Ashes of Heaven

by C. Dale Brittain

  “Exile with you beside me will be sweeter than living in luxury at the court of the highest potentate. Come, we must leave at once.”

  But Isolde shook her head. “No, sweet friend, we cannot leave Cornwall. We cannot win forgiveness unless we are here. Mark has forgiven us before—after all, I am his queen!—and he shall do so again.”

  Tristan looked toward the castle, as if expecting the court to be gathering already, and took a deep breath. “He might forgive you, for he loves you too much to harm you—if I am gone. Unless you are carrying my child, you may still soften his heart with tears and repentance. But after this I can no longer be his heir. Cornwall is no longer my home. I must go or I shall be hung, entirely justifiably. If you cannot bear to leave Tintagel, then stay and seek forgiveness and enjoy being queen, but I must leave without delay.”

  “What will you do? Where will you go? What will become of me without you?”

  He tightened his arms around her. “Nothing will happen to you. Perhaps I shall go to the court of Sussex, and then on to Bretagne and my foster family. But I must go now, to get my horse before Mark can waken the court.”

  “My sweetest, my only love, when shall I see you again? How can I survive here without you?”

  Tenderly he removed her arms from around him and rose. Her choice had been between exile with him and queenship without him, and he did not think she had found the choice very difficult. “We may never see each other again this side of hell. We have known perfect love, but we have never known happiness and now never shall. Until you die, keep me in your heart, for you will always be in mine. Do not let absence and time lessen your affection, and do not forget me. Now kiss me, sweet Isolde, for I must go.”

  She began then to weep. “Our hearts have been as one for far too long for me ever to forget you! For all time, whether you are near or far, my life shall be in your keeping. Do not let another woman into your affections! And, dearest love, keep yourself safe, for we are one life and one flesh, and if you were gone I should perish along with you.” She embraced him and kissed him one last time, then he tore himself away, seized his clothes, and darted off through the orchard toward the stables.

  Half an hour later, with the sun above the horizon, Mark returned, along with the most noble members of his court. They came quietly through the apple trees to the bed that had been set up for the queen. Mark motioned, and they stepped up on either side and looked in.

  And there was Isolde, alone, her face buried in the pillow. They could not tell if she woke or slept, but she did not move at the sound of their footsteps, other than the slight motion of her breathing.

  In a moment, thinking that staring at a queen in her bed was very unseemly, the court retreated to the edge of the orchard, walking as quietly as they could so as not to wake her.

  They waited for Mark to speak first, but he seemed to know what they were thinking. “He was here but a short while ago,” he insisted. “If you had not all been in bed yourselves, we would have caught them together.”

  But the members of the court shook their heads. “Sire, it is very wrong of you constantly to make these accusations against the queen. True, there have been rumors and whispers about her and your nephew, but you have yet to prove anything against them. When you brought her to trial before the bishop, she established her innocence to everyone’s satisfaction. The last time you publicly accused her of adultery, you changed your mind just a few months later and loudly proclaimed her constancy yourself! Are you ill that you repeatedly see such scenes that no one else can see—first your nephew and the queen lying with a sword between them, and now the two of them in each other’s arms? You must hate both your wife and your own honor to make them repeatedly the subject of such slander! We have all seen the queen in bed here alone. And where is Tristan?”

  III

  When Tristan, sorrowful and with his mind full of Isolde, reached Parmenie, there were more bad tidings. For Rual, his faithful foster-father, had died during the winter.

  “I know I should have sent you word at once,” said Curvenal unhappily. “But there were no ships that time of year, and then I did not know how to tell you such painful news.”

  Everyone in Parmenie had gotten beyond the first stage of mourning, so Tristan was isolated in his grief. Even Florete was seen to smile and laugh again with her grandchildren. For Curvenal and Karsie now had a baby boy as well as their daughter, and their little girl was big enough to run all around the castle and be everyone’s pet.

  “So,” said Curvenal, “shall I send my boy to Cornwall for his education in another half dozen years?”

  Tristan shrugged and did not answer. He had not told anyone he was in exile.

  Rual had rescued Tristan from his own folly many times over the years, but now he would never do so again. Tristan sat remembering how Rual had saved him from boyhood scrapes, searched for him when he was kidnapped, come with reinforcements when he had killed the old duke. He found himself wishing that Rual had written him letters in Cornwall, letters that might somehow have made him give up his dishonorable love for Isolde—though even Rual would have been hard put to rescue him now. His yearning for his foster-father was made even worse by the guilty realization that Rual would have liked to hear from him occasionally.

  Knowing that he needed to mourn, Curvenal mostly left him alone. It was no consolation to Tristan to realize that Isolde, back in Cornwall, was also miserable, for she had but one sorrow, and it felt that he had a great many. He had lost his beloved, lost the man who had been a father to him, and, he now thought to himself, utterly betrayed the loyalty and honor that Rual had demonstrated throughout his own life.

  It did not help that his mind was drawn back to the playful debate he and Isolde had had in the orchard last spring, when he had argued that the lover whose sweet friend proved untrue suffered the most. Isolde, he knew with the certainty of a kick to the stomach, loved her husband, even if she loved her husband’s nephew more, but he himself had never had anyone a tenth as dear to him as she.

  He was sitting by the window in his chamber, the same set of thoughts repeatedly going through his mind on well-worn tracks, when Curvenal put his head in. “The lord of Karke is here, and he has brought Kaedin and Isolde.”

  Tristan was on his feet and halfway down the stairs before he could even wonder what Isolde was doing here, much less ask himself who the lord of Karke might be and why he had brought her. Her name alone had his body moving before his thoughts could form themselves.

  But when he burst into the great hall he did not see her. Three people were there, wrapped in traveling cloaks: a sober-faced man somewhat older than Mark, and a young man and young woman, who looked enough like him to be his children. None of them was Isolde.

  Only then did it occur to him that there could be women of that name besides the queen of Cornwall.

  He stood stiff and awkward while Curvenal introduced them. “This is Tristan, my foster-brother and heir to the throne of Cornwall. This is Lord Jovelin of Karke, and his son and daughter, Kaedin, known as Kaedin the Bold, and Isolde, known as Isolde Fair Hands.”

  “You’ll soon learn why my brother is termed ‘the Bold,’” the young woman commented, “but at least he’s named for a strength. I’m named for a vanity! When I was young, my nurse put special lotions on my hands every night so they became soft and white, and now I don’t dare go out without my gloves!”

  Everyone bowed to each other, then Curvenal continued, when Tristan appeared unlikely to speak, “Karke and Parmenie have been allies ever since that great tournament a few years ago—but that’s right, I do not believe I ever told you about it. I’m afraid that Lord Jovelin has come with bad news.”

  Tristan had little interest in his news. He could not take his eyes off Isolde Fair Hands. She was not the queen, but the name itself made him stare at her as though expecting to see her transform into his beloved. She had dark, curly hair and a touch of olive in her complexion—she looked in fact more like Brang
ein than like Isolde the Blonde. When she took off her riding gloves her hands were indeed smooth and pale, the nails pink and well shaped.

  “Isolde is a name for great queens,” he got out at last, when she noticed him staring and lifted an eyebrow at him.

  Isolde Fair Hands smiled. She had a lovely smile, and dark eyes that tipped up at the corners. “Yes, I understand that it is the name of both the queen of Eire and the queen of Cornwall. But in our family the story is that it is a name for women related to adventurers and mercenaries from Ispania. Our mother’s father came to Bretagne from Ispania many years ago, and that’s what she always told us.”

  “I am very pleased to meet you all,” Tristan mumbled then, thinking that she might be a distant cousin of his own Isolde. His own Isolde, who must know that he was in Parmenie, but had not even bothered to send a messenger to inquire after him or to reassure him that she and Mark were reconciled.

  “Now,” said Curvenal to his visitors, “take off your cloaks, sit down, and tell us what bad news has brought you and what we may do to assist.”

  In a few moments they were all sitting with glasses of wine, and Lord Jovelin told them his story.

  “I am afraid I have angered the duke,” he said, “although it was entirely unintentionally.”

  “If the duke is angry, it should not be at us,” put in Kaedin, “but at himself for his own obstinacy.”

  “The duke!” Tristan thought but managed to keep himself from saying. “But I killed him!” The man he had killed, he reminded himself, was the old duke of Bretagne, and there would have been a new one for several years now. He would have to keep his thoughts and emotions in better check, he told himself firmly, or they would all imagine him half-deranged by grief.

  “You will recall that the duke summoned all his Breton lords to his Christmas court,” said Lord Jovelin.

  “Of course,” said Curvenal. “How could I forget? It was terrible weather for traveling. And my father had died but a few weeks earlier, so I was in scarce mood for a festive court, but I thought I had no choice but to go.”

  “Inland we had even more snow that you did here by the sea,” said Jovelin. “I did not attempt the journey, but sent my apologies once the weather had improved somewhat. Apparently the duke was made furious by my absence.”

  Curvenal nodded. “You were not the only lord absent. The duke said nothing openly of his feelings, but after the rest of us had renewed our oaths of allegiance, he made several veiled comments about those who were absent. Cannot you now swear your oaths to him and placate him?”

  “I tried. I even went to his court in February to give my oaths. But he refused to receive me, and he has now sent word that he has given the lordship of Karke to someone else!”

  “He should not deprive us of our castle unless you prove grossly disloyal!” cried Kaedin the Bold.

  “And your efforts to swear loyalty show just the opposite!” agreed Curvenal.

  “You are right, he should not be able to do so,” said Lord Jovelin, serious and low. “But he has. The lord of Arundel has sent word that he now considers Karke his castle, and if we do not leave within two weeks, he intends to mount a siege.”

  “The lord of Arundel has few knights who follow him,” said Curvenal thoughtfully. “He has never had much to draw on, other than having married the duke’s cousin. But why are you not home preparing for the siege?”

  “I have come to ask for your help,” said Jovelin. “I fear my own days as a war leader are behind me—if they ever existed at all. I hope that the ties of friendship between us, and the fact that you knighted young Kaedin last year, might mean you would be willing to aid us.”

  Kaedin the Bold took a deep breath and said, “I would very much appreciate your assistance, Curvenal, but if you cannot come, or do not wish to anger the duke, do not worry. You have taught me well! I shall myself lead the defense of Karke against both the duke and the lord of Arundel.”

  At one time Tristan would have been very interested in all of this: the alliances, the loyalties, the wounded honor leading to retribution. The castles of Karke and Arundel had once been names he knew, although he had never seen them, for Rual had educated him as future lord of Parmenie, even though he had not realized at the time that that was what Rual was doing, and such an education required knowing at least something of the politics of Bretagne.

  But now it all seemed rather meaningless, an exercise without a real point, because none of it involved Isolde.

  Except, he told himself, that might be exactly what he needed. If he took part in this war, then he would not constantly be thinking of their last kiss, and of her unwillingness to leave Cornwall with him.

  “I shall direct your defense myself,” he burst out. “Curvenal, do not quarrel with the duke unnecessarily, as my own father did to his sorrow. Kaedin, I do not doubt your honor and desire to fight for your home, but you need someone who has already led successful battles to assure victory. Let me help you, and I will make sure you receive all the glory.”

  They all turned to stare at him. “Tristan,” said Curvenal, “I salute your courage, but Bretagne is no longer your home. What will King Mark say if you are killed in Breton wars?”

  But Cornwall was no longer his home either. “King Mark likes having a warrior for his heir,” said Tristan, which was at least partially true. “I was born and raised here, and I killed the last duke in retribution for attacking his liege man—my father. I will not allow the new duke to get away with doing the same thing.”

  Curvenal would have said something else, but Kaedin burst out, “I heard about your battle with the duke! And wasn’t it you who killed the unconquerable champion of Eire? Father, we must take him back to Karke with us!”

  Isolde Fair Hands smiled widely. “A hero! A hero to save Karke! But just in case he can’t do it single-handed, Curvenal, could you send us some knights as well?”

  IV

  And so the next day Tristan rode off with the lord of Karke and his children, as well as two dozen knights of Parmenie. He and Lord Jovelin were already discussing Karke’s readiness for a siege. The castle had a deep well, but it sounded to him as though it would need more food supplies. Jovelin’s bannermen had been notified they might be called on to fight for their lord, but Jovelin did not have as clear an idea as Tristan would have liked of how many would actually answer that call, or what weapons and men they would bring.

  Planning for the defense of Karke, he thought, had certainly distracted him from his great sorrows. Sometimes he did not think about either Isolde or Rual for fifteen minutes together.

  When they discussed strategy, Lord Jovelin took the lead, as was right for the lord of the castle, in spite of his protestations that his days as a war leader were long past. Both of his children also participated in deciding what they would do.

  Kaedin of course was always part of the discussions. Tristan thought he recognized himself in the young man: recently knighted, convinced of his fighting ability, looking forward with eager anticipation to a real battle. It had only been a few years since he had been like that himself, even though it now seemed a lifetime—back before he had met Isolde the Blonde.

  But he was surprised that Isolde Fair Hands was just as eager to help plan for a siege. She rode astride like a man, rather than sidesaddle like a lady, and was not shy to share in a joke or state her opinion. And yet there was nothing coarse or awkward about her, just an enthusiasm and readiness to join in whatever was happening that was very like her brother’s.

  She was nothing like Isolde the Blonde, except for their names.

  When they came over a rise and saw the castle of Karke, rising sharply on a high hill before them, Lord Jovelin and Kaedin broke into song: not one Tristan had heard before, but one that sounded like a lay in honor of their land. He found himself thinking that he would have to learn that song, work out the harp accompaniment, and teach it to Queen Isolde.

  Isolde Fair Hands, for once, did not join in the action, but
let her father and brother sing without her. “Do you not enjoy singing, my lady?” Tristan asked politely.

  She laughed, teeth flashing white. “I do, but people always ask me not to! Or, in my brother’s case, order me not to. I don’t know why he feels he can order me around,” she added good-naturedly. “He may be the heir, but I am two years older and in fact taught him how to read when we were children. But in this case, Lord Tristan, I fear he may be correct.”

  They reached the castle with but ten days until the lord of Arundel had threatened to claim it for his own. It was a far older and larger castle than Parmenie, built of black stones over the generations, with two great halls from different eras, chambers positioned awkwardly from the point of view of either hall, and numerous towers, both round and square. Rooms, halls, and courtyards were mingled together in a mix through which Jovelin and his children moved without hesitation but which constantly confused Tristan. On one side its massive gates faced a river, crossed by a drawbridge, and behind the gates the castle rapidly ascended its hill, until at its highest point the walls overlooked a sheer drop of over a hundred feet. Tristan thought he understood why the lord of Arundel was eager to take it for his own.

  They had decided that it would be hopeless to try to meet their enemies in open battle; the duke was certain to accompany the man to whom he had given Karke, and his armies would far outnumber anything Lord Jovelin could assemble. Tristan thought to himself that he had been able to defeat the old duke only because he had caught him when he was not expecting an attack and had just a small body of knights with him. In retrospect, it had been madness to attack him; Rual had, as always, been right.

  Their chief hope was to let their enemies besiege the castle and to outwait them. Any trees and bushes near the castle that might shelter attackers were cut down. The bannermen were summoned, to come with weapons and food to last six months. Many came, but also many villagers arrived from the surrounding countryside, pulling carts with their belongings, fearing that their houses would be burned if the besiegers could not immediately gain what they wanted.