Lady of Hay

by Barbara Erskine

  She straightened abruptly. “Don’t be absurd. You know damn well I’m not. And you know why.”

  “I think you will. I don’t think you’ll be able to stop when the time comes.”

  “Oh, believe me, I will, Sam.” Jo clenched her fists. “Do you think I will want to go on when John turns against them? I don’t want to know what happens then. Do you think I could bear to live through all that—the knowledge that Richard did not lift a finger to try to save her, for all his love. And William! William, after all their years of marriage, their children—William betrayed her!”

  “She had betrayed William first,” Sam said sharply. “She had driven him too far.”

  “He was a coward,” she retorted. “A bully and a coward.”

  Sam flinched visibly beneath her scorn. “He paid for that last betrayal,” he said. “He paid. Dear God, how he wanted to make reparation. Don’t you think he wanted to return to save her?”

  Nick pushed open the kitchen door behind them. “Come on, you two, what’s happened to supper?”

  “No!” Jo did not even hear him. “No, I don’t think he did. He didn’t give tuppence for anything but his own skin. Don’t forget, he let his own son die too. His eldest son!”

  Sam narrowed his eyes. “His son! Will wasn’t his son. Will was the bastard of that weak fool, de Clare. An incestuous bastard!”

  “Sam!” Nick shouted. “Stop it!”

  Sam ignored him. He hadn’t taken his eyes off Jo’s face. “Do you know who little Matilda de Clare married? No, not Reginald. Not good, honest, upright Reginald, so like his father. No, you let her marry Will! You let her marry her own brother!”

  “No!” shouted Jo. “No, that’s a lie. Will was William’s true-born son.”

  “I don’t believe you. Matilda was a whore. She deserved to die the way she did.”

  “Sam, shut up!” Nick glared at his brother. “You bastard! Leave it alone, do you hear?”

  Suddenly Sam smiled. “Of course. I’m sorry. How tactless of me.” He was breathing hard. “Yes, why don’t we have supper! It can’t matter now, anyway, can it, what happened eight hundred years ago?”

  It was a quiet meal. After leaving most of her food untouched, Jo pushed her plate aside and toyed instead with the glass of wine. It was only just after eight when Nick stood up.

  “I must go, Jo.” He took her hands as she rose too. “Take care, won’t you.”

  She gave a watery smile. “Of course. Don’t worry about me.”

  “If you want to speak to me, Jim will have the phone number in the office. And I’ll be in touch with them just as soon as I hit New York. Do you want me to call you?”

  She shook her head. “Forget me for ten days, Nick. Concentrate on your work. I’ll see you when you get back.”

  He looked at her hard for a few moments, his blue eyes intense, then he kissed her gently on the forehead. “Sam will be here to take care of you, don’t forget, if you need him.”

  Sam was still seated. He refilled his glass slowly, watching as Jo raised her arms suddenly and threw them around Nick’s neck.

  He frowned. “I’ll see you back at the apartment later, Nick,” he said.

  “You’re not coming with me now?” Nick disengaged himself gently. There was a hint of caution in his tone as he looked down at his brother.

  “There are one or two things I want to say to Jo first.”

  “No!” There was no reason for Jo’s involuntary response; its violence surprised even her. “I mean, not now, Sam, please. I am so tired. I’d really rather be on my own this evening, if you don’t mind.”

  “I won’t keep you long.” Sam did not move.

  Nick put his hands on the back of Sam’s chair. “Come on, you can see Jo wants us both to go.”

  “She’ll change her mind.” Sam glanced up at Jo with a smile. “A cup of coffee, then I’ll leave if you still want me to. I promise.”

  She clung to Nick for a moment on the landing and stood watching him walk down the stairs, then slowly she turned back. “You really want coffee?”

  “Please.” Sam had collected the plates. He carried them through to the kitchen, then he leaned against the wall, watching as Jo set about making some instant coffee. “Not the real thing?” he inquired lazily. There was a slight smile at the corners of his mouth.

  “It takes too long,” Jo said over her shoulder. “I mean it, Sam. I really am too tired to talk.” She turned suddenly and looked at him. “Sam—”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “Is Nick—” She hesitated. “Have you ever hypnotized Nick?”

  Sam smiled. “That’s an odd thing to ask.”

  “Have you?”

  “Put down the kettle for a moment and look at me.”

  “I’m making your coffee.”

  “Put it down, Jo.”

  She did so, slowly. Then she stared up at him. “Sam—”

  “That’s right, Jo. Close your eyes for a moment. Relax. You can’t fight it. There is nothing you can do, is there? You are already asleep and traveling back into the past. That’s it.” Sam stood for a moment staring at her, then he moved forward and took her hand, leading her out into the apartment’s short hall. A right turn would take him toward the front of the apartment, the living room with its open balcony doors. To the left was the bedroom and next to it the bathroom.

  He turned left. In the bedroom he pushed Jo into a seated position on the end of her bed, then he moved to the windows and closed the heavy curtains. He switched on the lamp. It cast strange synthetic shadows in a room where the evening sunlight was still struggling through between the folds of the heavy material, lighting up a dazzling wedge of gold on the dusty rose of the carpet.

  Sam folded his arms. “So, my lady, do you know who I am?”

  Jo shook her head dully.

  “I am your husband, madam!”

  “William?” She moved her head slightly as though trying to avoid some dazzling light.

  “William.” He had not moved. “And you and I have a whole night, do we not, to remind you of your duties to your husband.”

  Jo stared up at him, her gaze alarmingly direct. “My duties? Of what duties do you intend to remind me, my lord?” Her tone was scornful.

  Sam smiled. “All in good time. But first I want to ask you a question. Wait. There is something I must fetch. Wait here until I return.”

  ***

  Matilda stared at William’s retreating back. He slammed the heavy oak door of the bedchamber and she heard the ring of his spurs on the stone as his footsteps retreated. She shivered. The narrow windows of the chamber faced north and the shutters braced across them did nothing to keep out the cold. She went to stand near the huge hearth, drawing her fur mantle around her. Her bones had begun to ache now in the winter and she could feel her soul crying out for the balm of spring sunshine. She must be beginning to feel old! What had William gone to find? Wearily she bent and picked a dry mossy apple bough from the basket and threw it on the fire. It scented the room immediately and she closed her eyes, trying to imagine herself warm.

  William returned almost at once. He flung back the door and stood before her, his face closed, his eyes hiding some new anger. She sighed, and forced herself to smile.

  “What is it you wish to ask me, William? Let us speak of it quickly, then we can go down to the great hall where it is so much warmer.”

  What was it he held behind his back? She stared at him curiously, feeling as she always did now for him a strange mixture of scorn and fear and tolerance and even perhaps a little affection. But he was so hard to like, this man to whom she had been married now for so many years.

  William slowly held out the hand he had been keeping behind his back. In it was a carved ivory crucifix. She drew back, catching her breath, recognizing it as coming from a niche in the chapel, where it was kept in a jeweled reliquary. It was reputed to have been carved from the bone of some long-dead Celtic saint.

  “Take it.”
r />   “Why?” She clutched her cloak more tightly around her.

  “Take it in your hand.”

  Reluctantly she reached out and took the crucifix. It was unnaturally cold.

  “Now,” he breathed. “Now I want you to swear an oath.”

  She paled. “What oath?”

  “An oath, madam, of the most sacred kind. I want you to swear on that crucifix in your hand that William, the eldest child of your body, is my son.”

  She stared at him. “Of course he is your son.”

  “Can you swear it?”

  She stared down at the intricately carved ivory in her hand—the decorated cross, the tortured, twisted figure of the man hanging on it in his death agony. Slowly she raised it to her lips and kissed it.

  “I swear it,” she whispered.

  William drew a deep breath. “So,” he said. “You told the truth. He was not de Clare’s bastard.”

  Her eyes flew to his face and he saw the paleness of her skin flood with color. For a moment only, then it was gone and she was as white as the crucifix she had pressed to her lips.

  He narrowed his eyes. “You swore!”

  “William is your son. I swear, before God and the Holy Virgin.”

  “And the others? What of the others?” He took a step toward her and grabbed her wrist. He held the crucifix up before her eyes. “Swear. Swear for the others!”

  “Giles and Reginald, they are yours. Can you not see it in their coloring and their demeanor? They are both their father’s sons.”

  “And the girls?” His voice was frozen.

  “Margaret is yours. And Isobel.” She looked down suddenly, unable to hold his gaze.

  “But not Tilda?” His voice was barely audible. “My little Matilda is de Clare’s child?” He pressed her fingers around the crucifix until the carving bit into her flesh. “Is she?” he screamed suddenly.

  Desperately she tried to push him away. “Yes!” she cried. “Yes, she was Richard’s child, God forgive me!”

  Abruptly William let her go. She reeled back, and the crucifix fell between them in the dried herbs on the floor. They both stared at it in horror.

  William laughed. It was a humorless, vicious sound. “So, the great alliance with Rhys is built on counterfeit goods! The descendants of Gruffydd ap Rhys will not be descendants of mine!”

  “You must not tell him!” Matilda sprang forward and caught his arm. “For sweet Jesus’ sake, William, you must not tell him!” She gave a little sob. Dropping his arm, she whirled around, scrabbling on the floor until she found the crucifix. She grabbed it and thrust it at him. “Promise me. Promise me you won’t tell him! He would kill her!”

  William smiled. “He would indeed—the fruit of your whoring with de Clare.”

  She was trembling. The fur cloak had fallen open. “Please, promise me you won’t tell Lord Rhys, William! Promise!”

  “At the moment it would be madness to tell him,” William said thoughtfully, “and I shall keep silent for all our sakes. For now it shall remain a secret between me and my wife.” He smiled coldly. “As for the future, we shall see.”

  He stretched out and took the crucifix out of her hand. After kissing it, he put it reverently on the table, then he turned back to her and lifted the fur from her shoulders. “It is so seldom we are alone, my lady. I think it would be a good time, don’t you, to show me some of this passion you so readily give to others.” He carefully removed her blue surcoat and threw it after the cloak before he turned her numb body around and set about unlacing her gown.

  She was shivering violently. “Please, William! Not now. It is so cold.”

  “We shall warm each other soon enough.” He turned and shouted over his shoulder. “Emrys! You remember Emrys,” he said softly. “My blind musician?”

  She did not turn. Clutching her gown to her breasts, she heard the door open behind her then close again quietly. After a few moments’ silence the first breathy notes of the flute began to drift into the chamber, spiraling up into the dark, smoke-filled rafters.

  She shuddered as William’s cold hands pulled the gown out of her clutches and stripped it down to the floor.

  “So,” he whispered. “You stand, naked in body and naked in soul.” He took a deep, shaky breath. “Let down your hair.”

  For some reason she could not disobey him. Unsteadily she raised her hands to her veil and pulled out the pins that held it. She uncoiled her braids, still long and richly auburn with only a few strands yet of silver, and began to unplait them slowly, conscious of the draft that swept under the door and toward the hearth, sending icy shivers over her skin. She still had not looked at the musician.

  William watched in silence until her hair was free. It swung around her shoulders and over her pale breasts, rippled in the firelight into dancing bronzed life.

  He took another deep breath and groped at last for the brooch that held his own mantle. “You have a girl’s body still, for all the children you have carried,” he said softly. ‘Trueborn or bastard, they haven’t marked you.” He put his hand on her belly.

  She shrank back, her eyes silently spelling out her sudden hatred, and he laughed. “Oh, yes, you detest me—but you have to obey me, sweetheart! I am your husband.” He dropped his cotte after his mantle. “You have to obey me, Matilda, because I have the key to your mind.”

  She swallowed. “You have gone mad, my lord!” As if breaking free of some spell, she found she could move suddenly. Turning, she picked up her fur cloak and swung it around her until she was covered in rich chestnut fur from chin to toe. “You hold no keys to my mind!”

  “But I do.” Abruptly the music stopped. William raised his hand in front of her face. “Drop the cloak, Matilda. That’s right.” He smiled as, unnerved, she found herself obeying him. “Now, kneel.”

  Furious, she opened her mouth to argue, but the argument did not come. Scarcely realizing she did it, she knelt on the rich fur and stared up at him, the firelight playing on her pale skin as slowly he began to undress himself. Watching, she saw the stocky naked body, the mat of graying chest hair, tapering down to his belly, the sturdy muscular thighs, the white ugly scars, one on his left thigh, the other on his left shoulder. She had seldom seen him naked. Though everyone customarily slept unclothed, wrapped in blankets and furs, or sprawled in summer on coarse linen sheets, she resolutely rolled herself in the covers whenever possible and kept her eyes tightly closed. Now there was no escape. Some force of will in him seemed to keep her eyes open, fixed on his body. Nervously her gaze traveled down to the rigid penis, then back to the corded muscular arms that could hold her so mercilessly as he used her. She clenched her fists defiantly, her eyes rising once more at last to meet his.

  He smiled. “Lie down, wife. There on the floor.”

  “No,” she breathed, summoning the last vestiges of her strength to defy him. “No, my lord, I will not. It pleases you to treat me like a whore but I am your true wife, faithful to you for many years. If I must submit to you it will be on our marriage bed!”

  “Faithful?” He sneered suddenly. “You have betrayed me with de Clare. With who else, I wonder?” He looked at her, suddenly calculating.

  She dropped her gaze and he laughed. “Your eyes spell out your guilt! Who was it? One man? Two? A hundred?”

  “Only one other, my lord.” Why was she answering him? It was as if some force compelled her to make the admission.

  “And who was that one other?”

  “One to whom you yourself would have given me, my lord,” she burst out. “And I did not lie with him willingly. Before God, I swear it! He took me by force.”

  William raised an eyebrow. “And who was this so eager suitor, madam?”

  “Prince John,” she answered in a whisper.

  “So!” The angry color rose in his cheeks. “So, you are a royal whore. And where did John take you? On a bed trimmed with cloth of gold? No matter. For me you lie on the floor where you belong.”

  He stooped and
picked up the broad leather belt he had dropped with the rest of his clothes. “Lie down, Matilda, or I will give you the thrashing you deserve.”

  Behind them the music began again suddenly, thin and breathy, unrelated to the darkness of the chamber, the flaring smoky torches in the sconces, or the bittersweet smoke of the fire. Outside the wind had begun to moan gently across the hills, an eerie, dismal sound, as lonely as the cry of the hungry wheeling buzzard, riding the currents below the streaming clouds.

  Matilda did not move. Her eyes narrowed scornfully. “You resort so easily to violence. You are like an animal, my lord. What you cannot take by force you wish to destroy.” She saw his hand tighten on the leather thong and she felt a quick pang of fear, but she did not move. “I have often wondered why you have never beaten me,” she said half thoughtfully. “You have often wanted to.” She smiled at him. “Perhaps you have never dared.”

  He stared down into the mocking amber eyes. The sorceress. The witch. Did she know then that he was afraid of her? He clenched his fist tighter on the belt, resisting the urge to cross himself with his free hand. He must take her now, while his desire was hot, while his anger sustained him. Whip her and mount her and by God’s bones he was not too old to get her with child again. A trueborn child to replace the bastard girl he had given to the Welsh.

  He stepped forward, his arm raised, and brought down the leather thong across her shoulders with every inch of strength he possessed.

  He heard the air whistle out of her lungs as the blow fell, but apart from that she did not make a sound. For an instant he saw fear in her eyes, then hatred—then, as he raised his arm for the second blow, she threw back her head and laughed. The sound rang out, wild and mocking, and he felt his desire shrivel and die as he heard it. Goose pimples raised on the flesh across his shoulders. With an oath he dropped the belt and groped at his feet for his tunic.

  “So be it,” he breathed. “You may laugh now, my lady. You may call up whatever demons protect you and scorn me now, but mine shall be the last laugh. Stay here! Stay in your castle, my lady! Stay in the past and lick your wounds. Stay there!”

  He swung his mantle over his shoulder and walked out of the chamber.