by Jack Whyte
UPSTAIRS, WILL STRIPPED OFF his armor and his padded tunic and leggings until he was left wearing nothing but his white lambskin apron, and then he spent what seemed like an unseemly long time bending over the bed, peering closely by the light of his single candle at the three separate piles of clothing that lay there, and fingering the fabric of the various garments. They were fine and soft and sensually wondrous, and he finally decided in favor of the greens, simply because the hue seemed somehow brighter, even in the candle’s light, and he felt an inchoate urge to wear something bright.
It was only as he lifted the delicate, square-necked undershirt of fine pale green wool, wondering if it would in fact fit him, that he noticed the washing bowl and the ewer of clean water on a narrow table or wash stand at the foot of the bed. He approached it cautiously and saw that it was flanked by a hanging towel of flocked material that he knew to be called Egyptian cotton, and a smaller, folded square of the same material, similar to one he had seen his sister Peggy use for washing her face, and a small bar of rich, wondrously scented soap that he knew had not been made in Scotland. He fingered the soap tentatively, marveling at its creamy texture, and on the spur of the moment decided to use it. He splashed water into the bowl, soaked the washing cloth, and then rubbed it with the soap, inhaling deeply as the scent of the moistened substance was released and threatened to set him reeling with the pleasure of it. Once committed, he wasted no time but washed his entire upper body, scrubbing the cloth beneath his armpits and reveling in the coldness of the water against his heated torso. He then dried himself with the rich toweling and splashed more water over his head, rubbing it into his scalp and then toweling his hair until it was almost dry, after which he combed it into some semblance of order with his clawed fingers. And afterwards, refreshed and invigorated almost beyond belief, he set about making sense of the clothing he must don.
He pulled on the softest pair of loose breeches he had ever worn, settling them almost comfortably over his lambskin apron, aware that even loose as they were, they stretched taut over his muscular thighs and calves. He tied them securely with the drawstring attached to the waist, after which he shrugged into the matching undershirt, feeling it hug him and then stretch easily across his chest. As he laced up the single fastening at the neck, he gazed down at the remaining garments on the bed beside him. There were hose, with knee ties, and he knew as soon as he looked at them that he should have put them on before pulling on the breeches, so he removed those and pulled on the pale green hose, stretching them over his bulging calves so that there was no need to tie them in place. He then donned the breeches again, snuggling them over the hose below his knees before retying them at the waist. Next he pulled on the softest pair of calf-high boots that he had ever handled. They were of supple dark green leather that he knew to be chamois, parchment thin and brushed to a silken softness, and they fitted him to perfection. Encouraged then by his success with the boots, he shrugged quickly into a loose shirt with a wide, deep vee in front, several shades darker than the square-necked undershirt that showed beneath it, and finished his transformation by donning the knee-length, open-fronted outer garment, like an open surcoat with sleeves, that he folded across his chest and tied with a long, woven belt of the same material. He had no means of seeing his reflection, but he felt more at ease and more unconfined than he could ever remember. He gathered up his clothing and armor carefully, slinging his buckled sword belt over one shoulder, and carried the heavy and ungainly pile awkwardly under one arm into the neighboring chamber, where he dropped it on the cot there, acutely aware all the while of how strangely shy and diffident he felt in his borrowed finery.
At the top of the stairs, he heard laughter from an open door nearby, at the far end of the passage, and he went and stuck his head into a well-lit chamber to find the boy Henry, propped up in bed and being spoon-fed from a bowl of soup held by one of Jessie’s women, the one called Marie. Beside her, on a chair nearer the foot of the bed, the girl Marjorie sat chattering gaily, her eyes on the bright embroidery on which she appeared to be working industriously. As Will entered, she looked up at young Henry, her eyes dancing with mirth, and added some quip that made the boy laugh, even as he caught sight of his lord and mentor. The laughter vanished quickly and he sought to push himself up farther, wincing as his shoulder tensed, but Will stopped him with an upraised hand and told him to stay where he was. The sudden quiet in the room had a strange quality, as though all three occupants had been frozen in mid-motion, the woman Marie caught with the hand that held the spoon upraised, the girl Marjorie suspended in bewildered surprise, her smile fixed in place, and young Henry himself poised as though about to fall over on one side. Will nodded cordially and greeted each of the ladies in turn, then spoke briefly to the boy, asking him how he felt and embarrassing him by asking whether he was happy with the quality of attention being paid to him.
The boy was looking well, he thought; still pale and waxen looking, with deep purplish rings under his eyes, but the eyes themselves were bright and the lad’s hair was clean and shone with health. Although he was still heavily bandaged, his injured shoulder appeared to be normally positioned, and his arms lay easily upon the bed’s surface. Will spoke for a little longer, attempting to put them all at ease, though with little success, he felt, and then he took his leave, heading resolutely down the stairs with a profound sense of relief that his squire was thriving.
TWO
Seated in front of the fire that now roared in the open grate, Jessie Randolph kept her head lowered and pretended to be engrossed in mending the piece of fabric she held on her knees, but she had to fight against the impulse to look up eagerly when Will knocked and entered.
Now, come inside, Will Sinclair, and take your proper place without stopping to question every impulse that occurs to you. In God’s name, play the man and not the monk, the champion but not the knight. Summon up that famous bravery of yours and let it strengthen you to see me as a woman and a friend and not as Threatening Woman. And when I do look up at you, God help me, let me see a change in the man to match the change in what he is wearing now.
Will stood silently just inside the threshold and stared at her, holding his breath and waiting for her to look up.
“Come and sit,” she said quietly, without looking up. “If you will be patient with me, I will be no more than a few moments in finishing what I am doing.”
He crossed silently to the chair opposite her, then stood there, feeling strangely shy and illogically awkward without the protection of his armor, but when she showed no reaction to his closeness he sat down slowly, watching her fingers at her needlework. Eventually he began to relax, lulled by her air of calm concentration, and he found himself enjoying the heat from the fire as it washed over him. She kept sewing, betraying no awareness of his presence. She was bareheaded, her hair parted straight down the middle of her bowed head and worked into two flawless plaits that were twisted into perfect spirals and pinned so that they covered her ears. In the stillness of the room, broken only by the fluttering of flames and shadows and the swift, deft movements of her busy fingers, he imagined that he could smell the scent of her, a wafting awareness of warmth and sweet-smelling cleanliness, and as he watched, moment by moment, he became aware that the stiffness and tension that had held him in suspense was bleeding out of him with each breath.
Jessie had to fight hard to keep her eyes on the sewing in her lap, but from the corner of one eye she could see his feet and ankles in their rich green boots and was aware when they crossed and uncrossed and finally rested comfortably, one flat on the floor, the other lolling sideways, resting easily on its heel. From that point onward, she could almost feel the strain easing in him, and as the awareness of that grew in her, the fiercely held joy in her burned brighter. Yet still she kept her head bent to her sewing, hoping he knew sufficiently little of needlecraft to be unaware that what she was doing there was nonsense.
Will, fortunately, knew nothing of sewing. But something strange was ha
ppening here, he knew, and he knew, too, that whatever it was, he was at ease with it, for reasons that he made no effort to define. As he gazed at Jessie’s bowed head he was dimly aware of a tiny, tenuous stirring somewhere at the back of his mind that tugged at deep-seated ideas of loyalties and conflict, but he ignored it deliberately, content for the time being to trust his instincts as he always had before, to enjoy looking at what lay before his eyes and to believe that all was as it should be.
It was only when Jessie raised her head suddenly and smiled at him that he snapped to attention, startled that he had come close to dozing off, lulled by the fire’s warmth and his feelings of well-being. He straightened guiltily, glancing about him and realizing for the first time that the two of them were alone in a comfortable firelit room, in a situation that could only be described as intimate. Embarrassed to be caught thus off-guard, and acutely ill at ease, he found himself almost glaring at his hostess.
“Where is everyone?”
Jessie merely blinked at him, her expression demure and slightly puzzled. “Everyone? Oh, you mean Tam. I told him to spend a night at leisure.”
She stood up, her sewing still clutched in one hand, and moved towards a large side table that stood against the wall to one side of the fireplace, and as he saw the way in which her clothing shifted around her he was surprised to realize that, for all his sudden discomfort, he had been unaware of her body until that moment.
Jessie, unable to see his face, was still talking, speaking to him over her shoulder as she scanned the tabletop in front of her.
“That poor man has no life of his own at all, you know. He spends far too much time with you, waiting upon your every wish and whim. And so I set him free for the night, to thank him for rescuing us today. He is probably enjoying himself now with Mungo and the others, for I am sure Hector will have left them well supplied with drink and food, if he has not joined them himself.”
Will cleared his throat, then blurted out what was in his mind. “I was not thinking of Tam, Lady Jessica. I was wondering about your … companions, your ward and your two women. Should they not be with us?”
“And why should they be here, my women?” She turned to face him, holding up her sewing in both hands, and he could not read the expression on her face or in her eyes, though she gave him no time for either. “To ensure propriety? Are you concerned for your safety here, alone with me?”
“No, that is not what I meant at all.” He threw up his hands, then let them fall to his sides and shook his head. “Of course I meant no such thing. But I have never known you be without them for so long. The child Marjorie rarely leaves your side, and the two women are ever in the background, one of them or the other if not both.”
“Things have changed here since the arrival of your young squire, and I have grown accustomed to being neglected, taking second place to his needs. He has bewitched my ward, you know. She has appointed herself his guardian, and she rules all of us like a tyrant in seeing to his every need. And so the women of this household wait upon Henry, and entertain Henry, and hover around Henry constantly—myself included, most of the time.” The fondness in her eyes removed any possible sting from the words she uttered. “So that is where everyone is … seeing to Henry, while I have supposedly been seeing to you. But I have been neglecting you, I fear.”
She turned away, set down her sewing, and removed the cloth that had covered the offerings laid out on the side table. “You must be hungry.” She waved a hand over the items on display, and he felt the saliva welling in his mouth as she continued. “This is cold venison in a wondrous crust made by Hector, and the salmon here, baked and skinned for your pleasure, was also cooked by Hector, without whom I should starve in squalor. But if neither of those please you, this dish holds roasted piglet, still hot, and there beside it, its skin, intact and succulent, coated with flour and salt and broiled to a crisp perfection that I heard Hector say would make a dead man drool.” She turned back the edges of a snowy white cloth that covered a trio of small clay serving vessels. “Cheese of our own making, sweet apples from our own trees, and fresh bread, crusty and warm from the oven. And to drink, we have the last of the shipment of wine delivered two years ago from Bordeaux, both the red and the gold.”
Will stood up, blinking, dazzled by the variety of the offerings and completely disarmed by her pleasure in his presence. He nodded slowly, then went towards the display, where she stood holding out a wooden platter for him to use.
“The pig is wonderful. I tasted some of the crackling when Hector brought it in and you were upstairs.” She was grinning, obviously greatly pleased with something, although he had no idea what it might be. He merely nodded and took the platter from her hand.
“Here. Let me cut some for you.” She rapped the brittle crust of crackling sharply with a heavy-bladed knife, shattering it into several pieces, and lifted two of them onto his platter, then cut a thick slab off the bread and loaded it with twin finger-thick slices of succulentlooking meat before chopping a bright red apple into eight segments and piling half of them beside the crackling. Still slightly overwhelmed, he waved aside her offer of anything else, then stood looking around him.
“Sit at the table there. It is set for two, with knives and spoons and salt. Which kind of wine would you prefer?”
He opted for the golden color, then moved to take a seat while she poured and brought wine to him in a magnificent stemmed glass goblet. She returned then to help herself to a wedge of the cold venison pie and another of the salmon, onto which she spooned a generous portion of clotted, creamy golden sauce that she told him was another of Hector’s secrets, made from eggs, cream, and herbs. She came and sat across from him at last and invoked a blessing on their meal before starting to eat with the appetite of a twelve-year-old boy. Watching her set about it, Will realized that he was ravenous, having eaten nothing all day other than the handful of dried oats and fruit with which he had broken his fast that morning. They ate in companionable silence, almost reverentially paying tribute to the excellence of Hector’s cooking, until both their platters were bare and their goblets empty.
When Will sat back and pushed away his platter she cocked her head, smiling at him again, and it was a measure of how much his trust in her, and in himself, had grown that he merely looked at her with mild curiosity, one eyebrow rising in a wordless query.
“It pleases me that you chose the green,” she said. “I was right, the color suits you well. And the clothes themselves might have been made for you.”
He felt his face flush, but it was with pleasure, and he managed to respond gracefully. “I am in your debt—” He caught himself before the words “my lady” could spill out, wondering what to substitute and finding himself still uneasy with using her given name. But then, before she could interject, the words came to him and he smiled with relief. “You have introduced me here, this night, to the world of ordinary, well-contented men who live their daily lives unfettered by the constant demands of duty and a rigid Rule of conduct.”
She dipped her head in a tiny gesture of acknowledgment. “Ordinary, well-contented men … I wonder if such creatures truly exist in this world of ours. Ordinariness is less ordinary than it may at first appear, and you yourself are far from ordinary … You have changed greatly, you know, since first we two met. A year ago, you would never have said such a thing, would never have thought of it. But to be truthful, I myself would not have believed, as recently as one month ago, that you and I could sit for so long together at ease like this. The grim Templar Sir William Sinclair would never have permitted it, lest he find pleasure in it.” She grinned suddenly, her eyes alight with mischief. “I am glad my friend Will came here today in his place. Will is far more … human … far less predictable and humorless.” Her grin faded as she sat straighter and glanced up at the windows high on the wall. “I have lost track of time, but I see blue sky up there, so the sun has not set, or if it has, the dusk is not yet full.” She rose to her feet. “Come, then.
If you have had your fill of eating, walk with me to the byre to check the safety of our treasure chest, for I confess I have not thought of it since your arrival, even to verify that it was undisturbed by our visitors. I will have someone clear away the food while we are gone.”
“But not the wine.”
She glanced at him in surprise, caught by the hint of levity. “No, not the wine. That we will keep. I will have the fire rebuilt, too.”
THREE
They stood together in the gathering darkness of the byre, in front of the bundles of feed that covered the chest of gold coins, eyeing the undisturbed symmetry of the pile. Outside, in the gathering dusk, the returning cattle were clattering into the cobbled yard at the back of the cowshed. The mangers in the stalls on either side of where Will and Jessie stood were filled with fresh fodder for the coming night, but the hay on the shelf that held the treasure appeared untouched.
“Is it safe enough, think you, or should we unearth it to be sure?”
Will responded with the merest shake of his head, for his thoughts were elsewhere. He and Jessie had been seen by several people inside the house and on their way here, and although no one had seemed to take any special notice of them, the nagging notion had arisen in his mind that, in being seen abroad like this, they could be suspected of improper behavior. The thought of impropriety had stirred vague feelings in him of both disloyalty and dismay, since his hostess had given him no slightest cause for concern over propriety and it seemed to him the merest thought of such a thing was demeaning to both of them. He had tried to thrust it aside, but the harder he tried, the more stubbornly the notion held, so that now his mind was filled with wonderings about what Jessie’s people might be thinking of her, spending so much time alone and unattended in the company of a man who was not related to her.
“What are you thinking about there, sir knight, with such a glowering frown upon your face?”