by Anton, Shari
His smile widened. “Because today Richard made a spectacle of himself on his horse, faced George with the iron will of a true lord, and allowed his people to cheer him. ’Tis a tidbit I cannot wait to tell Gerard. Good journey, Lucinda.”
With that, Stephen strode off toward the manor, leaving her more confused than before. She would try to sort it out later, when her head didn’t hurt. Her stomach, surprisingly, no longer roiled.
Lucinda warily eyed the barge that rested partly on the bank of the Granta. ‘Twas no more than a raft of ten logs lashed together with rope. A tarp covered the sizable mound of goods piled in the center, yet left ample room around the edges for the men to push and steer the barge with long poles.
“’Tis safe,” Richard said, extending his hand to help her onto the barge. “It has not come apart from underneath us yet”
“Yet,” she said, putting her free hand in his. Her other arm was wrapped around her thrice-folded bearskin that Richard had told her to bring along as a soft mat to sit upon.
Philip, she noticed, hopped from log to log with the grace of a deer. She just hoped she wouldn’t disgrace herself by falling into the river before the barge left shore.
With her balance none too steady, her hand clutched in Richard’s, she gingerly stepped as far into the center of the barge as she could get. She bent to sit down and made a rather ungraceful landing.
“Comfortable?” Richard asked.
“I am fine, Richard. Go about your duties.”
To his credit, he did so without another comment on her nervousness or clumsiness. Not until his back was turned did she brace her hands on either side of herself and shift her backside to a better position. Just when she thought her body stable, Richard shouted for the men to shove off.
She grabbed the tarp and held tightly.
The barge glided away from the bank. On a command from Richard, the men lowered their poles into the river and set the barge in motion. The last she saw of anything familiar was Connor, growing smaller with distance, his arm raised in farewell.
She loosened her grip on the tarp. Richard plopped down beside her.
“What think you of my ship?” he asked, a wide smile on his face, the river breeze ruffling his long, blond hair.
“’Tis like no other ship on which I have sailed.”
He chuckled. “I imagine.” He tapped on a log. “’Tis sturdy, and unless we have a storm, a smooth sailing vessel.”
“And in a storm?”
“We seek the bank and shelter.”
Six men—three on each side—worked in a coordinated pattern of lowering a pole into the river at the front of the barge, walking along the side to the back, then returning to the front. Edric stood at the front, correcting where needed, keeping half an eye on Philip.
“I should call Philip,” she said. “His curiosity will soon get the better of him and he will distract Edric from his task.”
“Very little distracts Edric, not even Philip. He is good with the boy.”
Lucinda couldn’t disagree. Edric was extremely patient with her son, as was Richard. Both took care to answer his questions in a calm and thorough manner, not brushing him aside. Lately she’d learned, from Philip’s stories of his adventures each evening, that others about Collinwood had been patient with her son, too. And Philip had also made a friend of the blacksmith’s son, a year younger than himself.
Edric’s doing? Richard’s? She didn’t know, but was grateful. Her son, at least, had a chance of having a true home with Richard.
“Since coming to Collinwood,” she said, “Philip has told me that he would like to be a soldier, a tanner, a blacksmith, and a great lord. Care to wager that he will now wish to be a sailor?”
“Hmm. After sailor will come merchant or monk. He will find Ely a delight.”
“What is Ely like? A large city?”
“Nay, merely a Benedictine monastery, atop a hill rising out of the marsh. The last time I visited the place, the cathedral had just been begun. I am anxious to see how the work progresses.”
He also wished to talk to the masons about the process and costs of building a stone keep. Lucinda thought it an ambitious and costly project, but kept her opinion to herself.
“And the bishop?”
“Hervey?” Richard considered for a moment. “He is one of the few churchmen I know who deserves a bishopric. A good man with few vices.” He glanced at the mound of goods. “I believe I have managed to play into each of those vices, sinner that I am to tempt him so. I will be surprised if he does not buy most of this.”
Lucinda couldn’t imagine that Richard would have many sins to confess. Except tempting a bishop to excess. Or perhaps his liaison with her. She shoved that guilt-burdened thought aside, refusing to feel guilty of any sin for expressing her love for Richard in the only way she could.
Richard’s fingers tilted her chin up, turned her face slightly. He frowned. “You are pale. Are you still ill?”
“Nay, merely tired.”
He brushed her cheek with his knuckles. “Well then, rest if you can. ‘Twill be a long day before we stop for the night” He looked to the front of the barge, then rose. “I will rescue Edric. Mayhap Philip and I can snare some perch.”
Lucinda pushed at the tarp. Behind it were stacked sacks—of what she didn’t know—not crates. More accustomed now to the movement of the barge, she twisted around so she could lean against the sacks.
Despite her illness, sleep had come hard last night. The hurt in her head hadn’t kept Stephen’s words at bay. At sometime in the wee hours, she thought she’d finally understood what the man had meant.
She’d wondered, when first coming to Collinwood, why Richard’s people hadn’t greeted him with more enthusiasm. Now she knew that Richard hadn’t allowed them to.
Richard had changed, even in the short time since she’d known him. Stephen had noticed, too. He’d implied that Richard’s confidence had grown and that he seemed more at ease with his role as lord.
All well and good, except Stephen thought that she had something to do with that change. She didn’t. Richard’s growth into his role had been a natural one. She’d done nothing to aid or hasten it.
Lucinda closed her eyes and listened to the lap of water against the timber vessel, floating along on a peaceful current. Her last thought before falling asleep was that Stephen had been wrong.
When she again opened her eyes, the barge had slowed to nearly a stop. Several boats and barges now shared the river with them, going both directions.
The wharves of Cambridge came into view. Lucinda tossed off sleep with the blanket, and dared to rise to her feet. The bulk of Cambridge stood on the east bank. To see it, she must move around the goods. Log by log, using the tarp for hand-holds, she moved to the front of the barge.
Richard stood on the very corner, Philip snug at his side, Edric a few steps off.
Richard pointed forward. “There is where we will pay our toll. See how we line up behind this fishing vessel?”
Philip nodded.
“Look up the bank and you will see Cambridge Castle on Castle Hill. A fine, stout place it is. Built by the Conqueror to secure these lands against the northern English who resisted his kingship.”
On Richard went, pointing out a fishery and a wharf-side alehouse that served particularly good ale and victuals. Her stomach grumbled at the mention of food and drink, despite the odor wafting back from the fishing vessel.
For a long time the barge inched forward in the very busy port. Richard dug coins from the leather pouch secured to his girdle.
“Here now, Lord Richard!” a man called out. “’Tis not a hunting trip you make this time, I see.”
“Nay, not this time. We make for Ely.” The barge bumped against the pillars of the wharf. Richard handed over the coins. “How goes the Granta?”
“Reports of smooth sailing all the way to the Ouse, so I hear. Up to see the bishop?”
“Aye. Any sins you wish me to confes
s for you, Thomas?”
“Nay. I have too many to burden you with. A good voyage to you, my lord.”
The men bent hard to the poles, spiriting the barge back into the current, setting them on their way once more. The excitement over, Richard turned around and spotted her.
He nudged Philip. “Your mother has found her sea legs.”
Philip giggled.
She smiled. “Not quite, but I work at it. I have also found an appetite. I assume that food lurks under the tarp.”
Richard ruffled Philip’s hair. “Fetch your mother some of the apricots you uncovered earlier. ‘Twill keep her stomach quiet until we stop for a proper nooning.”
Philip needed no further urging to duck under the tarp.
Richard walked over to her. “There is a pretty place not far up the river. We will stop there to rest and eat, let you use your land legs again.”
She ignored his teasing about her legs.
“You have made this journey before.”
“Not all the way to Ely, but nearby. You will see why when we reach the Fens. ’Tis a glorious marsh, ripe with waterfowl. A spectacular place to hunt.”
As Richard promised, a short while later the men guided the barge to the bank, and after a short nooning they were underway again.
The farther north they traveled, the fewer trees marked the bank. Tall rushes took their place, until Lucinda had a hard time marking land from marsh. The Fens were uninhabitable to people, but provided a home to countless swans, heron, terns, geese and lapwings—and a myriad of other fowl she couldn’t begin to name.
Richard called a halt to the day at one of the lonely little islands of land that dotted the marsh.
“Is the land like this all the way from Cambridge to Ely?” she asked of Richard.
“Mostly. We will turn onto another river on the morrow, the Ouse, though you will hardly know the difference. One can walk the Granta’s bank from Collinwood to Cambridge, but not much beyond.”
Ely did appear a magical place. On the west bank of the Ouse rose a great hill. Atop it stood the monastery. Richard had taken a jar of wine and a length of fine white linen—most appropriate for an altar cloth—to the bishop.
She, Philip and Edric had spent the past two hours wandering among the merchants’ stalls and viewing the wonders of the cathedral. They now stood outside of the chapel where Saint Etheldreda, a Queen of Northumbria and founder of the community some 400 years ago, rested in peace and glory.
Lucinda listened as the bells rang the canonical hour of terce, echoing over the wildness of the marsh, calling monks—and Bishop Hervey—to prayers. Richard should be coming to fetch them shortly.
She couldn’t wait to see him simply to tell him that Philip didn’t wish to be a merchant or monk. He’d taken one look at the shrine to Saint Etheldreda and decided he wanted to be a saint. Richard would find it humorous, as she had, though she hadn’t said so to Philip.
A simple thing, a shared jest. Sharing it with Richard seemed natural, as though the jest wasn’t complete until she told it to him. As other things weren’t complete until shared with Richard.
She could tell the man almost anything without fear of being brushed aside or laughed at. He didn’t always agree with her opinions, but he never belittled them.
So why was it so hard to tell Richard that she loved him?
Because she wanted to hear the words back, and doubted that he could honestly give them to her.
Lucinda spotted him coming across the courtyard, paying more heed to the parchment in his hands than where he walked. As he neared the spot where she waited for him, he looked up, and smiled.
“Edric,” Richard called. “Have the men haul all of the goods up from the barge to the bishop’s residence. Leave only the supplies we need for the trip home.” He rolled the parchment and tucked it into his tunic. “The bishop’s men will give you further directions on the evening meal and where to bed down for the night.”
“Talked old Hervey into all of it, did you?” Edric said.
“Aye, told you I would. Be quick, Edric. I passed by the kitchens on my way over here and whatever is roasting over the pit smells like heaven.”
Edric chuckled as he took his leave.
“As for you two,” Richard told her, “I will take you over to the ladies’ court after we eat. Apparently you will have the whole place to yourselves. They do not receive many female visitors here.”
“Must I stay in the ladies’ court?” Philip asked, disgruntled. “Could I not sleep with the other soldiers?”
Lucinda crossed her arms. “Saints do not whine over where they are asked to sleep. They accept it as God’s will and are thankful for whatever shelter is provided.”
“Truly?”
“Aye, my son. Truly.”
“Oh.”
At Richard’s puzzled look, she briefly told him of Philip’s aspiration to sainthood. To his credit, Richard managed to squelch the laughter that threatened to burst through his smile.
Richard ruffled Philip’s hair. “For tonight, you must be content. Edric and the others will be far too busy to keep an eye on you. I will be with the master of the masons until well after you should be asleep. Come, let us be off to the refectory so we can eat.”
Lucinda grabbed Philip’s hand.
“You had a good day,” Lucinda commented as they walked.
He nodded. “Bishop Hervey decided that he cannot live without everything I brought. Blessed be.”
“Did you happen to tell him that you chose all of those goods with his vices in mind?”
“I did not have to. He knew the moment I began describing what goods awaited him on the barge. ’Twas the linen that caught his interest, and the wine that sealed the bargain.”
“Does he pay you enough to build your stone keep?”
“Nay, but ‘twill make a good start. I will find out more this eve when I speak with the master mason.”
“Then your business will be done here.”
“We can leave for home on the morn with a much lighter load than we came with,” he said, then turned to Philip. “So, you wish to take the path to sainthood do you? Have you considered the hardships necessary to obtain such a high place in heaven?”
Richard began describing a life of haircloth, and callused knees, and continuous prayers.
While Lucinda thought of returning home.
Home. Collinwood. Richard’s home. Philip’s home until he reached his majority, the place he would always think on fondly.
Lucinda wished it were hers, but knew it could never be. Her place at Collinwood was temporary. In less than two years she would be free of the king’s restriction that she remain with Philip, and would be expected to move on.
She glanced at Richard. At some time in the past weeks she’d stopped thinking of home as a place, but as a state of being. As peace. A peace she’d found with only one man, a man she could never call her own, to whom she would never belong.
Chapter Seventeen
Lucinda picked up a spindle and distaff, took a seat near the pile of carded wool that lay on the far side of the manor, and began the deft twirling motions that would turn the wool into yarn. In the two days since returning to Collinwood, she’d worked as hard as any of the women to turn the spring fleece into cloth.
She hadn’t asked permission, simply done it. The women had watched to see if she did the task correctly, until the oldest and best of them nodded her approval. Though none spoke to her, none had sent her away.
Spinning required little concentration, the movements ingrained and habitual. ’Twas also a task she performed well. The yarn she made would weave into smooth cloth with no nubs or weak threads.
Richard sat at a table with a wax tablet and stylus. The master mason had given Richard the costs of both stone and labor to build his keep. Wanting to get the most for his coin, Richard labored over alternate designs and reworked costs.
A commotion in the bailey drew Richard’s head up. He put down
the stylus. Before he could rise, Connor came into the manor.
“A messenger from Wilmont, my lord,” Connor said, walking hurriedly across the floor. He handed Richard a rolled parchment. “The messenger is asked to bring a reply immediately.”
Lucinda’s stomach clenched. She’d tried not to worry about George contesting Philip’s wardship, but couldn’t think of a more urgent matter. Gerard probably didn’t think her worries urgent, however. Too, word of the king’s decision would likely come by royal messenger, not Wilmont’s.
Even as she told herself that the baron’s missive had nothing to do with her or her son, was merely an important message from brother to brother, she couldn’t dismiss the foreboding feeling that the message brought ill tidings.
Richard unrolled the parchment and leafed through the pages before starting to read. A missive indeed, of four pages. Richard read without revealing any reaction, until he reached the third page. His visage skewed into a harsh scowl.
Unable to sit still anymore, Lucinda put down her work and walked over to the table. She sat across from Richard and waited impatiently for him to finish reading. When he finally did, his scowl had faded, but not vanished.
“Is there news of George?” she blurted out.
“Henry told him to return to Normandy and leave the boy with me, as I believed all along would happen.”
So great was her relief that she closed her eyes and blew out the breath she hadn’t realized she held. “Thank the Lord.”
“Aye,” he said, with an edge to his voice that brought her up short. Something else in that letter upset Richard.
“All is not well at Wilmont?”
“’Twould appear not. They seem overly concerned over what is happening here. Apparently Stephen’s tales caused some alarm.”
“I cannot say that I am surprised, Richard. Had Stephen had his way, you would have given Philip and me over to George. I imagine Gerard feels the same. Does he advise you to do so?”