The King's Witch (39 page)

He nodded, pleased; but he knew why, and it was not for his sake. He said, “ I am going to Jaffa again, once they’re seen off. You come with me.”

“Thank you, my lord.” She lowered her eyes. She put her hand on his wrist; he thought she was listening, as if her fingertips had ears. He shut his eyes. Maybe then he would hear what she heard, his body talking, wiser probably than his mind.

The sun was just rising, the air pink and warm already, the ships rocking at their anchors on the bay. Richard led Johanna down the quay, her hand on his arm. The galley captain himself waited for them above the small boat.

Johanna turned to him, resolute. She wore a traveling cloak of green, her best color, her skin warm against it, her eyes like sea jewels. She said, “Richard, you must take care. Come quickly.”

“I will.” He held her hand. In spite of her meddling, he was sorry she would be gone; he would be much alone, with her away and Rouquin in a temper. He said, “ I will come soon after.”

“ I hope so.” She kissed him. Her eyes were damp. But she looked away, over his shoulder, not meeting his gaze. “Richard—I—I—did wrong, I think. I made a mistake. Something awful. Forgive me. I hope it comes to nothing.”

He held her hands.“ Whatever it is, it doesn’t matter. Tell Mother about it when you see her; she’s got all the advice.”

She hugged him.“ I will. Please come soon.” She turned and went down into the little boat.

He turned to Berengaria. “ Take care, little wife.”

“My lord, I will.”

Then she too was gone, rowing toward the galley standing in the bay. In a few months they would reach Poitiers. The rising sun beat on his back. It would be hot here, in this strange place, where somehow he could not find a way to win. He turned and went back to the citadel.

From the top floor, he watched the galleys stroke out to sea, and he crossed himself. God who hated him, please watch over his sister.

Now he had other problems.

As he had anticipated, nobody wanted Guy to be King. Without Richard there for his champion, Guy would have nothing. He might as well admit that. He called a council, which sat for one day and named Conrad the King, his heirs by Queen Isabella to follow him to the throne.

Throne of a few cities, a kingdom with a false name. Even so, it gave a man like Conrad room to strut.

“ I told you the Crusade was dead. You see, in the end, who comes out best.” The Italian thrust his chest out, pranced and preened around him in his curly-toed shoes, his diamond-crusted ears, his greased hair. “You have to work with the real matter, see, not dreams.” He shot a look at Humphrey, across the room. “Of course, for some people, that’s hard.” He laughed as if he had made a joke and went away. Across the room, Richard caught Humphrey’s glance, and held it; now that the Crusade was over, he had no reason anymore to be chaste. He smiled, and Humphrey, his eyes bright, flushed and smiled back.

He would give Guy Cyprus. A bigger, better kingdom than Conrad’s. Let the greasy schemer strut then.

But only a few days later, before he could deliver this thrust, a courier from Tyre said, “My lord, the King is dead.”

“King Conrad,” Richard said. “What happened?” He had met the courier rushing up the courtyard steps as he was coming down from the hall. Behind him on the staircase, de Sablé and Guy de Lusignan overheard this and began to chatter, and Richard waved a hand at them impatiently to shut up.

“My lord,” the courier said, “it was the Assassins. Two of them came upon him in the street in Tyre; one gave him a letter, and while he was reading it they both stuck knives in him.”

“Assassins,” he said. “ Who sent the letter? Did they take the killers alive?”

“My lord,” the courier said, and sank down on his knees on the step below Richard, his hands together. “One was taken. They put him to the test.”

In the fear of the messenger, Richard saw what news was coming ; he glanced over his shoulder at the other men, on the stair above him: de Sablé, who was as always thinking about something else, and Guy frowning in bewilderment. Richard faced the courier praying to him. “ What did they find out?”

“He said it was you, my lord. He said you paid the knives.” The courier was white as bone.

Richard stood a moment, not surprised, not even, really, angry. He said, at last, “ Pity I didn’t think of it.” He beckoned to a page. “Give this man a bezant.” He went on down the stairs.

In the pulpits of Tyre, of Acre, of the fat little towns that throve because of him, the priests cried shame on him, murderer, oath breaker, the man who turned back from Jerusalem and then killed the King. Whenever he rode out in Acre, people gathered to jeer and curse at him. He remembered what Johanna had said when she left.

His beard itched and he wanted it off. He sat on the balcony, where there was good light, so the ham-handed barber would not slice his face to pieces. The razor scraped against his throat. Down the way, his pages loitered, a few other men, waiting to catch his notice. Through them came the doctor, slender as a palm tree, wearing a dark gown and a plain white coif, bowing before him.

“You sent for me, my lord,” she said.

“Yes, come here.” Richard waved the barber out of earshot. She came to the side of the throne and he studied her, up and down; when he wanted to be bled, she did it, not the barber, and he began to think he would have her shave him, too. He said, “You have heard all this about King Conrad.”

She said, “I have heard only street gossip, my lord.”

“Yes, now that my sister’s gone, the brew here must be thin as whey. Did she do it?”

Edythe twitched all over. Her eyes went elsewhere and her voice grated. At her temple a dark curl escaped the edge of her coif. “Conrad was not her enemy.”

“Could she have done it for his wife’s sake?”

“His wife’s sake,” she said, in a true voice, and looked at him. He saw that the words had quickened some connection. She gathered in a deep breath. When she spoke he had the feeling she was changing the subject, although it was the same wife. “She and Isabella wrote, but he caught them at it. She was trying to help her escape. You know that. That led to what happened last winter here, eventually.”

“The Assassins killed him. How could she have reached them? How likely was she even to know they exist? Do you know who they are?”

“No, my lord. Only—” She shrugged. “They kill people.”

“They kill people for hire. Unlike righteous folk who kill them for God.” His eyes narrowed. “Why Conrad, though? She had enemies—which did she want dead?”

She said, “No one, my lord, no one, she would not have done this.”

“You told Rouquin already. You women, you keep and break faith at the same time. It was de Sablé. Who is still alive.”

“Oh, God, my Lord, she would never have—killed him. My lord, I pray you, you must know her better.” Defending Johanna, she was urgent, swift-spoken.

“No. But de Sablé was devilling her. I know my sister. She cannot keep her fork out of the pot, and so she is ever being burned. She got help to discourage him. Or at least she thought that was what she was doing. But whoever helped her turned her purpose to his own ends. Which was to kill King Conrad.” For his wife’s sake.

“ I don’t know.” She rubbed her hands together. “ It was not my lady Johanna, ever.”

He rubbed his finger over his clean-shaven chin. The barber had left a rasp of stubble under his jawbone. He said, at last, “I know.” He nodded at her. “Go get ready to sail for Jaffa. We should be able to leave tomorrow.”

She dipped him a curtsy. “My lord.”

He sent a page for Humphrey and met him in his small room at the end of the hall. The young man came in smiling. He was beautiful, his face smooth, young, happy; he would be a boy when he was fifty.

Richard sat down and did not tell him to sit. He said no greeting. His voice was stony. “You betrayed me. You used my sister in your plot against Conrad; you made my sister guilty in his murder. Everybody thinks it was me; I don’t care about that, they all hate me anyway. But I love my sister, and you corrupted her. She trusted you because I trusted you. Go; I never want to see you again.”

As he spoke, Humphrey’s face slid down out of its smile, and the creases along his nose grew deeper. He was suddenly not beautiful anymore. He turned and went out the door. Richard sat there awhile, until he knew Humphrey was gone, and no one else saw him, and put his hands over his face.

He remembered how he had set out on this, the glorious words, the high promises, round oaths taken with the fullest confidence. What had been golden once seemed like tin and paper now. Under a fraudulent banner he had led his people into the desert, and the wind had blown them away. He lowered his hands, empty as an old wineskin, wretched.

They sailed back to Jaffa, and that night Edythe went into the hall, where the court was gathered around to hear music. Rouquin was not there. She slipped back out onto the windy terrace, looking toward the sea. A storm was blowing in, and out as far as her gaze could reach the waves jumped in dashes of foam, vivid in the dark. She went down the stairs into the courtyard. It was empty; she could hear the men talking in the hall above her. Then, by the wall, someone hissed at her.