Trist moved onto her thighs and butted his head against her stomach. She stroked his soft fur, back and forth, back and forth. “Will you have babes soon, Trist? Severin told me that you had been gone, back to the forest, he believed. Did you find a mate? If so, then why did you leave her?”
He mewled, wrapping his paws around the chain of keys that hung from her waist.
“Your belly is fat again.” She paused, leaning over to gather the marten against her. “I would have been very unhappy if you had died, Trist.”
A shadow fell over her shoulder. She knew it was Severin. She was smiling even as she raised her face to him. He had come to her again. He had known she would be here in her garden.
“Have you come to take me for another walk in the forest? Will you press me against a tree and jerk up my gown as you did yesterday? Then will you lift my legs around your waist and come into me?”
He stumbled, nearly falling over her patch of blooming daisies, all of them with bright yellow centers and stark white ray flowers.
Trist batted a paw at him. He came down onto his haunches, stroking Trist’s chin.
“The forest, Hastings? You wish to do more than take a simple walk?”
She leaned closer to him. “What I truly wish to do is strip off all your clothes, press you down upon your back against the soft green moss, and mayhap then I would recite poetry to you.”
She giggled even as she leaned against him. “I would see the effect of my words upon you.”
He leaned over and kissed her. “After you’d given me your best words, Hastings, I would bring you over me and let you take me. Would you like that? It would free my hands to stroke you.”
She became very still, her eyes steady on his face. “You will stay with me, Severin?”
“Aye, I will stay with you forever. You are my wife.”
She wanted also to be his love, but that could wait, she supposed. One day he would love her. Surely he already admired her insides.
They rode again into the forest.
“Mayhap it will become a habit,” Gwent said to Beamis, shading his eyes with his hand, watching until Severin and Hastings disappeared from view.
“Aye, if the master doesn’t muck it up again. At least the beautiful wench is gone, praise the saints. Lord Severin did not keep her. He will not go to Sedgewick to see her. I know when a man has made a decision.”
“I agree with you and that pleases me as well. The boy shows good sense.”
“I thought you told me once that Hastings threatened to make his bowels watery if he deceived her.”
Gwent laughed. “I wonder if she would do that. It would bring any man low.”
Lady Moraine said some time later to Alice as she polished the laver, “We will all become well used to my dearest son and Hastings disappearing in the middle of the day.”
“Aye,” Alice said, staring over at Beamis, who was wiping the back of his hand across his mouth after drinking his ale. “I wonder if Beamis has ever disappeared in the middle of the day in his bloody life?”
At the evening meal Severin did not ask anyone to taste Hastings’s food. No one marveled at that. There was a lightness in the air, an ease in all the talk now that the Sedgewick people were gone. Now that Marjorie was no longer here to attack the mistress and seduce the master. And the child who had accused Hastings of pretending to poison herself to gain Lord Severin’s pity. Eloise wasn’t missed either.
The talk that night was about the place called Rosehaven. What would they find? It was a mystery that teased every brain.
The following Monday morning they left for Rosehaven.
29
“WILL YOU SEE MARJORIE AGAIN, SEVERIN?”
He turned to face her in their nest of blankets. It was a cool night, the air heavy with an approaching storm. It was their second night away from Oxborough. By tomorrow night, given no accidents or outlaws or rain—which was too much to ask of the gods—they would reach Canterbury. “No,” he said, reaching out to touch her belly. She was wearing her gown since she, Severin, and twelve of the men were all lying about the dying camp fire, each wrapped in blankets. She felt his hand on her bare thigh, moving up, then resting on her leg, waiting. He eased his hand onto her belly. “Lie on your back so I can rest my hand on my child.”
She turned to her back. His hand was warm, his fingers callused.
“I did not mean to ask, it just came out of my mouth.” She sighed. “I have never known such jealousy, such helplessness. It is not a nice thing. I hated the feelings, sometimes even more than I wanted to kick Marjorie.”
“I know,” he said. His hand began to rub lightly over her stomach. “It was difficult for me, Hastings. She is so beautiful, perhaps even more so now than when she was a girl. I saw her through my boy’s memories, all of them radiant with worship for her. When I left her all those years ago, I was bowed with grief. Then, suddenly, she was with me again. I was overwhelmed.
“Nay, do not pull away from me, Hastings. It is difficult for me to speak of, but I owe it to you. Because of who she was, because of who I had been, I mucked up my miracle.”
“You what? What is this? What miracle?”
He laughed quietly. “Never mind. Even in my besotted state I came to realize she was dangerous to you. Finally, I came to realize also that she had changed over the years. I swear to you that when she was young, there was no meanness in her.”
Hastings didn’t disagree. On the other hand, she would never have laid a wager on the absence of meanness in Marjorie, at any age.
“The child, Eloise. I am not certain, but I wonder if Marjorie has stoked a black fire in that child’s heart. She did lie about you.”
Hastings wanted to howl yes, Marjorie was ruining Eloise, but she kept her mouth shut. Now was not the moment. For the first time, he was speaking frankly to her. She was also very aware of Severin’s hand lying quietly in the hollow of her belly. She heard several of the men snoring. One grunted in his sleep. There was some quiet conversation on the other side of the fire, an occasional chuckle.
“What will happen, Severin?”
“What do you mean? To us, Hastings?”
“Aye, to us.”
“Why, you will bear my sons and daughters and we will build a great dynasty. Our name will pass through the centuries, known and respected.”
“That is not quite the magnificence I wished to hear about.”
He leaned down and kissed her. “No? Then I will take you to that forest and we will lie on every patch of ground where the sunlight forks through the oak trees. Nay, not now, when we are home again, home at Oxborough.”
She fell asleep with his hand resting lightly on her belly.
• • •
“That small jewel of a keep is Rosehaven,” Gwent said, pointing to the golden-stoned castle that stood at the end of a promontory that reached like a long bony finger well into the River Glin.
“Lord Brenfavern said it was owned by the Earl of Oxborough,” Severin said. “He had not yet heard of the old earl’s death. It is guarded by men-at-arms hired from all around these parts. They take turns. There has never been any trouble since all the men-at-arms perform duties here at one time or another during the year. An interesting strategy.”
“But who lives there?”
“We will find out in a very little while,” Severin said. “Lord Brenfavern didn’t know.” He kicked his warhorse in his sides.
“Carry our standard high,” Gwent called to the man carrying the Oxborough crest. “We want no surprises and no arrows raining down upon us.”
There was neither surprise nor arrows.
The guard immediately recognized the Oxborough standard and waved. They heard men shouting. Without challenge, the guard opened the double gates that led into the small outer courtyard. There were at least a dozen soldiers standing about, several horses, and an armorer pounding on a helmet. The men called out welcome, making no moves at all toward their weapons. Severin motioned Gwent and
the other men to remain in the outer courtyard.
He and Hastings rode slowly into the inner bailey. Severin came to an abrupt halt at Hastings’s gasp. There were gardens surrounding the inner walls of the keep, filled with vividly blooming flowers, so many of them, and on one wall was a trellised rosebush that spilled huge red blooms from near to the top of the wall to the ground and beyond. Beautiful stone fountains stood in the center of clusters of flowers. The sound of flowing water filled the air. Severin heard a bird twittering. There were wide walkways so that no one trampled the gardens. Hastings sniffed roses strong in the air.
“It’s a castle for a princess,” she said, flinging her arms wide. “Just look at it.”
“Your father’s mistress, Hastings. Prepare yourself for it. He has treated her very well. He created this special place just for her.”
Hastings heard the children’s shouts before she saw them. Then four girls came running from one of the gardens, all laughing, shouting, calling to each other. Two women were trying to keep up with them.
The oldest of the girls appeared to be no more than ten years old, the youngest only four or five years old. They came to a surprised halt, staring up at the man and woman.
Her father’s bastards? Hastings felt a cramp forming low in her belly. She wasn’t sure now that she should have come. Her father had obviously deceived her for years, had kept a mistress ever since he’d murdered her mother, and she had borne him all these girl children.
The oldest girl called out, “You must dismount. Mother does not like the gardens to be trampled. Did not Gergen tell you? You must leave your horses in the outer courtyard. Mother will be displeased if you harm her flowers.”
Severin nodded and dismounted. He turned and lifted Hastings down from Marella.
“What is your name?” Hastings called to the girl.
“I am Marella.”
“That is my palfrey’s name!”
The girl laughed. “Your mare is very pretty. I do not mind having her name at all. But it is also the name of William’s prized mare. It is said that when the mare died, William mourned her for a week and buried her beneath his bedchamber window.”
“That is quite true,” Hastings said. “It is also true that William’s mare had a white stocking, just like my Marella.”
“Aye, that’s what Papa said.”
The youngest girl, all blond and white and skinny, ran through her sisters to Severin. She had not one whit of fear. But the women did. They were shouting at her, but she paid them no heed.
Severin came down on his haunches. “And who are you?”
“I, my lord? I am Matilda.”
“A famous name.”
“Aye,” the little girl said, flinging her head back in a gesture that Severin recognized, not certain how he did, but knowing that he had seen that gesture before. “She was William’s wife. She was short and perhaps a bit plump, but she was brave and loyal and the most beautiful woman in Normandy. Just as I am, except I was born in England and will likely remain here. My mama says I will be short as well. Who are you, my lord?”
“I am the Earl of Oxborough. This is my wife, Hastings.”
“I wanted to be named Hastings,” another girl of about seven said, stepping forward, “but Father said it wasn’t possible, that another girl already had that name. My name is Normandy. That is where William came from.”
“You can’t be the Earl of Oxborough,” Marella said, grabbing Matilda’s hand and pulling her back. “My father is the Earl of Oxborough. You are lying.”
“Oh dear,” Hastings said.
“He will come and take you away,” Matilda said. “Papa wouldn’t let anyone harm us.”
Suddenly a woman’s voice rang through the children’s chatter. “Who are you, sir? What is going on here? Why did my men allow you to enter?”
Hastings turned slowly at the woman’s voice. Oh God, memories flooded through her mind. She remembered that voice. The woman was standing in the pure sunlight, tall and straight, no gray in her rich chestnut hair, her eyes still a vivid green. She was heavier, but still she was beautiful, her dark green wool gown falling in graceful folds to the ground.
Hastings took a step toward her. She stretched out her hand, staring, disbelieving. No, it was impossible. She wet her lips. “Mama?”
The woman froze. She moaned softly, then picked up her skirts and ran to Hastings. She grabbed her arms and shook her. “Is it possible? Is it really you, Hastings? Oh my baby, my baby! Oh God, you’re here!”
“I don’t understand this,” Gwent said, coming up to stand beside Severin.
“I don’t either,” Marella said.
“Come here, Harlette,” one of the women called to a dark-haired little girl who had sidled up to Gwent.
“Who is Harlette?” Gwent asked.
“She was William’s mother,” the little girl said. “She was the most beautiful lady in all of Normandy, before Matilda. But who is she?”
“She,” Severin said slowly, watching his wife hug the woman who was her mother, “she is my wife. She is the Countess of Oxborough.”
“But Mama is the Countess of Oxborough,” Normandy said.
“I don’t understand,” Marella said. “They are different women.”
No one would ever deny that they were mother and daughter, the resemblance was so marked.
“But you were beaten to death,” Hastings said yet again as her mother continued to cry and hug her. “Father didn’t want me to see it so I was taken away, but Dame Agnes told me you were dead. She held me when I wept. She took care of me.”
“Ah, Agnes. How I have missed her. Aye, your father had me beaten. When I fell unconscious from the lash he had me taken away. He proclaimed to all that I was dead. Actually he took me to the Healer in the forest. When I was well, he said he could not allow me to resume my place at Oxborough. He would be shamed if he allowed it, for I had dared to cuckold him. But he could not live without me, he said, and he cried, Hastings. He cried and cried, begging me to forgive him.
“I refused. I told him he was an animal. I told him I would never forgive him. He brought me here to this small keep that sits on this point into the River Glin. It was a pitiful pile of stones then. But I planted my gardens. I gave it life. I named it Rosehaven and it became a place of beauty. You will see all the roses later. I named one Hastings, after you. There has never been violence here.” Her mother paused, staring at her daughter, who was exactly her same height. “You are beautiful, Hastings, more beautiful than the rose named after you. I always knew you would grow up well. And just look at you. As each of my other daughters was born, I looked for you in her, and always there was something to remind me of you. A shrug, perhaps, or the way Marella laughs, the way Matilda flings her head back, all have something of you in them. Ah, but I have missed you, wondered about you, wondered if you ever thought of me and what you thought. Did you believe me evil? Sinful?”
Hastings shook her head. She couldn’t speak, the tears were too full in her throat.
“I begged him to let me see you, but he refused. He said that if you knew I still lived, that he still lived with me, that you would not be able to keep the secret.”
“When he was dying, I wonder why he did not tell either of us,” Severin said, rubbing his chin.
“My husband was not overly encumbered with scruples,” Hastings’s mother said. “So he is dead.”
“Aye, many months now. He made Severin his heir; we were married when he was dying. I’m sorry, Mother.”
Lady Janet said nothing for a very long time. She stared toward the small larch that grew in the middle of one of the gardens. “He wasn’t a bad man. I imagine I will miss him. I came to accept him, for I had no choice. But he loved his daughters—all of you—and he saw to it that no neighbor ever coveted Rosehaven. You say he never told you. Well, I doubt he wanted to face your recriminations on his deathbed, Hastings. Now, come into the keep. I will serve you some sweet wine and some cakes that my cook
does very well.”
The great hall of Rosehaven wasn’t very grand. It was more like a manor house, not fashioned for war or siege. The walls were all the same pink stone with beautiful thick tapestries covering them. There were only four trestle tables, each cleaner than the next. There was a small fireplace that had no black soot on it. Fresh rushes were scattered on the stone floor. They smelled strongly of rosemary. It was a keep for a princess.
After they were served wine and cakes, Lady Janet said, “Your father had the tapestries sent from Flanders.”
“They are lovely,” Hastings said. “They must keep you warm in the winter.”
“Not really, but they are lovely to look at.”
Trist poked his head out of Severin’s tunic.
Matilda gasped and pointed. Harlette shouted, “Look, Lord Severin carries an animal in his tunic.”
Hastings looked at the line of girls. “You are all my sisters,” she said, still unable to take it all in, still distrusting her own eyes. Her mother lived and she had four more daughters. She got a hold on herself. “Ah, this is Trist. He is a marten. If you are gentle and you don’t yell too loudly, he will come out and play with you.”
Trist worked his way out of Severin’s tunic and jumped to a trestle table. He eyed each of the girls. He held out his paw to Normandy. She squealed. Trist mewled and turned onto his back, waving his thick tail at them.
“What is your mother’s name?” Severin asked quietly as he watched the girls sidle nearer and nearer to Trist, who was putting on a fine entertainment for them.
“Janet. Her father was the Earl of Monmouth. He died some two years before my father supposedly had her beaten for her faithlessness.”
“Ah, so he had no fear of retribution.”
“No, my mother’s younger brother became earl, but he was too young to seek retribution. I have never seen my uncle.”
Lady Janet handed Severin another goblet of wine. “I trust you will like this one. It isn’t so sweet as the first. Naturally it comes from Normandy, though I did not realize any grapes would grow in that northerly climate.”