For My Lady's Heart (46 page)

He hated her now. She had done all she could to drive him to it. She had
a conversation in her head with him about it, to explain to him. She had
poisoned him, yes, but it was to spare him. She imprisoned him, but it was
to keep him safe until she and Gian were gone. If she denied him as her
husband, broke her vow and murdered his heart, it was so that she did not
have to live knowing that he did not.

She could not kill Gian instead, she told him. She had thought on it long
and deep. She knew of wives who had slain their husbands—one had been flayed
alive, but the others had only paid fines. But it was no easy task, not with
Gian, who had eluded the best of killers, and if she failed once, there
would be no magistrate to sentence her, for she would not live so long.
Allegreto would not aid her in it, nay, but oppose her.

And if she succeeded—she would be theirs. She would belong to the Devil
wholly.

She told these things to Ruck. But it was not a conversation. He never
answered. In her mind he stared at her with unyielding silence. He would not
understand. Could not. Her deliberate dishonor was beyond his comprehension,
as the black depth of Allegreto’s love was beyond Cara’s.

They knew themselves—she and Allegreto. They knew how close the Devil had
them. She could almost pity Allegreto, who still held to his own mysterious
honor by a thin thread. If he had wished to rid himself of Guy as a rival,
he would have done it, and yet this subtle suggestion of his that Cara and
her lover return to Italy boded of darker intentions, or else foolish hopes.
He was not so old, Allegreto, that he might not have hopes, but Melanthe
would not allow Cara to drive him beyond endurance. She and Guy must stay in
England, far away from him.

In return for such a kind favor from Melanthe, Allegreto would make
certain that Ruck hated her. He would say all the things that Melanthe did
not have the strength to say herself, kill pride and hope and future. And
Ruck would go home to live in his enchanted valley, where Melanthe had never
been meant to go.

They were old allies, she and Allegreto, strange friends and familiar
enemies.

“This is your last lesson, green man. Have you learned it?”

“Ruadrik.”

“Ruadrik, then.” Allegreto made a courteous bow. “Lord Ruadrik of
Wolfscar.”

His voice echoed in the old brewery, calling from all sides, whispering
back from the high slits of light made in the shape of holy crosses, the
only windows in the curving wall. Ruck had shouted until his voice was
nearly gone, but if anyone passed outside those windows, they did not come
into his prison.

She had done this. Allegreto made no secret of it. Ruck was to be kept
here until she was gone from England, and if he followed her, he would die
by some means just as unclean and secret as her sleeping poison, but lethal
this time.

His last lesson. If he did not appear to have learned it, then he did not
leave this place.

Allegreto sat on the far edge of the huge round well, his legs dangling
in it. He pilled one of Ruck’s oranges and tossed the rind. Ruck heard it
strike the water with a faint plop. A queer imprisonment, this, with food
befitting a banquet table—or a princess—fruit and almonds, fresh cheese and
white bread. The brewery was ancient, but his bonds were new and strong, the
anchor sunk deep into the wall, the fetters no mere bands about his wrists
and ankles, but a whole steel boot on his right foot and a fingerless metal
glove that extended up his left arm to his elbow, padded inside, both fitted
to him so perfectly that they must have been patterned on pieces of his own
armor.

John Marking, without nay. Ruck cursed his own witless-ness. To suppose
that she ever meant him well, to trust Allegreto for one instant—old Sir
Harold had never been so mad and simple as Ruck when he had thought he had
won.

He remembered her face in that brief moment of his victory. Smiling at
him. In the death-dreams, it was that expectant smile that had tortured him
worse than demons.

Allegreto sucked the juice from a segment of orange and spit the seed
away. “She told me why she let you live,” he said. “She said you prayed too
much, and would haunt her to tedium if she killed you.”

“Tell her I’ll haunt her into Hell itself if she marries Navona.”

“Then prepare your howls and shrieks, for that’s what she’s going to do,
green man.”

“Ruadrik.”

“Ruadrik. Late of Wolfscar.”

With a light move Allegreto stood up, pitching the last of his fruit into
the well. He came around to Ruck’s side to draw water at the great crane. It
might have lifted a ton of water. The bucket hooked to it now seemed
absurdly small. Allegreto did not even work the elaborate machine itself,
but only dropped the bucket in. The plash echoed, a memory of dreams,
scaping and sloshing as Allegreto hauled the bucket up by hand and set it
within Ruck’s reach.

The youth sprang up the stairs three at a time. At the door he paused. “I
leave you to ponder—will I return, or will I not? Her mind is much occupied
with her wedding. She might forget you entirely, green man.”

“Ruadrik,” Ruck said.

“Did I tell you this was a walled park, my lord Ruadrik? Nothing but deer
for two miles in all directions. And the river. I think you should shout,
and hope they hear you on the river. Enlarge your skill at haunting.” He
gave Ruck a charming smile. “Verily, a place like this needs a ghost.”

The door boomed shut behind him. Thin crosses of light angled down,
illuminating the stone floor, vanishing into the enormous well.

Cara kept herself in the background as she was bid while Gian visited
them with his daily presence at supper. She was hopeless at concealing
things, Princess Melanthe had said, and well Cara knew it. She could never
have contended so coolly as her mistress did with him, insisting that they
set forth at once for Italy against his new determination that they marry
here in England.

“These fools make a martyr of the fellow,” Gian said. “There are a
thousand candles for him after just a seven-night—next we’ll have a miracle,
and his fingerbones sold in the market square.”

“All the more reason to depart.” Princess Melanthe watched Gian’s own
sewer, always with him, make a tasting from a platter. “Look, there is a
fresh salmon, the best of the year, they say. I could almost be pleased that
it’s a fish day.”

“Nay, we will not flee from deluded rabble. We’ve only to wait a little
time for the banns, and then a feast to make them forget their saintly
Ruadrik ever crawled out of whatever wolf’s cave he inhabited. I prefer it,
my lady.”

“Gian, this business had disturbed your wit. So you are not popular here.
You are foreign. What matters it? Let us go home and leave this
unpleasantness.”

“You’ve been in no such hurry. Why so anxious to leave, my love?”

“By hap I do not care for the ugly looks I receive when I go out,” she
said sharply.

“Peasants,” he said. “If anyone dares insult you, tell me.”

“I would rather not wait until it happens. I am telling you now, I wish
to leave as soon as we may. If you love me, you will agree.”

He set down his wine. “That, my dear one, is a device you will do well
not to invoke too often.”

“This fish needs spicing.” Princess Melanthe examined the platter with a
frown. “Cara, send to the kitchen—a fried parsley, I think. My deepest
pardon, Gian, I cannot say why the herbs were forgotten.”

Gladly Cara left the chamber. She sent a page with the parsley, and did
not return herself, for it was certain that Gian in this difficult mood
might take any unholy notion into his head. With one of the laundry maids
for chaperon, Cara slipped out into the yard instead, passing under the gate
to the stables.

In the late evening light Guy curried Gian’s horse himself. Cara stood in
the shadow, too shy to approach him. She admired his hair, golden as it was
in the last sun rays, and twisted her skirt and the present she’d brought
together in her hands. She was glad he had stayed with the princess, even
when the green knight had come. She hoped that he’d made his choice to be
near her, though it might equally well have been only because the princess
could reward him far more generously.

He reached, sweeping his comb down the rouncy’s smooth gray haunch. All
of her heart seemed to run out after him, just watching his sure and simple
motions, the shape of his hand, and the breadth of his back.

One of his grooms said a soft word, and all the men looked at Cara and
the laundress. Guy straightened, turning. When he saw her, his face grew
pleased, but he immediately looked down at the currycomb in his hand as if
it held some vital mystery.

It was the first time she had approached him in public since their
private speaking. His men grinned, and one of them pitched a pebble at Guy.
It bounced off his shoulder. He lifted his hand and brushed at his sleeve
absently.

Cara handed her present to the laundress. It was a silk lace. The maid
went up to Guy and held it out to him. “From Donna Cara,” she said simply.
Cara thought she might have had the wit to embellish a little, but she was
English.

He looked about at the men instead of at Cara. She held her breath,
worried at the solemn set of his mouth. But then he reached out and took the
lace, holding it between his hands. Amid whistles and mockery, he grinned at
her.

Suddenly one of the grooms came under the gate and snatched her about the
waist. He pulled her back. Cara gave a shriek, resisting him, but it was not
a very serious abduction, for Guy chased him off with a few hard cuffs and
caught her back against his chest. He smoothed her hair and went down on his
knee before her, pulling his good white gloves from his sleeve.

“Donna Cara,” he said, “I give you these on condition that you will marry
me. Will you agree?”

She felt everyone in the yard looking at her. One of Gian’s men called to
her in Italian not to be a fool, offering himself as a better choice. She
gave him a glare and took the gloves. “Yea, sir. I agree.”

Amid the clapping, Gian’s men made ugly mutters. A sudden scuffle
erupted, the English grooms converging, but as Cara gripped Guy’s arm, a boy
came running from the house.

“Make ready! My lord departs!”

Instantly the fight dissolved. Guy shouted for the saddles, hastening to
the gray rouncy. The meal could not possibly be over. Cara feared that Gian
and her mistress must have come to open battle. She caught the laundress’s
hand to run with her toward the kitchens, but already Gian appeared at the
door, walking with such long and angry strides that his white cloak flared
out in spite of its heavy embroidery and gold bosses.

He came under the gate, passing Cara without a glance. Then to her
horror, he halted, looking back at her.

With a slight move of his hand, he made his men go past. The yard was
full of confusion. Cara looked desperately for Guy, but he was swinging one
of the elaborate saddles onto a horse’s back. And as she looked, she knew
Gian saw her look, and cursed her own weakness.

He smiled at her in a kind way and stood beside her as if he had suddenly
become patient with waiting. “Donna Cara. It is a pleasant evening to be
abroad in the air, is it not?”

She made a slight courtesy, all she could manage on her weak knees. “Yea,
my lord.”

“A pleasant evening for lovers. But where is Allegreto?”

A flash of utter terror swept over her. She dropped her eyes. “I know
not! I know not, my lord.”

She should not have repeated herself. She should have said it with more
surprise. She did not know. Why should she know?

“Why should I know, my lord?” She spoke it aloud, an attempt at the cool
tone Princess Melanthe would use.

“Indeed,” Gian mused, “why shouldst thou?”

His thoughtful tone dismayed her. She made another courtesy, afraid to
look up at him.

“He has been a little absent of late,” he said softly. “He told me that
he had a lover. I had thought—but thou wilt forgive me, Donna Cara, if I
offend thy modesty—I was so dull as to suppose it must be thee.”

She did not know what to do. She never knew what to do. All she could
think was that she should never have let him trap her.

“Ah—but this is thy young man, is it not?” Gian asked in French as Guy
led up his rouncy. When Cara answered nothing, her tongue frozen, Gian said
to him, “My compliments to thee. A fair and chaste maiden for a bride.”

“Grant merci, my lord.” Guy bowed deeply. “Donna Cara does me great
honor.”

To Cara’s vast relief, Gian mounted. As he settled in the saddle, he
looked beyond her. The rouncy threw its head and danced a step, though Gian
made no visible move.

Cara turned to see Princess Melanthe crossing the yard. Several of the
other ladies hurried behind her, lifting her trailing skirts. She stopped
beneath the gate. In the dusk her skin seemed white and cool, her breasts
rising and falling evenly beneath the low neckline of her gown.

“I came to see you well, Gian,” she said. “I would not have us part in
anger.”

“My lady,” he said, “I would not have it, either, but you have tried me
sore this night.”

She tilted her head, smiling slightly. “I did not think you chose me for
my docile nature.”

“No more did I, but I would have you know who rules between us.”

“Then choose your battles more carefully, my love. For I make my respects
to the king tomorrow and leave for London before sunset—and to Calais from
there. It will be a lonely wedding without a bride.”

In the whole yard there was not a sound but for the chink and soft breath
of the horses. Such brazen defiance was beyond Cara’s grasp—all the alarm
and confusion that Princess Melanthe should be feeling seemed to be
concentrated in Cara’s trembling limbs.

“Then you have won, my lady,” Gian said at last. “I’ll be at your side.
But take care that your victories are not often bought so dear, or you may
find that you’ve purchased defeat.”