The Cross and the Dragon (6 page)

“My greetings,” he said in a baritone as musical as any singer’s. Hruodland bent to kiss Theodelinda’s hand, then Alda’s.

Alda thought she would faint.

“Mother, I must talk to you,” Alfihar said, leading Theodelinda away, his arm around her shoulders.

Alda saw Ganelon halfway across the courtyard making his way toward her. She held her dragon amulet, desperately thinking for a way to avoid him without fleeing outright.

“Count Ganelon,” Leonhard called cordially.

Puzzled Leonhard did not tell Hruodland to leave her, Alda watched Ganelon turn toward her uncle.

“My nephew has fine hounds for hunting,” Leonhard said. He dismounted and handed the reins to a servant. “Come, let me show you the kennels.”

“What is she doing with my enemy?” Ganelon snarled, pointing at Hruodland and Alda.

Alda’s eyes widened as she noticed Hruodland’s hand clenching into a fist. Now, she had to get the two of them away from each other, despite what Leonhard had said about staying away from Hruodland. God had granted her fondest wish — to see Hruodland again, and the last thing she wanted was for him to be hurt in a fight.

“Our enemies are the Lombards and the Saxons,” Leonhard chided. He strolled toward Ganelon. “We have conquered one and will subdue the other.”

“
He
is still my blood enemy,” Ganelon replied.

“But we are all Franks,” Leonhard said calmly.

While Ganelon and Leonhard argued, Alda’s mind raced. With Ganelon’s back turned, she could escape and be alone with Hruodland. But first, she had to think of an errand for Veronica.

“Veronica,” Alda said quickly, “was our embroidery put away? Could you see to it?”

“Of course,” Veronica muttered and walked toward the manor.

With Ganelon’s back still turned, Alda gathered from snatches of their conversation that Leonhard and Ganelon’s argument had turned to religious matters. Alda suppressed a smile. Ganelon would be occupied for a long time with her literate uncle, who knew much of the Bible and books of the saints by memory. The pale-haired count of Dormagen would be fortunate to have time for a bath before dinner.

Hruodland was scowling as he looked toward Ganelon. The hostility at Geneva had not dissipated.

“Hruodland, would you like to see our lands from the tower?” Alda asked, already grabbing his arm and leading him as quickly as she could away from the group.

“Yes, certainly.” His scowl disappeared into laughter.

Alda told herself not to look back at Ganelon. At the entrance to the tower, Alda realized Hruodland might think of her as bold.
He may have ideas about me that a man should not have of a Christian lady. Then again… can I not have a little pleasure before my sentence to purgatory with Ganelon?

Alda walked slowly, trying to be graceful, trying to unlearn her walk, heavy on the heel, halfway between marching and running. She glanced at him from the corner of her eye. To her relief, he was still smiling.

“How long will you stay with us?” Alda asked.

“A few days,” he replied. “Enough time to rest our animals and bake some bread.”

While they climbed the stairs, his right sleeve slipped, revealing a jagged, scarlet scar.

“The wound on your arm,” she asked tentatively, “does it cause you pain?”

“Oh, this? It’s nothing. The Lombard who delivered that blow was twice your size. And with Durendal,” he said, patting his sword, “I finished him with one swift stroke.”

“Oh my,” Alda said admiringly.

She and Hruodland reached the top of the tower and approached the waist-high wall on the side overlooking the river.

“Do you not have a guard posted here?” Hruodland asked.

“Yes,” Alda answered. “He must have gone downstairs to join the others.” She smiled. She was alone with Hruodland.

“This view is well worth the climb.” Hruodland rested his elbows on the wall and leaned forward.

Alda leaned beside him, facing the river. “My father had it built high so he could see merchant boats. If anyone tries to invade, they cannot take us by surprise.” She frowned.
Why did I say that? Trade and war are a man's domain.
Then she became angry with herself.
Ganelon has poisoned my mind already. I never cared if a man thought I was meek or bold before. Why should I care now?

“Does something trouble you?” Hruodland asked. He shifted his weight and touched her shoulder.

“Perhaps I should not talk of trade or war,” she mumbled.

“Why not? It is good when a woman understands such things.” His arm swept toward the river, the mountains, and the forest. “This is a welcome sight after the war. And so are you.”

Alda felt the heat of a blush spread over her cheeks and neck.

They stepped back from the wall and faced each other. Hruodland took half a step closer. She did the same. His face wore the look of a man reuniting with his sweetheart.

“It is good to see our men home again,” she said.

“Yes, it is good to be back in Francia,” he said with a smile. “We would have come home sooner, if not for the willfulness of the Lombard king.” Hruodland shook his head. “He could have spared his own people much suffering. It was a sad sight when he finally did surrender.” He winced. “The women and children were starving and sick. Think of the beggars outside the church, a whole city of them.”

Now it was Alda’s turn to wince. She had seen the ragged, diseased beggars on the church steps in the cities she visited on the way to Geneva. The beggars, desperate for a miracle to heal their twisted legs and pus-filled sores, had come to pray to the relics of the saint housed within the church, whether it was in Worms or Strasbourg or Besançon.

“What kind of a monster would do such a thing to his own people?” Hruodland spat. “He deserves to be in the cloister. It is an act of mercy on Uncle Charles’s part.”

King Charles
, Alda thought. Although she had heard Hruodland call the king such a familiar name before, she still found it difficult to fathom. “The iron crown our king wears, I have never seen it before,” she said.

“He wears it well, doesn’t he? It’s the iron crown of the Lombards. Good for ceremony, but he tells me it is quite heavy. Now that the people have seen our triumph, it will rest in the treasury until we come to the next town.”

“I am so glad to see you again. With the March of Brittany so far away…” Her voice trailed off. “What brings you here?”

“Um, I was curious about Alfihar’s home. You and he both spoke so much of it. And, of course, the mountain across the river. Which one is the place where Siegfried slew the dragon?”

They turned toward the river, and Alda pointed to Drachenfels, where the long-ago hero had slain the monster and bathed in its blood to make himself invulnerable. With her free hand, she touched the beige, oval Drachenfels stone in her amulet, a gift from her father.

Hruodland touched her shoulder. They turned toward each other again and stepped closer. They were in an embrace. Alda could feel Hruodland’s breath. She closed her eyes, anticipating the next moment. They heard footsteps on the stairs. They opened their eyes, looked at each other, and moved apart, watching the stairwell.

It was Veronica. “Alda, your mother is asking for you. You will find her in the kitchen. If you follow me, Prince Hruodland, I will show you to the hall, where you can prepare for a bath.”

Hruodland followed Veronica. Alda walked, almost marched, to the kitchen, a small building just behind the manor. Despite the open windows and door, smoke filled the kitchen and stung Alda’s eyes and nose. In the massive stone hearth, drops of water boiling in an iron cauldron escaped over the rim and hissed when they hit the flames. Skinned and dressed calves and lambs were suspended from chains to roast at the back of the hearth, while plucked ducks and geese hung on hooks on the hearth’s periphery with shoulders of swine. The aroma of white and rye bread wafted to Alda’s nostrils as the baker used a long-handled wooden paddle to remove loaves from the wide oven, built into the stone back wall, its white-hot ashes in a lower chamber. Cooks chopped shallots and carrots, their knives clunking against wooden tables.

“Alda, we have a special guest,” Theodelinda said over the noise. She handed Alda a few sprigs of fresh mint. “You should look your best at dinner.”

“I have no wish to look my best for Gan...” A pop from the hearth cut her off.

“I have no time for a quarrel,” Theodelinda said in her mother tone, a tone that still stopped all arguments.

Alda stormed out of the kitchen. Grinding the mint with her teeth, she marched back to the manor and climbed the stairs to the solar, where the afternoon sun shone through arched windows on an embroidered tapestry of the Virgin and her Child. The solar was spacious enough to accommodate two curtained beds for the count’s family, cots and pallets along the wall for maidservants, looms, chests for clothes and sheets and drying cloths, chests for jewelry, a basin and its stand, a few stools, and a small table for the night candle, combs, ribbons, and clay bottles of perfumes and lotions.

Hearing footsteps on the stairs, Alda turned toward the sound. When Veronica entered the solar, Alda offered her a sprig of mint and opened the chest, releasing the bittersweet scent of wormwood, and picked through the shifts and large-sleeved gowns. She decided on a robin’s-egg-blue gown embroidered with dark red and yellow threads.

After Alda removed her jewelry, she picked up her rose oil and her clean clothes. She and Veronica descended the stairs and walked to the women’s side of the bathhouse.

The bathhouse was a wooden structure just outside the manor. Slaves had dug four holes in the earth, each big enough for ten people, and had lined the holes and the floor with stone and clay. Slits in the walls allowed some light. Usually, servants lit tallow candles on bath day, but Theodelinda had ordered them to use the beeswax candles for the royal family. A fire burned in the warming room, heating the cauldron of water. Servants had dumped the river water into the cold baths and the water from the cauldrons into the hot baths. A partition of warped wood separated the women from the men.

Alda and Veronica hung their clean clothes on pegs in the warming room. They stripped, unbraided their hair, cut lavender, rosemary, and chamomile hanging from the rafters, and stepped into the room with the baths.

With her maid beside her, Queen Hildegard relaxed in the hot bath, smelling of lavender. In a nearby tub, Prince Karl was bathed by his nurse.

Alda saw flickers of light from the men’s side and heard splashing. They were singing ribald tunes — “Out there a fool, in here a maid.” Alda could distinguish the voice of Alfihar, Hruodland, and the king among the others. Veronica dipped a bowl in the hot bath and crushed chamomile into it. Alda and Veronica threw lavender and rosemary into the water. The scent flooded the room as they slipped into the bath.

“It is good to see you again, my lady queen,” Alda said. “You look well.”

“I feel well, other than some morning sickness.”

“You are with child again?” Alda asked breathlessly.

Hildegard smiled and nodded.

“How wonderful!”

“It’s a blessing,” the queen said. She leaned forward so her maid could wash her back. “And you, Lady Alda, do you have a betrothed?”

“My brother was negotiating with him, then the war took him away.”

The nurse finished with the prince and took him to the warming room. Following them with her eyes, Alda spied her mother entering the bathhouse.

“Who is the man?” the queen asked.

“Ganelon of Dormagen.”

“You are the one. Oh, Good Lord.” The queen frowned and made the sign of the cross. “Do not consent to nuptials with him. He is a cruel man.”

“Forgive the intrusion, my lady queen,” Theodelinda said, stepping into the bath with her maid. “But why do you say this to my daughter?”

Theodelinda’s servant added rosemary to the water. Its scent blended with the lavender.

“Ganelon would be a bad match for your daughter and worse for your clan,” the queen replied. “Very few men can abide him. I cannot abide him.”

“Why?” Theodelinda asked.

“He pretends to have morals, but he shows no respect for God’s commandments — ‘You shall not covet another’s man wife.’ During our siege at Pavia, he sought favors from Karl’s nurse and sent little gifts — ribbons, cakes, and the like. She had no desire for him, and nothing she said could sway him. I myself heard her say, ‘I cannot betray my husband.’ And his response? ‘What I am asking is not betrayal. It would not produce a child.’”