To Defy a King (29 page)

Mahelt looked at the tallies. There were five of them, and each one had ten notches. 'Fifty,' she guessed.

Hugh looked smug. 'Times ten,' he said.

She stared at him. 'Five hundred?'

'I thought it was a good number with which to begin. I've arranged for them to be brought to Settrington before the winter storms begin. When they arrive, we'll go and see them.'

Mahelt melted into his arms. He smelled of soap and herbs now. Clean.

New. His hands went to her loose hair and then to her body under the robe and cupped her breasts. Mahelt shivered with lust and anticipation. Hugh dismissed the maids with a flick of his hand and drew Mahelt to the remade bed, where they made love in a tender, urgent, slightly damp tangle with the sheepskin under them and the morning light above.

'I missed you,' Hugh said. Propped on one elbow, he stroked Mahelt's hair.

'I watched the stars each night as I lay on my pallet, and I thought of you.'

'I watched them too,' she admitted. 'The maids said that night airs through open shutters would cause upset humours, but I paid them no heed. I knew somewhere you were watching the same stars in the same sky.'

Hugh leaned over to kiss her. 'I was. Every night.'

Mahelt responded, and then drew back and cupped the side of his face with her hand. 'You have said nothing about Ireland. Are there things you are not telling me again?' She sought reassurance in his expression and did not find it.

He twisted his head to kiss her palm before lying back with a sigh and folding his arms behind his head. 'The King was greatly successful there. He brought the de Laceys to heel and he has bought the loyalty of most of the Irish kings with scarlet robes and gifts of jewels and horses.' His jaw tightened with anger as he told her about losing Brunet. 'The King reimbursed me out of his chamber in Dublin, but the money didn't take into account all the training and how much Brunet was worth at stud. I should know by now not to trust Longespee. The nut never falls far from the tree.'

'John always takes,' Mahelt said with a curl of her lip. 'And he never gives anything either, because there is always a price to pay. What of my family?'

Hugh's expression relaxed slightly. 'Your mother is well and so are your brothers and sisters. I saw them at Kilkenny. Your new baby sister has red hair like Richard, and Ancel is a sturdy little chap. Your mother sends her greeting and her love. I have a wall hanging in my baggage from her and a brooch she thinks you will like. She was very hospitable to me, and keen to hear news of how you and our son were faring.'

Mahelt absorbed his words hungrily, but it was only the beginning of the meal and she was still ravenous. 'And my father?'

Hugh sat up and draped his hands around his upraised knees. He looked towards the window and Mahelt studied the line of light across his shoulder and down his bicep. 'Your father is well too.' He gave a wondering shake of his head. 'He outdoes much younger men, including me. I would be ready to drop with exhaustion while he was still giving orders and seeing to details when everyone else had been slumbering for hours. He swore allegiance to the King and he backed it up to the hilt in the campaign to bring the de Laceys to heel.' Hugh dropped his gaze and picked at a knot of embroidery on the coverlet. 'John captured de Braose's wife and eldest son. They're being held at Windsor until de Braose pays an indemnity of forty thousand marks.'

Mahelt gasped. 'No man can afford that! Holy Mary, even your father or mine could not raise such a sum!'

Hugh shook his head. 'De Braose swore he would do so, then fled to France, which John took as proof he was justified in not trusting him and that de Braose had been in collusion with the French all along.' He paused and Mahelt saw him gathering himself.

'Tell me,' she said. 'I am no milksop to faint away.'

Hugh shook his head. 'I am not afraid you will faint,' he said.

'Then what are you afraid of?'

He sighed. 'The King demanded more hostages from your father when we were in Dublin, just before we embarked for home.'

'More hostages?' Mahelt sat up, her gaze beginning to spark with the indignant anger he had anticipated. 'Who?' she demanded. 'Who has he taken?'

'Geoffrey FitzRobert, Jordan de Saqueville, Thomas Sandford, Walter Purcel and Jean D'Earley. Jean D'Earley has been sent to Nottingham but I do not know where the others are. He's also seized your father's castle at Dunamase.'

'How dare he!' She flung the bedclothes aside like a blow and sought her chemise. 'How dare he do that!'

'Your father was willing to give up the hostages and they were willing to do as he bade them,' Hugh said calmly. 'He is a consummate player when it comes to politics. If he had refused with the full host of England on his threshold and all the Irish kings in their new scarlet robes, then Maude de Braose wouldn't be the only one locked up in Windsor. This way he still holds the moral high ground and remains his own man. He said to me himself that it does no harm to bandage a finger that is not cut.'

Mahelt thrust out her lower lip. 'It is not to be borne!'

'What choice do we have? He is the King.'

'I can think of a hundred better men.'

'So can I,' Hugh answered, 'but it is not their anointed right. We should attend to our own concerns and strengthen our lands.'

'So he has won. He does as he pleases and everyone lets him because it is meet and safe to do so - because he is "the King"?'

Hugh sought his shirt and braies. The linen was clean and soft against his chafed, scrubbed skin and smelled faintly of rose petals. 'I want to see my son grow to manhood. I want to play with him and show him things. I want to see him ride his first horse and court his first girl. I want him to have brothers and sisters and the kind of life in childhood that I did. One day, he will be the Earl of Norfolk and he will have to make decisions that will affect everyone in his care. He must learn to shoulder burdens and responsibilities above and beyond those of most other men. But for this moment let him have the safety of his childhood. Let him play. I will have that peace for him because all too soon he will have to grow up and face the world.' He rubbed his chin. 'When I go to church, I pray for all those who have been brought down, and I give thanks that we are not yet among them.'

Mahelt shuddered, not knowing whether to embrace him or rage. He had frightened her and because they had so recently been lying on the bed in an intimate warm tangle, his words came as a greater shock. Her stomach was a tight knot as she left the bed and went into the antechamber where her women were going assiduously about their duties while waiting for her and Hugh to finish their private 'conversation'. The looks of knowing amusement dropped from their faces at the sight of Mahelt's expression as she crossed the room to the baby, who was being dandled on his nurse's knee. Lifting him in her arms, she kissed him and without a word brought him back into the bedchamber.

Hugh had donned his undergarments and was putting on indoor shoes of embroidered kidskin. Little Roger clamoured to be set down on the floor, wriggling in Mahelt's arms and shouting until he got his way. He plopped on his bottom by the side of the bed. He reached out small hands, grasped the coverlet and hauled himself upright. 'Dad-dad,' he said, beaming at Hugh.

Hugh laughed with pleasure and surprise. The baby let go of the coverlet and took two wobbling but determined steps towards him before plonking down again with a little grunt of expelled air. With utter determination, he pulled himself up again, wavered and took another two steps.

Filled with pride and delight, Hugh looked from his son to Mahelt. Her face aglow, she laughed and wiped her eyes on the back of her hand. 'He's been on the verge of this for days. He was just waiting for you to come home.'

The baby pulled himself up a third time, and tottered the final steps to his father, grabbed his leg for support and beamed up at him, his eyes a bright, sunny hazel. Hugh stooped and gently turned him round to face Mahelt. She crouched and held out her arms and Roger tottered towards her, plumping down, pulling himself up on the bed, walking again, determined to reach her.

Hugh's heart swelled with love and pride. Moisture tingled in his eyes. He thought of sitting with Mahelt at the weaving frame, blending the colours into one harmonious pattern that would last beyond the moment. A little piece of each of them caught for ever.

'Our duty first and foremost is to him,' he said, as the baby reached her and tumbled into her arms. 'He is our future. John is only the now.'

24

Framlingham, June 1212

Mahelt had joined Hugh's sister Marie and Ela in Ida's personal chamber and was enjoying a good gossip. Various small children played around the women's feet, although little Roger was at the stables with his father,

'helping' him ready things for the next day when the Bigod troop departed for the royal muster at Nottingham, and thence to war in North Wales. Ela's son William, sixteen months old, was toddling about the chamber with a wooden horse in his hand. Ela was pregnant again and suffering nausea.

Marie's eldest son Randal was off with the men too, but her three-year-old daughter played at her feet, and Marie was expecting a third child in the autumn. Mahelt herself had a second son in the cradle, named Hugh for his father.

Ida said, 'When I was a young wife, I cannot remember a time when I wasn't with child or recovering from bearing one - not that I'd be without any of them,' she added hastily. 'They are God's gifts and I love them all.'

She made a face. 'One of the court ladies told me that douching with vinegar before lying with a man prevented conception, but it doesn't always work.'

'You tried it then, Mama?' Marie looked at her with innocently wide eyes.

'When I dwelt at court and I was . . .' Ida hesitated. '. . . when I was the King's friend, yes. But I have a son from that time, to show that God's will is not denied.' For an instant she looked haunted, but then shook herself and found a smile for Ela. 'And now he has a son of his own and a fine and fruitful wife, and I thank God for His mercy.' She turned to Marie. 'With your father I never used such wiles because we were united in righteous wedlock and I did not want to deny him heirs for Norfolk and daughters to make fine marriage alliances. It was my duty, my part of the bargain. I loved your father and I honoured and feared God.'

All the women nodded with understanding, but then Mahelt said, 'Even so, a woman should not wear out her body and her spirit in constant child-bearing.

I know my duty to bear sons and daughters for Hugh and for Norfolk, but I will not be a brood mare - nor does Hugh wish such a thing.'

Her remark elicited raised eyebrows from Ela and Ida. Marie, however, leaned forward with a glimmer of interest. 'So what do you do?'

Mahelt darted a glance at her mother-in-law, and then threw caution to the wind. 'The usual things. Abstinence, because the Church says it is good for the soul.' She rolled her eyes as she made the remark. 'A small piece of moss . . . Not riding all the way to London . . .' 'Why should not riding all the way to London . . .' Ela began in puzzlement and then blushed fire-red as understanding dawned. 'Oh,' she said.

Marie wrinkled her nose. 'Someone told me to tie a weasel's testicles in a bag around my neck. I suppose that might keep Ranulf away, but everyone else too! I also heard that putting lettuce under a man's pillow makes him less amorous.' Her eyes twinkled. 'Or at least less able to be amorous.' She made an illustrative flopping gesture with her wrist and forearm. 'It doesn't work,' she added. 'I've tried.'

The women burst out laughing. Ida took Ela's son into her lap. The child rested his head trustingly against her breast and put his thumb in his mouth.

'This will be my third,' Marie said. 'My heart quails at the thought that I may yet bear another dozen - more if I survive. Maude de Braose had sixteen!'

A sudden silence fell over the banter at Marie's mention of Maude de Braose. 'God rest her soul,' Ida said, crossing herself. Marie's daughter tripped over her smock, landed hard and began to wail. Marie hastened to pick her up and comfort her in her arms.

Mahelt gazed upon the protective ring the women formed around the children, both the born and the unborn, and wondered how secure they really were. King John's imprisonment of Maude de Braose and her son had become murder. Everyone had been appalled by the details that had gradually emerged. John had moved Maude and her son from Windsor to Corfe, putting them in an oubliette there and abandoning them to starve in the cold and the dark. Rumours hinted that Maude had sustained herself with the flesh of her dead son until she too had perished. The news had made Ida physically sick and horrified everyone in Framlingham. How could such a man be king? Gossip was already rife that he had murdered his own nephew, and with the death of Maude de Braose, the unease was growing apace. He was an excommunicate king, a man outside of the Church. Rome had absolved the English barons of their oaths of loyalty to serve him. Each detail was akin to hard raindrops falling into a pool, causing ripple upon ripple, but contained. But one day the pool was bound to burst its banks and overflow in a murky flood because it could hold no more.

De Braose had fled to take shelter in France and King Philip was threatening invasion of England, although it was no more than a threat so far. At Framlingham, Earl Roger deliberately kept his head down and stayed out of involvement in wider political affairs, save for essential duties such as this summons to the muster in Nottingham. Her own father was pursuing a similar policy in Ireland. He had his sphere of influence there, but he was an ocean away and busy with his new port on the Barrow. But for how long could you keep looking the other way, she wondered, because if you didn't have your eye on the danger, perhaps one day it would be your turn to be seized and destroyed.

Hugh lifted his son on to the back of the mischievous black and white pony he had given to Mahelt and which was now their heir's first mount. Roger giggled and smacked his small hands down on the pony's withers. Pie started and swished his floor-length black tail, but was immediately amenable to the crust of bread Hugh fed him on the palm of his hand.