A Place Beyond Courage (27 page)
Robert of Gloucester stared at John with eyes full of admiration and mirth. ‘God’s blood, I don’t believe you’ve got FitzHubert in your gaol!’
They were sitting in John’s chamber at Marlborough. This time the stairwell was empty of guards. Gloucester held his green glass cup with the appreciation of a courtier and a man of tasteful sensibilities. Although the son of a king, his braies were of plain but superb quality linen and he didn’t sit in such a way as to expose his crotch to the view of all and sundry.
John gave a casual shrug. ‘Believe it, my lord. He played me for a fool and whatever else I may be, I am not one, nor do I suffer them gladly, especially when they come intending me harm. Nor, with the greatest respect to your sons, am I twenty and wet behind the ears.’
Gloucester gave a wry laugh. ‘Indeed not. I would caution any man to trifle with you. What are you going to do with FitzHubert now?’
John pretended to ponder the question, although he had already made up his mind. ‘I have heard he was wont to smear his victims with honey and leave them out in the sun to be attacked by every stinging insect on God’s earth,’ he said. ‘I thought about doing the same to him, but while it would be amusing for a while, it wouldn’t be of lasting benefit.’ He gave Robert a considering look. ‘Perhaps you would like to buy him from me, being as he was in your pay when he turned traitor.’
Robert choked on his wine. ‘Buy him from you!’ he coughed.
John smiled. ‘If you want my strength in the Kennet valley, I need to be able to pay my troops and provide them with good horses and equipment.’ He studied his cup. ‘I can hand him back to his own men at Devizes for a fee or give him into the custody of William D’Ypres, since they’re kin. Or you could have him from me for five hundred marks.’
‘What?’ Robert gasped, his throat still in semi-paroxysm. ‘Five hund—You jest!’
John kept his own gaze steady. ‘I don’t think it too high a sum for what he has done to you. If you buy him from me, you can do as you please with him.’
Robert glared at John, but then he began to chuckle. ‘You’re a wily one, John FitzGilbert, you know that, don’t you? Very well. For five hundred marks, I will have him from you, but I expect good value in return.’
‘And you will receive it, my lord. I do what I must to survive - as do we all.’ John inclined his head, restraining the urge to laugh and fist the air at how well everything had worked out. Five hundred marks was an appreciable sum and once FitzHubert was in Gloucester’s custody, John was certain the mercenary would never trouble him again . . . and Devizes was now open to be taken on the Empress’s behalf.
20
Bristol, February 1141
To a commanding royal fanfare, the Empress entered the great hall of Bristol Castle. She was clad in a crimson gown, the panels and gores embossed with twists of spiral silk thread in the same shade of red. As usual, a gem-set coronet adorned her brow - the least she would consider to wear when holding an audience.
With everyone else, John flourished a bow, knowing how much store she set by obeisance and protocol. Partly it was a result of her training at the German court, but it was her personality too. She saw her dignity upheld in the deference of others. With his years of experience as a courtier, the flourishes and rituals were second nature to John; but even so, he found it wearisome at times. Matilda seldom dropped her guard or smiled. Perhaps only with Brian FitzCount was she her true self and the rest of the court was never allowed a glimpse into that relationship.
John made his report to her. A baron had sent her two palfreys complete with saddle and harness as a measure of his goodwill. A merchant wanted to present her with a bolt of silk cloth in person. Matilda was gracious about the horses but less keen on accepting the cloth from the hands of the merchant, particularly when she learned he was from London. As far as she was concerned, the Londoners were one of the reasons she was not yet Queen of England. They had welcomed Stephen; they had turned their backs on her. She was of the opinion that the folk of the city should be given no privileges and visited with a rod of iron rather than wooed with gentle words.
John had bade his ushers keep the merchant in the antechamber ready to be summoned but Matilda made it clear that while she would accept his cloth, she did not want to see him. ‘Thank him and send him away,’ she commanded John with a lofty wave of her hand.
‘Is that wise, sister?’ Gloucester looked troubled. ‘He may have wealth and influence we can use.’
Anger sparked in her fine dark eyes. ‘Stephen may choose to water with the horses,’ she said in a clipped voice, ‘but I will not be bought by a London merchant for a bolt of silk.’
‘But you could buy London for a smile and a word,’ Gloucester said.
She looked irritated, then sighed. ‘Oh, admit him,’ she capitulated with obvious displeasure, making sure everyone knew she was just humouring her half-brother.
John fetched the merchant and cautioned him to bow low, say little and let his fabric do his talking. The man slipped John a bag of silver for his advice, which John stared at in disbelief. He was frequently offered bribes; sometimes he took them, but not from merchants touting bolts of cloth. He reckoned from the weight of the small leather purse to have been tipped about a day’s wages and didn’t know whether to be insulted or amused.
Matilda looked down her nose at the merchant, but deigned to accept both his cloth and his felicitations, with the kind of mien that revealed she thought him well beneath her and was tolerating him on sufferance.
‘He was probably a spy,’ she sniffed to Gloucester after he had been dismissed as swiftly as possible with a vague assurance that his business would prosper should she become Queen. She bade one of her women remove the fabric - beautiful red silk brocade - to the storage coffers.
‘Doubtless he was, and he’s learned very little here, except you are well guarded and have a court that would be the envy of any prince in Europe,’ Gloucester said. ‘Let him spy. He’ll learn nothing of value . . .’
As John was seeing the merchant on his way, a messenger pounded in on a sweating courser. There was blood in the horse’s nostrils and it was staggering, its wind broken. John left the merchant to the gatekeeper and conducted the messenger straight to the Empress - and although he bowed and flourished, he was peremptory now.
The messenger, swaying with exhaustion, blurted out the news that Earl Ranulf of Chester had seized the keep at Lincoln from Stephen’s castellan. Chester had ridden to fetch reinforcements, leaving his wife, Gloucester’s daughter, to defend the keep which was under siege from Stephen and in desperate need of aid. If it didn’t come, she would have to surrender herself and the castle.
‘I have to go to her,’ Gloucester said. ‘Even were she not my flesh and blood, this is a God-given opportunity. We cannot let Lincoln slip from our grasp. The Earl of Chester has long sat on the fence, but if we can win him over now, then we become twice as powerful.’
Matilda leaned forward, her gaze as fierce as a hawk’s. ‘I have no love for Ranulf of Chester,’ she said, ‘but you are right, we need him; his support will make all the difference. Go, my lord. Go as soon as you may.’
John felt the news surge through the court like a clean, bright wind, blowing in change and a freshening of optimism. He wouldn’t trust the Earl of Chester farther than he could throw a feather. He was fickle; an earl by birth and a mercenary at heart; but Lincoln was a strategic fortress and if he was prepared to hold it for the Empress, then he had to be helped.
Within the hour John was busy with lists and tallies, and orders for supplies and carts to take them up the Fosse Road to Lincoln.
In Marlborough, Aline stared at the cross on the altar of the Church of Saint Mary and prayed with intensity. Dear, sweet Virgin, let John be safe. Let him come home from Lincoln in one piece. What would happen to her if he was taken for ransom or killed? What would happen to their sons? She had nightmares that his absence would provoke an attack on their lands from their enemies. Sometimes she thought about going up on the battlements to look out for John’s return but she never got that far because she was terrified she might see hostile troops instead. Even the Candlemas feast of the Purification of the Virgin, which was one of the high points between winter and spring, had been marred by the worry of what might be happening at Lincoln and she had not been able to give her full heart to the ritual.
When she had married John, she had thought he would protect and care for her, but life hadn’t turned out like that. He spent all of his time on the Empress’s business, or else patrolling his domain. He would sleep the occasional night at Marlborough, but he had his own chamber, and showed small inclination to share hers beyond the obligatory procreative duty. She craved the security of knowing he was near. She needed to feel he was looking after her, but that need was not being met. Her only security was the Church. When she prayed, she was in communication with God and His Holy Mother, as she was never in communication with her husband. It was the only straw she had left to grasp in a world otherwise bereft of comfort.
In Salisbury Sybilla too was praying - for her brothers who had ridden to join King Stephen and put an end to Ranulf of Chester’s ambitious designs on Lincoln. For the soul of her mother also, who had been buried two days before her brothers rode out. A winter cold had thickened on her chest and then settled on her lungs. Sybire had died of the congestion, leaving the household bereft of its maternal rudder and Sybilla as sole chatelaine. She was accustomed to responsibility and had taken over the duties with efficiency and aplomb, but little joy. Nor was the season conducive to lifting the spirits. The wind was bitter; there had been snow showers last week. Today it was raining and the colours of the cathedral interior were muted. The reds were rust, the blues were charcoal and the yellow was the hue of weak urine.
She lit a candle for her mother who had been buried at the Augustinian priory at Bradenstoke. Sybilla’s third brother Walter was a canon there, so at least their mother was resting close to her family and masses would be said for her soul on a regular basis.
Shivering despite her fur-lined cloak, Sybilla left the cathedral and made her way towards the castle. The wind was blowing hard across the plain, assaulting the bank and palisades in sweeping gusts. Eyes narrowed and tear-stung, her veil flapping about her face, she hurried towards the anticipated warmth of the solar fire.
Then she saw the troop riding up the track towards the gate, the foremost bearing the red and gold standard of Salisbury. The horses were plodding, heads down, legs heavy from being hard-ridden, and the men astride were slumped like half-filled sacks. She saw her brothers, side by side. William had a long cut down one cheek. Patrick was unmarked, but his expression was bleaker than the rain-spattered February wind. Sybilla hurried to meet them.
She noticed quite a few wounded men, although no one needed a litter. But there were gaps in the line and several familiar faces were missing.
‘What’s happened?’ she gasped.
William neither turned his head nor answered, but fixed a desperate gaze on the approaching stronghold.
Sybilla swallowed. ‘Patrick?’
He looked at her. ‘The King went down,’ he said through stiff lips. ‘He’s Gloucester’s prisoner. Lincoln was a disaster . . . a rout.’
‘The King is a prisoner?’ She stared at him in dismay.
He shook his head in grim reply and urged his horse up the hill and through the heavily guarded entrance.
Sybilla waited until the horses were through and into the courtyard, then pushed her way through the dismounting men, the bundles of baggage and gear, until she reached Patrick again.
She grasped his sleeve. ‘What does this mean for us?’
‘Well, it’s hardly an opportunity on a golden platter, is it?’ he snarled. ‘We’ve to decide whether to hold for Stephen or bow our heads to the Empress.’ He spat the last word as if it were a piece of gristle, making it abundantly clear what he thought of such a notion. ‘The cowards broke and ran. The men he’s made earls of the realm. Hah! About as much backbone as a bucket of boiled eels. Even William D’Ypres fled the field rather than stand.’ He flicked a jaundiced glance towards his brother, who was staring straight ahead, his mouth as tight as a sealed coffin. Sybilla wasn’t blind to the antagonism between the men.
‘You didn’t stand either?’ she risked.
‘There was no point,’ William said wearily. ‘What could we have done on our own except be captured like Stephen, and that would have left our lands unprotected and our father with a ransom to raise. When we saw how it was, we cut our cloth to suit . . . but we didn’t quit when there was all still to fight for . . . unlike some.’ Again, the brothers exchanged looks. ‘There are wounded to be tended,’ William said tersely to Sybilla. ‘See to them.’
She bridled at his tone, but compressed her lips and, for the sake of the injured men, held her tongue and went to do his bidding.
For the next few hours she was kept busy binding, tending, overseeing the provision of washing water, food, beds and raiment for injured and uninjured alike. The story continued to emerge in fits and starts. Stephen had been in command of the town, but not the castle, which he was besieging. When Gloucester’s force had arrived, bolstered by a host of Welsh mercenaries and dispossessed knights, Stephen had chosen to go out and give battle instead of staying behind the town walls. His lords had not been as keen on the prospect of embroiling themselves in vicious hand-to-hand fighting when the odds were evenly stacked. When it came to standing firm, their resolve had faltered and they had abandoned the field. Her brothers had not been in that first wave, but had fought on until they knew they must either flee or be captured. Now they were furious; both felt their manhood had been shamed because they were not the kind of men who ran away. And they could not agree what they should do next.
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