by Speer, Flora
“Stop that nonsense and stand up and drink this!” Arianna had never seen Meredith angry before. Silver-grey fire shot from her eyes, and her face was hard as stone when she spoke. “I will not hear another word against Thomas. This is your duty to him, you silly child. Stop thinking of yourself all the time. Swallow this drink, I say. It will hasten the pains, but end them sooner.” She pushed the cup at Selene. “Drink now, before the next pain comes.”
“Do as she says, Selene.” Arianna realized that Meredith was badly frightened for Selene’s sake, and that her fear was being expressed in anger. “Drink it all, my dear, it’s for your benefit.”
Confronted by that combination of pale-eyed fury and concerned friendship, Selene obeyed. The brew began to work almost at once, the pains coming harder and faster, until Selene’s shrieks rang through the tower keep, nearly deafening the two women with her, and bringing Joan to the chamber door.
“Thomas has nearly lost his wits for worry,” Joan said, surveying the scene before her. “What shall I tell him, my lady?”
“Tell him I hate him!” Selene screamed.
Joan nodded understandingly.
“It will soon be over,” she observed calmly. “D’you need my help?”
“Yes.” Meredith pushed a bright red strand of hair off her forehead. She and Arianna had stripped down to their long-sleeved linen shifts, and both were wet with perspiration. “Go down and tell Thomas all is well, then bring us water to wash her with. You can take care of the baby when it is born. Arianna and I will be busy with Selene.”
By the time Joan reappeared with a bucket of hot water, Selene was past walking, and Meredith had her kneeling on a straw pallet on the floor.
“I’ll hold her,” Joan said. She knelt behind Selene, supporting her while catching her around the waist with strong arms and pressing down hard on her heavy belly. Meredith knelt in front of Selene, holding her hands and encouraging her.
Arianna crouched beside her frightened friend, mopping her damp face with a cool cloth and urging her to obey Meredith’s instructions so the child would be born quickly. She thought Selene did not hear her, for her emerald eyes were wide with terror and she was panting like some trapped animal. When the next pain began Selene shrieked wildly, turning into a madwoman, struggling against Joan and trying to break free from her restraining arms, refusing to follow Meredith’s orders, pulling her hands out of Meredith’s grasp. Arianna tried to recapture Selene’s flailing arms and called to her over that rasping, screaming voice.
Selene’s resistance did not last long. Nature had its way, her body took over its natural function, and she could not help pushing as she was supposed to do, until at last, in a great gush of blood and water, the baby was born, crying almost as loudly as its mother.
“Blood,” Selene gasped, her voice hoarse from all the screaming. “I can’t stand blood.” Her eyes rolled back and closed, and her head lolled against Joan’s shoulder as her body went limp.
“No! Selene, come back,” Arianna cried, chafing Selene’s cold hands. “She’s dying! Meredith, help her.”
“She’s not dying, only exhausted by foolish resistance. Lay her down, Joan,” Meredith advised. “Arianna and I will care for her. Here, you take the baby. She looks healthy enough.”
Selene lay in a stupor, unable to move or speak. Meredith and Arianna worked until they had her bathed and in a fresh, dry shift. With Joan’s help they lifted Selene into the narrow bed they had prepared for her at one side of the room, and then Joan went to call Thomas.
“Arianna?” Selene’s eyes opened, but her voice was no more than a whisper and her hand moved weakly on the blanket. Arianna took the hand and held it tightly.
“You have a beautiful daughter, Selene.”
“No,” the weak voice said. “No, a son.”
“It’s a girl, Selene.” Meredith brought a swaddled bundle to the bed. “Would you like to hold her?”
“Too tired.” Selene’s eyes closed.
There was a tap at the door and Thomas appeared, followed closely by Guy. Thomas bent over his wife and kissed her cheek tenderly.
“I failed,” Selene murmured huskily, her eyes still closed.
“Never say that, my love. We can have sons later.”
“No more,” Selene whispered weakly. “I’m punished enough. No more children.”
Thomas looked at Meredith, a fearful question in his eyes.
“She’s worn out,” Meredith said. “It was a hard birth and you know how much she wanted a son. Take nothing she says seriously until she’s stronger. She can have more children, Thomas. She only needs time to recover.”
With a sigh of relief, Thomas turned back to Selene. He hadn’t even looked at the baby, but now Guy poked a finger at the bundle in Meredith’s arms, moving the wrappings aside to see the little face. Arianna, watching Guy in preference to the sight of Thomas adoring Selene, saw the older man’s eyes fill with tears.
“My first gr—” Guy said softly, then stopped suddenly, and he and Meredith exchanged a look of deep meaning. Meredith laid the baby in his arms.
“How beautiful she is,” Guy said in wonder. “Thomas, see your daughter.”
Thomas left his wife’s bedside and took the baby from Guy, holding it awkwardly, staring at the infant’s features with an expression similar to Guy’s.
“You need practice,” Guy said, laughing, and reached to adjust the bundle. “Knights are taught to hold swords, not babies, but you will learn if you want to. I did. It’s not unmanly to love your own child.”
The smile on Thomas’s face lit up the room, and Meredith brushed a few happy tears off her cheeks, but Arianna wondered what it was that Meredith and Guy understood and the rest of them did not.
Selene was still terribly weak the next day, and she showed no interest in the baby.
“You are going to feed this child yourself,” Meredith told her sternly. “You are still bleeding, Selene, and if you nurse, it will help to stop the bleeding and you will return to a healthy state sooner. You are to drink red wine, and milk, and eat everything Joan or Arianna or I bring to you.” Seeing a tear roll down Selene’s pale cheek, Meredith relented in her scolding and went on in a gentler voice. “You nearly died during that terrible labor. I was so afraid for you. But the risk is not over. I’m sure you know there are women who die days or even weeks after giving birth. I don’t want that to happen to you. Let me help you. Please do as I instruct you.”
Selene burst into uncontrolled weeping, and Meredith, dismayed, took Selene into her arms and held her as though she were an injured child.
“This sadness afterward often happens, too,” Meredith soothed, “and I promise you it will pass. You will be well again, and the day is not far away, either.”
“After all that pain,” Selene wept, “and all those months of feeling sick every day, all I have for it is a girl. Thomas must hate me.”
“He doesn’t, I assure you. You haven’t even seen your daughter, Selene. She is beautiful. She looks just like her father.”
“Not like me?” Meredith was surprised to see that Selene looked almost hopeful as she brushed away her tears with both hands. “Like Thomas?”
“She has golden hair and big blue eyes, and I think she has Thomas’s disposition, for she seems quite happy, though she must be hungry by now. Would you like to hold her?” Meredith did not wait for an answer, but simply went to the cradle, took up the baby and placed it in Selene’s arms. As she straightened up she saw her own daughter hovering in the doorway. “Did you want to see the baby, Cristin?”
“Could I?” Cristin tiptoed across the room. She had stayed well away from Selene during the last few weeks, not wanting to feel the lash of her erratic temper, and now she was more than a little hesitant.
She need not have worried. Selene had just fallen in love with the tiny creature she held, and in the unexpected upwelling of joy and deep affection she felt, she was ready, for a time at least, to embrace the whole world.
She pushed back the baby’s wrappings so Cristin could see better, and even let her hold one tiny hand.
“When she’s big enough,” Cristin said solemnly, “I’ll make Geoffrey teach her to ride.” Selene burst into laughter.
“What are you going to name her?” Cristin asked. “She’s part Welsh, isn’t she, since she was born here? She ought to have a Welsh name.”
Selene was about to reply sharply that her baby was most definitely not Welsh, when it occurred to her that Cristin had just shown her a way out of an unpleasant dilemma. She did not want to name her child after Lady Aloise, which she was afraid Thomas would suggest, or Meredith, as she feared Guy would want. Both men might consider a Welsh name to be a gracious gesture toward Guy’s subjects, and would thus not raise objections to her wishes.
“Tell me some Welsh names, Cristin.”
The girl began reciting a long list, until Selene, laughing again, told her to stop.
“Where did you ever learn all of those? Deirdre,” she said, “I like that one. My baby is Deirdre.”
“If Thomas approves,” Meredith cautioned her.
“He will,” Selene said, determined to have her own way on this. “I’ll make him agree.”
When Thomas came to see her later, bringing with him an exquisitely wrought gold and amethyst bracelet as reward for the safe birth of his first child, Selene thanked him so prettily, and kissed him so tenderly, seeming to promise future delights as soon as she was well enough, that he readily consented to her choice of a name for their daughter.
It was often hard to keep a fall-born baby alive during its first winter, but Meredith did everything she could to see that Selene was well fed and cared for, so she could pass her strength on to the child. Still, with all her concern for the new mother, it was a full two weeks before Selene felt well enough to go to the great hall to eat, and she adamantly refused to return to the room she had shared with Thomas. She spent all of her time with the baby, allowing only Cristin to help her, and she avoided as much of the Christmas celebrations as she decently could.
“Don’t worry,” Meredith said to Thomas, trying to make light of a situation that had begun to worry her. “Selene still tires easily, and as for Cristin, this is fine training for her. I’m glad to see her out of the stables for a while. Selene is exerting a good influence on her. Cristin has asked for a new gown. As for the other, Selene will come to your bed again soon. Give her a little more time.” She watched his unhappy face and wished she dared tell him to find himself a serving girl to occupy his nights until that happened. She did not. She knew Thomas well enough to guess he would only be satisfied with Selene.
Selene herself fought a daily battle within her own heart. She loved her baby, and she was fond of her husband, but she feared his desire lest he get her with child again. She was torn between the two of them and fear for her own life. She could not have another child. It was too terrible a process, and Meredith had said she had nearly died bearing Deirdre. She knew it was her duty to give her husband a son, but that duty she would shirk entirely. Guy had been content with only a daughter; Thomas must be, too.
As for the promise she had made to Isabel more than a year ago, which also preyed on her thoughts, that, too, she would avoid fulfilling if only she could, and Selene had thought of a way. If Isabel were to come to Afoncaer, she could do whatever needed to be done herself, and Selene need do nothing. If she were the instrument of Isabel’s coming, she would be free of her promise without actually betraying Thomas. She approached Guy that very night, while they all sat at table.
“It would be lovely if my baby’s birth were the impetus for peacemaking,” Selene said to him. “I thought of asking Lady Isabel to visit and meet Deirdre. Will you write to her, my lord, and ask her to come to Afoncaer? Will you tell her she is forgiven, and invite her home?”
Guy choked on his wine. A silence fell over the table, and all eyes turned to Selene. She saw Reynaud staring at her with his cold, pale blue eyes, watching her as he always did. She tried to ignore him. It was harder to pretend not to see Meredith’s hurt face or Arianna’s astonishment.
“Are you mad?” Guy gasped when he could speak.
“Selene, what can you be thinking?” Thomas cried. “You never spoke to me of this.”
“There wasn’t time. I only thought of it this afternoon,” she told him sweetly.
“King Henry exiled Lady Isabel for the rest of her life,” Guy declared.
“You mean you did,” Selene replied. “Thomas told me it was you. My lord, you are a nearly independent ruler here. You could allow her to return if only you would.”
“Selene, stop this at once!” Thomas commanded.
“I will forgive your suggestion,” Guy told her, his face pale with anger, “only because you were not here at the time to know everything that woman did.”
“But she is Thomas’s mother,” Selene persisted, disregarding Thomas’s continued efforts to make her be still. “It’s most unkind not to let her see her grandchild.”
“If it had been left to Isabel,” Meredith put in, her voice shaking with outrage, “Thomas would not be alive to father a grandchild for her.”
“Meredith is right. Isabel,” Guy said with a snort of derisive laughter, “never cared for any child, not even her own. No, Selene, Isabel will not return to Afoncaer, not while I’m alive. And you will never speak of her to me again.”
His dark blue eyes, devoid of all warmth, locked with Selene’s, and in her guilt it seemed to her that Guy saw into her heart, knew what she was doing and why, and felt nothing but revulsion and disgust for her.
“With your permission, my lord,” Selene said, rising, “I will retire to my bedchamber. I am very tired.”
“A good idea,” Guy said coldly.
Thomas burst into her room half an hour later.
“How could you do such a thing?” he demanded. “I have told you what happened here when I was a boy.”
“Your mother said he was a cold-hearted, spiteful man,” Selene declared. “I see now that it’s true.”
“You will never find a more warm-hearted, more generous man than Uncle Guy,” Thomas sputtered. “How dare you speak of him that way?”
Selene wasn’t listening to him. She did not care that she was at odds with Guy and Meredith. She had never really liked them, having judged them by Isabel’s opinions, and she dismissed the thought of them easily. It was Thomas who concerned her. She knew she still had power over him so long as he wanted her. Perhaps if she let him make love to her just once he would then be agreeable to the plan that had suddenly come into her mind. It was a risk, but only yesterday she had overheard Joan say that a nursing mother could not get with child. A glance at the cradle assured her that Deirdre was fast asleep. She decided to chance it.
“I am sorry I suggested Isabel come here. I was only thinking of you and our child,” she said softly, moving closer to him. “I never imagined Guy would be so angry.”
“I think you did know. You have heard enough about my mother to guess what his reaction would be.”
“Don’t be angry with me.” She pouted a little, her right hand moving lightly along his sleeve.
“I am angry, Selene.” But he did not pull away from her stroking fingers.
“I think you are just unhappy that we have been apart so long.” Her hand, continuing its soft rubbing motions, reached his warm fingers and slipped around them.
“That is your doing,” Thomas said, “not mine. It’s more than two months since Deirdre was born, and still you refuse me. Were it not for Meredith counseling patience, I would have ordered you back into my bed weeks ago.”
“I am not refusing you now.” She took his hand and put it on her breast. “I want to lay with you, Thomas.”
He looked at her as though he did not believe her, but when he moved his palm across her breast, she knew with certainty that she did want him, had wanted him for days. He must have seen the open desire in her face, for he caught her a
gainst him. His mouth came down hard on hers, and she lost her fears, even forgot her hasty plan for a moment, in the pleasure his nearness brought her. She led him to the narrow bed where she had slept for two months, and he looked at it doubtfully while she removed her headdress and shook out her hair.
“There’s not much space there,” he said.
“Then we shall be that much closer together.” She reached down to the hem of her gown and pulled it up and over her head in one graceful motion. Her underdress followed, then linen shift, shoes, and stockings, and when she was completely unclothed she lay down upon the bed and smiled at him.
“Come, Thomas,” she said. “Come and love me.”
“You are so beautiful, even lovelier than you were before.” He knelt beside the bed, and slowly ran his hands along her body, thrilling her with his touch as he moved from throat and shoulders to richly full breasts, lingering there to tease at her sensitive nipples and watch her writhe sensuously under his attentions, before continuing to the curve of her waist and her still-slender hips. Her abdomen was slightly rounded now, and he buried his face in its soft smoothness, while his hands moved further down along her flanks until she cried out and moved against them.
“Undress,” she moaned. “Why don’t you undress?”
“Shall I?” he teased, straining upward to nibble at her lower lip, and keeping his hands where they were.
“Yes. Yes. Please,” she panted. “Please.”
His tongue flickered across her lips, then plunged into her mouth, while below, down there, his fingers probed gently. Her hips arched upward, her body opening to him, and suddenly Selene burst into wild, pulsating pleasure. It happened so fast, and therefore so unexpectedly, that she could do nothing but give in to it. It was over quickly, and when he moved away from her she was close to tears.
“Why didn’t you undress? I wanted to feel you inside me.”
“So you shall, my love.” Now, at last, Thomas began to pull off his indoor robe. “I’ve been apart from you too long, Selene, and I’ve had no other woman. I want you so badly I was afraid I’d lose my wits and attack you. I wanted you to feel the joy of it first, so you would remember how wonderful it was. And now,” he said, lying down beside her, “now it is my turn.”