The Mistress Of Normandy

by Susan Wiggs

  A high-pitched whine rose above the nasal twang of bowstrings. The arrows flew in a dark swarm toward the willow brake. Shouts of pride and satisfaction burst from the men.

  “Bien fait, les gars,” said Jack, moving through their ranks, slapping shoulders, pumping hands. “Well done!” Grinning broadly, he approached Rand. “So, my lord?”

  Pride and affection surged through Rand. “Jack, I know not what to say. ’Tis a miracle you’ve wrought, no less. You’ve transformed a group of farmers into a lance of archers.”

  “So I have,” Jack said with a remorseless lack of modesty. “A few have become crack shots. Come, we’ll show you.”

  Aiming at a painted bull’s hide stretched over a wooden frame, the archers displayed their marksmanship. Arrows shredded the hide until the target hung by a thread.

  Jack bowed comically. “Now, the pièce de résistance.”

  Rand watched as his scutifer calmly took up a bow, nocked an arrow, and, with the remaining two fingers of his mangled right hand, drew a yard of string.

  His throat tightening with pity, Rand saw blood crease the joints of Jack’s fingers. He took a step forward. “Jack, my God—”

  “Hush, my lord, you’ll spoil my aim.”

  Jack let the arrow fly. With a hiss it drove straight and sure, its iron-wrought tip neatly severing the last string holding the bull’s hide. The target thudded to the ground.

  Cheers erupted from the men. Jack planted his bowstave, leaned against it, and crossed one leg, the toe pointed negligently toward the ground. “Not bad for a crippled scutifer, eh, my lord? They took my fingers, but not my aim.”

  High in Rand’s heart rose love for Jack, admiration for his devotion, his skill. Rand wanted to embrace him. Guessing Jack’s reaction should he attempt such an outrage, he merely smiled and said casually, “A scutifer no more, Jack Cade. That was the work of a master archer.”

  Gratitude blazed like a banner across Jack’s face. He grinned. “So...?”

  “So we take Bois-Long.”

  * * *

  An interlude of peace reigned at the château, and Lianna settled into a numb routine. She rose at dawn, retched into a basin, then broke her fast with cider and bread, only to be sick again. Battling the seductive lassitude of the condition she had once rejoiced in, but now despaired of, she went about the business of running the household.

  Gervais seemed disinclined to attend to the myriad details of stewardship. He preferred hawking and hunting, swapping yarns with Gaucourt’s men, and winning the affection of the people of Bois-Long through lavish flattery and costly favors.

  Thus the management of the estate fell to Lianna, as it ever had. She appreciated the distraction. While arbitrating a dispute between tenants or supervising the planting of hops near the riverbed, she could banish Rand from her mind—often for as long as a whole minute.

  She rode out sometimes, but never as far as the glade. To go there was to yield to tender feelings she could ill afford.

  Secretly she’d taken steps to deny Gervais’s claim on Bois-Long. She’d penned missives to the administration in Paris, contesting the entail of the castle and lands. But although her requests for royal indulgence were couched in flattery, she had little hope of a ruling in her favor. The Armagnac party was unlikely to indulge Burgundy’s niece.

  Not so secretly, Gervais, too, had taken steps. He dictated letters of his own and dispatched them to Paris, begging to be acknowledged as Sire de Bois-Long.

  Hunched over her books in the counting house early one morning, Lianna glanced from Guy’s livre de raison to her own account book. She counted the grain figures and slid the beads of Chiang’s odd reckoning device. Rapidly she calculated the yield of rye and notched the figure on her tally stick.

  Idly she spun the beads. They were threaded on wooden dowels, set in a rectangular frame. One red stood for ten whites; one white for ten blacks. Figuring could be achieved simply by sliding the beads to and fro, here and there.

  She sighed. Would that all problems were so neatly solved. But beads in a frame would not reckon her uncle’s treachery, Gervais’s presumption, or Rand’s determination to take the château for King Henry. Nor would figures on a tally stick lay out an easy life for the child she secretly carried.

  What was she to do about the babe? It could be passed off as Lazare’s. People would think it only a few weeks late in coming. The necessity of lying bothered her, yet she must do so for the baby’s sake, to protect her child’s inheritance.

  Yanking her attention from the anxious thoughts, she made another calculation and entered the figure in her books.

  The clink of spurs on flagstone made her drop her stylus. “How efficient you are,” Gervais said smoothly. “Up even before the servants.”

  “’Tis a time to work without distractions.”

  “Ah, but I find you very distracting.”

  She noted his bloodshot eyes, the disarray of his fine clothes. The scent of stale wine and woodsmoke wafted to her. “I was going to remark that you, too, are up early. But I see you’ve not yet been to bed.”

  “Not to sleep, anyway.” He laughed at her cold expression. “Don’t look at me so. Longwood had you for two nights.” With an idle finger he fished down into his tunic, pulled for the talisman Roland had found near the glade. Lianna kept her expression carefully bland, although it galled her that Rand’s device, his lofty motto, had fallen into the keeping of one such as Mondragon.

  Gervais smiled. “Surely the Englishman taught you a woman’s pleasure.”

  She stared down at her books and privately swore not to let Gervais know she’d lain with Rand, married him. Such an admission would ruin her plan to credit the child to Lazare.

  Moving behind her, Gervais wove his fingers into the hair at the nape of her neck. She fought the urge to recoil.

  “Tell me,” he said, pulling her head back gently but insistently, “how was the Englishman? Did he give proper attention to your lovely neck, your beautiful breasts?” His other hand strayed over her shoulder. Although his touch was light, she sensed a latent, hidden brutality in his caress. “Have you a soft spot in your heart for him?”

  She snapped, “You know naught of what is in my heart.”

  “I care not,” he stated. “I am the Sire de Bois-Long.”

  Angry beyond caution, she blurted out, “How can you be so certain? Suppose I carry Lazare’s child, the rightful heir?”

  He laughed harshly. “My father swore he’d never lie with you.”

  “The sheets of our marriage bed were duly examined. The marriage was consummated.”

  He clamped both hands on her shoulders, squeezed until she winced. “You’d best be lying.”

  She said nothing. The bruising pressure of his fingers abated. He’s a fool, she thought. I’ll best him in this. Turning the subject, she said, “What do the hobelars report?”

  “The Englishman and his sorry contingent have apparently given up on Burgundy’s timely return from Compiègne. They’ve repaired to the coastal hamlet of Eu, where an English cog has docked. Doubtless they’ll soon seek their own safe shores.”

  She twisted to face him. “I’m surprised you and Gaucourt haven’t mounted an attack to speed them on their way.”

  His gaze shifted restlessly about the counting chamber. “Mustn’t divide our forces.”

  She hid her relief behind the veil of her hair. The true reason, of course, was that both Gervais and Gaucourt feared her uncle. “Why don’t you go to bed?”

  “Why don’t you come with me?” He laughed at her outraged scowl. “We could be good together, you and I. You’re so efficient at managing the château, and I am so adept at inspiring loyalty. Think of it. Together we could—”

  “Save your dreams for Macée.”

  “She’s become a burr beneath my saddle. If it weren’t for her, you and I could be married.”

  No, we couldn’t, she thought darkly. I am already wed. “Do you never cease your plotting?”
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  He chuckled. “Never.”

  Lazare forfeited his life for plotting, she thought, but said nothing.

  “I’m off,” said Gervais. “’Tis May Day. I’d best go arm myself for the tilting. Gaucourt has called in all his hobelars for the holiday.” Gervais reached across the table, grasped a lock of her hair, and twirled the strand in his fingers. “And you, I trow, shall be Queen of the May.”

  She pulled back. “So I have ever been.” In sooth she had not the heart for the role this year. But to relinquish the title to Macée would be to admit to a secondary position at Bois-Long. And that Lianna would never do.

  “I’ll see you at the tilting yard,” Gervais said. “I’ve an announcement to make before the tourney,” he added cryptically, and left the counting house.

  Bothered by Gervais’s cocksure mood, she put away her stylus and corked the inkwell. In a spirit more suited to mourning than to merrymaking, she went outside where, yawning, the castle folk were coming out to greet the May.

  Crouched on a weeding stool in the garden, Mère Brûlot watched a group of children as they picked flowers to weave into wreaths. For a moment Lianna stood captivated by the fresh, smiling faces and laughing voices of the children. The golden glow of early morn bathed the scene in soft, diffuse light.

  In his eager foraging, one sturdy boy trampled a row of blossoms.

  “Mind the pease,” said Lianna. Irritation, left over from her confrontation with Gervais, edged her voice.

  The child looked down at the vines crushed beneath his bare feet. Quickly he scrambled to Mère Brûlot’s side.

  “Nom de Dieu,” said Lianna, “the flowers all but choke the food.”

  “You ordered them yourself, my lady,” Mère Brûlot reminded her.

  “I can’t think why,” Lianna murmured. But in sooth she knew. She’d been in love when she’d ordered the flowers. Now her dreams had died, strangled by Rand’s betrayal. Annoyed at herself for subjecting the child to her temper, she gave him a quick hug and walked away. In the greensward, the maypole stood like a flower-crowned sentinel, ribbons and streamers blowing in the fragrant breeze. Soon the shaft would be a centerpiece for merriment, circled by hand-clasped dancers weaving the ribbons as they sang to the coming of spring.

  Dressed in finery, Lianna would be expected to oversee the festivities. People came from the towns of Abbeville and Pont-St.-Rémy to compete at footraces, hoop rolling, and tilting. Costumed chessmen would enact their game on the checkerboard lawn. Others would play at morelles, attempting to win an anklet of bells by aligning colorful balls on the game green.

  She must behave as if this spring were no different from seasons past. As if she were still Aimery’s placid, self-possessed daughter, and not the secret bride of an English invader.

  By midmorning, guests thronged the western fields. Spectators pressed for a better view of the tournament lists. More arrived on foot, mounted, or in carts. Overdressed, overwarm, and nauseated, Lianna sat with Macée in the open pavilion beside the jousting field. Behind them, Bonne sat eating sweetmeats. The field was surrounded by a stout fence, which in turn was encircled by a higher fence, the space between crammed with squires and knights.

  “Gervais wears my token,” said Macée, pointing.

  Armed and mounted, he waited behind two cords stretched across the lists. A wisp of ruby silk fluttered on his sleeve.

  “Did you give yours to the Sire de Gaucourt?” asked Macée.

  Lianna shook her head. “I have no favorite...among these men, or anywhere.”

  Bonne gasped. A fierce look from Lianna held the maid silent. Macée sniffed and turned her attention to the lists. Heralds marched beneath fluttering pennons; horsemen checked their blunted and rebated lances and swords. Here was the spectacle of chivalry at its most colorful, and at its emptiest. Men rode at one another for no better purpose than to knock from the saddle an opponent who was not an opponent. All for the sake of winning a wreath for their heads, a string of bells for their ankles.

  Spying a lone figure on the distant battlement of the castle, Macée shaded her eyes. “Chiang,” she said. “Doubtless he’s too busy with his powders and potions to join us.”

  “Your husband has ordered a feu d’artifice tonight. Even if Chiang wished to watch the jousting, he’d be too busy mixing his charges.” She lifted her hand to wave at him; distractedly he waved back and disappeared behind a gunport.

  Of late Chiang seemed withdrawn, uncommunicative, and uncharacteristically obedient to Gervais’s whims. And all the while he seemed tense with waiting.

  Restless and inexplicably nervous, she shifted her attention to the pageantry of the tourney. Peasants and tradesmen milled about, laughing, eating gingermen and quaffing cider specially brewed for the maying, tinted light green with parsley. Still more visitors appeared on the west road, perhaps a score and ten of them. Highsided, penlike carts lumbered behind stout haquenée horses. The newcomers, she noted absently, must feel as hot as she. To a man, they wore long cloaks.

  “Here’s the parade of arms.” Macée straightened her hennin and leaned forward as trumpets blared a salute. Led by Gervais and Gaucourt, the knights rode down the lists, seventy men crowding the fenced area like a sea of gold. Armor caught the sunlight and magnified the glare so that, momentarily dazzled, Lianna shaded her eyes and looked away.

  The crowd buzzed and then fell into an expectant hush; new arrivals moved among them, pressed close to the outer fences. A few, she saw with mild irritation, had rudely jostled others aside. One of them, a priest in brown robe and knotted scourge, haggled with a young boy over a prime seat at the head of the lists. Most unbecoming for a cleric, she thought, as was that gauntlet of leather....

  Lianna jumped to her feet.

  Macée snatched at her wrist, pulling her back. “You’re blocking my view. Now hush up and listen. Gervais spent hours learning to recite his proclamation.”

  “He could simply read it if he’d learn his letters,” Bonne muttered.

  Macée scowled. “Be silent while your lord speaks.”

  Lianna ignored Bonne’s cheeky retort. Trembling in every limb, she combed the crowd with her eyes. Her hands clenched the fabric of her embroidered cotte. With mingled hope and dread she watched the strangers press in on the lists, not with the idle curiosity of spectators, but with the single-minded intent of predators. They perched on the fence or took up positions at the entrance and exit points of the yard. The tallest of the cloaked and hooded men climbed the outer fence, braced himself at the top. She knew that masculine form, the easy grace with which he moved.

  Rand.

  Obviously he’d come to take the castle. She should act, call a warning. The heavily armed tourneyers could finish him with a few blows.

  Gervais droned on heedlessly, enumerating the rules of combat. “Foul play results in forfeiture of the prize.... No rushing a man when he’s down....”

  Everyone listened to Gervais; none noticed the secret movements of Rand’s men. Warn the knights, she told herself. For the sake of Bois-Long and France, warn them. But the words stuck, unuttered, in her throat. Not even for her home, her country, could she bring about the Englishman’s death.

  He lifted his hand. As one, the visitors flung off their cloaks, planted the bowstaves the garments had concealed, and swiftly nocked their arrows.

  “At day’s end the champion shall win the hon—” Gervais’s voice broke off. A collective gasp rose from the crowd. For a moment the scene froze like a painted tableau. Then mothers hastened their children to safety; a few men cast nervous glances over their shoulders and slunk away.

  The figure on the fence shrugged out of his cloak.

  Sunlight glinted in his golden hair and on the device of the leopard rampant that adorned his cotte d’armes. He held his ready bow with strength and assurance. Lianna felt a sudden, involuntary pride in her husband, the father of her child. Behind him, a youth lifted a pennon emblazoned with the motto she’d seen on the talisman
: A vaillans coeurs riens impossible. She was fast learning to respect the words.

  To valiant hearts, nothing is impossible. Not even the conquering of seventy armed knights.

  Macée clutched frantically at Lianna’s sleeve. “It’s the Englishman, the one who escaped.”

  “And that cheeky herald,” added Bonne, pointing at Jack Cade. “What in the name of St. Denis is—”

  “He cannot do this,” said Macée. “Gervais was going to have the people swear fealty to him today, to us—”

  “Lay down your arms.” Rand’s voice boomed like thunder.

  Incensed, Gervais spat on the ground. “Never, Englishman. You’ll die where you stand.”

  Gaucourt had gone momentarily tense; then he seemed to relax as he finished a silent tally of the bowmen surrounding him. “Idiots,” he bellowed to the fearful crowd. His caparisoned horse sidled beneath him; a light breeze ruffled the long plume on the knight’s helm. “What can these motley peasants and English god-dons do against our armored strength?”

  He turned to his men. “Arm yourselves,” he commanded. The knights tossed blunts and rebates off their weapons.

  Rand nodded briefly at Jack Cade, who guarded the exit point. He let fly his arrow. Like a razor borne aloft, it neatly severed the curling panache on Gaucourt’s helm. Gasps rose from the onlookers.

  Bonne clapped her hands and sent the Englishman a look of pure admiration. When several people turned and scowled her into silence, she quickly abandoned her applause.

  Gaucourt shook a gauntleted fist. “You’ll pay for that! You’re carrion!” He gestured at the castle. “Your head will rot on that wall.”

  “Lay down your arms,” Rand said again, this time with a biting edge of impatience in his voice.

  Rage reddened Gaucourt’s face within his helm. “Whoreson!” He yanked a pennon from one of the heralds and raised it aloft to signal his men to charge.

  Split seconds later an arrow pierced the staff of the pennon, cutting through the wood.