Rose of Hope

by Mairi Norris

  “But what of the raising of the runestone for our father and my daughter? The ceremony is but a few days hence. Will you not come?”

  “I will come, but not to be present among those gathered. But you will know I am there, and I will hear what you speak.”

  “’Tis not my wish you should continue to be estranged. You are my brother, blood of my blood. You belong at Wulfsinraed. Even Fallard agrees. He would have you return, not as a burh workman, unless that be your choice, but as the son of Kenrick Wulfsingas, taking his rightful place.”

  “But of a certainty that ‘rightful place’ is not lord of the burh. Is it, Ysane?”

  She cast down her eyes. “Nay, my brother.”

  “Then until that time comes I belong not, and I will take not a lesser place than that which is mine by right.”

  “Oh, Cynric, this is such a tangle! I know not how it may be resolved and for that I am sorry, and afraid.” Teardrops slipped down her cheeks.

  “A wise man once told me that in the future, good may come of things that now seem evil. We will pray the good may come.”

  He took her face between his hands and kissed her forehead and then the tip of her nose, and she uttered a shaky little laugh. He wiped away her tears with his thumbs. When he spoke, his voice was a whisper. “Westu hál, Ysane.”

  “Westu hál, my brother. I love you.”

  “As I love you, little one.”

  As she turned away, she knew his eyes, solemn but resolute, kept watch while she moved down the path, and that he followed her, out of sight until she reached her escort. He would trail the three of them. As always, he would protect her until she was safely returned to the burh.

  Varin and Ingram rose when she appeared, and she surprised unsmiling concern on their faces.

  “We were discussing mayhap, ’twas time to come visiting, my lady,” Ingram said.

  “Aye, and never mind the Saxon’s friendly words,” Varin growled, still clearly angry at having had an arrow aimed at his heart.

  Ysane offered a gentle laugh that was not entirely forced. Their concern for her welfare was unfounded, but ’twas real enough. Nor would she allow her fear for Cynric to mar the joy she felt at being with him again, or allow that fear to cause men such as these to wonder why she feared for him.

  “Had you come,” she said, “you would have found a brother and his sister, falling asleep in a boat on the lake.”

  “You slept in a boat?” Varin’s ugly face mirrored his confusion.

  “On the lake, my lady?” Ingram sounded no less mystified, and not a little perturbed by her admission.

  “Aye. We fished for Cynric’s supper.” She flung the words over her shoulder as she walked Freyja to a fallen log and climbed into the saddle ere either could move to help. “But ’tis truth, I fear to say, the fish were in little humor to be caught. Howbeit, we were favored by fortune, for a nice little perch, exactly the right size, obligingly leapt out of the water and landed right at our feet.”

  She set Freyja to walking in the direction of the burh, then stopped and looked back when she realized no one followed. Both men stared after her, and neither looked happy.

  She burst out laughing. “Oh, very well, I lied. Cynric had a pole and he caught the fish. But ’tis truth to tell, ’twas exactly what he needed.”

  Varin looked at Ingram. “Her nose seems red enough to have spent that long in the sun.”

  Her fingers flew to that appendage and felt the heat radiating from it. Oh, faith! So absorbed had she been with Cynric’s company she had failed to protect her skin. She would need a mild burn ointment from Luilda once she returned to the burh.

  “Aye,” Ingram agreed. “And she seems merry enough, like she enjoyed her time with the man.”

  She smiled radiantly at them both. ’Twas necessary they believe she had not a care in the world. “I return home, my friends. You may follow or not, as you like.”

  There was naught left to say. They mounted up and followed. But she heard Varin, thinking his booming voice so low she could hear it not, vow to Ingram his captain would know all he could tell of the events of this day.

  A chill passed over her at his words.

  “I like not the lady’s brother, Ingram, nor do I trust him,” Varin said, “though it seems the captain deems her safe enough with him. But all is not as it seems between the siblings. There is trouble there, or I miss my guess, though my lady seeks to hide it. I can discern naught of what it might be.”

  “Aye,” Ingram said, “’tis also my thought all is not well. But ’tis better to tell of misgivings, than be regretful later. If the trouble lies but in our minds, no harm will be done.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Alewyn lifted two unlit torches from their fluted iron brackets. She thrust them into the flames crackling below several spits of pigeons roasting for supper. Once lit, she handed one to Ysane. Carrying the other, she grinned like a young girl at Ysane’s two guards and led the way down the steps into the buttery, a cave-like structure.

  Ysane stifled a giggle.

  How easily laughter comes these days, and all because of one very large, very determined dark knight. Even my fears for Cynric feel not so hopeless now that Fallard rules here. I know how Roana feels, as if I move in a daze of love.

  One of her guards stopped at the kitchen door while the other took up position at the buttery’s second door, which opened outside and led to the well and the smokehouse.

  Like the crypts and holding pits, the buttery had been excavated to the island’s bedrock but here, the heavily beamed wooden ceiling was very low. Even Ysane’s head cleared it by mere inches as she moved through the rows of kegs and barrels filled with various spirits. Her escorts would have to bend uncomfortably inside the space.

  She dodged hanging haunches of smoked and salted meats and skirted open wooden frames stacked with smoked fish. Linen sacks filled with flour of varying sorts lay against the walls between baskets of dried fruits and vegetables. Winter straw, strewn thick upon the floor, crunched beneath her slippered feet as she moved toward the darkest, coolest section farthest from the doors. There, sheets of ice off the ponds and the lake were layered in the corner among thick stacks of straw, with crocks of fresh butter and cream nestled among them.

  The hall’s spice locker was there too. On shelves above were rows of stacked pots of honey, the last of the winter supply. Beside the locker was a small table that held the jars and crocks of dried herbs and liniments Luilda used to make her medicaments.

  The two women settled their torches into the brackets on either side of the locker.

  “Need you help with your work, my lady, call to me,” Alewyn said. “Alyce is busy with her bread, but I have a wee bit of free time do you need it.”

  Knowing full well ‘free time’ was a nigh unheard of luxury for the industrious cook, who usually refused it even when offered, Ysane shook her head. “Nay, Alewyn, I will be fine,” she said as she pulled the key to the spice locker from its ring at her girdle. “’Tis but a simple accounting I plan, so as to know what needs be bought when the spice-peddler stops by. I will require but a short time.”

  Alewyn nodded and hurried back to the kitchen, forgetting not to make eyes at the guard, who shook his head even as he grinned back. This time, Ysane chuckled aloud. Alewyn was a notorious flirt, but none took her seriously for she never took herself so. Neither she nor her sister had ever married. They had decided at an early age they needed none but each other. But that stopped not the more outgoing of the twins from playing a game she enjoyed.

  The flickering torchlight played over Ysane’s hands as she became engrossed in the inventory. She lifted high on her toes to reach for a small, earthenware pot on the highest shelf. Absorbed in the work, she barely noticed when her left heel came back down on something cool and yielding that had not been there before.

  “Ouch!” The exclamation burst from her as a sharp, burning sting touched her ankle above her slipper. She dropped the po
t and jumped back, her eyes searching the floor.

  What could I have stepped on?

  The small prick rapidly increased to a pain shocking in intensity. Something moved in the shadows at her feet. Gasping, tears already flowing, she grabbed the torch and thrust it nigh the floor. A long, cylindrical form slithered away, its motion sluggish. The zigzagging brown and tan dorsal pattern was all too familiar, though she had never seen it inside the hall.

  The guards at the doors jerked as her scream reverberated through the long, low chamber. Swords drawn, their faces registered shock as they scanned the dark space, searching for an enemy they could not see. They nigh fell over their own feet as they scrambled headlong down the steps in their rush to reach her.

  ***

  Five days later, Fallard stood at the edge of a stream far from Wulfsinraed. Exhausted from too little sleep, too much anxiety and from leading a frustrating, fruitless patrol, he debated the wisdom of following his heart and heading home. They had ranged through his lands for a day and a half and found no sign of rebel activity. The sortie should last several days longer and go further afield, but he loathed not knowing how Ysane fared while he was gone from the hall. He stared into the gurgling flow, letting the hypnotic coursing of the water calm the clamor in his mind.

  Abruptly, he made his decision. “Harold!”

  “Aye?”

  The second marshal’s acknowledgment was wary. Fallard could blame him not. For the duration of the patrol, he had been a distempered wolf, snapping and snarling and generally making life miserable for them all. Even young Roul walked softly around him, his normal ebullience subdued.

  “Mount up the men. We go home.”

  No one was heard to complain.

  As Foudre’s easy canter bore him toward the burh, he tried, without success, to pinpoint the moment when simple lust for a beautiful woman had slipped into love. Nor could he decide when merely desiring a wife to bear him heirs had changed into a need so desperate for this one woman, above all others, he would battle aught in heaven, hell or earth to protect her. He only knew he would find little will to live without her. He remembered fighting the change, but could no longer remember why. All that mattered now was reaching her side. He urged Foudre into a gallop.

  ***

  Ysane reclined in the hall amid the low-burning fire pits, facing the courtyard. Her left foot, still slightly swollen and wrapped in a medicinal plaster, was stretched out on a pillow-topped stool in front of her. Through the doors, thrown wide to take advantage of the after-the-nooning breeze, she watched the ruckus of the patrol’s arrival. She squirmed, wishing herself out there to welcome them home as befitted the lady of the hall.

  But when Fallard strode through the door her agitation evaporated and her heart lit up. She smiled in warm welcome, her happiness expanding when an answering glow surged like flame in his eyes. Relief was in his gaze also, at finding her recovered enough to sit in the hall, and he made no effort to hide it.

  “You are well, my rose?” He gave her no chance to answer as he bent to raise her chin and press a hard, impatient kiss on her mouth, a kiss that slowly gentled, yet became more ardent. He knelt to search her face.

  “Aye, my lord,” she said, when she could breathe again. “Luilda says the injury will soon be healed.”

  He laid a feather light touch on the skin above the plaster, where the mottled coloration of the bruising was fading to green and yellow. “’Tis a relief to find the skin cool,” he said. “’Twas a close thing, you know, for a few days. Did the serpent’s fangs find full purchase, things might have gone differently.”

  “So Luilda said. But ’twould seem ’tis uncommon to die from an adder’s venom, though ’tis not unknown for the bites to become putrid. But that happened not, and we may be thankful.”

  “Aye, we may. Now then, as much as I dislike so quickly leaving your presence, my love, I would offend you no further with the rankness of my person. Do you excuse me, I will return as quickly as may be.”

  “A hot bath will soon await you in the burnstów. Rush not, Fallard. I will still be here when you finish.”

  He growled, pushed aside her headrail and bent to playfully bite her earlobe, then followed it with little nips down the side of her neck. She gave a little shriek of a laugh that dissolved into a shivering, indrawn breath as his mouth found hers. “Ah, Ysane. I could feast on you like slices of honey-spiced apple. I have missed you, my rose…and I will hurry.”

  Roul loped up as he left, Fallard’s helm in hand. He bowed. “’Tis good to see you fare well, my lady.”

  “My thanks, Roul. Tell me, why is the patrol home so soon? I had no chance to ask my lord.”

  The squire’s grin nigh split his face. “’Twas the captain’s decision. You should have seen him, lady! A starving bear would be of easier temper. Why, I feared for my life, and more than once. His very expression nigh tore strips from my skin.”

  Ysane laughed. “And what, pray tell, was the cause of this ferocious behavior?”

  “Why, ’twas you, my lady. He worried for you.”

  As he dashed for the stairs, Ysane wondered if she looked as bemused as she felt.

  ***

  Fallard sighed, rotated his left shoulder, rubbed the old wound and closed his eyes as he eased into the hot, scented bath. He kept them closed as Roul bounced into the chamber and laid out clean clothing. His groan was low, but drawn out. The boy’s unflagging vitality made him feel decrepit, like a pair of boots worn far too long. Faith! Too many years and too many battles were catching up to him.

  “Captain, are you in pain? Need you a potion?”

  “Nay, Roul. That will be all. Tend to my gear, now, and then to yourself.”

  He knew without looking the squire grinned, and he shuddered as Roul bounced back out the door. He rested his head on the rolled linen at his neck and allowed muscles taut to the point of pain begin to relax.

  She is well. None of the horrors I imagined these past two days befell her. Saint’s bones, but it has been difficult.

  Ysane’s heel had come down on the serpent very close to its head. Sluggish from the cold, it had been unable to twist around to do more than graze her ankle with one fang, barely penetrating the skin. Still, her poor little foot had swollen horribly, the bloating reaching her knee by the end of the day. For a short but terrifying few hours, she writhed and cried out, calling for Angelet, for her father, for Cynric and for himself. Despite Luilda’s quick action, ’twas nigh three days ere the nausea eased and the painful, blood-filled blisters began to disappear from around the site.

  He had never left her side, refusing even to sleep, and he had cared for her, allowing no one else but the healer, Roana and Lynnet into the chamber. Every few hours, he forced the odd smelling liquid Luilda ordered down her throat. He bathed her when sweat poured from her body, and cradled her in his arms while Lynnet changed the bed linens.

  Sitting by her side, clutching her hand, he wished with all his heart he could take her pain to himself. Never had he felt so helpless, and he silently raged at that impotence. Aye, love came at high cost, though he would have it no other way.

  By nightfall of the third day, the ugly red streaks on her leg began to dissipate. The swelling eased, and the shiny, discolored skin of her foot no longer looked as if it might split open like a ripe plum left too long in the sun. Luilda announced she would live. Only then had he allowed the healer to persuade him to rest. He slept through the night, and the following morn left on patrol.

  Though he had reprimanded Ysane’s guards with a restrained rage that left them sweating, his anger was aimed more at himself. He was one of William’s most feared and respected knights, but what good was his prowess with a sword if he could keep not his beloved wife safe in her own home? He ordered her guard tripled while he was gone, leaving Trifine and Domnall in charge of the rotating shifts. Lynnet was never to leave her side and a cot was set up in the chamber so the slave might sleep there. Even so, ’twas all he coul
d do not to set Ysane in a litter, surround her with all his knights and men-at-arms and send her far away to safety…preferably all the way to his family in Nourmaundie.

  He also ordered an even closer watch on Leda, though how she could have accomplished such a feat with the serpent he knew not. Worse, he still had no proof the snake’s presence was aught more than unhappy coincidence, though he believed it not. The little adders were common enough throughout the forest and were awakening with the spring, but they were shy, non-aggressive creatures and usually stayed clear of human habitation. Not even the village elders could remember more than one or two ever found inside the wall. Thus to his mind, not only Leda, but most of the burhfolc were now under suspicion of trying to kill his wife.

  ***

  Ysane moved an unfinished piece of embroidery off the small table beneath the south-facing window in her sitting room. Gathering her writing materials, she sat to compose a letter to her sister Gemma. ’Twas not quite noontide on a very warm, sunny day early in the month of tending sheep, and the ceremony of the raising of the runestones had occurred that morn. She wanted to pen her impressions to Gemma while they remained fresh in her thoughts. She stretched out her left leg and sighed in relief as she carefully rotated her ankle. It felt so good to be off her feet. The adder bite had healed, but her foot still pained her when she had to stand on it for a time.

  From the window, she could see the guard tower. She watched as one of Fallard’s knights climbed the wall stairs to speak with the sentry patrolling there. The guard nodded and the other man returned the way he had come.

  Below the wall, the brightening colors of her garden glowed like jewels in the sun. She had spent many happy hours there in recent days. She weeded and cleaned, pampered her rose bushes, and prepared the soil in the new lavender beds, which she had created by transplanting the contents of several other beds. She would plant the new cuttings very soon. Did the rootings grow properly, this twelvemonth she would have enough lavender to offer Roana for use in her bath without having to purchase it from the monks.