Michael JECKS - Belladonna at Belstone

His view was uninterrupted from here, right down as far south as Dartmoor, the sight of which made him stop whistling, his lips still puckered, as he warily studied the grey hills, outlined with white where the snow had fallen.

Try as he might, he could not like the moors. Dartmoor was as bleak and untameable as the deserts he had seen in his youth as a Templar, when he had travelled as far as Acre in defence of the Christian kingdom of Jerusalem. To Baldwin’s mind it was uninviting; threatening, almost.

But he would not allow it to affect his mood. He had enjoyed a fast ride to Cadbury and back, hurtling along on his new courser, a strong beast with powerful shoulders and haunches which had cost him thirty marks, money he counted as well spent. There was no doubt that the stallion was more than capable of carrying him swiftly over great distances, and could serve as his destrier if need be; although at this moment Baldwin was more interested in the animal’s ability to cover his mares. His stock was low; a murrain had reduced his stables and he must breed more.

Hearing light steps behind him, he turned to see his wife, and felt once again the pride and longing which always seemed to accompany her appearance.

“My Lord,” Jeanne greeted him, signalling to the boy behind her. “I expected you in your hall, but if you would stand out here, would you care for warmed wine?“

She watched hawk-like as the boy, Wat, the cattleman’s son, carefully brought the jug to his master and filled a pot, passing it to Sir Baldwin. Only when her husband had taken the pot from the lad did Jeanne relax. Wat was far too interested in the manor’s ales for his own good. As a servant he had come to enjoy tasting all the barrels in the buttery, and from his appearance that morning, he had tried much of the strong ale the previous night. Jeanne had been sure he would spill Baldwin’s drink, but thankfully he didn’t. Blissfully unaware of his pale-faced servant, Baldwin stood at the side of the doorway, his pot steaming and filling the air with the good, wholesome scent of cloves and nutmeg, cinnamon and lemon, while he gazed proudly over his demesne.

Jeanne was content. Here, with this husband who valued peace, who detested animosity and arguments, she could live restfully. Her duties were hardly onerous: she scarcely had enough to fill her day in this well-organised estate. The manor had a fund of stolid, hardworking serfs, and in the house were servants to take charge of almost any aspect of life. Jeanne saw her responsibility as maintaining the calm efficiency of the place so as to ensure the continued tranquillity of the knight, her husband.

From the look of him, she had so far succeeded. At his wedding, Sir Baldwin had been slim-waisted, a tall man in his middle forties. He had carried himself like a swordsman, broad-shouldered and with a heavily muscled right arm, but now his form was subtly altering as Lady Jeanne regulated his kitchen and forced the cook to learn new dishes. Baldwin’s belly was thickening, his chin growing beneath the neatly trimmed, dark beard. Even the lines of suffering which had marked his forehead and had lain at either side of his mouth were fading, and the scar which ran from temple to jaw seemed less prominent.

His clothing too had undergone a transformation. Baldwin was not vain, as some of his older and threadbare tunics could testify. Most of them had been mended several times, making him look as tatty as an impoverished mercenary without a lord. These days, Jeanne was delighted to see her husband displaying the trappings of wealth. Today, for instance, his robe was fur-lined, his hat’s liripipe trailed to his shoulder, his tunic was a gorgeous blue. It was only right. Jeanne, as proud of her husband as any young wife, felt that a man with such authority should dress himself accordingly. Beforehand, few who met Baldwin would have guessed that he was the Keeper of the King’s Peace for Crediton, a man whose sway might technically have stopped short of the death penalty without a coroner’s formal approval, but who was still one of the King’s most important local representatives.

It wasn’t the power which had attracted Jeanne to him. She had been unfortunate in childhood: a gang of trailbastons had murdered her father and mother, and she had been sent to relatives in Bordeaux as an orphan. Her uncle had married her off as soon as she was old enough to a Devon knight, Sir Ralph of Liddinstone, a brutal man who had blamed her when she was unable to conceive the children he craved, and took to beating her. It had been a great relief when he caught a fever and died.

She had been anxious lest all husbands would behave in the same way. At first, when Ralph died, she was keen never to tie herself to another man – but then she met Sir Baldwin, and something about him made her review that decision.

Sir Baldwin had an essential gentleness which she found reassuring, and his actions demonstrated a respect for her and her sex which was novel; whereas most men professed a chivalrous civility towards women, Sir Baldwin was one of the few she had ever known who took pains to behave respectfully, rather than simply using expressions of admiration and courtly love to obscure some very earthy intentions.

Yet there was more to his attraction than mere politeness and kindness. He intrigued her, for in his eyes she could sometimes see a melancholy, as if a memory had triggered a sad reflection. At those times she loved him more than at any other, and had a strong maternal urge to defend him.

“How was the horse, my love?”

Baldwin finished his pot, tossed it to Wat, and caught hold of his wife, kissing her. “Magnificent! As fast as I could have wished, and steady, too.”

Jeanne pulled back from his encircling arms and peered up into his face, ignoring the sound of the pot smashing on the cobbles as Wat fumbled the catch. Baldwin’s eyes shone with an honest brilliance, and she made a moue. “I wish you would be more cautious when the tracks are iced, husband. What if you were to fall far from here, and no one knew where you were?”

“Do not fear for me, my Lady,” he grinned. “With a horse such as him I would find it difficult to lose my seat. And the important thing is, he should sire a whole generation of foals before the end of the year.”

He stooped to kiss her, and she responded, but as he embraced her, he felt her stiffen at the sound of hoofbeats. Turning, he saw a messenger riding fast towards them.

The sun shone brightly on the convent too. Lady Elizabeth could see that the night’s snow had mostly melted as she sat in the cloisters with the account rolls spread before her. She hated them. Not only was she unable to add and subtract, she found her treasurer’s scrawl difficult to decipher. Most of the time she reluctantly accepted what Margherita had written – not an ideal state of affairs, for she instinctively mistrusted the other woman.

Lady Elizabeth was seated in her favourite spot. Here, she could keep an eye on her obedientiaries and now, as the women returned from the frater and their main meal of the day, was the best time of day for her to observe her nuns and assess their mood.

Giggles and laughter were quickly stilled as they approached the cloister and saw their prioress sitting there. She noted that Moll’s death had not affected the novices much. They were young and were bound to recover more quickly; they wouldn’t appreciate the impact this death could have on the priory. Elizabeth gave a grim smile as she caught sight of Katerine: some of them wouldn’t be particularly upset to see Moll go, the prioress thought.

Katerine was a shrewd little thing. Only one-and-twenty, she was dark-haired, with pale skin, a wide mouth and tip-tilted nose that gave her an earnest, cheerful aspect – but the impression was betrayed by the eyes. Brown with green flecks, they were – a pretty combination – but there was nothing pretty about the calculation in them.