Shadows and Strongholds (40 page)

The sun was striking noontide as Brunin rode into Whittington on a lathered, blowing Jester. He was too cold to feel its warmth on his spine, too preoccupied to notice the green of the trees or the watery glint of the marsh surrounding the keep. The attendant took Jester's bridle and led the horse away to the stables. Splashed with mud from his hard ride, hair windblown, Brunin strode towards the keep. Joscelin's sword banged at his side and he clutched the scabbard to hold it steady. Servants and soldiers watched his progress, but he didn't see them, for his mind was on a single goal.

Avoiding the great hall, he mounted the outer stairs to the private quarters and, setting his hand to the lion's head ring, heaved open the door.

His mother's women stared at him with open mouths and shock-widened eyes. A small child, black of hair and eye like himself, let out a wail and was picked up by Heulwen, the Welsh nurse. Her hands patted; her voice soothed. '
Tawelwch nawr, tawelwch nawr, cariad bychan
.'

Her voice resounded inside Brunin's head, which felt like a cavern that was alternately echoing with nothing and overstuffed with wet fleece. He hesitated on the threshold, forcing himself to take measured breaths instead of gasping as if he had run all the way from Ludlow on his own legs. The women were not weeping and, until he had burst into the room, had been going about their daily tasks; therefore his father yet lived and was not about to expire on the moment. Lit prayer candles stood in all the niches though. Clenching his fists he went to the second door, which partitioned the bedchamber from the day room, and pushed it open.

The sweet, fetid stench of sweat and sickness made him reel and take an involuntary backstep. For
a
moment he almost continued retreating, but, with a determined effort, he controlled himself and, breathing shallowly through his nose, approached the bed.

His father was propped upright and supported by numerous cushions and bolsters. His unlaced shirt exposed a glistening mixture of herbs and grease, which had been spread across his chest to ease his breathing. Brunin was shocked at the sunken cheekbones, the hollow eyes with lids like scraps of shrivelled leather, the fever-blistered lips. Sweat beaded his father's scalp, glistening through the receding hazel-brown hair. Seated either side of him like mourners at a tomb were Mellette and Eve. The family chaplain was present too, and Brunin's brothers. A deathbed.

Brunin dug his short fingernails into his palms and joined the tableau. 'Is he… ?'

Mellette glared at him. Her eyes were red-rimmed and inflamed, but without tears. 'You took your sweet time.' Her voice was a haggard croak. 'Fortunately he still lives.'

It was an unfair accusation, for Brunin could not have arrived any quicker unless he had wings, but he did not argue, merely flicked her a look.

His mother's eyes were brimming. She moved to one side, making room for him at the head of the bed.

Brunin leaned over his father. The heat emanating from him was like a brazier and the smell of the herbs so pungent that it was almost visible. His father's breath bubbled in his chest and emerged through his open mouth in a hoarse crackle.

'Father… sir?' Brunin leaned over and gently touched his shoulder. 'It is Brunin. I have come from Ludlow.'

There was no response, save perhaps a quickening of the chest and the rattle of deeper-drawn air.

He wont hear you,' Mellette said. 'And even if by some miracle he does, you won't get any sense out of him. The fever's put him out of his wits.'

'What hope is there?'

'The hope of prayer, my son,' said the chaplain.

'Hah! It hasn't done much good so far,' Mellette snapped. 'My son at death's door, his wife carrying badly, a murrain among the sheep, the Welsh all over the border like rats in a granary, and no one to put a stop to it.' Her gaze flashed to Brunin, sharp as broken glass.

The chaplain looked uncomfortable. Brunin tried again. 'My lord father, there has been a battle at Ludlow. Lord Joscelin has taken Gilbert de Lacy prisoner and demanded a ransom of his family'

FitzWarin moved his head and groaned softly. His eyelids strained as if trying to ungum one edge from the other.

'I have been knighted on the field of battle,' Brunin added, addressing his words to his father, but intending them for Mellette, who was eyeing him narrowly. 'I will tell you more later, but, in the meantime, I promise to hold our lands together while you recover.'

'Even if you have been knighted, that does not grant you manhood,' Mellette said with a jaundiced look at the scabbard hanging by his left hip.

Eve spoke up from the other side of the bed. 'It has to be enough. What other choice do we have? And do not say Ralf. He is younger than Brunin and less experienced… nor has he had the benefit of Brunin's training.'

'Be careful with your assumptions,' Mellette snapped. 'You know naught of my mind.'

'More than you think, madam,' Eve replied, trembling with the effort of holding her ground and answering back.

'Must I die to the sound of bickering too?' FitzWarin's voice was a rusty wheeze, pursued by a bout of severe coughing. Eve hastily set a wine cup to his lips.

'Drink, my lord,' she said in a panicky voice.

He shoved her hand aside, and the wine spilled down the front of her dress in a bloody stain. For a moment he struggled to breathe through the phlegm clogging his lungs; finally he won through.

'How can I drink, woman, when I can't even breathe?' he gasped, and slumped back against the bolsters. But his purple colour slowly eased to red and his gaze wandered with an effort to Brunin. 'I cannot separate dream from truth,' he said hoarsely. 'Did you say there was a battle at Ludlow?'

'Yes, sir.' Brunin told his father what had happened, but sparsely, putting no meat on the bones. 'And then your messenger arrived.'

FitzWarin winced. 'Blame the women for that. I am not yet at death's door. And Joscelin has given you your knighthood.'

'Yes, sir.'

'Then you must have aquitted yourself well.' He licked his swollen lips and gestured to his wife, demanding the wine that moments ago he had flung aside. Eve refilled the cup from the flagon and tilted the rim towards her husband's lips. He took several swallows and suffered Eve to dab away the trickle that ran from the side of his mouth. 'Joscelin would not give such an accolade lightly.' He reached to take Brunin's hand. 'I put Whittington in your care until I am better.'

'Yes, sir.' Brunin felt the heat of his father's blood pulse against his own flesh, swift as a river in spate, and knew that now he himself must either sink or swim.

'I'm glad you're home,' Richard said, as Brunin entered the old bedchamber dial he had once shared with his brothers.

'You are?' Brunin looked warily at his second brother. Two servants had assembled a rope bed and were busy stuffing a mattress with clean straw. Brunin slung his baggage roll down at the side of it and wondered when he was going to find time to sleep. 'I suppose absence has made the heart grow fonder then.'

Richard shrugged. 'Ralf thinks that all he has to do is shout to make people obey and respect him.'

Brunin gave a sour grin. 'He hasn't changed much then. Where is he?'

'Gone to Oswestry' Richard rubbed the back of his neck and looked uncomfortable. 'He's got a girl there.'

Brunin arched one eyebrow. 'He's gone to see a girl when our father is so sick that he has a priest at his bedside?'

'He says he's gone to gather news. The Welsh raids have been growing more bold and there's talk of the King going to war against them.'

Brunin wandered the length of the room, looking at the embroidered hangings. Since his last visit, his mother had completed a scene of summertime and added a border of stylised wild strawberries. He paused by his youngest brother's bed. William had been an infant when Brunin had gone for training to Joscelin. Now he was eleven years old and the practice sword and shield on his rumpled coverlet were badges of approaching manhood. Brunin picked up the sword and swung it, rotating the hilt at speed, swishing the air. He had watched soldiers perform such tricks when he himself was a boy, and been awed. He smiled ruefully at the memory.

Richard watched him. 'Is it true that Lord Joscelin made you a knight?'

Brunin sighed and cast the wooden sword back on to Thomas's bed. 'Yes, it's true,' he said, 'but not in a moment. It took nine years, and I'm still not sure that he was right.'

Ralf arrived as dusk was falling. The distance between Whittington and Oswestry meant that he had had time to sober up a little and was able to dismount unaided from his horse—which had not been the case when struggling into the saddle outside the alehouse. He knew that he should have remained at home, but he had been unable to bear the stench of sickness and the oppressive atmosphere. His mother hunched like an old woman, but clutching a belly ripe with yet another child, her eyes full of haunted despair. His grandmother purse-lipped and angry. Everyone looking to him to make it right. It was what he had always claimed to want; he had ever muttered that the FitzWarin barony was his lost birthright. But for the inconvenience of his milksop older brother, he would have been the heir. Now that the prospect was imminent, however, he was terrified, and since he dared not admit that terror, even to himself, he had run away to the alehouse and the arms of wool merchant's daughter Sian ferch Madoc. She didn't care who he was. She was small and well endowed, maternal and welcoming. He wanted to make her his mistress, but he knew his grandmother would not countenance her presence at Whittington. The only way he could see her was to ride to Oswestry.

'Your brother is here, sir,' said the groom as he took Ralf's horse.

'Which one?' Ralf took a lurching backstep, then managed to steady himself.

'Master Brunin.'

Bitterness and relief flooded his throat. The scapegoat had arrived. There was no longer any need to worry who would take the blame.

'And my father?'

'Word is that there is no change, sir.'

'See to the horse.' Ralf wove unsteadily towards the hall. Before he entered, he doubled up against the limewashed wall, and heaved up the last quart of ale he had drunk. Wiping his sleeve across his mouth, his nose and eyes streaming, he lurched towards the door, but before he could make an entrance, his elbow was seized and he was pushed down on to the stone bench by the door.

'Our grandmother will crucify you if she sees you in that state,' Brunin hissed.

Ralf squinted up at him. In the soft spring gloaming, Brunin's eyes and pupils had merged into one dark circle-like a hunting cat's. He was wearing a dust-stained tunic; there was a sword at his hip with a plain grip and hilt, and spurs glinted at his heels. He looked seasoned and dangerous.

'Why should you care? Thought you'd be glad to see her nail me up.'

Brunin smiled sourly. 'I would not be glad to see her do that to any of us. Besides, with our father so ill, we need all to be of one mind, not squabbling and divided.'

Ralf sleeved his face and stared up at his brother. Something had changed, but his brain was too fuddled to decide what.

Brunin sat down on the bench beside him and threw back his head. 'You have never liked me, and in truth I have responded in kind,' he said with closed eyes. 'But if we don't mend our differences now, we never will.'

Ralf snorted as if with contempt, but he could think of nothing contemptuous to say. He wanted to grasp the olive branch being held out, but he did not know how to without seeming weak. The fact that he had ridden in drunk, and discovered Brunin on the territory that had long been their battleground, had set him at a further disadvantage. 'Where did you get that sword?' he demanded with a gesture.

Brunin used his left hand to draw the blade straight up and out of the scabbard. 'It is Lord Joscelin's old one. He said to take it for protection on the road.' He handed it across.

Ralf set his fingers around the tightly bound buckskin grip and tested the heft. He held the hilt flat on his palm and checked the balance, then thumbed an edge that was as bright and thin as a sliver of new moon. A little over-sharpened with wear perhaps, but still a good weapon. 'If it is his old one,' he said, enunciating the words carefully, 'then he must have fought with it when he was a mercenary'

Brunin's eyes opened and narrowed. 'Yes. What of it?'

'Nothing… It must have carried him through many trials.'

'You once said that you would rather be trained at the hands of an earl than at those of a common mercenary'

'Much good it did me.' Ralf handed the sword back to his brother. 'I didn't envy you when Joscelin de Dinan took you to train, but you had the last laugh, didn't you?'

'I'm not laughing,' Brunin said quietly. His eyes glittered in the darkness as he looked at Ralf. 'What news did you gain in Oswestry… assuming you did more than go there just to put distance between Whittington and yourself and avail yourself of some female comfort.'

'Hah, you're well informed,' Ralf said sourly. 'Enough to know nothing.'

'Then tell me.'

Ralf's stomach rolled queasily and he thought he might be sick again. 'King Henry's going to war against the Welsh,' he said. 'The news is all over the town like the stink of blood on a slaughter day. There's a summons to muster in Northampton at midsummer.'

Brunin's glance sharpened. 'You are sure?'

'I'm drunk, not deal,' Ralf said belligerently. The messenger'll be here by the morrow and you'll hear for yourself. Henry's set to rein in Owain Gwynedd before any more of our territory goes down his throat.'

Brunin swore under his breath and mentally added another helping to his trencher. Frowning, he began to count on his fingers. 'We owe the service of at least six knights,' he said, 'or the value of such, and God knows how much silver's in the coffers. I'll check on the morrow and have the scribe draft letters to our vassals.'

Ralf wiped his hand beneath his nose and sniffed loudly. 'Sian says she does not know if her father will stay in Oswestry or retreat over the border. The rumour is that Iorwerth Goch and the heirs of Rhys Sais are gathering followers to join Owain Gwynedd's troop.'