Secret Song

by Catherine Coulter

  “What happened to Daria’s father?”

  Roland stared down at his friend.

  “No, I’m not out of my head. What happened to him?”

  “He died. In a tourney, some years ago.”

  “I see.” But he didn’t, not really. He said very quietly, “Your wife saved my life, Roland.”

  “She pulled stones off you, that’s true. But not all that many. The men hauled off the bulk of them.”

  “Nay, it was more—much more. The stones, they had already hurt me—” Graelam fell silent. He said nothing more until Daria entered, carrying a goblet in her hand. Her mother followed her, strips of cloth over her arms.

  Daria paid no heed to her husband. She sat beside Graelam, smiled down at him, and said, “Drink this, my lord. It will take away the pain and make you sleep for a while. My mother will bind your ribs. Have you pain anywhere else?”

  Graelam shook his head, his eyes never leaving her face. He drank the bittersweet brew. His head soon lolled on the pillow, but before he closed his eyes he said, “Thank you, Daria. Thank you for my life.”

  “What did he mean, Daria?”

  She raised her head and looked at her husband. “I couldn’t let him die. I couldn’t let the vision end like it had with my father. I just couldn’t. I have failed too many times in my life. I couldn’t fail in this.”

  She stood then and straightened her gown. She left the chamber then, saying nothing more.

  Roland said to Katherine, “Your daughter is behaving strangely. What is she talking about? I don’t understand.”

  Katherine shook her head, motioning Roland to help her. Between them they managed to bind Graelam’s ribs with strip after strip of stout white cloth.

  Whilst Roland stripped off the remainder of Graelam’s clothing and brought a light cover to his waist, Katherine walked to the small window slit and looked out.

  “Stay a moment, Roland,” Katherine said once he’d finished.

  “I should go see to Daria.”

  “In a moment. Did she tell you about her father?”

  “Only that he had died in a tourney in London just before Edward left for the Holy Land.”

  “There was something else. She saw her father die.”

  Roland stared at her. “I beg your pardon, my lady?”

  “Daria saw him die, three days before word reached us that he’d been killed accidentally in that tourney in London.”

  “You mean she had some sort of vision?”

  “Aye, I suppose that is as good a word as any. In any case, it happened.”

  Roland was thinking of her telling him that she’d known him the moment she’d first seen him. She’d recognized him deep within her. He shrugged, irritated, for it was the kind of thing a man couldn’t touch, couldn’t look at and say it was real or wasn’t real. He didn’t like this sort of talk. It was nonsense. Anything that smacked of visions belonged to prophets in mountain caves, not to young females.

  “I realize it’s difficult for you to accept, Roland. Just imagine what it is like for Daria. Evidently she saw Graelam being crushed by the stone wall. But somehow she brought him back.”

  “He was never dead. He was simply unconscious—and only for a few moments, nothing more.”

  “Perhaps,” Katherine said. She gave him a sad smile. “Don’t hurt her with this, Roland.”

  His head snapped up. He said, his voice quite cold and quite distant, “I am not a monster.”

  He left her then, saying over his shoulder as he paused at the chamber door, “I will send Rolfe to attend his master. You must rest, Katherine.”

  Roland found Daria in the orchard. She was seated on what was now called Lady Katherine’s bench. She was staring down at her hands, clasped in her lap.

  He sat beside her, saying nothing.

  “Lord Graelam is all right?”

  “Aye, he will survive. He’s sleeping now.”

  “Will you send a message to Kassia?”

  “I probably should before Graelam regains his wits. He detests illness or weakness. But his wife should be told, just in case something goes wrong, just in case he is hurt internally and—”

  “No, he isn’t hurt internally.”

  Roland looked at her then, his eyes narrowed. “You have no way of being certain of that, Daria. No way at all. Why do you say it with such assurance?”

  “I just know,” she said, her voice now as distant as his.

  “How do you know?”

  “It matters not. I have much to do now, Roland. If you need me for naught else, then—”

  He quickly grasped her wrist and pulled her back down. “I won’t accuse you of being a witch, if you’re afraid of that. My men just might be thinking that, though. You’re not stupid, Daria. You know there might be talk. I want you to tell me exactly what you did so that I may combat it.”

  “I shoved the men aside and pulled off the stones myself. You see, I knew exactly what stones to shove aside to clear his head and his chest. Then I saw that he was motionless, that he wasn’t breathing, and I was no longer just afraid. I was furious, so enraged that I couldn’t control it. It is an odd reaction for me, but it happened. I was so angry that I struck his chest with my fists, again and again, and screamed at him like a shrew. That is likely what your men will gossip about. They will say that I lost all reason. But Graelam breathed again and he moaned and then he opened his eyes.”

  “He was merely unconscious.”

  “Yes, he was merely unconscious.”

  He looked at her profile, his mouth thinning. “You weren’t there when the wall collapsed on him.”

  “No, I was in the solar mixing herbs.”

  “How did you know what had happened?”

  “I saw it happen.”

  Roland was silent for many moments. He was aware of bees swarming about the apple tree behind him. He heard sparrows flapping their wings in the still hot air. The heavy smell of grass filled his nostrils. This should be a peaceful spot, but it wasn’t. There were mysteries here, and things he didn’t understand, and there was pain as well, and he knew he was the cause of it. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t begin to know what to think about this. He rose and looked down at his wife.

  “I must send a message to Kassia. Doubtless she will arrive shortly to see to her lord.”

  Daria merely nodded.

  It was deep in the middle of the night. A storm was blowing in. Just as lightning streaked across the sky, Daria awoke, pain convulsing her belly, a cry erupting from her mouth.

  20

  Daria had never imagined such pain. It welled up in her, overpowering her, capturing all of her within it, and she couldn’t stop it, couldn’t control it. The pain twisted and coiled until she screamed. She wrapped her arms around herself, drawing her knees up, but nothing helped. Then, suddenly, just as the pain had started, it stopped.

  Roland lurched upright at her first cry. He’d just come into their bedchamber a short time before and was on the edge of sleep. “Daria.” He clasped her arms and tried to bring her about to face him, but her pain was keeping her apart from him, apart from understanding, apart from even the knowledge of him and his presence. So he held her until she quieted. She lay on her back, staring up at him, panting heavily.

  “It’s gone,” she said, her voice low and harsh. “It was horrible but now it’s gone.”

  “What pain? Where did you hurt?”

  “My belly. Cramps, awful twisting cramps and—” Her eyes flew to his face. “Oh, no.”

  Roland quickly lit several candles. He turned back to see her standing beside the bed, staring down at herself. He felt himself grow cold at the sight. Blood blotched red on her white shift, blood streaked down her legs, puddling at the floor between her feet.

  She looked up at him, her eyes blank. “I don’t understand.” Another cramp seized her, and she fell to her knees with the force of it.

  She was losing the child. She was bowed on her knees, crying. He lifted h
er high in his arms and felt the agony of her body as she twisted and heaved against him. He laid her onto her back, watching her immediately roll to her side, her legs drawn up, her arms around her belly.

  “Hold on,” he shouted at her, then ran from the bedchamber, grabbing his bedrobe as he went.

  He met Katherine in the narrow corridor. Her face was pale in the dim light.

  “What’s wrong, Roland?”

  “It’s the babe, she’s losing the babe.”

  Katherine ran past him. She stood over her daughter, wishing she could take the pain from her, magically take it into herself, but she couldn’t, of course. She pushed sweat-soaked hair from her daughter’s forehead, speaking to her softly. “It will soon be over Daria. Soon now. Don’t frighten your husband so, darling. But look at him, his face is as pale as the dawn light and your pain becomes his. Come, Daria give him your hands and he will help you.”

  Roland moved automatically to do as Katherine bade. He was grateful for any instruction, for he felt so damnably helpless. He grasped his wife’s fingers, then eased his hold so that she could grip his hands instead. She saw him, at last. “Roland, please make it stop.” She was gone from him for many moments, locked into the pain of her body.

  Daria felt a mighty twisting that wound tighter and tighter, crushing her within it, and she prayed in that instant for oblivion, for that thick whiteness she’d seen that afternoon. But she felt everything; nothing faded, nothing lost its sharpness. She felt the flood of liquid down her legs, and she knew then that she was losing the babe, losing her babe, Roland’s babe. The wet was sticky and warm and she screamed for herself and her own loss and she screamed for the loss of the unborn child. She was aware that someone’s hands were on her body, warm water and cloths were touching her gently, and Roland was holding her face against his chest and she could feel the sharp loud rhythm of his heart and he was speaking to her, yet she didn’t understand his words. Slowly, as the screams that clogged her mind and her throat finally pulled away from her, releasing her back into herself, she made out his words, soft but insistent, pulling at her, lulling her.

  “Hush, Daria, hush now. You’re all right. Everything is all right now. Hush.” And he was rocking her, kissing her sweaty forehead, and for a moment in time she was comforted and allowed herself to heed his words and his gentleness, and gave herself over to him.

  She heard her mother’s voice. “I can see no damage done, Roland. Now I must get the bleeding slowed. Just remain as you are. Hold her and soothe her. Keep her as quiet as you can. Try to—comfort her.”

  He did, kissing his wife’s temple, speaking to her endlessly of the farmer he’d visited and the man’s four daughters who’d wanted to come back to Chantry Hall with him and serve his beautiful wife. Aye, they’d all heard of her, of her kindness, of her gentleness. He talked and talked, of nothing and everything, yet none of it was important and he knew it, but it didn’t matter. Daria was quiet. He watched Katherine bathe the blood from her daughter, watched her make a thick pad of white cotton cloths and press it against her. He saw the crimson cloths on the floor beside the bed.

  It was over.

  Daria felt the smooth edge of a cup pressed against her closed lips. She opened her mouth at Roland’s command and drank deep. She lolled back against her husband’s arm, aware that the potion she’d drunk was drugged, aware now that Roland was stripping off her bloodied chemise and bathing the sweat from her body. She felt the soft cool material of her bedrobe as he wrapped it around her. When she was on her back, she opened her eyes to see her mother and Roland standing beside her. But they weren’t looking at her, but at each other, and Katherine was saying quietly, “It isn’t uncommon at all, Roland. She will heal and there will be other children for you. Also the vigorous activity this afternoon—she lost the child, but she did save Graelam. A choice God doubtless approved, Roland. It was no one’s fault.”

  Roland was silent.

  “It’s for the best, Roland,” Katherine said, unable to bear the empty pain of his silence. She really meant nothing by her words, just feeling so helpless that she said anything to ease him, for it hurt her to see him so shattered and withdrawn into himself. She wished he would say something, anything. But he remained silent. And she said again, “It’s for the best, Roland.”

  Daria felt darkness clouding her vision, closing over her mind, but she fought it. She laughed, a raw ugly sound. “Oh, Mother,” she gasped, the words pouring out unbidden, “you’re so very right. It is for the best. Roland’s best. This child is dead and Roland is silent because he knows he must wait until he can yell his relief to the world—he is a man of some wisdom. He doesn’t wish to shock you or any of our people, Mother, with his rejoicing.” And she laughed and laughed until the tears streamed down her face and she was choking on them, and then suddenly she felt his hand strike her cheek and the laughter and tears died and succumbed to the tug of the poppy juice. She saw her husband’s face, drawn and white; then she saw nothing.

  Roland stared down at his wife’s pale face. Bloodless, he thought blankly, his eyes going toward the soaked cloths. So much blood. “You’re certain she will be all right, Katherine? She’s so pale—”

  “She’s lost a goodly amount of blood, but withal, she’s strong and fit. She’ll come through this, Roland. She’ll regain her strength and come back to you.”

  He continued to look at his wife’s face, continued to listen to her breathing, continued to feel her damning words sear through him.

  “What did she mean—that you would yell your relief?”

  Roland looked up at Katherine of Fortescue. Slowly he shook his head. “She meant nothing,” he said.

  Katherine was tired, worried to her very soul, and thus she spoke harshly, without thought. “She meant something, all right. I’m not blind, Roland. There is strife between the two of you. My daughter is bitterly unhappy and you, well—you seem so distant with her, so removed from her. Damn you, what did she mean? What have you done to her?”

  And Roland said simply, giving it up because he was so unutterably weary, “The king and queen know of it, but no one else. The child she carried wasn’t mine.”

  Katherine drew back, so surprised that she dropped some of the bloodied cloths. “Not your child? That makes no sense at all. No, that couldn’t be—”

  “I don’t know whose child it was. More than likely it was the Earl of Clare’s, or perhaps another’s, a man I never knew of. No, it wasn’t her fault, I would swear to that. Daria is good and true. She would never betray me. She was raped.” He paused, raising Daria’s limp hand and pressing his mouth to her wrist.

  Katherine continued to stare at him. He moved restlessly, saying more to himself than to her, “But you see, she insisted the child was mine. She refused to back down, even though all pointed to fabrication. I have assured her repeatedly of my protection, promised that I would think no less of her, and begged her to tell me who had taken her against her will, but she kept insisting that the child was mine, that she’d given me her virginity one night when I was ill, out of my head with fever. I don’t understand her, but now it is over and there will be no more dissension between us.”

  Katherine wished desperately she hadn’t pushed him. What he’d told her—it was something she would never have imagined. She guessed he would regret speaking the truth to her, feel anger at her for goading him, so she said nothing more. She felt exhaustion creeping into her very bones; she looked down at her daughter and knew she would sleep for many hours now, healing sleep. She nodded to Roland and left the bedchamber. When she opened the door, she saw Sir Thomas standing there. She wasn’t surprised to see him. She smiled and said, “I would very much like to rest now, sir.”

  “I will assist you to your room, Katherine,” Sir Thomas said, and gave her his arm.

  Roland eased onto his back, and clasped his wife’s wrist. He felt the pulse, strong and steady beneath his finger. She would live. He felt relief so profound that he shook with i
t.

  No, he wouldn’t be shouting his relief. He wouldn’t be shouting at all. He wished he’d kept his mouth shut, but it was too late now.

  Graelam de Moreton sat up in his bed, his wife standing over him, her hands on her hips. They looked to be in the midst of an argument.

  “If there are wagers to be made on the outcome of this conflict, my groats are on Kassia.”

  “Get out, you dammed sod. And take me with you.”

  “Nay, Roland,” Kassia called out, laughter in her voice, “stay. Graelam becomes more and more unmanageable, but perchance you can convince him that he will be rendered impotent if he doesn’t allow himself enough time to heal. I have told him that is what happens to men who don’t obey their wives’ commonsense instructions.”

  “That’s her latest dire prediction,” Graelam said. “I refuse to believe it. You don’t, do you?”

  Roland kept his expression steady. “I can see why she would be concerned,” he said at last. “After all, you have always told me that your rod is a good deal of your wife’s contentment bliss. Were something to happen to it, why, then, what would she do?”

  Kassia gasped. “Roland, did he say that, truly?”