Hugh sighed. He could understand her reluctance to clear the air, but until they did, there would be no real peace between them. He wanted a true peace with Isabelle, not just a charade for the sake of their family.
That night when they were ensconced within the solar he forced the issue. Pouring them goblets of sweet wine, he told her, “We must settle this now, ma Belle.”
Isabelle sighed. Men were so difficult. Could not Hugh be content that they were safely home, and that she loved him? “I do not know what there is to say, my lord,” she told him.
“You told me once that you did not love Guy d’ Bretagne,” he began.
“I did not,” she agreed. “I told him that I did because I knew it pleased him, and it allowed him to trust me. I needed that trust if I was to help you, Hugh Fauconier. Why do you refuse to understand?”
“Yet, I believe, you enjoyed his passion,” Hugh replied grimly.
Isabelle thought a long moment, and then she said, “Sometimes, aye, I did,” she admitted, “even when the pleasure was forced from me. I seemed to have no control over my body, but that is not love, my lord. And you, did you not enjoy yourself with Vivienne d’ Bretagne? And until you came to yourself again, thanks to my efforts, did you not have a small tendresse for the bitch? What is the difference between us, Hugh? Tell me that, and I will beg your forgiveness.”
“I am a man, madame,” he declared loftily. “A man, good or bad, may do as he pleases within the tenets of the law. A good woman must remain chaste no matter the circumstances.”
Isabelle threw her goblet of wine at her husband. “You great donkey!” she cried. “What in the name of heaven has your maleness to do with anything? I will speak with you no further since you cannot be reasonable. I am going to bed.” She climbed into their bed, turning her back on him.
Hugh was astounded, and his first instinct was to grab her and beat her soundly. To his credit, he did not. Instead he slammed from the solar without another word.
The next morning it was obvious to both Alette and Rolf that something was very wrong between the lord and lady of Langston. When they had left the hall, Alette looked unhappily to her husband.
“I fear, Rolf, that our peaceful days are over. There is, it would seem, a breach between my daughter and her husband. Can it be healed, I wonder?”
“If it can,” Rolf told her, “they must do the healing, ma petite. They are neither of them easy people. Isabelle is headstrong, and Hugh proud. My duty is to steward Langston, and yours, I believe, is to see that the children, ours and young Hugh, are not unduly troubled by the war that will be fought between Hugh Fauconier and Belle from Hell.”
“Do not call her that!” Alette snapped at her husband, who laughed at her ire. “I shall never forgive Ancient Albert, may God assoil his soul, for calling Isabelle by that awful sobriquet!”
Hugh did not return to the hall that night. Alette was careful in her conversation with her daughter, but she need not have worried. Isabelle was distracted; her main interest seemed to be her son, and she spent her day playing with him, tucking him into his bed that evening herself. She would not remove Hughie from the nursery in New Tower, for he was happy there with his two little uncles. In the solar she slept alone once more.
In the morning Belle entered the hall to find Hugh at the high board, pale and sipping something from a silver goblet. “Have you found yourself a rustic mistress then, my lord?” she asked him tartly, signaling a servant to bring her some food.
“I spent the night alone,” he told her.
“It would appear that you also spent the night imbibing a great deal of bad wine, my lord. You are as white as fleece,” she replied.
“Is that concern I hear in your voice, ma Belle?” he murmured. “Did you miss me in the night? I might have stayed, but your sharp tongue and your temper do little to encourage me.”
“Nor does your arrogance please me,” she snapped. “Sleep where you please, my lord. It matters not to me at all.” Her hand reached for her goblet.
Reaching out, he quickly grasped her wrist. “Do not, lady. I am weary of your bad disposition.”
“And I of your disdain, my lord,” she told him. “Let me go, Hugh. I merely mean to drink the cider, not hurl it at you. I shall be bruised by your brutality, I fear.” She shook him off.
“Is my brutality then not as refined as Guy d’ Bretagne’s?” he demanded of her.
“You are despicable, my lord,” Isabelle said wearily, and then suddenly her voice was calm and measured. “Guy is dead, Hugh. I would not be alive had he not taken the blow Vivienne meant for me. Would you have preferred it that way? That I died, and the babe with me? We both owe him a debt of gratitude, strange as it may seem.”
“Whatever I may have owed him, lady,” Hugh said coldly, “you, ma Belle, repaid the debt a thousand times over.”
“Ahhhhh, that is the crux of the matter, isn’t it, Hugh? Guy d’ Bretagne was my lover, and you cannot let that go, can you? I can forgive you Vivienne. Why can you not forgive me Guy? I did not love him. I love you!” She glared angrily at him. He was being so pigheaded, damn him! Did he think her memories of him with Vivienne were any less painful than his memories of her with Guy? They both had to put it behind them, or they would never be happy again.
“I would have preferred that you remained at Langston like a good wife, and that you had not come seeking me,” he said, his voice rising.
“How many times must we go over this, my lord?” she demanded of him. “Had I not sought you out, we should not be home today. You should be grateful to me instead of angry! When you came to Langston, did I inquire of you how many women you had swived?”
“I was not married to you then, damnit! How do you think I feel knowing that Guy d’ Bretagne made love to you, held you in his arms, kissed you, made you cry out with pleasure? I love you, too, Isabelle, but I do not know if I can ever forgive you!” His plain face was anguished.
“Then you are a fool, Hugh,” she said quietly. “You are allowing your pride to stand between us. I should not have believed such a thing of you, my lord. I thought you wiser than that.”
“Then what are we to do?” he said, and his voice was sad.
“Unless you can put the past in the past, my lord, I do not know what we can do,” Isabelle responded softly. “I am ready to pick up the threads of my life again as the lady of Langston Keep. You must fight your own demons, Hugh.” She arose from the high board, and without another word to him left the hall.
Hugh Fauconier watched his wife go, her head held high. For a moment he could almost believe it was as it had been when they were first married; but then his big shoulders slumped and his head fell into his hands. Isabelle had lain with another man. He could never forget it, and if he could not forget, how could he forgive her? It was a terrible conundrum he was unable to solve.
* * *
During the weeks that followed, Langston appeared to have returned to normal. The servants behaved as if Isabelle had merely been away for a short time and had now returned to assume her duties as their chatelaine. Even Alette deferred to her daughter without difficulty. Young Hugh was making up for lost time with his pretty mother, following her about as she tended to her duties, snuggling into her lap to gaze up at her adoringly when she sat in the hall by the fire.
Only Hugh Fauconier seemed unable to shake the images of his wife that tormented him: Isabelle, her red-gold head against Guy d’ Bretagne’s shoulder. Guy, his dark glance possessive; his elegant, long fingers offering her a tidbit, a sip from his cup; thrusting the phallus into her writhing body while she cried with pleasure. Guy had owned Isabelle as Hugh had never believed it possible for any man to own a woman. Had she really resisted him? That doubt troubled him greatly, and he knew he should not have any doubts about his wife. She appeared to have been absolutely forthright with him, yet his suspicion lingered, for he could still see Isabelle nestled in Guy d’ Bretagne’s lap, complaisant, and more beautiful than he had
ever before known her to be.
Now she moved again through her familiar world with a dignity and a serenity he would not have believed her capable of, her belly growing rounder each day. She was more assured of herself than she had ever been, and he had had absolutely nothing to do with it. Had Guy? Why was it that the d’ Bretagnes yet had a hold on their lives? They were dead and buried, both of them, still their sorcery lingered.
Finally Alette tried to intercede with her daughter. “You and Hugh cannot go on like this,” she gently scolded Isabelle.
“What do you want me to do, madame?” Isabelle asked patiently. She could not confide the truth to Alette. How could her sweet, sheltered mother possibly understand?
“Well, there must be something that you can do,” Alette replied.
Isabelle laughed. “Can you turn back time, lady? If you can, then do it, I beg you. I like not this rift between myself and my husband any more than you do.”
Rolf, too, tried broaching the subject as he and Hugh rode across the estate one winter’s afternoon. “Alette and I are disturbed that you and Isabelle cannot manage to overcome your differences, whatever they may be,” he began. “What can we do to help you both to a reunion? We cannot bear to see you so unhappy.”
Hugh realized then that he had absolutely no choice. The burden he was carrying was simply too great for him to bear alone. “You must never tell Alette what I am about to tell you,” he said, and then he revealed to his friend in detail the truth of his and Isabelle’s time at La Citadelle. He concluded by saying, “If you can help me erase the memories I have of my wife with another man, then do so, my friend. I live in agony with those memories, for I love Isabelle above all women, yet I cannot forget.”
Rolf was stunned by the revelations Hugh had just made. Still, he was a sensible man. “Hugh, you are being foolish,” he said. “Your wife is not responsible for what befell her at La Citadelle. She knows that or else she could not live with her shame. How could a girl as basically innocent as your wife have known that a woman’s body will respond to any skillful lover, Hugh? You were her only lover. Can you imagine her shock at finding out that another man—a man she did not even love—could coax a response from her? Yet she kept her wits about her, brave woman that she is. My sweet Alette would have crumbled and gone mad. Not Isabelle. She accepted what she could not change, and everything she did, Hugh, she did in order to free you from the enchantment you believed imprisoned you. She sacrificed herself totally for her beloved husband. No woman could love a man more than that! She is formidable, and you should be proud of her.”
“I see them together!” Hugh groaned unhappily.
“What you see,” Rolf said sagely, “is clouded by your damned overweening pride, my friend. Isabelle is to shortly bear you another child. Though the circumstances of that child’s conception are odd, to say the least, it was conceived by you both. Replace the old memories that taunt you with the new memories that you will make together now that you are home again. Only then will you be able to exorcise that which distresses you so greatly. You know in your heart that Isabelle loves you, and always has; and I know that you love her.”
Suddenly there came a shouting from behind them. The two men turned about to see a serf running toward them, waving his arms and shouting. Turning their horses, they hurried toward him.
“The lady Alette,” the man gasped, almost out of breath when they reached him. “Her says the babe is a-coming, my lords!”
Hugh and Rolf galloped the few miles’ distance back to the keep, but as they entered the hall, Isabelle came toward them, smiling, a swaddled bundle in her arms.
“I have a little sister,” she said gaily, and placed the infant in her father’s arms. “My mother says she is to be called Edith, for that was the queen’s name before she came to England.”
Rolf gazed down, awed by the dainty pink and white creature in his arms. She had a tuft of golden hair, and her blue eyes regarded him most carefully. “She looks just like my Alette,” he said, teary-eyed.
“I saw,” Isabelle said with a small chuckle. “Let us hope she is indeed the daughter our mother so desperately desires, and not a whit like me.” Then she laughed aloud at her stepfather’s look of concern, teasing him, “One never really knows with children, Rolf.”
In the days that followed Edith’s birth, Hugh Fauconier thought of his friend’s words. He had never known Rolf de Briard to speak with such wisdom. Rolf had always been so carefree. Suddenly his friend seemed much older, and filled with sagacity. Hugh pondered to himself everything Rolf had said. Was it possible that he was right? Could a reconciliation with Isabelle be the key to obliterating his memories of what had happened? Was it really that simple? God only knew he wanted a rapprochement with his wife. A new beginning. But what if Rolf were wrong? What would happen to them then?
Hugh knew that he had to think on it further before he decided what he would do. Would Isabelle even welcome his overtures now, or would she angrily rebuff him? Still, he had seen her glancing at him when she thought he was not looking. Her gaze was always one of deep sadness, yet if his eyes met hers, she was always proud and defiant.
Something had changed. Isabelle sensed it. Hugh was suddenly not quite so combative whenever he approached her. Yet he had said nothing that would lead her to believe he had overcome his aversion dilemma. What had happened? Had anything happened, or was she just imagining it? Neither her mother nor her stepfather had said anything out of the ordinary. Isabelle knew if there was the slightest change in Hugh’s attitude, her mother would have come to her joyfully with the tidings.
Belle’s labor began early in the morning of the last day of March. Suddenly Hugh was with her, as he had been when she birthed Hugh the Younger. His was a calming presence, and in the early stages of her labor, while Alette directed her, he saw that the baby’s cradle and swaddling clothes were nearby, and that Ida, the sister of little Hugh’s nursemaid, Ada, was ready to take charge of this new child.
Isabelle made herself as comfortable as a woman in her condition could upon the birthing table. She half sat, her smock pulled over her hips, legs wide apart, waiting. The child would come when it would come, and not a moment before. Little Hugh’s birth had been easy, she seemed to recall. He had come very quickly, and her mother had complained how easy a time she had had of it. Isabelle winced. This birth, she sensed, would not be as easy.
All through the day her pains came, easy at first, harder as the hours passed; but the child remained unborn. Alette was almost smugly satisfied that at least this time Isabelle was behaving as a birthing mother should, totally forgetting how quickly her own new daughter had come. Hugh would not leave his wife’s side. The servants brought him food and wine, but he ate sparingly, his main concern for his Belle.
Finally, in the hour before midnight, it became obvious to everyone that the child was close to being born. Belle pushed and strained, and slowly the baby slid from her body.
“It is a girl!” Alette crowed.
“She is not crying,” Isabelle said, aware, and frightened.
To both women’s surprise Hugh, with some inborn instinct, took his daughter and, placing her on Belle’s body, parted the infant’s lips, inserting a finger into the baby’s throat to gently lift a clot of mucus from it. Then, bending down, he blew softly into his daughter’s mouth several times. She coughed, her eyes flew open, and taking a great gulp of air, the baby began to wail at the top of her lungs.
Belle wept wildly with relief. Then, clasping her child to her breasts, she soothed it. “You saved her, my lord! You saved her! How on earth did you know what to do, Hugh?”
He was amazed himself, and shook his head. “I do not know, ma Belle,” he answered her honestly, “but I could not let our daughter die after all we went through to have her.”
The baby was taken up by her nursemaid, cleaned, and set in her cradle while her mother finished the birthing process. Afterward Hugh sat by his wife’s bedside, her hand in his. For
a while they continued in silence, and then he spoke.
“She will be called Matilda, after the queen.”
“She will be called Rosamund, my lord. Matilda indeed! It is a name I dislike, although I like the queen,” Isabelle responded. “No Henrys and no Matildas, thank you.”
He laughed. “You may have your way, madame. I do not really like the name Matilda, either.”
“And you would have saddled our daughter with it? For shame, my lord!” Isabelle scolded him.
“I remember how good the king’s mother, the first Matilda, was to me as a boy. It was more to honor her, I think,” Hugh said. For a moment they were as of old, but then the wall between them sprang up once again.
Several weeks later the king’s messenger arrived at Langston requesting that Sir Hugh, Baron Langston, and Sir Rolf de Briard, along with the other two knights belonging to Langston Keep—Sir Fulk and Sir Giles, formerly squires, who had been knighted in the absence of their lord and lady by Rolf—attend the king, who was planning his campaign for Normandy. The service was owed, and must be paid.
“You cannot mean to go!” Isabelle said to her husband.
“I can hardly refuse the king,” Hugh said testily.
“We are barely home six months,” she shouted, her temper boiling over at long last. “I cannot believe that Henry Beauclerc is so lacking in knights that he must have you. Was your earlier service in Normandy not enough? It almost cost us each other! Rolf, Fulk, and Giles are going. Are three knights not enough service from Langston? I would have my husband safe at home for a change, and I should like to tell the king that, damnit!”
“Madame,” Hugh roared back at her, “the king will hear nothing from you! You will shut your mouth and let me do my duty as I have always done it! What kind of an example would I set for young Hugh if I shirked my service to my overlord?”
“Go, then!” Isabelle said angrily. “But if you do not come back safely, I shall never forgive you, Hugh Fauconier! Never!”
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