Child of the Phoenix (34 page)

Then John was behind her, his hands on her shoulders. She felt herself grow tense.

‘Eleyne, may I present a kinsman to you.’ His voice was perceptibly more gentle. ‘Come, turn round. This is a cousin of my grandmother’s, Robert Fitzooth.’

Swallowing hard, she faced them and forced herself to smile. The young man was as tall as John and as good-looking, with an irrepressible twinkle in his eye. He swept a low bow.

‘Lady Chester. I have heard so much about you and I had abandoned hope of seeing you before I left. Greetings, madam, and welcome home.’

She found she was smiling at him, responding instantly to his warmth and charm, so unaffected and uncomplicated after her husband’s greeting. Almost without realising it, she allowed him to lift her heavy cloak from her shoulders and toss it over a bench, then he produced a cup of wine from a hovering page.

‘You lucky man,’ he called over his shoulder at the earl. ‘You never told me how beautiful she is; that the storm would pass and the snow melt and the sun come up inside the hall when she came home.’

Eleyne laughed, and saw that John too was smiling, watching the two of them, arms folded with the tolerance an adult might show two children at play. ‘She likes you, Robin,’ he commented with a wry laugh. ‘Lucky man. Make the most of it.’

After supper Robin organised games and dancing in the hall and led Eleyne into all the dances, leaving John in his chair by the fire. By bedtime Eleyne was exhausted.

Robin looked at her and laughed at his cousin. ‘You will curse me for leaving your bride too tired for your private sport. Forgive me, my lord.’

John gave a forced smile. ‘Eleyne has enjoyed herself. It’s good to see her happy.’ He stood up and, reaching across, took her hand. ‘Nevertheless, as you say, it is late. Time for us to retire.’

They walked side by side from the hall, between ranks of bowing men and women, conscious that as soon as they had gone the dancing would start again.

Beyond the hall, the castle was bitterly cold; the wind had veered at last into the north and with it came the stranglehold of ice on the snow. Feeling the bite of it in her bones as they climbed the broad winding stair to the lord’s bedchamber, Eleyne wondered briefly if Dafydd would reach home before the ice came. Dafydd and she had exchanged so few words on their ride to Chester; their mutual resentment was a physical barrier between them.

Above her, at the angle of the curving stair, John stopped and looked down at her. His smile had gone. ‘You find my kinsman Robin attractive, I think.’ His voice was flat.

She stopped too, raising her face to look up at him in the shadows, and her skin tingled with warning. ‘He is indeed an attractive man.’ She could hear the defiance in her voice.

‘More so, no doubt, than your husband.’

Eleyne smiled sadly. ‘No one should be more attractive than a husband to a wife, my lord,’ she said softly. For a fleeting instant the image of William de Braose rose before her.

‘No, they should not.’ His mouth snapped shut on the words and he continued to climb.

Eleyne followed him, holding her heavy skirts clear of the stone steps. ‘Are you at all pleased to see me, my lord?’ Her voice, tenta tive above the howl of the wind, barely reached him.

‘Of course.’ He did not stop.

At the head of the stairs the gallery divided. To the east, it led to a small chapel and the lord’s private apartments; to the north, it led around the great square of the keep to the apartments reserved for visitors of state. Eleyne paused, then taking a deep breath she turned after her husband.

At the door to his chamber he bowed to her courteously. ‘You may make this room your own, Eleyne. I have given orders that your coffers and your servants be sent here. I myself will sleep elsewhere.’ He looked at her, thoughtfully. ‘Just until you are recovered from your journey.’

‘And then, my lord?’ She did not realise that her eyes were pleading.

‘And then we shall see.’ He reached out and touched her cheek. ‘I trust you did not bring the Lady Rhonwen back with you from Wales, Eleyne.’

Eleyne froze, her eyes on his, unable to look away.

‘You know how I mistrusted that woman,’ he went on. ‘She was bad for you, keeping you a child, leading you into evil ways …’ He paused, noticing her stricken expression. He said nothing, then slowly he sighed. He pushed open the chamber door and walked in.

Rhonwen was supervising the unpacking of Eleyne’s boxes, standing in the middle of the floor as some half-dozen maids scurried around her, depositing armloads of linen in carved and painted coffers and chests around the walls. The lights flickered in the draught of the open door and Rhonwen looked around. For a long moment she and Lord Chester surveyed one another, then quietly, somehow hopelessly, he laughed: ‘So that is the way of it.’

‘You never said she couldn’t return, my lord,’ Eleyne cried. ‘You never said she had to stay in Wales.’

‘Did I not?’ He looked at her coldly. ‘I had thought you would have understood my intentions.’

That night Eleyne tossed and turned alone in the great bed, listening to the wind howling in the chimneys, and by morning she had reached a decision. After hearing mass in their private chapel at her husband’s side, she waited until the household had broken their fast and then followed him to the side chamber where he was sitting at his desk. His face was pale, his hands stiff with cold as he reached for the first letter. His clerks hovered nearby waiting to begin work. One of them, his nose red and swollen, sneezed dismally into the crook of his arm and wiped his nose on his sleeve.

‘I should like to talk to you alone, my lord,’ she said boldly. Her back straight, her eyes steadily on his, she clasped her hands together to give her courage.

For a moment she thought he would refuse, then with a curt nod of his head he gestured the clerks towards the door. Bowing, they withdrew.

‘If you are wondering where Robin was at breakfast, he has left the castle,’ he commented curtly. ‘He too was afraid of being caught in the snow. He asked me to pass his farewells to you.’

‘I did not go downstairs to breakfast, my lord,’ Eleyne retorted. ‘Sir Robert’s whereabouts are of no interest to me.’ Her eyes were heavy from lack of sleep and her head ached. She must not lose her temper; she must keep up her courage; she must remember what she had vowed to do. ‘I came to talk to you about Rhonwen. If it is your wish, I shall send her back to Wales. All I ask is that we give her a dowry to enable her to marry well. I love her as a mother. I should not like her thrown destitute upon the world.’

John looked at her closely. ‘Have you told her that this is what you intend?’ he asked shrewdly.

Eleyne hung her head, then once more straightened her shoulders. ‘Not yet, my lord,’ she said honestly. She smiled wearily. ‘I didn’t have the courage. But I shall do so at once if it is your wish.’ The pain in her eyes was obvious, in spite of the resolution in her voice.

He frowned. ‘You really love that woman, don’t you? Even knowing she is not a Christian.’

‘She will attend mass if I ask it of her, my lord,’ Eleyne said firmly. She took a deep breath. ‘I was a child when I came to you. I did not realise that the things I had been told by Einion were bad. He had offered to help me understand my dreams. For that I was grateful. But I know what I did was wrong. I am no priestess of the Welsh gods of ancient times. I am your wife and I am no longer a child. I have put Einion’s teachings behind me, and Rhonwen understands that. I saw Einion …’ She hesitated. To tell him was a risk; it was also perhaps the key to the future. ‘I saw him before I came back to Chester and he confirmed what I already knew in my heart. That my place is at your side. And that our future lies in Scotland.’

She saw the excitement flare in his eyes, and she felt an answering excitement inside herself.

‘In Scotland?’ he repeated. ‘He said that?’

‘Yes, my lord. He said that my place was with the King of Scotland and that I would live – and die – in that country.’

John stood up. He threw the letter which had been clutched in his hand on to the table and watched as it slowly refolded itself. ‘So. It is to happen. When?’ He rounded on her, his face alight with suppressed fire.

She shook her head. ‘He showed me no calendar, my lord.’ She smiled, her heart thumping with excitement.

‘And the future? Did he see children?’ The eagerness and fear in his voice made her blush as she replied: ‘He said I should be the mother of a line of kings.’

‘So!’ He smacked his hands together triumphantly. ‘I knew it! I felt it in my bones! And you –’ He reached out and took her hand. ‘You are to be the mother of my heir.’

She smiled. ‘So it would seem, my lord.’ She looked up at him as he pulled her closer and she could feel her breath coming in small gasps. It was working; working more surely than ever she would have dreamed possible. Let it be now, she thought incoherently as she reached up, seeking his lips with her own, now while he is excited and optimistic and strong. Let it be now.

As if reading her thoughts he murmured through his kisses, ‘Why don’t we retire to the bedchamber, my Eleyne? Dear God, you’ve been away too long and I have missed you.’ He held her away from him as if trying to reassure himself that she was indeed a grown woman now, eager in his arms. ‘You’re not afraid?’

Her heart was hammering wildly beneath her ribs. ‘Oh no, my lord, I am not afraid.’ She reached up again to kiss him, her lips tracing the angle of his jaw, finding the soft skin of his cheek beneath the rough neatness of his beard as he caught her hand and pulled her towards the door.

Outside the three clerks were waiting dutifully to be summoned back to their master’s office. They looked up as the door opened, but neither the earl nor the countess noticed them, even when one sneezed yet again as they walked past. Holding Eleyne by the wrist, John walked swiftly across the stone flags towards the staircase. Almost running to keep up with him, Eleyne was oblivious of the interested faces watching from the shadows as she followed him upwards, concentrating, as he was, only on what was to happen once they reached the privacy of the bedchamber. He flung back the door and stood still.

Rhonwen sat by the fire with two other women. They were gossiping softly in the intimate warmth of the hearth. The three faces turned in surprise as the door crashed against the wall.

‘Out!’ John jerked his thumb towards the door. The women rose and, dropping their spindles, scuttled past him. Rhonwen hesitated for a second as though she were about to speak. One glance at John’s face made her change her mind and she followed the others, closing the door behind her.

‘At last.’ John turned the key in the lock. Unclasping his mantle, he let it drop to the floor. ‘Wife –’ He pulled her to him and kissed her. She could feel the strength and power centred within him, so different from his habitual gentle reserve. Lifting her mouth to his, she felt herself grow dizzy with longing. He felt her excitement and smiled. ‘So, you are eager for your husband at last.’

‘You know I am,’ she whispered. She longed to tear off her clothes, to feel his hands crushing her breasts, to feel his skin against hers; to throw herself to the ground and roll on the floor naked before the fire. Her whole body sang with life. But then, dimly, in some recess of her mind, she heard a small voice of caution. She must not shock him with her eagerness; she must not let him think her wanton; she must let him lead.

Closing her eyes she pressed against him, feeling his arms tighten immediately around her. ‘Sweet Eleyne,’ he murmured, his lips against her ear, and now he was slowly, gently, feeling for the lacings of her gown. She stood still, trembling with anticipation as he undressed her, removing each garment slowly and carefully until even her shift had gone. For a long time he did nothing. He stood looking at her with an expression of wonder on his face. ‘I hadn’t dreamed you were so beautiful.’ His voice was hoarse. Not touching her body, he reached up to the braids wound around her head beneath her veil. Unpinning the fine fabric, he began carefully to unplait her hair until it hung in a rippled curtain around her breasts. ‘You are sure you’re not afraid?’ He had felt her trembling.

She shook her head, her eyes lowered, shy suddenly before the intensity of his gaze. ‘No, I’m not afraid.’

‘My love.’ His hand on her shoulder was featherlight. She scarcely felt it as it traced along her collar-bone and down towards her breast. But his gentle touch on her nipple sent a bolt of lightning knifing through her body. She gasped and he looked up, frowning. ‘I didn’t hurt you?’

‘No. No, my lord, you didn’t hurt me.’ Her words came in a rush.

‘I wouldn’t hurt you for the world, Eleyne – ’

‘You won’t, my lord.’ Her voice dropped, instinctively low and seductive as she caught his face in her hands and brought it towards hers. ‘You won’t.’

He kissed her long and hard, then he drew her towards the bed. She followed him, her breathing quick and shallow, her pale skin flushed in the light of the fire.

His body was painfully thin, his skin as soft and white as a girl’s. To Eleyne it was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen. Mesmerised by the intensity of his gaze and the light touch of his hands on her belly and flanks, she lay back on the bed, her hair spread loose on the silk sheets and pillows, unaware that as her arms drew him down towards her, her legs had parted as naturally and wantonly as any village girl’s with her man in the hay.