Winter Song (27 page)

Raymond would not have had time to broach the subject of
Ernaldus even if he had decided to do so, for his mind was soon diverted to a
more important subject. They had hardly dismissed the castle folk, who had been
summoned to watch the hangings to reinforce the authority of their masters, and
turned away from the last body, still twitching on its gibbet, when the lookout
in the gate tower called that two men were riding up the road. Alys went in to
order the setting up of their belated dinner, and Raymond waited to greet his
guests.

As it happened, the riders were not guests, but messengers
with a packet of letters from Aix. Raymond had, of course, written to his
father as soon as the marriage contract was signed to inform Alphonse of the
rich dower he had won with Alys. He had told his father that he intended to
take his future wife’s property in hand before bringing her to Tour Dur because
he felt that to be of paramount importance. However, Raymond discovered on
reading his father’s letter that this practical program did not sit well with
either parent.

Lord Alphonse wanted Raymond home as soon as possible,
saying that it was essential to summon the vassals to a fresh homage ceremony.
Raymond’s grandfather had been very ill again, he reported, and a renewal of
oaths at a wedding would be of infinite value in reminding them of their duty.
In addition, Alphonse wrote, Lady Jeannette had suffered agonies of
disappointment and spent her days weeping over her son’s lack of consideration
for his womenfolk. Raymond grimaced, wondering which reason for summoning him
home was more important to his father.

There was a separate letter from Lady Jeannette. Raymond now
opened that. How could he drag his betrothed all over Gascony, his mother
wrote. He would kill the poor girl before he married her. And, Lady Jeannette
added, she was frantic, not knowing when they would arrive so that she could
tell the steward when to begin preparations for the wedding. Winter weddings
were so difficult, she complained, with no fresh fruit or vegetables to be had,
no calves or lambs, and newborn piglets very scarce. She was sick with worry.
Raymond must come at once and take the preparations in hand himself. He should
leave Alys to follow more slowly. There was no need for her to arrive before
the ceremony, but Raymond must ride home as fast as he could.

Raymond’s teeth set hard with irritation. He dismissed the
messengers to eat and rest, thrust his mother’s letter impatiently into his
belt, and returned to reread his father’s with more care. He now discovered
that Lord Alphonse had also covered the back of the sheet. This part of the
letter was far more to Raymond’s taste. His father was passionate in his
praises of his son’s cleverness in wringing so much from the English king. He
was less pleased with the arrangement that left the property in Alys’s hands
but accepted it philosophically, acknowledging the reasons Raymond had given
for yielding on this point. However, he again recommended that Raymond come to
Aix as soon as possible so that the couple could be married forthwith.

“It will be best to get the girl with child at once,” Lord
Alphonse wrote, “and induce her to will the lands to the child without delay. You
can explain to her that if she survives the bearing, she can change her will to
accommodate any future children, but that if she die in childbed without a
will, the lands will fall back into the king’s hands.”

A brief pang, as if an icy knife had pierced his chest, made
Raymond’s hand close hard on his father’s letter, crumpling it. Alys die in
childbed? Then he snorted with disbelief. What nonsense! She was young and
healthy and would have the best and tenderest care. His father was like an old
woman sometimes, starting and whimpering at every shadow. Raymond straightened
the parchment and read it to the end, snorting again at the disquisition on the
change of power in Bordeaux. The news was a little late to be helpful to him,
but his father’s recommendations on how to handle the situation fitted so well
with what Raymond had decided himself that all in all Raymond felt quite
pleased with the letter despite that stupid part about Alys’s will.

Raymond dismissed that from his mind as he climbed the
stairs to the hall. He was aware primarily of pride in having judged so well
what position he should take in the situation in Bordeaux. Raymond knew his
father had many weaknesses, but cleverness in politics was not one of them.
Lord Alphonse was a skilled diplomat and had often won concessions for
Raymond-Berenger in conferences that he could not have won on the field of
battle. Secondly, Raymond realized that he had forgotten completely his promise
to his mother to marry Alys at Tour Dur. He still thought it an excellent idea,
and more essential now that his grandfather’s health was so uncertain, but he
wished he had told Alys at once. She might be offended at the notion that he
had allowed his parents to believe she would travel all over Gascony with him
without either the blessings of the clergy or a suitable woman companion to
testify to her purity. Thirdly, and most immediately important, Raymond wanted
his dinner. He was starving.

That desire was to be satisfied at once. When he entered the
hall he saw all was ready and only his presence lacking for the meal to begin.
As soon as the first edge was off his appetite, he described the contents of
his parents’ letters. Far from being offended, Alys was warm in praise of his
forethought in planning a second wedding.

“It is all very well to have the contract and for us to know
that the highest prelate in England joined us, but that will mean little to
your vassals. Indeed, they must themselves witness our marriage. I would not
have thought of it, but you are very wise, my lord. Having seen the proper
ceremony with their own eyes, they cannot ever say that your children are
marked with any stain of illegitimacy, which someone seeking to make trouble
might do, claiming that what was done so far away, in England, might be ill
done.”

Another brief chill passed over Raymond at Alys’s casual
mention of children. She had spoken of them before, of course, but then the
idea that she might die in the bearing had not been forced into his mind. He
ignored the unpleasant sensation and answered lightly, “Yes, my love, but you
have forgotten one small thing. It is a bit late for you to mark the sheets
with proof of a maidenhead. How are we to explain that with due decency for you
and satisfaction for my honor?”

Alys realized he was joking and laughed. “Well, if our
eldest child is a girl, it will not matter. But if we have a man-child, who, in
due course, will be their overlord—”

“I fear we will need to confess that the wedding is not our
first,” Raymond interrupted, wishing she would leave the subject of children.
She was so blithe and fearless, but several of Raymond’s friends had lost wives
in childbed, and they, too, had been young and healthy and cared for most
tenderly.

“I suppose,” she began slowly, and then her eyes began to
twinkle. “Oh no. I know how it may be managed, Raymond.”

“Oh, you do, do you?” he exclaimed. “And where did
you
hear of such tricks?”

“Tricks?” Alys looked genuinely surprised. “I do not know
any tricks, but my flux is very regular. I can tell it out on tally sticks for
however many months away is needful. Then, if we set a date near the middle of
my time, we would be sure to strike some blood, even should I be a day or two
early or late.”

Raymond burst out laughing. The assumption of a continued
flux precluded getting with child and thus precluded the danger of childbirth. “There
are more certain ways,” he pointed out, refusing to acknowledge the relief he
felt. “A bladder of chicken’s blood concealed in the room or a nick with a
knife where the hair grows thickest on me.”

Alys leaned over and placed a light kiss on his lips. “I do
not like that last notion, my lord and my husband. To endanger your jewels to
prove my purity—no.”

He returned her kiss in good earnest but continued to
chuckle. “But it is my political purpose, not your purity that is in question.”
Still, he was obviously considering the idea seriously, for after a moment he
added, more soberly, “No, it will not do. Your maids will know.”

“They will not speak of it if I bid them be still, but I do
not think we should conceal the first marriage from your mother and father.
Sooner or later you or I would mention the wedding in England. Besides, surely
Queen Eleanor will write of it.”

To this Raymond agreed at once. He had never intended to
deceive his own family. Then his eyes lightened with inner laughter again,
although he kept his expression sober. “There is another reason to tell them,”
he said. “If we do not, we will not be able to share a bed until we are
remarried.”

Alys’s eyes widened. “Oh!” she exclaimed. “We will not be
able to do so anyway, for if we do, all the servants in Tour Dur will know it, and
we cannot stop all their mouths. But still—”

“I have lost my liking for this plan,” Raymond announced, cutting
off what Alys had been about to say. But he was laughing again almost before
the words were out of his mouth, and he continued, “No, perhaps I have not.
There will be good sport in finding a time and place where we can slake our
thirst for each other.”

Alys smiled at him, but she was aware of a sudden prick of
jealousy. Secure in the knowledge of her beauty, she had not until that moment
considered how desirable Raymond was as a man. The easy jesting way in which he
mentioned aping the devices of an illicit love affair made Alys aware that he
must be familiar with those devices. She was not foolish enough to resent the
women of his past, although she preferred not to think about them, but she was
suddenly awake in a new way to the fact that Raymond was unusually attractive.
There was a magnetism in his pale eyes, so brilliant in his dark-skinned face.
There was a stamp of high breeding in his high-bridged nose and well-cut lips,
an assurance of quick wits in his lively and intense expression.

Now Alys remembered that she had wanted him from the first
moment she had seen him, and she had never wanted any other man. Perhaps where
very dark men were more common, not every woman would be drawn so immediately
or think him quite so handsome as she did, but Alys could not imagine any woman
who would not respond to the sensual promise of his strong, lithe body. The
past could be left buried, but what of the temptations of the future?

Unaware that he had set the seed for the birth of a monster,
Raymond shrugged his shoulders. “It is something to think about, and there is
no need to decide the point at once. But there is a more serious problem, Alys.
My father desires that I come as soon as possible and that I send the
messengers back at once with a date when we will arrive in Tour Dur. It is not
fair to give the men less than a month’s warning. What with the rainy spells we
have in winter and the roads being bad in some places, they need time to settle
their business and travel.”

“That is most reasonable,” Alys replied, glad to shake off
the unpleasant notion of predatory women offering her husband a chance to play
a game he seemed to enjoy.

“Well and good, but how can I know how long I must sit in
Amou before I can come to terms with Gaston of Béarn, or how long it will take
me to drive Gamier out of Ibos?”

Alys wanted to say they should leave Gaston and Gamier to
their own devices, her interest in the welfare of Gascony and in the profit of
Ibos being far less than her desire to keep her husband out of a war. In time
she remembered that urging safety on Raymond was like setting a torch to a
barrel of hot pitch, prone to cause an explosion.

Instead, she bent her head and said softly, “Only you are
fit to decide whether it is truly needful to withstand Béarn or take Ibos at
this time rather than another, my lord.”

Raymond fished a particularly succulent piece of meat out of
the bowl of ragout they were sharing and held it to his wife’s lips. Alys took
the tidbit offered and kissed the fingers that offered it, understanding that
it was a husband’s appreciation of her meekness. She thought it very clever of
him to give such wordless thanks. The skill of knowing the kind of compliment
that, spoken aloud, might be taken as an insult by a woman not naturally meek,
however, made her uneasy. But her attention was drawn to a more healthy
problem.

“Yes,” Raymond said wryly, “but the truth is that I do
not
know. I wish I could be in two—no, three—places at one time. I cannot decide,
for the life of me, which matter is more urgent.”

Now Alys was quite accustomed to men who became caught in
the ruts of their own reasoning. Richard of Cornwall was particularly prone to
that failing. She had discovered an almost infallible method of jolting the
sufferer onto a new track. It had its dangers, but Alys was willing to take a
chance. She pursed her lips thoughtfully and then shook her head.

“If you have an idea, no matter how farfetched, I would
welcome it,” Raymond urged, falling neatly into the trap Alys had laid.

“Even so, I think this will not do,” Alys said very gravely.
“For if you sliced yourself lengthwise, the pieces would not balance. Moreover,
an arm and a leg without voice to speak or eyes to see are of no particular
value, whereas a head without limbs is at a sore disadvantage. Now, crosswise,
no part of you would fall over, but the center section, having neither head nor
limbs—”

She stopped abruptly and began to laugh as Raymond lifted
the bowl of ragout and threatened to tip the remains over her head. He had
listened quite seriously for a moment and then was so stunned by what he heard
that he was incapable of reacting for another few seconds.

“Raymond, do not,” Alys cried, choking. “You will only ruin
my dress and my wimple and then have to pay for another.”