The Wolf Hunt

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The Wolf Hunt Page 36

by Gillian Bradshaw


  “God prosper you, cousin!” he called cheerfully. “Greetings, my lady! Duke Hoel is still in the lodge with the duchess. She has indigestion and doesn’t want to come hunting today. It might be best if you stayed with her, Lady Eline: I understand you shouldn’t tire yourself.”

  Eline smiled; she hadn’t been sure that a daylong hunt would be good for her, either, and she had no objection to staying comfortably in the lodge with the duchess. Alain thanked Tiher for the suggestion and escorted Eline toward the lodge, leaving his servants to hold his horse.

  Hoel was in the main hall of the lodge, standing by the unlit fire and talking to Havoise, who was cossetting her indigestion on a chair in the shade. Marie, who was attending the duchess, saw the newcomers enter the room, glance about, and then start toward the duke, smiling.

  In the next instant, everything changed. Eline stopped short, halfway across the room, and went white. Alain stopped beside her with an oath. Havoise stared in surprise, and Hoel began to turn to see what she was staring at. Isengrim, dark and deadly, had slipped from the duke’s side and was walking purposefully toward the pair, head low and hackles raised, his eyes gleaming with triumph.

  Eline screamed, a horrendous long wail of terror that turned every head in the room and forced silence even on the crowd outside. Alain reached for his sword. The wolf dashed the last few paces across the floor and leapt upon him.

  The next moment, Alain was rolling screaming on the rushes, with Isengrim’s teeth locked in his sword hand, and Eline shrieking, “Someone kill it, kill it, kill it!” helplessly over him. None of the onlookers stirred: everyone was paralyzed with shock. The wolf released Alain’s mangled hand and made another lunge, this time toward his throat. Screaming, Alain caught the wolf’s head with his left hand, and stopped the reddened jaws inches from his neck. Isengrim snarled horribly and drove himself on, his paws flailing at Alain’s body as he forced all his weight down onto that trembling left hand — and the hand bent, and the jaws drew nearer, the fangs dripping blood and saliva onto Alain’s face. Eline, still shrieking, seized the wolf’s collar with both hands and tried to haul him off. The great dark head whipped round, and for a moment the eyes, passionate with human hatred, stared directly into her own. She let go of the collar and struck the animal’s face with her hand, shouting now in wordless loathing and rejection. Isengrim turned from Alain toward her, and her shout shrilled into anguish. The wolf’s jaws closed on her face.

  “Isengrim!” bellowed Hoel in horror, and at last charged across to his pet, grabbed the wolf’s collar, and dragged him off. Eline collapsed half-sitting beside Alain, her face a mask of blood. Her hands waved helplessly to fend off empty air, and she gave short high panting shrieks of pure horror.

  Alain was on his knees, drawing his sword left-handed. “Monster!” he shouted. “I’ll kill you this time!” Isengrim snarled and lunged toward him again, almost tearing free of the duke’s grasp.

  “Put that down!” yelled Hoel. “De Fougères, see to your wife! Somebody fetch the doctor for the lady! Isengrim! Bad, bad, bad!” He dragged the wolf toward the fireplace, picked up his silver-handled riding whip from his chair, and began to beat the wolf savagely. Isengrim crouched unresisting under the blows, but his eyes were still fixed on Alain with a desperate and lethal desire.

  To Marie, still standing stunned beside the fireplace, the scene suddenly seemed to freeze: Eline lying on the floor; Alain standing over her but looking in hatred toward the wolf; and the wolf, under the blows of Hoel’s riding crop, staring back. And in that frozen instant everything fell into place, and she could see it plainly. She made a choked sound of protest and steadied herself with one hand against the wall.

  “My lord!” shouted Alain. “Look what the creature’s done to my wife! Let me kill it!”

  “lt’s my wolf,” said Hoel. “And he’s never hurt anyone before. Isengrim! What got into you? Have you gone mad?”

  People were running in from outside: Tiher appeared, and Bishop Quiriac. Havoise was kneeling beside Eline now, pressing a cloth against her face to stop the bleeding and looking wildly around for someone to help her.

  “Mother of God!” exclaimed the bishop. “Did your wolf do that, Hoel? I thought you said he was tame!”

  “He is!” said Hoel, throwing the riding crop down in disgust. “He’s never done it before.”

  “It’s an evil creature!” yelled Alain. “A stinking, evil, savage monster! Look what it’s done to my wife! And to me!” He held up his torn and dripping sword hand for everyone to see. “My wife is with child: this may kill the baby before it’s even born. My lord, I beg you, kill the creature! Kill it now, before it harms anyone else!”

  Hoel looked down at the wolf — his good Breton wolf, the only tame wolf in the world, the bravest beast he’d ever owned. No sane animal would attack humans with such frenzy. Alain was right: such an animal was not safe to keep, and would have to be destroyed.

  “My lord,” said Marie faintly, “I think I understand why Isengrim attacked these two.”

  Hoel looked up again, sharp with hope. “What’s that, Marie?” he asked eagerly.

  “My lord,” she said, her voice unsteady, “the most important thing now is to see to Lady Eline. She needs a doctor, and she needs to be taken out of this crowd to somewhere quieter. Her husband should stay with her to calm her. We can discuss what to do with the wolf afterward.”

  “Very good, Marie!” Duchess Havoise exclaimed approvingly. “The lady needs help. Lord Alain, will you please put that sword away and come see to your wife?”

  Alain looked at Eline, then shoved the sword back in its sheath and knelt to put his arms around her, clumsily and onehanded. She gave another gasp, flung hers around him, and began to cry. More helpers rushed up, the duke’s doctor appeared, and Eline was carried out of the hall, clinging to her husband, into a quiet room where she could rest and be tended.

  The bright hunting crowd stood about murmuring, shaking their heads over the wolf, who still crouched bloody-muzzled at Hoel’s feet. The duke’s forester pushed his way through them. “Are you going hunting now, my lord?” he asked respectfully. “Or do you want to cancel the hunt, after what’s happened?”

  Hoel looked at his brother. “You go, if you like, Quiriac,” he said. “It’s a shame to waste all the preparations.”

  “You’re not coming?” asked the bishop.

  “I haven’t the heart. I’ve never prized any beast the way I’ve prized Isengrim. I wish you could have seen him fight the Count of Bayeux’s wolfhounds: it would have done you good.”

  “More good than seeing this sight, I’m sure,” said Quiriac, kicking at a spot of blood on the rushes. “You’re going to have to have the beast destroyed, Hoel. And, to tell the truth, though I’m sorry that you’ll lose your pet, I’m sorrier for that lovely lady. Well, if you haven’t the heart to hunt the hart, I do. Come follow the horns if you change your mind.”

  The bishop left with the forester to find the stag of sixteen tines. Most of the crowd, murmuring to one another, left with him. Tiher started to go, then looked at Marie and turned back.

  Havoise returned from seeing to Eline. “She’s quiet now,” she reported. “The doctor says she’ll be scarred for life, but there’s no reason to suppose she’ll lose the baby, thank God.”

  “Thank God indeed,” said Hoel gravely. “What Isengrim did is dreadful enough without that. Well, Marie? Why did he attack Lady Eline?”

  “My lord,” she said — and swallowed, for her voice was still unsteady with shock. “I think we’d better discuss this in private. Can we use your own chamber?”

  XVI

  Like all the ducal residences, Treffendel was crowded, but the duke’s own chamber was the largest and finest room available, and the most private. It was above the Great Hall, and, like his chambers in Rennes, consisted of a small bedroom and a larger dressing room. They went up to the dressing room now: Hoel, Havoise, Marie, and, at Marie’s request, Tiher. Hoel cl
ipped the leash on Isengrim’s collar and pulled the wolf along as well. When they reached the room, he tied the animal to an iron candle stand in a corner. Isengrim lay down with his head on his forelegs, watching silently as the four humans settled themselves, Hoel and Havoise in the two chairs, Tiher on top of the clothes chest, and Marie, standing, in front of the empty iron fireplace.

  Isengrim’s muzzle was still wet with blood. Its taste filled his mouth, and the sweet, thick smell drowned every other scent in the room. It was Eline’s blood, mostly. He had not meant to attack Eline. He had meant to kill Alain. His failure was double, and he knew that the next thing to expect was death. Hoel would lead him out into the forest, pat him on the head, and then draw his sword and position it carefully to catch the heart and kill instantly. He had already decided to pretend he didn’t understand what the duke was doing. He had begged for mercy before, but he would not do so again. The life he had was not worth preserving-though he still wished he could have killed Alain. It was bitter to die like an animal, without having exacted any payment from those who had made him one. But no — he hadn’t meant to exact anything from Eline.

  He looked at Marie with tender regret. She stood with her back to the fireplace, as straight and tense as though she were braced to enter an icy river. He did not see what she could possibly urge on his behalf, but he was grateful to her for trying. It was something to have won her affection, even though he’d missed the prize of her love.

  Marie stood so straight because she was afraid that otherwise they would all see her trembling. He mouth was dry, though she was sweating, and she swallowed repeatedly, trying to loosen the tightness in her throat.

  “Well, Marie?” said Hoel. “You know why Isengrim acted so wickedly?”

  “My lord and lady,” Marie began formally, “I hope you won’t be offended if I talk first about something else. It is connected, though it may not seem so. Tiher and I had meant to talk to you today about the very people Isengrim attacked.”

  Hoel glanced quickly at Tiher, who gave a small, tight nod of agreement. “Have they been having trouble at Talensac?” asked the duke.

  “They have,” said Tiher. “But that’s not what we wanted to talk about.”

  Slowly and heavily he spelled out the case against his cousin. Hoel listened, impatiently at first, still worrying about his wolf, but gradually, as he understood the implications, with close, unhappy, frowning attention.

  “This is a very bad business,” he said when Tiher had almost finished. “I should have thought of it before.”

  “Everyone knew Tiarnán liked to go hunting alone,” said Havoise quietly. “Everyone knows that’s a dangerous thing to do. And everyone knew that fellow Éon had sworn to kill him. We were all quite worried about the robber at the time, though I haven’t heard a word of him for months.”

  “I heard a rumor recently that he died last April,” said the duke. “Certainly the last time he was reported to have robbed anyone was in March. But you’re right; any suspicion of murder fell on him, and not on those nearer who had more motive.”

  Tiher squared his shoulders. The problem of whether his cousin was a murderer might have tormented him, but here, before the duke, he was free to play the part he had always played and defend Alain once more. “My lord, I believe that Alain is innocent,” he declared firmly. “Or, at least, innocent of murder. Certainly, he loved Eline, and he may have been to see her when he told us he was going to St. Malo — but that doesn’t mean that Lord Tiarnán’s death wasn’t an accident. My lord, you know my cousin: he’s always been more lover than fighter. Most likely he simply visited the lady and told her of his undying devotion, and she fluttered and wept and committed herself to nothing. I agree that you must question him to clear the matter up, but I firmly believe he never murdered Lord Tiarnán.”

  “And you, Marie?” asked Havoise. “Tiher defends his cousin. Are you taking the part of the accuser?”

  “I don’t believe that Alain murdered Tiarnán,” Marie replied, and was surprised at her own voice’s steadiness in the face of what she must say next. “But I’ve just come to believe that Tiarnán is still alive.”

  She glanced round at the three surprised faces, and let her eyes slip momentarily to the fourth face, that of the wolf, who watched her with dark intensity from the corner. She looked away from him quickly, afraid now of what she might find in those black-rimmed eyes. She locked her hands together behind her back to keep them still.

  “Tiarnán had a secret,” she went on quietly. “I ask you to remember that, and to consider what it could have been, because it’s the heart of the whole matter. Kenmarcoc, who was his bailiff, says that his master used to disappear alone into the forest for three or four days at a time, never admitting any company, and leaving behind even his dog. What he did there was so frightening that when his wife learned of it, she fled to her sister at Iffendic and treated him afterward with horror. She told me that he was a worse monster than the robber he saved me from, and that she was glad she was free of him. But his confessor, who knew his secret, was never sure whether or not it was sin, and reproached himself before me for his own refusal to condemn it. He said that he was partial and could not judge.”

  She took a deep breath. Already she had broken confidences on every side, and dragged things out into the light which were meant for shadowed privacy. She was bound to go on. Everything would have to be laid bare to judgment. How the duke would judge she could not be sure; she could only hope that his heart’s sympathies would match her own. “My lord and lady,” she said, lifting her head higher, “another thing the hermit told me was that he knew the first owner of your wolf Isengrim. He said the wolf had been lost through theft and treachery, that it was providential that he had come to you and you had shown him mercy. I could not understand why the fact that you hadn’t killed a wolf should bring the hermit so much joy, until now.

  “I think I have told you how, when I was being brought to Rennes for the first time, I met a wolf in the forest, and then met Éon. I dreamed that Éon was a werewolf, and afterward when I heard the story about him I was afraid that my dream was true. But when Éon first saw Tiarnán, he recognized him and shouted ‘Bisclavret!’ — speaking in Breton, which at the time I didn’t understand. When I remembered it afterward, I thought he must have been threatening Tiarnán, saying, ‘I am a werewolf, and if you attack me, I will make you suffer!’ But I could see at the time, and can see now, that he was calling Tiarnán a werewolf. I had heard, as we all have, that wolves are evil, savage creatures, and I transferred the name of werewolf from the man who’d come to help me to the man who attacked. I was wrong. Éon was no werewolf, and Tiarnán is.”

  The three human faces were incredulous, only their respect for her and the sweeping force of her exposition keeping them silent. She did not dare look at the wolf. She had betrayed his secret now. She could only pray that her listeners, knowing the wolf as well as the man, would not hate him even when they believed.

  “Think!” she urged instead. “A man disappears, hunting in the forest, and a wolf appears in the main street of Talensac. A marvelously crafty wolf, as you’ve said many times, my lord, far more intelligent than any dog. More intelligent, in fact, than an animal has any right to be. How would a hunted wolf have known how to beg you for mercy? What did Count Ranulf say after Isengrim beat his wolfhounds? ‘It’s a witch!’ he said. ‘It doesn’t fight like any natural creature.’ And we all know it was true. Isengrim fought like a man, with a man’s courage, a man’s cunning, and a man’s willingness to spare the vanquished. My lord, you saw just now in your own hall how well Isengrim understands that he must disable a man’s sword before he can kill him. How would a wolf know that? There’s more, my lord! The lymer Mirre, Tiarnán’s dog, barked in greeting when she saw Isengrim and fawned on him. He welcomed her, except when she came into heat, when he drove her off: What animal would behave like that? And Isengrim has shown himself perfectly gentle with all people, except two. Wh
en he saw Alain after he was first captured, he lunged at him. When he saw the same man again just now, coming into your hall with Lady Eline, he attacked them both. And the enmity between those two and the wolf was on both sides. When we came here in March, we all heard how bitterly Alain had pursued his quarry, and how many rewards he and his wife had offered, and traps they’d had set for it. And what did Alain say in the hall just now? ‘Monster!’ he said. ‘I’ll kill you this time!’”

  Tiher suddenly stirred. “He said at Talensac the other night that if the people there knew what their machtiern really was, they wouldn’t want him back.”

  “When I told him last March that we’d taken his wolf alive,” said Hoel slowly, “he went gray and I thought he would be sick. He said that he’d drunk bad water. But he begged me to kill my wolf, begged me again when he saw the wolf — and begged me again just now.”

  Hoel turned and looked at the wolf, which lay motionless, head on paws. The bright animal eyes now seemed so full of humanity that it shocked him that he had been blind before, that he had not guessed that this was not a natural creature. “Tiarnán!” he called, and they all saw how the animal’s head lifted and ears flicked forward in response. Then the ears flattened and the head dropped to the forepaws, and the wolf looked back at them blankly — afraid, Marie realized now, afraid, and quite horribly ashamed.

  “My God,” whispered Hoel. “Marie, you’re right.”

  “All I’ve said is guesses,” she replied. “But there are two people in this house who know.”

  “And they will tell us,” said Hoel grimly. He went to the door and roared for the servants to bring in Lord Alain and Lady Eline.

 

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