Wild Wood

by Posie Graeme-Evans

  This means something, Jesse can feel it.

  Alicia hesitates, then says more reasonably, “Look, the trust has to be convinced the house can be self-supporting before they’ll take it on. We’ve never properly opened Hundredfield to the public, but that’s the only hope now, and it absolutely will never happen if that roof goes.” Without rancor she adds, “And it’s not for you to tell me what my parents would or would not have liked for Hundredfield, Rory.”

  In the deeper quiet that follows, Jesse’s not sure what to do. She hesitates. And turns a tap on to fill a kettle.

  “Jesse, I am so sorry!” Alicia hurries from the table. “Really, what unforgivable bad manners.”

  Jesse puts a hand on Alicia’s arm. “I’d say you’re going through utter, utter shit right now. Can’t pretend it isn’t happening.”

  The plain speaking robs Alicia of words.

  Jesse turns the tap off. “I’ll put this on the stove for tea, but I might just take myself off to bed, if that’s all right? You said you wanted to get started tomorrow, Rory. Straight after breakfast?” She doesn’t give either of them time to reply. “Good night.”

  Her last sight, as she closes the door to the kitchen, is of Rory. He’s standing beside Alicia, an arm around her shoulders.

  Shivering, Jesse stands on the mat in the bathroom and looks at herself in the mirror.

  Behind, steam rises as the tub fills. She doesn’t want to have a bath, but getting into bed clean after all the dramas of today will make her feel better. She needs to sluice the tension—so many tensions—away. Yawning hugely, she starts to clean her teeth, remembering a semiserious boyfriend from a few years ago.

  Geoff was such a romantic. He liked to surprise her with candles when she came home from work. She’d enjoyed those candlelit baths, the petals scattered on the bed, and they’d lived together happily enough for a year, even if her parents had been upset; cohabiting before marriage was a shameful thing to them.

  Jesse wonders now if her birth mother’s being unmarried had been an influence. Perhaps they thought she’d head in the same direction? In the end, she’d asked Geoff to move out, but that had been for her own good reasons.

  Jesse breathes on the mottled glass, draws a heart with a fingertip, and writes J + G 4 eva.

  Her hand drops. Be honest. Scented candles had not been enough. And Geoff had been one of the good ones.

  Why does she always want more? Maybe this mirror—so strangely mottled—is some kind of symbol. An actual demonstration that she doesn’t recognize herself anymore—doesn’t, really, know who she is.

  And that’s the truth.

  Can you really see yourself as others see you? This face—what does it actually say?

  Jesse turns side-on, looks at herself over one shoulder. She’s been told she’s pretty quite often. Geoff even said she was beautiful. Actually, he repeated it so many times, it began to annoy her. She doesn’t think she’s beautiful. What does the word actually mean?

  She peers more closely at her image, feature by feature. Something about the nose she’s never liked—too strong, and it’s got a bump. Her chin as well; there’s a bit of a cleft. How could that be beautiful? To be fair, her skin has always been an asset—though Alicia’s is finer, more creamy somehow—and her eyes. Jesse’s never minded when people comment about their color. Geoff said her eyes were like an Australian sky when a storm’s on its way. She liked that.

  Australia.

  Abruptly, tears well and overflow. Her heart hurts.

  Sniffing, Jesse stands back. And sees the silver candle sconces. They’re fixed to the wall on each side of the looking glass, and the candles are part used. Someone else has stood here and lit those wax tapers. No way of telling when, or who. Or why. Alicia?

  Jesse shakes her head. Alicia’s not the romantic type.

  But she is.

  Jesse looks around for matches, finds a box in a little lidded pot. Once lit, the mirror and the holders complement each other; it’s surely intentional that this riot of glimmering roses and twining leaves was made to frame the surprised viewer in a silver garland. The effect is magical, as if Jesse’s some sort of nature spirit half discovered in dappled light.

  As if she’s another person. A different girl.

  She leans closer. The face in the mirror, the face-that-could-be-her-face, is smiling. But she’s not smiling.

  Don’t be so ridiculous! Jesse shivers violently and chafes her arms. What is this? Emotional exhaustion, it must be. And, of course, whatever the effect was, it’s gone.

  She strips off and gets into the bath, slides down until her nose is just above the water.

  So. Candlelight is dangerous. Who knew?

  24

  WHEN I returned, the chapel was empty. I was grateful, for I had not found Margaretta or the children.

  But Maugris had been more successful. The broken doors had been removed, the floor swept, and the walls hung with branches of holly and pine. Fresh resin—the scent of a winter forest—and sweet wax perfumed the air from all the lighted candles.

  Unwillingly, I stared at where we had placed Flore’s bier. There was nothing to see, no sense of the tragedy or the mystery.

  Set into the floor a pace away was my mother’s tomb. Candlelight found the crystals in the stone, as if she were buried beneath a coverlet of stars. Unsheathing my sword, I knelt beside her grave. Bless us, Mother. Help your sons so that Hundredfield does not fall.

  Was it blasphemy to pray to a mortal woman as if she were a saint—as if she could intercede with the Christ, who hung above me? It was, and I knew that, but somewhere distant, I heard someone singing. The refrain had no words, but the sound was soft and sweet, each note formed as if it were liquid grace.

  My mother had sung in such a way.

  Enchanted, half terrified, I did not dare to look up. “Ma mère?” Tears stood in my eyes.

  The song ceased, but the silence rang. And a baby laughed.

  I turned my head to the sound.

  Margaretta stood behind me. I thought she must have come from the entrance to the chapel. She held a newborn in her arms.

  Embarrassed and, yes, angry not to have found her earlier, I stood to speak harsh words. But the baby stared at me, and I was silenced.

  Margaretta had seen the sword in my hand. “Aviss!”

  A small boy was hiding in her skirts, and she scooped him up. The child wailed at her frightened expression, and that set the baby crying too.

  I backed a little way off and laid my sword on the tiles. “I will not hurt you, girl. Or them.”

  Margaretta tried to console the boy. “Hush, hush. All is well. This is the nice brother.”

  I was surprised into a smile, though Aviss still stared at me with great, drowned eyes.

  “Your son?” I made the sort of face one does to a puppy, or any young animal.

  She set him down on the floor again. “Yes.” He hid behind her knees.

  I displayed empty hands. “May I see?” I meant the baby.

  Margaretta hesitated, then nodded.

  I stepped closer and held out a finger to my niece. She seemed to inspect it, and then me—as if considering what I might be. Confused, I said, “It seems to me that much has changed at Hundredfield.”

  “May I sit, lord? I am weary and the baby . . .”

  She did not want to answer me. I nodded. “The little one must be heavy.” I waved at the altar steps. The priest would not like it, but he was not here to see.

  As Margaretta settled her son behind her, the infant smiled at me. Perhaps it was wind. I knew little of babies. “A fine child.” I forced civility into my voice. “Robert told me you were with your mistress when my niece was born.”

  “Yes.” She arranged the infant in the crook of one arm.

  “Has my brother seen her?”

  Margaretta hesitated, then said, “He was there.”

  “As the baby was birthed?” My voice rose.

  “My mistress was dying
, and he would not be kept away.” She was trying not to sniff and dropped her head. “There was no time. After the child came, I put her into the arms of my mistress. And the Lady Flore held her but . . .” Tears slid down her face, and she could not speak.

  I was surprised by a churning wash of emotion. “Forgive me, but why did Lord Godefroi have you wait on his wife?”

  “I do not know.” The girl wiped her face with a hand. “But I miss her. So much. Aviss does also, for he loved her as he loves me. She was a dear friend to us both.”

  “The Lady Flore was your friend?” I tried to understand what this might mean.

  “She cared for me as if she had been my mother. More than that.” To see Margaretta so sad, Aviss began to cry again, and the baby, that strange little being, tried to pat her face. Truly, I was astonished.

  As the girl pulled her son close, I spoke above the noise. “What more do you know of her?”

  “Forgive me, lord. Aviss must be comforted. He is hungry.” The girl gestured helplessly.

  “Of course.” I turned half away as she opened the bodice of her dress.

  As the boy settled to the breast, his sobs turned to snuffles and I felt Margaretta study my face. Her glance touched my skin like a hand. I flushed with the sense of it, though I did not look at her.

  I tried again. “Did the Lady Flore seem . . .” Words eluded me. “Was she a good woman?”

  “I do not think she was a woman at all.” Margaretta spoke low, gazing down at her son’s nestled head, his hair like feathers against the curve of her breast.

  I swallowed. “Why do you say that, woman?”

  Margaretta hesitated. “Once, I saw her fly.”

  I remembered the feast all those months ago. She did not eat. Was Matthias, therefore, not just a vindictive fool, jealous his influence had been usurped? Was he telling the truth?

  Margaretta must have seen my expression. “It is true, lord. It was before the little one’s birth.” As her son sucked, she hitched the baby closer. “Greatly pregnant, the Lady Flore yet flew across the river at dark one night.”

  “Did she have wings, then?” I thought it a sensible question, considering.

  She transferred her gaze to the baby. “My mistress was not an angel, if that is what you are asking. And now she is gone.” Margaretta shook her head. “Because of the priest, and what he said, the people here would have killed Flore, and her daughter. Aviss also.” She put her hand on the boy’s head.

  “Because he is Godefroi’s child?”

  Margaretta did not raise her eyes. “The Lady Flore said we must hide when it was needed.” Her son’s eyelids fluttered as he remembered to suck, fighting sleep.

  “And you have had need?”

  “I think your brother would have killed me after my father . . .” She could not cobble the words together. “. . . after the soldier was killed. His fury was very great. But I could not leave her—how could I leave Flore? She needed me. And her protection, her care for me and for Aviss, saved us both. She convinced Lord Godefroi to let me live.”

  The boy had ceased to suck and slept peacefully against her chest. I tried not to watch as Margaretta laced her gown.

  “Her daughter will continue what the Lady Flore has begun.”

  I did not know what she meant. “Margaretta, if you know where she is—”

  Margaretta cut me off. She stood with both children in her arms. “Will you let them live? Will you protect them?”

  “Am I a monster that would kill children of my own blood?” I was offended.

  Margaretta searched my face, feature by feature. “No. You are no monster.” Her voice was flat. “But you must speak the truth, or I cannot tell you what the Lady Flore told me.”

  “What do you mean?” My family owned this girl and her son, yet I spoke to her as if I were the supplicant.

  There was a pause, and then she said, “Lord Bayard, when did the Lady Flore come to the keep?”

  I said slowly, “I have never known.”

  “On the day of her daughter’s birth, it was one year and one day since Lord Godefroi found her in the forest.” The expression in the girl’s eyes was eerie, as if a fire had kindled there.

  “And so?”

  “The Lady of the Forest comes when she is needed. She shares the bed of the man she must and has his child. The baby is always a girl. That is very important.”

  Perhaps I laughed. “A boy is better.” But I looked at Godefroi’s daughter and was less sure. The child was staring at me as if she understood each of my words.

  Margaretta stepped closer. She stared at me as if we were equals. “I brought this child, your niece, out of the body of my mistress and into life. And I say to you that though the Lady of the Forest always seems to die, she is never buried. On the day after the child is safely born, her body disappears.”

  I was shocked to silence. No one, so far as I knew, had seen what Maugris and I had in the chapel this morning. Or spoken of it, either.

  So much pity was in Margaretta’s eyes. “The child of the Lady of the Forest will bring abiding good fortune to your family, or she will be the destruction of your house. It has always been so. That is the truth you must know.”

  I shook my head. “And I thought you a clever girl, Margaretta. This is nonsense.”

  Her expression hardened. “You do not think me clever, Lord Bayard. You think me a peasant, and peasants are animals incapable of thought; all of us at Hundredfield are property to you and your brothers, things, not people.”

  Had she seen my thoughts?

  Margaretta spoke urgently. “The Lady Flore chose me, Lord Bayard, and she chose this place. She chose your brother too, and your family. But I guard her daughter with my life and even the life of my own child, if that must be given. This was the trust she gave to me. I will not betray the Lady of the Forest and I am not afraid.”

  “If the priests hear you speak in such a way, it may come to that.” I went to pick up my sword. “Where is the body of your mistress?”

  Margaretta’s face worked. If it was distress, or happiness, I could not tell.

  “Did you move it from the chapel as my brother slept? Tell me!”

  Margaretta said in an awed whisper, “Then, it is true. All of it is true. She is truly gone.” Her face shone white and dazed. “Time will pivot now, and fortunes change. She told me that.”

  “You speak in riddles.”

  She shook her head. “There are no riddles here. Not anymore.”

  I pulled the sword belt tighter by a notch and turned to the opening of the chapel. “Stay here. When Lord Godefroi permits it, I shall send men to bring you to him.”

  “You do not understand. The men here will kill us all if they can, the children and me. And you as well.”

  I ignored her. “You are safe by the altar, Margaretta. You have sanctuary in this holy place.” I hurried to the stairs.

  “Lord Bayard,” Margaretta called. “You believe more than you say you do. She spoke to you.”

  That brought me back to the chancel at a run. “What did you say?”

  But the chapel was empty.

  25

  RORY PUSHES the door open and Jesse peers past his shoulder.

  With long windows at the far end, the room is twice normal height, and all around the walls, shelves carry books—thousands and thousands of volumes, their titles stamped in gilt on leather bindings. There are no modern books at all. Not one.

  “Who has enough time to read all this?” Jesse’s nervous as she wanders from bookcase to bookcase.

  “Not me.” Rory beckons. “I want to show you something.”

  She follows him to a fireplace on a side wall.

  Rory points. Above the mantelpiece is a tall glass case. “This is a map of Hundredfield, with the country around it.”

  “Really?” She cranes to look.

  He nods. “It’s hand-drawn and made before anyone knew about latitude and longitude. No real scale, as you see.”

&n
bsp; They stare in silence. “What’s that?” Jesse points at a bold black line.

  “The border between England and Scotland.”

  “It looks close.”

  “Yes. The border shifted quite a bit, back and forth. This map’s never been properly dated because carbon-element-decay analysis means you’d have to snip a bit off and destroy it. Alicia’s dad wouldn’t let it be done. Fourteenth century, or possibly earlier. Before printing, anyhow.”

  “It’s rather nice, though, isn’t it? Like a kid’s drawing. The estate looks huge—the amount of land, I mean.”

  “It was. Even the plague, when it came, couldn’t destroy this family.”

  “So the Donnes of Hundredfield were tough.” Jesse can’t bring herself to ask if Alicia really is the child of an earl. It seems so much like fantasy. A waitress who’s an aristocrat living in a ruined castle?

  “Only, they weren’t called the Donnes then. Names change over time.” Rory switches the subject. “I think I’ll set up over there. Okay with you?” He points.

  Anxiety. My constant friend. Not. “Yes. That’s fine.”

  In a slant of sun, chairs crowd a library table. With magazines strewn over its surface, it’s as if someone got up, forgetting to tidy away.

  Or expecting the servants to do it, thinks Jesse as she watches Rory stride over with a reel-to-reel tape recorder. Placing the equipment with some care, he says, “Pick somewhere comfortable; you’ll be sitting for a while.”

  Jesse folds herself into a low armchair with scrolled arms. “No rush.” She brushes dust off the cover of a magazine. Tatler, August 1956. Her eyes widen. The month of her birthday. Spooky.

  She flips through the pages as Rory pulls an extension cable out of a canvas bag and looks around for a power source.

  Jesse points. “On the wall beside the windows.”

  “Well spotted.”

  Jesse doesn’t hear him. She’s found a photo of a ball in progress. “Wow.”

  “What?”

  “Look at this.”