So Great A Love (13 page)

Margaret saw the gleam of hope in Catherine's
eyes and knew her friend must be told immediately that Tristan was
on his way to Bowen, and that he was bringing a wife with him.

“My lord, please,” Margaret said, knowing she
sounded desperate. “You must be the one to tell your sister.”

“Tell me what?” Catherine asked.

“Arden,” Margaret said, abandoning formal
manners in her need to convince him to do what he obviously did not
want to do, “think back to the time when we were all young, all
fostered together at Cliffmore Castle. Remember our youthful hopes
and dreams and be gentle with Catherine. I know you can be gentle,
if only you will.” She made herself meet his eyes, praying he would
see the plea in them and treat his sister with compassion.

“Arden? Margaret?” With one hand still
holding the uneaten bread and the other hand at her mouth to hold
back an incipient cough, Catherine looked from her brother to her
friend. “You are frightening me.”

“There is nothing to fear,” Arden said. “Lady
Margaret is correct when she says you must be told at once. She is
concerned that you will be disturbed or hurt by what I will say. In
a few days, depending on the weather and the state of the roads,
Tristan will arrive. I left him in Portsmouth, to see to our
baggage. And to the welfare of his wife.”

“Tristan is coming here? He is alive and well
and home in England again?” For a moment Catherine's face shone
with a radiant happiness. But almost immediately the color drained
away. “With his wife? Tristan has married?” She choked on the words
and tears welled in her eyes. The piece of bread dropped from her
hand to the floor, unnoticed.

“Arden, that was not gentle,” Margaret said
in stern reproof.

“Sometimes,” he responded, “a swift blow with
a sharp blade is a kinder cut than a sawing motion made with a dull
knife.”

“You were not amputating a limb!” Margaret
cried.

“Was I not? I do remember how she doted on
Tristan all those years ago. But it was a young girl's dream and
best killed quickly. It should have died before this.”

“It was a deep and lasting love that lodged
itself in a maiden's faithful heart,” Margaret said to him. “If you
still owned a heart, you would understand.”

Disgusted by Arden's coldness toward his
sister's pain, Margaret turned her full attention to Catherine. She
immediately wished she had done so sooner. Catherine stood with her
head bowed, like a flower drooping on its stem after being stricken
by an icy blast of winter air. Her arms dangled at her sides, as if
she would never find the strength to use them again. Her shoulders
slumped. Just as Margaret reached her and put a supporting arm
about her waist, Catherine's knees buckled.

“Arden,” Margaret cried, “help me!”

Arden was on his way down the steps to the
great hall. At Margaret's urgent call he spun around.

“Cat!” Arden saw what was happening and
rushed to Catherine's side, to catch her before she crumpled to the
floor.

“Carry her to her room,” Margaret ordered,
pointing the way. “Lay her on the bed. Aldis! Where are you? Come
and help us!”

Arden dumped Catherine onto her bed and
turned toward the door, looking like a man desperately seeking an
escape route. Margaret assumed he wanted to leave the room as
quickly as possible, which was what even the boldest men often did
when confronted with sickness. Then Aldis came running and Arden
halted in his tracks, staring at the girl with an expression of
utter horror.

“Arden!” Aldis exclaimed, smiling at him.
“You've come home at last. Are my father and brother with you?”

“No.” Arden's answer to her eager questions
was little more than a choked groan.

“Aldis,” Margaret said, interrupting whatever
Aldis was about to say next, “Catherine is ill. We will need a
pitcher of warm water and some clean cloths to wash her face. And
ask Cook if there is any lavender water in the stillroom.”

“Yes, of course,” Aldis responded. “I'll see
to it at once. Arden, we will talk later. I have so much to ask
you.” She hurried away.

“Oh, dear God in heaven, why should Aldis be
here?” Arden whispered. “Why didn’t you or Catherine tell me?” He
went to the door and placed one hand on the frame as if using it to
keep himself upright.

For the next few moments Margaret was too
concerned about Catherine to attend to Arden’s complaint. She
busied herself undressing her friend, though she did glance at
Arden once or twice. He seemed to be taking long, deep breaths. By
the time Catherine was tucked under two warm quilts and Margaret
could give her attention to Arden once more, he was standing at the
foot of the bed. His face was coldly composed, shut tight against
any display of emotion or any further questions.

“I can see that Catherine is in capable
hands,” Arden said. He shook his head as he regarded his sister.
“She is making a great deal of fuss over something that is beyond
changing,” he added scornfully.

Outraged by his lack of human warmth toward
the sister who loved him, Margaret took a purposeful step forward
as if to challenge his coldness. She was far too angry with him to
care about being polite.

“You may have helped to rescue the Holy Land
from the Infidel,” she declared, “and, for all I know, you left a
trail of mistresses from here to Jerusalem and back to England
again, but after witnessing your behavior toward both Catherine and
Aldis, I can tell you this: you know nothing at all about women.
Furthermore, where women are concerned, you are an abject
coward!”

If his eyes were cold before, they turned
even paler and more icy at her insulting words. Margaret caught her
breath, knowing she had gone too far and fearing he would hit her.
Instead, he curled his lip in a disdainful sneer and struck at her
with her own weapon. He used words.

“I marvel that your father was able to find
one man willing to bear the sharpness of your shrewish tongue,” he
said, “let alone convince a second poor fool to take you on in
marriage.”

Before Margaret could say anything more he
was gone. She heard his footsteps hastening across the solar and
down the stairs to the great hall, where the men of Bowen greeted
him with noisy delight at their lord's homecoming.

With Catherine still keeping to her
bedchamber it was Margaret who saw to it that the high table was
covered with a clean linen cloth in honor of Arden's presence, then
set with silver spoons and cups, and with wooden trenchers to hold
the slices of hollowed-out bread into which the spicy meat stew was
to be ladled. The weather being unsuitable for hunting, the cook
was forced to rely on preserved foods from the storerooms to round
out the menu, though she did sacrifice a few birds from the
dovecote, which were spitted and roasted over the kitchen fire.

When midday came Aldis was so eager to speak
with Arden that she ran down the steps and hurried across the hall
to where he stood by the fire. Margaret followed more slowly with a
reluctant Catherine, but she could hear the conversation.

“Where is my father?” Aldis asked of Arden.
“Did he return to England with you? And what of my brother?”

There followed an oddly tense pause until
Arden responded in a low voice, “I left Uncle Oliver and Roger
behind, in the Holy Land.”

“I did so hope they were following you with
Sir Tristan's party.” Aldis sounded disappointed. There was another
tense and awkward silence before she spoke again. “When you left
them, were they in good health?”

By this time Margaret and Catherine were in
the great hall and Margaret could clearly see Arden's grim, pale
face.

“Cousin Aldis,” Arden said in the harsh voice
that Margaret was beginning to know too well, “do not harangue me
with your woman's questions, nor ply me with your tears. I have
endured enough of both for one day. I have nothing more to say to
you.”

“But, I only wanted -” Aldis broke off
speaking when Arden turned his back and stalked away from her, to
take his place at the high table.

“Be seated,” Arden said, making an abrupt
gesture that included everyone in the hall.

With the lord of the manor returned after a
long absence, it should have been a happy gathering for his
homecoming meal. That it was not was due in large part to Arden,
who sat in the lord's chair glowering at the company, speaking only
to Sir Wace and then only when the seneschal asked a direct
question. Where the ladies were concerned, Arden's treatment of his
sister bordered on rudeness. Catherine's proper place was at
Arden's left hand and Margaret, their guest, should have been
seated at Arden's right. Instead, he made Sir Wace sit next to him.
Catherine was beside Margaret, as far from Arden as she could be
while still sitting at the high table, and Aldis was relegated to
the other end of the table, where she was too distant for
conversation or for questions.

“Arden may never speak to me again,”
Catherine whispered to Margaret. She did not touch the food set
before her and she tasted only a few sips of wine. Catherine's eyes
were fevered and over-bright and they shone with tears. Still, she
lifted her chin and pulled back her shoulders, not allowing her
hurt feelings to be seen by the men-at-arms or the servants.

“In time, Arden's anger will soften,”
Margaret said, though she wasn't as certain as she sounded. She
believed there was more to Arden's cold disregard of his sister's
feelings than mere irritation at finding her where he did not
expect her to be, or even anger at learning why she was at Bowen.
In his first, unguarded embrace of Catherine and his startled cry
of, “Cat!” when he realized she was fainting, Margaret had seen
proof that Arden loved the girl. But from the way he was treating
her now, Margaret did not think Catherine would believe he cared.
Arden's behavior toward Aldis was even more incomprehensible to
Margaret.

The meal that should have been a festive
feast did not last long. Perhaps reacting to the tense atmosphere,
and in striking contrast to their usual tendency to linger in the
hall, the men-at-arms, squires, and servants all found excuses why
they ought to be elsewhere as soon as they finished eating. Before
long there was no one left but the three women and two men who sat
at the high table.

“Well,” Sir Wace said, clearing his throat
and rising, “I have duties to attend to, if you will excuse me, my
lord Arden.” He waited, but Arden did not respond. With an
expressive shrug of his shoulders Wace stepped down from the dais
and followed the last of his men from the hall.

Arden gave no indication of noticing the
sudden clearing of a hall that ordinarily was filled with activity.
He remained at the high table, staring into his silver cup as if he
would find in the dregs of his wine the answers to questions he
could not speak aloud.

It was Catherine who finally intruded into
the silence surrounding Arden. She left her seat and went to him,
to kneel at his side.

“Dear brother,” she said, “I cannot bear your
anger. We have been separated for so many years and I have missed
you sorely. I want to be close to you again, as we once were.
Please say you forgive me.”

“You will have to ask our father's
forgiveness for what you have done. I have none to give you,” Arden
said, not lifting his gaze from the winecup. He continued in a low
voice drenched in scorn, “You began by committing a foolhardy act
that may draw our father into bloody warfare with a fellow baron.
Next, you came to Bowen without Father's knowledge or permission,
bringing with you Cousin Aldis, who should never have been involved
in your thoughtless deeds and, most reprehensible of all, you are
sheltering a woman who is a fugitive from her lawful guardians.
Finally, you weep and wail over the marriage of a man who scarcely
knows you exist. Don't look to me for forgiveness.”

Catherine knelt motionless, her eyes
searching Arden's averted face. Clearly not finding what she sought
from his hard-set profile, she stood, steadying herself with a hand
on the back of the lord's chair. Arden did not move. Slowly
Catherine stepped from the dais and walked out of the hall, her
head bowed, her long skirts dragging after her. Aldis sent a
frightened glance in Arden's direction before she followed
Catherine.

The sight of Catherine so forlorn and of
Aldis afraid tugged at Margaret's heart until her temper surged far
beyond her ability to keep it in check.

“What has happened to you?” she scolded
Arden. “The boy I once knew would never be so cruel. But you are no
longer that boy,” she added before Arden could say it for
himself.

“You should have told me at once that Aldis
was with you,” Arden muttered, still contemplating his winecup.

“Do you want to destroy both of those girls?”
Margaret demanded. “Or are you trying to make them hate you?”

In response to her impassioned whisper Arden
lifted his gaze from the winecup, to look at Catherine's drooping,
departing figure, with Aldis' arm at her waist offering fragile
support. Then Arden transferred his gaze to Margaret. What she saw
in his unguarded eyes terrified her. Never had she seen such pain
and grief, or such aching loss. The openness of Arden's gaze lasted
for only an instant, before a veil dropped somewhere behind those
ice-blue eyes, as he closed himself off from human contact. In that
one moment Margaret recognized the lost and lonely soul who hid
behind Arden's stern defenses.

And she knew that he knew what she had seen
in him. Arden might in time forgive his sister her misdeeds and he
might even answer all of Aldis' questions about her menfolk, but
Margaret was not sure he would ever forgive her for what she had
just learned about him.

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