Novels 03 The Wise Woman

by Philippa Gregory

  Alys pulled at her hair mercilessly and coiled it into a rough plait. “Badly?” she asked.

  Morach cocked an eyebrow at her. “Sure you want to hear?” she asked.

  Alys nodded.

  “He had her this afternoon,” Morach said. “After he had been with his father. You were still in the old lord’s chambers. He came striding down here and shooed all the women out of the room and he took her like he was possessed. If this is your magic moppets then they’ve done their job well. He can’t leave her alone. First this afternoon and then tonight again.”

  Alys’s face was shocked. “How were they together? Was he as rough with her as ever? He was never tender with her?”

  Morach shook her head. “He didn’t bind her this time,” she said. “But he did everything else he had a mind to do. He slapped her a little and he pulled her hair. Then he made her take him in her mouth. He’s careful for the child so he would not lie on her. He thrust himself into her mouth and bellowed like a bull with pleasure.”

  “Stop it,” Alys said abruptly. “You’re disgusting, Morach. How d’you know all this? You’re lying.”

  “I watched,” Morach said, smiling, tucking the fine shawl around her shoulders and moving the pillow behind her tousled head. “I needed to know. Of course I watched.”

  Alys nodded. Nothing Morach could do would surprise her.

  “And what about her?” Alys said abruptly. “Why does she permit it? Now that she has his child. Why is she still so demanding?”

  Morach chuckled. “She’s not demanding—you silly little virgin!” she exclaimed. “What should she demand? She’s getting everything a woman could want—and more than a decent woman would admit to wanting. She lies there, like a pink soft mountain, and lets him crawl all over her.”

  Alys scowled. “He said he would go to her no more once she was pregnant,” she said. “He said he had to have a son, and then he would come to me. Then he said he would go to Newcastle to think what to do—that he longed to live with me and yet he had to keep her sweet. All this time I have been waiting and waiting. All this time, Morach! Waiting and waiting for him.”

  Morach looked at her without sympathy. “Go to him then,” she said. “You cannot fight her whelping heat with your convent coldness. Go to him and tell him that you want him, and that he’s to leave her. Hex him, promise him darkness and passion. Pain beyond pain and pleasure beyond pleasure. There are things you could give him, there are things you could do, that he has never even dreamed of with his little drabs. Tell him you’re a witch and that if he comes to you you can give him pleasures that mortal men only dream of. He’s like any man—they all long for witchery and wickedness at night. If you want him, Alys, take him! You don’t have much time, you know.”

  “Time?” Alys asked instantly. “You’ve foreseen something, Morach?”

  “Away.” Morach flapped her hands, fending Alys off. “You’ve not much time when you’re young and beautiful. The plague could come any day and mark your face. The wind could blow and scar you. You could fall sick and lose the clear color of your skin and your eyes and hair. You’re getting thinner every day with this passion burning up inside you—a month from now and you’ll be a plain spinster. If you want something you should get it at once. Waiting is a trial for no one but yourself.”

  Alys nodded. “I am on a rack of desire for him,” she said softly.

  “Shall I tell him?” Morach asked. “I’m the last person to leave them at night. I could take him to one side and tell him that if he leaves Catherine’s room he can come here. And I’ll keep guard till the two of you are done.”

  Alys turned toward the bed and looked at the old woman. Her face was suspicious. “Why?” she asked. “Why would you risk offending Lady Catherine—you who stand so high in her favor, paid twice what the rest get, free to come and go, eating like a pig and free to speak your mind to her? Why risk it?”

  Morach chuckled. “It’s a game, child,” she said indulgently. “It’s like casting the runes, or reading the cards, or making herbs. It’s a game. What will happen next? All magic is the question—what will happen if…? I want to know what will happen to you when Hugo has you. I want to see that happen. It takes my fancy, that’s all.”

  “Can’t you see it?” Alys asked. “Why can’t you see the future as you used to see it, Morach?”

  The old woman shrugged. “I can see you don’t have long; that should be enough for you. When I look, it all goes dark, I can see nothing except darkness and water. So you’d best act as any woman would—never mind the Sight. What will it be? Shall I tell him you want to see him?”

  Alys paused. “Yes,” she said, with sudden decision. “Now. Call him out now. Get him away from Catherine now. I can’t bear him to lie with her tonight.”

  The old woman nodded and slipped from the bed, spread the shawl around her shoulders and crept through the door. Alys took up the mirror again, ruffled her hand through her thick hair, watched the color rise in her pale cheeks. Across the gallery she could hear Morach’s peremptory knock on the door and her call: “Lord Hugo! The old lord is asking for you. He said you were to come at once!”

  She heard Hugo’s muttered oath and his quick step to the door. She heard him call to Catherine, telling her to sleep, and then the bedroom door slam behind him. He stepped out into the gallery.

  Alys tossed aside the mirror and went out of her room to meet him.

  “Lord Hugh does not need you. I sent Morach to call you out,” she said. She held her head very high and her hair fell in a ripple of gold away from her face. Hugo stared at her, at the thin cotton of her nightgown and at the rapid pulse beating at the hollow of her neck under the half-open gown.

  “Alys,” he said softly.

  He could see the muscles in her neck move as she swallowed.

  “I cannot bear you to lie with her,” Alys said. “You told me to wait until you came back from Newcastle and I have waited. I want you as my lover. I have dreamed and dreamed of you coming home to me.”

  Hugo’s dark gleam of a smile came, and faded. “You heard my father,” he said. “You know how much I need an heir. You know that my future and my family’s future depends on an heir to this castle and these lands. And he has promised me that money, Alys. I cannot distress Catherine when she is carrying the child I need more than anything else in the world!”

  “What about me!” Alys broke out. “I see what Catherine needs—aye, and gets! And I see what you need! But what about me?”

  Hugo looked at her, his smile crinkling around his eyes. “You want me,” he said. It was not a question.

  Alys nodded.

  “Is Morach gone from your room?” he asked.

  Alys did not look up; she nodded again.

  “Come then,” he said and slid his arm around her waist, and she let him lead her to her bedroom, swing her off her feet and lay her on the bed.

  He pulled up her gown to see her naked and gave a little grunt of pleasure at the sight—like an animal, Alys thought. She closed her eyes and thought of the nights and days she had longed for him, had longed for this moment.

  “This is Hugo,” she said to herself. “Hugo, that I have dreamed of and longed for, and desired more than I have ever desired anyone in my life.”

  It did not help. She felt cold and arid. She was nervous of the pain and the weight of him.

  Hugo hitched his nightshirt up around his waist. “If you were a witch indeed then you would enchant me,” he said. “They were talking of witchery in Newcastle. They say if a man so much as touches their skin then no other woman can ever excite him again.”

  Alys shook her head. “I’m no witch,” she said. “You told me to put all that aside, I did as you bid me. I cannot enchant you.” She was getting cold, half naked before him.

  Hugo dropped on top of her and Alys was crushed beneath his weight. He had eaten spicy meat at supper and his breath was sour. She threw her arms around his broad shoulders and said, “Hugo,” thinki
ng how she had longed for this moment—that it must be what she wanted, since she had wanted it for so long.

  “If you were a witch,” Hugo said, rubbing himself gently against her, “what pleasures would you give me, Alys? Do you think witches can make men fly? Do you think they can make them lust all night and all day? Would you conjure for me virgin after virgin? All of them wet with desire, all longing for me. All lying with me and with each other? A great rolling bed of women with mouths and hands and bodies for my pleasure alone?”

  As his words excited him he arched his back and leaned up on his hands and pushed into her. Alys screamed—a sharp scream of pain—and wriggled at once away from him. “No!”

  Hugo laughed, put his hands on her thin shoulders and said breathlessly: “Take it, Alys! It’s what you’ve been hot for! It’s what you’ve been pining for! What did you expect? A touch as gentle as your own busy little fingers? This is what a man does, Alys! Learn to like it!”

  At every word he spoke he thrust deeper into her. Alys scrabbled frantically against him, trying to pull herself up and away from his greedy lust. “Oh!” Hugo said suddenly, and he fell heavily on her.

  They lay very still for a few moments. The pain inside her eased a little and she felt his cock grow limp and slide away. She smelled her blood and felt it trickle on her cold thighs. She felt the skin around her eyes tighten and grow cold with drying tears. She moved a little and Hugo rolled off her, like a pig in a wallow, and lay on his back, gazing blankly at the ceiling.

  Alys crept a little closer and put her warm head on his shoulder. She could hear his heart thudding and slowing. His arm came around her and held her.

  “I hurt,” Alys said in a little voice, like an injured child.

  Hugo chuckled. “Not a witch then,” he said. “You’ve done no shagging with the devil, that’s for sure.”

  “I told you I was no witch,” Alys said impatiently. “I was a virgin. You have taken my virginity. And you hurt me, Hugo.”

  He nodded, as if it did not matter much. “It always hurts maids the first time,” he said indifferently. “What did you expect?”

  Alys said nothing, but the world of her expectations was laid out before her in bitter colors.

  Hugo gave a yawn and sat up. “Give me a cloth,” he said. “I cannot go back to Catherine like this.”

  Alys slipped from the bed and walked awkwardly over to the linen chest. She could feel a trickle of blood flow warm down her thigh. She passed him a length of linen. “Go back to Catherine?” she asked stupidly.

  “Of course,” he said. He mopped at his crotch with quick, hard gestures, wiping her blood away. Wiping the smell of her away. He looked up at her shocked face and shrugged.

  “Come on, Alys,” he said impatiently. “You heard my father, you know what this child means to me. Every night of my life until the baby is born I shall sleep in Catherine’s bed. I shall make her as content and serene as I can. I owe it to my son, I owe it to my line and, by God, I owe it to myself! I have waited to sire a son for eighteen years! One woman after another has been barren with me. Now my wife, my own legal wife, is with my child and they all say it will be a son. Of course I shall watch over her, and anything she wants will be hers!”

  “I dreamed of a son that we would have,” Alys started. “You and me.”

  Hugo leaned forward and patted her white cheek. “When you are pregnant with my son you will be my favorite,” he said carelessly. “While Catherine carries my son I am hers to command. Right now there is only one thing in the world which could keep me from Catherine.”

  “And what is that?” Alys asked. Her throat was aching from holding in her anger and her pain.

  Hugo grinned. “The rutting I have dreamed of with you!” he said, laughing. “Ever since I saw you, and especially since they all thought you were a witch, I thought you would take me—like witches are said to take men. I thought you would ride me like I mount a horse. I thought you would know ways which would drive me mad with lust for you.”

  Alys shook her head slowly. “And instead, I was just another virgin,” she said softly. “An ordinary girl.”

  Hugo stood up, tossed aside the bloody cloth and drew Alys into his arms. “Ordinary girls give pleasure too,” he said consolingly. “Another time, sweetheart, when I am now wearied with traveling and sated with Catherine. Another time it will be better for us both.”

  Alys nodded, hearing the dismissal in his voice.

  “But don’t send Morach for me again,” he said warningly. “Catherine is bound to find out and distress could harm the baby. I will come to you when I can leave her without her knowing. I will come to you when she sleeps.”

  “In corners,” Alys said. “In doorways. Hidden in secrecy.”

  Hugo gleamed. “I love it like that,” he said. “Desperate and quick. Wouldn’t you like me to take you like that, when we’re too hot to wait for a proper time?”

  Alys turned her head away so that he could not see the anger and resentment in her eyes. “Like any ordinary girl,” she said.

  He put an arm around her waist and kissed her carelessly on the top of her head.

  “I must go,” he said. “Sweet dreams.”

  The door shut softly behind him. Alys walked wearily to the bed, flung herself down on her back and watched the flicker of the firelight on the ceiling. She did not turn her head as the door opened. She knew it was not Hugo.

  “Fool,” Morach said companionably. “I thought you were hot for him. I could have told you it would hurt, lying with a man you hate.”

  Alys turned her head slowly on the pillow. “I don’t hate him,” she said slowly. “I love him. I love him more than life itself.”

  Morach gave a little crow of laughter and hitched herself up into the high bed.

  “Aye, you say you do,” she said agreeably. “And you think you do. But your body says different, child. Your body said ‘no’ all the way through, didn’t it? Even when you were trying to tell yourself you were in heaven.”

  Alys raised herself up on one elbow. “Help me, Morach,” she said. “It hurt and I hated him touching me like that. And yet I used to tremble when he so much as looked at me.”

  Morach chuckled and heaved the blankets over to her own side. “He’s a disappointment to you,” she said. “And you hate Catherine. You’re torn different ways at once. And you don’t consult your own pleasure. Get hold of your power, Alys! Find what you want and take it. You lay there tonight and asked him to rape you. What he wants is a woman to drive him mad—not another victim.”

  Alys pulled the blankets back and turned on her side with her back to Morach. “And you watched,” she said irritably.

  “Of course,” Morach said calmly. “And I can tell you, he had more pleasure with Catherine’s wanton joy than he did with you.”

  Alys said nothing.

  “If it had been me,” Morach said thoughtfully to Alys’s stiff back, “I’d have taken my time and given him wine, and taken a glass myself. I’d have drugged him maybe. I’d have used earthroot, which makes a man dream of desire until he is mad with it and makes him hard with no chance of ease for hours. I’d have told him bawdy stories, I’d have let him watch me touch myself. I’d have told him I was a witch and that if he touched me he would go mad for my touch forever. And when he was half pickled with lust then I’d have let him have me. I wouldn’t have whimpered beneath him like a ravished scullion.”

  Alys shut her eyes and hunched up her shoulder.

  “But I wouldn’t have done any of that until I’d decided whether I wanted him or not,” Morach said to the quiet room. “I wouldn’t have a man when we had a score to settle. I wouldn’t tup a man who was lying his head off to me. I wouldn’t let him roll on me and then wash himself clean as if I was dirt. I’d make him choose between me and his wife. And I’d use my magic to make him choose me.”

  Alys turned around and looked at Morach. “There is no magic in the world that can stand against an heir,” she said
bitterly. “All I can hope for is for the bitch to die in childbirth and the heir to die with her.”

  Morach met her look. “And me here to see that she does not,” she said equably. “It’s a fine net you’ve meshed yourself in, little Alys.”

  Alys turned her back on Morach again and thumped down into the bed.

  “You must wish you were back at the abbey,” Morach said, rubbing salt in the old wound. “You’d have been safe from all this uncomfortable reality there. Safe with your mother in Christ.” She paused. “Pity,” she said cheerfully.

  Alys had thought herself unhappy before, but after that night her days were harder still. The weather was against her through a long wintery April. Alys thought that the long season of darkness and cold would never end.

  She had known harder winters in her childhood with Morach when food and even firewood had been scarce, and for frozen day after frozen day Morach had sent her out of the door of the snowed-in shanty to scoop a bucket of snow and set it to thaw on the little precious flame. At night they had huddled together for warmth and listened for the cry of the wolf pack which came nearer at twilight and dawn. Morach would throw another turf of peat on the fire and a handful of herbs and laugh as if the bitter cold and the pain in her belly and the long lonely cry of the wolves amused her.

  “Learn this,” she would say to Alys—wide-eyed and thin as an orphan lamb. “Learn this. Never cross a powerful man, my Alys. Find your place and keep it.” And the little child with the great blue eyes too big for her white face would nod and clench her little chicken-foot hands in the old sign against the evil eye.

  “That farmer was a bad man,” she said solemnly.

  “He was that,” Morach replied with relish. “And dead now for his injustice to me. Find your place and keep it, Alys! And then avoid the hard men with power!”

  Alys had been cold then with a deep iron coldness which had stayed with her for all her life like some incurable growth of ice in her belly. All the petting at the abbey, all the banked fires of blazing logs, all the sheepskin rugs and the wool tapestries could not cure her of it. When the wind howled around the walls of the abbey she would shiver and look up at Mother Hildebrande and ask: “Was that wolves? Was that wolves, Mother Hildebrande?”