by Alys Clare
She did not know.
She looked up to speak to the Domina but she had gone. Helewise stood alone in the clearing enduring the agony of her thoughts.
Seventeen
Josse and Ninian made their way up to the coast by the network of paths and tracks that spread out from the meandering Seine as the river made its stately way westwards to the sea. Josse felt strongly that they must remain out of sight, and keeping off the main roads ensured that few people would remember, if asked, a big man and a lad riding good horses and leading a distinctive grey.
He told himself his caution was in case any of the surviving Knights of Arcturus were on their trail, determined to take back the black figure, but he knew in the depths of his mind that this was not true.
He was not sure what he feared. Sometimes when he was very tired he thought he heard a baby; sometimes it cried; sometimes it made gurgling sounds of contentment.
It just went to show, he thought, how grief, anxiety and fatigue could play tricks.
They left the river and headed off north towards Fecamp. Josse knew the little place and had decided it was a better option than the bigger ports such as Le Havre or Dieppe. As they approached the sea, calm and silvery-grey under the bright afternoon sun, he saw that he and Ninian need not even advertise their presence in Fecamp for, ahead of them on the shore, he spotted a small fishing hamlet where a cluster of wooden-framed dwellings made a semicircle round a jetty stretching out into the sea. Tied to the jetty was a small fleet of fishing boats and some larger craft. He drew rein, signalling to Ninian, and, wheeling Horace round, headed back into the shade of a small copse through which they had just passed.
‘Stay here with the horses,’ Josse said, ‘while I go down to the shore and ask about passage over to England.’
Ninian nodded, already jumping down to take Horace’s reins. ‘Be careful, Josse,’ he said. He looked worried. Josse nodded an acknowledgement.
He trotted over the short, wiry grass, pleased to be using different muscles after so long in the saddle. In the hamlet he quickly found a seaman happy to take two people and three horses over to Pevensey. The price was steep — with no competition, for his boat was the only one available that could transport horses, the seaman could ask what he liked — but Josse agreed. They would sail on the evening tide.
Josse bought a flagon of cider, some fresh bread, a large creamy cheese and two small onions from the seaman’s wife and hurried back to the hiding place in the trees. He and Ninian consumed the food and most of the cider, and then Ninian curled up in the shade and went to sleep.
Josse sat with his back to a birch tree, staring out over the distant sea and listening to the natural sounds all around. Birds sang; a soft breeze stirred the leaves. The three horses, their tack removed and hobbled to prevent them straying far, tore at the grass. Ninian snored gently. No baby sounds now, Josse reflected.
I imagined those little cries, he thought. My half-aware mind heard an animal or a bird and, because I am tired and grieving, translated it into a human sound. I must not give way to such fancies.
Firmly he turned his mind to Philippe de Loup and the Knights of Arcturus. He had not liked leaving the dead man out there in his lonely grave; it went against everything he believed in. No prayers were said over de Loup; no marker told others where he rested. Even thinking about it now gave Josse a shudder of abhorrence and he vowed that he would have prayers said for de Loup’s soul as soon as he was back at Hawkenlye.
But what else could I have done? Josse asked himself. Aye, I could have returned to Chartres and found a law officer to tell him there was a dead man out on the road beside the river, and that would have brought down on my head such a barrage of suspicious questions that I should have been driven to my knees. Moreover, it would not take a genius to connect de Loup with however many of the knights were found in the cathedral crypt, dead or too badly injured to escape. I would probably have been accused of laying out the night watchmen too.
Even if Josse had been prepared to risk his freedom, going back to Chartres would have involved Ninian. Josse could have tried to make the lad go on alone, but he knew Ninian would not have left him. The boy had a loyal heart.
Ninian. Josse took another mouthful of cider and thought back to the eager boy he had met seven years ago. They had liked each other straight away, he and Ninian; even before Josse fell in love with the lad’s mother, he had taken to Ninian for his own sake. When Josse did what Joanna asked and found a place for the boy, in his fellow knight Sir Walter Asham’s household, he had swallowed the pain of leaving the lad with no expectation of ever seeing him again. Unlike Joanna, Josse had no scrying glass. But then — it was funny how life worked out — their paths had crossed once more. Now Ninian seemed to have attached himself firmly to Josse’s side, as if, with Piers dead, he had turned into Josse’s squire.
What should I do with him? Josse wondered, the question instantly answered with a slightly mocking echo. Do with him? He will not be done to; he will decide for himself.
Ninian had said he did not wish to return to Sir Walter. Had he not been happy there? Josse did not know. What else would the boy do? Once he had returned the black goddess to Hawkenlye, then what?
Josse had not yet found the right moment to tell Ninian about Meggie. He glanced across at the sleeping boy. I will do so this night, he vowed. Before we set foot on English soil, I will tell him. Joanna would be happy, he thought, to think of her son and her daughter meeting at last.
Joanna… There was something that had been nagging at him ever since the night in the cathedral. Now, at last, he let himself think about it. She had been saying goodbye; until now, even approaching that aching moment had threatened to undermine him totally. Even now, tears filled his eyes as he pictured her. He had asked if she wanted to go and she had said it was the only way, whatever that meant. She had told him she loved him and her children, and that she could only bear to leave them because she knew Josse would care for them. She must have known Ninian was there, he thought — of course she did! — for then she had said something about Meggie being able to see her and speak to her and added that she hoped this was the gift she left to any of her blood. Ninian too, she seemed to be saying, would be able to commune with her in whatever form she now took.
He saw but could scarcely take in the obvious conclusion: Joanna wanted Josse to take care of Ninian as well as Meggie. Why else, he asked himself, with a sudden lift of the heart, why else say, it is only because I know you will look after them so well that I can leave them? She said ‘them’, not ‘her’; she meant both her children.
I must not force this on to Ninian, Josse thought. For my part, I am overjoyed at the prospect of becoming Ninian’s guardian, but I must make quite sure he feels the same.
He drank some more cider. The fierce, sharp pain of thinking about Joanna and picturing her pale, tired face was already lessening, softened by the images of a life with Joanna’s children. My children, he thought drowsily, living in my household; Meggie because she is of my blood and Ninian because all of us wish it so.
The empty mug fell from his hand as he slipped into sleep.
Josse woke up to be faced by dazzling orange as the sun went down in the west and the shining sea reflected the brilliant sky. He stretched and yawned, watching Ninian as the boy packed their gear with neat, economic movements. His face was set, and his eyelids were pink and puffy, as if he had been crying.
‘Ninian?’ Josse asked tentatively.
The boy looked up swiftly, then bent once more to his task. ‘I’m all right.’
But you’re not, lad, Josse thought, any more than I am. Still, if a stern facade was the boy’s way of keeping his emotions under control, it was not Josse’s place to attempt to get beneath it.
Ninian ran out of jobs to do and, after a brief hesitation, came to sit beside Josse. ‘How long till we go?’ he asked.
‘Our boat sails two hours after sunset,’ Josse replied. ‘We’ve a while ye
t.’
Silence fell. Josse, very aware of Ninian beside him, sensed strongly that there was something the boy wanted to say. He’ll need to speak of his mother, Josse thought, praying for the strength to respond without breaking down.
When Ninian finally rounded up his courage and broke the silence, it was not at all what Josse had expected. ‘Josse,’ he began, ‘I feel really bad because I lied to you.’
‘Eh?’
‘I think Sir Piers did too, but I’m sure he didn’t want to any more than I did. It was to protect someone else, you see, and no matter how much we liked you there just wasn’t any choice. I hope you’re not disappointed in me.’ He hung his head.
Josse thought carefully before speaking. ‘It’s perhaps a little like attacking in self-defence, isn’t it?’ he said eventually. ‘You and I had to hurt the knights down in the crypt because they were trying to kill us. Sometimes you have to do something that’s usually regarded as bad because the alternative is even worse.’
‘Yes, that’s it, sort of,’ Ninian said eagerly.
There was a pause, heavy with the weight of things unsaid. Josse waited.
‘I think I can tell you now, Josse,’ Ninian said in a low voice. ‘You see, we were protecting someone’s good name. He — this person — was doing a good thing, but everyone would have thought he was involved in a very bad one.’
Josse began to understand. ‘You’re talking about what happened on the Ile d’Oleron.’
‘Yes. De Loup told you that the king was against the Knights of Arcturus and everything they were and did, and I could see that it came as a complete surprise to you and you’d had no idea until that moment. Well, Josse, I could have told you ages ago, only Sir Piers and I vowed that we would not mention King Richard’s name at all. We knew what the gossips would say — it’s funny but people always want to believe the worst possible interpretation of events, don’t they? — and we decided it was safer to pretend that our saviour was an unknown knight. We were convinced that de Loup and his knights would keep quiet about King Richard’s involvement that night — it would not reflect well on them that one man fought off all of them to rescue me and Sir Piers — and we swore to do the same.’ He sighed. ‘But now the king is dead, Sir Piers is dead, the knights have lost their treasure and, with their leader and driving force also dead, are probably in disarray.’ He raised his clear blue eyes to Josse. ‘You know, anyway, so now I can confess that I told you a lie and hope you forgive me.’
‘Of course I do,’ Josse said warmly. ‘You had no choice, Ninian, and what you did was right and honourable. If the king had not had the moment of carelessness that allowed the guard who rowed the three of you out to the ship to see his face, the secret would never have emerged.’ He paused, thinking hard. ‘But it is better this way,’ he concluded. ‘Now, if by some devious means the tale of what went on in that tower should ever be whispered again, Queen Eleanor will know the truth.’
He had imagined that, having confessed and with his fault off his conscience, Ninian would have relaxed, but instead he seemed even more tense. Again, Josse waited.
‘Josse?’
‘I’m listening, lad.’
‘Josse, you know about Thorald of Lehon?’
‘Aye, I do.’ He was wary at the mention of that name. Thorald of Lehon was, in the eyes of the world, Ninian’s father. The truth was a closely guarded secret which Ninian might not know…
‘He’s dead,’ Ninian went on quickly. ‘He wasn’t my father, even though he was married to my mother.’
‘Aye.’ For a wonderful moment, Josse wondered if Ninian was bringing up the subject of his fatherless state because he envisaged Josse in that role.
‘I found out something,’ the boy said. ‘When I was ten, Sir Walter took me and lots of the other boys to a melee. It was really exciting. We watched heaps of mock battles and there was this one knight who was so good he- But that’s not important.’ He paused, taking a steadying breath. ‘There were some great names at the tournament and Sir Walter had to have us drilled and coached so that we did not let him down in front of the lords and ladies. Anyway, this old couple were watching the fighting from a box up in the stands and they kept staring at me. The woman was muttering to her ladies, and other people were looking too. I didn’t like it and I slipped away on a pretend errand, only then I thought I’d really like to know why they were so interested in me, so I crept round behind their box and listened.’ His face was red and he did not meet Josse’s eyes.
‘The old man had gone back to watching the sport, but the lady and her women were still muttering, and one of them said something about fun and games and pretty girls slipped into chambers to warm the beds. I didn’t understand — then — and I thought they meant servants with warming pans. Then the old woman said, “I asked and he was ten last September, so he’d have been got that Christmas at Windsor,” and she mentioned something about fine new apartments and enough room for lots of women, and she talked about people called Bellebelle and Rosamund.’
Josse had heard the tale before. Lost in the past, he saw Joanna, her face as scarlet as her son’s was now as she confessed her shame and humiliation.
‘Then — ’ Ninian’s voice was sharp with anguish and Josse was jerked back to the present — ‘then she said, “The lad’s got the look all right and those eyes are unmistakeable.”’ He put his hands over his face.
Josse said carefully after a moment, ‘Did you know what she meant?’
‘I guessed she was referring to me, but I didn’t understand the rest. Some of the older boys must have heard the rumours because that night they cornered me in the stables and pulled off my hat so they could look at me. They made me stare at them and they started jeering and saying I was a nobody and blue eyes didn’t make me a… didn’t prove anything. I got really angry and I threw off the boy who was holding me down. Then I grabbed a pitchfork and swung it at him and the others, and I hit one and made a big cut over his eye. One of them said I had the temper to go with the eyes, and then one of the squires heard the rumpus and came out and we all got a beating.’ He had removed his hands and was sitting up straight, shoulders squared. ‘I fought them off, Josse, and they didn’t taunt me any more. One of them who was nicer than the rest explained.’
‘You know, then?’ Josse asked gently.
Ninian turned to look at him. ‘Yes, Josse, I know.’
‘Don’t think ill of your mother,’ Josse urged. ‘She was young and inexperienced, and her cousin manipulated her and made it happen.’
Ninian’s clear eyes showed no shadow of doubt. ‘Yes, I understand that. The squire who sought me out to tell me explained what it was like back in those days.’ Then, curiosity in his voice, ‘How did you know?’
‘Your mother told me.’ For a precious moment he gave the lovely memory full rein. Then, carefully storing it away again, he added, ‘I’ve known since the three of us were together in the house in the woods, all those years ago.’
‘You never told anyone?’
‘I told Abbess Helewise of Hawkenlye but nobody else. As for your mother, I understand she told just one other person. It was her secret, Ninian, and now it’s yours.’
Slowly he nodded. Then, his voice so tentative that it made Josse’s heart ache, he said, ‘Do you think he knew too?’
Josse had to think for a moment. ‘King Richard, you mean?’
‘Yes.’
Did he? Josse wondered. Apart from his understandable wish to rout out the evil things that were being done on his mother’s island, had the king found out the identity of one of the knights’ intended victims? Had his fear for the boy urged him on in that dash across Oleron, that furious attack on the tower at World’s End?
Perhaps. It would be typical of Richard to adopt a cause for a sentimental reason and pursue it as vigorously as only he knew how. On the other hand, he was not renowned for acts of kindness for his full siblings, so was it likely he would have fought so hard for a half-brother? Then
again, King Richard’s full brothers were in the habit of conspiring against him, whereas Ninian was not. Perhaps…
‘I don’t know, lad.’
Ninian nodded. ‘Well, you weren’t there,’ he said fairly. ‘I think-’ He stopped, reddening again.
‘Go on. What do you think?’
He raised his head proudly. ‘I think he did know that we shared a father. He took such care of me, Josse. Sir Piers was going to take me on the horse he’d grabbed, but the king wouldn’t let him. He said I’d be safer with him. It was stormy that night and the wind was howling, and the knights were yelling and I was really scared, but I thought I heard him say something about brothers sticking together.’ He raised his chin as if defying Josse to contradict.
In that moment he looked so like Henry II of England that it was unmistakeable. If he had cause to adopt that particular expression that night, Josse thought, then King Richard would have known the truth in that instant even if he had not done so before.
Did it matter? he asked himself. If it helped a grieving boy to get over a terrible period in his life, then would it hurt to let him believe that his royal kinsman had deliberately set out to save his young half-brother’s life? It might well be the truth, in any case..
‘Then,’ he said, reaching out to put an arm round the boy’s shoulders, ‘you’re probably right and he did know.’ Smiling, trying to lighten the intense mood, he said, ‘Lucky for you, young Ninian, that he was there.’
With that the matter was settled. He and Ninian exchanged a deep look, as if sealing a bargain. And he knew that neither of them would refer to it again.