The couple smiled and passed on, moving toward the Great Hall, their servants picking up and hoisting their travel chests from a cart that had followed them.
“Yes, I’ve seen it before, and it’s always the same performance,” Stephen murmured at my side. He pressed against me, smiling slightly. “Endearing, though, isn’t it?”
“It is,” I said. “They’re charming.”
He touched my hand beneath my cloak. “I’ve never had a declaration of love in the courtyard before.”
As people milled around us, we stood rooted to the spot in what seemed like an intensely private moment.
“You know I love you, my sweet Will.” He spoke softly. I watched his Adam’s apple bob up and down. “I don’t think I could love anyone more.”
As I watched him in a daze, I wondered how I could hold back from making him mine in the days and nights to come. And there would be so many of them, if he was right, before we could enjoy each other! The unfairness of it rankled.
And yet, I was filled with a deep joy.
Chapter 6
I don’t remember much about the approach to Christmas. I remember greenery appearing around the castle chambers, wreaths of holly with its sharp leaves and red berries, and snow falling on the Great Mere while winds whipped it. In our chamber, we fought off the cold by heaping extra blankets over ourselves; but very daringly, in the month of December, we had started sleeping in the same bed—his.
It didn’t mean that we were making love. In fact, our embraces were more innocent than before, just kissing and holding each other. It was as if our mutual declaration of love had left us content just to lie in each other’s arms. I know my heart felt full when I was with him, warm and full.
But one night close to Christmas I remember waking up and seeing him staring at the ceiling. When he turned to me, his face looked bleak.
“Stephen, what’s wrong?” I said. “A bad dream?”
“No...” he whispered. There was a hopelessness in his voice that bothered me.
“You saw something?”
“Yes.”
“Please tell me, Stephen.”
But he wouldn’t. He just asked me to warm him up, so I did, with my embrace. I tried to joke with him, to make him laugh.
I had no sense of foreboding.
***
The day before Christmas, the odor of meat roasting in the kitchens was glorious. “Roast pork and goose,” Thomas said with satisfaction. We sparred in a long room in the castle, since it was too cold to do so outside. I remember flying over the boards as we feinted and parried.
“You’re heavy, but you’re light on your feet,” Thomas observed. It was true I was getting quite stocky, and taller, as was he. We matched each other well and our friendship had stayed warm and competitive, although critical at times.
Henry and the younger Simon looked in upon us often. We were called upon to keep their swords and armor bright. Now that they were full-fledged knights, it was even more important that they looked good. I saw that Henry gravitated to Thomas and Simon toward me, and Thomas accepted this without any outward sign of anger or jealousy. It was considered more important to serve the eldest son, I assumed, so perhaps that pleased him.
“My father will be here tomorrow for the feast,” Thomas declared, wiping his brow. “Will yours?”
“Sir John is not my father,” I answered coolly.
“Oh, sorry, your stepfather, then. You must introduce me if he does turn up.”
“Of course,” I said. But I didn’t really want to meet Thomas’s father.
***
Christmas day dawned. I lay in bed beside a slumbering Stephen, thinking of my mother getting ready for her day at the castle. I hoped she would come. Her appearance seemed vague to me now. I could remember her voice best.
Stephen woke reluctantly, sighing against me. “I don’t have anything for you,” he murmured.
“What, a gift? That’s all right. A kiss will do,” I told him quietly.
I could see that he liked that, and I bent to kiss him. He clutched me fiercely, drinking me in, his hands wrapped around my back.
“Mm, that was ferocious,” I murmured. “Like a wild beast.”
I didn’t get up. It was one morning where we would not be missed anywhere, I thought, and could do what we liked.
He pulled away from me, though, and began dressing. I watched him, thinking that he was just eager to get on with the day.
“You must be hungry,” I remarked.
He looked at me and there was a rueful expression in his eyes. “Will,” he said finally.
“What is it, Stephen?”
“Somebody will come in a moment. To the door.”
“No, you must be wrong about that,” I said lazily. I stayed in my nightshirt but sat up, hugging my knees to my chest. “Who would disturb us?”
“Ordinarily, no one,” he muttered. His voice was very faint as he looked at me.
I still wasn’t worried. I thought it was some mood of his. “But you didn’t see anything,” I said.
“A few days ago... I did.”
I remembered his bleak face. “What did you see?”
He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Just remember, we will meet again. I see that too. Although...” He winced slightly. “No, forget that.” His Adam’s apple bobbed. “We will meet again, my love.”
I shook my head. “This is nonsense! Neither of us is going anywhere.”
Just then there was a rap on the door. He looked frozen. He moved slowly to the door and unbolted it.
Standing there in the doorway, with a dark traveling cloak over his white robes, was Brother Michael. He looked sniffily at me in my nightshirt, then turned to Stephen. He cleared his throat.
“I have been given orders. Lady Eleanor sent for a Franciscan cleric from France, as I mentioned to you. He arrived today.”
“Yes,” Stephen said in a monotone.
“Well, she’s apparently decided that she wants a new chaplain. I can’t imagine why! But there can’t be two of us. I’m to go back to our main House at Oxford after the feast today, and I’ve asked for you to accompany me. Lady Eleanor agreed to this.”
“But you’ll be back?” I blurted out in alarm. They both looked at me, Stephen with no expression on his face, Brother Michael with a sort of sneering rage.
“No, Stephen will remain with me at Oxford. I’ve spoken to the prior about him. He’s an excellent candidate for the novitiate—to join our order—down the road. And frankly, there’s never been much to occupy him intellectually at the castle. Has there, Stephen?”
“I suppose not, Brother,” Stephen said listlessly.
“You see, the other fellow brought a clerk with him as well,” Brother Michael said to me. “That really settled it.” He smiled grimly. “So, prepare your things.”
I got up, hoping that the sight of my bare legs would make him leave. I was shaking, which embarrassed me, but I was beginning to understand.
“You can’t do this,” I said to Brother Michael.
“Will, don’t.” Stephen sounded distracted. He didn’t look fully at me. “I think that Brother Michael has made up his mind.”
The friar sighed impatiently. “Yes, of course I have. I’ve thought about it for a long time now. And whatever attachments you two obviously have,” and here his tone deepened into contemptuousness, “you can pick them up again at some time in the future.”
“When I’m a holy friar?” Stephen said. It was not said with any particular venom, more with sad irony, but just the way he said it made Brother Michael bristle, step inside, and slap him across the face.
My jaw dropped open. Without thinking, I grabbed my dagger that was lying beside the bed. I lunged.
“No!” Stephen cried. He was able to reach out and stop my arm, prevent me careening forward. I felt his strength then, his grip on my forearm that would leave a bruise.
“Leave us,” he said to Brother Michael, who stepped out s
urprisingly quickly, his footsteps echoing away down the passage.
He bolted the door. He rested his head against it for a moment.
“Oh God.” I had flung myself down on my pallet. “No. This can’t be...”
“Yes it can, Will.” Stephen was collecting his few possessions in a bag, still not looking at me. “Sometimes things change. It’s what I saw. I didn’t want to tell you.”
“You should have told me!”
My eyes were closed, tears seeping out onto the bolster. I felt brokenhearted.
“At least we had what we had.” His voice was faint, and I wondered if he was on the point of passing out. “We gave each other what we could.”
I sat up, my limbs feeling heavy and useless.
“Please get dressed,” Stephen told me. I saw his eyes now: they were heavy and full of tears. He rubbed his hand across his face. “I saved you back then. He might have snatched the dagger and killed you. He’d have enjoyed it.”
“Or I might have killed him,” I said. “I think he deserves it.”
“They’d have sent me away anyway, then. As for you, I don’t know.” He touched my arm gently. “Still, I appreciate it.”
We embraced, but it felt like he was a stranger in my arms.
“I’ve been foolish, I let him see that I cared for you,” he mumbled against me.
“What will I do without you?” I truly didn’t know, as I asked it, and the despair in my voice seemed to rattle him.
“Do what you do best. Make Simon want to keep you here. Be loyal to him. Then once you’re knighted, you might be able to come get me.”
“Or can’t you work to get back here?” I whispered.
“Scheme, you mean?” He half smiled. “It’s unlikely, once they get their claws into me at the priory, but at least I’ll be safe from the world.” He swallowed. “And Will, I promise you that I won’t forget you. But I want you to go out and live as much as you can, enjoy life as much as you can, when you serve Simon. Because that’s your natural way. You don’t have to be faithful to me. I don’t expect it.”
He caressed my lower lip. It felt impossible to kiss now, in a sensual way.
“You’re mad if you think I’d want to be with anyone else.”
He faintly smiled again. “You will be tempted. And I want you to forgive yourself when you are.”
I nodded. “You really see us together again?” I asked it with the pleading voice of a child, embarrassed by my need, but needing to know.
He put his arms around me. Now he seemed older, the mark on his pale face starting to stand out lividly.
“I love you,” I whispered.
At the same time he said quietly, “Yes. This time I see it, it’s after a great battle. Simon knights you after the battle. But you hear news and come to find me and bring me back...” He paused and sighed. “It’s exhausting to try and convey what happens. We... almost don’t make it, I fear, but I want to keep the faith that we do.”
“Yes, let’s keep the faith,” I said numbly.
“You’ve seen how strong I am,” he said. “I won’t let him take me by force now. I don’t want you to wonder about it.”
“But he must want you.”
“Of course. But he’s past it. It’s the act of a selfish old man, Will, dragging me away with him. But he’s not all-powerful, believe me.”
“I still think that if I beg young Lord Simon...” My mind was reeling, trying to think straight. “If I plead with him, couldn’t he overrule his mother’s decision?”
“You would think so, but Earl Simon doesn’t ever want to displease the friars. It’s very simple: he and his wife have sins on their conscience and they believe the holy men can intercede with prayer and save their souls. They truly believe that.”
“But they’re not holy men!” I protested in a furious whisper.
“Shh,” Stephen said, holding him against me. “You heretic.”
We just stood there, as the noise of the household rose around us with laughter and chatter. Guests were clattering in through the gate.
“I can’t bear this day,” I moaned.
“I know, my love.”
We still didn’t separate. I knew that when we stepped outside our chamber, we would be pulled apart.
I felt young and unsteady. Stephen had been able to disarm me earlier. He was so set on going, so resigned to it. I wanted to fight, but he had already determined to leave. Our passion was gone, too. It had flared out, dimmed in part by our sadness. Part of me wanted to start sobbing now—I knew I would when I was alone later—but sobbing in front of him seemed childish and undignified.
He walked away from me and pulled a scroll of parchment out of his bag, tied with a ribbon.
“Get dressed, Will,” he said quietly, his back to me.
I obeyed mechanically, taking deep breaths as I did so. There was a squeezing feeling in my chest. When I was dressed, he handed me the scroll.
“What is it?”
“Look at it later. It’s an old poem that I copied down. If you don’t know Latin well, Amaury will translate it for you.”
I nodded, letting the parchment drop onto my bed. What could I give him?
In the end I chose something I had brought with me from home. It was a little wooden trinket box with the figure of a unicorn inlaid in ivory, resting its head on a fair-haired lady’s lap. My father’s father had brought it home from Spain during one of the Crusades, I’d been told. He was the first in our family to be knighted. My mother had given it to me after my father died, after I’d saved her, as she put it, from dying of smallpox.
Stephen held it silently, weighing it in his hand.
“Will they let you keep it there?” I asked.
“Yes, but I don’t know if I ought to take it. It’s beautiful.” His voice was soft and lilting.
“Of course you should. I’ve never even had anything to put inside. One day I’ll give you a ring,” I said strangely. My voice had become shaky. “Oh, this is so wrong.” I wept into my hands for a moment. “This isn’t meant to be.”
Thomas banged on the door, shouting, “Will! My father’s here. I want you to meet him.”
“I’ll see you there, Thomas,” I called back. I did not want him to see us, and I heard his footsteps echoing away.
“Will I even get to embrace you in farewell, later, I mean?” I asked.
He shook his head gently. “Do it now.”
We embraced, our lips meeting so hard that we both gasped. He allowed the kiss to deepen, our tongues meeting and playing against each other.
“We should have done it,” I said, staring at him. “Don’t you think?”
He shook his head. “Better that we did not. I think you would have killed him, in that case.”
“Well, yes, there’s that.” We both smiled, but Stephen pushed me toward the door.
“Go, Will. I’ll see you out there, I’m sure.”
At the doorway I looked back. He stood there with the box still in his hand, his long fingers gripping it.
“Go, Will,” he repeated. And then, with a tired smile playing on his face, “I love you.”
I took one last look. I ran down the passageway out into the chaos of the Great Hall, where many important personages milled around in their finery, along with beggars expecting generous alms on this special day. The tables were set and serving dishes were starting to be heaped on them.
Thomas grabbed my arm and pulled me toward a slender, bearded fellow with sharp black eyes. He was finely dressed in velvet robes, and his stout, freckled wife sported gold rings and a necklace.
I bowed. Thomas babbled my name and a few details about me. His mother smiled at me and asked if I knew my mother was here.
“Here, now?” I asked stupidly. Thomas dashed off to get her. His parents were sipping from goblets and gave me one from the table, saying, “It’s Christmas,” and other trite things. I sipped the mulled cider and tried to forget.
“Slow down, young man,” Hug
h Despenser said jovially. “You have a long day ahead.”
Oh, how true it was, I thought as I nodded and smiled. How long the days were going to be!
My mother appeared, holding a babe in arms. She handed it to her husband, who took the child with reluctance. We regarded each other shyly.
“Dearest Will.” She leaned down and embraced me. I loved the musical quality of her voice, her soothing, familiar scent of lavender. But it seemed strange to have maternal touch after such a long time without it.
“I’ve missed you. Truly. My poor boy.”
“Good day to you, William,” her husband said. “Sir Richard de Havering has brought fair reports of your progress.”
I nodded dumbly. I caught a glimpse of Stephen out of the corner of my eye, moving across the room, away from me this time.
Away, and out of my life.
I tried to attend to my mother. “I worried about you, Madam,” I said.
“The childbirth went well, though I’ve told Sir John I will not go through it again!” she laughed. Sir John looked peeved at that.
“Your new sister is called Joan,” my mother said.
The pale, plump baby looked healthy. I smiled at her for a moment. We would have a different last name; there was only one Talbot left now.
“Will you sit with us at table?” the Despensers enquired of my mother and her husband, who nodded. I was glad; they could exchange pleasantries for hours, and no doubt they would.
The tables were all full that day. Stephen and Brother Michael were seated far away from us, far away from the fire, as if they were already being pushed out the door. I still looked at him often, trying to remember his face. I did not know if I would ever see him again, or if he had just told me that story to mollify me.
“Did you know he’s leaving?” I asked Thomas sharply. He was watching me. I sensed he knew.
“I was told,” he said.
“By whom?”
“Simon. Or was it Henry?” His tone was a little too casual.
“You’re glad, I suppose.”
“Well...” He attended to his meat, chewing thoughtfully. “I knew you’d take it hard. But honestly, it’s for the best. Squires like us aren’t friends with people like him.”
A Knight's Tale: Kenilworth Page 5