The Dagger and the Cross (54 page)

Her breath caught in her throat. She could not swallow. She
choked out the words as she must, as her pride demanded. “I will do as my king
commands.”

Gwydion rose, paced to the far wall, turned. So would his
brother have done. It was altogether unlike Gwydion. “Will you? Will you do so
much?”

“He is a suitable match,” she said.

“He has asked for you.”

“It is my king’s right to bestow me as he wishes.”

“You cannot abide him.”

“Does it matter?”

She heard the hiss of his breath. She meant what she said.
She would do as he bade, as she had been bred and raised to do.

“I failed of my duty,” she said, “but that is done. You may
be assured that I shall not transgress again.”

Gwydion’s eyes were wide and very pale, almost silver. “You
would do it,” he said. “You honestly would.” He approached her slowly. When
they were face to face, not quite close enough to touch, he halted. “What if
I set you free to choose?”

“Why ask, when you will not?”

“What do you know of what I will or will not do?”

He spoke softly, but his words stung. Her own were all the
more haughty for it. “You will do what your majesty must do.”

“You have a brother,” he said. “Your brother has sons.”

At first she did not understand him. It was all her mind
could do to sustain her shell of coldness, let alone to comprehend his
subtlety. When she began to understand, she did not believe what she
understood. Rhodri had a son, that was true. “What, is Luned pregnant again?”

“She was. They are two. Boys both, and as strong as anyone
could wish for.”

“Twins run in our blood,” said Elen, hardly heeding her own
words. Three sons. After Aidan, Rhodri was Gwydion’s heir, unless Gwydion sired
a son himself. Then Rhodri’s sons. Then—

“I am still a valuable property,” she said.

“You will always be that.”

But not, any longer, quite so precious to the line. He was
telling her that she was free. That she could choose.

“Then I choose Raihan,” she said.

Gwydion’s eyes were level on her. “Was there no man of your
own faith to take, that you must have an infidel?”

“Did you think I had a choice?”

“You might,” he said. “You well might.”

“No,” she said. “No more than you, or Aidan, or Morgiana.
Humans can love, too, my lord. Sometimes even eternally.”

There was no reading Gwydion, ever, unless he wished it. He
was pure inhuman stillness. His eyes were grey as rain.

His silence, his mute intransigence, made her angry. And
anger made her forget to be wise. “Apart from the cut of his privates and the
count of his lineage, he is a thousandfold the man that your fine Lord
Constable will ever be.”

To her profound astonishment, the king laughed. “Truly, one
bandit’s son is very like another; even if one calls himself a lord.” He
stilled; he was unreadable again. “Do you expect that I will go to war in Rome
for you, to win yet another dispensation?”

“No,” she said.

“You know that without the Holy Father’s decree, you cannot
marry him.”

“Then I will not marry him.” She paused. “I will not marry
anyone at all.”

“Your children will be bastards.”

“There is no bastardy in Islam.”

“You would go so far?”

“I could,” she said. Knowing it. Somewhat appalled herself,
to see how shallow her piety ran.

“I have always done my duty,” she said. “As child, as
daughter, as wife. Even in my heart I have never asked aught but to be what a
woman of my line should be. Now I know myself for a hypocrite. I was never
sinless; I was merely untempted.”

He did not deny it. He said, “I will not force you to wed
against your will. Any man in Christendom whom you may wish to wed, you may
have, whether he be king or carpenter, and I will bless you.”

“But not Raihan.”

He reached for her. She started. He laid his hand against
her cheek. “Child,” he said. “I never wanted you to be unhappy. When I saw how
you were healed, here in Outremer, I was heart-glad.”

“Until you saw the one who healed me.”

He shook his head. The stillness had gone out of him; and
with it a subtle, thrumming tension. “He was not,” he said, “the one I would
have chosen for you. But God is wiser than I.”

Elen stared at him. “You’re not angry. You’re not angry at
all.” No: he was not. No more did he repent of his letting her suffer so
painfully, and for naught.

For naught? His glance denied it. She glared. “You were
testing me!”

“No,” he said. “You tested yourself. I was never more than
the mirror of your conscience.”

True; but that was only half of it. “You are too wise a
king,” she said, “for the likes of me.” She looked him full in the face. “Do we
have your blessing?”

He barely hesitated. “You have it,” he said. “You have
always had it.”

Her throat went tight. He opened his arms. She hung back,
resisting. He did not move. She flung herself into his embrace.

There in the safety of his presence, with his blessing on
her, all her temper shrank and faded. If he had tested her, then she had tried him
sorely. He was man enough, and king enough, to forgive her. Could she do any
less?

Such wisdom to come to, all late and unlooked for. It might
almost have been witchery.

She stepped back, out of his arms. “May I go, my lord?”

“To your Saracen?”

His eyes glinted. She lowered her own. Her cheeks were warm.
“Not if
you forbid me.”

“I set you free.”

Like a hawk off the fist. She leaped; she soared; she flew.

o0o

“Well done,” said the voice which Gwydion knew better than
any in the world.

Gwydion turned, barely ruffled. Aidan grinned at him.
Gwydion spared him the glimmer of a smile. “You’ll bless our catling’s sinning,
then?” Gwydion asked him.

“How can I not?” Aidan said. “Raihan is almost good enough
for her. He’ll try to talk her out of this, you know.”

“And fail.”

“No man is proof against a determined woman.” Aidan wandered
to the winetable, found a bowl with pomegranates in it, took up a rose-red
fruit and tossed it from hand to hand. “They’ll probably call in a
qadi
and
marry as Muslims do. Will you try to stop them?”

“Will you?”

“I am hardly in a position,” said Aidan, “to preach against
the marrying of infidels.”

Gwydion plucked the pomegranate out of the air, cut it open
with his dagger. They shared it between them, finding it ripe and honey-sweet.

“It could have been worse,” Gwydion said. “She could have
insisted on taking Messire Amalric.”

“She could indeed,” said Aidan. “And been wretched ever
after.”

“But properly, Christianly wedded.”

“I don’t feel very proper or Christian when I think of that
man.” Aidan licked his scarlet-stained fingers, frowning at the air. “He’s in
Tyre. Did you know that?”

“I know it,” said Gwydion. “I saw him this morning.”

“Did you?” said Aidan. He paused. “Do you know what his mind
reminds me of?”

“Yes,” Gwydion said. “A certain late conspiracy.”

Aidan was not surprised that Gwydion had thought of it
before him. Gwydion had always been the quicker to think, as Aidan was to act. “And
yet,” said Aidan, “none of them said a word about him. Not even Messer Seco.”

“As if he had bought their silence,” Gwydion said, “or been
given it of their prudence. He is, after all, the only lord among them. That he
would play so many sides in this game...that, I can easily believe. He asked
for Elen this morning.”

“Again?”

“Again. And for passage west, ostensibly to preach the
Crusade.”

“Bold,” said Aidan, “if he had a hand in the forgery. And
arrogant, to think that you would even consider him after what his brother did
to this kingdom.”

“Ambitious, and well convinced of his own worth.” Gwydion
met his brother’s eyes. “Shall I summon him to hear the lady’s answer for
himself?”

Aidan smiled slowly. “You can do better. You can send me to
fetch him. He’ll fancy himself properly escorted.”

“No,” said Gwydion. “I think that I shall send Messire
Raihan. If you will lend him to me.”

“And tell him what, and why?”

“If you will.”

Aidan’s smile widened to a grin. “I do. Oh, I do indeed.”

o0o

Amalric de Lusignan, though ambitious, was not a fool. He
came warily, and he came in his own good time. The brothers were waiting for
him, Aidan stretched out lazily at Gwydion’s feet. Amalric raised his brows at
the picture they made. “You should be woven in a tapestry,” he said.

Aidan smiled with a white gleam of teeth. Gwydion wore no
expression. He gestured; Amalric, after a moment’s pause, sat where he was
bidden. His smile was remarkably free of strain. “I’ve heard the news,” he
said. “I’m glad.”

Aidan nodded, but did not speak. He did not trust himself to
be wise.

Gwydion shifted slightly. Amalric’s eyes flicked to him.
Quietly he said, “I have considered what you asked of me. The lady has been
spoken to. The choice, in the end, is hers. You may speak with her if you wish.”

Amalric eased perceptibly. So, then: he had expected other
tidings. Of her refusal? Or perhaps of a certain conspiracy? “I’ll speak with
her, sire,” he said.

Gwydion bent his glance on Raihan. The mamluk bowed low and
departed.

They waited in silence. The brothers would not break it;
Amalric, in courtesy, could not. He sat straight in the tall chair. Still
though he was, he seemed subtly to fidget.

His mind was a buzzing nothingness.

That, said Gwydion for Aidan to hear, walled the king from
me at Cresson.

Aidan’s response was wordless affirmation. It was indeed
what he had sensed then and, like the fool he was, disregarded. It was like
Brother Thomas’ sleights of mind: not power, but not-power. But stronger. How
much stronger, Aidan had only begun to see.

He laid his arm across his brother’s knees, as much for
reassurance as for his body’s comfort. On the surface Amalric’s mind seemed all
harmless nothing-in-particular. Beneath, it was madness.

Gwydion was calmer, less openly revolted. The man is
eminently sane. The walls he raises are madness and confusion for any of our
kind who may trespass.

And he doesn’t even know it. Aidan shivered in his skin.

I think he knows, Gwydion said. His mind-voice was deathly
quiet. Not what he is, but how; and why.

Raihan returned, shadowing Elen. It seemed perfectly proper:
the servant, deferential; the lady, regally gracious. When she made her
reverence to her uncles, greeted the Constable, sat composedly under all their
eyes, the mamluk took station behind her. A guardsman’s place; or a watchful
lover’s.

Gwydion perceived it. A spark kindled in his eye, mate to
that in Elen’s. “My lady,” he said. “Messire Amalric wishes to hear what you
have chosen. Will you accept his suit? Make this, perhaps, an occasion for
doubled rejoicing?”

She was not unduly disconcerted to have it direct, without
the usual dance of preliminaries. She did not, Aidan noticed, glance at her
lover. Raihan stood as a guard should stand, light and erect, at ease but
alert; but his hand on his swordhilt was white about the knuckles.

Amalric was hardly more composed. His eyes flicked from face
to face, avoiding the lady’s. Until she spoke; then they fixed on her as if
they had no power to move.

“I have considered,” she said, “and pondered long. I am
honored that so high a lord should seek my hand, and I once widowed already,
and no proof that I can bear him healthy sons.”

“As to that, my lady,” said Amalric, “I’m sure I needn’t be
concerned.”

She regarded him coolly, with no visible disfavor. “My lord
is kind.”

He rose and bowed with a passable flourish. “My lady is
worthy of every kindness.”

Elen inclined her head. “That is for my lord to judge.”

“I hope I may do more than that,” Amalric said.

Raihan quivered like an arrow in a target. Aidan wondered
that Amalric could not see it and know it for what it was.

To Messire Amalric, no doubt, the mamluk was invisible:
dark-faced, bearded, turbaned, Saracen.

Elen, well aware of all of them, glanced briefly at her
younger uncle. He tried to warm her with a smile. She eased a very little and
raised her chin a fraction higher. “My lord may hope,” she said, “but alas, I
fear I cannot be so gracious. My husband whom I loved is scarce a year in his
tomb. To contemplate another in his place...” Her voice trembled. It was not
all feigned. She was exerting all her will to keep her eyes down and not to
feast them on the one who had taken her dear lord’s place. “My lord, I pray
your kind indulgence. You offer me honor and glory far above my poor deserts.
How can I accept them? I would but bring a third into our marriage bed, a ghost
who would be ever between us.”

A very solid ghost, Aidan thought, with eyes the color of
sulfur burning.

Amalric mustered a clenched-teeth smile. “My lady may find
that there is no better exorcism for a lover’s ghost than a new and living
lover.”

Elen’s cheeks flushed faintly. “That may be so, my lord. But
it is too soon. Please, my lord, if truly you have any regard for me. Someday,
perhaps, when the pain is not so fresh...but now, my lord, now I cannot bear to
think of it.”

Gently, Aidan willed her. Not too broad a mime of grief, or
milord would scent the mockery in it.

Milord, it seemed, was blind enough to take her at her word.
She was distractingly lovely in her plain somber gown and her white wimple,
with the slightest quivering in her chin, the slightest shimmer of dampness in
her eye. She rose with pure unconscious grace and held out a slender hand. “My
lord, I am most honored, you must remember that. I wish you well. I pray that
you may find a lady who is worthy of you.”