He so wanted to spoil her.
She sighed a second time and shifted, facing him. A tiny sleep crease ran down her flawless cheek. Her hair, even by the low fire, was the brightest thing in the hall.
How had be ever considered, even for a moment, anything a fellow like Edgar had told him, even a dying Edgar? He had known the man was rotten with envy. But he would make it up to Sunniva. They would marry, soon, and be a family. The girls would be as delirious with happiness as he was.
Planning their future, the wider world seemed far away, yet he could not linger abed forever. There were the horses to tend and breakfast to prepare. He would bring Sunniva a cup of ale and some cold roast pork in their bed; something for the girls, too, if they were awake when he returned from the stable block.
Whistling, Marc forced himself to slide away and skulk about for his clothes, stubbing his toes on the table as he searched for his leggings. He cursed, rubbing his foot, then grinned. It did not matter. Nothing did, this morning. Nothing would dent his truly excellent mood.
Returning later from the stable, he noticed a wisp of dust blowing in from the south. Straining his eyes in the bright, glowing, rain-washed morning he squinted into the sunrise. Nothing. There was nothing.
But he had to be sure. Marc cast himself to the ground, feeling with his fingers and all his body, listening through the snippets of birdsong for the one sound he did not want to hear.
And there it was. Steady. Relentless. Like rushing water on top of a storm-cloud. He had heard it too often not to know what it was.
Their horses: he had to saddle them first. They could flee naked if need be, but they had to get out and away.
Someone was coming, and that someone had others with him — or her, but Marc did not think the leader would be a woman. He had counted twenty horses and more: a war-band, he wagered, bearing down on this homestead at a gallop.
The mystery owner was returning, and not alone.
We have to get out before they get here.
Sunniva was dressed and boiling water in a small cauldron when Marc burst back into the hall. The girls were playing "tag" around their pallets.
Relieved they were also dressed, Marc bundled their things into a huge messy pile on a bed sheet and lifted it onto his back.
"We need to go. Now," he told a wide-eyed Alde.
"Quickly!" Sunniva ordered, while she refilled their water flasks with the cauldron water. "Grab a pork bone and then go outside with your uncle!"
She snatched up Isabella's rag doll, rammed it down the front of her own gown, and began ushering the three girls to the door, answering all their, "What is happening?" "Who is coming?" "Why do we have to leave?" with the all-embracing, "Your uncle will explain once we are on the road again."
Marc was proud of her, but there was no time to say so: they had to get out.
In the end, they made it to the stable. Marc had loaded up the mule and Sunniva had snatched up the leading reins of the ponies when they heard the ominous clattering of hooves.
Before he knew what she was about, Sunniva spurred her own horse and rode out to meet the oncoming riders in the yard.
"My lords!" Her clear voice carried over the tumult. "We are a few, sorely-tried travellers who availed ourselves of your roof-space yesterday night. We came in peace and are leaving in the same blessed state. We took only what we needed and have left gifts in return."
Gifts? What was she talking about? Marc thought, sprinting through the heaving, sweating mass to shield her as the men and horses milled round.
"Who are you?" bellowed one of the newcomers. "Speak your name quickly!"
"I am Marc, master of horse —” The rest of his speech was lost as a score of male throats groaned and hissed. Sunniva had torn off her head-square and her long loosened hair stopped every breath and tongue for an instant.
"I am Sunniva Cena-daughter, and my father and three brothers, who lately perished at the battle of the bridge of Stamford, were all loyal to King Harold, as I am still."
Suddenly there was silence. Men stared at the churned earth and would not look at each other.
"What news have we missed?" Marc asked.
"Harold is dead," said the warrior who had demanded their names. "He was killed on Senlac field, a long way to the south. Many of his men died with him." The man's wind-reddened face became still more hollow-cheeked, his faded blue eyes seeming to stare at nothing. "Our own lord is among the fallen."
"Then who," stammered Sunniva, "Who is king?"
The warrior grimaced. "William of Normandy." He spat after he spoke, as if to clear his mouth. "William the Bastard!"
"The people will not bear it," murmured Sunniva, amidst a general grumbling of the men.
"They will have to!" snapped back the answer. "As we must now."
"Uncle?" Alde called across a sea of weapons, tugging on her lower lip with nervousness as she and her own pony were hemmed in by the foam-flecked horses of the men. "Isabella needs the midden."
"I will take her," Sunniva volunteered, quick as a lightning flash. "I will take all of you."
The men parted slowly — wearily though not grudgingly — as she guided her plucky bay mare through their battered, clustered ranks to reach the girls. There was silence as she shepherded them and their ponies outside the homestead's ditch and palisade: Marc could see the warriors watching and knew they were thinking of their own women-folk. As for him, he was mightily relieved to see them go: this yard of armed men was no place for his girls. He only hoped and prayed that Sunniva would have sense enough to keep on riding, taking herself and his three far away from danger.
If anything happened to his girls. If anything happened to Sunniva -
"Hey, man, are you deaf? Who are you?"
The warrior who shouted was the same one who had spoken out before. He was a small, rangy kind of man, brown as a hazel nut, wiry and supple, though drooping with tiredness. His leather jerkin was thick with mud, his sword notched and slightly bent. His own face was equally battered; he had a massive purple bruise slashed across his chin and an egg-shaped bruise on his forehead where his helmet must have been knocked off.
Feeling at a distinct advantage in terms of age and experience, Marc nevertheless drew his sword. "I am Marc de Sens, from across the narrow sea. Who are you?"
"Thorkill of Abforde." The warrior fingered the egg-shaped bruise on his forehead. "But you are Norman!"
"Breton." Marc knew such a distinction would make no difference to the English, as the mood in the closed-in yard darkened with the men's scowls, but it mattered to him. "I came to serve the old king, Edward."
"Edward the Norman-lover?"
The other men were nudging their mounts forward by this time, buffeting against him. Marc kept his temper and his feet and answered steadily, "Edward, the rightful English king."
Thorkill continued to rub his bruised forehead: Marc was tempted to ask him if the action helped him to think. "What did he want with you, Norman?" he asked at length.
Another shove — it felt like the heel of a boot against his ribs — which Marc ignored. The longer he could keep his feet, the further, pray King Christ, Sunniva and his girls would be escaping.
"To train his cavalry," he replied, when a second boot kicked into the small of his back. "And to tend his horses." Marc tossed Thorkill a piece of free information: whatever happened between them he saw no reason for the fellow's own mount to suffer. "Your charger has a bruised fetlock. It needs a compress of —”
"You need not tell me what it needs, Master of horse." Thorkill interrupted, with a sneer. "Aye, you were saying something of the like, and then your woman broke in. Do you always let her do that?"
Marc stiffened, heat rising in him like a flame. He wanted to raise a few more bruises on Thorkill's face, perhaps give him a permanent injury. "You will speak no ill of my lady," he said, grinding out the words.
"Speek noo eel," mocked Thorkill. "Or what, Norman?"
So easy! From bein
g hard-pressed to contain his anger, Marc could hardly believe it. What he had imagined he would really need to work for had dropped at his feet like a ripe plum.
"Or we fight," he said. "You rest a while, so all is fair, and then we fight." He smiled, relishing this next. "Unless you are afraid?"
Thorkill of Abforde lunged, leaning so far forward in the saddle that he was in danger from pitching from his lamed horse. "You dare say that to me, who has ridden from Senlac?"
"I dare," Marc answered. "And I challenge you. No one insults my lady. No one."
For a change, Thorkill scratched at his blood-stained, dun-brown moustache, and then his ear. "I meant no disrespect to your handsome wench, but I will fight you, Norman. For the pure pleasure of spilling your guts."
"No!"
Marc's heart plummeted into his guts. Sunniva had returned. True she was alone, but she had come back. He motioned to her, away! But she merely flicked the sides of her horse with her feet and surged closer.
"You must not do this!" she was saying. "You cannot! How then, am I to ride to my homeland? What of your youngsters?"
"Silence!" bawled the reddening, clearly disconcerted Thorkill. "What is said cannot be unsaid." He stabbed a blood-stained finger at Sunniva. "You, woman, if you cannot watch in quiet, then do not watch at all!"
"Do not leave the children alone, Sunniva," Marc said, knowing she would not be able to refuse his request. "Please. For their sake, if not mine."
She could not. Looking angry and afraid she yanked on her horse's rein and turned about, cantering away. To watch her go was a strange thing: he was glad, and proud of her, amused and stirred by her indignation and touched by her concern.
Most of all he wanted to tickle her till she cried mercy. Did she think he had no plan at all? Did she worry, even for a single instant, that this squirty little English knight could best him?
We will have a reckoning on this matter, Sunniva, he promised. Later.
It was hard for her to leave. Only the thought of Alde and Judith, alone and wondering, of Isabella, sickly with fear, made it possible for her to do so. Sunniva rode slowly, her head throbbing.
"Let me help," she wanted to plead with Marc. "Let me stay and fight beside you. You know what I can do with blades." But that was impossible. Who would care for the children, then?
"Damn you, Marc," she whispered, angry that he had inveigled her into this position, then horrified that she should be cursing him. She had only ever used her blades as part of a show. Could she truly thrust one into another human being?
"No," she whispered, waving to Alde and Isabella while Judith was already off her pony and pelting over the grass toward her.
Marc would have to do it, she thought, appalled. Fight a stranger, a man against whom he had no reason to be angry. And if he won, what then? Would the others let him go? Why had he thrown out that challenge? What did it matter what Thorkill said of her? And to offer the man advice on how to treat his horse!
"He is mad," she said.
"Men are terrible fools," she said aloud, swinging down from her horse to catch the stumbling Judith in her arms, glad of her warmth, her sweet childhood scent.
"Where is he?" Judith yelled, kicking against her shins. "He should be here!"
"He is coming, dear one." Sunniva could say nothing more, offer no more reassurance other than her own embrace. She smoothed the child's crumpled clothes and wiped her tear-streaked face. "There, now, you need not cry. Your uncle will be with us soon."
"When?" demanded Alde, who had also dismounted and was staring at the palisade with narrowed, hungry eyes.
"Soon," Sunniva repeated, ashamed of her inadequate answer.
Sitting very straight on her dappled pony, Isabella began to cry. As Sunniva reached for her, too, Judith let out an inhuman howl and Alde burst into tears.
"That is enough, girls," said a quiet voice behind them.
"You live!" Sunniva whipped round and then she was in his arms, with Judith and Alde jammed between them and Isabella half-crying, half-laughing. "How? How on earth did you -?"
She stopped, not wanting to know if he had killed anyone. It was sufficient, a miracle, that he was safe. He and Theo: the chestnut looked down his long nose at her and snorted, as if this outpouring of emotion was beneath him. Marc, however, was laughing: his face and eyes as bright as a boy's.
"I knew I had to be quick. I knew you or these three elflings would never wait as you should. Though I fear I had to leave the mule and our baggage behind."
"No matter," Sunniva said quickly, "You are here and whole."
"Should!" Alde was so scandalized that she stopped crying and began to hiccup instead. "That — hic — is not — hic- fair!"
"Did you fight them all with your sword?" Isabella asked, examining her thumb intently before putting it into her mouth to begin a furious sucking.
"No sword," Marc answered. "No blade of any kind," he went on, winking at Sunniva.
How dare he do that when we have been hanging in uncertainty? Sunniva thought, but then curiosity was too much. "So how?" she prompted.
He shrugged. "I confess I was inspired by your tricks with knives. I feinted a blow with my sword and threw a punch instead. I hit Thorkill on his bruise —”
"The egg-shaped one?" Alde asked, hiccups now under control.
"The very same, although I was aiming for his chin. His horse shifted at the last instant and I caught him on the forehead instead. Still he went down, landed on his rump with a wet snort, tried to rise and fell back."
Did anyone laugh? Sunniva mused, though she did not ask. The "fight" such as it was, sounded almost comic. She was surprised no other warrior had stepped in to continue it.
"Had his landing been softer, I think he would have snored," Marc went on, as if he had guessed part of her thoughts. "He and the others, they were all half-crippled with exhaustion. I have seen it before. Men can die on forced marches if they push themselves too hard. The men at the farmstead were like that: they have fought and lost a battle and then slogged their way home. To fight one lone warrior — even a Norman who is really a Breton — was too much. They were glad to see me walk out."
"They let you go?" Sunniva wanted to hit herself as soon as the words were out: of course they had let him go! He was here, towering above her, big as a tree and twice as safe.
"They were not eager to detain me," Marc answered, but now, for the first time, he twisted round to look back. "Even so, I think it best we move on."
"I agree," said Sunniva, because she did. She heartily agreed.
Chapter 22
They had ridden all day, eating nothing and drinking nothing except cool boiled water. At sunset Sunniva spotted the sheep-pen close to the track and they bedded down, with a wicker hurdle and the horses' saddle cloths slung over their heads. It was a damp, uncomfortable cave but they all slept quickly, huddled together for warmth.
Now she felt the loss of their possessions most keenly. With only stones to use as cooking pots, she had roasted and ground acorns for their supper and baked them on a thin slate as a kind of biscuit. It was poor stuff, famine fare, but they had little else. Isabella had cried all the while that she ate. Judith had slapped Alde and Alde had punched her. Marc put himself between them and they had both slapped him. He said nothing, except, "Finish your food."
Soon after, they stretched out by the tiny guttering fire, Marc in the midst of them as a kind of living, heated cushion and, to Sunniva's utter astonishment, they all slept. She even dreamed.
She dreamed of Cena when he was a young man, with fair curling hair, bright eyes and a sinewy frame. They were walking together on a golden beach. He smiled and held out his hand to her.
"You have done well for yourself, daughter."
His acknowledgement of her brought tears to her eyes. "Thank you, father," she said, the sound of the surf surging in her ears.
He did not embrace her but his fingers were warm and gentle against hers. He squinted out to the distan
t sea.
"The people will accept you," he said, after a time. "That is your duty. To lead them and to keep them safe."
Sunniva inclined her head, accepting her responsibilities.
"Marc is a good man. A fine, good man." Cena squeezed her hand, then released it. "But you must leave him, daughter."
"Never!" Tears spilled from her eyes as panic threatened to overwhelm her.
"You must! He is a Norman. Our land now is flea-ridden with Normans. He is one of the invaders! He is a known killer! If you stay with him, my death and the deaths of your brothers will have been for nothing."
Cena turned his back on her and began to walk away. The beat of the waves grew louder and as Sunniva drew in a breath to argue she found herself shouting, "No!" at a rotting post from the sheep-pen. Thoroughly awake and disturbed, she broke down in weeping, only managing to stifle her sobs when Isabella shifted in her sleep and snuggled against her, her small rose-bud mouth frowning around her thumb.
Biting her hand, Sunniva sat up. The thought of leaving Marc and the girls filled her with dread. The land about was becoming ever more familiar to her: she thought she could reach home from here without a guide. And if she travelled off the roads and at night she should be safe enough.
But to leave Marc...
She watched him sleep. She would not believe that he was a woman-killer: that kind of studied cruelty and cowardice was not in him. As for the rest, what did it matter if he was a Norman, or a Breton? He was hers, and she his. They loved each other. He had told her he loved her. She embraced that wondrous knowledge with a smile, longing to wake him so he would say it again. He was all to her, magnificent, manly, kind, surprising, engaging, full of stories. She loved his laughter. She loved the way he jangled as he walked.
She kissed the blue cross tattoo on his arm and he muttered and rolled toward her without crushing Judith who slept against his back.
Love and Chivalry: Four Medieval Historical Romances Page 43