"The Lady of the Lilies. I have never seen her, but I can believe it."
Ranulf found himself wondering about the damsel's true name. In the last few months she and her company had appeared at almost every tourney. He had been away on his estates, but now he had returned to the jousts, her name seemed to be on every man’s lips. Some said she was the mistress of Sir Tancred of Mirefield, a knight he knew to be of middling ability, but a good-natured sort.
"I have not seen her, either," he admitted. He had not sought her out before. Now he wondered why. Was Giles right? Was he turning into a clerk? Was he dull?
Giles has not seen her, either, he reminded himself, but then Giles had also been away, at the courts of France, and had only lately returned to England.
"Her tent is a wonder of colour and delight, Sir. I saw it this morning, on my way to you. Her attendants were erecting it and making all fine."
That surprised him. "She does not stay at the castle? I thought all the ladies were with Blanche Fitneyclare."
"Not my Lady of the Lilies. The castle is too old and dark for one so delicate and fair."
Ranulf raised his head and stared at his steward. "You, too? I thought it was only Giles who fell in love so quickly, and sight unseen."
The older man scratched at his ear and cleared his throat. "The list of harvesters will keep until noon-time, sir. The Lady of the Lilies demands that knights who would claim her favour seek her out first, ahead of the other ladies. And she will make us wait. It is said she always makes squires and knights wait."
"Arrogant wench!" In spite of this, Ranulf felt a glimmer of interest, the more so when Offa set his sturdy legs more firmly apart and said ruggedly, "She is a real princess, sir, from the far east beyond China and Cathay. She travelled west from her father's court to escape the pestilence."
"Her father let her come all this way? I did not think her retinue so large."
"No one would dare interfere with my Lady of the Lilies."
Ranulf sensed that Offa had an anecdote he wanted to share, and he tried to block the matter with a terse, "A pity for her, then, that after all that travel, the pestilence has come here to England."
Offa's swarthy face darkened to a dull red. "I would like to see a real princess." The words before I die hovered in the air between them.
Ranulf gave up and straightened, cracking his head on one of the tent poles. Refusing to rub his smarting forehead, he ducked toward the door-flap, saying over his shoulder, "For you then, we shall both go, or I shall have no peace before I fight."
He could not see Offa's face but he sensed the man grinning as he stepped out into the sunlight.
Promise me, her brother had pleaded with her on his death-bed. Promise me you will guide them to a better life. That you will not live a wicked life of sin and lies. They follow you as they follow me, so you must vow this, Edith.
And, clasping his limp and fevered hand, she had vowed that she would do all he had asked, for Gregory had been dying and she had wanted to comfort him.
Three days after she had broken them out of Warren Hemlet's church, her brother had collapsed. She had tended him, building up a bed of grass and heather by the road-side, warning the surviving villagers to stay back. Fearing the pestilence, these had fled into the woods, but they had returned after she had buried Gregory at the edge of one of the strip fields. Walter had even carved a cross for her to put on the grave. She had made the sign of the cross but she had not prayed—why should she pray to a God who took Gregory but allowed Sir Giles to flourish? After a time, prompted by the children's hunger-cries, she had moved from the grave and tottered on, blind as to where they were going.
She had expected to die, but she had not. When she did not die, she took it as a sign that God had not noticed, and she had decided that God would not notice when she put her first plan into action.
For two years now her plan at worked well and better than well, even more sweetly than she had hoped, and she told herself that she felt no shame—none, excerpt for when she dreamed of Gregory.
For the last month, she had been dreaming of her brother every night.
The truth of it was that she did not like to sleep without a husband. Bundled with the other widows at night, she missed a man's warmth, a mate's rough yet tender wooing. At such times, all she could do was work: labour until she was so weary that she dropped like a stone onto her pallet.
I have some time before the knights arrive and clamour for favours. I could take our bed linen to the river to wash. With my work-rough hands and my hair over my face no tourney man will know me. Yet if any lusty serving man detains me and he is charming and comely, then why not? If we are all due to die soon of the pestilence, why not indeed?
She smiled and began to strip the pallets.
She was walking with the bundled sheets to the shallow, slow-moving stream when she realized that another was there before her. A man, big and muscled enough for a knight but not in armour, was sitting on the river-bank with his boots off, dangling his bare feet in the clear water.
Large, fine feet they were, too, and very clean. She stood in the shade of a young beech tree, shielded by its fresh leaves, and watched him; this nameless knight. He was new to her, and a pleasure to look upon, with a trim waist and good shoulders. He slowly kicked his legs in the water and she noticed the dark swirls of down on his calves, less lustrous and straighter than his fair-going-to-russet shaggy, badly-clipped hair. She wondered if the tiny dark fish were nibbling his ankles and laughed softly at the foolish idea. He was handsome, she conceded, if long, clean-shaven features as regular as a mason's new carving of a king were to one's taste—and they were to hers. On his feet, standing proudly on the daisy and speedwell studded grass, he would be tall as a castle keep, but wiry, with a rangy strength she admired when he skimmed a pebble across the river.
He had a paring knife on the grass beside him, on his left side: a left-handed fighter, then. In a flash, she imagined him cutting her toe-nails, using his long, supple fingers to cradle her feet. She drew him in her mind, long arms reaching for her, rolling her tight into his arms. His strong, full mouth would taste of peppermint, she decided, and she would feed him mint tisane and sweet, sweet dates. He would sweep her off into an uncut field of wheat and there, with the poppies glowing round them, he would make love to her. His hands would be supple, gentle and powerful together, and he would be generous with pleasure: shielding her, caressing her, teasing her, filling her....
Such vivid thoughts brought a wave of heat pounding into her face, but she kept staring, tense as a harp string, waiting for something, some sign as to whether she should be bold. It would be a foolish risk, but then, would he know her again?
"Probably not, for he is but a man,” she murmured. And it was a glorious gold and blue morning. A kingfisher flashed by, bright as a rainbow, and her knight looked both comely and charming.
Choosing for herself, she lowered the bundle of bedding and took a step closer. Ahead, her nameless knight splashed in the stream like a young lad and she chuckled to see him so simply happy, but then, perhaps hearing her unguarded laugh, he turned his head.
His lean, narrow face was bleak, with a haunted look of grief about his dark brown eyes: a strained, weary face of many lost and lonely days. Sorry to see such pain and now shy of intruding, she moved sharply back, into deeper cover and shadow, but he called out to her.
"Little maid?” The unguarded, stricken look dropped from his face as he smiled—to reassure her, she realized. “The bank is large enough for two. I shall not trouble you."
When she did not stir, he patted the ground beside him. "The sun is warm and the water very pleasant. We may sit together in peace." He smiled again, his teeth white against his tanned face—good, strong teeth, she noticed, and none missing—"You have my word."
Tempted, she almost moved forward, but then caught herself in time: he was being kind, but such grief as his should be respected. To make all sure, to stop herself from
yielding, she called back, "I must go. My lady awaits."
"Your lady? No lord, then?"
She did not answer his questions. It was time to go, more than time. A tumble in field might be a consolation, as a plucked flower may be a delight, but both would quickly fade.
And if we are all to die of the pestilence, what matter? Did you not hope and plan for exactly this kind of encounter? Stop this foolish shyness! Seize this brawny, beautiful brute and make him yours for the morning!
She shook her head against herself, her loins and lips tingling at the lascivious notion. That glimpse of his heart, and his kindness, made him real to her: a person, not a day-dream of desire, and she would not treat him so. Thus, when he rolled to his feet in a swift, powerful arc of movement, she skittered sideways, away from his likely approach. Plucking the heap of sheets off the beech mast, she gathered them tight and then pelted off, the sun burning on her head and face. Torn between going and staying, even as she fled, she made for the tall, multi-coloured tent at the eastern side of the tourney ground, her mind in as much turmoil as a kicked beehive.
We could have this morning, and then? Do not look back!
Do you want to lie with him and then yearn after him for weeks? Do you want him to regret our union?
Do not look back! He may take it as a signal to follow!
Do you want to watch him flirt with others, and realize that grief of his, that seeming care, is as shallow as a dew pond? Worse, do you want to see him with another lady and know for sure our time meant nothing?
"I would be his equal and mean all of it," she panted, her calves and thighs aching as she ran past a startled group of pages, who instantly began to point and to make lewd remarks on her bouncing breasts. "I am his equal." Against the jeering of the tousle-headed, gawping lads, her voice sounded false in her ears, too light.
Ranulf knelt beneath the spreading branches of the beech tree where the maid had sheltered. Offa was still in the bushes somewhere, struggling with his bowels. His poor steward had been sweating with fear, though he had tried to convince the hapless Offa that it was likely nothing more than the sudden, unfortunate results of eating a bad meat pie, and not the pestilence.
He rose off his knees into a crouch. She had been about this height, as brown and nimble as a sparrow, with a mass and maze of hair. She had carefully hidden her face and eyes. Perhaps her mistress had not known she had ventured to the stream; perhaps she was playing truant, like a school-boy. A mystery maid, much as the Lady of Lilies was a mystery princess.
"I wonder who she belongs to?" he said, idly patting the narrow trunk of the beech where the lass had leaned and not really caring at that moment if he meant maid or princess.
"Offa!" he bawled, pitching his shout above the stirring camp, "Have you died in that hedge?"
There was a cracking of twigs and his steward burst out into the water-meadow from a stand of hawthorn and guelder rose, his mouth already busy with excuses.
"Peace, Master Steward, and lead on." Ranulf waved off the rest, only half-listening as Offa apologized again. All of this—stream, maid and princess—were pretty diversions. They would pass the morning until it was time to fight again.
Chapter 2
As this tournament was not close to a town, the place of procession was not along any street but ran from castle Fitneyclare to the tourney ground itself. This was a large space of water-meadow and high standing grass and wheat—uncut crops both and now a mêlée ground for knights. Ranulf could hear the yelling of brawling squires, of carpenters hammering and sawing as they erected stands for spectators and a wooden mock-keep in the middle of the hay-field. The lady of castle Fitneyclare had insisted that only ladies and damsels should stay within the real, stone castle and so the rest—knights, squires, farriers, baggage wagons, market stalls, traders and all manner of hucksters—encircled the fighting area.
Ranulf strode through this encampment of tents and wagons with accustomed ease, returning the anxious salutes of fellow knights. He could hear Offa padding behind and so knew the fellow still lived. "Where is this splendid tent?" he called back, but then he saw it for himself.
Stunned, he came to a stop on the rutted, dusty track. Olwen would have loved this, was his first thought, and the bright morning was shrouded for him, and dulled. With a glowering eye he took in the sight, itching to find fault.
There were hurdles about the tent, hung with garlands and tiny be-ribboned charms and tinkling bells, all very dainty. Copper-skinned, dark-haired children dressed in gowns of silk darted in and out of an unseen entrance to the tent, tossing rose petals and calling to each other in high, strange voices.
"In case the lady should walk outside," murmured Offa beside him, clearly as amazed as he was.
The tent meanwhile, a rainbow of scarlet, yellow, blue and gold, was well dug in, the poles perfectly lashed together and straight. A troop of minstrels played pleasingly on rebecs outside it, strolling round without tripping on the guide ropes. The scent of lilies hung about the little camp.
"All very nesh and pretty," Ranulf grunted, wondering at the lack of guards. "Are there guards within? Amazons, perhaps?"
"The lady does not care to speak of any kind of warfare away from the lists," Offa whispered urgently. "Or so I have heard. Do you see the charms hanging on the hurdles? It is said she has many more to fend off disease and hardship."
Ranulf fixed his glower on his gossipy steward but his eyes caught a slight movement by the grand, purple entrance to the tent. Although the door flap was still down he guessed that someone was peeping out. Instinct told him it was a woman, and he waved.
The bright eye in the crack of silk was hastily withdrawn.
“We come too soon,” Ranulf observed, briefly amused, but Offa merely pointed and now he noticed the other knights and squires, clustered under a canopy set just outside the entrance to the lady’s camp. They waited in line, obedient and docile as lap dogs, and the sight of their tense yet mooning faces irked him. Giles at least had not been fool enough to wait; he was nowhere to be seen, doubtless strolling to court the ladies of the castle, but these men—were they men at all? And if they were....
“The princess courts danger. I’d not allow a wife of mine to set her establishment within this camp of soldiers and men-on-make.”
“Her camp is very discreet and to the side,” said Offa.
“Even so.” He sounded pious as he spoke and loathed himself: the woman and her entourage were thriving, and who was he to care?
Cursing, he turned away and, further down the field, spotted a knight stalking up the jousting ground toward the tent, red-faced and breathing hard. But not from hurrying. Running and stumbling beside the stocky knight was a page with a bloodied nose. The little lad was crying, and no wonder: his shoulders and back were bloodied: dark stains showed through his baggy tunic. He had been lashed and hard, and now, as he tripped on an ant-hill, the knight punched him again, striking the side of his head with a vicious blow that Ranulf would not have inflicted on a boar-hound, much less a boy.
"Hoi! No more!" Incensed, he strode forward to intercept the knight, but the coward vanished behind a troop of fire-eaters, dragging the weeping page with him.
Ranulf sprinted after them, smashing into wagons and water butts in his haste, leaping over tent posts and ripping aside tent flaps to look inside the nearest tents, but the pair had gone.
"I will remember you, though. Badge of white with a red fist? Very apt. I will know you again, and then you will answer to me." Ranulf spat on the grass to seal his vow and ran hard up the field, determined to retrieve Offa and return to their work. The Lady of Lilies would wait.
"Glove me, please," said the Lady of Lilies. Standing in the centre of the tent, she extended her hands and her attendants moved in, smoothing the white gloves over her narrow fingers, covering the red scars where she had been burned by a Chinese dragon.
Sitting on his accustomed chair within her silken chamber, eating his second cupful of w
ild strawberries, Sir Tancred trembled, caught between delight and awe. This glorious lady was so mysterious, so beautiful, he was tempted to worship her.
"Are you to joust this afternoon, Sir Tancred?" she asked, smiling at him.
No one but he and her followers saw her smile. No one but he and her attendants ever saw her face. Sir Tancred's chest warmed at the thought. He rose and bowed, aware too late that he had not placed the cup on the floor before he bowed. "It is my urgent hope, princess, to joust for you."
"You do me honour, my lord, and I have a special token for you." Her smile deepened. "May I have a strawberry?"
"Take them all, my lady." He passed the cup to her nearest maid, who fed her a bright berry, and then, at a nod from her always-generous mistress, finished the cup between herself and the other maids.
Watching them together, Sir Tancred thanked all the saints that he had encountered the princess and her caravan on the road to London, that winter day a year ago. She and her people had been beset by a crowd of vagabonds and he had charged the motley mob without thinking—his single bravest act. The shock, and his good horse and his own men had scattered the would-be looters. Since that day, he and his folk had joined the entourage of the princess, or she and her folk had joined his: he was never sure which, and in truth it mattered not a jot to him.
He heard the rumours of course but ignored them. He had his own girl, Christina, and was well content with her. If crude louts thought that such an amazing creature as the princess would take a middling, grey-bearded knight for a lover, they were fools.
"What news from the lists, Sir Tancred?"
He loved her voice, so low and mellow. He felt valued by her appreciation. Distracted, he took a moment to answer. "Aye, the lists. Sir Henry's arm has healed cleanly and I hear he has made plans to honour you."
She sighed a little, her lovely face clouding. "I am most happy Sir Henry is healed, but it was a simple potion I gave him, no more. He has no need for these elaborate thanks."
Love and Chivalry: Four Medieval Historical Romances Page 86