The Cross and the Dragon (27 page)

“Judith,” he murmured. “Judith of Bordeaux.”

Judith, Gerard remembered, the woman who had bedded Hruodland and many others before her husband had died. The king had appointed her the abbess the summer after Lombardy was conquered.
Retired from the world?
Gerard thought.
She looks and acts like a queen.

Judith reeked of sandalwood perfume from the Holy Land. Her clothes were pure white linen, the lack of dye her sole concession to humility, but even they were embroidered with blue. A tight bodice and a girdle of gold and sapphires showed off a plump figure any countess would envy. She wore a silk veil, secured with a sapphire headdress. Rings covered her pale, soft fingers, bracelets jangled on her wrists, her necklaces entwined with each other on her bosom.

“Lord Gerard?” Judith said in Frankish, her eyes widening. “I almost did not recognize you. Bishop Leonhard told me what happened at Roncevaux, God rest their souls,” she added, bowing her head. “Is your brother comfortable?”

“Yes,” he mumbled.

Gerard looked down and realized he had been holding the dragon amulet all this time. He slipped it into a pouch on his belt.

A servant whispered in Judith’s ear. “The baths are ready,” she said. “You and your party must rest here a few days. I shall have the laundresses wash your clothes — you may borrow some I lend to guests at my residence. After the baths, please join me at the table.”

* * * * *

As he sat in the tub, Leonhard wondered if he would ever feel clean again, if he would ever stop smelling death.

“Your brother, how does he fare?” Ganelon asked Gerard. His tone reflected more eagerness than concern. He might as well have said, “Is he dead yet?”

Gerard sat up straight, and his cheeks colored. “His condition has not changed,” he said slowly, then muttered something in Roman.

“What did you say?” Ganelon asked, scowling.

“What will it take to stop this foolish quarrel?” Leonhard said. He stepped out of the tub and reaching for a drying cloth a servant handed him. “Is the massacre of our kin not enough? Even if you disliked them in life, we should mourn their death.”

His gaze darted to Ganelon’s face and Gerard’s. Something burned in both pairs of eyes, something that was extinguished in Leonhard when he saw Alfihar’s body. He was tired, tired of death, tired of keeping a truce between two feuding families.

“We have more important concerns,” he snapped.

As he donned borrowed clothes in the warming room, Leonhard hoped his brother could keep those two from each other’s throats long enough to rejoin the main army. Beringar had seen – what? forty winters? – and had lost much of his hair, but he was a battle-hardened warrior and had the scars to prove it. If Beringar could not manage those two young idiots, no man could.

* * * * *

The smell of bread, roasted goose and pork, soups, stews, and other dishes greeted Gerard, Leonhard, Beringar, and Ganelon when they entered the abbess’s dining room. Judith’s jewelry glittered in the evening sun as her musicians played zithers and flutes and sang love songs.

“Those clothes suit you, Lord Gerard,” Judith said, passing him a cup of wine.

“Thank you,” he said. “I like to,” he cleared his throat and corrected himself, “would like to buy them from you.”

Judith looked at Gerard with wide sky-blue eyes.

“Abbess, I do not know if the bishop has apprised you of how grave my brother’s condition is,” he said. Determined not to show any sign of weakness, he spoke slowly, careful of his Frankish grammar. “He is dying, and I am his heir. If I am to be a count, I must look like a count. I have some money.” He cleared his throat. “As for his care…” He fumbled in his pouch but found only a few coins and the dragon amulet.

“You need not worry about such things,” said the abbess, putting a jeweled hand on Gerard’s shoulder. “I remember Hruodland from court. What a pity. He was so charming. We shall attend to him. We are sisters of charity.”

“I am of noble blood, like you. I need no charity,” he replied. He paused. “I would like to give you our hound. He is a fine animal.”

“He will have a special place among my dogs,” she said. “I have fine kennels and servants to look after him.”

“It’s fitting the dog stay with Hruodland,” Gerard said. “He kept the beasts away from his body.”

They all were silent for a few minutes. Then Judith asked, “What will you tell the king about Hruodland?”

Leonhard and Beringar dropped their knives. Gerard dropped a piece of bread, and Ganelon froze in the middle of biting into a drumstick. The four noblemen looked at each other.

“We cannot tell the king that Hruodland lingered so,” Leonhard said. “It would be too difficult for him. The deaths of his closest friends and his nephew will be hard enough. And Alda, if she knew he was here, no matter how faint the hope of seeing him alive, she would come here.”

“Such a journey would be dangerous,” Beringar said, “but that headstrong girl would have little regard for her own safety.”

“We shall say Hruodland died in battle — he is dying as a result of the battle,” Leonhard said. “And that his soul is commended to heaven — I gave him last rites, and Abbess, you will see that he has a Christian burial.”

“Of course,” Judith murmured.

Gerard and Beringar nodded numbly.

“So we are to make Hruodland a hero who fell on the battlefield?” Ganelon sneered.

“He is no less a hero for taking his last breath in a hospital,” Judith snapped. “He gave his life fighting for the Lord’s cause.”

“Count Ganelon,” Beringar barked, “you were the one who did not want to take Hruodland with us from Roncevaux because it would slow us down. Do you wish to take him with us now?”

Ganelon glared at Beringar.

“I thought so,” Beringar continued. “Then we have no choice but to leave him here in the sisters’ care. Do you want to tell the king his nephew is at the hospital and incur His Excellence’s wrath for leaving Hruodland behind?”

“No,” Ganelon muttered. He paused. “It’s best to say he died at Roncevaux.”

“That is what Hruodland would want,” Gerard said. “By the time we meet the king, Hruodland will be dead regardless. There is no need to speak of his suffering in the hospital. He would not want the king to know. Nor would he want Alda to endanger herself.”

* * * * *

After matins prayers, Sister Elisabeth knew she would not be able to sleep for a while. With the passing of her womanly courses, sleep did not come easily most nights.

Instead of going to the sisters’ dormitories, she walked to the ward for the dying to check on her patients. Although clouds obscured the moonlight, she knew her way. As she approached the hospital, she saw the flicker of the night candles in the windows.

When she entered the ward for the dying, she was surprised to see a man bending over a patient — what was his name? Oh yes, Hruodland of the March of Brittany. The stranger looked up at her. He was a handsome man in his twenties with pale blond hair. In the candlelight, his eyes looked like ice. Elisabeth recognized the blond as one of the abbess’s noble guests. She could tell from his build that he was a warrior, but he was not as broad as the other warrior, an older man with thinning hair. He held a wineskin. He seemed startled, then his look became accusing, as if to ask her what she was doing here.

Elisabeth’s brows drew together and her mind flooded with questions.

“I am Sister Elisabeth,” she said loudly and clearly in Roman. She thrust out her chin and drew herself to her full height, such as it was. “And from whom do I have the pleasure of this visit to the sick at this strange hour?”

He gave her a blank look. She repeated the question in Latin. Still, a blank stare. Elisabeth rubbed her temples. She knew little Frankish. She asked one of the few questions she did know in that language, “What is your name?”

“Beringar of Bonn,” the blond answered. He said something else quickly in Frankish.

Now, it was Elisabeth’s turn to give the blank stare.

“Wine for him,” he said slowly in Frankish, pointing to the inert body on the cot.

Elisabeth smiled. Of course, giving wine to his friend. “Kind act,” she replied in Frankish.

She patted the stranger’s hand and looked into his icy blue eyes. She wished she knew enough words of Frankish to say something of comfort. She turned her back on the blond to attend to the ward’s other patient, a man who had spent most of his life at the abbey.

The warrior must be a dear friend,
she thought,
for him to come here in the middle of the night
.

Chapter 19

Gerard visited the hospital’s ward for the dying one last time before the scouting party resumed its journey. He knelt beside the cot and held Hruodland’s hand. He admired how the nuns had cleaned up his brother. They had shaved off his beard, closely cut his greasy, tangled locks, and washed what hair was left. Hruodland lay between the sheets, wearing only the medal of Saint Peter. The flesh on his scarred chest had started to waste away.

Hruodland’s eyes were closed, and he smelled of urine again. Lay sisters scurried behind Gerard to fill a tub with water.

“I did everything I could,” he said. Gerard bowed his head and murmured the Pater Noster.
Please, Jesus, call him home
. He made the sign of the cross. “Go with God.”

Releasing Hruodland’s hand, Gerard rose to his feet and regarded his brother. Hruodland lay very still, and his breathing was slow and deep.

Sister Elisabeth entered the ward for the dying through a curtained doorway from another ward and approached Gerard. She watched the lay sisters bring water to the tub.

“We will take care of him,” she said.

“Your sisters can do better than my servants,” he said, reminding himself of why he was leaving Hruodland behind. “He looks more peaceful than I have ever seen him. The orchard cemetery is a better resting place than the wayside.”

“His suffering will end soon,” Elisabeth said.

Gerard thanked Sister Elisabeth and left the hospital. He took in the sea breezes and wished he could enjoy them. He straightened his shoulders and held up his chin. If he was going to be the count, he had better act like one. He joined the party at the entrance to the abbey and mounted his horse.

“How does your brother fare?” Ganelon asked, again in a tone that eagerly said, “Is he dead yet?”

Gerard narrowed his eyes. “His condition is declining. Sister Elisabeth says he will enter heaven soon.”

Ganelon looked down and smiled.

“My brother is dying because of battlefield!” Anger made Gerard’s Frankish stilted and his Roman accent heavy. “He was brave man, unlike…”

“Stop it!” Leonhard barked. “Both of you!”

Beringar’s sword sang as he withdrew it from its sheath. “You boys can continue your bickering once we join the main army. But there will be no bloodshed here. Act like men!”

Gerard and Ganelon glared at each other like two fighting tomcats that had had water thrown on them. Leonhard and Beringar looked at each other and shook their heads.

As Beringar sheathed his sword, the great gate to the abbey opened and the scouting party rode out. Leonhard and Beringar rode side by side between Ganelon and Gerard. The soldiers and carts of supplies followed. The road through the marsh was solid, and the sky was overcast.

The noblemen rode at a canter at the head of the group. To make haste, they had decided to replenish the supplies to last only until they arrived at the next city, Bordeaux. The lightened load allowed the horses towing the carts to trot.

For a moment, all that could be heard was the rhythm of the horses’ hooves, the jostling of the jars, axes, and other items in the carts, and the sea birds’ calls.

“You know, Leonhard,” Beringar said, “Alda is free to marry again. She is still young and has a generous dowry.”

“My brother not even dead yet, and you talk of Alda marrying again?” Gerard asked angrily in stilted Frankish.

Leonhard, Beringar, and Ganelon turned toward him. They all had puzzled looks.