Death and the Maiden

by Samantha Norman

  And the alternative? Despite the many years she had had to think about it and to persuade Rowley of its existence, she was coming close to admitting defeat. Now that Mansur and Henry were dead, she could no longer hold up her own life—which, after all, hadn’t been so bad—as an example because Rowley would dismiss it, and with some justification, as a dangerous anachronism.

  Perhaps, with the caution of age, as she felt herself hurtling toward the grave, she was becoming increasingly conscious of the fact that neither she nor Rowley would be around much longer to keep Allie safe and that an arranged marriage might indeed be preferable to her falling into Richard’s clutches as his ward.

  She looked up to see Allie awaiting her response.

  “It’s nothing,” she said. “It’s just that . . . well, you look so beautiful and grown-up, and I suppose I can’t help feeling a bit nostalgic . . . But it’s nothing, really, so go, go on. Go and enjoy yourself.” She wafted her away with a smile and stood watching as she floated off into the crowd.

  “Ah well,” she sighed, reaching for comfort for the bowl of sweetmeats on the table beside her. “I suppose Rowley will be pleased.”

  “Pleased about what?”

  His voice beside her made her jump. She hadn’t seen him approaching, nor had she realized she was thinking aloud.

  “That,” she said, pointing at Allie. “Our daughter becoming courtly.”

  “Oh yes.” Rowley tilted his head back and folded his arms proudly across his chest. “Magnificent, isn’t she?”

  “And soon to be married off, I suppose?” Adelia snapped.

  Rowley looked at her. “I hope so. Don’t you?” he asked.

  Just for a moment she was teetering on the brink of resurrecting their age-old argument, until something about the set of his jaw decided her against it. Besides, she was tired of fighting and also knew that, whatever she said or did now, nothing would prevent him from starting the negotiations necessary to secure Allie’s match with Lord Peverell at tomorrow’s banquet.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” she said. “I’ll just get cross . . . So tell me your news. I want to know what happened with the count. I presume he won’t be invading Normandy now?”

  Rowley nodded. “Lengthy business though,” he said. “There were endless bloody councils: we had to go to Oxford, London, Winchester, Windsor, all over the place, actually—Eleanor’s still indefatigable, you know, even worse than you . . . but you’re right, there won’t be an invasion, not for the time being at least and not while she’s regent. In the end she had to threaten to confiscate his estates and now he’s off sulking in Wallingford.”

  “Good,” said Adelia. “Let’s hope he stays there . . . But what about the interdict? What’s the news on that?”

  He stared at her incredulously. She was as ruthless as Eleanor in her way; perhaps all women were, he thought, when you spent enough time with them.

  “Do you mind if I sit down?” he asked. “I’m exhausted.”

  Adelia found him a stool and hurriedly shoved it into the back of his knees. “There,” she said. “Sit down on that and tell me, tell me, tell me.”

  “Well,” he said, “you’ll be pleased to hear that I think it’ll be over pretty soon. On our way here we traveled through quite a bit of the diocese, the boarded-up churches and the bodies in the snow, not to mention all the pitiable wretches who came shuffling out of their cottages to tell the queen about their suffering . . . Anyway I think it was enough to convince her to see Walter of Coutances on her way back to France and persuade him to return Longchamp’s estates if he’ll agree to lift the interdict.”

  Adelia gave a squeal of delight and clasped her hands together. “Thank you, oh, thank you,” she said. “I knew you could do it.”

  “Don’t mention it,” said Rowley, closing his eyes, wondering whether he would have the energy to open them again. One more day, he thought while Adelia chattered away beside him. One more day until everything is resolved and we can go home and live peacefully. One more day . . .

  Chapter 66

  The next day Allie kept her promise and took Eleanor to the guest chamber to meet Hawise.

  “I imagine you’re quite pretty under all those bruises,” the queen said, smiling at her benevolently. “Nasty accident, though, by the looks of things . . . Riding, did you say?” she asked, turning to Allie, who nodded quickly and decided that the conversation had gone as far as it ought and it was time to leave.

  “I’ll come back later,” she mouthed to Hawise from the door.

  When it closed, Hawise flopped back onto her pillows in a state of euphoria.

  Allie needn’t have worried; Hawise hadn’t heard a word of what the queen had said. She had been too excited and too mesmerized by her resplendence, the dazzling clothes and exotic scents that wafted into the room with her, to notice anything else at all.

  But, as the day wore on, the memory faded and the room became drab once more, making her wistful for a little more of the magic, wondering how much longer she would have to lie here alone.

  Now that she wasn’t in quite so much pain—apart from the occasional twinge in her arm, although even that was improving—the imposed bed rest had started to feel less like a cure than a curse. Far from feeling better, she now had too much time to think and dwell on things . . . And “things” were getting worse, the nightmares especially, prompting her memory, which in turn resurrected details of the ordeal she had happily forgotten, along, of course, with the inexorable fear that her captor was still at large and might yet come for her again.

  Sometimes she felt it so intensely that she wanted to scream, only she dared not for fear of disturbing the ladies-in-waiting who had been garrisoned with her and who treated her with disdain as it was, as if she were a disease they might catch.

  She settled back on her pillows and closed her eyes. Despite the nightmares, sleep was the only respite she had from this incipient boredom, and she was just drifting off when the door opened and Lena, holding a lighted taper, came into the room.

  “Come to do your candles,” she told her, amused by the look of alarm on Hawise’s face. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to frit you. But it’s gettin’ dimpsy, ain’t it? . . . Quiet, too,” she added, looking around with a frown as if she disapproved of the fact that there was nobody there to disturb the peace. “Never mind, the banquet’ll be startin’ soon.”

  As she went about her business, lighting the candles and ineffectually tidying, Hawise found her inane chatter—usually so irritating—strangely comforting and was surprised at how much she missed it when Lena left eventually and the room went quiet again.

  At some point she must have dozed off again, because she woke with a start to the sound of footfalls and the burble of conversation drifting up through the floorboards as the guests arrived for the banquet in the hall below.

  She lay staring at the ceiling, listening to the rising cacophony of people enjoying themselves, fighting pangs of envy that she wasn’t there to see it for herself, imagining the lords and ladies, resplendent in their finery, their mouths watering, like hers, in eager anticipation of the great feast Gyltha had so lovingly described. And then she thought about Allie, no doubt reunited by now with her Lord Peverell, and wondered whether—as everybody seemed to assume—an arrangement would, indeed, be made this evening to secure her future happiness . . . She hoped so, the future happiness at least, even if, deep down—however wonderful Lord Peverell turned out to be, and he did sound wonderful—she worried about it.

  During her confinement she had given Allie’s marriage prospects a great deal of thought and had come to the conclusion that it was an aspect of her life she didn’t envy. In fact, it made her increasingly grateful for her lower status, which exempted her from the social and economic politics of the more exalted. At least she had the freedom to choose a husband—within reason, of course—and, best of all, Penda on her side, who was so antipathetic to the idea of marriage, whether arranged or not, that she had
promised her, very early on, that in the unlikely event her parents came up with an unsuitable match, she would veto it. And because Ulf and Rosa were her tenants and, therefore, subject to merchet, she could.

  Whether she married or not, Hawise knew that her future would be governed by hard work, but at least she would have a certain dominion over it and she wouldn’t die of boredom in a gilded cage.

  Downstairs the noise level was rising dramatically.

  Such was their enthusiasm to meet the queen that in spite of the weather, all the guests had made herculean efforts to get there, arriving in their droves, stomping through the courtyard like cattle to the trough, the men barely breaking stride as they divested themselves of their swords, the women flinging their cloaks at the servants as though they were human pegs.

  Allie was standing in the middle of the hall trying to make conversation with one of Eleanor’s ladies-in-waiting but, with one eye and half a mind on the door, found it hard to concentrate.

  The trouble was that the Dunstan party hadn’t arrived yet and she was increasingly anxious that Lord Peverell’s attendance might be the sole casualty of the weather.

  “You’d ’ave thought some o’ them buggers might’ve ’ad the decency to get snowed in,” Penda grumbled as she went past her. “Even that miserable old bastard the abbot of Elsford’s got ’ere!”

  Allie stiffened when she saw her lips purse—the precursor to the spitting that invariably accompanied any mention of the abbot—but was relieved when she saw her shake her head ruefully and wander off.

  “Stop it!” a voice beside her hissed.

  “Stop what?” she hissed back.

  “Worrying, twitching like that,” said Adelia. “You can stop it right now because he’s here. Look!”

  Allie looked up, heart pounding, to see Lord Peverell, gazing at her from the other side of the room as though she were the only person in it.

  “My apologies for the late arrival,” he whispered when he took her hand and kissed it. “Only it seems that Matilda has developed an aversion to the snow . . .”

  Allie grinned, in sympathy with both the capriciousness of horses and the forbearance necessary to deal with them, and was about to inquire after her further when Sir William interrupted them.

  “Unpredictable like all women, my lord,” he said. “But perhaps before we leave Mistress Almeison will perform some of her magic and cure her of it.”

  He was smiling as he said it but Allie felt the sting of his barb nonetheless . . . and the threat . . . “Magic” was a dangerous word to bandy around, especially around her, and the fact that it had fallen from his lips was alarming.

  “It isn’t magic!” she snapped, ready to deliver a robust homily about the science of horse medicine, when a loud trumpet blast ended the conversation and the guests rushed to take their places at the tables.

  Food, Hawise thought wistfully, correctly interpreting the hush downstairs. Her mouth watered as she envisaged the sumptuous dishes Gyltha had described to her: plates of crane and venison, boar and pheasant, larks’ tongues and . . . beeves—she still wasn’t quite sure what they were, but Gyltha had made them sound delicious. Then she remembered Allie’s promise to smuggle a plate of food up to her and, despite being desperately hungry, resolved not to get cross if she forgot, because tonight Allie could be forgiven for having more important things on her mind.

  A little while later the drone in the hall began again, low-level at first, like the rumble of distant thunder, until—fueled, no doubt, by the copious quantities of wine and ale Penda served—it became a roar.

  Hawise half leaned out of bed, pressing her ear to the floor, hoping to catch a thread or two of the conversation, perhaps pick out the queen’s voice or Allie’s even, but it proved impossible, not to mention uncomfortable, and eventually she eased herself back onto her mattress and fell asleep.

  From her vantage point on the dais, Penda was enjoying another moment of self-congratulation.

  Despite her earlier misgivings, or perhaps because of them—she was a great believer in giving hostages to fortune, after all—the evening had been a success; everyone appeared to be enjoying themselves, even the queen, who, she had been delighted to hear, would be leaving tomorrow. Although mercifully brief, the royal visit had been an expensive interlude, but, God be praised, not ruinously so, and worth every penny if, as she promised, Eleanor managed to get the interdict lifted on her way back to France.

  Looking along the row of diners, she was inspired to a belch of contentment by the sight of Rowley chatting happily to Lord Peverell and, no doubt, securing Allie’s match.

  Ah well, good for him, she thought. She liked James Peverell and thought he would make as good a husband as any, but, never having married herself, or ever wanted to, was profoundly grateful for the means that enabled her to pay the annual amercement to the king so that she need not have a husband foisted on her.

  Whether or not marriage would agree with Allie, she didn’t know and had almost deliberately avoided thinking about until now, first because she couldn’t help feeling guilty for her part in the conspiracy with Rowley, and second because now that she had gotten to know her, she had a sneaking suspicion that Allie’s natural independence and strength of personality might make the confines of matrimony difficult. She hoped she was wrong about that, Christ’s blood she did, but if not, at least if Allie did marry James Peverell, she would remain close enough for Penda to keep an eye on her.

  A wheelbarrow trundled noisily over the dais to take the last of the leftovers, and while the tables were being cleared, she signaled to the musicians in the gallery to strike up. As soon as they had done so, she pushed her stool back into the shadows from which she would enjoy the rest of the evening vicariously.

  Hawise woke to loud music and the rhythmic thumping of feet in the hall below.

  Dancing; people dancing and having fun with their bellies full, the lucky things. It felt like torture to be missing out, but having resigned herself to the fact that with all the renewed vigor of the activity in the hall, she was unlikely to get back to sleep, she decided she might as well join in. And before long, the fingers of her good hand tapping, her feet jiggling, she even forgot to feel hungry and was enjoying herself when the chanting began.

  “Penda! Penda! Penda!” It was a lone voice at first, but gradually others joined in, rising in volume and drowning out the music.

  Hawise pressed her hands together in delight. She knew what was happening and imagined Gyltha standing proudly in the hall leading the campaign to persuade Penda to perform. She could almost see Penda’s expression of shy reluctance, too, as a firm hand—most likely Ulf’s—propelled her to the door to fetch her bow.

  She leaned out of bed again, staring at the floorboards, holding her breath, and listened intently.

  When Penda reappeared with her bow and quarrel, a hush fell on the hall as the guests gathered, forming a circle around her.

  “You,” she said, pointing at a man in the middle of it. “Yes, you, sir,” she repeated when the man hesitated. “Step over here, if you please, and put this on, if you’d be so kind.”

  Up in the guest chamber, Hawise giggled. She could almost see the look of trepidation on the poor man’s face when, anxious not to disappoint the audience, he reluctantly put on the ridiculous-looking hat Penda had given him.

  “Thank you, sir,” Penda said.

  By now he would be red faced, grinning with embarrassment—they usually were—wondering what on earth he had let himself in for.

  “Step back please, sir . . . Further, further if’n you don’t mind . . . further . . . and a little bit further please.” Penda would blindfold him now, leading him to the other side of the room, where she would position him with his back to the wall.

  “Don’t be nervous, now, sir,” she told him. “I ain’t never missed.”

  The next sequence was Hawise’s favorite; the burst of raucous laughter as Penda—warming to her role—turned to the crowd and mo
uthed “often”; then a collective gasp and nervous squeals when she squinted, pretending that her eyesight was failing. Then there was more giggling followed by a sepulchral hush as, at long last, she raised her bow, loosed her arrow and sent it ripping through the hall into the very tip of the conical, comical hat.

  Hawise held her breath, anticipating the gasp of wonder as the astonished man turned to the wall in which the hat was now firmly pinned and, with an expression of awe and gratitude, acknowledged how very narrowly he had just avoided death.

  The applause that evening was rapturous. Hawise lay back on her palliasse soaking it up as though it were hers. It seemed to last forever and she was even beginning to feel sleepy again when at last it began to die down and she heard the voice . . .

  . . . A man’s voice, rising above the others, familiar with that faint but unmistakable inflection of laughter in it.

  “Bravo, Lady Penda! Bravo!”

  Hawise froze, and from then on was deaf to everything but the blood pulsing in her ears as terror swelled her veins.

  Her first instinct was to hide, to pretend that she had been mistaken, that she hadn’t heard him . . . But that was the old Hawise, the one who had been destroyed in the cavern that dreadful night and yet, by some miracle, been reborn and cast in strength. So instead of cowering in her bed, she got up, got dressed and made her way down to the hall.

  Allie spotted her immediately, amused at first by her peculiar appearance, her disheveled hair, the inside-out, badly laced bliaut, and assumed she must be sleepwalking and that, if she could only get to her in time, she might be able to save her blushes and send her back to the guest chamber before anybody else noticed.

  With that in mind, she slipped quietly off the dais and made her way through the crowd toward her. It was only when she was close enough to see the expression on her face that she realized something was wrong—very badly wrong.