Alinor

by Roberta Gellis

  Jamie and two other northerners were up now. They had taken over Sir Robert’s and Owain’s positions and those two to come to Ian’s aid. It was on his side that the pressure and danger were greatest. There was neither time nor space for niceties of technique. Ian merely protected himself with his shield on the left, while his right arm rose and fell as regularly as if he were working a pump handle and with about as little aim. A man screamed; another fell.

  “Cry quarter,” Ian shouted. “You will be spared. Cry quarter!”

  “Yielded,” a man whimpered.

  “Throw your weapons over the wall,” Geoffrey ordered, “and get out of the way.”

  The offering of quarter, shouting the offer as a battle cry, had been planned to take the heart out of the rebellious castellan’s men. In general the idea was a good one, but it had its drawbacks. Each man who yielded increased the crowd and blocked the space that Ian’s fighting men could occupy. Nonetheless, the offer had to be made before rage and bitterness aroused stubborn resistance in the defenders. A body gave softly under Ian’s foot and nearly overset him.

  “Get the dead out of the way,” Ian shouted at Geoffrey.

  The boy was intelligent enough to know that his master did not expect him to lift the weight of a man and armor over his head alone. This was a “message”. He slid back, past the crouching, yielded man to pass Ian’s order to the men-at-arms who were now coming over the wall. They began to pull the fallen men out from under the feet of the fighters and toss them over the wall. One man screamed as he went over. The men-at-arms were not investigating the difference between dead and wounded too closely; if the body lay still and had weapons, it went over. Geoffrey shuddered, but he did not interfere. His business was to get back to his lord so that he could carry further commands.

  The harsh order had another effect. Men who were slightly wounded and who might have fought on, showed an increasing tendency to throw their weapons away. Soon there was no comparison in the will to fight between defenders and invaders. For the invaders there was little choice. Once upon the wall, it was more certain death to try to go down the ladder than to fight. For the defenders, quarter was protection. Once yielded, if they saw the invaders taking the worse, they could escape down the ladders without much fear that their unyielded comrades would waste blows or arrows on them.

  The pressure behind Ian was growing greater than the pressure ahead of him. Owain, thrusting around his master from behind, could still use his sword, but Ian was doing more damage with his shield than with the blade, because he had so little room to strike. Inexorably, as much by weight as by skill, he was pressing closer and closer to the door into the tower. Sir Robert smashed his sword hilt into the jaw of the man opposing him, stepped forward the width of the body, and was pressed sideways so that he faced the inner edge of the wall.

  “There is fighting in the bailey,” he shouted. “We have breached the wall.”

  The defender who had thrust Sir Robert sideways hesitated, with his sword raised for a blow, and also looked over the wall. What he saw gave him no comfort. He threw down the sword and cried aloud, “Yielded.”

  After that, what resistance was made was a mere token. Before the men of the first wave up the ladder felt the need to stop and breathe, they had won to the door down the steps of the tower. In the guard room at the base, the fighting would be more determined, Ian thought. There were a number of men standing to the defense of the drawbridge mechanism. Ian measured his opponents warily. They were fresh and, he decided, ready to make a last stand. These were probably relatives of the castellan or squires grown up in service, not to be bribed into yielding by offers of quarter.

  “Geoffrey!”

  “Here, lord.”

  “Tell Sir Alfred, or whoever else you can reach, to make all haste into the other tower and raise the portcullis.”

  It was surprisingly quiet in the tower, the thick walls blocking the shouts and clang of arms from the bailey and from the walls above. Geoffrey’s boots on the sanded stone floor could be heard clearly as he took to his heels. Ian also heard the heavier steps of men-at-arms coming down the stairs into the tower base.

  “Coward,” one of the defenders cried passionately, “you will overwhelm us with numbers.”

  Ian laughed. “I do not extend the courtesies of honor to thieving dogs who steal from children and widows.”

  A cry of rage answered Ian’s contempt, and the knight leapt at him. Ian laughed again. It was what he had wanted. Others surged forward after the leader, and the solid ring of defenders was broken. Ian’s men charged forward also, some to engage and fight, but others worked over the handspikes holding the drawbridge up. The sound of the blows used to loosen the spikes pierced the rage of Ian’s attacker. With a shriek of anguish, he realized he had been taunted into his own defeat. Unwisely, he glanced toward the winch he was supposed to defend. Ian laughed one last time and caught his opponent’s neck where the turn of the head opened a space. The armor was good; the head was not sheared away, but the man was dead in the next instant anyway, and Ian had to wrench fiercely at his sword to free it from the collarbone.

  There was, in fact, no particular need for haste in freeing his weapon. The man who lay dead at his feet was the castellan’s son, and the others were going down rapidly. Soon the noise of the drawbridge descending was reinforced by the screeches of the portcullis going up. Geoffrey came pelting back with word that the castellan himself was also dead. He had been at the breach in the walls and had been killed in the bailey. No one had bothered to close the forebuilding, and so far as Geoffrey could see in his hurried trip back, there were no defenders there, so that the keep itself, if not already taken, was open to anyone who wished to walk in. Ian shook his head and stepped out into the bailey. Behind him, he heard Jamie mutter, “Stupid bastard,” in the coarse northern dialect.

  Sir Robert came up wiping his sword on a strip of tunic he had torn from some prisoner. Puzzlement was written large on his face. “My lord,” he protested, “there were far too few men, and the keep was ill prepared for war. What did the fool think he was doing, to defy you in such a case?”

  “I do not know,” Ian replied. “Make all secure, Robert, calm the servants and set them to work again. Let us not look a gift horse in the mouth.”

  It was all he could say under the circumstances, as above all, he did not wish to look this particular gift horse in the mouth. Stupid the castellan might have been, although it was not Simon’s way to appoint stupid, untrustworthy men—unless he had done it as a gesture to pacify “someone” in authority. Still, not even an idiot would have raised rebellion with his keep so undefended against retribution. The man had had time enough to prepare, heaven knew. And yet he did not prepare. Why? To that, there was only one answer. Because he did not expect that any attempt would be made to take his keep, not even when an army camped around it. Because he had expected help that had not come.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “Alinor,” Isobel said suddenly, “you must stop mourning for Simon. He has been dead near a year. You are making Ian very unhappy.”

  “But I do not mourn for Simon,” Alinor replied, lifting startled eyes from her work. “I never did mourn for him—he was very glad to die—I mourned only for myself, bereft and alone.”

  “You will not succeed, so do not waste your time in trying.” Isobel spoke rather sharply, for her. “I am not a man, whom you can send off on a false scent with a twist of your tongue. It has taken me a long time to find the courage to say this, and I will not be turned aside. That is a good man you married, and you are making his life a bitter hell.”

  “It has nothing to do with Simon,” Alinor sighed, tears rising to her eyes. “And you cannot say worse to me than I have said to myself. But it is not always so bad as it was yesterday. You saw us at our worst time. The first few days of our being together are very hard. In the letters we write, we cannot see each other’s eyes, you know. My words are kind, his are cheerful. Perhaps I
should not write at all, yet there is news I must send him and advice I must have from him. And I know he is unhappy, and I worry dreadfully that he will not guard himself properly, so I beg him to have a care and I say I miss him—I do miss him. Then he rides home, or I must send for him for some purpose—it is even worse when I send for him—and we meet—and—”

  Alinor burst into tears, and Isobel stared in blank amazement at her friend’s heaving shoulders. Then she rose heavily, for she was far gone with child again, and came around the embroidery frames. For a moment or two she caressed Alinor wordlessly. Then she drew her toward the bed where they could sit side by side, touching.

  “Every word you say speaks of love. You miss him. You worry about him. What then ails you, Alinor?”

  “A stupid, unimportant thing that I cannot drive out of me—a nothing, a shadow, and it is ruining my life and Ian’s.”

  “A shadow… Alinor, surely you cannot believe that Simon would disapprove or would deny you the—”

  “I told you Simon has naught to do with this.” Alinor uttered a choke of laughter in the midst of her tears. “Would I, for any reason, call Simon a nothing? If Simon knew what I was doing to Ian and why, he would rise from his grave to beat me for such a stupidity. But I cannot help it. I try and I try… Oh, let it lie, Isobel. I swear that scolding me will not help. Here I come to comfort you and—”

  “Comfort me? I thought you had come to help me bring another joy into the world. All goes well with me, Alinor, as you know. I do not have your fear of Ireland and, indeed, my news from William is excellent. As soon as I am lightened of the burden I carry, I will go to him there.” She cocked an eye at Alinor. “What, no outcry? You are not using all your powers, my love. You are allowing me to come back to the matter you wish to divert me from.”

  Alinor could not help laughing again. “It is not that I do not wish to talk of it, only that I can see no sense in hearing from you what I have already told myself so many thousand times.”

  “Now that shows you are not thinking clearly. You would never hear from me the things you would say. Never would I demean myself to use such language as you do, Alinor. No, now seriously, my love, you are plainly treading the same path around and around like a blindfold ox milling corn. Tell me the tale. If I see only the same things you do, then you have wasted an hour’s time. No more harm can come than that and, after all, we have naught better to do. We must wait until my little one decides he wishes to look upon the world.”

  It did not take long for Alinor to give Isobel a more complete version of Ian’s proposal than she had written, to describe his reluctance to return to the keep before they were married, and the events at the tourney. Isobel shook her head over Alinor’s interpretation of the events, but she did not contest it. She wanted the meat of the present matter.

  “So he might have some foolish, half-formed dream left over from childhood. Well, what of it? Simon loved the queen just so, and it did not trouble you.”

  “How did you know that?” Alinor asked in amazement.

  “It was written in his eyes for all to see.”

  “Perhaps.” Alinor shrugged. “But when he needed to choose, he chose me and not the dream.”

  “Well, if you are not the greatest ninny! Who do you think Ian would choose, if it came to the point?” Isobel was well-satisfied with the faint flush she saw rise in Alinor’s cheeks. Obviously, the very unoriginal idea she had stated had not occurred to her friend or had been deliberately overlooked. “What I want to know is not what Ian dreams but what has passed between you since you conceived this notion.”

  Alinor shuddered. “I tried to hide what I felt. I swear I did. But he sensed it. He knew that I knew. He tried every way—except renouncing the dream—to ease me and please me. Then he grew angry, which I did not blame him for in the least, and we parted. I went on progress to the keeps I had not visited since Simon’s illness, and he went to look over Adam’s lands and to examine carefully those three strongholds which he meant to wrest from the rebellious castellans.”

  ‘‘I do not desire an itinerary of your travels, Alinor. What do you mean, you tried to hide what you felt—what did you feel?”

  “Nothing.” Alinor’s eyes were desolate. “I am not angry or jealous—that much a fool I am not. I do not know how to say it, but it is like hearing a joke you do not understand. You laugh with your mouth, but inside you are not laughing. When Ian speaks to me, I answer, but only with my mouth; there is nothing inside. I serve him willingly, but with the same courtesy I would use to a stranger. I—”

  “Have you denied him your bed?” Isobel asked sharply.

  Despairingly but easily, as if from frequent practice, Alinor began to cry. She was shivering uncontrollably, and Isobel put her arms around her and held her close. After a while she quieted and shook her head.

  “Of course I have not. What cause have I for such a thing? It is horrible, horrible. Sometimes I cannot answer to him no matter what he does. That is not so bad, because I can pretend. I do not know if he is deceived, but it is not so awful as when he does arouse me. Then I am taken with such fits of weeping as I did not suffer even when Simon died.”

  “Some women are taken that way,” Isobel suggested.

  “Not I, and Ian knows it. It was very sweet between us, Isobel, until that accursed tourney.”

  That was the first really important thing Alinor had said. Isobel had wondered, despite Alinor’s denials, if she was making up excuses not to love Ian because of some stupid idea about being faithful to Simon. It seemed that was not the case. The problem really lay between Ian and Alinor. But what the problem was, Isobel still did not know. She was willing to credit that the trouble had started with a convulsion of hurt pride, but Alinor was not the type to hug her hurt to herself and inflict pain to soothe her spite.

  “Well then, you were hurt by Ian’s inconsiderate departure, but if it was so sweet between you, how could you allow a little thing like that to overset you?” Isobel wondered.

  “I do not know,” Alinor moaned. “I knew I had no cause to be jealous or angry. He never said there was no other woman. He never went to her but that one time. I have tried and tried to conquer my coldness.”

  “How?”

  “I have not let a cross word pass my lips. Even when Ian is furious and says cruel and dreadful things, I do not quarrel with him. I answer softly or give him his way. Isobel, never in my life have I been so obedient, so compliant to any man. I fulfill his lightest wish, no matter how foolish, without hesitation or any complaint.”

  Alinor was staring at her hands in her lap and did not see the growing expression of horror and astonishment in Isobel’s face. Her first view of it was when Isobel interrupted her catalogue of penances with a cry of “Oh, poor man!”

  “How poor man?” Alinor snapped, bristling at the unappreciative remark. “Since when do you think sweet compliance a wrong?”

  “Since you, against your nature, have adopted it. Compliance is for such hearts as mine, not for such as yours. Alinor, how could you! How long does Ian know you?”

  “I am not sure. Some seventeen years. How can that matter?”

  “And in all that time, how have you responded when you thought he was foolish or unreasonable?” Alinor was silent. Isobel nodded and put it into words. “You have told him, no doubt in language better fitted to one of your men-at-arms, what you thought of him, of his plans, of his brains, his ancestry, and everything else. And you did the same to Simon, right in front of Ian—since you did not regard him as a stranger or one to whom polite behavior was necessary. Am I right?”

  “Likely you are right, but I do not see what that has to do with my present trouble.”

  It was the very core of her trouble, Isobel believed. Alinor was of a totally open nature in her dealings with those she loved. When she was hurt or angered, she spat out her pain and thus relieved her heart. It was her crazy conviction that she had no right to lose her temper or be her own passionate, unreas
onable self because, however she denied it, she was jealous without cause. Naturally, every time she checked the hot words that rose to her lips, she reminded herself of the cause of her restraint and became jealous all over again. In addition, the projection of so much sweetness and good nature was doubtless curdling Alinor’s sharp and pungent soul. But Isobel was not about to say anything concerning that. It would only give Alinor a new guilt to brood upon.

  “I do not know what to say about your trouble,” Isobel replied obliquely, “but I see clearly a way to make Ian less unhappy. You say he senses your coldness. Perhaps—if so, you are mistaken and there is no other woman, not even a dream of one. A man does not sense such things unless his very soul is bound to their cause. If his inmost heart is fixed elsewhere, he sees only what is on the surface. But what is on your surface tells a clear enough tale to anyone who knows you well.”

  “But I tell you, I smile. I do not scold or complain.”

  Isobel burst out laughing. “Scold and complain you never did, but smile and be meek? Alinor, if you had suddenly become meek and obedient to Simon—before he fell ill and knew the reason, I mean—what would he have done?”

  A stricken expression came into Alinor’s eyes, and after a pause a giggle shook her. “He would have called the best physicians to attend me, believing that I was dying. Oh, Isobel, he did so once. You know, when I am breeding, toward the end I become very soft and satisfied. The first time, Simon grew near frantic. He hung over me and asked me every other moment whether I ailed and what troubled me. I thought he was run mad, until he finally spoke out and told me I was so complaisant he thought I was growing too weak to argue.”