Great Maria (7 page)

A crow cawed in the fields. Ahead, the torches on the wall of the town rippled in the wind. The dark settled down over the world. The fragrance of the softening earth rose around her. The moon had not yet risen, and she kept her stride short, for fear of tripping. When she reached the foot of the hill, she sat beneath an oak tree, her eyes on the town half a mile on.

Ceci might wake up and cry for her. Murder was a terrible sin, but what they were trying to do to her was a sin too. The dagger lay in her lap, cool to her hand, the hilt wrapped in leather, the edges honed white. Down the road, a horse was cantering up from the town.

She looked around carefully, to make sure she was unseen. The moon appeared over the edge of the hills in the east. The horseman trotted up the road toward her. She stood up and crossed the ditch.

“Please,” she called. “Help me—please—”

Walter Bris rode up to her and reined in his horse. “What are you doing out here?” He dismounted.

Maria pretended to faint, collapsing on her side with the dagger under her. The knight muttered an oath. He knelt beside her.

“She’s witch-wild. Strongarm’s brat: crazy as he was.”

He gathered her up, one arm under her shoulders and the other under her knees. She raised the dagger and stabbed him in the throat.

The blood splattered across her. He staggered; he shouted wordlessly, and she struck him again, writhing out of his grip. He fell. She leaped on him, her knees on his chest, and drove the knife to its hilt in his neck. His eyes glared at her, reflecting the moon. His yawning mouth erupted blood. He sagged and was still.

Maria backed away from him toward the trees. His horse moved restlessly along the dirt road. Her surcoat and her overskirt were spotted with blood. She wiped the dagger on the grass and tore off the top layer of her skirt. If she hurried she could be there to eat supper with Richard. She would never be cruel to Richard again. The knight lay crooked in the road, one arm flung out. Now, at least, he would not suffer for the treasure he had missed. She caught his horse and rode it back across the fields toward the castle, left it under the wall, and went in again through the postern door.

***

In the morning, while Richard still lay in bed, she took her bloodstained clothes out and buried them in the briars at the foot of the castle wall. She brought Ceci with her. For a while she sat in the tall grass playing with the baby and making her laugh. The baby’s hair was starting to grow in, soft as air, dark brown like Richard’s, wisps of curls at her ears and neck. She reached for everything she saw: the grass, Maria’s fingers, the shadows of birds. When she lifted her face up to her mother’s, her smile was wide as her cheeks. Maria had never loved anyone else, not even her mother, as deeply as she loved Ceci. The ghost of Richard’s face in the baby’s made it easier to forgive him for listening to Walter Bris.

At last she went back up to the Tower. While she climbed across the steep slope, Ceci astride her hip, a party of horsemen galloped up the road toward the gate. They would have found the dead man. She ran the rest of the way to the Tower.

Richard was sitting on the bottom step of the staircase on the Tower, talking to Ponce Rachet. When he saw her, he called to her and took Ceci from her arms. “Go bring us some wine,” he said, but before she could go, he caught her wrist.

“What’s wrong?”

Maria pulled free and ran up the outer stair toward the hall. She guessed at how she looked; she felt sick and weak. When she was pouring the wine, she knocked over a cup, and the wine splashed on her skirt like drops of blood. At that, she began to cry and for a moment could not lift the ewer or clear her eyes.

Outside, a man shouted. She set down the ewer and rubbed the tears from her eyes, picked up the wine, and poured two cups full. Taking one in each hand, she went out and down the stair to where Richard sat, a little crowd gathered around him.

They had brought Walter Bris back with them across a horse. At the sight of the body she nearly stumbled. Richard took the wine from her, and she sank down on the step behind him. Ceci babbled and pulled on the laces of Richard’s shirt. Absently he caught her hand.

“We found him on the road,” Theobald’s messenger was saying. “He has been sliced to death. Who would have done it? His sword is still in its scabbard.”

Richard cradled Ceci in the curve of his arm. The baby reached for his cup; she burst into a long dreamy string of nonsense. Richard shrugged.

“Probably he had a lot of enemies. He was no particular friend of mine.” He pointed to a knight at the foot of the stairs. “Take him and bury him. Maria—” He looked around behind him to find her and lifted Ceci toward her over his shoulder. Maria took the baby upstairs, her knees unsteady.

***

At dinner, she could not eat. She stayed in her room the rest of the afternoon, playing with Ceci and sewing with two of the castle women whom she trusted not to talk to her. Richard came in and out of the room a few times, and each time started to speak to her but broke off. When supper was ready, she had a servant bring her a dish of it—she had been feeling sick to her stomach all day, she thought she might be with child again. She ate a little and threw the scraps out the window while the women weren’t looking.

While she was sitting by the window nursing Ceci, after sundown, Richard came in and sent away the women attending her. She heard the mattress crunch when he sat down on the bed. Sliding her thumb into the baby’s mouth, she moved her around to the other breast. Richard kicked his heels a few times on the bedframe.

Abruptly he said, “Did you kill Walter Bris?” Maria startled. His voice was edged with disbelief. She licked her lips. She had waited too long to deny it, so she said nothing. Ceci held her breast in her hands and suckled hungrily. Richard said, “Why did you kill Walter Bris?” She had to twist to see him. The baby in her arms gave her courage. “He wanted you to leave me. I heard him. He said such things about me—
a robber chief’s wench
—you should have defended me, but you didn’t, you listened to them.”

He rubbed his palms together absently. The baby, finished with the breast, was nuzzling Maria. She got up to take her to the bed. Richard sat watching her. She laid the baby down between the pillows, kissed her, and drew the cover over her.

Richard took her by the wrist and turned her to face him. “That was a damned stupid thing to do. You might have been caught.”

“I was careful.”

“Not very. I saw last night before supper the dagger was gone.” He twisted her arm, to make her stand closer to him, her hip against his knee. “You could have gotten me into a lot of trouble, doing that—I should take a belt to you. Why didn’t you trust me? I wouldn’t give you up for a Count’s daughter, even if Theobald were serious, which I doubt.”

Maria turned her arm against his hand, and he tightened his grip. Her wrist hurt. She said, “You heard how they talked about me. I didn’t have to tell you. You should have done it.”

To her surprise, he opened his fingers. She drew her arm free. “Maybe you are right,” he said. “I should have done something.” His mouth stretched into a smile. Amazed, she saw the thing amused him. He said, “You’ve been spying on me. What did I tell you about that?”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I won’t do it again.”

“No, not tonight, maybe.”

He was staring at her, his eyes sharp. He said, “Thank you for putting the knife back last night. I was afraid you meant to use it on me. Nobody else even suspects you, nobody here knows you.”

“I told you,” she said, “I was careful.”

He shook his head. “You were lucky. If you do it again—” He gave her another piercing look. “Don’t do it again. I ought to break your neck. What if someone had seen you? What if you couldn’t kill him?” His eyes were sharp. “You did it alone. All by yourself.”

She went off across the room. “I don’t want to talk about it.” On the hearth, she knelt and took a log out of the box beside the fire. All afternoon she had tried to pray. She would have to go to the Cave of the Virgin, to pray there. He was still watching her. She dumped the log on top of the fire and got up to go to bed.

Eight

In the cave, two women were praying in loud competing voices. In spite of the hot summer sun outside, the cave was cold and damp. Maria knelt in the back of it, holding Ceci on her lap. The baby looked solemnly around her. Maria took Ceci’s coat from her basket and wrestled the baby into it.

One woman rose, crossed herself, and left the shrine, and Maria took her place. She had brought the baby’s christening gown, sewn with crosses; she laid it at the feet of the statue. Before her, the baby sat bundled in her coat, looking curiously at the strange woman beside them. While Maria prayed, she kept watch on the child, who was learning to crawl. The strange woman left and an old man, richly dressed, took her place.

Maria asked a blessing for the baby growing in her womb, and for Richard, his brothers, and the souls of her parents. She had forgotten how happy prayers in this place made her feel. She had asked the day before for absolution for killing Walter Bris. Now she offered a prayer for his soul. Probably he was in Hell anyway and the prayer wouldn’t help him.

Ceci reached out toward the christening gown on the statue’s feet. It was just beyond her grasp, and she strained as if her arm might suddenly sprout another inch. Maria crossed herself. There were more people outside, waiting to be allowed in. She gathered up the baby and her basket and went out through the narrow corridor in the rock. A boy on crutches hobbled past her.

A dozen pilgrims waited in the yard of the shrine. They talked among themselves, or stared at the knights who waited in the shade of the beech trees. Inside the cave, the dank cold had made Maria shiver. Outside, the bright sunshine glittered on the rocks and the heat flowed like a liquid over the ground. She crossed the yard to the trees.

Roger stood in the shade, talking to the English monk. While she took off the baby’s coat and put her on the ground, he said, “There are some travelers here from the north. I want to talk to them—do you mind?”

Maria shook her head. She was hunting through her basket for the purse of money Richard had given her. Roger went off under the trees where the ground was soft with mast. The monk bent toward Maria.

“Lady, we were all distraught to hear of my lord Robert’s death. Most untimely—we have included him in our prayers.”

Maria handed him the purse. “Thank you. Richard wishes your prayers as well.”

The monk took hold of the bottom of the purse, but she did not let go of the top. She looked him in the eyes. “He will guard the road and protect the shrine here,” she said, and when his face lost its practiced smile, she let him take the purse.

Stiff, the monk tucked the purse away. “I will speak of it to the abbot in Agato.”

Maria bowed to him. “Thank you.” Richard had said they would have to accept him as their overlord, now that he held Birnia; the road from Agato to the shrine ran through Birnia. Ceci had hauled herself to her feet and was standing on her widespread legs, her fists balled up in Maria’s skirt. Maria took her on one hip and the basket over her arm and crossed the yard to Roger.

She had never come to the shrine in the summer. The many pilgrims waiting to go in and pray made the yard seem much smaller. Roger was leaning up against a tree, near the steep hillside; a young man with a pilgrim’s hat and staff stood talking to him. When Maria went up to them Roger took her by the hand.

“This is my brother’s wife, Maria.”

She and the young pilgrim murmured at each other. She tugged her hand out of Roger’s. Ceci was demanding to be put down. She set the baby on the ground.

“You said you intended to fight the Saracens,” the young pilgrim said.

Roger nodded. “The Saracens hold the whole south coast and the mountains. There will be hard fighting—my brothers and I have been fighting here for years, all over the area, we know the Saracens. And they know us, I can tell you. There will be honor and glory to be won. And it’s work for Christ too, naturally.”

“Do you need men? What about plunder?”

Two more strangers came up behind the man in the pilgrim’s hat: young men, of Roger’s age. The first introduced them to her and Roger, who shook them each by the hand. The tallest of the three smiled.

“I heard mention made of plunder?”

Roger leaned his weight against the fat beech tree behind him. He set his hands on his belt. “My brother Richard is the lord of this land. We want to fight the Saracens. I was telling your companion here that we need knights—good fighters who don’t mind a long hard war. There’s plunder, yes. The Saracens are rich. We mean to take Mana’a, in time.”

“Mana’a,” the man in the pilgrim’s hat said blankly. His face quickened. “The Saracen city? Do you mean Marna?”

The tall man pursed his lips. Roger shrugged, his face schooled to innocence. “Marna. They call it Mana’a, and we’ve fallen into the name, I suppose.” He gestured toward Maria. “Her father was Robert Strongarm, you will have heard of him.”

They talked about wars. Ceci had gotten up on her feet again, clinging to Maria’s skirt.

“You said your brother is lord here,” the tall pilgrim said. “But I’ve heard this is lordless ground, since the old Duke of Santerois died.”

Roger smiled. “Anybody who thinks it is lordless can try to take it.”

The other men laughed. The one with the hat had a long staff, and Ceci leaned out and clutched it. Maria stooped to pick her up. The little girl hung on to the staff, refusing to let go.

“By God’s holy blood,” the man in the hat said, “if your brother has a grip like this little knave’s, you might be right about that.”

Everybody laughed again. Maria detached her daughter from the pilgrim’s staff. In a high humor, the young men all shook Roger’s hand again, bowed to her, chucked Ceci under the chin, and went off promising to come back in the spring. Roger swung toward her, his face bright with amusement.

“What if they knew the little knave is a girl?”

Their knights came up around them, bringing their horses. Maria put the baby in her saddle.

“Do you think they will come back—those knights?”

“They’ll come back,” Roger said.

***

They went south to her own castle. One day in August, Richard and his friends took over the village common to break a string of four-year-old colts. When she had done all her work in the castle, Maria took the baby down the hill, Adela coming with her to carry the basket with their dinner in it.

The common lay between the village and the river. The grass was browning in the summer heat. In the middle of it the men had put up a short strong post to tie the colts. A strapping black with a white face was lunging and rearing around it. Maria set the baby down in the grass under an oak tree and helped Adela lay out the cloth and the food: bread, two cold roast chickens, cheese, and a leather flask of wine. Ceci crawled in the flowering grass.

“Hold him, Ponce!” Roger shouted.

Ponce Rachet was wrestling a bridle onto the black colt’s head. Three other knights stood around helping. Richard came over to the oak tree, and Maria gave him the wine and a piece of the chicken.

“How are they?” she asked.

He sat down, his mouth already full and his jaws grinding. He said something unintelligible about the two colts they had already broken. Adela went off to the village to see her sister.

Maria settled herself comfortably and ate a simnel cake. She licked the crumbs off her fingers. The new baby rode high in her belly, which made it hard to sit up straight. They were trying to sling a saddle onto the black colt’s back. It lunged from the men’s grip and knocked Ponce Rachet sprawling. Roger came up.

“Sit down and eat something,” Richard said.

“Is there enough?” Roger sat down. He picked up the other bird. Maria looked around for Ceci. The little girl was crawling up the little slope behind her, toward the castle.

“Keep watch on her, will you?” Richard said. “What if a horse gets loose?”

Maria chewed on a piece of bread. The pounding of the hoofs and the dust were making her head ache. Now they were trying to chase the black colt around the snubbing post. Richard shouted obscene advice to them, his voice ringing in her ear. She threw the bones of the two chickens into the meadow. Richard lay back on his elbow, his head almost in her lap. She gave him the wine flask. He drank; with his free hand he rubbed the bulge of her body. She pushed his hand away.

“Where is she now?”

She looked over her shoulder. A hundred feet away, in the grass, the little girl sat surrounded by orange butterflies. Richard poked Maria in the side.

“Go get her. Why are you so careless with her? One of those horses could break loose—”

“Then she would be safer up there than here. If I ran after her all day, I would be dead. You spoil her.”

He laid his fingers on her body again. Maria moved away. Roger was watching them; it made her uncomfortable when Richard touched her in front of him. Roger got up and went to join the men around the post. They had saddled the black colt. Ponce Rachet was swinging onto its back.

“When are you raiding?” she asked. All summer he had been forcing the villages around them to pay his new taxes.

He grunted. Picking up her knife, he cut himself a piece of the cheese.

“I haven’t spied on you,” she said. “Not once since I promised.”

“Therefore I should tell you everything.”

“You will drive me to it.”

The men leaped away from the black colt. On its back Ponce Rachet let out a yell. The colt doubled up into a buck. Roger cheered and laughed among the other men.

Richard was picking his teeth. He said, “Go get Ceci.”

Maria got up and walked out into the sunlight. She scooped her daughter up at arm’s length. The little girl laughed at her. Maria tossed her up and caught her, and she giggled. Maria carried her back to Richard.

Ponce trotted the black colt out until it broke into a gallop and turned it in circles to slow it down. Ceci immediately crawled away up the slope again. Maria sat beside the tree and leaned her back on it.

“I haven’t made up my mind yet—about my war,” Richard said eventually. He stuck the toothpick in the corner of his mouth. “It’s not like raiding a couple of chance pilgrims which is all your father ever did.”

Maria said nothing. She had seen him and Roger and his friends making plans in the evenings after supper.

“When I decide, I’ll tell you,” he said. “I suppose there’s no harm in it.”

“Thank you.”

She let him touch her body. In the meadow, Roger and a dark-haired knight started away to the pen to bring another colt. Maria ate cheese. In the heat she felt even fatter than she was.

Ponce led the black colt away. Its head drooped; it walked trustingly beside the man who had broken it. Roger and the dark knight, Welf, were leading up a long-legged bay. Ceci was asleep in the sweet grass just behind Maria. She pulled the child into her lap, feeling sluggish and discontent, although he had given her what she wanted.

Richard went down to the meadow again. The bay hardly bucked at all, and the next after him was mild enough, but the third, a golden chestnut, fought the men like the devil. They had to throw it twice before they could bridle it. The dark knight saddled it and climbed up and was instantly pitched off into the grass. The men whooped and laughed. Maria braced her hands on her lower back. She decided to take Ceci up to the castle. When she looked, Richard was mounting the chestnut colt.

The horse flung itself into the air. In mid-flight it screwed its body around and swapped ends. Maria cried out. She got clumsily up onto her feet. The colt squealed. Richard clung to its back. The other men were scattered around, silent for once, watching. Roger came up to her. He was smiling.

“He can’t pass by a mettlesome horse. A quirk of Richard’s.”

The colt’s mouth was bleeding; its golden color was lost under a dark sweat, but it fought tirelessly. It bounded off the ground, coiled in the air, and came down again hard. Richard had the sweat-soaked reins wrapped around his hands. The colt spun in a dizzying circle and reared straight up. Richard hit it between the ears with his fist. The colt flipped over backwards.

Maria’s mouth filled with blood. She had bitten through her lips. She put Ceci down and lumbered heavily out onto the meadow. The colt lay still in the dust. Richard was hidden beneath it. The knights clustered around it. All along the riverbank, the serfs were running up to see. Roger raced past her and elbowed a path through the knights.

“Dead, by God.”

Her knees weakened. She went around the sprawled body of the colt. Propped up on his arms, Richard was lying on the ground, his face streaked with sweat and black dirt, and his chest heaving. The colt lay across his right leg. Maria sank down heavily beside him. She knew she should pray but she was too relieved to think of a suitable prayer.

“You can’t ride everything, you know,” she said. Roger was calling to somebody to bring a horse over from the village.

“Don’t bother with that, drag it off,” Richard shouted to his brother. “I don’t want to lie here all day, damn you.” He looked at her. “When that horse went down, I was still on him.”

“It looks the other way around to me,” she said. She went back to the oak tree, picked up Ceci and the flask of wine, and walked back down again to the little crowd around Richard. Ponce and another man had gotten long-handled hoes from the serfs and were forcing them under the carcass, one on either side of Richard’s pinned leg. Ceci tugged at Maria’s arm; she wanted to be let down, and Maria thrust her into the arms of the knight beside her. The man and the baby clutched each other, startled. Maria knelt down beside Richard.