Anne Herries - Medieval Brides

Cecily bit the inside of her mouth so hard the metallic taste of blood burst onto her tongue. Yes, it had to be Judhael. Pray God he had not dragged Emma into this. If they were caught the Duke of Normandy would be merciless. What was it Edmund had told her? That the whole of southern England had been laid waste…

Sick with dread, she held her peace. But dread was not her only emotion. She was frustrated too—frustrated and angry. Before Edmund’s arrival, Leofwine had deferred to her, had been content to talk to her. But now that Edmund was here—even though she was lady of the Hall and Edmund had been but one of her father’s many housecarls—they were doing what men always did: talking to each other as though she, the woman, was invisible. Her father had treated her mother in like manner. As a child she had resented it every time he had done this, and despite the passing of the years her view of such behaviour had not changed.

‘Judhael.’ Edmund nodded with satisfaction, but his expression was ugly. ‘Good—it’s time we had some substance behind us. The tide will turn in our favour, Leo. This is but the beginning.’

Leofwine’s face remained closed. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

Cecily shifted, uncomfortable with the way Edmund was leading the conversation, but just then Adam strode into the hall and Edmund clamped his mouth shut. An awkward silence gripped the room.

Adam had been helping Brian Herfu with the slaughtering, and he was numb with cold. He made straight for the warmth of the hearth. Newcomers. A pregnant woman was seated to one side of the fire, cradling the baby Philip, and at the other end of the hall Cecily was standing with Edmund and a bearded Saxon. She did not look happy.

Conscious of the grim aspect he presented, with his tunic and hose begrimed with sheeps’ blood, Adam nodded briefly to the woman at the fireside. ‘The annual winter slaughter,’ he murmured.

The woman swallowed and gave a curt little nod, but her eyes widened and fastened on the bloodstains. Adam knew by the way she lost colour that she had to be thinking of Hastings. Thankful that he had at least had the forethought to wash the worst from his hands in the river, he flexed his fingers before the fire and waited for feeling to return.

‘Adam, we have guests,’ Cecily said, breaking the silence. When she started walking towards him, he left the hearth and met her halfway. He took her hand and she shuddered. ‘You’re frozen!’

‘You can’t wear gloves when killing sheep.’

‘You’ve been helping Brian?’ she asked, surprise in her tone.

‘As you observed yourself yesterday, the practice field needed clearing. Did your father not take part in the cull?’

Slowly she shook her head, quietly observing the blood on his clothes, but she did not withdraw her hand from his. Indeed, she was rubbing her thumb over the back of his hand as though she would impart some warmth to him. ‘Never. But I expect Brian was grateful, since we’re so behindhand.’ She waved at the woman at the fireside. ‘Adam, this is Evie Smith, and this…’ she led him towards the trestle ‘…is her husband, Leofwine. He is a goldsmith. They are come from Winchester and are in need of our help.’

Adam’s insides were in a trice as cold as his fingers. ‘From Winchester?’ Golde Street. Hell, he had almost forgotten about Golde Street. These must be the people she had visited. Cursing himself for letting himself be distracted by a soft body and melting blue eyes, he forced himself to listen.

As she gave him her account of what had happened to Leofwine Smith’s workshop, his mind seemed to split in two. One part of him was attending to the tale his wife was telling while the other was wondering where her loyalties lay. If it came down to a stark choice between the Saxons—‘my people’ as she constantly chose to refer to them—and himself, how would she choose?

Duke William’s plan to throw up a motte and bailey in the south west of the city was not news to him, but he had had no idea that sixty homes would have to be demolished to accomplish it. He noted the stiffness in Leofwine’s posture and found he felt some sympathy for the man. The goldsmith had pride. He resented having to fling himself on Adam’s mercy.

‘My Hall is yours, Leofwine Smith,’ he said, in his stilted English. He wound his arm about Cecily’s waist, to endorse the welcome he knew she had given. Under his arm, Cecily held herself like a block of wood. Upset that her friends had been made refugees? Pray God that is all, Adam thought, giving her a slight squeeze. Her eyes met his, and they were dark with apprehension. Suspicion twisted within him like a cold snake. No, he thought. Don’t, my princess—don’t be thinking of betrayal. But there was more, he’d swear. Something else was eating at her…

‘You did not think I’d refuse them?’ he muttered in French, for her ears alone.

‘No—no,’ she said, but her expression did not lighten.

Edmund was watching them, those thin lips curling in sardonic amusement. It was he, Adam would swear, who was at the root of Cecily’s tension. Damn the man. Left to his own devices, Adam would have had him banished from the village before he could blink. Yet, since Edmund had not actually made a move against him, he could not act—not without being the unjust boor that Cecily’s people no doubt expected him to be.

‘Leofwine has more to tell your husband—doesn’t he, Lady Wymark?’ Edmund said.

She flushed and twisted against his arm, the emphasis placed on her new title apparently discomposing her. Ruthlessly, Adam tightened his grip. ‘Yes?’

‘Tell him, Leo. Tell him about the mint.’

Adam listened as best he might while Leofwine told him—in English—of a rebel raid on the Winchester mint. Though the cold snake in his belly kept shifting—don’t, my princess, don’t betray me—he kept his comments as neutral as he could.

‘I wonder if that happened on Raoul’s watch,’ he said, grimly aware of the disturbing undercurrents flowing between Cecily and Edmund. They had not looked at each other once during Leofwine Smith’s recounting, but Edmund’s gaze was simply too innocent, and as for Cecily—her body was taut as a bowstring. It was hard to believe this was the same girl who had woken in his arms that morning, warm and soft, a relaxed and loving bundle.

At that moment Edmund’s gaze met his, and he stretched his lips into that sneering smile that Adam was coming to loathe. Adam did not trust Edmund further than he could throw him. But what concerned him was rather this: would he ever be able to trust his wife?

Supper was over, the boards were cleared, and Adam alone remained in his seat at the head of the table, for the moment replete and disinclined to move. After so many months in Duke William’s train, living like a nomad, hungry more than half the time, it was bliss to contemplate bed with a full stomach. But being gifted Fulford had more than one benefit, and eating well was not, in his view, the most important one. He glanced down the table, towards another of the benefits of Fulford. Cecily, his wife—his loyal wife. Or so he prayed.

As was becoming her habit after each meal, she was sitting on the other side of the fire with Gudrun in the Saxon sleeping area. The newborn was in her lap. It seemed everyone had taken to that side of the Hall. Hoping that was not significant, Adam sipped his wine. The pregnant woman sat near Cecily, talking to her husband. Even Richard had found a stool near the women. Idly strumming his lute, his fellow knight was rolling his eyes at Matty while he sang a Norman love song. Doubtless the girl couldn’t understand a word, but that didn’t stop her blushes.

Adam’s gaze returned to his wife and traced her slight figure as she rocked the baby to sleep. Her features were soft in the fireglow. As ever, that tendril of hair had escaped its braid and gleamed on her breast, a curl of gold. Rock, rock, rock, as she murmured gently to the baby. That baby, he thought. That baby—the way she cossets him. Philip.