Sweet Enchantress

by Parris Afton Bonds

  PARRIS

  AFTON

  BONDS

  SWEET * ENCHANTRESS

  Published by Paradise Publishing

  Copyright 2013 by Parris Afton, Inc.

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover artwork by Coragraphic Covers

  This is a work of fiction and a product of the author’s imagination. No part of this novel may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away.

  BONUS

  First chapter of my novel THE MAIDENHEAD is at the end of SWEET ENCHANTRESS

  “In the heaven of Indra, there is said to be a network of pearls, so arranged that if you look at one you see all the others reflected in it. The same way each object in the world is not merely itself but involves every other object and, in fact, is everything else.”

  Sir Charles Eliot

  CHAPTER I

  A sorceress?

  A seductress?

  The beggar stared hard at Montlimoux's chatelaine. Her skin was unbecoming, browned by the sun like that of a peasant woman’s. Dirt smeared one sunbaked cheek. Her fingernails were encrusted with the earth in which she dug. By his troth, seduction by a wharf-side wench would be more pleasurable!

  From his viewpoint just beneath the vaulted inner ward, the chatelaine was within a lance span of his hands. He watched while she tended the courtyard garden. The pungent odor of sage, mint, and other herbs that had been winter-dead floated up from the soil tilled by her spade.

  Corps Dieu, if she wasn't talking to herself. Her tone was clear, as resonant as a bell's virgin ring, a quality that doubtless was not attributable to her maidenhood, though she wore her hair loose as became a maiden.

  A brown wren lit on a nearby stone bench, and she exclaimed in a mirthful voice, "Ah, my friend, you have come to greet me.”

  She raised her hand, one finger outstretched, he supposed for the bird to perch, but it took flight in a wild flapping of wings. A small cry of disappointment escaped her.

  A sorceress? The beggar’s lips pulled into a thin smile. The chatelaine was no sorceress— or seductress, God knows—but merely a simple-minded drudge!

  Mayhap, the farrier had made a mistake when directing him to the Countess Dominique de Bar. But, no, she was the only woman in this part of the inner ward. His gaze moved past her to search the domestic buildings and maze of hedge holly, possible places for concealment on a moonless night. He had noted earlier that no soldiers guarded the chateau's battlements. More telling, the chateau’s iron portcullis was rusted.

  Had no jealous army ever challenged its barbicans? Or loyal paladins charged out to defend those twin gatehouses? Yet the graceful chateau had been admirably constructed so that at one time it could have been made impregnable, if need be.

  Admittedly, the once rich and cultured province of Languedoc had been known for the prominent role its women played. The delicacy and refinement of Languedoc was said to have been the creation of a society dominated by women.

  Nevertheless, he scarcely believed that a woman, much less this madwoman, could rule an entire county singlehandedly. Surely, some man exercised authority in this far-flung principality between the province of Languedoc and the Duchy of Aquitaine. Surely, a garrison existed to defend the chateau and its glistening white town of Montlimoux, capital of the county of the same name.

  Yet he had seen neither mercenaries nor local knights as he had climbed the cobbled road that corkscrewed upward through the hilltop town.

  His mind’s eye recalled that river-ribboned village with its lime washed, closely built guild shops and its steeply gabled homes with over-hanging bay windows. Its countryside had once been a veritable symbol of stability. Thousands of acres of well-tended vineyards, dense woods, and allodial land had girdled it.

  Casual questioning of the inhabitants had revealed that holy wars, the Albigensian Crusade in particular, had decimated it half a century before, but signs of the land's potential were evident. Silver mining in the area had long been profitable and had long been responsible for tales of Albigensian treasures.

  Incredibly, this strategically located county was obviously undefended.

  Although he had made no revealing movement, the chatelaine sprang to her feet and whirled to face him. For a prolonged moment, she studied him as intently as he had her. “Remove your hood.”

  More than her imperiousness, her direct gaze bothered him. It was merely her eyes, he reassured himself. Their bold, hazel color was too pale against her dark skin. Mayhap, she had Saracen blood to explain her duskiness.

  Just then February’s brisk wind curveted through her hair. He had judged it a nondescript brown color, but now it came to life in reddish flame. Like the fires of hell, maybe, but most certainly not the tresses of a Saracen offspring.

  He blinked and the devilish red hue of her hair was gone. He would do well to remember that this land's strange sunlight played tricks on the eyesight. Languedoc lacked the pale, gentle sunlight and fine mists of England.

  For a moment, he was tempted to seize her. He curbed his impatience. Slowly, he lowered the filthy hood, as ragged as his cloak. “God speed, my lady.” His native Anglo-Norman French was not the language of Languedoc, which was closer to Latin than Castilian and northern French whose vocabulary was partly Teutonic. But his fluency in Latin aided him.

  Beneath arrow-straight brows, her gaze inspected him as closely as a burgher's wife does bedclothing for fleas. Apparently, he proved unsatisfactory, because her eyes narrowed in a frown.

  While he realized that she was by no means a hag, the severity of the strong nose, the square jaw, the broad forehead all bespoke a. vexing intelligence that detracted from ideal comeliness. She might not be insane after all, but neither was she a seductress. Not unless she changed into one by use of her reputed sorcery.

  “You do not mean well, villain,” she said at last.

  He blinked again. Had she read his thoughts? No, he did not believe in such foolery. "I seek only food, my lady Countess. I am hungry. By the law of your land I am permitted to enter and solicit leftovers from your board, am I not?”

  "You do not mean well,” she repeated. "However, the chatelaine of Montlimoux never turns away a soul seeking succor. We do not dine until the vesper bells. Until then you may assist in the stables. After you have eaten, you will be given alms. Then you will go on your way.”

  Old incidents exploded in his mind. Of his subservience. Of noblemen's condescension. And noblewomen's. His jaws tensed, and he strove to tamp down the battering memories.

  At that moment, a Goliath of a man loomed before him, seeming to appear as if summoned by magic, though no doubt his presence had been concealed by the shadows of nearby statuary. The giant wore the white robe with the red cross of the banned Knights Templar. He was old, well into his late fifties. His complexion was ravaged, and he lacked brows and lashes. "I will conduct him there; my lady.”

  The beggar recovered himself and touched his forelock in a servile gesture that galled him because it came so readily, even after all these years. Rather than follow the ox-like Knight Templar, he strode alongside him, easily keeping pace with the man’s lengthy strides. He himself was by no means of average height, was at least a head above most men. And while he was solid of sinew and bone, this giant would have thrashed him had their ages been more equal.

  "You have traveled far?” the Knight Templar inquired.

  “Aye.”

  "The lord to whom you owe allegiance?”

  "My Lord God Almighty,” he muttered.

  The Knight Templar grinned down at him, then nodded meaningfully at his hood. “
As the peasant says, ‘The cowl does not the monk make.'”

  The vagrant was struck by the gravelly timbre of the giant’s voice and by his grin. A startlingly pleasant one in the visage of a gargoyle. "I earn my bread not by the cross but by the coin.”

  The Templar grinned again, his sparkling eyes like black peppercorns. "As the peasant says, 'A gambler’s purse has no latch.' Ahh, here is our smithy. Bertrand will set your hands to earning honest coins.”

  The blacksmith was short with pipe-stemmed legs and powerful shoulders. "It will not be coins but manure your hands are working with, knave,” he chuckled.

  He put him to work with a tow-headed stable lad, Hugh, who was mute. While the vagrant swept the stables clean of manure, he pried the smithy with questions about Montlimoux. "Who is the Templar? A relative of the Countess de Bar?”

  "Her steward.” Bertrand swung his hammer with a mighty blow to the red-hot steel he forged. "The Templar has leprosy, you know.”

  The beggar halted to stare at the smithy's soot-blackened face. "And the Knight walks freely among the villagers?”

  Steam from the forge hissed and hazed. "Baldwyn Rainbaut’s leprosy does not seem to be passed along.”

  “Oh?” He began spreading fresh rushes Hugh had fetched, noting that the horses in their stalls were blood stock. "Why is that – why is his leprosy not contagious?”

  "Our chatelaine, Countess Dominique.” The man fanned the red coals' flames with leather bellows. “She is fey. She has the healing hands.”

  He prompted Bertrand by commenting, "I am told they say other things about her. That her chateau walls are the color of a faded rose because she had the mortar mixed with the blood of beasts.”

  The smithy shrugged and fastened the glowing lump he held in his tongs on an anvil mounted on an oak stump. "They say a lot of things about Montlimoux.”

  The vagrant was interested in specifics, but Hugh passed him the fodder bag, and he had to wait until he had fed the horses before trying to elicit any more information.

  Finished with that task, he nodded toward Hugh, trudging toward the last stall with a bucket of water. "The mute stable boy there, the leprous Knight Templar—it would appear the chateau is a castle of outcasts.”

  The smith revealed missing teeth. "Myself included.” He pulled on the laces of his leather tunic and almost proudly displayed the fleurs-de-lis that branded his sweat- sheened chest. "For poaching.”

  "At Montlimoux?”

  "No, in Champagne.” With iron tongs, he picked up the glowing andiron he had newly fashioned and held it aloft, examining it this way and that. "A fetching piece of work, eh?”

  "You forge no armor, no helmets, no swords?”

  From the town below, the vesper bells tolled the evening hour of six. Bertrand laid aside his work with a simple reply. "No need for such.”

  Along with him and Hugh, the beggar made his way across the bailey to the keep's great hall. Within, his practiced eye assessed all that it encountered. No rushes here, impregnated with grease from food and droppings from favorite dogs. The high-ceilinged room’s flagstones were clean enough to reflect the candlelight. The candles were of beeswax, not the smoky, acrid tallow of rush torches.

  But no tapestries heavy with gold and silver warmed the walls. Nor did ornamented chests and buffets display silver wine cups, brass ecuelles or finely glazed pottery. The chatelaine's coffers reflected the impoverished state of the countryside. Compared to this small, seignural court, King Edward's royal one at Windsor, however bleak, coarse and militaristic, was lavish.

  At least, entertainment was provided. From the galleries above, minstrels entertained on viéle, lute, and tabor. The lords and ladies of the chateau, numbering a dozen or so that evening, were already seated at one side of a long trestle table on a dais. He noted that the wash-worn table cloth, which doubled as the communal napkin, looked to be of the finest woven linen. Obviously, the county had once been a source of wealth.

  His gaze located among the damosels the chatelaine seated in the center. By now he knew she was four and twenty and unmarried. She appeared to have washed, and her hair was, at least, restrained at her nape in a net seeded with pearls. She had donned fresh clothing, a long-sleeved silk tunic under a faded velvet surcoat embroidered with gold thread, now barely discernible.

  The inevitable lap dog of every noblewoman was missing. Instead, perched on the back of her heavy chair was a falcon—sleek, hooded, and murderous.

  A damoiseau, wearing her heraldic badge of the unicorn, hovered near her. The servant was waiting to carve for her a civet of hare. She ignored her food. Her full concentration was focused on the young man at her left. He wore a peacock-plumed beaver with a turned- up brim. Beneath it were lively eyes and a masterful jaw.

  The beggar studied the young man more closely. His hands, strong yet graceful, made gestures, as if describing something to the countess. Though the beggar strained to over-hear the animated conversation, the clatter of wooden platters and tinware along with the noise of guests chattering and the music of a plucked lute masked their intimate talk.

  Was this man the power behind the chatelaine? Or the old Knight Templar, Baldwyn Rainbaut, on her right?

  "Your turn,” Bertrand prompted.

  Hugh nudged him, and he recollected himself, moving forward to the copper basin on a low hutch. Fine soap, such as he rarely had the opportunity to use, lay at the side of the basin and pitcher. It was not the caliber of Windsor’s Castilian soap, but neither was it that of meat fat and wood ash. Perfumed with herbs, it had an olive oil base that suggested a lot of preparation had gone into its making.

  He left off his inventorying and washed his hands and face, then went to find an empty place on one of the benches.

  The food being served was leftovers from the course just finished by the nobility and better than the thin gruel served at the Earl of Pembroke’s board. Comradely conversation was exchanged by those gathered at the lower tables. Next to the beggar, a woman smiled coyly—or tried to. Her upper lip had been cut off. The fate of a harlot, most likely chased from the dark corners of a castle, doubtlessly to the regret of its sex-starved grooms and archers.

  Repelled, he took up the communal tin cup, still greasy from the lips of the man to his other side, the chandler, and swallowed a draught. After he replaced the cup between them, his gaze sought the chatelaine again.

  As he had been told, she was heralded as the patroness of the troubadours, and at the moment one was composing flowery verses in praise of her. However, she was not heeding the coxcomb's impassioned voice. She was staring straight into his own eyes. Her greenish gaze was spellbinding. He did not stir. It was as if she were stealing away his breath.

  Laughing, Dominique de Bar plucked off Denys's beaver cap and ruffled his shock of jaw-length golden hair. "I have been wanting to do that all evening, Denys Bontemps! And now that we are alone, I may.”

  He grabbed her wrist and kissed its underside. "And I have been wanting to do this all evening.”

  She saw the longing gaze cast by Jacotte, a farm girl who had hired out as one of her ladies-in-waiting, and quickly tugged her hand away. "Enough. Iolande, tell the dolt to mind his manners.”

  The old Jewess, domestic steward of Montlimoux, sniffed her disapproval. She replaced in a chest the second of a two-volume, gilt-bound Tristan, which her mistress had been reading in the library. "You two were never mindful children.”

  Dominique's childhood ally had matched her bravado and outstripped even her impetuousness. Ignoring Iolande’s remark, she said, "Show me your sketches, Denys. Tis impatient I am to begin the construction.”

  She watched as his hands, powerful from years of stone cutting, smoothed out the scrolled parchments. "This is the shell of the hospital.”

  "But the vault is so high.”

  "The higher the vault the more space for the windows you plan.”

  "Yes, we need windows. Scores of them.” Her eyes marveled at the cross-ribbing, the pie
rs and flying buttresses. Denys was a master mason with a knowledge so esoteric that it remained a professional secret. "Your skill, Denys, is superb.” She glanced from the sketches to him. "You are much in demand in Paris and Troyes and Avignon. Yet you return here. I am grateful, friend.” She adored him, had always thought him a bold, bright and beautiful creation.

  "'Tis you who sent me away to Montpellier.” Bantering reproach and yearning, always the yearning, colored his voice.

  Denys Bontemps was baseborn, but it was not his low birth that had stood in the way of marriage with him. Courtly love might be based on grace, but married love was based on duty—and her duty was to Montlimoux first and foremost. Why marry when her life was already full, if not with happiness, then with a harmony that she had made her own?

  "And you came back from the university there an architect and engineer of renown. For this you owe me a hospital, after which I shall release you to the French king and his grandiose plans for cathedrals.”

  "But 'tis the Great Architect I work for, Dominique.”

  "You and I both agree on . . .” She paused and smiled. Denys's thoughts were already moving ahead, making preparations for the next phase of construction.

  “A large amount of traveling will be necessary, at first,” he was saying. "I expect to acquire our marble from Carrera. The Venetians have the best glassmakers. And, Dominque, I shall need the largest windlass—”

  She laughed. "Enough, dolt, or you will surely bankrupt our meager coffers! As it is I charge you while on your travels to go to Cologne and purchase manuscripts.” Her library contained already a large number ranging from philosophy and law to travel and medicine. "I shall give you a list of—”

  “My lady Dominique?” Baldwyn stood in the library’s arched doorway. Just behind him loomed the shadowy and imposing figure of the beggar. “'Tis the alms you promised.”

  The same uneasiness she had felt earlier in the garden nudged the recesses of her mind, but she refused to identify its origin. She did not wish to ruin this evening with Denys. She only wanted the beggar gone at once. “Give him a handful of deniers from the strongbox.”