by Judith Tarr
And yet he had no magic. That was perfectly clear. It was because he was the king, and because he was old William’s son, and Mathilda’s.
William was very much out of place here in this stronghold of holy women. Women were not to his taste at all, Edith thought. She was not sure what she meant by that—it came into her head, whole and complete. William and women were not comfortable together.
The abbess was not making anything easier for him. She had to suffer his presence—however much she hated him—because he was the king. She would give him all that duty demanded, and be sure he knew why she did it.
William prowled the room. Half a dozen of his men stood by: guards, most of them. One was brimming over with magic, carefully damped now and walled against the abbess.
That one watched Edith from the moment she passed the door. She could feel that scrutiny like the heat of a fire on her skin. She raised wards against it—quite like those that he had raised against the abbess.
His eyebrows had gone up. Bemusement? Respect? Both, she thought.
He was like her: half of the old blood. The rest of him had to be Norman. He was dressed like one, and carried himself like one, too. No one else was that arrogant.
Except, of course, for descendants of Saxon kings.
Sister Gunnhild bowed in front of the abbess. So did Edith. The king was across the room just then, scowling at the tapestry that hung on the far wall. One of the pensioners had brought it as part of her offering to the abbey. It was meant to depict the Last Supper, but the ladies who embroidered it had transformed the Lord Christ into a Saxon king and his apostles into earls and thanes, and behind them were scenes of hawking and hunting and even a battle against Vikings in longships.
“So Harold’s still king here,” William said.
Edith understood Norman. She even spoke it. Her father had made sure of that, as little as her mother had approved of it.
It had been a long while since she needed it, but it came back easily enough. She knew what William was saying. She could even answer, “That’s the Lord Christ, my lord.”
William turned. Behind the scowl his face was not bad to look at.
He seemed to find her even less to his liking than the tapestry. “That’s Harold, fighting Normans.”
She shook her head. “No, really. It’s the Last Supper. See. There’s the chalice. And twelve Apostles.”
His scowl sharpened to a glare, then drained away. For the first time he seemed to see her. “You’re Malcolm’s daughter,” he said.
“Yes,” said Edith.
“You can go now, Mother,” William said to the abbess. And to Sister Gunnhild: “You, too.”
“That would not be proper,” Mother Abbess said, “lord king.”
“She’ll stay,” William said, tilting his head at Sister Gunnhild. “You, Mother, have many duties crowding on you, I’m sure. I won’t take any more of your time.”
Edith had been thinking that this king had no grace. Now it was clear he did—when it suited him to use it.
Abbess Christina knew herself dismissed. Edith waited for her to fight it, but for whatever reason, she chose not to. She nodded coldly to the king, and said to Sister Gunnhild, “Remember what we are.”
Sister Gunnhild bowed. Her face was expressionless within the veil. Edith thought she seemed a little pale—but maybe that was only the way the light struck her, with her fair skin that looked so ill in black.
Mother Abbess took her leave with stiff dignity. William watched her go. He did not like her at all, Edith thought.
When she was well gone, the king turned back to Edith. Much of his bad temper had vanished, along with most of the shadow that had lain on the hall. He looked her up and down. “So you’re my brother’s godchild. You’ve grown up well.”
“Thank you, sire,” Edith said. “How is my godfather? Is he well?”
“He was the last time I saw him,” William said. “I’ll remember you to him when we meet again.”
“That’s kind of you,” she said.
There was a silence. Edith could not find anything to say, and neither, it seemed, could William.
She took the time to consider whether she liked him. She did not think she did. Whether she hated him . . . no. Nothing as strong as that. Aside from a mutual dislike of the abbess, they had nothing in common. They were quite literally worlds apart—she with her magic and her learning, he with whatever he did without either. Hunt, she supposed. Fight. Preside over banquets.
When William spoke, he startled her. She had been content with the silence. “There are those,” he said, “who think I should be making a royal match, and royal sons. What do you think of that?”
“I think you don’t want that at all,” she said.
The words had come out on their own. If she had had anything to do with it, they would have stayed buried where they belonged.
His glare was back, more sulfurous than before. “What makes you say that?”
“It’s true,” she said.
“Does it matter what I want?”
He was amazingly angry, and yet she was not afraid. This man was no danger to her. “You’re the king,” she said. “No one can make you do anything unless you allow it.”
“Duty can,” he said. “The Church may.”
“It can try,” she said.
“Do you want to marry?” he demanded.
She blinked. That was so close to what she had been thinking that she had to wonder . . .
Her father might have considered such a match, but he would have made it clearer that that was what he meant.
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Would you want to marry me?”
“No.” That was altogether unpremeditated and completely honest. “We’re not meant for one another.”
“There are those who say we are. Your bloodlines, mine—we match like blooded horses.”
“You can’t just breed blood to blood,” Edith said. “Any breeder knows that. You have to consider the animals, too. We wouldn’t match well. We’d hate each other—and nothing would come of it.”
“Even the worst marriage can produce sons,” William said.
“This one wouldn’t.” Edith met his bright blue stare. “I do want to marry. I think I’m meant to. But you, no. God made you as you are. When you see my father, will you tell him something for me? Tell him I’m to be bound with final vows on the feast of the Virgin.”
William might be no scholar, but his wits were quick enough. He followed all of that, and barely blinked at it. “I’ll make sure he knows,” he said. His eyes narrowed. Then, astonishingly, he smiled. “I see why they made me come here. You’re not for me, no—and that’s a pity, taking all in all. You’ll make someone a remarkable queen.”
“I would hope so,” Edith said, “unless God gets me first.”
“Then we’ll hope He doesn’t,” William said.
CHAPTER 21
Was that a disaster?” William asked. They were back in Gloucester, and it was late: well past midnight. But William could not find it in himself to fall asleep.
Robin arched a brow at him. “Does it feel like a disaster?”
“No,” said William. Then, less quickly, “No. It feels as if something happened, something important—but I don’t know what.”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” Robin said.
“That’s the trouble with this world,” muttered William. “Too damned much of it is waiting and watching and trying to see what will happen next.”
“I rather think that’s part of the pleasure,” Robin said sleepily.
“You would.” William flung himself on the bed. Robin was already asleep, gone far away from William and his fretting and his memory of the clear-eyed child with the face that would, in time, be beautiful.
She reminded him of his sister Cecilia. Even if women had been to his taste, he would have found her too witchy for him. But that she could and indeed would be a queen, he had no doubt. A king w
ould find her someday, and set her as high as she deserved to be.
Which of course did nothing to solve his problem—but then nothing could. That was the lesson he had learned in Wilton Abbey. She had said it. He was what he was. There was no changing it.
The king’s visit left a strange scent in the abbey’s air—as if he had flung open the doors on something new and as yet unfathomed. Edith’s mind was clearer. She had come to a decision.
Once William was gone, she had to face the abbess. She had expected that, and rather oddly, she did not dread it. For the first time since she read her father’s letters, she was calm inside herself.
Sister Gunnhild was interrogated first. Edith had to stand in the hallway. The time for dinner came and went; the bread she had worked so hard to make was fed to everyone else while she went hungry.
It was a sacrifice. Perhaps spitefully, she chose not to offer it to God. She gave it to Britain instead, to the earth beneath her and the air she breathed, and the folk of air who shrank from coming so close to the nullity that was the abbess’ presence.
Maybe it was spite, but once she had done it, she knew it had been the right thing to do. She leaned against the wall, and the stones held her in a cool embrace. It was like a long draught of clean water, or a deep night’s sleep.
When Sister Gunnhild came out of the abbess’ study, Edith was almost sorry to leave the place of rest she had found in herself. She was ready, she thought, to face whatever the abbess had in store for her.
Sister Gunnhild’s face gave her nothing to hold to: no warning and no reassurance. The walls were high and the gates barred.
Edith took a deep breath and mustered what defenses she had, and stepped through the door.
She almost lost her resolve when she saw the abbess’ face. The abbess was not smiling, but there was an air about her that Edith had never seen before. It was approval; gratification. “Come,” she said as Edith hesitated. “Sit.”
She had never said that before, either. Edith had not even known there was a chair in the corner, or that the privileged might sit in it.
She sat very carefully, knees together, hands folded in her lap. Abbess Christina regarded her with a notable lack of coldness. Edith would never have called it warmth, but it was warmer than anything she had shown before.
“Sister Gunnhild tells me,” the abbess said, “that you dealt most adeptly with the king.”
Edith kept her eyes on her interlaced fingers. That had always been the safest course during these audiences, and she saw no reason to change now. “Sister Gunnhild is very kind,” she said.
“Is it not the truth?” said the abbess. “He demanded that you be his queen. You rightly and properly refused him.”
That was not all that had gone on, but Edith was hardly inclined to say so. “Yes, Mother Abbess,” she said. “I told him I am to take full vows. He accepted that.”
“Did he indeed?” said the abbess.
Edith shot a glance at her. She was much more gratified than Edith might have expected—in fact she sounded almost triumphant. “Was that a mistake?” Edith asked. “Should I have said something else?”
“No,” said the abbess. “Oh, no. That was excellently done.”
“Then what—”
“Child,” said the abbess with a return of her old, grim manner, “you have done well. That is all you need to know.”
“Yes, Mother Abbess,” Edith said as meekly as she could force herself to be.
“Good, then,” said the abbess. “Go; continue your studies. Be assiduous in your devotions. It will all be done soon enough, and you will rejoice to be the bride of Christ.”
Edith bit her tongue until the pain made her eyes water. She rose and genuflected, and kissed the ring that was presented for that purpose. The stone was cold under her lips, with an odd tingle, as if some spell lay on it.
Whatever it was, it could not pass her wards. She was safe—though from what, she was not exactly sure.
The next morning, when Edith went to her lessons, she found only a single book on the table in the library, and no Sister Gunnhild. The book was one she had often read from before: a collection of bits from old philosophers. There was a scrap of parchment in it, and on the parchment a handful of words in Greek: In the orchard, by the oldest tree.
It looked like a fragment of poetry, and there was no doubt that was what it was meant to seem. Edith raised her brows at it. Notes and secrets were not like Sister Gunnhild at all. But who else in the abbey could either read or write Greek, except Edith?
It could be a trap. If it was, Edith had wards, and the folk of air were flocking thick today. She tucked the scrap of parchment into her sleeve, closed the book neatly and left it exactly where she had found it, and made her casual and unconcerned way out of the library and the cloister and through the orchard.
The day was glorious: warm, bright, sweet-scented. The grass was almost as green as that of the Otherworld; the sun was nearly as splendid. Apples and pears were swelling on the boughs. Some had begun already to blush with ripeness.
Such a day reminded Edith more vividly than ever that the life of the cloister was remote and cold, and her body was young and beginning, itself, to ripen. She was powerfully tempted to cast off the heavy bindings of her habit, but she was not that far gone—yet. She did slip out of her sandals and dangle them from a finger, and if the wind chose to pluck the veil from her hair, well then, she could catch and carry it, but she did not have to put it back on—not yet.
The sun was warm on her uncovered head, the wind playful, plucking at the tight braid of her hair, teasing out random curls. She almost hated to go on, but the sooner it was done, the better.
Sister Gunnhild was waiting deep in the orchard, near the wall that divided it from the open downs. The apple tree that grew there had been planted when Rome ruled in Britain, or so the story went. Edith sometimes wondered if it was older even than that. Its roots were sunk deep, and it drank the power of this earth—drawing up strength from the great stone circle that was not so very far away at all.
Edith seldom thought directly of the circle, the Giants’ Dance as people called it in the Otherworld. It was there, drawing in power and radiating it out, but it had never seemed to have much to do with her.
For some reason, today it was strong in her awareness. Things were stirring. The king had come here, and brought with him more maybe than he knew.
While Edith’s awareness leaped suddenly wide, Sister Gunnhild rose from where she had been sitting. Her veil was still in place, but her feet were bare, too. Her face was guarded as always. Still, Edith could feel gates opening under it, and walls crumbling that had stood for years, maybe all her life.
When she spoke, the words came tumbling out—strange, because her tone was still so composed. “Ever since you walked out of air, I’ve been gathering courage to ask you something.”
“Ever since I—” Edith began.
“Please,” Sister Gunnhild said. “I know you have no reason to trust me. I was set over you to be your watchdog, to shape your mind and bind your spirit. I was supposed to empty you of everything that was not perfectly Saxon.”
“You never even tried,” Edith said. “We were learning philosophy, theology, Greek, but not—”
“Not what I was supposed to teach you,” Sister Gunnhild said. “I know. I lied to the abbess. For years I told her you were learning prayers as she instructed, and histories of your ancestors, and invocations of their memory. I let her believe that you were perfectly prepared to be what she wished you to be. There are great sins on my soul, and I will atone for them.”
“Why?”
Sister Gunnhild’s shoulders tightened, then eased. She drew a long sigh. “Because I loathe this life. Because I was never made to live in walls, constrained in a cage. Because I saw from the beginning what the queen your namesake would have made of this isle, and what the abbess still labors to make it. I have no love for Normans, but I believe God has given them th
is kingdom for His own good reasons. I also believe the abbess has let her hate for them overcome her acceptance of God’s will—and I will not be a part of it.”
Edith did not know what to say. Some of it was not so surprising, once she thought about it, but the rest had taken her off guard. It had been a while since she felt too young for anything. Just now, she was making up for it.
“Can you help me?” Sister Gunnhild asked. “Can you send me away? It doesn’t matter where. Wherever you go, I’d far rather be there than here.”
“Even if it costs you your soul?”
Sister Gunnhild never even flinched. “If I stay in these chains, my soul will die.”
Since that was how Edith felt, she could hardly argue with it. But she said, “How do you know I go anywhere?”
“For years, I’ve watched you,” Sister Gunnhild said. “You’re never at recreation with the others. You’re always gone—vanished. I’ve seen you slip through air as through a curtain. Wherever you go, it must be better than here.”
“It is,” Edith said, “but not for long. Not for mortals. We can’t eat or drink there, or we’ll be bound forever.”
“That,” said Sister Gunnhild, “I could well bear.”
“I can’t do it,” Edith said. It was hard, because Sister Gunnhild was so desperate, but Edith could never have forgiven herself if she had given way. “I am sorry, really I am. But I hate it here, too—and I haven’t vanished forever. There’s no place there for a mortal soul.”
Sister Gunnhild lowered her eyes. Edith knew that gesture all too well. She refused to waver because of it, but it did make her heart twinge.
“Please,” said Edith. “Don’t do something you can’t get out of.”
“Such as take vows in this abbey?” Sister Gunnhild did not sound as bitter as she might, all things considered—but Edith was little comforted. It was even less comfort that she sighed and said, “I’m desperate, I suppose. And cowardly. I could run away and trust to God to keep me safe in the world. But would God do that? I’m supposed to be His bride. How angry will He be when I repudiate Him?”