“None.”
“I do.” Chester flicked an ant off his shim. “Men like Leicester and Derby are worth only what we make them worth to us.”
“I don’t believe that, Chester.” He wondered if Chester himself believed it and decided that he did.
“Then you don’t understand yourself. You need not answer me now. When you want to join us, let me know of it, and we will discuss the terms of it.” He smiled; his unwinking, bulging eyes were sleek with confidence. “Like kings.”
Fulk looked away, down toward the city; the sun had gone down, and behind him, in the dusk, a nightingale began to sing. Lights showed in the city and the besieged castle. After a moment, Chester got up and went to his horse, mounted, and rode away. Where he had been sitting, the grass sprung up, leaf by leaf, hiding the gaps he had torn out.
All that night, Leicester's men battled the looters, drove them from street to street among the burning houses, the garbage, and the swine; Fulk, sitting in his tent listening to Morgan’s harp. Could hear occasional shouts and screams. He had tried to find Rannulf to tell him what had happened between him and Chester, so that Rannulf could report it to the prince, but Rannulf was not in the camp. Fulk thought he was with the prince.
The problem of supply would lessen when the city was quiet, because the supply masters of each army could buy in the marketplace, but the normal trade of Stamford would hardly be enough. He had not yet gone to Highfield, to ask Rohese to sell the army herds and grain, although he had thought of that, and of Red Alys of Dol, every day since he had heard how close Highfield was. There was no sense doing anything before he understood all the implications.
While Morgan sang of the knight on the road, Fulk wrote out instructions to the supply masters of the army, and read letters from his steward concerning his own demesne. His Norman lands, the seat of his family, seemed as distant and indistinct as a star; he had not been there in over a year, an extraordinary absence. Yet William Malmain his steward reported that the vicomté was quiet and the crops growing to a great harvest. The maturing yellow wine, the kind Fulk liked best, was better than usual, William wrote; since traveling ruined it, he hoped Fulk would come to Bruyère before it was all drunk up.
I’ll go at Christmas. Hugh should be knighted at Bruyère, anyway. He thought, as he had before, of leaving Hugh his Norman lands, and Rannulf only the Honor of Bruyère in England, less certain bequests Fulk intended for the White Monks. No one man could care for all that land anyway. That was probably Thierry’s argument. Fulk made aimless marks with his pen along the margin of the letter he was reading. Most of the great lords of England had lost their Norman lands when Prince Henry’s father had conquered Normandy from Stephen.
Stephen had given some of his barons compensation, of course, which was how Chester had come into his claim of the Honor of Lancaster, and the Honor of Bruyère was one of the smaller important holdings in England, only four hundred and eight knights’ fees. Fulk drew a circle in the margin; his pen was dry, and he dipped it again in the ink.
When he had succeeded his grandfather as lord of Stafford he had come all unprepared into as much as Rannulf would inherit, and he had learned it eventually. If he split up the demesne, Hugh at least would fret for lack of things to do.
He wrote William Malmain a letter, to tell him that he would come to Bruyère in Normandy for Christmas and that Hugh and Morgan would be knighted then. William could also arrange for the commissioning of a statue of the Virgin, for the chapel at Bruyère-le-Forêt, from one of the woodcarvers in Rouen. He paused, trying to remember the name of the man who had done the work in the new church at Bruyère.
Morgan was in the middle of a verse, and Fulk waited until it had ended. Putting down the pen, he called, “Morgan, will you come here?”
The music stopped, and Morgan walked around from the back of the tent to stand before his table. The tent all around them was stacked up with packed baggage, to be moved into the city the next day.
“We are knighting Hugh, this Christmas,” Fulk said. “You should be knighted then, too.”
Morgan put his hands behind his back. “No, my lord.”
“You’re old enough, and you’ve learned enough as a squire to make you a good knight, Morgan—there isn’t much more you can learn as a squire.”
“I hate swords,” Morgan said. “I hate shields, and fighting, and all the worse than fighting, and I will not be a knight, ever, my lord.”
Amazed, Fulk stared at him, his mind empty. What the abbot of Saint Swithin had said of the children of the wars came back to him, that they had learned nothing worthy of them. Arguments boiled up in his mind, and he rejected them all. He knew Morgan would not care what other people thought of him, a man of his blood who did not become a knight.
“Whatever pleases you, Morgan.”
“Thank you, my lord. You need a harp player more than a knight, anyway.”
Morgan went back to his playing. Fulk watched him. He would have to get another squire, because Morgan would soon be too old for a squire. One of the candles was guttering, and he realized that he was sleepy. But he did not rise; he sat drawing in the margin of the letter until Morgan had finished the song of the knight on the road.
He finished the letter the next morning and signed it and put it away until he could unpack his seals to seal it with; somebody shouted outside his tent, and he looked up.
Morgan went outside to see what was happening, and immediately put his head in the door and said, “My lord, come out.”
Fulk got up and went into the sunshine and the bright wind. Everywhere in the camp, men were carrying their goods toward the wagons. Leicester and three other men were leading a packed horse untoward him, and when he saw Fulk Leicester booted his mount forward and dismounted.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and caught Fulk by the arm. “He’s dead, Fulk.”
Fulk brushed past him and went to the side of the burdened horse and pulled back the covering. It was Rannulf, his head turned against the skirt of the saddle, and his hair hanging down. Fulk stood with his arm stiffly outstretched, holding back the flap of the cloak, frozen. “No,” he said. “Oh, no.”
“A man of mine found him in an alley in the city—he was stabbed. Come inside, Fulk.”
Fulk let go of the cloak, and it fell back across Rannulf’s head. “Help me,” he said. He pulled blindly at the ropes that held Rannulf onto the horse, and all those around him moved up and unhitched the ropes and helped him lift the body down.
Leicester said something, but Fulk could not hear it; he was weeping and a rushing sound filled his ears so that he could hear nothing. They carried Rannulf into the tent. Morgan cried out. They laid Rannulf on the ground, and Fulk knelt beside him and pulled off the cloak. Blood covered the boy’s chest, and there were two deep wounds in his right side. He had not even worn mail.
“He was stabbed from behind,” Fulk said. “Who?”
Leicester sent away his men. “Looters, I would think. We found him in the alley this morning, as you see him.”
“What was he doing in Stamford?”
“Chester sent him in last night, apparently, to carry this message to Thierry.” Leicester took a scrap of canvas from his coat; there was writing on it.
“Chester sent him alone?”
“I don’t know.”
Fulk looked at the piece of canvas. The scribbling on it blurred so he could not read it. He said, “It’s for my sins. God has stricken me for my sins.”
“Will you take him to Ledgefield?”
Fulk made a small sound in his throat. Morgan had sunk down near Rannulf’s head and was staring at him. “Is it too far?” Fulk said. “But Eleanor would want to bury him. His lady.”
Leicester said, “I will arrange it.” He got up and went to the door.
Fulk looked around. Roger came in. “My lord—” He knelt stiffly in his hauberk. “Do you need me, my lord?”
“We’ll take him to Ledgefield.”
“They say that Chester sent him to the city and he was killed there,” Roger said.
Fulk nodded; he was staring at Rannulf’s face. It looked much older. My son is dead. He could not bear to think of Margaret. Morgan went to a chest and opened it and took out a cloak lined with fur. Coming back, he unhooked the clasp of the one Rannulf was wearing. The sentry said, “My lord, my lord of Chester is here.”
With Chester came Rannulf’s squire, who began to help Morgan. Chester said, “Fulk, I had no idea he would go alone. He knew the city was—”
“Thank you,” Fulk said mechanically, to make him stop.
“They’re blaming me, all over the camp,” Chester said. “Everyone liked Rannulf.”
Fulk stood up. Eleanor, Rannulf’s wife, with her two baby children—He thought again of Margaret. The sentry let Simon d’Ivry in, who bent down to look at Rannulf and threw a harsh glare at Chester. Fulk stared at Chester, wondering what he was doing in here, and the sentry put his head in the door and said that Thierry was outside.
“No,” Fulk said, but Thierry was already through the door.
“Poor Rannulf,” Thierry said, and knelt down and put his hand on the boy’s wounds.
Fulk went over to Leicester and said softly, “Get them out of here, please.”
Leicester spoke to the men filling the tent. Fulk went into the back, among the piles of packed baggage. He felt hot, and he ground the heels of his hands into his eyes to stop the tears flowing.
“They’re gone,” Morgan said, and he turned. Even Leicester was gone. Rannulf’s squire had wrapped Rannulf into the cloak. Morgan was straightening the body’s legs.
“Let me,” the other squire cried. “He was my master.”
Morgan slid back out of the way. We should take him to Stafford, Fulk thought. And lay him under the altar where his mother lies and his great-grandfather, where I will lie. Ledgefield was closer. It’s for my sins. See how I am punished. He pressed his fist to his chest.
A man of Leicester’s came back, with Roger, and Roger said, “My lord, we have a litter. Is that enough?”
“Yes.”
He had bled so much—his clothes were stiff with blood; if they had found him sooner, might he not have lived? Fulk wiped his face on his sleeve. Don’t think that way. I could not find him last night, he must have been in Stamford.
Hugh came in, looked at Rannulf, and came straight to Fulk. “My lord, shall I go with you? To Ledgefield.”
Fulk jerked his head up. He had not thought of Hugh once. Calm, not crying, Hugh met his gaze and said, “I’m sorry. Let me go.”
“I should have asked you to,” Fulk said.
“Do they know who did it?”
Fulk shook his head. “Looters. Maybe we can find out.” Hugh’s face was all new to him, like a stranger’s: my living son. “Did you see him before he died? Yesterday?”
“No. I haven’t seen much of him since he came. We always fought, you know that.”
So did he and I. Fulk shook his head; he felt as if he were waking up. He looked around the tent. “When will we leave?”
“Before noon,” Roger said. “Morgan, get your lord some wine.”
“No. I’d get drunk.” Fulk stood up. “Morgan, you’ll have to unpack again, I’ll need clothes. We’ll be gone some days, Hugh. Get ready.” He walked aimlessly around the tent, and went to the door. Outside, the camp in the confusion of breaking up covered the stretch of land between him and Stamford, and he stood and watched it all blur and clear and blur before his eyes.
Ledgefield Castle stood on a low round hill, baked hot and brown by the late summer sun; like Stafford, it had a gatehouse and a tower opposite each other on the wall, but it was made of gray limestone, not the red rock of Stafford. They reached it in three days from Stamford, and took the body into the chapel and laid it out before the altar.
Hugh had gone on ahead of Fulk to tell Eleanor. She met them and led them into the chapel; Fulk beside her could see her hands trembling, but she neither wept not spoke, and her pale, thin face was expressionless. She looked at Rannulf once, after he had been laid out, and turned to Fulk.
“Come inside, my lord.”
She took him across the courtyard. The chickens scattered before her, clucking; her household was all gathered in a quiet knot by the well. Hugh was arranging everything, she said, in a toneless voice, and took him up the stairs into the gatehouse. She passed the door into the hall and went up another flight of steps to the top room, where she slept and where her children were.
“She is asleep,” she said, nodding toward the bed on the far side of the room. Fulk could see the little girl curled up on it, beside a hunting dog. It was getting dark, and Eleanor picked up a candle and lit it from one on the wall. She lifted the candle over the cradle.
All Fulk could see of the baby was its mass of dark hair and a fat little hand. Eleanor thrust her free hand out quickly to catch the wax dripping down the candle, so that it would not splash on her baby, and turned away. The light shone on her plaited yellow hair and in her pale eyes.
“I can’t believe he’s dead.” She whimpered and moved away. “I thought I would see him once again, at least.” When she walked, the bundle of keys at her belt jangled; she walked heavily, like an old woman. She was seventeen.
“Mama?” the little girl called sleepily, and the dog lifted its head and licked her face. Her nurse came out of the alcove and went over to quiet her. Fulk heard the murmur of the old woman and the child’s drowsy voice and went out the door after Eleanor.
“Will you find out who did it?”
“I’ll try. I don’t know. They robbed him, we’ll keep watch for what they took.”
“Since Hugh came I looked at the babies, until you came. Just at my babies.” She went down the narrow stairs, holding the candle up with one hand and her skirts with the other.
“Where is Hugh?”
“In here.” On the landing before the door into the hall, she pulled at the latch, and it opened immediately from inside. Roger backed up to let them in.
“Thank you, Sir Roger,” Eleanor said. She put down the candle, took a napkin edged in braided red and yellow thread and blew her nose. Her head turned toward Fulk. “Do you think it was an accident, that my husband died?”
Roger went off across the room, toward the bed in the corner. Morgan was there already, watching from the shadows, with Hugh. Fulk frowned at Eleanor. “What do you mean?”
“I have lived thus far in my life and seen nothing that was accident,” she said. “Tell me it was an accident that my husband is dead.”
“He was robbed and murdered,” Fulk said. With a glance, he saw that Roger was watching him intently. Chester sent him there, he thought; his heart was hammering, and he could not meet Eleanor’s eyes. Chester—he shook his head. “I know what you mean. It was an accident.”
All her face swollen, her eyes red behind their pale, thin lashes, Eleanor faced him, exactly his height, and said, “I want my vengeance.”
There was a page near the door. Fulk beckoned to him. “Go to bed, my lady.”
“Rannulf is dead, I want vengeance.”
The page stood beside her. Fulk said, “Light my lady to her rooms, boy. Eleanor, I have to go back to Stamford tomorrow. Whoever killed him, I will find out.”
“God’s curse on you if you do not.” She turned stiffly, as if she were made of wood, and followed the page and his candle. From the doorway, Fulk watched her go up the stair, and after she had rounded the corner he watched the candlelight bobbing along the wall. He pulled the door shut by the iron ring of the latch.
“Do you think it was an accident?” Roger said.
Fulk crossed the room to the end where the bed was. On the hearth, there was a basin of water warming, and he sent Morgan for it. He thought, If it were no accident, then I am not guilty. “I would believe that it wasn’t, if I could think who would want to kill Rannulf.”
“Chester sent him there alone.”
; “Why should Chester kill him?” He pulled off his coat and his shirt; Morgan put the basin down in front of him, and he bent to wash his face and hands. “Chester would kill me, not Rannulf. Thierry would kill me. You just want someone to strike back at.” He dried himself off and reached for his shirt again.
“Where are you going?” Morgan said. “You are tired. You should sleep.”
To the chapel,” Fulk said. He put on his shirt again and took his coat over his arm. “To pray.”
Eleanor cried all through the mass, and her daughter, terrified, clung to her and howled. Fulk could hardly keep his eyes open. He had slept a while, on the floor of the chapel, but it had not been enough. The stench of the dead man drowned the incense. The voice of the priest sounded as if it came from a great distance. They carried Rannulf down into the vault under the altar, and the clammy, sweating air woke Fulk up a little. Eleanor’s sobs and the screams of the little girl and the baby reverberated around the tomb. Long before they went back up into the chapel, Fulk was shaking violently. Roger saw it and gave him his cloak.
They went up into the sunlight, the soft wind, and the blue sky. Their horses were waiting, and Roger sent the knights who had come with them to mount up. Eleanor came over, clutching the baby, with the little girl in the arms of her nurse and still screaming.
“My lord, when I spoke last night—” She bit her lip until it turned white. “I was wild, I meant no insolence.”
“You are never insolent.” She hadn’t slept either, he could tell by her hollow eyes. “I wish I could stay longer. Is there anything I can say to comfort you?”
“My lord, you know there is not.” In her arms, the baby looked up at her solemnly and yawned.
“Take your children and go to your mother. I don’t want you to stay here alone.”
“No,” she said. “I have Ledgefield to rule, I’m a grown woman now. Be careful, my lord.”
THE EARL (A HAMMER FOR PRINCES) Page 24