Wonderful

by Jill Barnett

  I brought her barley malt,

  She turned it into magic ale,

  Instead of what she ought.

  But no one yet did realize,

  The power of the brew,

  For they gulped it down.

  Without a frown.

  Or even one small clue.

  — 13th-century Welsh Folklore

  Chapter 35

  Time moved by swiftly. Soon the scarlet poppies that had bloomed in the stubble of early spring turned into summer nightshade, then into first glimpses of Michaelmas daisies with their bright yellow centers.

  Only the day before, Clio had noticed that the leaves on the cherrywood trees by the eastern road had begun to turn brown at the tips. On the last market day, the villagers had seen a flock of wild swans flying overhead. So once again, the season was beginning to change, much as life at Camrose had changed.

  The wide moat and stone bridge were completed. There were two walls between the keep and the moat, each with two huge iron portcullis gates and plenty of missile holes. Merrick had been pleased.

  All the old stone and wood walls had been reinforced, and the parapets were revamped to protect archers and the oilmen, as well as the guard lookouts.

  Most of Merrick’s major protective changes were done or close to being done. The masons and carpenters had started enlarging the keep, adding another wing off the eastern side, with drawings sketched for bedchambers with chimneys and other comfort rooms to house the family and provide quarters for the frequent visitors who came to Camrose.

  The borders themselves had been quiet, but word came of trouble in the north, near Rhuddlan, and a few random incidences as far south as Radnor. Merrick changed the construction of garrison quarters to areas over both barbicans, then had to go to the coast to oversee the shipments of badly needed building supplies: mortar and stone, iron and oak timber, that came by ship from England and was unloaded at Cardiff.

  Now, there were times when Clio walked through the castle and could not believe this was the same place she had come home to, the castle the Welsh had ransacked.

  Once again, as in her youth and the heyday of Camrose, the whitewashed and freshly plastered walls were hung with rich imported tapestries, and every stone floor was warm with an exquisite Turkish or Moorish loomed rug.

  Their wedding gifts had been dispersed to special places throughout the castle, a brass birdcage with turtledoves in a niche in the solar, an urn with a base of blown Venetian glass sat near a new window with precious diamond-shaped glass panes that when you gazed out of them, made the late August sky look wavy.

  The old rough furniture, beds, tables, and benches, and old cooking pieces were given to the servants and villagers. Copper pots and huge kettles lined the kitchen boards, where new ovens crafted of cast iron lined the bakery walls, and seven open spits had mechanical wheels that were run by water weights and could each easily turn a side of beef.

  Brother Dismas had returned from a pilgrimage to Rome; he was a whole new martyr, full of the latest in superstitions and papal pronouncements.

  He refused to eat anything with walnuts, because of course everyone knew that witches and spirits gathered under the black walnut trees. Two weeks before, he had taken to wearing blue because witches didn’t like blue, it being the color of heaven.

  While the monk was gone, poor Sir Roger had become the target of Old Gladdys’ trickery, and not a week passed that someone about the place didn’t have a new tale or jest to tell about her hot pursuit and tormenting of Sir Roger FitzAlan.

  He showed up at supper one eve just before he left with Merrick wearing a rich, new royal blue surcoat. A few moments later, Old Gladdys, with her winking eye and dandelion hair, walked into the great hall dressed in a robe of vivid sky blue. She sat down right next to Roger.

  But this day, Clio awoke to the long rays of late sunshine slipping through the new west window that Merrick had ordered for their bedchamber. She sat up suddenly, flinging back her long hair and frowning.

  What hour was it?

  She glanced toward the mercury clock, a saint’s day gift from Queen Eleanor, that sat across the chamber on a small burlwood table with an onyx top. She squinted at the hour, still seeing double from waking up to that amber sunlight.

  ’Twas late, well past Sext. She wiped her eyes with a hand. Over half the day was gone.

  What is wrong with me?

  For the last fortnight she kept sleeping later and later, no matter if she went to bed well before Compline.

  She started to rise, but the room swam before her eyes. She sat back down quickly, shaking her head, then fell back on the bed until the lightheadedness passed.

  The chamber door opened, then clicked closed, but she didn’t look up, just lay there instead with her arm slung over her eyes.

  The steps that pattered across the room were light, not manly like Merrick’s.

  ’Twas Dulcie, she thought, then heard the light sound of pouring water.

  She lifted her arm and peered across the room.

  It was her maid.

  She took a deep breath and pushed herself up, her arms still propping her up.

  Dulcie stared at her with a sharp and disapproving frown, as if sleeping so late were a cardinal sin.

  Ignoring her, Clio arched her back and stretched her fists high in the air, yawning again.

  After twisting this way, then that, she admitted, “I am so very tired.”

  “I do not know why when you slept for most of the night and day.” Her maid sounded snippy. It seemed she truly missed that troubadour who had sung at the wedding.

  “I know.” Clio sighed wearily. “Perhaps it is because Merrick has been gone. I sleep better when he is here.”

  “You sleep less when he is here,” Dulcie pointed out.

  Her maid was right. They never slept for more than two hours between loving.

  So she sat there, hopeful, but uncertain, afraid to get too excited. Perhaps her wish for a child could be coming true. In her heart, though, she did not want to be let down again. She was almost afraid to want it too much.

  After a long stretch of silence, she asked, “Do you think I might be carrying a child. Finally?” She wanted so badly to give Merrick a child. A babe that was part of both of them, a symbol of their love.

  For the past six months, since the day they had wed, she’d hoped and prayed, only to have her hopes dashed when the new moon came and with it, her body’s signs that she was not breeding.

  “You cannot be with child. You just had your woman’s flow.”

  “Aye.” She did not know what was wrong with her then. This lazy, listless feeling. With another wistful sigh like so many over the last few months, she washed and dressed, deciding she needed to do something to take her mind off her woes.

  By the time the sun was setting, Clio had finished a fresh batch of ale. It had taken longer this time, for it was only she and old Gladdys working in the brewery. Ever since that early spring, Thud and Thwack spent most of their days training under the tutelage of the squires and the other knights.

  She still sought the secret Pict ale, but had had little success. She thought she had hit upon something special when everyone who drank the brew began to sneeze.

  Even Merrick. But then she found out one of the cook’s lads had spilt precious pepper in the ale ewers and was afraid to tell anyone.

  For this day’s brew, Old Gladdys had arranged the water pots in a ring, like the fairy rings and sacred stones in the western hills. Then she had staggered the latest herbs and other ingredients according to their cures and whether they bloomed with the sun or the moon.

  The supper bells rang loudly, and Clio’s head popped up. She had dozed off again. Frowning, she scanned the room.

  Old Gladdys was sitting in a willow chair, braiding marsh reeds into herb baskets.

  “How long did I sleep?”

  Gladdys shrugged, “As long as your body needed.”

  ’Twas the third time that d
ay she’d dozed off. “I wish I knew what was wrong with me.”

  “You don’t know?” Old Gladdys threw back her head and laughed. “Married to a bull like your dark lord and you cannot think of what is wrong?” She shook her fuzzy white head. “Foolish girl.”

  “I just had my woman’s flow. I cannot be breeding.”

  “Some women have their flow every moon until the babe is born.”

  “They do?”

  She nodded.

  “Then how can I know if I am breeding?”

  The old woman studied her for a long time. “Stand up.”

  Clio stood. Old Gladdys got up and walked around her three times, rubbing her chin and eyeing her belly.

  She stuck out a bony finger and poked her in the tip of her breast.

  “Ouch!” Clio grabbed herself. “Why did you do that?”

  “Your breast is tender?”

  Clio nodded.

  “And you sleep all the time?”

  “Aye.”

  “Here, spit in my hand.”

  “Why?”

  “Just do it.”

  Clio did.

  The old woman rubbed her hands together then wiped them on a cloth she took from a leather pouch that hung from her robe. She walked over to the cooling ale pots and waved the cloth over the coals while she chanted some Welsh song.

  The cloth caught fire and she swirled around and threw it across the room.

  “Hurry!” She waved her hands at Clio. “Stomp out the fire with your left foot.”

  Clio ran over and stamped the fire out.

  Gladdys hunkered down and stared at the ashes for the longest time, then she looked up at Clio. “Press on your other breast.”

  Clio did and flinched.

  “Is it sore, too?”

  “Aye.”

  Gladdys straightened. “You have a babe in your flat belly that should be born about the time of the Easter bonfires.”

  Clio prayed she was truly hearing those words and that she wasn’t dreaming. “Truly?”

  “Aye.”

  Clio stood there, afraid to believe it and afraid not to.

  “What made you think you were not breeding?” Gladdys asked.

  Clio search the old woman’s crinkled face. “Perhaps the fact that I had not put out any fires with my left foot?”

  The old woman cackled and cackled. “You are not so gullible as some of the others.”

  “Please tell me the truth. I have to know the truth.”

  Gladdys gave her a direct and honest look. “You are breeding.”

  “Dulcie said I could not be with child,” Clio mumbled.

  “Did she now? She should know, a maiden who swears to all that your ears will fall off if you kiss under a full moon.”

  Even Clio had to laugh then. Dulcie had been spending too much time with Brother Dismas of late.

  “I gave birth to seven sons and three daughters.” Gladdys said with much pride. “Not once did my woman’s flow stop.”

  “You have children?”

  Old Gladdys just smiled wickedly and gave her a sly wink. “Sir Roger does not know what he is missing.” Then she laughed.

  Merrick and his troops and wagons moved up the steep road that cut across the Taff Valley. ’Twas late and there was no moon this night. He was tired and frustrated, and instead of riding through these dark hills, he wanted to be home in bed with his wife, whom he had not seen in too many days for his liking.

  Roger came riding up from the rear.

  “Is the wheel fixed?”

  “Aye. Was only that the load shifted.”

  Merrick reined in and scowled. “Who was the bloody fool who oversaw the loading of that mortar? I’ll have his neck for not paying attention to his work.”

  Roger gave him a long look. “The fool?”

  “Aye,” Merrick barked.

  “I’m riding next to him.”

  “What are you blathering?”

  “You supervised the loading. As I recall, your exact words were, ’It will not be done properly unless I stand over the bloody fools.’ “

  Merrick did not say a word. He couldn’t. He remembered the moment clearly. After a few brooding moments he said, “I’m tired.”

  “Tomorrow even you’ll be home, and hopefully by the next day you will have stopped barking orders at one and all and biting off the heads of those who chance to ask you a question.”

  “I need to get back to Camrose.”

  “Believe me, Merrick, we all want to see you back at Camrose.” Roger rode alongside of him for a few minutes more.

  Neither spoke. There was nothing to say. They just needed to ride. Another day and they would be home.

  From the rear came the sudden sound of a horse’s hooves. Both Merrick and Roger reined and turned back.

  Sir Isambard rode toward them hard and fast. His sword was drawn. He called out Merrick’s name.

  A second later an arrow flew through the air. It hit the old knight squarely in the neck. He grunted. His horse reared and he fell.

  “Scatter!” Merrick shouted, and suddenly Welshmen swarmed out from the rocks.

  It was a trap.

  Chapter 36

  The ale casks ran dry late the next afternoon. At Clio’s order, the bottler brought the fresh ale up from storage in the buttery and served it with the evening meal. With Merrick and many of his men gone, the meals in the hall were much quieter than when the castle was full.

  Because the men seemed intimidated by her presence, Clio ate her late meal in her chamber. She saw that they had a good meal, then left them to their man talk of battles and hunting and “the truly big one that got away,” whether it be salmon, deer, or a ferocious enemy.

  She was still tired and her appetite was waning. She got ill, light-headed and queasy, as soon as the sun set, so she went to bed and lay there, staring at her belly as if she expected it to swell with her child right before her very eyes.

  She could hear Cyclops snoring and she leaned down and peered under the bed. “Cy?”

  He opened one eye and stared at her. “Merrick is gone. ’Tis safe. Come up?” She thumped on the mattress and he moseyed out, leapt up onto the bed, and curled next to her shoulder. She settled back against those silken pillows.

  As she stroked him, he purred in her ear. The sound soothed her, drowned out the men’s laughter from belowstairs.

  She stared at her belly for the longest time. It was so hard to believe that inside her was a life. A living being. A child. A little person who was half Merrick and half of her.

  Would it be a boy or girl? Would he or she have blue eyes or green? Fair hair or hair as sleek and black as midnight?

  “What do you look like?” she asked her belly. “Halloo in there. This is your mother.”

  She began to rub her stomach, gently, the way she would someday rub this babe’s back.

  “I shall talk to you every night, my child. Let me tell you about your father. He is, oh, so very handsome, with black hair and blue eyes and the most wonderful mouth, at least when it isn’t bellowing orders.”

  She smiled. “You will be very proud of him, for he is the bravest knight in all the land. The king made him an earl. The Earl of Glamorgan. But he is better known as the Red Lion, and all fear him. But me, and perhaps Sir Roger and King Edward. You will like them and they will be your godfathers.

  “But back to your father. I know him in the way you shall know him. He is a kind man and gentle, but firm, and he will not let you be anything except the best you can be. He will not be easy; however the truly wonderful thing is that he will love you with all that ferocity in his warrior’s heart.”

  She began to cry a little, tears choked her throat and burned in her eyes. She placed her palm flat on her belly, hoping to feel something anything, a flutter, a heartbeat, a kick, and she wished Merrick were here, so she could tell him what they had done and see his face.

  She finally had a gift to give him. “Well, my child,” she said. “Sleep well
. Oh, I almost forgot. I give you my word that I will not sing you any lullabies. I realize that would be cruel for you because you would have to stay there and listen, a captive audience. You could not run away, now could you?

  “I sing so poorly that I suspect you would think twice about whether or not you wanted to come into a world filled with such noise. Oh, dear Saint Swithun! I just had a horrible thought.” She tapped a finger against her chin. “I hope you do not inherit my voice. Poor wee babe.”

  She sighed. “Good night, my child. Good night.” She closed her eyes, then said, “Know that you are loved.”

  And before the men had even finished the first cask of ale, Clio was sound asleep.

  Merrick knew something was afoot the moment he rode over the rise. He could see the silhouette of Camrose in the distance, but there was no light of any kind.

  Surely even from this distance he should be able to see the torches for the watch guard. He rubbed his eyes. They burned from lack of sleep. He was weary and sore from the fight they’d had in the valley, a bloody battle. Besides Sir Isambard, he had other wounded in the wagons.

  And like himself, he knew his men were tired and hungry and needing the succor of Camrose.

  “What is it?” Roger moved to his side.

  “Look there.”

  Roger followed his gaze. “Oh, God …”

  A second later Merrick put his spurs to his tired mount and rode like hell toward the dark castle.

  Merrick pounded on the gate, but the porter did not answer. He shouted up to the parapet but got no response.

  “How the hell are we going to get inside?” Roger asked.

  Merrick paced back and forth, thinking. What the hell was going on inside? He stopped and stared up at the barbican, rubbing his whiskered chin.

  Then he walked over and kicked at the door as hard as he could. When there was still no response, he turned to his men. “Make as much noise as you can. Shout, yell, clash your swords.” He turned to Roger. “Come, help me pound the bloody hell out of this door.”

  It did not take long for the peep to slide open, showing the glimmer from a weak candle and one black eye.

  ’Twas Old Gladdys.