FireSong

by Roberta Gellis

  Fenice looked up inquiringly. “If you do not wish to make the sentences, my lord, you may tell me in round terms what you wish to say, and I will set it all in order. Then you may read it over and tell me what I have writ amiss, and I will correct it. It will take a little longer—”

  “You cannot sit there in the sun,” Aubery said, not having heard a word she said but having finally made the connection between the facts that she was perspiring and he did not feel particularly warm. “It is too warm for you. Come to this side.”

  “You are so very kind, my lord,” Fenice replied, “but will this table not crowd you?”

  “There is plenty of room if you sit in that corner and I sit in this. Besides, I cannot think when I stare at a blank sheet of parchment.”

  Fenice obediently changed position, and Aubery, who had risen to move the table and desk for her, another example of consideration that made her give him so warm a glance that it was fortunate he was looking at the placement of the furniture rather than at her, was so pleased with his ingenious reason for not needing to face her that he now began to dictate his letter without delay. When it was finished, Fenice handed the sheet to him and asked him to read it over and point out the words that were not written as he had pronounced them. Somewhat to his surprise there were not many, and he asked why.

  “I remembered,” Fenice said, “how Lady Alys writes, which is different from Papa’s writing.”

  She scraped out the few words that needed correction. The changes in spelling made her remember what Lady Alys had said about the difference in English and Provence customs. Since the marriage had been accepted in principle, it did not seem that her future husband was concerned, but she thought it would do no harm to mention her knowledge of English. Any little thing to her credit might just overbalance the disadvantage of her birth, if that had to be disclosed.

  “I can even write a little in English,” she boasted, as she handed over the sheet for a final examination.

  This was so surprising a statement that Aubery was distracted from the subtle perfume wafted in his direction by the breeze coming in the window. He inquired about the unlikely circumstance, and Fenice told him about Arnald. “Enid and I were sorry for him. We thought at first that there was something wrong with his tongue. One of the weaving women has a dreadful hole at the top of her mouth, and she cannot speak right—” Fenice stopped abruptly. The woman had sat near her mother.

  Aubery was leaning back in his comer, his eyes half closed. He was full of food and a little tired from a restless night, his long ride, and his battle with the four renegades. While he concentrated on the information he had to transmit to the Earl of Hereford, and read over what Fenice had written, the sexual urgency that disturbed him so much had diminished. Needing to pay attention to what she said had also inured him somewhat to the music of Fenice’s voice. He was still stirred by her presence, but only enough to make him aware that her proximity was pleasant. That did not set off his feelings of guilt because there were many women whose company he enjoyed. The little story she had told, idle chatter such as a woman makes to amuse a man who has nothing to do, was soothing.

  “And then?” he said, encouraging her to continue.

  “Oh, we asked why he spoke so strangely, and he said it was because his native tongue was different. So we corrected his French, and he taught us English.” Fenice spoke hurriedly, eager to get away from the dreadful slip she might have made, and then, afraid that Aubery might revert to the subject, she asked, “My lord, what will the king do when he comes?”

  “Make a show of force and then bargain, I suppose,” Aubery replied before he thought. Then he turned his head to look at Fenice, surprised by the question because Matilda would never have asked about such a thing, unless she was frightened. So Aubery added, “There is nothing for you to fear.”

  “I am not afraid,” Fenice assured him, with an expression of mild surprise. “I am only curious. You see, I do not know anything about what the English think of affairs in Gascony, and if I am to live in England—” She stopped abruptly again, this time crimsoning painfully. Nothing had yet been signed.

  Aubery had been very pleased by her reply. He was accustomed to women taking an active interest in public affairs because his mother did and, in fact, had found Matilda’s lack of interest in the subject a disadvantage. However, the abrupt end of Fenice’s remark, obviously in the middle of a sentence, and the deep blush that indicated embarrassment startled him.

  “I have no lands anywhere else,” he said. “Surely you were told that your property was to be exchanged for a small yearly income and the reversion of Marlowe?”

  He was aware of a feeling of anxiety as he spoke. Often girls were told nothing, but Alys was not the type to conceal important information from her stepdaughter. Unless the need to send Fenice away was compelling? Was Fenice ignorant that she was to be exiled permanently? Would she be unwilling?

  As to the last two questions, Aubery was not left long in doubt, for even as they ran through his mind Fenice was saying, “Oh yes, I knew of the exchange. Lady Alys told me.” But she was blushing harder than ever and did not raise her eyes as she added, “But…but I did not wish you to think that I-I am cocksure of your approval.”

  “Why should you not be?” Aubery asked, his voice sharp. The girl was too pretty and too accomplished to have such doubts after the subject of dower rights had been already approved. She acted as if she were a hunchback. Why should she doubt her acceptability?

  “I…I am not so immodest,” Fenice whispered, her voice trembling.

  Now Aubery wondered about her first husband. Could the man have been dissatisfied with so beautiful a creature? He almost asked whether she had been unhappy in her first marriage, but an enormous reluctance to hear a contrary answer stopped him, and he told himself he did not wish to give her any opening to pry into his marriage.

  “Do not act like a goose,” he said harshly. “You are a beautiful woman and, I am sure, if Alys trained you, have every art and skill necessary to make a good wife. There is no need for all this blushing uncertainty, unless you think me so greedy as to demand more than was offered or just plain mad.”

  “No, no—” Fenice had begun, when she was interrupted by her father, who said, “A writing table, how convenient,” and thrust several sheets of parchment onto the flat surface, adding, “Sign where the mark is, Fenice, while I warm the wax. I have brought your seal.”

  Fenice picked up the quill and dipped it. William laid his hand over hers, which was shaking with excitement. He had mistaken her desire for fear, and asked, “Do you not wish to read what it says, child?”

  “Papa would not hurt me,” Fenice replied, shaking her head. “If he is content, I am sure I will be.”

  “Of course your father would not hurt you or allow you to be hurt,” William agreed, and then smiled and said, “I could not hurt you myself, so sweet a child you are. But perhaps there is some detail in the arrangement you would like done differently, for example, Raymond and I thought you would like to have a farm of your own from which the rent would be paid to you, but if you would rather have me place a sum with the Templars that will be paid to you each quarter so that you will not have the labor of overseeing the farm, I would be glad to change that.”

  “Have you a preference in the way my income is paid, my lord?” Fenice asked hesitantly, and then, when Aubery did not respond, “Sir Aubery?”

  “It has nothing to do with me,” Aubery replied, having thought, until she used his name, that the question was addressed to her father. “It is your money to do with as you will. It will come directly into your hands…Oh, I see what you mean. No, the farm will be no trouble to me to defend or to oversee. It is close to Marlowe.”

  That had not been what Fenice meant. She was very surprised about having a private income and had asked because she assumed the money was to be Aubery’s. Alys had not got around to telling her about that part of the arrangement because the details had not b
een settled. However, since it was plain from Aubery’s answer that he was already aware of what had been done, Fenice murmured that she was content and hurriedly signed. She was overwhelmed with joy, believing that it must have been Aubery who had suggested she have her own money, because no such arrangement had been made by her father in her first marriage contract.

  Wax was spilled, her seal pressed into the blob. Then her father gestured her to get out from behind the desk. She was shaking so hard that Raymond took her in his arms and said to Aubery, who was sliding behind the writing surface, “Wait.”

  “No, I am content,” Fenice cried. “Please, Papa, I am content.”

  All three men looked at her, and she hid her face in Raymond’s breast. To gain a little time, William said, “Everything is exactly as we planned, Aubery. What had to be worked on was the form of the quittances. It is made very clear that no child of Lady Fenice’s will have any rights in Fuveau or Trets. Moreover, Raymond agreed that we include some reasonable arrangement should there be an heir of my body. There will not be, but it would be foolish to exclude the possibility in a legal quittance. Alys and her children are specifically excluded in that section not only from Marlowe but from all lands I may acquire in the future, with the exception of the case of the deaths of all of your heirs and your brother’s heirs of either sex.”

  Aubery had not heard a word that his stepfather said, which did not matter since he was aware of everything except the exact wording of the arrangement. He was looking at Fenice, torn between the desire to ignore her obvious terror so that he could have her and the knowledge that it was not right to force a woman into an unwelcome marriage. His father had accepted an unwilling bride for her possessions, and had murdered his mother’s brothers to obtain the land. He pushed the desk aside and stood up.

  “Lady Fenice, if you are reluctant—”

  Fortunately by then Fenice had realized that if she did not control herself, she would precipitate exactly what she had feared, out of the goodness and kindness of his heart, Aubery would refuse to sign. She turned and disengaged herself gently from Raymond’s grip, took a step forward, and held out her hand to Aubery. The hand was still trembling, but her eyes met his steadily.

  “I am not reluctant, my lord, I swear it. I am only what you said before—a silly goose. You can see that my papa is not forcing me. I am only…only a little nervous.”

  Chapter Nine

  In the days that followed the signing of the marriage contract, Aubery was given no further reason to believe his bride was reluctant. In fact, the joy that blazed up in her eyes when his signature and seal were affixed to the documents gave him the odd feeling that he, not she, had been somehow trapped. The way Fenice now glowed with happiness compared to her earlier uncertainty nagged at him. He told himself that he was imagining things, that he was becoming suspicious for no reason as his father had been, but he could not prevent himself one night from taking out his copies of the quittances and contracts and reading every word.

  Reading them made him feel worse. They were exactly as William had described them. He was protected in every way, and the allowance William was making to Fenice was sufficiently generous, unless she was madly extravagant. Had Fenice left such heavy debts in Provence that Raymond wanted her out of an area in which she was well known and therefore could order jewelry and clothing without her husband’s knowledge or permission? Was that the secret Alys and Raymond were keeping?

  In a moment he shook his head. There was no way that could hurt him even if it were true. He had controlled Matilda’s tendencies to spend more than she should. Aubery closed his eyes, and his throat thickened with unshed tears. How cruel that had been when her life was to be so short, but he had not known. He had not known!

  Wrenching his mind from a wrong he could never undo, Aubery considered the question Alys had raised that morning, when did he wish to marry and how? It was odd that she had stopped him after having first sent Fenice away on an errand. And when he had given no immediate answer, she had looked at him strangely and suggested blandly that he discuss the matter with Fenice in private and let her know what had been decided.

  He had felt then that Alys was teasing him and, not being in any mood for it, had snapped angrily, “What is there to discuss?”

  And he had been silenced, not so much by Alys’s sober reply that she needed to know whether he wished to wait for the king’s arrival so that there would be English witnesses, perhaps the Earl of Hereford, his overlord, at the wedding, but by the intense look of trouble on her face. He had a still worse shock when, stopping abruptly in the middle of the questions she was asking, Alys had taken his hand and said most earnestly, “Oh, Aubery, if you do not wish to marry Fenice or wish to wait, you must know we will not hold you to this agreement. Do not worry about Marlowe, we—”

  Aubery, recovered from the astonishment that had held him silent, replied, “Whatever is in your head, Alys? I find the arrangements most satisfactory. After all, I must marry to provide heirs to Ilmer and Marlowe, and Lady Fenice will be a good wife, I am sure. Unless you know something about her that I do not?”

  It had been a pointed question, but Alys had shaken her head and replied in the negative immediately, assuring him that her doubts had nothing to do with Fenice. Still, she had not looked completely happy and had urged him again to discuss the wedding with Fenice in private. “She is too much in awe of Raymond and too much aware of obligation to me to speak her own mind freely, but we wish to please her. Perhaps you can tease her true feelings from her. Go down into the garden, and I will send her to you.”

  Damn Alys for her mischief, Aubery thought as he ground to death an innocent tendril of thyme that had grown into the graveled path, and gritted his teeth. What she had said about Fenice was probably true enough, but he was sure her purpose was to push him into the girl’s company. Why the devil was Alys so eager for him to spend every minute huddled in a corner with Fenice? It must be sheer mischief. He would have to stop trying to avoid being alone with Fenice. The more he sought to escape her, the more devious ways Alys found to thrust them together.

  Meanwhile, Fenice had returned from her errand and, being told by Alys that Aubery wanted her, blushed with delight and rushed off to the garden. Aubery was quite right in accusing Alys of mischief, she was using every device she could find to provide opportunities for him to be alone with Fenice, because she had noticed that he preferred to avoid that situation. Fenice, however, was completely unaware of it and not in the least disturbed because Aubery did not try to push her into dark corners where he could caress her.

  She had never been courted as Alys had been, nor had she ever been the center of any man’s attention, except the few weeks with her husband before his mother had poisoned their relationship. During that time when Delmar had desired her, he had just said so or led her off to their chamber.

  Fenice felt it was quite natural that Aubery spent most of his time with her father and Sir William. There were the coming sieges of La Réole and St. Emilion and the growing famine to consider. Fenice was aware that when Aubery had time to spend with her, he enjoyed it. More than once, he had forgotten an arrangement to ride out when they had been talking together.

  In addition, Alys had never seen Aubery’s eyes up close as Fenice did. He never showed much change of expression when talking to her, except sometimes irritation with the subject when he was explaining the political situation in England. But there was something in his eyes that Fenice recognized and sometimes a filling of his lips that was familiar to her, too. She knew the look of desire when she saw it. Delmar had never lost that. She felt it stir strongly in her, too, so strongly that her breasts became painfully sensitive and there was a throbbing in her groin, but that, she knew, was for after the priest’s blessing, and she was proud that Aubery did not ask her to yield to him beforehand.

  Thus, Fenice ran down to the garden and, seeing her betrothed staring down at a patch of herbs, approached him eagerly. Spitefully, Auber
y bowed to her with cold formality, but her face lit with a smile, and she dropped into a curtsy of response with perfect good humor, asking how she might be of service. His formality, which Fenice innocently read as a form of respect, gave her intense pleasure, and Aubery was ashamed of himself for taking out on Fenice his irritation with Alys.

  “Sit down here with me,” he said, moving toward a seat farther along near a bed of lilies. His voice was soft with apology. She was, he thought, as sweet of temper as Matilda. He must not be unkind again. “Alys asked me to speak to you about our wedding. She wishes you to have exactly what you desire.”

  Fenice blushed deliciously. “I desire what will please you, my lord,” she replied.

  “That is just what you must not say,” Aubery pointed out. “You are always too eager to please others. This is your wedding. You are to please yourself.”

  “It is yours, also,” Fenice remarked, smiling, and then said more seriously, “I know that Lady Alys was concerned about the fact that there would be no English witnesses other than Sir William.”

  “That does not matter,” Aubery assured her. “Alys’s marriage was a state affair because of Raymond’s kinship with the queen and his high position in Provence. But I have no such exalted relatives or position. The only interest the marriage of a simple knight to a simple gentlewoman could arouse would be in immediate neighbors or family. My father’s two sisters are both immured in convents. My only uncle has been dead many years. As for neighbors, Hurley, which is nearest to Marlowe, belongs to my mother and will go, in the distant future, I hope, to my brother, John. Naturally, my mother and brother are aware of the arrangement and approve heartily. Closest to Ilmer is Herron, which is not truly a keep, only a rich manor, and its master, Harold, is just a boy and in his uncle’s ward. And Sir Savin of Radanage—” Aubery scowled blackly. “He will be no witness at any marriage of mine, nor would I care what he thought.”