Ashes of Heaven

by C. Dale Brittain

  “Please say that you will help me!” Isolde cried. “You have always been dear to me, since we were little girls together. Help me, or otherwise I shall perish from the effects of the cursed potion!”

  “The effects of the potion must have worn off years ago,” said Brangein mercilessly. “If passion rules you still, it is because you encourage it to do so. And if I am so dear to you, then why did you try to have me killed?”

  “Dear Brangein, that was so long ago! And I told you at the time, it was all the fault of those wicked squires—the same wicked squires who extorted money from Mark just last month.”

  “You should thank all the saints of Eire that they did not tell Mark the real story. Ah, Isolde, I loved you as a girl, but I should have known better than to love you as a queen, for you have caused nothing but misery for me—you and your lover Tristan, most despicable of men!”

  Isolde gasped and put a hand to her lips. “You distress me so! Do not speak like that of the man most precious to my heart!”

  “I shall speak the truth for once, and I do not care how much it distresses you!” Her voice was raised, and the men working on the pavilions looked toward the women, although they could not make out the words. “I should have known better than to allow myself to be drawn into your schemes again after you nearly had me murdered, but I have known enough always to hate Tristan.”

  “Hate Tristan!” The queen’s eyes were wide and frightened.

  “Of course I hate him! Because he is your husband’s nephew and heir I always sought to be polite to him, but you must know me ill not to have noticed. You hated him once yourself, or have you forgotten? He killed Morold, and it is a bitter shame to me that I kept you from slaying him in revenge.” Brangein’s eyes blazed, and her chest rose and fell. “Tristan twice came to Eire in disguise, and everything he ever told us has been a lie. Do you imagine he loves you? Then why did he flee from Mark’s wrath and leave you to face him alone? By now he has doubtless forgotten you and found some other woman, betraying you with her as the two of you long betrayed the king.”

  Isolde tried to interrupt, but Brangein rushed on, unheeding, all the words she had never dared say before coming out together.

  “I have excellent reason to hate him, even aside from what he did to Morold and to you. Because of him, I had to leave the court that had been my home, and your mother who had been like a mother to me, and I had to follow you to Cornwall, where I am treated like nothing more than your servant. Because of Tristan and his scheming, I was forced to lose my maidenhead. You and he together utterly dishonored me in making me a partner in your adultery. The only man who you ought to consider ‘most precious’ to your heart is your husband, the man whom Tristan ought to revere and serve as his uncle and lord, and instead you have shamed him and made him a figure of mockery in his own court!”

  “I understand at last,” said Isolde, her voice low in contrast to Brangein’s. “You are jealous, for you love Mark yourself!”

  Brangein, who had been pale with anger, went even whiter. “My own feelings have nothing to do with it. You and your lover have behaved most dishonorably, and I shall never again help you conceal your wickedness.”

  She stormed off, back toward the castle, leaving Isolde looking thoughtfully after her.

  II

  Kaedin’s hand closed on Tristan’s shoulder. “Come with me.”

  Tristan looked up, surprised. “You are back from your ride?”

  “Isolde is changing her clothes. Come, before she returns.”

  The young man’s face was drawn and white. Tristan, wondering, excused himself from the castellan, relieved not to have to hear more about a siege from thirty years ago, and followed Kaedin up the dark and narrow stairs to the top of the tallest tower.

  They were alone except for the sea birds. The sky was overcast and the wind chill; Tristan wished he had brought his cloak.

  Kaedin spoke without preamble. “You have grossly dishonored my sister.”

  Tristan blinked. “What has she told you?”

  “She told me enough. She has tried to keep it from me, but I can see what happened. You have refused to lie with her because you have another sweetheart.”

  “No, no!” Tristan protested. Inwardly he was wondering desperately how he was going to explain this, but he could not let his desperation show.

  “You married Isolde, in words only,” said Kaedin grimly, “because you wanted a castle of your own, and you thought if you couldn’t inherit Cornwall then Karke might do. How long until you planned for my sister and me to have a little accident?”

  “Kaedin, I have never thought to harm either you or Isolde! I swear it on Christ’s blood!”

  Kaedin grunted but did not answer.

  Tristan took a deep breath. “It is true, as you seem to have learned, that I have not yet taken her maidenhead, but that is because of my old battle wound. It is in my groin, and when it becomes inflamed, as it does too often, it leaves me incapable of love. I explained all this to Isolde, even showed her the scar, and she understood even if you do not. And, Kaedin, I must say, it is most unseemly for you to inquire into the secrets of your sister’s marriage bed.”

  Kaedin’s expression remained hard. “This ‘old battle wound,’ I notice, did not keep you from challenging the lord of Arundel and has not kept you from riding or from running upstairs two at a time. And I also notice you have not denied your other sweetheart. Why insult my sister by marrying her when you love another?”

  The thought flashed through Tristan’s mind that this was an excellent question—one he had asked himself. “No, no!” he cried again. “I have no sweetheart. I hope to make your sister truly my wife as soon as the pain of my wound subsides somewhat.”

  “Then how do you explain the cameo ring you gave her? Isn’t it a token from your sweetheart? Isolde may have thought you obtained it for her, but you were already wearing it when you first met us.”

  “I swear before God, it was my mother’s ring!” Tristan insisted. “She died when I was born, and my foster-mother gave it to me in memory of her. You know my dear Florete, ask her if you do not believe me! I never gave that ring to any woman until I gave it to Isolde Fair Hands. May the Son of the Maid strike me down if I speak falsely!”

  Kaedin frowned, then gave a short, reluctant nod. “Well, maybe the ring does appear rather old-fashioned. Maybe it was your mother’s. But if you have no sweetheart to whom you are pledged, then why reject your own wife?”

  Before Tristan could answer, there were rapid footsteps on the stairs, and Isolde Fair Hands burst out onto the tower roof.

  “Kaedin!” she cried. “What are you doing?” Kaedin gave a guilty start. “I told you not to say anything to him!” She whirled toward Tristan. “Forgive me, sweet husband! I never meant to let him know. And I told him it was none of his affair!”

  Tristan spread his hands. “Kaedin is just very protective of you. If you were my sister, I would be equally concerned for your honor.” He stopped. This was not coming out the way he intended—he was suggesting that his wife was like a sister to him. “Do not blame him, but come downstairs with me, that you and I may have a glass of wine together.”

  She glared at Kaedin but came and slipped her arm through Tristan’s. A gull crying overhead seemed to be mocking him. No more excuses, he thought. Tonight he would have to bed her properly.

  Conflicting desires and self-loathing had kept him from making Isolde Fair Hands truly his on their wedding night. But that evening when she lay down beside him, dressed only in her shift, in the curtained bed in the castle’s best guest chamber, he did not roll away from her as he had every other night. Instead he put his arms around her and drew her toward him. “Sweet Isolde, sweet wife,” he murmured, “I regret so much having given you sorrow, having shamed you before your brother.”

  “It was my fault, Tristan,” she said. Her voice was cool, her body stiff. “I should have kept your secrets better. Think no more of it.”

 
Is this what his longing for Isolde the Blonde had led to, being hated by the woman to whom he was married?

  A lovely and spirited woman who would be delighted to go anywhere he wanted, who would not prefer some royal throne to his affection, and who would not divide her love between him and someone else.

  He began to kiss her, her cheeks, her eyes, her lips, first very gently and then with more and more passion. This, he thought, was the Isolde he ought to love, not Isolde the queen. She gave a little sound of surprise, then whispered, “Dearest Tristan, your wound—is it troubling you less?”

  “Much less,” he murmured. “Or perhaps I should say that your beauty is such that it makes me forget any pain but the pain of being apart from you.”

  She took hold of him, a bit awkwardly but enthusiastically, and kissed him back. Her inexperience and eagerness reminded him forcefully of his days with Isolde the Blonde on the ship coming from Eire, and the desire that had long eluded him in his marriage bed swept over him. He pulled off her shift, the blood coursing hot through him. As he laid himself on top of her and her arms closed around him, he seemed to be embracing both Isoldes. He tried to be gentle, but when her thighs opened for him he could no longer control himself and crushed her in his arms as he thrust into her with a cry of joy.

  In a moment he rolled off her and held her tenderly to him, kissing her all over her face. “I hope I have not hurt you, dearest Isolde,” he murmured. “I have yearned for this moment since the day of our marriage.”

  “Sweet Tristan,” she said a bit breathlessly, “teach me what I can do to make sure that your old wound never bothers you again!”

  As they drifted off to sleep in each other’s arms, he felt sure that he had banished all thoughts of the Isolde who had once been the queen of his heart.

  That idea lasted through the autumn and winter but not into spring.

  Tristan, Isolde, and Kaedin all attended the duke’s Easter court. When they returned to Karke a message was waiting for Tristan, folded and sealed with wax, the parchment somewhat stained and creased. “It was sent here for you from Parmenie,” said Lord Jovelin, “but I believe it arrived there from Cornwall.”

  Cornwall! How long ago had it been sent? Could it be from Mark, either asking for his return or else ordering him never again to cross the channel? What news did it bring of Queen Isolde? He found his hands shaking as he broke the seal.

  It was from the queen—he recognized her handwriting even before he could stop his hands from shaking long enough to read it. It was very short.

  “Please tell me that you are well and that you have not forgotten the ship—the Cave—the orchard.” There was no signature; there was no need for one.

  “Is it bad news?” said Isolde Fair Hands at his shoulder.

  “No, no, it is just a missive from King Mark, chiding me for not having written lately.” Tristan forced himself to sound cheery. “I realize I have not even told him I am married, by far my most important news!”

  She looked over his shoulder. “The ship—the Cave—the orchard?”

  “A reference to Tintagel’s coat of arms,” Tristan lied. “It is right by the sea, hence the ship, and there is a famous cave in the cliffs below the castle, where once a wizard was supposed to have been imprisoned by enchantment. In the autumn the orchards of Tintagel bear delicious apples that are sought after, all over the great British isle.”

  He heard himself telling these preposterous stories and felt vile. His whole marriage was nothing but a series of deceptions. He had never told his wife that it was her name alone that attracted him to her in the first place; he had created the fictitious pain from his old wound to explain his conduct in bed; and now he was denying what Isolde the Blonde sought to remind him of: the times that their love had been most passionate.

  “Then you should write the king back immediately,” said Isolde Fair Hands. “Come, I will help you. He doesn’t mention the queen,” she added thoughtfully, frowning at the queen’s letter Tristan had just told her was from Mark. “Shouldn’t she have had her confinement? I hope nothing went wrong.”

  “No, no, her confinement must still be two months away,” said Tristan, remembering that his story had been that he had left Cornwall so that Mark and Isolde’s baby should be born without a potentially threatening rival heir in the castle. But he had left Cornwall nearly a year ago, so the imagined child should have been born by now. If he was going to be nothing but a lying trickster, he needed at least to remember what story he had told. “I am sure Mark would have mentioned it if there was any problem,” he added hastily.

  Isolde Fair Hands frowned but did not question the timing. She brought Tristan parchment, pen, ink, and sealing wax. When he just stared at them gloomily, she said, “Come, if you cannot find the words, I shall dictate.”

  In despair but not knowing what else to do, he wrote at her direction. “To Mark, glorious king of Cornwall, greetings.”

  “His chiding letter is short to the point of rudeness,” commented Isolde, “but you need to be especially polite in response. After all, he has reason to be angry with you if you promised to write and never did! He must have heard about the war in which you took part and be worried about you.”

  “I helped defend the castle of Karke when it was besieged by the duke of Bretagne,” Tristan continued the letter, “and all turned out well.” He refused to follow his wife’s suggestion and put in anything boasting of his own part in the successful end to the siege. “And now, most wonderful news, I am married to the lord of Karke’s beautiful and noble daughter.”

  “Shall we say that we will come to Cornwall soon, so that I may be introduced to the king and queen?” asked Isolde, smiling at the description of herself as beautiful and noble.

  “Better not to say anything about visiting Cornwall until after the royal heir is born,” Tristan replied. He stared at the words he had just written, imagining the queen reading them, and knowing they would be to her like a knife to the heart. She had never been true to him, but that did not mean he was justified in being untrue to her.

  “Besides,” said Isolde Fair Hands with a small smile, “it is possible that soon I will not want to travel far.”

  Tristan looked quickly toward her and then away, aghast. In his years with Isolde the Blonde he had never gotten her with child, and it was as though he had forgotten that that was the normal result of love-making.

  “Ask King Mark to greet the queen for you,” said Isolde Fair Hands. “It would be impolite not to mention her.”

  It would be like salt in a wound after the previous sentence, but Tristan wrote, “My beloved wife and I ask you to greet the queen for us and to give her all our wishes for happiness.” He signed it, “Tristan,” not with a monogram such as he had started to use when delivering justice in Cornwall, but with a scrawl such as he had used as a boy in Parmenie.

  “Do you have a seal for the wax?” Isolde Fair Hands asked, reading over the letter with approval.

  “No, I always just used the royal seal of Cornwall,” said Tristan dully.

  She glanced at the broken wax seal on Queen Isolde’s letter. “Mark does not seem to have used it when writing you.”

  The queen, Tristan realized, must have simply pressed a stone or shell into the wax to seal her letter. “Oh, he doesn’t use it for informal or personal notes,” he said. What was one more lie when he had already told so many?

  “We’ll seal yours with the official seal of Karke,” said Isolde Fair Hands decisively. She hurried off to get it, and when she returned Tristan had snapped the quill pen in two and was sitting with his face in his hands.

  She put her hands on his shoulders. “It is all right, Tristan,” she whispered, “you do not need to hide your true feelings from me. I already know them.”

  “You do?” he said, horror-struck. What had he said, or what rumors had she heard? If he had spoken Isolde’s name in his dreams, how had she known he did not mean her?

  “I know you well enough, sw
eet husband, to realize that you did not leave Cornwall under happy circumstances. You and Mark had quarreled, had you not?”

  When he did not answer she continued, “Yes, I thought so. And now you’re wondering when you will ever return. I know the reason you never mentioned the quarrel is that, in retrospect, it was so petty. Well, I know how a young man and an older one may not always see eye to eye, especially when the young man is the heir, wondering how many years he will have to wait for authority—yet he cannot wish the hasty death of a man he loves! Even our father, mild-mannered as he is, has sometimes had shouting matches with Kaedin. Well, even though King Mark’s letter to you was so short and rude, he did inquire after you. Your response will go far to heal the breach. In another year, or even less, the quarrel will be as if it never took place.”

  Tristan could not bear to look at her but threw his arms around her waist and hid his face in her breast.

  His “old wound” flared up again immediately. He lay awake in bed, despising himself.

  He had told Isolde the Blonde, “We are truly one, sharing one life, one death, one sorrow, and one joy.” He had thought that nothing in his life had any meaning, not family or honor or warfare or even the crown of Cornwall, except for her love. But after a few short months apart, he had discovered that he loved another woman instead.

  His wife lay pressed against his back, one arm thrown across him, her breath warm on his neck. No one would understand or appreciate why he did not embrace her in love. The queen, as soon as his letter arrived in Cornwall, would know that he had betrayed her, and she would not consider the betrayal any less because he now turned away again from his wife. Kaedin, who had learned or guessed in the fall that his sister was now truly Tristan’s wife, might soon give up his friendly attitude and start questioning him anew about his other sweetheart.

  He had married because he had hoped to forget the pain of his lost love, Isolde the Blonde. But why had he wanted to forget her? She was his eternally, whether they were apart or together. Instead of forgetting her, he had only made miserable a delightful young woman whose only mistake was admiring him.