By Design (42 page)

“I
THANK YOU
for making this journey to tell me all of it. I heard of Edward's decree, but of course I worried about Addis.”

Moira's fingers gently soothed a balm over Rhys's healing palm while she spoke. She had insisted on tending to this herself when she saw the bandages upon his arrival. He had spent the last hour drinking her wine with one hand while she bathed the other. He had diverted his attention from the raw scar by regaling her with lively stories about the great events that she had missed.

She prepared the binding to wrap his palm. “I think that your story is incomplete, though, from the way that you rode in the gate. Those days in the saddle took more strength than you had. You have suffered much, my friend, and must stay a few days and rest.”

He could tell that she suspected the real reason for his condition. It had not been the journey that had tired him, nor the healing wounds, but a lack of sleep. Thoughts of Joan plagued him at night.

He had almost veered north while he rode. Time and again he had to stop himself from heading to the road where she journeyed. Only the pain of their parting kept him from doing so.

He never wanted to go through that again.

“Will you stay as I ask?”

“Aye, a few days.”

They sat in the solar, bathed in light pouring through the large windows. A nurse rocked the fussing baby in a corner, and little Patrick played with a toy on the floor.

The domesticity soothed him. So did Moira's friendship.

She set aside the little pot of ointment, and held his hand in hers. “How long since you received this cut?”

“A fortnight.”

“It looks like it was cleanly sewn.”

“The man did his best.”

“Not good enough, I fear. You have lost the strength in this hand, haven't you?”

“It does not close as it should. I think that it never will.”

“It is too early to know that.”

“So Addis says. But I do know it.”

She must have seen how certain he was, and did not offer any more false hope. “I am sorry.”

“I can still hold a quill. I can still create with my mind if not my hands. Being the King's principal builder will bring me wealth, and status equal to a courtier. I have not lost so much.”

“That is not true, Rhys. You have lost a great deal, and the fact that you will never carve again is only a part of it.”

The sorrow in her voice touched him. It probed his hidden grief.

Something in him began cracking, as if the thin edge of a metal wedge had started a fissure in a soft stone.

He looked down at the child playing nearby. Little Patrick smiled up at the attention. He pushed to his feet, and toddled the few steps to come closer. He beamed with a big smile, and smacked Rhys's knee. “Up.”

Rhys raised his knee. The child laughed, and pushed it, showing what he meant.

“He wants you to cross your legs so that he can ride your boot,” Moira explained. “It is a game that Addis plays with him.”

Rhys crossed his legs. Patrick straddled his booted foot and leaned into his leg, arms extended. Rhys rocked him up and down.

The child's squeals of delight rang through the chamber.

Rhys laughed. Then, suddenly, the mirth died and the sound caught in his throat. Patrick still rode, giggling with pleasure, but the child's voice and face dimmed. The fissure grew and grew, like a hammer pounded the wedge down, and profound sorrow poured through the increasing gap, engulfing his mind and dulling his senses.

Hands removed the child from his foot. Steps receded. Patrick's indignant howls and the baby's fussing disappeared behind a closing door.

Silence surrounded him. He stared blindly at the spot where the child's innocent face had just been.

Motherly arms slid around him. A woman's hand pressed his head to a soft shoulder. His battered heart relished the comfort, but it only weakened him more.

He took a deep breath, and began to pull away. “Hell, Moira, your husband will never understand. He will kill me if he hears of it.”

She firmly eased his head back down. “Ah, Rhys, you still do not understand him. He took three messengers to Nottingham, and did not need you to make this journey
for his sake. He sent you to me, so that you could share your sorrow with a friend.”

The depth of Addis's generosity moved him more than he could contain. It defeated his defenses. The fissure reached his heart.

And then, because it was Moira, he broke.

Snow dusted the city of London, and the overcast sky promised an early nightfall. Rhys turned his horse onto the lane where he lived, and let the horse find his way home.

He had delayed his return as long as he could. He had stayed with Moira more than a few days, and then gone to the town of his youth. His uncle had received him with warmth and given him a bed for as long as he wanted. There had been some good times there, surrounded by the cousins born of his uncle's second wife.

The young ones had thought his role in Mortimer's downfall a splendid adventure, but his uncle had followed him to the graveyard one evening to have a private talk. While they gazed down at the graves of his parents, and of a dark-haired woman and a nameless babe, his uncle had spoken his mind.

“If you did it for yourself, to advance your station, so be it. But if you did it for her, and what happened all those years ago, you've still got notions in you that need fixing. Let lords and bishops worry about the big world. Men like us live in a small one, and there is contentment in our gardens that nobles never know. Go and serve the King now, and build his castles and churches, and grow rich from his favor, but make your life in your craft and in a family if you want to know any peace. There is no point in risking your neck over who holds the power, boy. One's the same as
the next to us, and justice comes and goes at their whim. You find a good woman and take care of what's important now.”

Maybe he would. Perhaps it was time to put aside boyish notions and accept what life was about. His new position at court meant that he could even marry above his degree if he wanted. Not too high above, but there were gentry knights who would accept him for their daughters. He would look for a practical woman with property, who sought only security, and who did not mind that her husband's love lived forever with someone else.

He paused a few buildings away from his house, at the place where an alley would take him back to the stable. Aye, he should start a family and find the peace his uncle spoke of. In a year or so, he might be able to do it. Not in this house, though. There would be no contentment in its garden, ever again.

Some boys strolled by. One broke away and came to greet him. It was Mark's friend, David.

“Back finally, are you? You missed all the feasts. The ward was drunk for a week after the decree got read, and everyone went to the execution. The men kept looking for you, since we heard you'd been in the thick of it, same as last time. They'd have bought you all the ale you could drink. Where have you been?”

“I went to visit my boyhood home.”

“Ah, well, then you celebrated with them there. Anyway, it was a grand time. Do you want me to take your horse back? Mark showed me how to groom him.”

The idea of avoiding the garden entrance appealed to Rhys. He dismounted and handed over the reins.

David made to lead the horse down the alley, but paused. “I heard that Mark's a baron now.”

“So he is.”

“He always said he had secrets that would surprise me. I can't wait until he comes back and tells me of it.”

“He will not be back. He has returned to his home.”

“He can visit when he comes to court.” He pulled on the reins. “You go in and get warm. I'll see to the horse proper for you, and leave your bags outside the garden portal.”

The youth led the horse away. Rhys walked down the lane to his door.

He still did not want to go in. All of the time away had not lessened that one bit. Well, it could not be avoided forever. Until he bought another house, he had to sleep somewhere.

He turned the latch, stepped inside, and waited for the void to assault him.

It was not emptiness that flowed over him. Not absence. She filled the air. He stepped into a place haunted by the phantom of her presence, and into a cloud of memories.

Her brief return to the house the day that they fled had left its remnants. He half expected to smell bread baking.

He closed his eyes, and savored the feel of it. Touching the breath of her fading ghost was worth the wrenching heartache.

He absorbed it fully, because it would not last. It would seep away with every minute that he lived in this place without her. Very soon this would once again become the house too wide for one person.

He forced himself to look, and to let that begin happening. He walked into the hall, to accept the future.

A sound. Quiet and vague.

Another, more distinct. It came from the kitchen.

His heart began pounding. Slowly. Hard. He told himself it was only David, bringing the bags in rather than leaving them in the garden. Or the wind hitting a loose shutter.

The vague sounds continued. He stared at the hearth,
explaining them away, resenting the pitiful hope that just built and built.

A new sound. A voice. A woman humming. Its meandering melody drifted toward him like the growing tendril on a vine.

Forcing himself to move, he walked toward the kitchen.

C
HAPTER
29

W
ARMTH AND LIGHT
. It did not come just from the fire in the big hearth. The woman in the chamber produced her own brilliance, and his whole being flushed in response.

Joan stood beside the window. The table had been moved close to it, and one shutter stood open to the cold, overcast day. A workboard rested on it, holding the clay shape of a figure.

She molded with deft fingers, intent on her task. Lost in her craft, she had not heard him enter the house.

She wore a dove-colored gown of fine cloth, with embroidered blue lines braiding along the neck. She had unlaced the sleeves and pushed them up, revealing a lady's creamy arms and hands, but blotches of clay had still smeared the costly fabric. A rich blue surcoat, and a wimple and veil, lay piled at the end of the bench. The ensemble looked expensive enough to be court dress.

She must have come to Westminster, to visit the Queen. He imagined her making some excuse, and slipping away
for this visit, not knowing that he was on a journey. He saw her waiting, and growing bored, and finally going out to the garden and the barrel in which some clay still soaked, and deciding to pass the time doing that which she loved.

Then again, maybe she had known he was away, and had come for the clay alone.

If so, he did not care. He indulged in the joy of seeing her. He would pay dearly for this visit, but he did not care about that either. Watching her mold the clay, feeling her intensity, was worth the pain of a hundred partings.

He stood at the threshold a long time, sharing her craft vicariously, experiencing the soul through her quiet rapture, watching the little figure grow more defined. He had thought never to know that power again, but she unknowingly gave him the gift of tasting it once more.

Finally the day's light grew too dim. She drew back and considered her progress with her hands on her hips. She glanced at the hearth, but knew that its heat would dry the clay too fast, and that she could not continue in its light.

Her expression changed while she looked at the flames. She realized that she was not alone. Her gaze darted about, and found him in the shadows by the doorway.

She smiled, but her eyes glistened with moisture. And with something else. Her hands went back to her hips, smearing more clay on the dove-toned fabric.

“You take your time returning home, Rhys Mason.”

He went to her, and took her face in his hands, and tasted the lips that he had kissed so often in his dreams these last weeks. She might have duties to her family's honor now, but their love permitted him this intimacy at least.

She let him, and lingered, and seemed sad when he forced himself to pull away.

“You have been in town long?” he asked.

She began wrapping the statue in damp cloths. “Seven days.”

“I am glad that I returned before you left.”

She completed her task in silence. Something poured out of her, and it was not just happiness in their reunion.

Finally, when the board had been cleared, and the statue placed on a shelf, and the table wiped clean, she began fixing her sleeves.

His heart dropped. Night would fall soon. No doubt the Queen expected her attendance.

Her life awaited her return.

She did not put on the surcoat. She looked out the window to the garden. She appeared to be an elegantly worked statue illuminated by the evening's silver light.

“You should not have made me leave with them. At Nottingham. You should have let me stay with you.”

She had not brought her love to him, but her anger. “God knows that I have hated doing it, Joan, but you had to go back. Telling you to do so was the right thing.”