To Defy a King (32 page)

Longespee turned dead eyes upon Hugh. 'There is nothing I can do. He will not be moved. The die is cast. He says this is a lesson to Llewelyn and all men who would plot against him.'

De Cigogne looked round at Hugh. 'There are traitors in our midst, my lord Bigod, and the King is in a mood to deal with all who would defy his will.

Unless you are so minded to join these wretches, have a care.'

'You will imperil your souls for this!' Hugh choked.

'They are hostages for the word of their lords, a word that has been broken and defiled,' Marc replied evenly. 'The King is within his rights, and they are not going to their Maker unshriven.'

Hugh's stomach was a void. The last thing on earth he wanted to do was watch, yet he had to, because he had to bear witness for their sake, because he could not turn his back on these boys. Dear God, dear God. What if this were his own son going to his death thus? One moment at play, the next choking on the end of a rope because of the power games of grown men.

Hugh's chest tightened and his eyes blurred and stung, but he forced himself to keep looking as the youths were dragged to the crenel gaps and hurled over like sacks of flour. A few would be fortunate; their necks would snap and they would die instantly, but others would jerk and dangle there, inexorably suffocating as the sun climbed in the sky.

Rhodri was in the second group. Hugh started forward, not sure what he intended to do, but something . . . anything rather than let this happen. De Cigogne shot out a hauberk-clad arm and seized him. Another mercenary assisted and their grip was sure, powerful, and deliberately harsh. They seldom got to lay hands on the son of an earl with impunity, although de Cigogne had enjoyed himself on a few occasions with the older Marshal lad.

De Cigogne and his companion held Hugh fast and there was nothing he could do as each youngster was hurled over the wall. He did not see the jerk and recoil as the ropes ran taut, nor the bodies kicking, struggling and dying against the pale amber stones, but he could picture it. In the silence after the last child had been flung to his death, the mercenaries released Hugh and he wrenched away from them and, stooping over, vomited into the grass, not caring who thought him weak and soft.

Longespee said nothing, but turned and walked away towards the upper bailey, his jaw clamped and his movements stiff as if he had a rigid spear thrust down the back of his surcoat.

'Dear Christ.' Ralph crossed himself. He looked towards his retreating lord and half-brother, and then at Hugh.

'Do not speak of Christ,' Hugh croaked as he stood up, wiping his mouth.

'He wasn't here today. This isn't His work.' He shuddered and tried to pull himself together, for the sake of his whey-faced brother and because his troops needed leadership, but inside, he felt like a frightened, bewildered child himself. He swallowed another retch. 'We should ask His mercy for those Welsh lads . . . and for ourselves, because this deed damns us all.'

At Framlingham, Mahelt was sorting out the undercroft and enjoying herself. The organisation brought clarity and efficiency to household processes that depended on orderly and well-stocked supplies. As a descendant of royal marshals, provisioning and organising were in her blood

- and decidedly preferable to sewing! She had discovered an old barrel of meat crawling with maggots and had given some to the castle youths to go fishing in the mere; she had told them to throw the remainder on the dung pile for the poultry to peck at. The extra nourishment would fatten the hens and help with the laying too.

They were running short of honey and wax which would have to be ordered in from Ipswich, and they needed some new barrels for holding the brined meat once pig-killing began in November. She would have to tell their steward to have a word with the cooper in Thetford. Her son ran a stick along a row of barrels, counting them as he skipped. 'One, two, fee, six . . .'

'Four,' Mahelt laughed. 'It's four after three.' She picked up a costrel, unstoppered it, sniffed at the contents and then took a sip. Mead, sweet, strong and tasting of summer, flowed over her tongue. Outside she heard horses clopping into the courtyard and made a mental note that her father-in-law had returned from his daily inspection of the demesne.

'One, two, fee, four, six, tenty!' Roger declared triumphantly, whacking his stick against the last barrel in the row. He spun in circles until he was dizzy and then plopped down on the floor. Mahelt returned the mead to the shelf before a sip became two and then three.

'Dad-dad!' Roger squealed. Mahelt whirled and saw Hugh standing just inside the doorway. His clothes were dusty and travel-stained and his hat was pulled low, concealing his eyes in a manner so reminiscent of his father that she shivered. Little Roger dashed to him and Hugh swept him into his arms and buried his face against the child's neck.

Mahelt stared at her husband in surprise as she tugged her apron out of the belt of her gown. She had not thought to see him home until the end of October at the earliest. 'What's happened?' she asked, because it was obvious something was wrong.

Hugh shook his head. 'I rode ahead of the troop,' he said hoarsely. 'They'll be here soon enough.'

'Dad-dad, Dad-dad, I can count to ten! One, two, fee . . .'

As Roger chattered in his arms, Hugh looked up and across at Mahelt and she was appalled to see that his throat was jerking and that he was fighting back tears. Hastily she took the child out of Hugh's arms and handed him to a passing maid. 'Take him to the Countess and tell her that my lord is home,'

she said. 'Then tell Simon to prepare food and drink and bring it to my lord's chamber.'

When the woman had gone on her errand struggling with a screaming Roger, who wanted to stay with his parents, Mahelt took her husband's arm. 'Tell me!' she said firmly, doing her best to cover her fear.

Hugh made an inarticulate sound. Curling his arm around her waist, he drew her inside the musty, lantern-lit undercroft and shuddered against her. She could feel that he was indeed sobbing and her fear increased. She soothed him, one hand around his neck, stroking the hair at his nape, the other grasped in his at his breast. 'Hugh, what is it?'

He continued to quiver in her embrace. It was safe in here and dark and he could vent the emotion he had been holding inside ever since Nottingham Castle. 'I don't think I can tell you,' he said hoarsely.

'I am strong enough to bear whatever it is. It's the not knowing that will undo me. Why are you not in Wales?'

Releasing her, he wiped his eyes on his sleeve. Mahelt went to shut the undercroft door, then she sat him on a barrel and handed him the costrel of mead. 'Drink,' she said. Her tone was curt because she was angry now as well as concerned. Hugh's face wore an expression she had never seen before, as if something fundamental had been broken, and she was ready to do battle with whatever had caused it.

Hugh took a swallow, lowered the costrel and looked at her. 'There was a plot uncovered against the King at Nottingham . . . a plot to murder him and the Queen and his children.'

'What?'

'It's true. The King of Scots sent him a warning, and one came from Wales too - from his daughter - but by then it was too late and it wouldn't have changed the outcome anyway. He was set on making an example.'

'What do you mean it came too late?' Mahelt stared at him, her spine tingling. Was John dead? Her thoughts flew to her oldest brother and she wondered if he had been involved or captured. She felt queasy, but told herself Hugh wouldn't be crying over Will's arrest. He would be expecting her to cry instead. Nor would he be distraught over a plot to kill the King.

From the secretive way the men had been acting on their last day at home, she suspected he had known something even before he set out. Her father-in-law had been on edge since they'd been gone too, limping out of his chamber to intercept every messenger who rode in.

'Since we could not ride into Wales as the King intended and since Wales had been planned as the place to kill him, the King hanged the hostages Prince Llewelyn gave to him last year.' His eyes were wide with remembered horror. 'All twenty-eight of them. Threw them off the ramparts one at a time while those waiting the same fate watched it happen, and John's mercenaries counted them over the edge like our son counts his numbers. Some of them . . . some of them were little boys who should still have been at their mother's skirts. One was called Rhodri; I don't know who his father was, except Llewelyn's vassal.

I was in the midst of playing camp ball with him and the others when John's mercenaries came to take them. One minute he was chasing me for the ball, the next he was throttling on a rope. Philip Marc said we should rejoice, that it was one less nit to grow into a louse, but I say we are damned for this.'

Mahelt dropped to her knees before him and took her hands in his. 'No, Hugh, not you,' she said fiercely. 'Dear God.'

'Do not talk to me of God; I have been supping with the Devil.' His mouth contorted. 'I thought I had a long enough spoon, but I was wrong. There is not a spoon long enough in this land.' He looked down at her hands, folded over his. 'But I have no choice, because if I do not sup, I shall be eaten and my family will be eaten too, or starved or . . . or hanged. I am ashamed that I did nothing, but there was nothing I could do, and in truth, the King was within his rights. In law, it could be well argued that it was a just move - but it was not merciful and it was not moral . . .'

Mahelt gazed at him, feeling numb. She wanted to give him words of wisdom and restore everything to its rightful place, but her mind's eye filled with the image of corpses swinging from a castle wall, each one of them a member of her family, and the closest one to her was her child, struggling to count his numbers as his throat mottled and turned blue around the rope cutting into his neck, and her own throat was so tight she could not speak.

'Two of the plotters were discovered,' Hugh added hoarsely. 'Eustace de Vesci and Robert FitzWalter. They fled before they could be arrested but the King has ridden north with his hell-hound mercenaries and is replacing the castellans and sheriffs he suspects of conspiring to murder him.'

Mahelt bit her lip. 'What of Will?'

Hugh disengaged from her and rose to his feet. 'He is close to de Lacey and FitzRobert and both are suspects.' He gave her a warning look. 'If Will is involved, I hope to God he has had the wisdom to cover his tracks.'

She whitened. 'I have heard nothing, I swear it.'

He nodded stiffly. 'We must be careful. The King suspects everyone, and the mercenaries and sycophants with whom he surrounds himself will do whatever he bids because he pays their wages and gives them their power.'

There was a sudden loud thump on the door and both of them leaped with tension. 'Dad-dad, Dad-dad, come out!' little Roger bellowed. They heard his nurse trying to shush him and his indignant yell of refusal, followed by another thud.

Mahelt started forward, but Hugh pre-empted her. 'It's all right.' He put her gently to one side and going to the door, opened it on his furious, red-faced son, who was trying to fight off the nurse. Hugh held up his hand to her, then he stooped and swung Roger into his arms. He was a solid, warm weight for his years, but light too. Sturdy as oak, fragile as gossamer, and buzzing like an angry little wasp. Alive. Hugh had never seen anything more alive in his life. 'I'm here,' he said. 'I'll always be here.' And wiped the tears of fury from his son's cheeks, and then those of raw heartache and guilt from his own with the same hand.

'What happens now?' Mahelt asked.

He kissed Roger's salty cheek. 'We draw breath and count to ten.'

'One, two, fee . . .' said Roger, laboriously holding up one finger at a time.

'Four, fi . . .' He bounced in his father's arms.

Hugh took him out into the yard to watch the rest of his troop riding in.

'And after that?'

'Then we find a way through,' he said wearily, 'because for all our sakes, we must.'

26

Framlingham, November 1212

Mahelt was on tenterhooks for several weeks waiting to see if anything happened to Will, but nothing was said and for once she preferred not to know. No news was like throwing a blanket over an untidy corner. It didn't clear the problem but it made matters look better on the surface. The King had spent more than a thousand pounds fortifying his castles in the North; various castellans had been replaced and others had been forced to yield hostages - and after what had happened at Nottingham Castle, no one was in any doubt as to the consequences of rebellion.

At Martinmas in the second week of November it was time to slaughter the hogs that had been fattening on beech and acorn mast in the park. The males, saving the stud boar and his deputy, were destined to become bacon, salt pork, sausages, hams, brawn, blood puddings and lard to feed the household through the dark days of winter, while the sows were kept for breeding. The swine were herded into the lower bailey and one by one slaughtered with an axe blow between the eyes and a knife smartly stuck into the jugular, one person to do the sticking, another to catch the blood in big shallow bowls.

Then the dead hogs were scalded to remove the bristles before being hoisted up on ropes and eviscerated.

The yard and the slaughter sheds were a hive of bloody industry and Mahelt was engaged in the thick of things, an apron at her waist and her hair bundled in a linen kerchief. Organising such toil and taking part in it was to her taste because the rewards came far more swiftly than with something like sewing, where a project might take weeks of work to accomplish.

Tonight in the hall there would be roast pork crowned with crisp golden fat and accompanied by sour baked apples and sharp sauces to cut through the richness of the meat, and plenty of bread to mop up the gravy. Amid a communal spirit of feasting there would be songs, poetry and merriment, including a performance by one of the Earl's serjeants, Roland le Pettour, a jester who held his land for the service of tumbling, juggling and performing musical tunes from his anus when the occasion demanded.