The reply confirmed what he had expected. “The King for whom you would do anything and everything?”
“The same,” she plucked for a moment or two at one of the furs, digging though its softness with her nails. “It was surely the right thing to do. What would have happened at Bosworth Field had I not taken Richard away?”
Certain death, he knew that, for the boy stood between Henry Tudor and the crown. However he would never admit that to her!
“You did not tell them then,” she said.
“And how do you know that I did not?”
“Had you done so soldiers would have come. Not a moment would have been allowed to pass by. A man cannot sit easily on the throne when there is another contender, and a contender with more right.”
“It wasn’t because of you that I didn’t tell,” he snapped. She smiled back up at him.
“I know that right well, my lord.”
“Richard tells me that he has decided to take holy orders. It is not perfect. I am not delighted by the prospect for him, but he will be secure and he wishes to do so. He tells me he has a vocation. I don’t think he knows that for sure, but what else can he do? It is over now. There will be no more claims to that throne. The Welsh boy suspects but he can be easily watched. That leaves only you. What shall I do with you, madam?”
Kate raised her chin defiantly. “I did not ask you to wed me. You were the one who insisted on that. I have done nothing against you, save protect Richard.”
“Hah,” he scorned, “and you pretended affection for me to aid your cause!”
“I pretended nothing,” she said. He saw the pink begin at her neck, staining her pale cheeks. “You should know that!”
“How should I know?”
“Think about it!”
“It is easy for women to pretend to arousal. It is more difficult for the male. I think you should go to a convent, you may choose which.”
“I will not. No man will put me where I do not wish to go!”
“I can do anything that I choose to do to you, and no one will gainsay me. You are my property lady. I can dispose of my property where and when I think fit.”
“You will find that you cannot. I shall scream and protest all the way.”
“People will merely assume that you are a mad woman. It has been tried before. No ones pays any attention to such matters.”
“How cruel you are, Efan.”
He gasped, not so much at the words but at how she said them , so matter-of-factly, without hysteria or condemnation. She had a way, this jade, of getting underneath his skin, of overpowering him, of making him doubt even himself.
Into the silence she spoke again, very softly. “If you really want rid of me, then you shall purchase me a passage on a ship and I shall go to the Court of Richard’s aunt.”
“What and have you reveal to the lad’s aunt that he lives? To bring more trouble to our country.”
“Richard wishes no part of it anymore. I will give you my word that I will tell the Duchess nothing. That I will do for Richard because it is what he wishes.”
“All for Richard.”
“Everything I have done here, I have done for Richard.”
“Because your great love commanded you.”
“No, not exactly. I gave my word. That word was a solemn vow to me. When I give my word I do not break it.”
“What do you imply?”
“You gave a vow to me, you vowed to love and to keep me.”
“Damn you, woman, I did not expect that you were deceiving me.” He paused, attempting to still his anger, a fruitless effort because there were too many emotions stirring inside him. “Nor that you were a liar and a cheat and a barren woman to boot!”
She smiled a bitter little smile that did not light up her eyes. “It may be you? Or can you prove otherwise?”
“I cannot,” he admitted, refusing to be goaded further by her. His response surprised her and she lowered her lashes over her eyes.
“I have done more things against you. I will confess and will say that I am truly sorry.”
He listened as she told him about adjusting the books, to giving the son of Gloucester coin so he could make his escape. Her cleverness did not anger him, more he was amazing at her daring. Of course he could not be bothered with the keeping of books, but he might have learned and discovered her fraud if he had put his mind to it.
“And you think that I should keep you after this?”
“Did not say you should? I only said I would not go into a convent.”
“You implied that I did not keep my vows.”
“If you cannot forgive me, then what is the point of my remaining beside you? There would be no life for us if you were for ever looking over your shoulder and wondering what I was up to.”
She lay back against the pillows, as if weakened by their encounter. Of course she had been ill, probably was still quite poorly, for whatever else she was, she was not a woman who took to her bed without just cause. Watching her, he unbuckled his cloak and lay it across the trunk. “I will always be looking over my shoulder now because of Richard,” he added. “Will you eat something?”
“No, I am not hungry, thank you.”
“What has been the matter with you?”
“Weakness, sickness nothing too much to worry about.”
Caradoc went out into the passage and called for something to eat. His voice reverberating around the stone walls. Soon a trencher and victuals were brought, and a jug of warmed wine.
He ate a little, picking at a small piece of fowl here and there and a slice of lamb. Kate watched him as he sat at the small table. There were lines of fatigue beneath is eyes and at his mouth. Two days beard growth stained his cheeks and chin and upper lip. His auburn hair curled past his collar. Obstinate man, she thought, arrogant and hard, yet Richard had won a place in his heart. Once won, she sensed that place would never be lost. He was a man who would be fiercely loyal to causes, people and things that he warmed to.
His love and respect for his mother was an example of his nature. Many a man would have shunned their mother, or hidden her away if she was proof of humble beginnings, but Efan had brought her along to share his good fortune.
There was much beneath the surface, some core of goodness that a hard life had taught him to hide. That core would surface were she to reveal her secret. He might not forgive her, but he would not cast her out. Yet she demanded more, required him to want her because she was Kate Merryweather and not just the mother of his child.
The child started to move, she felt him pumping away at her stomach, probably in protest at her pride. Every throb seemed to be saying the words. “Tell…tell…tell…” She closed her eyes against the insistent drumming.
Anne came before he had finished eating, bringing a pitcher of boiled water. When she had set it down, she came to the lady and asked if she needed anything. Kate asked her to close the bed hangings so that Efan could bathe in private. At her request, Efan turned and glanced at her, then turned away again. She was not certain, but she had thought that he had smiled a little.
He was not long coming to her. She listened to the splash of water, heard the boy coming to pull off the lord’s boots, heard Efan groan his satisfaction. Then, there was the sound of clothes being removed, the clink, of buckles, the heavy jangle of his belt as it was put inside the trunk.
The growth of beard had gone. His face and neck were well tanned, but the flesh that was revealed between the parting of his robe was pale.
“Will you share the bed of the wife that you will drive away?” she asked coyly.
“It is my bed. If someone is in it then that is their own decision.”
“It is the warmest room and I have been ill.”
“And I have been on a very long journey. I have been sleeping in the open sometimes, and I have dreamed of my perfect bed. You may always leave if the idea of sharing distresses you.”
“I am too weak to move.”
“Then
I will carry you.”
“The other room is not aired. I may take the ague.”
“To me, and forgive me if I should sound as if I am greatly attracted to myself, you seem to be a woman who does not wish to leave this bed, or my company."
“I have never hinted that I wish to leave. I am merely point out that…” She stopped as Efan climbed into the bed and pulled a fur around him.
“It is warm in here and the mattress… .” He sighed his pleasure. “It is the stuff of my dreams. I swear that I am aging fast for such things never meant much to me before. Beds in some of the places I stayed were never this comfortable. The previous Lord of Mellorsdale took comfort seriously.”
“And were you always alone…in these less than comfortable beds?” she bit her lips, regretting the question, for there was a hint of caring clearly there. He yawned leisurely. “Aye,” he said, and so simply that she knew it was true.
He lay far from her. It felt as if there were a great sea between them. She had been very lonely. She had missed him greatly, missed him for their wrangles, for the challenge he presented to her, for all the things more than physical, but she had, it was necessary for her to admit, missed him, for that as well.
“Efan,” she said, for she had made up her mind and had managed to push her hateful pride to one side. “Will you forgive me? Will you let me stay. I swear I shall never deceive you again.”
There was a silence for so long a time that Kate thought he had fallen asleep. He was so still, not moving a muscle.
At last he said, very softly. “I was so angry that I wished to kill you. At Court I thought of throwing you to the King, but the words would not come out of me.”
“For Richard I suppose.”
“Perhaps and perhaps not.”
“Why would you not then, give us away, if not just for Richard…?”
He went on as if he had not heard the question, describing the court and the fine ladies in their sumptuous gowns, some with skin as pale as a pearl, with hair the color of wheat. Fine words, she thought, feeling jealousy stir. The child inside her moving restlessly against the onslaught of the alien emotion stampeding through her.
“But…” and the word took on great significance the way he said it. “I could not even feign interest. Fine ladies with fine manners, never stepping away from their breeding, never behaving at times, like pot women.”
“Are you saying that I behave like a pot woman?” she asked horrified.
“You are frequently a cat with uncut claws. I recall you clawed me once.”
“But you deserved to be clawed!”
“Really?” he turned his head to look at her. “Your hair is so brown, you have sun spots on your cheeks. These things haunted me, for I saw no lady at court quite like you. She is a deceitful baggage, I told myself, but loyal and brave. I do not believe I would have dared take such risks. She is warm too and a woman who is not warm to you because it is convenient, or to keep you sweet tempered. She is warm because perhaps she feels something. Am I being naïve Katy?”
“No you are not…”
“Then come, be warm to me again…”
“A moment, there is something…” His hand came out, cutting off her words, circling her waist that was tiny no more. She held her breath as he very gently pulled her to him.
“You feel different,” he said, “unless my senses deceive me?”
“I am different. You had better throw off the fur, the better to see just how different!”
* * * *
They passed a quiet Christmas, then barely three months from his return, the lord’s daughter was born. They named her Bronwen for Dame Caradoc and she was Baptized by the Abbot. It did not bother him that she was a girl child. She was his child. That was all that appeared to matter.
He stayed close to his wife, even agreeing to her unusual wish not to have a wet nurse, but to feed the infant herself.
“Well I am only a steward’s daughter,” she said. “I am not very special. I am no fine lady.”
“I would not say that,” he said but that was all. There were no fine compliments. He had not changed that much!
Two months after the birth of his daughter. Efan made arrangements to go riding with Richard. They met at the Abbey gates and rode inland through the frost ridden dale. Everything was gray and stiff and unyielding, a little like death, Richard said. The coldness of the image made Efan shiver. He barely knew the lad now. Richard had changed so much.
“Richard are you certain that you know what you are doing?” he asked at last. “You are young and life has not shown you all her bounties yet.”
“I have seen much life, life at my father’s court, a life where one has to look over one’s shoulder. Now I have found peace of a kind.”
“But you were full of fun and laughter. What will you become? They are a farming order. Will you be a tiller of the soil, or a milker of goats?”
“At the moment I am attending to my letters.”
“And what then? Oh, lad, I just wish you not to throw your life away!”
Richard’s laugh was a hollow sound. “My life was made forfeit on Bosworth Field Efan. What choice do I have? You say I could go to my aunt, become some kind of figurehead for a useless cause. I could stay at the castle with you and Kate, but we would forever be on tenterhooks in case visitors came who might recognize me. I am my father’s son. The only other thing I can do is to give myself up to the Tudor. No, the only way is the way I have chosen. I experience peace and contentment within the blessed walls of the Abbey.”
“But do you believe, lad?” Efan persisted.
“Oh yes, I am not that hypocritical, Efan. I do believe and my belief gives me peace.”
“What of women?”
Richard laughed with more brightness. “I have felt desire and have had a tumble or two...my curiosity has been satisfied.”
“Richard!” Efan was truly shocked.
“What? Are you shocked Efan. You?”
“I am merely surprised,” Efan muttered but he was a little shocked, as well. “I am lord here and I have never found a wench to tumble!”
“Because you were always too busy looking at Kate to look elsewhere!”
Efan saw that the lad was wise beyond his years. The truth hit him in the center of his chest. His bad temper, his violent verbal attacks on her, his attempted seduction. “You were too busy looking at Kate to look elsewhere.” Their wrangling, his desire to dominate a woman who would not be dominated, had made dealing with her doubly exciting.
He remembered the first time he had seen her, that wild tumbling hair, that defiance in the face of armed men. She was a woman who stirred his loins but more importantly, one who also put him on his mettle. The woman excited him as no woman had before. Courageous, willful Kate, was no ordinary woman!
“I can forsake the lure of the flesh,” Richard went on. “It will be a hard cross to bear at times,” he admitted honestly. “I am after all my father’s son, but I feel the sacrifice is for the greater reward. You may not believe me, Efan, but for the very first time in my life, I can feel that I really belong somewhere.”
“Kate will be very concerned,” Efan said.
“I will sup with you tonight. I will talk to her.”
“There is also the problem of that foxy Welsh boy. I trust him not, Richard.”
“The Abbot and the brothers carefully watch him. I am sure it will be all right.”
“You are truly noble, Richard.”
“I am not perfect. As I have said, I am truly my father’s son.”
* * * *
Kate was in a reflective mood for some weeks after Richard’s visit. He thought he knew the reason, for Kate, like himself worried about how genuine the lad’s vocation was. Choosing not to pursue the matter with her, he kept silent. For himself he was suspicious that Richard had chosen life at the Abbey because it seemed the only viable option open to him. However, he did not wish to burden Kate with his opinion.
At nig
ht they stayed within their apartments, sometimes joined by his mother. Often his eye would stray to the cradle and the perfect pink and white babe that lay sleeping. His child, born of his love making to his woman. But of course he never said any of this to her.
Kate had become his wife by force. Richard had long since confessed that he had commanded her to marry Efan. She was proving a loyal and excellent wife, warm blooded, spirited, he could not also expect her to love him as he loved her. That would be asking too much of the gods. He knew that you must never ask for too much. It was a hard lesson, but he had learned it by heart.
Dame Caradoc and Kate were whispering together in the solar. They giggled as Efan came in, and suspecting that they were conspiring against him, he went out again. They heard him call for his horse to be saddled and then went back to what they had been talking about.
“Then,” said the Dame, twinkling up a her daughter in law, “you can be sweet together again. It is all right now, believe me, my dear.”
“We have not been sweet together since he came home. He was afraid for the baby.”
“He is stupid at times in the ways of women and their bodies. Like most men I suppose,” the Dame scoffed. “Anyway, I will organize a special supper, roast swan’s meat and some of that fancy French wine, is it? Sweetmeats and honey cake, fond of honey cake is our Efan.”
They plotted the meal, ordered the apartments sweetened and then leaving Bronwen in the safe hands of her grandmother, Kate took silver and rode to the Abbey. She suspected that the bad weather was imminent. There was a real taste of snow on the wind and she wanted to see Richard before they were snowed in.
They took ale together. The Abbot had generously given over his apartment to them. It was good to walk and to reassure herself that if not deliriously happy, that Richard was at the very least content.
Later, before leaving, she went to see the Apothecary monk, for he had infused some rose petals and mixed them with oil. They made a pleasant scent when rubbed on the skin. He explained to her how she could make the salve, then gave her a sample, together with some soothing oil for Bronwen’s skin.
“Richard is coming along well. He is very good with potions,” he told Kate. Maybe he will come and work with me. It is up to the Abbot, of course, but I pray the Abbot will see it will be good for us both. I am getting old and forgetful.
Seed of the Broom Page 18