Lords of the White Castle (59 page)

One of Llewelyn's attendants opened the door and looked out, obviously drawn to investigate by the sound of raised voices. Fulke swallowed and held his fists down at his sides. He could feel the pressure of his sword hilt against the inside of his wrist and it was all he could do not to draw the weapon.

'You are right,' he said in a voice gritty with the effort of control. 'You have given your reasons, and raging avails me nothing.' He strode away, putting distance between himself and the temptation to lash out.

In one fell swoop, he had again become a landless outlaw. Llewelyn would yield Whittington to John and the Welsh mountains would no longer offer succour and safety. He would have to take to living in the forests again and relying on the support of sympathisers to his cause, or enemies of John. There was a bitter taste at the back of his throat. On the day that his son was born, he had lost his patrimony. The fight had to begin all over again, and he had no stomach for it.

It was a full hour later that he felt sufficiently calm to return to the guest house and join Maude and the children. She was asleep on her pallet, her braided hair gleaming on the coarse, bracken-stuffed pillow. The swaddled baby lay at her side in a makeshift cradle fashioned from a willow gardening basket. Fulke gazed upon his wife's face, the dark shadows beneath her eyes, the delicacy of brow and cheekbone and jaw. He knew that most of that delicacy was false, that Maude was usually as robust as a horse, but the bearing of three infants in swift succession and the circumstances of her last travail had drained her strength. How could he ask her to live an outlaw's life now when she needed rest and comfort? How could he trail three small children in his wake, the youngest a baby prematurely born? It would be irresponsible and likely end in tragedy. He gnawed on his thumbnail, already bitten down to the quick, and turning from the bed looked at his two daughters who were playing in a corner with Gracia. He had engendered them. Now it was his responsibility to give them a proper life.

CHAPTER 31

Canterbury, November 1204

The light was fading and Maude could no longer see to set the tiny stitches into the new smock she was sewing for the baby. She had strung a row of painted wooden beads across the cradle and he was hitting them with his fists and gurgling with the pleasure of accomplishment. Maude could almost feel his tenacity. Despite the handicap of being born on a wild Welsh riverbank, her son had thrived. There was still very little meat on him compared to her daughters at this stage in their lives, but he was formidably strong. Like rawhide, she thought with a half-smile, rather than plump, soft leather. She was not unduly concerned about his health, for he had the voracious appetite of a wolf cub.

The great pity was that Fulke could not see his son's development, the small daily changes that marked an evolving and strong-willed individual. The girls were. growing and changing too, although not as swiftly as the baby. Like her brother, Jonetta was too young to miss her father, but it had affected Hawise. Not a day passed without her demanding to know when her papa was returning. She had become naughty and attention-seeking, and seemed to think that her father's absence was her tiny brother's fault because he had been born and then her papa had gone away. It was impossible to explain politics to a two-year-old, no matter how bright.

With a heavy sigh, Maude put her sewing aside and rose to close the shutters against the gathering dusk. The cathedral bells tolled the hour of vespers. For the last four months she had lived her life to their sound, counting the time, fixed in a limbo of waiting and wondering.

After Prince Llewelyns declaration of his betrothal to John's daughter, Fulke had brought his family to the sanctuary of Canterbury and put them beneath Hubert Walter's wing, knowing that John would not dare touch them. Then he and his brothers had left England for exile in France: jousting, hiring their swords, spending the winter where John could not reach them. Maude had thought about crossing the Narrow Sea to join them, but it went no further than wishful thinking. A sea crossing at this time of year was always dangerous and never comfortable. She would have to leave the sanctuary of Canterbury to reach a port and would be game for capture. And the children were too small and vulnerable to risk such a journey. So she remained at the Archbishop's palace under the auspices of her former brother-by-marriage and waited.

Come the spring Fulke said he would return, but to what? An outlaw's life hounded from pillar to post? She bit her lip and drew the iron bolt across the shutters. Each time she thought in that direction, she was frightened by the uncertainty of the future. What was going to happen to them?

'Play with me, Mama,' Hawise demanded, tugging at Maude's dress. 'Play clapping.'

Maude had no inclination to do so, but for her daughter's sake she forced a smile and held up her palms so that the child could smack her own against them and chant a simple rhyme.

'Me too,' said Jonetta, toddling up.

'You're just a baby. Go away, I'm playing with Mama.' Hawise gave her sister a violent shove. Jonetta toppled over with a thump and set up a mighty howling—although more from shock than injury.

'Hawise, you wicked girl!' Maude shouted with exasperation as she reached to pick up and comfort Jonetta. The way Hawise flinched from the raised voice immediately added guilt to Maude's anger.

'I'm not wicked, I'm not!' Hawise stamped her feet in frightened defiance and her pale skin turned an alarming shade of beetroot. From the cradle, there came an indignant wail as the baby's voice joined the melange. Gracia, whose hands had been occupied with some intricate braiding, dropped her work and hastened to scoop up the roaring infant. Her action increased the size of Hawise's rebellion to a full-blown tantrum that even King Henry in his heyday would have been hard-pressed to equal.

The door opened and Hubert Walter stood on its threshold, his expression one of pained astonishment. Clutching his hand was a little girl, her eyes huge as she took in the scene.

'I have come at a difficult time, Daughter,' Hubert said. 'I'll return later.' He began to turn away.

'Oh no, your grace, please come in,' Maude implored, grimacing at the prospect of being abandoned to the mercies of three screaming children and wishing she was the one who could walk away. Perhaps Fulke had known what he was doing in more ways than one.

The sight of the Archbishop and the other little girl took the force out of Hawise's tantrum. Her screams diminished, her colour eased, although she continued to cry and ran to press herself against her mother's skirts. Maude's free arm enfolded her in a tender if exasperated embrace.

'Celibacy does have its rewards,' Hubert observed dryly.

'So does motherhood,' Maude answered with a pained smile. She looked at the child Hubert had brought with him. She was obviously ill at ease, but stood her ground doggedly. Maude thought she must be about seven or eight years old. Her ash-brown hair was bound in two neat, shining plaits twined with red silk ribbons and she had a solemn, pointed face, dominated by wide eyes the grey-gold of coney fur. 'Who is this?' she asked.

Hubert glanced down at his charge and squeezed the small hand engulfed in his great paw. 'My cousin and ward, Clarice d'Auberville,' he said. 'She has but recently come into my charge after her father's death.'

Maude knew that he did not literally mean that the small girl was his cousin. The relationship would be at least once or twice removed. She remembered from her marriage to Theobald that he had had a girl cousin who was married to a d'Auberville. This could not be their daughter. The age gap was too great, but a granddaughter was likely. If she was in Hubert's care, then probably the mother was dead too. 'I am sorry to hear such sad news,' she murmured.

'She was not close to him, and her mother died in childbed four years ago' Hubert said as if the girl was deaf. 'You know how it is in a great household when there is no mistress to rule it. She has spent her time with different nurses and the wives of her father's knights. Now she has come into my care and I have to find a niche to suit. While she is at Canterbury, I would ask of you the boon of caring for her.'

'You think me capable?' Maude asked wryly.

Hubert smiled. 'I know you are,' he said, sounding more confident than she would have been in his position.

Maude tilted her head. She felt deep sympathy for the child, whose circumstances sounded similar to her own as a girl. No mother and an indifferent father. 'Of course I will take her.' She smiled reassuringly at the little girl.

Hubert relinquished his grip on his charge and stooped to speak to her. 'This is Lady FitzWarin. You'll be staying with her for a while until more permanent arrangements are made for you.'

'Yes, your grace,' Clarice said, her childish treble aping the response of someone much older. She curtseyed to Maude, her manners beautiful. Maude ached for her, remembering herself as a child, weighed down by her grandmother's lectures on propriety.

Satisfied, Hubert nodded and left, closing the door behind him.

There was a moment's silence. Before Maude could decide how to break it, Hawise leaped into the breach. One fist still clutched in her mother's skirts for safety, she took a step towards the newcomer.

'How old are you?' she demanded.

Clarice looked at her solemnly. 'I was eight at the feast of St Anne,' she said.

Hawises mouth became a circle of awe and admiration and Maude fought not to smile. Hawise viewed adults as giants who could be either kind or cruel according to their whim and her behaviour. Older children, however, were worshipped because their position was not so far above her own. 'When I'm a big girl', was Hawise's constant refrain.

'I'm nearly four,' Hawise lied. 'Can you play clap?'

Within moments Clarice was seated on the rug of stitched sheepskins, playing a finger game with Hawise, all awkwardness forgotten. Hawise demanded; Clarice gave, her expression grave and sweet.

That first meeting set the tone of Clarice's presence in Maude's household. Gracia jestingly referred to the child as 'St Clarice' because of her unfailing good humour and patience. Unlike Hawise, whose moods were as volatile as her hair, Clarice was placid and gentle. She loved sewing and spinning. She adored the baby and playing big sister come mother to Hawise and Jonetta. Her clothes were never dishevelled or dirty, but, although fastidious, she was never prim. Maude sometimes wished that she would act more like a little girl of eight than a grown woman, but came to accept that it was Clarice's nature. She also began to love her and dreaded the day that Hubert would come and take her away when he sold her wardship or arranged her marriage. But she could not shut that love away. To deny affection to the child because of what might happen would be a sin, even though she knew that she was storing up heartache.

'When is Hawise's papa coming home?' Clarice asked her one raw morning in late February the following year. She and Maude were sitting companionably together at the embroidery frame in the window embrasure and Hawise and Jonetta were out with Gracia.