Fires of Winter

by Roberta Gellis

  That solved—for a little while anyway—my troubles with sleeping beside Melusine. We were away three nights, two spent in hunting lodges and one in Alresford. I was not on duty that night, so I sought out a woman—a thing I doubt I would have done had my appetite not been whetted by my wife. Not that I had forgotten my little plan for inciting Melusine’s jealousy, but it was safe to seek relief in a town miles from Winchester without asking permission. I paid to keep the woman with me all night and used her well, striving to leech all the hot spirits out of my body. And so I learned from a whore a second lesson I would never forget: Using the whore of London taught me that pleasure increases with caring, not with beauty; using the whore of Alresford taught me that the act of futtering does not reduce desire. The moment I laid eyes on Melusine, I was as ready as I had ever been.

  If she had tried to find me and been angry at my absence, she had forgotten or put the anger aside. She seemed glad to see me; her dark eyes were bright when they found me, and she took my arm and clung to it as we all, huntsmen and stay-at-homes alike, trooped into the great hall to eat a much elaborated evening meal. For this meal there was no formality or precedence. Except for the king and queen on the dais, everyone seized food from the trays as they were borne about or set down and found seats where they could. The heads of the greatest kills were brought in—one of the boars was the king’s but another, even larger, was mine—and Melusine smiled at me, glowing with pride, and joined the shouts of approval before asking, “Were you hurt?” Clearly she knew that wild boars were not easy to kill, and it warmed my heart that she should ask about my safety.

  “A little bruised,” I replied. “I went over and the devil stepped on me before I finished him.”

  “I will look to it later,” she said calmly.

  I was strangely torn between relief and disappointment. I certainly did not want Melusine to express concern for me too openly before the whole court; to draw the eyes of others always makes me feel hot and desire to hide my face. But if she cared, would she not have sounded more anxious or tried to drag me away at once to make sure the hurt was not dangerous as Audris would have done? I knew I was telling the truth and had no more than a few bruises, but how could she know? Before I thought, I voiced the question, and Melusine laughed.

  “Because I am not likely to misjudge a man’s health no matter what he says. You rode here and were steady on your feet when you dismounted and you are eating well and with good appetite, so no great harm can have been done. I saw your color and the way you moved. I was only nine or ten years of age when I began to tend bruises and sew up rents in the hides of my bro—”

  Her voice quivered and stopped, and she closed her eyes. I took her hand and said, “Melusine. Melusine, do not—”

  She opened her eyes again. All the brightness was gone, but there were no tears. “You need not fear that I will fall to weeping again. I am sorry if I was a burden to you Monday last. You took me by surprise, and—”

  “You were no burden,” I said quickly, cutting her off. “Never mind that. Tell me instead what you decided to do about Edna and how you have managed with the queen’s ladies?”

  She shook her head, and her full lips twitched, but she told me that she had decided to keep Edna, at least until we left, because she had been able to tell the queen that I had given her a fool for a maid and use Edna as an excuse to spend nearly all her time in her own chamber. I think she was annoyed with me for believing she would say too much in public, but I would rather have her annoyed than take the chance that word of my plan to visit Ulle would get back to the king or queen and I might be forbidden to take Melusine into Cumbria. I would have tried to pacify her, but I had no chance. The parade of the kills had signalled the end of the meal. Before Melusine could finish her tale, several men who had not accompanied the hunt came to congratulate me on my kill and stayed…to talk to Melusine.

  She certainly knew how to please men, what to say to them to set them at ease, to draw smiles, and to manage the talk so that no one man had more than his proper share of her attention or the general conversation. I was more silent than I should have been; Melusine had to draw forth my voice more than once and I saw that the other men were looking at me and smiling. They would roast me well later and spread the word that I was jealous—but, odd though it may seem, I was not jealous.

  I was glad to see Melusine’s eyes gradually brighten as the talk and attention eased her grief. Perhaps I am not a jealous man, but it was also clear to me that Melusine was not trifling with the men around her; there was nothing in her manner to rouse a man’s lust—unless the man was one of those who thought her beautiful, and even then I thought it unlikely for any to be tempted. I myself felt none of that hot rush of desire that had flooded over me several days ago in the queen’s hall and in our bedchamber or even when she greeted me on arrival.

  Rather than being jealous, I was stunned by her skill. I had seen no woman but the queen so able to control a group of men, and the queen was older and, when she wished, could enwrap men in a motherly warmth. As that realization came to my mind, I understood at once how Melusine pleased without stimulating. She was…sisterly. I recalled her desperate weeping as she recounted the roll of her losses; well, she had practice enough in being sisterly with seven brothers. But I also remembered that I had responded to her as a woman whenever we talked alone. Had her manner to me been different? If so, was that difference deliberate?

  The very notion started a new rise of heat, and I forced myself to pay attention to the talk and participate in it more, meanwhile rising from the eating bench myself and moving Melusine away from the table. It was not long after that when the king and queen left the hall, and I could begin maneuvering our small group slowly down the hall toward the outer door. I made no haste, but Richard de Camville, a clever devil and a pleasant drinking companion (now that Audris was safe from him), became aware of what I had done when our slow progress stopped.

  “That is a most tactful hint, Bruno,” he said, chuckling and directing the attention of the other men to the guesthouse across the yard. “But tactful or not, my friends, I fear we are being told that we are not wanted.”

  “Clever man,” I remarked. “I knew I could count on you to save me. Gentlemen, Camville is seeing to the heart of the matter as he always does. You are not wanted. I have better company for this time of night.”

  Although Melusine responded easily to the teasing comments made on parting by the other men, I sensed that what I had said had startled her and was making her uneasy. To shift the subject from what she feared without renewing my promise not to urge coupling on her, I said the first thing that came into my head, which was that I did want to talk of our journey north—I did not say to Ulle, fearing to set her grieving again—but that I did not wish to discuss it where a report of our plans might come to the ears of the king or queen. As I spoke, I could see the tension go out of her, and when I had finished she nodded.

  “I am not a fool,” she said shortly, but without anger, and then, in the same indifferent voice added, “Take off your clothes and let me look at you.”

  I gaped at her, associating what she said only with the jesting remarks I had made to rid us of our companions. I could not believe I had been mistaken in her almost fearful reaction, and this flat-voiced invitation was scarcely seductive, but a hope sprang up in me that despite her fear she wished to be fully my wife. Fortunately, I was frozen for a moment in the conflict of hope and disbelief, and Melusine cocked her head questioningly.

  “I have seen you naked before,” she remarked. “There is no need to be coy.”

  There was something in her voice that warned me that I had somehow misunderstood her, but my head was bemused by my rod, which had risen to attention, and I could only ask, “Then why do you want to look at me?”

  Melusine had started to turn toward the door, but she stopped and stared at me over her shoulder, frowning. “To s
ee if your bruises need salving. Do you not remember I said I would look at them later?”

  My disappointment was profound but too mingled with amusement at how desire could wipe out of my mind what did not feed it to allow my rigid shaft to shrink. In the past I had tried to hide from Melusine the fact that she excited me. This time I thought it best to let her see my desire and show her too that I was not a slave to it, so I stripped off my clothes without more ado. She stood watching me as if she had forgotten that she had started to turn away, the puzzled frown still on her face; but that looked as if she had forgotten the expression too. When I was naked I found she had turned back to face me fully, and I smiled at her.

  “The bruises need no salving,” I said softly, “but you are very welcome to look at them—or any other part of me.”

  I saw her eyes flash down and widen, and she backed a step away.

  “I will not pretend that I do not desire you, Melusine,” I went on. “But you need not fear I will force you either. I am the master of Monsieur Jehan de la Tête Rouge—” I tapped the red head that had pushed its way through the foreskin so she could not mistake of what I spoke, “—not he of me.”

  There was a moment’s silence, then Melusine swallowed hard and stepped forward, her full lips thinned and her round chin jutting. “Then hold Monsieur hard back, for I think myself a better judge of hurts than you.”

  “He is as hard back as he will go,” I protested in a slightly choked voice, and then began to laugh.

  “Perhaps those are the wrong words,” Melusine said stiffly. “I know little of such matters.”

  That made me laugh even more, and she regarded me warily but continued to walk toward me, and when she was close enough, laid a hand on my black and blue ribs. I could feel her fingers tremble, but her hand was warm, not cold with fear, and she peeped downward once or twice while she felt my ribs. That was enough encouragement to keep my shaft hard and to tempt me to advance my cause. I leaned forward and kissed the bridge of her nose, which was all I could reach, her head being bent. She leapt back like a startled doe.

  “You promised—” she gasped, her voice trembling more than her fingers.

  “Only not to force you,” I pointed out. “I never said I would not try to make you willing. And you need not look at me as if I were threatening you with torture.”

  Indignation chased the fear from her face. “I am not afraid of pain,” she said, much more steadily, and then, her voice shaking again, “I agreed to a truce, not to a true marriage.”

  “As for pain, I do not think I would hurt you if you were willing—or, at worst, only a little and for a short time. As for marriage—will you or nill you, Melusine,” I reminded her, “we are truly married. For better or for worse, I am your husband. I would prefer that it be better between us.”

  She swallowed hard again. “It may be better for you if we couple. I do not think it would be better for me.”

  I shrugged. The talk and my inner knowledge that she was not yet ready to yield to me had reduced the urgency of my desire, but I was not looking forward to lying beside her without satisfaction for three more nights, or even one more. “Do you think you can be ready to leave tomorrow?” I asked as I got into bed. “Last Monday the king said we were to go in a week, but if the letters I am to carry have been written, I cannot see why we should not leave sooner.”

  The tense alertness of a creature poised to flee relaxed, and Melusine sounded more natural, even tart. “If you will tell me how much to take and how you intend it to be carried, I can be ready in a few hours.”

  “What do you mean, how much to take?”

  “Is the bed ours?” Melusine countered reasonably. “The bedding?”

  “Good God, I never thought of them,” I admitted, drawing Melusine’s pillows to me so I could prop myself upright. “I think they are only lent by the king and queen. I will ask.”

  She made a moue of distaste, which made me wonder whether she hated Maud and Stephen so much that it offended her to lie in a bed they owned, but her next remark offered a different interpretation for the expression. “I hope they are lent, but we still have the chests, which must go in a cart and that will make for slow travel. And—and I do not wish to sit in a cart like baggage.”

  The last sentence was almost a plea. “You ride?” I asked, feeling blank.

  I realized I had never thought of all the difficulties when I asked Stephen for permission to take Melusine with me. One thing I had not considered was how to get her to Jernaeve. I could not take her pillion on Barbe; he was not accustomed and was too nervous a horse to take a chance. But to give her the freedom of riding a horse of her own might be a temptation too great for a woman’s promise.

  “Yes, yes I do,” she said eagerly, and then, as if she had read the doubt in my face, “and I will not try to run away. I swear I will not.” In her earnestness she came to the bed and put out her hand, as she had when she had sworn truce.

  “Very well, you shall ride,” I agreed, glad to make it seem that I was doing her a favor.

  In reality I could see no other way of getting to Jernaeve, doing the king’s business, and still finding time to visit Ulle. But even if Melusine rode well, that still left the problem of what to do with those things that could not be taken with us. In the past, my baggage had always gone with the king’s, and before I came to court I never had more than could be carried in a blanket roll behind Barbe’s saddle.

  “But we will not be able to leave tomorrow,” I went on. “I will have to make arrangements to store the chests and whatever else we do not take. There is no chance the king will remain here long, and I do not wish to burden anyone with the responsibility for our possessions.”

  Melusine nodded. “It is better to have a home to which possessions can be sent and faithful servants who will see that they arrive safely.”

  Our eyes met. “As soon as I can,” I agreed and then, cautiously, “if you can bear to live there.”

  I had taken Melusine’s hand when she promised not to flee from me and she had not withdrawn it. Now her grip tightened on mine, and I drew her closer and put an arm around her.

  “I do not know.” Her voice quavered, but she steadied it. “I think about it often, and it seems to grow less painful. When we are there, if I cannot bear it…” She buried her face in my shoulder. “I do not know what I will do. Papa would be so angry…”

  I did not make any direct reply. What could I say except that her father was dead and would not care at all—and that might hurt her more than believing he did care. I stroked her hair for a minute and then bade her softly to make ready for bed, turning her gently so I could untie and unlace her bliaut. She pulled away before I was quite finished, thanking me in a choked voice and saying she could finish for herself, and all but ran to the other side of the room. I was puzzled by Melusine’s change of mood, for she had come into my arms herself, and I had made no sexual gesture that could frighten her. Still, I knew she could not be pushed further that day, so I tossed her pillows back to her side of the bed and lay down with my back to her to give her privacy to finish undressing.

  It was as well that I had realized I would have too much to do to leave the following day. When I arrived in the king’s antechamber at dawn, there were already petitioners waiting, each pressing to be heard first, if not by right of earliest arrival then by right of the urgency of their business. And long before the king was ready to see anyone at all, the bishops of Winchester and Salisbury came in, both with sour downturned mouths. To give Stephen a little warning, I remarked after I told him they were waiting, that perhaps we should not have spent quite so much time in the chase, but he seemed at first not to want to understand, laughing and clapping me on the shoulder.

  “I am delighted that your wife already finds your presence so necessary to her that she quarrels with you over your absence,” he said. Then I saw he understood very well
because he added, “My ministers do not have the same excuse but seem to feel the same way—or say they feel the same way while they urge me to give them the power to rule my country without me altogether.”

  My chest tightened with anxiety. That sounded as if Stephen suspected Winchester and Salisbury of wishing to overthrow his rule. I could not be sure about Salisbury, but it could not be true of Winchester; he was Stephen’s brother.

  “It is not that they wish to restrict your pleasure,” I offered, trying to seem unaware of the direction the king’s remark pointed. “The bishops fear, because of the recent troubles, that you might be drawn away again to defend your throne before necessary business is done. I am sure that if you explained carefully that they can trust the queen—”

  “They do not wish to trust Maud,” Stephen said in a peculiar voice. “They want the power themselves, so they look for problems, not solutions.”

  He was, I thought, partly resentful and partly uncertain, and I would have been hard put to find an answer that would not have deepened his resentment. All I could think was that King Henry had trusted Salisbury to rule England for many years at a time and few had complained of the bishop’s management—and that answer would only have made Stephen angrier. Fortunately he did not wait for me to speak, gesturing irritably during his last few words for me to bring Salisbury and Winchester in.

  I was surprised to see that Stephen had smoothed the anger from his face in the few minutes it took me to fetch the bishops into his bedchamber, and he greeted them with a jest about trying to escape a scolding for running away from his duties by seeing them before he was truly awake. Both smiled at once, making me wonder if their sour looks had been owing to expectations of an unpleasant greeting rather than irritation with Stephen for hunting. It might be, I thought, recalling that stiff, uncomfortable dinner the day after my wedding. Winchester pressed the king’s shoulder gently, saying that Stephen deserved a few days’ rest. But Salisbury, although he looked quite benign, remarked that King Henry had loved the hunt also and found it restored the balance of his mind.