy father might give them breakfast, too.
Epilogue
Late September rolled out like cloth of gold, rich and mellow and warmer than midsummer. Hugh had lately returned from a joust in Picardy, loaded with money, and at once addressed himself to the challenge of their orchard.
“How long has he been picking apples?” David asked.
Joanna looked up from her furnace and frowned. She was counting down in her head and did not want to break off. It was Solomon who answered.
“My son-in-law has been battling with crabs and pear-mains since first light,” he remarked. “I believe the lady Elspeth and your father are now with him.”
“My father was fussing, was he?” David asked.
Solomon glanced at Joanna and nodded. It was common knowledge in both households that Hugh’s father was besotted by the thought of his first grandchild. As Hugh had observed, he and Joanna between them had finally beaten his eldest brother, Nigel, to a claim for Sir Yves’s attention.
Joanna worked the bellows and closed the door to the small furnace. She rubbed at the small of her back.
“I will see to the rest, daughter,” said Solomon. “You must walk now.”
She nodded and eased her way past the delicate glassware on the workbench, smiling at her father as she passed him.
“I am glad I have no stairs to climb here.” She stepped out of the small workshop directly into the yard. “Father loves it here, too. He can stargaze as much as he wishes with clear views of the whole sky.”
“It is a very pretty place,” David agreed, falling into slow step with her. “This was a gift of the lady Elspeth’s, I believe?”
“It was. Her parcel of land. The old shepherd’s hut was already here and Hugh and Father built the workshop. It was the first thing Hugh did, before he went off to tourney.”
“You do not mind his coming and going?”
“It is his trade.” She laughed at David’s startled expression. “Forgive me. That is how I think of it. He has his trade and I, when he is away, have mine. ’Tis true that he has cut down on the number of jousts he attends. He says he no longer has the taste for it and he thinks the time is coming when King John and his barons may wage war against each other here in England.”
David offered her his arm as they crossed over a ditch and out into the narrow track leading to the fields and orchards. “You are comfortable walking?”
Joanna glanced down at her own wide midriff and nodded. In truth she had felt well throughout her pregnancy, although standing tired her.
“Are you comfortable now, David?” she ventured.
“I am accepted back within my order. They accept I have no relics from the Holy Land.”
“Truly?” Joanna still was uncertain about David and the relics, but again he was adamant.
“I have no relics with me.”
He did not say he never had, Joanna noted. The mystery remained, although she found that she did not greatly care. “But are you content?”
“I do well enough at Templecombe.” He turned and walked backward for several paces, watching her rather waddling gait. “I paint when I can. That brings me peace. I finished a new painting yesterday evening: the head of Christ. The head of the preceptory is to install it in his house.”
“He gave you leave to visit today?” Of late David had begun to call on her and Hugh: the entire Manhill family seemed utterly fascinated by her burgeoning pregnancy.
David coughed and shifted to stride forward again. “Sir Brian knows I am here,” he said evasively. “But Joanna—” He stopped her with an arm. “Why are you and my brother on this little small holding? You have a full, rich household and lands.”
“A new stone castle with well-stocked kitchen and buttery, and lands bordering these here,” Joanna agreed. “Lord Roger-Henri delivered most generously on his promises.” To Hugh’s delight and astonishment. “But for my own work, this place is best.”
“Secret, certainly,” remarked David. “I cannot see the homestead now, surrounded as it is by trees and the curve of the hillside.”
“Discreet,” said Joanna firmly, and now she decided to sharpen their conversation. “Why are you here, David? You came but two days ago!”
“I have news. News Hugh will enjoy.” He smirked, suddenly shedding twenty years and looking almost a lad again. “Bishop Thomas of West Sarum is under investigation by his archbishop. The chatter at Templecombe last evening was that he may face charges of
heresy, and questions as to his treatment of prisoners.”
“Not so!”
“Indeed.”
“Lord Roger-Henri again?”
“Who knows? Does it matter?”
“Not to me,” Joanna admitted. Nor, she suspected, would Hugh care greatly. She stepped up to a wattle gate and ditch, the boundary of their orchard, and stood aside for David to go first. “If you will tell Hugh I am here, he will fetch me in.”
“I can lift you over the ditch and move that gate,” David offered, but she shook her head. “I have had this already with Sir Yves. Hugh is most determined it should be him and no other.”
“I would be the same,” David remarked. Surprising her then, he kissed her softly on the cheek and touched her forehead, as if he blessed her.
As he hurried away, Joanna thought of how matters had resolved and sublimated of late. Thomas under investigation, David reconciled within himself, Sir Yves closer to Hugh than he had been for years.
And Hugh, her powerful, wonderful Hugh, her new husband, running to her through the orchard, the sunlight honey on his restored, midnight-dark hair. She waited his coming, secure in the knowledge of his love.
“Dear heart!” He reached her and swept her up, big and heavy as she was, circling with her slowly, so she would not feel sick. “You do well, little one?”
“Very well, Hugo.” It amused her vastly that he still called her little. “And you?”
“How can you ask? You are here. The keeper of our child. My beloved.”
She kissed him. “Are you sorry now you took me hostage?” she asked, to tease him a little.
“How can I be?” His blue eyes shone with love and trust as he kissed her in return. “You hold my heart hostage. We are quit in debt. We are equal, love.”
“And safe,” she said. Finally, after years of wandering, she and her father were safe.
“Rich, too, which always helps!”
Laughing, Hugh lifted her again, over the ditch and into the orchard, where she readied herself for many tales of his battling with the apples.
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