Lords of the White Castle (54 page)

'I do not believe he will die,' she said with as much conviction as she could muster. While she was not a professional chirugeon or healer, her position as lady of the keep brought with it the expectation that she would know something of both occupations. Besides, her reputation had been enhanced among the men by the way she had dealt with Fulke's arrow wound. 'If he can be given honey and water off a spoon, so much the better. I would say he is capable of swallowing.'

'I will do it,' Barbette offered.

Maude nodded her thanks to the maid and moved on to examine the other wounded men, Fulke following anxiously at her shoulder. She felt the weight of his need for her to tell him that all would live, but she could not give him that reassurance. Only God had the answer. At least there were no gut wounds. Men could linger for days with such injuries and die in screaming agony. But there were some serious cuts to be stitched and broken bones to be set. She sent for the priest who had been a groom's son and had some knowledge of the latter and set those who were competent to binding the less serious wounds.

Pushing up her sleeves, she set to work herself: washing and stitching, bandaging and comforting. At first Fulke stayed with her, talking to the men over whom she toiled, but at some point he left, and when Maude paused for respite and looked round, he was nowhere to be seen.

Philip had suffered a mace blow to the thigh. The bone was not broken but he was badly bruised. William was applying a cold compress to the area as the brothers sat with Alain.

'Fulke?' William said to her enquiry. 'He was here not long ago to look at Alain. I think he went to the battlements.'

'The battlements?' There was fear in Maude's voice. 'Does that mean you were pursued?'

Philip shook his head. 'No,' he said quickly, 'nothing like that.'

William flashed a humourless grin. 'If they gave us a hiding, we took their hides,' he said. 'They weren't capable of giving chase.'

'Then why…'

Philip indicated his comatose brother. 'Alain's friend, Audulf de Bracy. They took him hostage and like as not they'll string him up when they reach Shrewsbury. Jean de Rampaigne's gone to see if he can save him.' He washed his hands over his face. 'Fulke has taken it hard. So far, he has brought us out of every scrape unscathed. Now he thinks he has failed us, but it's not true.' He gave Maude a troubled look. 'Go to him, Maude; he needs you.'

She collected her cloak and, leaving the chamber, climbed the stairs to the wooden wall walk. Mindful of her earlier near mishap, she trod carefully. Fine rain shrouded the night air, bearing on it the smell of woodsmoke from the cooking fires.

Fulke was standing at the place where the walk overlooked the road, although there was nothing to see. It was full dark by now, and the only light came from the keep itself and the dwellings in the village.

'You should come down and unarm,' Maude said softly as she joined him. 'Your mail will be red through with rust if you stand here much longer.'

He looked at her blankly, clearly struggling to change the focus of his thoughts, it does not matter,' he said. 'It can be cleaned.'

'You will not bring them home any sooner no matter where you stand,' she murmured. 'At least come below and let me tend your bruises.'

'They don't need tending.'

'A matter
of
opinion.'

He rubbed his forehead wearily. 'Maude, let me be…'

'So that you can brood yourself into a hole?' She took his hand and saw him wince. The knuckles were swollen where something had struck them. 'Theobald used to say that you could not judge a man by his victories, but by his conduct in defeat.'

That drew an indignant spark. 'I haven't been defeated!' His shoulders squared and his chin came up.

Maude gave a knowing nod. 'Well then.'

He sighed and turned again to the unyielding darkness. 'I bit off more than I could chew' he murmured. 'And for my mistake, others have paid.'

'They knew the price when they joined you,' Maude said. 'Many times you have seemingly bitten off more than you could chew and then astonished everyone by devouring your endeavour. William says you had a victory.'

'William would.' He bared his teeth. 'We held them off, and hurt them enough that they turned back from Whittington, but at cost to ourselves.' He gazed into the night, as if by will alone he could pierce the night and bring the missing men home.

'They will come,' Maude murmured.

He braced his arms on the wood. 'And I will wait for them.' He cast her a dismissive glance over his shoulder. 'You do not have to stay. This is my vigil to keep.'

Maude eyed him with exasperation. Whatever she said, he was not going to relinquish his position. Short of getting his brothers to carry him down by force and tie him to a bed, there was nothing more she could do. After a brief deliberation, she left him to his brooding, but only for as long as it took to collect a cup, a flagon of wine laced with uisge beatha, some bread and a smoked sausage from the kitchens.

When she returned, he had not moved, except that his head was bowed and more than ever it seemed to her that he was bearing an intolerable burden. She set the flagon down by his feet. 'It is my vigil too,' she said. 'I will not let you shut me out.'

He turned his head, his movement slow with weariness. The rain gleamed along his temple and jawline. Fine droplets quivered on the
ends
of his hair. 'In God's name, Maude,' he said hoarsely, 'do you never give up?'

She gave him the smile of an adversary. 'You should know better than to ask. My stubbornness is easily a match for yours.'

He made an inarticulate sound that could have been either agreement or dismissal. Maude tilted her head. 'I won't leave until you do.'

'I was wrong,' he said. 'The only time I bit off more than I could chew was when I took you to wife.'

Maude shrugged. 'You could always seek an annulment.' She withdrew the bread and sausage from the protection of her cloak.

Fulke eyed her and the food. She could see that she had diverted him from his brooding and that for the moment he had forgotten his weariness. 'I could,' he said and now there was bleak humour in his tone. 'However, I would be in just as bad a case, for then I would starve for want of fighting and loving, and instead of you bedevilling me out my mind, I would have nothing but memories and regrets.'

She gasped as he pulled her against the damp linen of his surcoat and the rusting iron rivets of his mail shirt. The pungent smell of salt sausage and bread rose in the moist air. The shape of the former squeezed in her hand caused Maude to glance down and almost burst into irreverent laughter. Somehow, she choked it back. Fulke's gaze lowered to the sausage then met hers. She saw the answering humour spark and then quench. He stepped back.

'I'm not hungry,' he said, but stooped to the wine and took a long drink straight from the flagon. He wheezed slightly as the uisge beatha kicked him on the way down his gullet. Nevertheless, he took another long pull.

Suddenly Maude was ravenous, almost craving, and in moments she had devoured more than half of the sausage.

Fulke returned to his vigil. Taking the flagon from his hand, she filled her mouth with the burning wine.

'Will they regroup in Shrewsbury and come again?' she asked.

He shook his head without looking at her. 'I doubt it. They have lost the element of surprise. John is bogged down with troubles in Normandy. He cannot afford the men or the time to add to the aid he has already given, whereas I have Prince Llewelyn on my own threshold and need but ask him for reinforcements. Come the spring, of course, matters might change.' He rubbed his brow. From his action, she knew that he must be suffering the kind of woolly headache that grew out of exhaustion. 'I dare take nothing for granted.'

Although she doubted her power to succeed, she was about to try and persuade him again to come inside, when they heard the clop of hooves on the road and a shout to the gate guards to open up. The voice was familiar even if the riders were two indistinct shapes in the mizzle.

'They're back!' Suddenly Fulke was imbued with a fresh charge of energy and he pelted down to the bailey. Maude winced as she heard him skid on the wet wood but, like her, he grabbed the rope rail and saved himself from serious injury. She followed him carefully, her stomach queasily replete.

'It wasn't easy,' Jean told Fulke. The knight's slender brown hands were cupped around a mug of wine while Barbette gently tended his battle bruises.

'He made it look as if it was.' Audulf de Bracy's voice was filled with the enthusiasm of a man reprieved from the gallows to whom life is momentarily almost too sweet to be contained—two black eyes, a lopped earlobe and a slashed hand notwithstanding. 'Strolled up to Furnel and the FitzMorys brothers bold as you please and offered to entertain the men with songs and music. Said he was a travelling player out to earn a crust and a bed for the night.'

'Audulf heard me,' Jean took up the tale,' and cried out that he was a nobleman and that if he was to be executed on the gallows the next day, the commanders should let the minstrel sing some religious songs for him. I was brought to his room and bade to do so. When the time was ripe, I overpowered the guard and Audulf dressed in his clothes. We left him bound and gagged with Audulf's leg bindings. To Furnel's men, it looked as if Audulf was escorting me out. By the time they found their companion, we were well away.' He raised his cup in a wry toast. 'One day I'll compose a song about it.'

'I owe you a great debt for tonight,' Fulke said quietly. Maude had finally persuaded him to remove his armour. He still had not eaten, and there was a feverish glint of exhaustion in his eyes. Sleep was the greatest need of all, but he would not yield while Alain lay in a stupor.

Jean shrugged. 'I did it for friendship. You would have done as much for me. It would have been a sin to waste my skills and let a man die.'

'Amen to that,' declared Audulf, raising his cup.

Fulke paced to the great bed where Alain lay, and Audulf joined him. 'Is he going to wake up?' the knight asked.

Fulke did not miss the note of anguish in Audulf's voice despite the man's striving for neutrality. Audulf and Alain had been bosom companions since small boyhood. The bond of brother to brother was strong with the thread of blood, but the bond of friend was perhaps stronger still because it was of choice. 'He has to,' Fulke said. 'If not for his own sake, then for everyone else's.'

'He will be all right, by and by,' Maude said. 'Indeed, it might even be possible to rouse him if you shake him, but the drubbing he has taken, he needs the peace.' She raised a warning forefinger. 'When he does rouse, he will have a terrible headache and will likely be very sick. It is best if you leave him for now.'

Audulf nodded, reassured if not entirely convinced. Maude took Fulke's arm. 'I have had a hot tub prepared for you in the kitchens and I have told the maids to make you a pallet beside Alain so that you can be within reach. Come,' she said. 'I can see you are almost sleepwalking.'

He did not consciously yield, but let her lead him out of the room and under a covered wooden walkway to the kitchens. A cauldron simmered over a banked fire and there was a steaming bathtub to one side. Through exhaustion as thick and heavy as a pile of woollen blankets he was aware of Maude helping to undress him, of stepping into a tub so hot that it almost scalded his flesh, and then, as he grew accustomed to the heat, of the lapping, exquisite comfort. Maude rubbed his knotted shoulders and, as she worked, the aching band across his forehead eased slightly. She gave him an infusion of willow bark to cushion the pain of his bruises and anointed them with a soothing balm. The tension had been a scaffold, keeping him on his feet. Now, beneath Maude's ministrations, it was demolished and weariness tumbled down on him.

When he left the tub she rubbed him down with a large linen towel and helped him dress in a clean tunic and chausses. Everything became a blur. He had no recollection of returning to his chamber, nor of lying down on the pallet she had made up for him. The darkness took him like a mother and enfolded him in dark, comforting arms.

He woke deep in the night to the sound of a child's crying and a woman softly hushing it. Disoriented, he blinked, not knowing where he was. Memory slotted reluctantly into place from what seemed a far distance. He heard the murmur of voices and sat up. His bruises made him stiff and he turned his head awkwardly in search of the sounds. His brothers were all asleep on pallets arranged around the room. Maude was seated at the side of the great bed, a gurgling Hawise in her arms, and Alain was propped up against the bolsters, his eyes open and lucid. As Fulke stared, Alain managed a weak smile.

CHAPTER 29

Palace of Aber, Wales,

August 1203