Roselynde (21 page)

"It was not your fault," Simon said defensively.
"You did not ride off alone. If you were taken by surprise—" His
voice faltered. She had not ridden off alone, but perhaps she had separated
from the group willingly, not understanding what was really meant by whoever
arranged the tryst.

"Oh, no," Alinor said, her voice echoing her disgust at
her own gullibility. "I was tricked." She related the entire sequence
of events, adding, "The reason I am glad we took no prisoners is that I
fear it would be an embarrassment to the Queen to have proof of this
wrongdoing. Someone with the power to hold me and hide me planned it. If there
were proof, the Queen would be constrained to act. This way she may drop a hint
of reproof or not as it seems best to her. Thus, she must know of it, and she
may scold me or punish me for being a fool so easily taken in. I have well
deserved it."

Simon shook his head. "The trick was well played. If it had
not been for Ian's quick eyes to see you were missing—I doubt if wiser heads
than yours would have seen the trap. But, indeed, it is well that the Queen
should know. Thus, I can set a watch upon you—"

"And I will keep that watch," Beorn burst out, his
respect for Simon overwhelmed by his wrath. "And I will pray that another
attempt be made. You need not fear, my lady. The Queen will not be embarrassed
by it. There will be such small pieces remaining of the men that try that none
will know them."

"I am sure I will be safe," Alinor soothed her outraged
master-at-arms, then turned toward Ian. "So I have your quick eyes to
thank for my rescue," she said. "If I have a gift in my power that
would be to your liking, I wish you would name it."

Stricken mute, the young man shook his head. Simon watched his
squire's face, then lowered his eyes. He had not been mistaken. The only
question now remaining was whether it would do the boy more harm to keep him
where he would see Alinor or send him away where he could only dream of her. I
am better off than he, Simon thought wryly. At least, I am "hers, to
her!" He is nothing, a passing glance and smile, a gift of armor or a
horse. Thank God she did not offer me a reward.

If the Queen reprimanded those who might have had a hand in the
attempted abduction, Alinor saw no sign of it. Both Bigod and de Bohun
continued to pay her particular attention, and Alinor was very polite,
unnaturally so, anyone who knew her would have said—but very reserved. No one
attempted any physical persuasion, however, for two hard-faced men-at-arms
accompanied every step she took outside the women's quarters and Simon rode
close beside her as they traveled.

Alinor was glad of that. She rode a soft foot pace and Simon,
perforce, rode softly, too. Night and morning she dressed the three wounds he
had taken for her. The two small ones were nothing, scabbed over hard already;
the gash, however, was still ugly, with moist yellowish edges marking the puffy
red flesh where Alinor had stitched it together. There could be no scandal in
Alinor's attentions to Simon. The two men-at-arms were always present and, with
the entire court on the move, private chambers were only for the very greatest
even in the huge royal castles. Simon slept in the Great Halls with the other
lesser lords.

On the thirteenth of August, a hard-riding courier brought word
that Lord Richard had landed safely at Portsmouth and would be at Winchester on
the next day. The people had turned out to welcome him, the courier said, and
to bless his name. By riding throughout the country, freeing political
prisoners, relaxing the harsh hunting laws, giving justice—all in her son's
name—the Queen had made Richard, totally unknown in England, welcome to his
people. From the merchants and artisans and from the petty barons, there would
be no opposition. There would always be trouble from the great lords, but that
was unavoidable and must be dealt with case by case as the trouble arose.

When they rode out from Winchester the next morning, it was clear
that the courier had spoken the truth. The roads were lined with people from
every hamlet and village within many miles. Alinor did not marvel at how fast
the news had spread. She had seen word of her own progresses leap from mouth to
mouth across her estates faster than the swiftest horse could bring the news.
She merely rejoiced for the Queen that the faces were happy and cheers followed
them. Alinor had heard tales of times in which the crowd stood with faces like
stone and curses, sometimes even clods and offal, were cast at the gentry.

Among the Court the mood was not as wholeheartedly welcoming. It
was not that there was any opposition to Richard. His claim was clear and
unsullied by anything—except that he had hounded his father to death. It was
not that which made the court uneasy. Most had been glad to be rid of Henry,
even those whose honor made them faithful. The Court's mood was like the
weather that day. First the sun of hope shone brightly. Then from nowhere a
little wind of rumor brought clouds of doubt that emptied sprinkles of grief.
But before the sorrow of drowning in the downpour, a new breath of rumor swept
the clouds away to reveal the sunshine of hope again.

Alinor was by no means exempt from the general mood, and she had
more cause than most alternately to dread and hope for Richard's coming. Simon
had been grim and unsmiling when she came to him that morning, sitting or lying
as she directed, with thinned lips and eyes mostly closed as she removed the
soiled bandages, washed away the pus that had gathered overnight, and bound him
anew. He had never behaved that way before.

"Do you have pain, Simon?" she asked.

"No."

"You are ill?"

"No."

She leaned closer, first laying her hand on his forehead to feel
for fever and then touching his throat to feel the pulse. There was no fever,
but under her fingertips his pulse leapt madly.

"What is it?" she whispered.

Simon turned his face away and then back. "The Queen will do
for you what she can," he said, "but do not think to play your tricks
upon the King. Lord Richard is a courteous knight, but—"

"But King first? I understand that."

Simon shook his head and turned away from her. "He is not
fond of women," he brought out softly, but as if every word cost him pain.

All Alinor understood was that Simon was warning her against
flirting with the King. She was puzzled both by the warning and by Simon's
distress, but when she had pressed him for more information, he had turned away
completely, hissing through closed teeth. "Leave me be. Do you as the King
orders and all will be well." Alinor could only fear that Simon had been
told something the Queen had concealed from her.

Nonetheless, it was hard to remember the doubts and fears when
Lord Richard came into view. Alinor had found the

Court finely dressed, but Richard's cavalcade was as the sun is to
the moon, and the King himself was the most magnificent. His armor shone with
gilding; his surcoat was crimson embroidered in gold and set with precious stones;
even his horse's trappings were gilded and bejeweled. Yet the man himself
outshone all.

He swung from his horse when they were close enough with the grace
of a cat. Simon, dismounting a little more slowly, had barely set the Queen
upon her feet when Richard reached them. The King eagerly forestalled his
mother's curtsy and bent his knee to her instead to ask her blessing. Queen
Alinor's voice trembled when she gave it. It was the first time Alinor had ever
heard those clear tones shaken. She kissed Richard's hands when he placed them
in hers and when he stood kissed his cheeks and then his lips.

They spoke a little, a few murmurs too low for the crowd to hear.
Then Richard turned to the Queen's cortege, who were all kneeling, and gestured
for them to rise, smiling sweetly. Alinor's breath caught at his beauty. He was
as big as Simon or William Marshal, but somewhat more lithe and with a
marvelous grace in movement. His hair was red-gold, worn just a trifle longer
than the short crop now fashionable so that the edges curled under. The eyes
were brilliantly blue, as bright as a clear summer sky, and his skin was pale
and fair and unmarked by the ugly freckling so characteristic of the fair
Angevins.

He turned then and said a few words to Simon. Alinor was relieved
to see Simon laugh easily and reply and then kiss the King's hand with genuine
warmth when it was held out to him. His mood had been so peculiar that she had
feared—she knew not what, for Simon's public manners were always excellent.
Then the King moved forward into the mass of courtiers and churchmen, saying a
pleasant word here and there where he recognized a face or a coat of arms. He
spoke kindly to one or two ladies also, but not to Alinor who shrank back as a
modest maiden should. She even looked away a trifle. The less she was noticed
at this moment the better she would like it.

The turn of her head showed her a second man who had bent his knee
to the Queen. By chance he glanced up also, and their eyes met. Without reason,
Alinor recoiled. There was not personal threat in the glance, but she shrank
from a rapacity that would eat the world if it could. Later, because of her
reaction, she wondered whether she had really seen the Queen hesitate before
she lifted the young man to his feet and kissed him.

The caress was affectionate more than politic, and Alinor realized
that this was the youngest of the brood, Lord John, the favorite who had turned
against his father when he saw the old eagle was failing. He could not have
been more different from his brother. Richard had taken his father's coloring
and the height of his mother's kin. John had exactly the opposite heritage. He
was short and broad, like Henry, and dark of hair and eyes like his mother.

John had raised his voice to greet Simon, whom he knew very well,
and Alinor heard him speak. It was the most surprising thing yet—a beautiful
voice, rich and sweet and smooth. The greeting was both warm and courteous, and
Simon replied in kind, smiling. Only Alinor knew Simon now, not only the
expressions of his face and voice but the tales told by the stance of his body.
She had felt relief when Simon responded to Lord Richard; she felt apprehension
anew now. Simon's voice was smooth, his face was pleasant, but his body was
poised, the shoulders tensed as if he were ready to ward off or launch a blow.

That, of course, was impossible. It was only Simon's un- conscious
response to his dislike and distrust of Lord John, and it communicated itself
to Alinor to reinforce the shock John's glance had given her. Nonetheless, she
found her eyes drawn back to the Queen's youngest son. There was a deadly
fascination about him, a kind of black charm that in the end might draw one as
a willing sacrifice into that rapacious grasp.

A new fear, bred by the Queen's slight hesitation in greeting this
youngest of her fledglings and Simon's peculiar behavior, seized upon Alinor.
Ordinarily she would never have thought of herself in connection with John. Her
estates were rich, but not a dowry for the son of a King and the heir to
England's throne. Isobel of Gloucester certainly seemed sure enough of her
marriage to John to have been given word of approval directly by the Queen. Yet
if the Queen and Lord Richard did not trust John, they might not wish to yield
into his hands the power Isobel's lands would give him.

Alinor could not really believe the Queen could be so stupid as to
give someone she did not trust half the loaf he expected, particularly not half
a loaf such as her own, which commanded miles of the invadable coast. For those
you did not trust there were only two paths. They must be destroyed or so
stuffed that, for fear of losing what they had, they would be faithful. If John
had not been flesh of their flesh, there might be some sense in starving his
expectations. To give him Alinor instead of Isobel could be an attempt to draw
him into open rebellion. In fact, Alinor could have credited that motive
anyway—the Angevins were more prone to hunt their kin down than to cherish
them—except that Lord Richard's desire to leave on Crusade as soon as possible
was an established fact. One does not incite rebellion and then go on Crusade,
leaving it to brew.

Still, Alinor felt herself sufficiently threatened by things she
did not understand fully to make her hurry to the Queen's quarters soon after
the cavalcade had returned to Winchester and the formal ceremonies of fealty
and greeting were over. There she made herself very busy—but very small and
quiet—in the niche that was her writing place in the chamber the Queen gave
over to business. It seemed to her that sons and mother must have private
matters to discuss and that the logical place to go would be to the Queen's
apartments. Perhaps strict formality would have decreed the King's, but the
Queen was old and also, it seemed to Alinor, the sons were still in awe of
their mother.

Forethought was soon rewarded. There were footsteps and then the
light, pleasant voice that Alinor already recognized as the King's said
solicitously, "But you must be tired, Madam. Leave these matters for now
and rest."

"Tired," the Queen replied sharply, "what has that
to say to anything. I am not tired, as it happens, but if I were nigh to
fainting with weariness it would be no excuse to neglect making—" Her
voice checked and began again more questioning and less decisive. "To
neglect discovering what your decision is."