by Lara Blunte
Tameas made Isobel laugh, though she hadn't thought it possible. For months she had heard people laughing at his sallies, and she had felt enormous disdain. That prince ─ and later that king ─ had better employ a jester in the court instead of being so amusing himself, she had thought. She had not liked his wit.
Now she couldn't stop laughing at the things he said, at how he would tease everyone and get the better of them. They often dined with Agnetta and Donnet, and the four of them made a merry party, with Tameas expertly mimicking the whole council, or the whole court, well aware of all their plots, ploys and intentions.
He also spent time with her alone, and that was even sweeter. He had her read to him, correcting her, helping her improve her handwriting ─ though, since that involved him guiding her hand as she wrote, the lesson often ended with them making love.
Now she took much more pleasure in the dinners they must give to visiting nobles or ambassadors, because she could enjoy her husband's wit and at times even add to it; she could talk of things that she knew or had learned from him, and she could dance elegantly.
And when they could get away from the others and go up the stairs, they would kiss at every step.
She heard him calling her Isolt, as if breaking her name in half and making two of her, one who could be happy with him, the other who could love Harry. She knew he meant it kindly, because in the last month she had seen no unkindness from him, but it still made her sad.
"Do you not want me to?" he asked, turning to look at her.
"Yes," she smiled, "I like you to call me that..."
The next morning the pages brought a large skin rolled like a carpet to his antechamber, where she had been reading, and Tameas motioned so they would open it on the ground.
Isobel saw that it was a map and approached eagerly as they were left alone.
"Our kingdom," he smiled.
She got on her knees to look closely at the map.
"Is it all here?"
"It is,” he said, "to the best of the best cartographers' ability."
She read Stonemount and saw the symbols of hills and rocks over her homeland, and her father's castle, then Benedikt’s new lands, obtained through marriage, marked with rolling hills, green fields and rivers.
She saw how vast and rich Lathia was.
To the northeast there was Silvermarsh, that uninhabitable place that divided them from the savages, and to the east the sea that separated them from the barbaric kingdoms of Ulrich and Etheld. Beyond the seas of the fertile south, there were the foreign kingdoms that worshipped another God, and had different customs.
"All this land here," she said, pointing to the frontier between Stonemount and the Midlands, "We could make rich."
He lay down next to her, holding himself up by one elbow. "How?"
"By planting! There is hardly anyone there now, but the land was good! With the wars, they lost everything, but they could get it back."
Tameas was staring at the map, "Hoping there would not be more war..."
"Why do you think there will be?"
He reflected for a moment, then said, "War is the state of man. I think there will always be conflict. If it weren't so natural to us, there would scarcely be commandments telling us not to kill, not to steal, not to covet. It's in our nature. The only way to keep peace is through might, and that's why a king is important, he keeps stability."
"Yet you have strained against it..."
"It's not because I didn't understand the need for a king, but because I didn't want it to be me. My nature is different."
"What is your nature?"
"I wonder if I want my wife to despise me again by confessing it..."
"I won't despise you. I can't, anymore."
He shrugged, "I think that if I had not been a prince I would have learned a trade, something I could do with my hands ─ painting, perhaps, or stone carving. And I would travel over many lands with the money I made."
"People who work as you say have uncertain lives..."
"More uncertain than a king? Still, I would have liked to go beyond the seas, to deserts and frozen places..."
She smiled, "But that means you would always be alone..."
He gave her a slow smile. "I would take a woman with half a name along."
She blushed and lowered her eyes, and when she glanced up again, he was still looking at her.
"But none of it will happen," he added, "because everything you see, which has taken so much effort to do, could fall like a house of cards if I don't stay on the throne. It could all go back to the hell it was before. And then there will be no moving forward, it will just be lords and their assassins fighting other lords, always one trying to wrench something away from the other, might against might."
"You have been crowned, you have been anointed by God, all the lords have sworn loyalty..."
"That does not mean much to people who want the throne. I will tell you what means something to them: to know that I have one thousand mounted knights at my disposal, and two thousand foot soldiers, and a thousand crossbowmen. That means something."
"Who would dare to come at you?" she asked.
"Only time will show me. In the meantime, I parade my force, and I watch them."
Isobel's face was troubled. "I hope God spares us more war!" she said, forgetting that she once, for a foolish, selfish moment, had been ready for the fight to continue if it had meant that she could stay with Harry.
"I hope it, too," Tameas said, looking down at the map. "But tell me about these fields that can be made fertile again..."
She looked at the map as well, then up at him, and tilted her head. "Why don't I show them to you? Did you not say you wanted to travel?"
THE GOOD EARTH
Tameas looked at the earth in his hand and then at the land before him. The earth was soft, but the land looked barren, blackened by many battles, with clumps of new vegetation growing wildly.
He and Isobel had passed a few stone huts on their way, inhabited by emaciated people who dressed in rags. Naked children had run out to stretch their hands to them and beg for anything to eat. They had had food distributed, and coin.
"How is it possible?" he asked. "Why are they here, if the land yields them nothing?"
Isobel had taken him to the fields, had dug with a knife and found the soft soil to put in his hand, "It's good earth," she said. "Things can grow here, many more crops than grow in Stonemount. I remember passing by as a child, even attending market here. It was rich land!"
"This place was at the confluence of different interests, one of the last places to be pacified..." Tameas said, looking around.
"Yes, and people started moving away long before the wars ended, some north, some south, and the ones who remained ─ well, you saw them. For some reason they didn't leave, but they didn't have the means to put things back together."
She had shown him the meager orchards that the inhabitants of this no-man's land planted near their houses to have something to eat. There had been no animals for a long time: no horses, no pigs or chickens, no dogs even. All living things, apart from humans, must have been killed for their meat.
"God's mercy..." Tameas muttered.
Isobel said, as they kept riding. "Imagine if all this land were to be fruitful again. People would return, if there were food and work, they would build towns. They could become prosperous, just selling the things they are able to plant to Stonemount, where the earth is not half as good, and my father's people would get better and cheaper things to eat."
After riding for several more hours they saw the opposite of the poverty they had witnessed: a land well tended, with strong peasant men and women working on it.
Tameas wanted to stop and talk to the farmers, and so did Isobel. Anything that involved the husbandry of the land interested her, because she had seen people go hungry and land go wasted for a long time.
The peasants in the field had stopped working and were now looking at the couple riding toward
s them. Tameas had told their escort, which consisted of thirty men, to stay out of sight of the field.
The newly minted coins with his face on them had not yet arrived here, and by their looks the peasants had no suspicion that these were the king and queen, but they could see that they were wealthy people.
Tameas crossed his hands on the front of his saddle and said, "Good day! Who owns this land?"
The people on the ground answered readily. "It's Master Firmin."
They pointed at a robust man who had been inspecting the work on the other side of the field. He had seen the visitors arrive, and now climbed on his horse and cantered towards them, a hat shielding him from the sun.
"G'day!"
"Good day to you!" Tameas replied.
The man's eyes escaped towards Isobel: he had noticed her golden hair beneath the riding hat and veil. He also glanced at Tameas' saddle, which bore his arms. His eyes returned, wide, to Tameas' face.
"Your Grace?" he asked, almost fearfully.
Tameas made a slight motion with his hand, asking him for silence. "Will you give us some refreshment?"
The man didn't know whether to bow or not, and his head stayed halfway down. "My house is too humble..."
"Nonsense. We are very hungry, and from the look of your land, we suspect that your food will be excellent."
In fact, when they were sitting in Firmin’s kitchen the smell coming from the hearth where the farmer's flustered wife and maid were cooking was wonderful. Tameas thought he could hear his stomach growling.
Master Firmin was setting down ale, water, butter, cheese, freshly made bread and sausages on the table, begging the king and queen to eat. His wife came, not soon after, to deposit a steaming stew of lamb and peas in front of them.
Tameas asked them to sit down as he and Isobel hungrily ate what was being brought. "By heaven, it's better food than we get."
The lady of the house tittered, and Isobel nodded eagerly as she kept eating. The ride had made her very hungry.
"Will you show me what you plant here?" Tameas asked after they had rested a little.
They walked with Master Firmin through the well-tended orchard, through the pens with chickens and pigs, to the wheat fields.
"We are harvesting the wheat we planted in winter. There is the wheat we planted in spring, which will only be harvested later. We sow twice a year, so that we still have one crop, if another goes bad."
"Will you plant something now, in August?"
"Yes, Sire, turnips, on the land from which we have just harvested the wheat."
"How many oxen do you need, to plough a land as big as yours?"
"I have three oxen, and it isn't enough," the man said. "They are very expensive. When one of them dies, it's a tragedy. Before there were thieves, or the armies would take the animals and eat them, but since there has been peace..."
Tameas and Isobel had many other questions and he answered them all as they walked and looked at things. He showed them the seeds he used, the wheat already harvested, the food he gave to the animals.
They passed the wheat field, and Tameas suddenly took off his doublet, asking one of the peasants to teach him to use the scythe as he was doing. Master Firmin looked surprised and started to work as well. The men, with the king among them, went on cutting wheat under the sun as insects droned in the heat.
When Tameas looked up, he could not find Isobel, until one of the workers pointed at the women who were tying up the sheaves of wheat. There she was with them, having turned her linen handkerchief into a headscarf to keep the sun off her head and face.
She smiled and waved to him.
They worked with the peasants all afternoon. When the sun began to go down, the workers put the wheat in baskets and started to walk towards the barn. Tameas walked with them, carrying his share, with Isobel by his side. They didn't speak because they liked the silence, the noise of their feet over the ground, of the breeze moving the tall grass, of the few words people were saying to each other. Tameas took Isobel's hand and she smiled.
As it was almost evening, with deep apologies and self deprecation Master Firmin offered his house to the king. Tameas knew they could have another tent pitched, but the cool interior of the barn was to their liking. He asked the farmer to give his men supper, but ordered a stall in the barn to be prepared for him and Isobel, overcoming Firmin's protests.
"Sire, Her Grace..." Firmin said.
Tameas waved a gracious hand in the air, "Oh, she is from the north, she doesn't mind. And I shall almost certainly bear it."
Isobel could not help laughing. The women swept the stall and laid down a pile of fresh straw on the ground, and when they left the queen was sitting on the windowsill, watching the evening sky.
"I will speak to Master Firmin, to see who can go to the other place, and help them recover it. I'll give them the oxen, the horses, the seeds..."
"It will do so much good," she said simply, "to so many people..."
"The queen has willed it," he replied.
Tameas was taking his sword from his saddle and unsheathing it. He started to beat and poke the straw with it.
"What are you doing?" Isobel asked.
"Seeing if there are rats," he said. "I hate rats!"
Isobel started laughing very hard. "Aren't there plenty of them in that court of ours?"
"I am used to those. If I hear a rat here, I will climb on your lap," Tameas said, still beating the straw.
"There won't be any rats!"
"How do you know?"
She pointed to one corner, "Because there are cats!"
Tameas looked and saw three felines staring loftily at them.
He sheathed the blade again, addressing the cats, "Serve your king well, little beasts!"
Isobel considered the sword. “What did you name it?”
He leaned his long frame against the wall, holding the weapon in front of him. "Sweetheart.”
"Liar!" she smiled.
His smile was impish as he said, "The name is Hellcat!"
She threw her head back and laughed, "You haven't seen the hellcat yet!"
Isobel swiveled, swung her legs out the window and jumped, running towards the farmer's house.
Someone had brought water for Tameas, and he washed his face and chest, then put on a clean shirt and his doublet. The Midland evenings were not as warm in summer as Lathia’s.
He saw through the window that Master Firmin, his wife and children sat before a fire, and that Isobel was with them. He walked out and started moving toward them, when he heard a crystalline voice raised in song.
Not for all the gold, my dear
Not for any riches here
Not for station, not for praise
Not for castles I could raise...
Tameas saw that it was Isobel singing, as she sat with a fat baby in her arms, looking at the fire, and that their hosts were listening with pleasure. He hadn't known that she could sing so beautifully; his wife had her secrets.
He approached slowly, so that he could watch her and listen.
Not yet for your beauty's sake
Let not report make that mistake,
Not for your days, your weeks, your years
For your kind laughter, or bitter tears...
He had reached them, humming a part, and joined her in song,
It's not for your warming of my bed
Your fair body, your truths well said
It's for all these things, and none
That I love you, and you alone...
A HAPPINESS THAT WAS TOO GREAT
"It has worked!" Agnetta said to Donnet.
It was Sunday, but the king no longer trained in the mornings. Tameas had set Isobel on to Sir Eldon, to make him give up coming that one day of the week, and had succeeded. The queen had sent the old warrior packing with arms crossed and a frown, and Sir Eldon had had to admit that he had finally met his limit.
Tameas and Donnet, however, believed that he worked them harder
than ever the rest of the week to make up for it.
But now, after attending mass, they had time to themselves with no council to meet and no court to hold. Tameas and Isobel were practicing archery at some distance from Agnetta and Donnet, who reclined on cushions under a sheer canopy. The married couple's laughter carried over the meadow.
“She is better than Tameas,” Agnetta giggled. “Look how he is trying to distract her so she misses the mark…”
“She doesn’t seem to mind being distracted,” Donnet said, with a puzzled expression on his face.
"Oh, they will be kissing under the mistletoe come Christmas, for everyone to see!" Agnetta said, as she lay on her belly watching them, her chin in her hands.
"Gadzooks, what have we done?" Donnet muttered.
"Something wonderful!" Agnetta said. "Look how happy they are!"
Donnet was frowning now. It was certainly a wonderful thing that the king and queen should like each other, and that he should be happy in his marriage and find support in his wife. It was a wonderful and wholly unexpected thing, and even Donnet had changed when Tameas had, and did not find such amusement in taverns and loose maidens anymore.
However, he was acquainted with what went on in his friend's heart and knew that Tameas had never loved any woman, not even Alyon, with passion. He might just be headed that way with Isobel.
Donnet wondered about the strength of the feelings between Isobel and Harry. He suspected it would not be easy for Isobel to forget a man who had dared everything to hand her a crown of love.
"Don't look so worried!" Agnetta said, turning towards him. "What can go wrong?"
You are too young, he wanted to say, hearts are complicated things. He knew the way that Tameas loved: only a few people, and much more deeply and fiercely than anyone could guess, judging by his cool exterior. He wondered if an antidote could be found for the fondness that his friend was developing for Isobel. Tameas would know enough pain, being a king, and did not need heartache.
But he said nothing to spoil Agnetta's happiness, and smiled as Tameas and Isobel joined them under the canopy. Isobel held flowers given to her by her husband, who stopped to stick a marigold in his sister's hair and another into the top of Donnet's boot. The pages came forward to serve them delicacies and wine.