The Rose at Twilight (46 page)

Finally, Alys sent them all away, becoming hysterical when they were reluctant to obey her. She settled against her pillows with wee Dickon nestled in her arms, fighting sleep when it would come, fearing that if she slept the baby would die.

When the door to the bedchamber opened, she snapped without looking up from her charge, “Get out. I will hear no more of your foolish prattle. Dickon will stay with me.”

“I have come to see my son, and he is not going to be called Dickon, but Henry Arthur, to please our king.”

She looked up then, sharply, and cried ecstatically, and with overwhelming relief, “Nicholas, you are here! Oh, Nicholas, they say he will die. He cannot. He must not!”

Nicholas moved to stand beside the bed, looking down at the two of them. His face was white, and she realized that the others had already told him what to expect. “Let me hold him,” he said, and his voice was tight.

“You will not take him away from me!”

“No. Move over.” He sat on the bed beside her, plumping pillows behind himself before he took the tiny, silent bundle from her. “I have sent for a priest,” he said.

“No!”

“He must be christened, sweetheart. The lass too.”

“I will not have my son named after the Tudor.”

“He is my son, too, Alys.”

A rap at the door announced the priest, and she knew then that Nicholas had been in the house longer than she had thought. She looked at him accusingly and with despair, and he put his free arm around her shoulders, drawing her close.

Anne was brought in by her nurse, and when the family and Madeline had joined them, the priest began the brief ceremony. When, with a hand poised over the little boy’s head, he asked, “Who names this child,” Rhys, standing godfather, said, “I do.”

Alys gazed bleakly at Nicholas.

He looked back at her with understanding, and the tenderness in his eyes that she had longed to see there, and said quietly, “There has been a change, Father. He is to be called Richard ap Nicholas ap Dafydd of the Welsh house of Merion.”

The priest nodded, and Rhys repeated the names without comment. When it came time to name the little girl, Madeline, who was to stand her godmother, looked at Nicholas. “Is her name to be in the Welsh fashion, too, Sir Nicholas?”

He looked at Alys and smiled. “One Welsh lad, and one English wench—is that not the way, sweetheart? I have no objection to calling her Anne. What say you to Anne Madeline?”

Alys looked past Madeline’s pleased smile to see Gwenyth nodding in agreement, and said, “We will use three names, if you please, sir, for I do favor Anne Madeline Gwenyth.”

“A large name for a child,” Nicholas said, “but so be it.”

The ceremony, without the usual trappings and long service, was soon over. When the others were leaving, Jonet bent over the little boy, still asleep in his father’s arms. “I ought to take him to the nursery now, sir.”

Before Alys could protest, Nicholas said, “We will keep him with us. Bring my lady wife some food, if you will. I think she has not eaten as she should. She must restore her strength.”

They took turns eating, so that one of them might hold the baby, and when the afternoon turned into evening, Nicholas got out his lute and played for them. Alys was exhausted, and while he played, her eyelids grew so heavy, she could no longer keep them open. The bundle in her arms was so light that when Nicholas took the baby from her she did not notice.

When she awoke, she missed Dickon instantly, and sat up in a panic. The room was dark except for the glow of firelight from the hearth, and above the crackling of the fire, she could hear music, a low humming sound. Nicholas was sitting in a chair beside the fire, hunched over, singing softly to their child.

Slipping out of bed, she crept nearer, not wanting him to stop, but he saw her. When he looked up, she saw the pain in his eyes and the tears on his cheeks, and she knew before he spoke what he would say.

“He is gone, sweetheart, only moments ago. I … I thought he might still hear me, so I did not stop the singing.”

Crying out in anguish, she collapsed to her knees by his chair, put her arms protectively around the still bundle in his lap, and gave way to her grief.

Nicholas let her weep until Jonet, coming in silently a few minutes later, took the dead child away to prepare it for burial. Then Nicholas got up and lifted Alys from the floor, cradling her in his arms and carrying her to bed. He was crying again by then, too, and he crawled into the bed with her, boots and all, and drew the quilt up to cover them, holding her tightly until they both fell, exhausted, to sleep.

When Alys awoke, he was still holding her, and he was awake, watching her, his eyes red-rimmed, his face gray with sorrow.

She said the first words that came to her, without thought. “I never thought to see you weep.”

“I am not made of stone, sweetheart.”

Her own tears welled again and spilled down her cheeks. “I lost your son, Nicholas. How can you ever forgive me?”

He said steadily, “It was not your doing, my love, but the will of God. There will be other sons—and daughters, too, may heaven help me. That is better—a smile, albeit a watery one.”

“There is little to smile about, but I am glad you came.”

“I wanted to come before, but Henry demanded as great a show of force as we could muster till we left East Anglia behind. I left him at Huntingdon. He goes to Coventry, where he wants the queen and Lady Margaret to join him at Kenilworth Castle.”

“You must leave again!” She would not beg him to stay, much as she wanted him to. She could not expect him to heed her needs when his king made demands of him, but she could not stem her tears. They ran down her face to her neck, into her bed gown.

Nicholas tried to mop them away with the edge of the quilt. “My handkerchief is sodden, sweetheart, so you must make do with this, but do not weep. ’Tis Hugh who goes with the queen. It will mean postponing his wedding, too, for as soon as you are fit to travel, I mean to take you and our daughter to Wolveston, and I doubt that Jonet will let the pair of you go without her.”

“You would take us yourself?” She was not anxious to leave, but neither was she much interested in staying in London or in going with the queen, especially if Elizabeth moved to Kenilworth and took Arthur with her. Thinking of the royal prince brought a fresh rush of tears, and Nicholas responded with dismay.

“You weep at the thought that I will take you myself! Would you prefer that I send Hugh with you?”

“No, no.” She tried to explain that she was glad he was going with them, but was surprised as well.

“I thought you would object to going at all just now,” he said, “but there are things about to happen in this country, and I would as lief you and wee Anne were well away from the court and safe at Wolveston with Gwilym and a host of armed men to protect you. My father wants to return to Merion Court soon.”

“Will you stay at Wolveston with us?”

“As long as I am able, sweetheart.”

“Good, for it grows lonely there without you.”

“It will not be lonely this time,” he said. “I mean to take Madeline Fenlord with us.”

She was grateful. “I hope her father will allow it.”

“He will. Can you keep a secret, sweetheart? Gwilym means to have her, just as I said he would, and he has received her father’s blessing, if he can only get the wench to agree.”

“Then she was right! But she thought Sir Walter had refused him.” She explained that Madeline had seen the two men talking, and had suspected the subject of their discussion. “She thinks her father looks for a more indulgent husband for her, not one who is interested only in her fortune.”

Nicholas smiled. “’Tis not only the fortune, sweetheart. Gwilym said he knew he had strong feelings for the wench the instant one of Everingham’s men dared to touch her, but he said, too, that she must come to want him as much as he wants her. She has been too much indulged to appreciate a husband, he said, and he cannot go through life with a wife he must coax and coddle. His chances look dim at the moment, but I believe his patience will prevail, and in any event, a few skirmishes between the two will make life at Wolveston more interesting for the rest of us.”

Alys could not doubt that, and when the time came to leave London, found herself looking forward to the journey with more interest than might otherwise have been expected. The bleak sadness she felt at seeing her tiny son laid to rest was a little compensated by the joy she felt each time she held Anne in her arms or watched her sleeping in her cradle, and when the great gray castle on the hill first came into sight, she experienced a sense of homecoming that she had never felt before. Wolveston was her home now, more than it had ever been, for she had been the one to set the house in order, and she could even take pride in the freshly plowed fields they passed as they made their way up the hill, and admire the new lambs in the green pastures.

The journey had been slow, for the baby, her nurse, and at times even Alys herself, had traveled in a litter, but today Alys was riding beside her husband, with Jonet, Elva, and Madeline riding behind them. Glancing at Nicholas, astride Black Wyvern beside her, Alys saw a look of pleasure in his eyes, and when he turned toward her, he was smiling.

“It is a fine place,” he said, “especially in the spring with the hills so green—like Wales.”

“Would you rather it were in Wales?” she asked.

“No, sweetheart. In Wales, it would soon be cut up in parcels, for my sons and their sons. ’Tis better here, where it can stay as it is to support all who dwell within its borders.”

“Mayhap the king will change England to make it more like Wales,” she said.

“He is more like to change Wales. The English way leads to power and stability, the Welsh to parcels and dissension. Then, too, men who struggle to make a small holding feed and clothe many dependents cannot provide men-at-arms for their king. But there is Gwilym now, coming across the courtyard to greet us.”

In the bustle that followed, while they dismounted, servants came from within to attend the sumpter ponies and to assist the nurse with the baby. Alys watched Gwilym but could detect no difference in his attitude toward Madeline, and she began to suspect again that Nicholas must be mistaken. Madeline seemed to be oblivious to Gwilym, but Alys was not fooled. Madeline cared, but if the man truly wished to wed her, Alys thought he would have to show at least a modicum of interest, or else Madeline would remain obdurate if only to prove she knew her own mind. At the moment, she might have been air for all the heed he paid her.

“A good journey?” he asked Nicholas, seeming not to notice when Madeline, in passing, carelessly trod upon his foot.

Nicholas grinned at him but replied casually, “Aye, not a sign of invasion or rebellion did we see.”

“’Tis quiet enough,” Gwilym said. “We shall be safe here, I think, despite the rumors. You’ll want to look over the place.”

Nicholas did, and for the next fortnight, he enjoyed being lord of the manor and spent his days riding with Gwilym, visiting the villages and the tenantry. Sometimes Alys and Madeline rode with them, and as the days passed, Alys noted that Mistress Fenlord was beginning to take greater offense at being ignored.

“He is worse than ever,” Madeline said with a sigh, as she and Alys watched Gwilym and Nicholas show a pair of small boys how to nock arrows to bows that were nearly too long for them. “He is as like to walk past a lady as to wish her a good day.”

“Goodness, do you wish him to speak to you?” Alys chuckled.

“It is of no significance to me,” Madeline said, lifting her chin. “He can have nothing of interest to say. Why is he giving that child a coin? It is for Sir Nicholas to reward his tenants’ children if he sees fit to do so. Will he not take offense?”

“Not Nicholas,” Alys said. “Gwilym gives a coin to every boy he sees practicing, believing that soon the men-at-arms from Wolveston will be amongst the finest in the land, and Nicholas approves. He says Gwilym always knows exactly what he is doing.” She could not repeat all that Nicholas had said, for she had promised not to do so, but she saw Madeline stiffen alertly at her last sentence, and hoped she would take warning.

Gwilym had ceased to criticize, or to note her clumsiness, which seemed to Alys to have increased since their arrival, but more than once Alys had seen the Welshman’s jaw tighten at some bit of carelessness or an ill-chosen word. She had surprised a look of amusement in his eyes once also, and once, when Madeline had scraped her arm through her clumsiness, a look of tenderness. Alys did not think he would remain impassive much longer, and two days later, when Madeline, having helped her wash her hair by the great-hall fire, suddenly took it upon herself to carry away the rinse basin instead of calling a servant to attend to it, Alys, warned by her expression that she had mischief in mind, watched with amused trepidation to see what would happen.

Nicholas and Gwilym were sitting comfortably at the other end of the hearth, absorbed in a game of Tables. Neither had paid the least heed to several conversational gambits made by the women, and Alys had hidden more than one smile at hearing Madeline raise her voice in a clear attempt to elicit at least a comment in return, but the men’s concentration on the roll of their dice and the movement of their tiles was too great.

Jonet, wrapping a towel around Alys’s head, said quickly, “You need not carry that basin, mistress. Call a ser—” She broke off with a gasp when Madeline tripped, seemingly over her own feet, and threw the entire basin of water over Gwilym.

He leapt up, sputtering, and Madeline said, “I
am
so sorry, sir. You must forgive my clumsiness.”

He replied as calmly as though he were not dripping all over the hearth, “Such carelessness, madam, is something that we shall discuss at painful length if it persists after we are wed.”

“Wed? How dare you, sir! I have never said I would marry you, nor shall I ever do so.”

“We shall see. I cannot understand why your father allowed you to make such a game of a simple matter. Your consent is not needed, only his, and that I have, sweet vixen, in writing. I had hoped you would know your own mind before you learned that fact, but since you persist in denying your feelings whilst you flirt like a spoiled child demanding attention, I’ve decided that as soon as Hugh Gower arrives to marry Mistress Hawkins, we, too, will be wed. ’Twill save us all the bother of two ceremonies.”