"You —” He shook her, seeing nothing but love in her yearning face. Still he longed for more assurance. "What were you about, eh?"
Her eyes pooled with tears. "Please do not be angry. I made a mistake, perhaps, because I was so concerned for you, because, too, my own pride in my own skill prompted me to act as I did. I did all I did without true thought or wisdom and I will willingly pay for it, but do not be angry, Marc."
"Later," he promised, making the word a threat, as he had once before. He knew he was being unjust, but still his anger boiled in his veins. "We shall discuss this later."
She bowed her head. "Whatever you wish."
There was a movement behind them, a scrape of a chair leg. Then: "We await your pleasure, de Sens."
William's interruption reminded Marc that they were not alone. Regretfully, resentfully, he pulled himself away to face the king. "My liege."
William noted the formal address and de Sens' resentment. Deciding that this dangerous emotion was not directed at him, he glanced at his brother, who was watching the pair with undisguised interest.
"A useful man," Odo had called de Sens and now William recalled the superb horses Odo had already had from the Breton. He himself had a favourite stud mare that was sickening with something which de Sens might very well know how to treat. He would give the man another chance.
"Come sit beside me, Lady Sunniva," he called in English. "De Sens — here." He pointed to the bench at the other side of the table.
There was a scurry of servants clearing the place beside him and setting out fresh cups and trenchers, and then the couple were sitting with him, Sunniva casting a longing glance at de Sens, the Breton not quite meeting her eye.
William chose to be blunt. "God's bones, man, you should not bear any grudge against your proxy! If she fought in your place and won, you should be glad!"
"I am glad," came back the flat response, while Sunniva coiled herself ever tighter upon her bench. William was tempted to knock their heads together, but he used words instead.
"I think you owe something to your proxy, de Sens."
Clearly startled, the man looked up from his untouched trencher of venison and, seizing the moment, William went on, "I think you owe us both an explanation." He lowered his head and dropped his voice so that no others could hear. "How is it you were ever called a woman-killer?"
This was the moment, Marc knew. There were no words to be uttered now but the true ones. He looked across at Sunniva: her warm green-blue eyes steadied him down, gave him the faith to confess.
He spoke to her, wanting her above all to understand.
"Two years ago, I publicly quarrelled with my widowed cousin, Agnes of Mellé. A matter of land rights and the selling of horses: we both thought we were right, but it was a shabby business. Agnes stormed off — she always did have a powerful temper — but then she was found later, before the end of that same evening, dead in her own castle. She had fallen headlong down a staircase and broken her neck."
"But you did not push her," Sunniva said at once.
Her certainty gave Marc the spur to go on.
"Aye, you are right," he said. "But, as you have guessed, that was the rumour soon enough. Many had seen us quarrel: we had fought since childhood." He felt himself blushing deeply in guilty embarrassment: even his chest hairs tingled. "As a boy I once knocked her through a window — a ground floor window, but still..."
His hands had found a meat bone to grind into the table: he did not know what he was doing until he saw the king glaring.
"What had Agnes done to you first?" Sunniva asked, leaning forward, elbows splayed on the table as if she were a boy.
Marc stared at the table, shame-faced. "Agnes had tripped me. I fell into the midden."
William smirked but stopped shy of outright laughter. "This is hardly to the purpose," he remarked, when he did speak.
"Not so, my lord. It shows a pattern, as in a tapestry," Sunniva replied quickly. "In this case, a pattern of trouble between Marc and his cousin. A pattern others would know and believe in. So the rumour would grow that Marc had indeed pushed his cousin again, as he did before."
"Something like," Marc admitted, while William yawned and said, "I would have done more than push."
"Quite, my lord king," Sunniva said smoothly. "Your pattern is to be relentless."
Ruthless, Marc supplied in his own head. But he was not as pretty as Sunniva, he could not risk saying it.
William yawned again. "If you did not push this Agnes of Mellé down the stairs, then who did?" he asked, confirming Sunniva's reading of his character.
"No one," Marc said quickly. "It was an accident."
He thought he had kept his face still but Sunniva leaned further across the table and touched his hand. "Come, Marc, you have kept this hidden too long."
"What, in the name of God?" William began, but Marc, finally released by Sunniva's utter faith in him, was already talking, the words spilling from him in a great flood.
"It was just after the fire, the blaze that had killed my brother and his wife. My nieces were staying with me at Agnes's and they were crying, shrieking with nightmares every night. For days they would not play. They wanted no nurse, no one but me or my mother: their last surviving family. And then, at Agnes's, Alde and Judith took a ball and kicked it about the stairs, and Isabella —
"I told Isabella she was too small for such rough play, that she must be still. Isabella brought cups and spoons to the top of the stairs leading to the castle garderobe: I saw her there and I was glad to see her so intent. She told me that she and her dolly were having a feast. Later, she remembered to take her doll with her to bed but forgot the cups."
He sighed, shamed afresh at the bitter, guilty memory. "I forget them too, and my mother was busy in the great hall of Agnes's castle; she never knew of my nieces' play.
"It was twilight and Alde did not see the cups at the top of the stairs. I found two by her twisted, broken body. She had stepped on them in the semi-darkness, after storming away in rage from our quarrel, and lost her footing."
"But why not say?" William asked, and now Sunniva answered: just as her touch had freed his tongue, she had listened and grasped everything at once.
"You did not want the girls questioned. They had suffered enough."
Marc sighed. "I did not want to remind any of them, especially Isabella, of a childish mishap gone terribly wrong.
"What age was the girl?" William demanded.
"Isabella was five at the time of the fire which killed her parents."
"She had bad dreams after?"
"For a long time. All of my nieces dreamed of fire and death for a long time." He had done so, too, but only to Sunniva would he admit it.
Still, now that he was talking, Marc found it a blessed relief to speak, especially as Sunniva kept clasping his fingers, giving him silent support.
"I know about bad dreams as a child," William said. For an instant, a frightened boy looked out of the face of a man. "It is hell."
Marc cleared his throat and resumed his story. "In the end, I brought them away from France. I stayed at the home of a kinsman who had settled in England as part of the old King Edward's entourage, brought over from Normandy to create a cavalry. I worked with him and his horses, and hoped a new life in England would help my nieces."
"Did it?" William was interested: he had stopped yawning and was picking his teeth, motioning with his free hand for Marc to continue.
"It helped a little."
"Were your earlier pilgrimages in France an attempt to comfort and settle the girls?" Sunniva asked, going, as she always did, to the heart of the matter.
Marc nodded, recalling the shrines he had visited, remembering the desperate prayers he had offered up to King Christ and his saints.
"Nothing stopped the bad dreams for Isabella. I could not have her questioned: I dared not."
"You did not want to subject her to more pain," said Sunniva.
"That too.
"
"And the rumours of your own guilt grew," she added.
Marc nodded a second time.
"I am surprised the shrines in France failed you," William said.
"So was my mother," Marc agreed, surprising himself by that confession. Once said, seeing Sunniva's sympathetic curiosity and William's raised, questioning eyebrows, it was easier to go on.
"Later, it was my mother's suggestion that I take the girls to Durham, to the shrine of the foremost saint in England. She sent word through a messenger that she had dreamed that the journey to Durham, the pilgrimage, would help us in a way that nothing else had. I knew it would be a risky journey so we travelled in high summer, when I hoped the roads would be easy and the northerners too busy with their harvests to be any trouble to us. On the way we encountered the pilgrim party that included Lady Sunniva and her kinsmen and I offered myself as an extra warrior to protect the pilgrims. My girls met Sunniva and finally settled and..."
He shrugged, sensing William's waning interest. "Since the girls are happy now, I have prayed to Saint Cuthbert to release me for the moment from my pilgrim vow. I shall return to the north in time, and complete my pilgrimage to Durham, perhaps next year, or when the girls are older. I shall pray then, at the shrine of the mighty saint, for Cuthbert to intercede with God for Isabella, so she will not suffer anything in mind or soul.... The rest you know."
"Indeed," muttered the king, glancing at Sunniva. "I have eyes."
"Yes," whispered Sunniva, answering Marc, her heart going out to him as she saw the weariness and mingled grief and relief in his eyes.
Finally she knew it all. Finally she understood. Marc's every action had been inspired by love. Like herself, when he had been faced with a hard choice, he had been able to do no other than he did.
Longing to comfort him, Sunniva smiled.
William saw her smile and knew what it meant. After a moment's silence, he looked at their untouched platters. "I shall have your maid brought to you, Lady Sunniva. You can take some food with you when you return to your quarters in the Abbey. De Sens, I think my brother has some questions for you regarding horses. Then you should return to your nieces."
Dismissing the pair, William rose to his feet and called for a guard.
Chapter 30
In any court, there is always someone who knows what is going on and that someone will sell the information. Bertolf's informer was the English maid who waited on his niece. Today, the maid walked with him beside the river while the ferryman waited to row her back to Westminster Palace.
"The king is beginning to favour Marc de Sens, my lord. The Breton has cured his favourite horse of a sickness that had kept the beast off its feed and unable to walk. The mare is now racing round the paddock at the palace and King William is gracious with de Sens. The Breton has asked for your niece's hand in marriage and William looks ready to grant his request."
This was bad, but Bertolf gave no outward sign of alarm. "Has my niece met this Breton alone, at any time?"
"No, my lord. The king keeps them apart."
"My niece knows nothing of this planned betrothal?"
"I do not think so, my lord. But she does not confide in me. She works on her tapestry and waits for a summons to the king. She prays daily, too, in the abbey church."
In hopes of meeting de Sens there, Bertolf thought sourly, as he paid the woman a silver penny and sent her off.
This was news indeed. Since Sunniva and the Breton had appeared at court, his own plans had been in flux. Her survival had been an unexpected complication. Now, though, he saw his chance.
Bertolf had heard — who could not have heard? — of his niece's bizarre intervention at de Sens' trial. He had decided to stay away and feign illness on the day of the Breton's ordeal, so the rumour of what she had done reached Bertolf too late for him to take issue with her or the king, but in the end it had not mattered. He knew that even though Sunniva had "won" the ordeal by combat, the Breton was angered by her behaviour, as any normal man would be. Whatever his niece and the Breton meant to each other, they were across with each other now. Their estrangement would make his final plan that much easier.
Cena should have beaten her more, he thought, walking smartly back from the river to his London house. When she is in my hands I will see to it.
That same afternoon, Bertolf put the first part of his plan into action. He had to begin today, before the Breton saw his niece alone and they could talk together, before the king announced their betrothal. He and his sons must be at Westminster Palace when Sunniva's "disappearance" was discovered.
And so it fell out, exactly as he had planned. He and his two sons were in the presence of the king when the hue and cry came that the Lady Sunniva was gone, kidnapped by unknown forces from the Abbey church itself — an unheard-of sacrilege. All that remained were her knives, laid in a spiral on the floor of the church, beside the high altar.
Bertolf watched with barely-contained glee as Marc de Sens crashed around the church and then the palace, questioning, threatening and shouting until even William had bawled "Stop!" He himself had played the part of indignant uncle to perfection, demanding assurances that she would be safe, questioning the arrangements by which she and the other heiresses had been held. Finally he had withdrawn, in icy disapproval, to his London house, to await developments there.
He would wait a week, Bertolf thought, prodding the ferry-man to urge him to more speed, and then announce his departure to his own lands. William and the Breton might suspect him, but they would have no proof.
No proof at all that Sunniva would be waiting there ahead of him, secure in his family's fastness in the marshes close to the Isle of Ely, marshes no stranger had ever penetrated.
He had planned well. The marsh-folk would not fail him: they knew many cunning traps and ruses and they were loyal to him. He had let them live in their own way, keeping to their old pagan ways without being troubled by priests. In return, they would do this thing for him gladly.
Sunniva and her rich lands were now his.
Chapter 31
The last clear memory Sunniva had for many days after was of walking, with a guard, into the abbey church. It had been her custom to pray within the church in the afternoon. She had hoped that Marc would hear of what she did and would come to the church to seek her out. Instead, an unknown enemy had found her.
A slender, fine-boned monk had approached her, within the sanctuary. He wore his cowl up to hide his face. His hands were hidden in his cassock. Something in the way he moved, bearing down on her guard, had alerted her that he was false. She had shouted a warning and tried to draw her best knife. The false monk, as small and lean as she was, had whipped about, faster than leaping fire, and blown something into her face.
She could remember the taste of whatever it was he had spat at her: bitter, tinged with a rotting savour.
She recalled nothing more for stretches of time, only glimpses of awareness, before another blurred figure hung over her, forcing a sickly-sweet drink down her throat. She tried not to breathe or swallow but then a face livid with colours, swirling patterns of blacks and reds, a devil's face, had swooped closer while harsh hands gouged and pinched or, worse, caressed.
Part of her knew she was stunned, carried off. She could not see because she was blindfolded, she could not fight because her wrists and ankles were bound together. She lay in a bow of pain, in the bottom of a boat, she thought, her muscles cramping as she was sprawled across the boat ribs. If she tried to speak she was drugged or gagged.
Then came a long drink, forced into her, and nothing more except the sounds of galloping and high wind.
Slowly, Sunniva stretched, enduring the shrieking pain in her limbs as she realized she was no longer hog-tied and could move. Exhausted by that simple act, she lay still a moment, registering that she was naked and in a bed. Below her, she heard distant sounds of chopping and sawing. She could smell bread being baked. She listened to the rustle of thatch above her head
, familiar to her since childhood. She was in an English home, in the country.
So who had brought her here? Her mind flashed to a long, lean face, staring, intent eyes, black and red swirls tattooed onto his cheeks and forehead. She shivered and opened her eyes.
"You are back with us again, Sunniva."
Her uncle sat on the bed beside her, smiling, putting aside the fishing net he was mending. He nodded. "Yes, I do mend nets: I find it relaxing. How are you now? You have had a high fever, these past days."
Sunniva swallowed. Her throat was painfully dry but she was shy of asking for a drink when she was naked. She lay with the covers up to her ears and whispered, "There was a man, with tattoos all over his face, in great swirling patterns. He kidnapped me. Did Marc save me from him? Is Marc here now?"
"Here? Why should Marc de Sens be here?" Bertolf rose from the bed and opened a chest, drawing forth a flagon and cups. "There is no tattooed man, there never was: that is your fever speaking. Do you not remember what happened at the palace? Has your fever affected your memory?"
Sunniva frowned, her frown increasing as Bertolf poured a drink into a cup and held it out to her. By sitting up on one elbow and pinning the covers to herself she revealed only her shoulder and arm as she accepted the wooden goblet of blackberry tisane, but she did not like it.
"What do you mean?" She sensed that whatever her uncle was planning to tell her might be a lie, but even so, his next words were a shock.
"Marc de Sens has repudiated you, my dear. He could not accept the humiliation that you heaped upon him by going behind his back to the king and asking to fight in his place. He is a proud man, Sunniva. He could not forgive you."
"Forgive me?" Sunniva felt light-headed again, her world crashing away. The goblet slipped from her clammy fingers, spilling into her bed. "He forgive me? After what I did for him?"
"I am not saying he was right, Sunniva." Bertolf backed away to the door of the chamber. "I shall send women to you now, to cleanse you. Clearly, you are still weak."
Love and Chivalry: Four Medieval Historical Romances Page 50