The Temptation (The Medieval Knights Series)

by Claudia Dain

  "I will suffer from the sin of pride if you keep on, my lord," she said.

  "It is not pride to know your worth," Hugh said. "Nor is it folly for me to give praise where it is deserved. And so," he said, taming finally to Denise, "may I say how comely you look in your green bliaut with your shining hair, Denise? You are as bright and fresh as spring grass in a meadow. I like your green bliaut very well."

  Denise glowed with pleasure and smiled up into Hugh's face with all the open adoration of a hound. Elsbeth was afraid her own look was not much different.

  Had she learned nothing from Ardeth? Would she walk the same path to the same end? She had to do better, to be better. She had to run from this temptation.

  She stayed where she was and tried to find the prayer that would lead her away from temptation.

  Had she prayed yet today? Had she sought the comfort of the chapel? She had not. What had become of her plan to show her husband her eternal devotion to prayer and chastity? It had disappeared somewhere on the cliffs beyond Warkham tower.

  "My lord!" Raymond said, hurrying into the chapel. "You are sought, or rather, your lady is. The lady Emma has begun her labor. You are required, my lady," he said.

  She had begun her labor. Elsbeth closed her eyes against the words. Bloody work was what she must now face.

  "Lady," Hugh said, "she will have need of you."

  She opened her eyes and said, "I am come. Tell her I am come."

  * * *

  "He comes," Emma said from her chamber.

  The lord of Warkham's bed was high and wide—too high for Emma, who had more comfort in sitting than in lying in any case. She sat upon a small stool, her knees spread wide, her breasts resting on the restless mound of her belly. She was naked, her skin flushed and her breathing shallow. The room was crowded with servants watching her, prepared to help yet not moving beyond the circle of their curious interest at the event of another soul coming into the world.

  "I see," Elsbeth said. "It is your time." She turned to the other women and said, "Get you gone. Marie, bring me a cord from the kitchens and a knife. Clean linen also. All others, depart. I cannot do what needs must be done with so many eyes upon me."

  They left, mumbling their discontent at having their amusement curtailed by strange notions of privacy and concentration. Emma did not seem to note who or how many were in her chamber; her mind was all on her child.

  "Have you sent for the midwife?" Elsbeth asked.

  "She is dead," Emma said. "Died not a week ago. There is no one to take her place. Except you, Elsbeth. You have done this before, have you not?"

  Aye, she had done it before, been trained in some small way in the matters of childbearing, as would befit the lady of a holding. But she was no midwife. She knew nothing beyond what all other women knew, and mayhap less. She had never borne a child and never would if her prayers were answered.

  "I have," she said to Emma, hiding all her fears in soothing calmness. That was what Emma needed and that was what she would provide. "I know what to do. Take what ease you can in that."

  "I am past ease," Emma said, huffing as Elsbeth watched the spasm work itself over her belly.

  "How often comes the pain?"

  "Often enough."

  "Can you lie down?"

  "I cannot breathe when I lie down. This babe presses against my wind, squeezing my heart."

  Marie returned with the cord and the knife. "Where is the linen?" Elsbeth asked softy.

  "The laundress has most of it, and it is still wet from washing. She is drying a length near the fire. It will come as soon as it may."

  "Is there none more?" Elsbeth asked, knowing it was she herself who had used the linen as binding.

  "Nothing clean," Marie said.

  "And is there no one in the village who knows something of midwifery?" Elsbeth whispered as another pain ran its course over Emma's distended belly. "No apprentice?"

  "Nay. She had an apprentice, but the girl ran off last spring. No one knows what became of her."

  Elsbeth straightened her spine and tossed back a length of her hair. "Then bring me wormwood and lady's mantle and set yourself to pray."

  "Aye, lady," Marie said, turning and leaving the room.

  Elsbeth almost wondered if she would see Marie again. Certainly she herself would not return to this chamber unless compelled to do so, which she had been by Emma's dire need.

  "Elsbeth?" Emma said.

  "Aye, I am here," Elsbeth said, turning to face her father's wife.

  "I am... I am afraid," Emma said, her eyes shining with terror.

  "I know," Elsbeth said. "I know."

  * * *

  The hours of Emma's labor were long. The day slid into a gray, damp twilight. Night came softly, yet nothing in the lord of Warkham's chamber was soft. Marie sat quietly in a corner on the floor, praying quietly, aiding Elsbeth when she could.

  Emma squatted, trying to push the babe from her, her arms over her head to give her more breath. The babe was not dropping, not moving down; only Emma moved, her belly heaving and roiling as her body tried to expel a babe who clutched his mother's womb with both fists. Elsbeth had given Emma a draught of wormwood for the pain. Whether it had helped she could not tell.

  "Give me something," Emma said softy, her face red with effort.

  "I have given you all I can."

  "Give me something... to stop this. I will die. Let me not die in pain."

  Elsbeth laid a wet length of linen on the back of Emma's neck and rubbed her distended belly. "I cannot. There is naught amiss. It takes much labor to bring forth a child."

  Emma laughed weakly and shook her head. "I know what is happening. I know."

  "What do you know?"

  "The child is dead."

  "Nay. Only God can see into a woman's womb. This is only a difficult labor, as most first birthings are."

  "Elsbeth," Emma said, looking into her eyes, "I watched my mother die in just such a way. Give me a way out of this pain."

  And had Elsbeth not watched her own mother, Ardeth, die in just such a way? And with her husband far from her? Elsbeth had been called from Dornei to help her mother in her labor at far Herulfmeade and she had gone to her most willingly, though not Gautier. Her father had been in London when her mother had died giving him yet another child. A woman's course was short and hard.

  "I will give you hops, it will calm you."

  Emma strained against another birth pain, her hands clutching her belly.

  "Do not leave me!" she said through the pain. "Do not leave me to die alone."

  "You will not die," Elsbeth said, but she was not certain. It had been many hours and nothing had changed. The babe did not come, though the pain did not relent. Women died in childbed every day. Every day. Every hour. "And I will not leave you."

  "My child is dead or dying and I will die," Emma said. "I know it."

  "We all die, Emma," Elsbeth said, gripping her hand and holding on to her, "but not today. You will not die today."

  "You will help me?" Emma said weakly.

  "I will help you, but not to die. I will only help you to live. You and the babe together."

  "My lord will be pleased if he has a son of me," Emma said.

  "Think of yourself now, not of him," she said. It was Gautier who had brought Emma to this pass; he did not bear thinking upon now or all thoughts would turn to curses. "Think of how strong you are."

  "I am not strong," Emma said. Her lips were white and dry, her nose pinched, her brow prominent on a face gone suddenly sharp and old. "Yet you are strong, Elsbeth. Push this child from me. Pull him out. Get him free of me."

  And so she did. She pressed and pushed against the mound of belly. She had Emma lie on her back by the fire and reached inside the wet dark of her to feel the babe and try to coax him out. She even held a lighted taper to the opening of her womb and called, "Come forth, child! Come into the light of Christ our Savior!" but the child did not come.

  "He will not c
ome," Emma said. She sounded resigned, or mayhap only tired, eternally tired from her bones to her skin, tired unto her very soul. "I will take him with me into heaven today. It is day?"

  It was night, darkest, blackest night without a moon to light anyone's way to heaven or to hell. It was not a night to die, without even a friendly light in the sky to guide a soul to heaven and to God's eternal rest. Yet would not the angels guide the way for a woman whose life was lost in the making of a child?

  "It is day," Elsbeth said, looking away from Emma to the high wind hole set into the stone. "It is a fine, bright day."

  Emma nodded and stared into the smoking fire, her head braced upon a folded fox pelt. "Have you sent for Father Godfrey? Send for him now. Cover me with my cloak. I am chilled. Strange to be so chilled on such a fine day."

  Elsbeth said nothing. She went to the door and opened it. In the narrow hall stood Hugh and Denise and Raymond, their faces solemn and gray in the flickering light of the torch.

  "Bring Father Godfrey," she said.

  Hugh nodded and took the first step away from her, Denise at his side. "Denise, go to your pallet," Elsbeth said. "This is no place for you."

  "I only wanted—" the girl said.

  "I do not care what you wanted!" Elsbeth said sharply. "Do what I say. Go."

  "Come, Denise," Hugh said. "This is wise counsel. Go to your place, as Elsbeth goes to hers. Raymond, see to it while I fetch the priest."

  He looked at her as he said it, his eyes dark and wide in the shadowy light. He understood. In that moment, she knew he understood all that she felt. Terror at her helplessness and rage that such a death was being played out before her weary eyes: That was what she felt. She should have been able to help Emma and the child. She should have been able to save them both. She should have... been in a convent where no woman was required to push a child from her, bloody and wet. And where no woman was required to watch.

  It did not bear contemplation, not now. Not when she still had so much left to do.

  She closed the door on them and turned back to her father's young wife. Her first marriage and her first child, both to end here, in this chamber, in this cold and dark chamber of stone. Emma deserved more. More than this short earthly life that ended in pain and terror.

  Elsbeth poured more wine and wormwood into Emma's cup. "Drink deeply, Emma. This will soothe your pain."

  Thank you," she said, drinking lightly of the cup and setting it beside her on the floor. "I am very tired."

  "I know you are."

  Emma felt the cloak with her hands and pulled it higher. "He will marry again."

  Elsbeth ignored the twisting in her heart and rubbed Emma's belly. The contractions had stopped. The babe was still and quiet. Even the hour was quiet. All the world was quiet in the hour of Emma's death. Even Gautier was quiet; asleep somewhere warm and dry, no doubt, while his wife labored on, naked and afraid.

  "Rest," Elsbeth said. "Give no thought to anything but rest. You have labored hard, Emma."

  "I have," she said. "I did not think it would be so hard, though God has promised us so, has He not?"

  "He has also promised that a place has been prepared for you. His house has many chambers, and one has been made especially for you. He has promised you rest and peace, and He has said there are no tears in heaven."

  Elsbeth ignored the tears sliding down her own cheeks.

  "And streets like gold," Emma said. "What must that be like?"

  "I do not know," Elsbeth said. But Emma would. Emma would know in moments. "It will be beautiful, that is sure. A place without hunger or cold or fear. No tears in heaven, Emma. Think on that. Trust in that," she said.

  Father Godfrey entered then and knelt at Emma's side. He prayed, his head bent, the sacraments in his hand, his voice a lonely echo that followed Emma into paradise.

  Chapter 13

  Gautier took the news of Emma's death with equanimity. He yawned when Hugh told him what had befallen his wife and child. He had been asleep, as Elsbeth had supposed, in the chamber given over to Hugh and Elsbeth's use. There was no good reason in his mind why a good warm bed should lie empty when Elsbeth was otherwise occupied with Emma in his own chamber.

  Whether that was the reason Hugh had been waiting through the long night in the hallway outside Emma's chamber, she never knew. Nor had she the heart to ask. She wanted to believe that he had waited and prayed out of concern and compassion. She let herself take comfort in that belief. If it was untrue, it mattered little, but believing was so very comfortable.

  'Twas because Hugh encouraged such belief to rise in her that he was so very dangerous.

  Elsbeth shook off thoughts of Hugh and set her thoughts on the funeral Mass for Emma and her unborn child. The chapel was full; all the folk of the village and tower and field had come to mourn the death of Warkham's lady. Even Gautier looked somber and saddened. He had much experience at wearing such a look; had he not looked the same at Ardeth's death a mere two years past? His oldest son had died five years past; a daughter born to him had died a year before that. He had learned to grieve very well and very efficiently.

  How long before he took another wife and plumped her with his child? How many months before another young bride came to Warkham, certain of putting her mark upon it and leaving behind only a grave? It would not be long. Her father did not wait long. He was determined to leave his mark upon the earth, and that meant leaving sons behind. Her father had five sons, a worthy number for any man, yet not enough for Gautier. Anything could overtake a child. The world was full of ills and dangers. The world was full of death.

  Her eyes had strayed to her father, her breath quickening in her anger. She forced her eyes downward and slowed her breathing. This was for Emma. Thoughts of her father had no place here.

  * * *

  Hugh stood at Elsbeth's side and could think only one thing: How would this death affect the consummation? He had blood and now death to surmount in sliding her beneath him and marking her as his; how much more tribulation could God send a man and the man still meet the task?

  More upon more. He was a man who was accustomed to trials. He could bed a fair damsel and win her heart in the doing. He was the man for that. And so he had been sent, the likeliest of all in Baldwin's court to win praise from Northern barons and their fair daughters; and so he had come upon Gautier and his daughter, Elsbeth, finding a baron hungry for gain and a daughter hungry for prayer. Well, she could pray after he bedded her, or even during, if that gave her solace, but he would have her.

  This waiting wore on him. He was eager to be home, back in the heat and sunshine of Jerusalem, back in a land where his name and his worth were as bright as the sun. Or would be, when he had accomplished his goals here.

  Win Elsbeth, win her heart and her will, and all else would follow. Honor. Renown. Power. And Baldwin's highest regard. Above all, he wanted that. He had his love, aye, but he wanted his regard, his respect. He wanted to close the gap between them, loving as equals. He would succeed. All he had to do was win Elsbeth.

  She was half won already.

  He looked down at her, at her dark and flowing hair and her proud nose and beckoning lips—a rare beauty and a woman of uncommon dignity. What woman possessed dignity? None he had ever known. Certainly it was not a trait sought in the sheltered women of the Levant; beauty, aye, and modesty, and charm, but dignity—that was for warriors and kings and emperors. Yet Elsbeth had dignity. How that a woman in a misty land surrounded by earthen huts and crumbling mortar put on dignity as her mantle?

  He liked her. 'Twas not required, but he liked her, 'Twould not matter, but it was a surprise. He had never thought to like the woman that he married.

  It was a blessing from God that she wanted a life in the abbey, but did God not know all, making all paths straight to His ends? This, surely, was His end. Hugh only wanted what God Himself must want. Yet, for all to begin, Elsbeth's courses must stop.

  When would Elsbeth's blood cease?


  * * *

  The Mass ended at its proper time, and Emma was cast before God, time having stopped for her. There was peace in such stillness. The chapel echoed the peace of God in some small measure; 'twas little wonder, Elsbeth thought, that she found such haven in prayer and with it, the joy of solitude.

  Hugh leaned close to her as Father Godfrey gave them the blessing.

  "Do you need to return to our chamber?"

  She knew well where his thoughts led his tongue. Well, God's time was perfect and she still bled, though not as heavily as before. Still, her blood was a barrier, and she smiled, secure in her defense.

  "Aye, I do," she said.

  "Then I will come with you."

  "We have trod this path before. I do not require a helper."

  "Nay, but a companion?"

  "You know better," she said.

  They progressed down the aisle, their feet mixing among the others of Warkham to make a sound like the march of the saints to the very throne of God. Would that it were so. Yet they were only the feet of the people, dirty and rough-shod, and they made their dusty way out to the open air of another gray autumn day.

  "Come, Elsbeth," he said, wrapping a long arm around her waist. "I would not leave you alone today, much has befallen that I would carry for you, if I could."

  "You cannot," she said, ignoring the feel of his hand on her waist. His hand just brushed the underside of her breast. 'Twas surely immoral to leave the church in such a manner.

  "Yet I would try," he said softy. "She was mother to you, and you—"

  "Emma was not my mother. She was scarce two years older than I."

  "—and you were by her for the whole, long length of her labor."

  "And accomplished nothing but to aid her to her death," Elsbeth said.

  "And so you need me, Elsbeth. Your very words are proof, for you did not aid her to her death; but in her death, which God ordained, you were the voice and the hand, which eased her. "'Twas mighty service and well done."

  "Well done?" she said, stopping, looking at the mud beneath her feet. Hugh's boots were a wreck, looking hardly different from the lowest serfs. This English weather would be the ruin of him. Could he not see that in returning to Jerusalem all would be well? He might even save his boots. But he understood nothing. He was a man and he spoke often, his words impressive to himself, though they were empty of meaning. "'Tis not well done to watch a woman die and her child with her. 'Tis not well done to have no more to say than 'Fare thee well' as the blood leaves her face and the stink of her bowels empties onto the floor. 'Tis not well done to—"