Here Be Dragons

by Sharon Kay Penman

Joanna lingered longer than necessary, sitting on the bed and stroking Nell’s hair, sunlit ringlets that curled around her fingers like finely spun silk. There had been no need for her to accompany Nell, just as there was no need for her to remain. But she was in no hurry to return to the hall. As miserable as her own wedding had been, her daughter’s was proving to be no less an ordeal.

  She could delay only so long, though, for it was almost time for the bedding revels. Soon she would have to help put Elen to bed, as she’d just done with Nell. But unlike Nell, Elen would not be sleeping alone. She swallowed the last of her wine, moved reluctantly toward the door.

  The spiral stairway was not lit; the cresset light had burned out, and she’d forgotten her candle. She’d had too much to drink, was feeling lightheaded and had to stop repeatedly, groping her way blindly in the darkness, a few steps at a time.

  She had no warning, nothing to alert her that she was no longer alone. She simply turned a bend in the stairwell and there he was, looming over her, barring her way. She recoiled against the wall, a scream starting in her throat, and he swiftly put his hand over her mouth.

  “Jesú, but your nerves are on the raw,” he muttered, and Joanna sighed with relief, recognizing his voice.

  “You startled me, Will!” she said indignantly. “How did I know who it was? What are you doing here? Did you follow me?”

  “Would you believe me if I said I was looking for a privy chamber?”

  “No, I would not.” Joanna was becoming aware now of the untoward aspects of this encounter, becoming acutely aware of Will. She was standing on the step above him, but he was still taller than she, and so close that she could smell the sugared wine on his breath. “I think you’d best let me pass,” she said, her voice suddenly husky, and he laughed.

  “You wanted to talk, did you not? Well, here I am.”

  “You’re drunk, Will. Let me by.”

  “Suppose…suppose I do not want to do that,” he murmured, and when Joanna pushed against him, he did not move.

  “What do you want from me?” she whispered, feeling behind her for the wall, seeking to orient herself in this eerie black well.

  “I do not know.” He, too, was whispering now, his breath hot against her cheek. And then his hand was on her throat, and his mouth on hers. She’d been expecting violence, but he was surprisingly gentle with her, and the kiss was unhurried, almost tender. It was that which held her immobile for several seconds, which kept her from struggling at first. But the spell did not last. With a gasp, she tore her mouth from his, shoved against his chest.

  Again he surprised her; when she pulled free, he let her go. She stumbled, nearly lost her balance on the stairs. Her head was spinning; she could not seem to catch her breath.

  “Have you lost your wits? Jesus God, my husband would kill you if he knew!”

  “Are you going to tell him?”

  To her fury, he did not sound particularly impressed. But as much as she wanted to tell him yes, she was going to Llewelyn, common sense prevailed. “No,” she said, as coldly as she could. “No, I’d not do that to Elen, would not stain her wedding day with blood.”

  Her words sounded hollow to her, even a little pompous. Will apparently thought so, too, for he laughed. He was above her now; the way below was clear, and she turned away, started down the stairs. He stopped laughing, for the first time called her by her name. She ignored him, lifted her skirts and plunged around the final bend in the stairwell, into the light. He caught up with her at the bottom of the stairs, reached for her arm, saying, “Joanna, wait.”

  She jerked away. “Do not touch me,” she spat. “Not ever again, do you understand?”

  Some of the guests had overflowed from the hall, several couples seeking privacy in the empty chapel. They turned toward the stairwell at sound of voices, and Will faded back into the shadows. Joanna stood there alone for a moment, leaning against the wall. And then she scrubbed the back of her hand vigorously across her mouth, stepped out into the torchlit chapel. Will watched from the stairwell as she reentered the hall.

  The bedding revels were not as raucous as they might have been, due in large measure to Llewelyn’s presence in the bedchamber. Even the most obstreperous of wedding guests tended to be somewhat circumspect, to curb their cruder jests in the hearing of the bride’s father. But Joanna still found the experience exceedingly painful. The sight of her daughter naked in bed with an unwanted stranger tore at her heart. She no longer cared at that moment about the cogent, convincing arguments that could be made in favor of this marriage, not when she looked at Elen’s face. Elen had lost her air of defiance; she clutched the sheet against her breasts, looking unbearably young to Joanna, utterly vulnerable. When she leaned over the bed to kiss her daughter, Elen clung to her, for the first time since agreeing to the marriage.

  “It will be all right, darling,” Joanna whispered, but there was nothing more she could do. She and Llewelyn had made this bed, and now it was for Elen to lie in it.

  The wedding party trooped back toward the great hall under a cloudless, star-studded sky. Traces of the first snowfall still lay unmelted upon the bailey ground, and some of the younger men began to pelt one another with snowballs, to chase the women, who fled into the hall, shrieking with laughter. Joanna was enveloped in a fur-lined mantle of Lincoln wool, but she could not stop shivering, not even after reaching the huge center hearth. She was soon joined by others, found herself in the midst of a boisterous, bawdy argument as to who felt the greater lust, men or women.

  Joanna was in no mood for ribald jests, for jokes about bitches in heat and rutting stags, and she turned away, pushed toward the edge of the crowd, only to stop abruptly at sight of Will. She spun about, but not in time; she knew he’d seen her blush. She brought her hand up to her cheek, felt the heat burning her face and throat. She could still taste Will’s kiss. It was a disconcertingly intense memory, even though she was sure she knew why—she had never been kissed before by any man but Llewelyn. Damn you, Gwilym Ddu, she thought, fighting the urge to cry the words aloud. Damn your arrogance and your audacity and your mocking grey eyes, damn you, damn you!

  “There you are, Joanna.” Llewelyn was smiling at her. “What are you doing so far from the hearth?” Catching her hand, he shoved his way through the crowd, into the coveted inner circle. There was some grumbling, which stilled as men recognized him, grudgingly gave way. Joanna followed reluctantly in his wake. She’d seen very little of him all night. Where had he been when she truly needed him? If he’d been more attentive, Will would not have dared to follow her into the stairwell. Llewelyn knew how she felt about the de Braoses. Why in God’s name could he not have found other husbands for his daughters? Why could he not have put her needs first, just once?

  The sexual argument was still going strong. Hubert de Burgh had claimed center stage, was insisting that it was not open to dispute; women were more lustful because they were imperfect. As the imperfect always yearned for union with the perfect, it only stood to reason that woman’s desire was greater. Undaunted when the women in the audience hissed good-naturedly, he said complacently, “You cannot deny what is set down in Scriptures. ‘All wickedness is but little to the wickedness of a woman,’ Ecclesiasticus. The noted theologian Tertullian put it even plainer. Woman, he said, is the gate of the Devil, the first deserter of Divine Law, responsible for the loss of Eden.”

  Joanna had never liked de Burgh. But never had he seemed so odious to her as he did now. In truth, he looked like a sleek, well-fed cat, insufferably well-pleased with himself. The braggart. And who in the world was Tertullian?

  “But the final word ought to go to the great Aristotle. He proved conclusively through his writings that the female state is one of deformity, albeit a common one. When the man’s seed is perfect, it produces a male child; when flawed or imperfect, a female. You might even say,” he quipped, “that the female is merely a misbegotten male!”

  Joanna had not meant to speak out. But with that,
the same imp that had once beguiled her into defying Maude de Braose again took possession of her tongue. “I do hope, my lord, that you will at least grant us poor ‘misbegotten males’ one small virtue. You will admit that without women, your Aristotle and Tertullian would never have been born?”

  There was laughter, and some of the women cheered; spirited debates were always a favored form of entertainment.

  Hubert de Burgh was smiling, quite unperturbed. “Indeed I will, Madame. But even as a breeder, woman is of secondary importance in the divine order. All know that the child belongs more to the man than to the woman, since the fetus forms from the male’s seed. You need only think of a tree sending forth roots. The father is like the tree, the mother like the earth that nurtures it. Whilst it cannot exist without the two, it clearly belongs more to the tree from whence it sprang than to the earth where it was planted.”

  It may have been the smugness of his smile. It may have been the memory of a bloody birthing chamber, those endless hours of agony and fear. It may only have been the proverbial last straw in a day of emotional turmoil. Suddenly Joanna was trembling, as angry as she’d ever been in her life. But Llewelyn had been alerted by her first outburst, had known at once that this was no game. Now he saw how her eyes narrowed, saw the pupils contract, like the eyes of a cat about to pounce, John’s eyes in a blazing Angevin rage, and he said swiftly, with just enough sardonic inflection to be insulting, “You surprise me, my lord de Burgh. Surely you have not forgotten the Lady Mary, mother of Our Saviour? If Our Lord Jesus was not ashamed to be born of woman, why should you be?”

  De Burgh’s smile froze. “I never said I was!”

  “Mayhap you should learn to choose your words with greater care, then,” the Earl of Chester observed coolly, “for I, too, took that as your meaning.”

  The crowd had fallen silent. Even the most politically naïve among them were aware that the conversation was heading for deep waters, pushed by currents that had nothing whatsoever to do with the Virgin Mary or the failings of women.

  De Burgh had reddened, but he was too well mannered—and too intelligent—to provoke an open row while a guest under Chester’s roof. He could wait. “It grows late,” he said tersely.

  He heard someone in the crowd, one of the Earl’s partisans safely cloaked in anonymity, mutter, “Later than you think,” and there was some scattered laughter.

  It was Joanna’s Uncle Will who acted to defuse the tension, to avert a confrontation. Will was not as friendly with Chester as he’d once been, and he had yet to forgive Llewelyn for that scene in Worcester Abbey. But Joanna was still his niece, and for her sake he raised his wine cup high, saying loudly, “It is indeed late, and for certes we want this evening to conclude upon a cordial note. Let’s drink, then, to the happiness of the bride and groom. To John the Scot and the Lady Helen!”

  The ploy worked; others took it up, until John and Elen’s names rang from the rafters. People began to make ready to depart, those who were not bedding down in the castle. Llewelyn and Chester were talking together; Joanna heard them laugh. So, too, did Hubert de Burgh.

  “Mama, that was wonderful, the best part of the whole wedding!” Davydd was grinning. “I was so proud of you.”

  “You should not have been, Davydd. If not for your father, I’d have caused a scene that they’d have been talking about for the next twenty years.”

  “Really? I wish you had! Hubert de Burgh went red as a radish; it was so hard not to laugh. Why do he and my lord Chester hate each other so much?”

  “The usual cause, Davydd—power. Chester was on crusade when the old Earl of Pembroke died, and when he returned, it was to find that de Burgh was now clinging closer to Henry than a limpet. Chester feels that he was shunted aside, that de Burgh usurped his rightful place as Henry’s chief counselor. And because de Burgh feels threatened by Chester, he is beginning to side with Llewelyn’s foe, the Earl of Pembroke. Does any of this make sense to you?”

  Davydd nodded. “Oh, yes, Mama. You have to counter your opponent’s moves, try to guess what he’ll do ere he does it. Just like chess!”

  Llewelyn was coming toward them now, and Joanna moved to meet him. “Ought I to thank you?” she murmured, and he shook his head.

  “No need; I enjoyed myself thoroughly!”

  “You do thrive on turmoil, I’ll grant you that. Llewelyn, I want to go back to the abbey. If this night does not end soon—”

  “No, not yet. I’ve a surprise for you.” Ignoring her protests, he put his arm around her waist and escorted her across the hall, into the solar, toward a corner stairwell. As she followed him, still objecting halfheartedly, she found herself thinking of her stairwell encounter with Will de Braose, and she wondered how long it would take for that memory to fade.

  As they reached the top of the stairs, the door swung open. “Morgan?” Joanna was utterly baffled by now. “What are you doing up here? What is—” She broke off, gazing about her in wonder. The chamber was ablaze with light, with scented wax candles. The floor rushes were freshly laid, and across the bed coverlets were scattered the last flowers of the season: marigolds, lilies of the field, even a few Christmas roses.

  “It looks like a bridal chamber, Llewelyn,” Joanna exclaimed, and then, “Good Lord, it is! This is the chamber in which we passed our wedding night!”

  Llewelyn was laughing. “I decided it was time to rectify a wrong. Sixteen years ago we neglected to get the nuptial blessing for our bed. But if you’ll come over here with me, breila, Morgan is prepared to remedy that.”

  Joanna took Llewelyn’s hand, knelt with him by the bed as Morgan made the sign of the cross, rapidly intoning a brief prayer to God Eternal, seeking His blessings upon His servants, Llewelyn and Joanna, that they might live in good accord in His divine love, and that their offspring might increase till the end of the ages. He then sprinkled holy water about, made a discreet departure.

  Llewelyn rose, started to help Joanna to her feet. “Breila? Are you crying?”

  Joanna gave a shaken laugh. “Hold me,” she entreated. “Just hold me close. Your timing could not have been better. You’ll never know how much this means to me, never…”

  Llewelyn pulled off her veil, began to loosen her hair. “It was not a good night for you, was it?”

  “It was an absolutely wretched night…until now.”

  “It gets better,” he said, and picking her up, he carried her to the bed, where they lay together midst the flowers, made love by candlelight in the bridal chamber where their marriage had begun.

  The chamber was dark, utterly still. Through a parting of the bed hangings, Joanna watched the dying embers of the hearth burn lower and lower and at last flicker out.

  “Joanna?” Llewelyn propped himself up on his elbow. “Can you not sleep?”

  “I was thinking of you, of our belated nuptial blessing. I do not know you as well as I thought I did, never suspected you had a romantic streak.”

  “Just make sure no one else suspects,” he warned. “There are some secrets to be shared only betwixt man and wife, and only in the dark, only in bed.”

  Joanna laughed softly. “Ah, Llewelyn, you do know how much I love you?”

  “I might have an inkling or two.” Her hair was caught under his arm and he shifted so she could pull free. “But you were not thinking of me, breila. You were worrying about Elen.”

  “Yes…I was. How did you know?”

  “Because,” he admitted, “so was I.”

  6

  Ludlow Castle, England

  July 1223

  The Earl of Pembroke had been attending to his Irish estates since November of 1222. Early in the new year, Llewelyn took advantage of Pembroke’s absence and struck at the Earl’s allies in Shropshire, capturing castles from Fulk Fitz Warin and Baldwin de Hodnet. Hubert de Burgh persuaded the young King to mount a punitive expedition into Wales, and by March 7 they were assembling an army at Shrewsbury. But the Earl of Chester now interceded upon Llewely
n’s behalf, persuaded Henry that Llewelyn’s dispute with Pembroke could be settled by peaceful means.

  The Earl of Pembroke thought otherwise. Arriving back in South Wales in mid-April, he laid successful siege to the castles of Cardigan and Carmarthen, which Llewelyn had held since the winter campaign of 1215. Llewelyn was just as swift to retaliate, and in early May Gruffydd led an army south. After taking and burning the Norman town of Kidwelly, Gruffydd and his men clashed with Pembroke at Carmarthen Bridge. What followed was a bloody day-long battle in which many men died but neither side could gain the advantage.

  At this point Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, intervened. Henry was now in his sixteenth year, and although not of a martial nature, he had his share of Angevin ambition. But his dreams of conquest centered upon the recovery of Normandy, not all-out war with his sister’s husband, and he was quite willing to heed Langton, to act as peacemaker. While Llewelyn was skeptical, he yielded to Henry’s request, agreed to attend a July council at the border castle of Ludlow.

  In an upper chamber of the castle keep, Llewelyn was meeting with Henry, Stephen Langton, and Hubert de Burgh, while Joanna awaited his return in the great hall. Although Henry had welcomed them with genuine warmth, Joanna was not comfortable at Ludlow. This was unfriendly territory, the great hall filled with hostile Marcher lords, men with extensive Welsh holdings, with very strong reasons for wishing Llewelyn ill.

  But Joanna was not alone for long. Within moments her young son-in-law approached, holding out a wine cup. She smiled, touched that he should feel the need to look after her in Llewelyn’s absence. “Thank you, John. Did I tell—oh, no!”

  John swung about, but could see no cause for alarm. “What is amiss?”

  “Across the hall. Ralph de Mortimer and Thomas Corbet just walked up to Gruffydd.” Seeing that he did not comprehend, Joanna added impatiently, “I know Thomas Corbet. He’s up to no good, means to bait Gruffydd into a fight. And believe me, it’ll not take much!”