Shields of Pride

Chapter 20

Quivering with excitement, Robert stood at his mother’s side in the dank autumn evening while Rushcliffe’s courtyard filled with men, horses and laden baggage wains.

‘Mama, there’s Joscelin!’ He pointed vigorously at the familiar liver-chestnut with its distinctive stocking marks.

Linnet’s heart fluctuated between her throat and her stomach. For three weeks they had heard nothing, apart from occasional frightening rumours that came down the Humber and the Fosse road with Nottingham-bound traders. They had been told on different occasions that the Scots had reached Yorkshire and were marching on York itself, that the Scottish army was thirty thousand strong and every man a savage. Both Milo and Malcolm had scoffed at such exaggerations.

‘Three thousand perhaps,’ Malcolm had said as Linnet smeared soothing ointment on his scar to prevent it from itching. ‘I’m no saying they won’t be doughty warriors, and gey savage, but they’ll be more lightly armed - out for what they can loot. They’ll nae hold fast against mounted Normans.’

Linnet had taken what comfort she could from his confidence and gone about her normal business as if Joscelin and his mesnie were out for the day hunting game and not hundreds of miles farther north engaging the Scots. To keep herself from brooding, she had taken up needlework with a vengeance. Not only was her wedding gown of sky-blue wool finished but she had also made Joscelin two shirts and a tunic of deep forest-green. Beside her, Robert was resplendent in a new tunic of that same green, his garment mirroring in miniature the one she had made for Joscelin. In Robert, the colour admirably set off the blond of his hair. In Joscelin, it would bring out the green flecks in his irises.

He was home to wear that tunic now but not for long. Earlier that day, Brien FitzRenard had arrived in a state of near exhaustion, craving food and lodging for the night and a fresh horse in the morning. He had staggered to the pallet she had hastily arranged for him in a wall-chamber and fallen asleep almost immediately, but not before telling her that he had orders for Joscelin the moment that he returned. Orders that she knew, with a heavy heart, would only send him somewhere else to fight.

She watched Joscelin light down from the saddle and noted with relief as he came towards her that he moved easily, without any impediment to suggest injury. Robert danced from one foot to the other like a hound straining on a leash. The man’s lips twitched. Linnet stooped, murmured in her son’s ear and gave him a gentle push. With a pang she watched him run to his hero.

‘I prayed every day like you said and I can gallop my pony now and guess what, one of the coneys has had five babies and they’ve got no fur!’ Robert gabbled out in one long breath, then shrieked with delight as Joscelin swept him up in his arms.

‘And he has learned to write his name, too!’ Linnet added, laughing, and, coming into the curve of Joscelin’s free arm, received a hard, scratchy kiss. ‘I’ve set the laundry tubs boiling, so you’ll be able to bathe, and there’s mulled wine in the chamber.’

‘You’ll turn him soft, wench,’ said a harsh voice and Linnet turned on Joscelin’s arm, her eyes widening with a dismay she was not quite swift enough to conceal. William de Rocher’s presence was a shock. Having had eyes only for Joscelin, she had not realized until he spoke that his father was with him.

‘I doubt it, my lord.’ An icy civility entered her tone. William de Rocher set her teeth on edge with his attitude. His look upon her was that of a merchant eyeing up a doubtful piece of ware. And he was soon to be her father-in-law. ‘Surely it is the duty of any chatelaine to offer her lord such comforts on his return.’

Ironheart grunted, unimpressed. ‘You’ve learned duty since midsummer then?’ he said.

‘And I didn’t even have to beat her.’ Joscelin put himself between his father and Linnet. ‘Don’t you want a goblet of mulled wine and a hot tub to take away the aches of the road? I know that I do. And if that’s turning me soft then I can live with it.’

‘Pah!’ Ironheart snapped and, without being invited, stalked towards the hall, his gait marred by a noticeable limp.

‘Pay no heed,’ Joscelin said. ‘The damp weather gives him joint ache and makes his temper worse than a mangy bear. If his pride wasn’t so touchy, he’d accept everything you offered.’ He shrugged and sighed. ‘It has not been the easiest campaign. Conan and my father haven’t really made their peace and I won’t become embroiled in their battle to blame each other for what happened in the past.’ He looked at the child in his arms and changed the subject.

‘That’s a fine new tunic to greet my return,’ he admired.

‘It was supposed to be kept for our wedding,’ Linnet said, ‘but he wanted to wear it and today is a day of celebration. Who knows when the next one will be.’

He gave her a sharp look. ‘Why do you say that?’

‘Brien FitzRenard rode in earlier with parchments for you, and they do not bode well, I think.’

Joscelin groaned softly and turned to walk into the hall. On the threshold, while they were still alone, he turned to Linnet. ‘Marry me now,’ he said. ‘Today.’

His words sent a ripple of shock through her but the after-effect was one of pleasant warmth. ‘If that is your wish, then it is mine too,’ she said demurely, but knew from the eager look on his face that he was not deceived by her very proper response.

‘The Earl of Leicester has landed an army on the east coast,’ Brien FitzRenard grimly announced and drew his stool up to the edge of the large, oval bathtub. ‘And Hugh Bigod of Norfolk is giving him all the aid he requires.’

‘Bigod? He must be seventy if he’s a day!’ Joscelin rested his arms along the sides of the tub. The water contained crushed salt to ease the aches of hard riding and was deliciously hot, almost unbearable.

Brien tiredly pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘He’s a perennial rebel. If there’s a brew of trouble, you’ll find Hugh Bigod taking a turn at stirring it. I’ve got parchments in my baggage for you to read - and you, too, my lord de Rocher.’ His glance went to Ironheart, who was sitting on a coffer, condescending with bad grace but a copious thirst to drink Linnet’s mulled wine. ‘Hugh de Bohun, the constable, is mustering an army to prevent Leicester from striking across the Midlands to join his allies. You are commanded to respond as soon as you can.’

Joscelin sipped the hot wine and watched Linnet and a maid warming towels at the hearth and laying out clean garments for him to wear. Linnet stopped in the act of unfolding a shirt and stared his way, a look of dismay on her face.

‘The horses are in no fit shape,’ Ironheart said tersely. ‘We’ve pushed them up hill and down dale these past three weeks. What do you want, blood out of a stone?’

‘If we don’t stop them now, it will be worse later.’ Brien’s voice was laden with weariness. ‘I need not remind you, my lord, that Arnsby and Rushcliffe will be prime targets for Leicester to attempt should he gain a solid footing in the region.’

Ironheart gulped down the wine and stalked across to the hearth to replenish his cup. Robert skipped nervously out of his way and ran to the side of the bathtub. Joscelin gently tousled the boy’s thistledown hair. He could not remember the anarchy of King Stephen’s reign, since he had only been a small boy himself when it had ended. He had, however, heard enough from his father and seen the lasting effect of its ravages to have a healthy fear of the like ever happening again.

‘Give me a night and a day to get married and I’ll put the troops on the road,’ Joscelin sighed to Brien. ‘As my father says, the horses need to be rested but I daresay I can commandeer some fresh mounts round and about.’

Brien looked from Joscelin to Linnet and spread his hands in a gesture of apology. ‘I know it is a lot to ask but if we can break Leicester now then I do believe we have a chance of peace.’

When Brien had gone, Joscelin looked at his father. ‘If you want to stay behind, I’ll take your men,’ he suggested.

‘I’m not in my dotage yet!’ Ironheart said indignantly. ‘All right, I would rather not go chasing across the country but Ralf and Ivo are with Leicester and it is past time they weren’t. I have given them free rein to no avail. Now let them feel the weight of my displeasure.’

Joscelin bit his tongue and attended to his ablutions, knowing that his words would only be wasted on his father’s current mood. To Ralf and Ivo, the weight of Ironheart’s displeasure would probably seem little different to the way he usually treated them.

Drying himself, Joscelin stepped from the tub and donned the new clothes that Linnet had laid out - a shirt of softened linen, an undertunic also of linen in a mustard colour and a tunic of dark-green wool. All were new, and while there had been no time for Linnet to do any embroidery they were embellished with braid and far finer than anything he had owned before.

‘Fine feathers,’ Ironheart said sourly.

‘Very fine,’ Joscelin smiled at Linnet.

With an impatient sound, Ironheart turned away and, shrugging off his cloak, began unlatching his belt. ‘There’s no point in wasting this bathwater, it’s still hot enough to boil an egg. Lay me out some fresh towels, will you?’

Beside him, Joscelin felt Linnet stiffen. Her eyes narrowed. Oblivious, Ironheart continued to tug off his clothes and toss them on the floor. In a quiet, cold voice, she told her maid to see to the towels and find fresh clothes for Ironheart to wear. Then, on the pretext of checking that the dinner arrangements were in hand, she excused herself.

Ironheart scowled after her. ‘She’s a wayward wench,’ he said.

Joscelin eyed his father with no small degree of irritation. ‘I think she had had enough of you,’ he said. ‘To have played bath maid, as duty insists, would have been too much. She might have drowned you. I know I certainly would.’

‘Where’s Mama gone?’ Robert sidled nervously around Ironheart.

Joscelin picked him up. ‘To talk to the cook. Do you want to come to the stables and see what I’ve brought you all the way from the north?’

Robert nodded vigorously.

Ironheart shook his head and, naked, went to the hearth to pour another cup of hot wine before stepping into the bath.

It had been October when Linnet had married Giles: fine, clear weather, scented with the pungent mulch from the harvest of cider apples and the trees all russet and golden in the beauty of their dying leaves. She had worn a chaplet woven with ears of grain as a fertility charm representing the ploughing of the virgin soil and the scattering of seed in hope of abundant harvest, and had felt dead inside.

It was October again: the cider harvest under way and the grain stacked in the barns. The weather this time was grey and damp, her bridal chaplet was a simple band of silver-woven braid and feelings were flowing through her, some of them with the same kind of discomfort that came to a cramped limb when unfolded.

On the high table, which was adorned with Rushcliffe’s rescued silver plate, Linnet sipped from the handsome, engraved marriage cup. She had toasted her first union in its depths as now she was toasting this new one to Joscelin. Henry, resplendent in a new tunic of green fustian, leaned between herself and Joscelin to refill the loving cup from the flagon in his hand. When he drew back and moved on down the table, she was faced by the bright hunger in Joscelin’s eyes. His look was like a hot handprint on her bare skin.

She swallowed, feeling afraid. Giles had been drunk and fumbling on their wedding night, full of terse instructions and curses. Open your legs, damn you. Wider, higher. Don’t just lie there like a cabbage. Stop screaming, it doesn’t hurt.

Joscelin placed his hand over hers and with the other lifted the refilled loving cup to drink from the place where she had set her own lips. It doesn’t always hurt, she told herself. There is pleasure in sin.

She became aware that Conan was watching them with benign amusement. The mercenary raised his cup in toast and murmured something sidelong to Brien FitzRenard. The justiciar’s man laughed and looked teasingly at bride and groom. Linnet wanted to snatch her hand from beneath Joscelin’s but knew that it would only intensify the ribbing. It was, after all, their wedding night and Conan was doing his best to preserve the traditions. Now and then, Ironheart would raise his head from the stupor of wine fumes to mutter about duty.

‘Use her well in bed,’ he slurred, eyes focusing independently of each other. ‘Girl children’re what you want.’ His head nodded as if too heavy for his neck. ‘When they marry you can choose your sons. Won’t be lum—lumbered with idiots.’

Joscelin cast an exasperated glance in his father’s direction. ‘God, how much longer before the drink poles him silent?’ he muttered to Linnet.

Linnet grimaced as she watched her father-in-law’s behaviour sinking further into boorishness with the diminishing level of wine in his cup. She laid her hand urgently along Joscelin’s sleeve. ‘I know that we are indebted to your father for the restocking of the keep,’ she said quietly, ‘but duty or not, I know I won’t be able to strip myself naked before him when it comes to the bedding ceremony. ’

He shook his head. ‘There is no need for us to stand unclothed before witnesses.’ He set his hand over hers. ‘You have seen me naked before and have been able to judge that you are not getting damaged goods, and I would have to be mad to repudiate you because of some unseen physical flaw. Besides,’ he added with a rueful glance at Conan, ‘do you think I relish the thought of being stripped and drunkenly commented upon? A man has more to conceal than a woman. Stiff or limp, I’ll be cause for all manner of bawdy jests.’

Linnet felt a weak surge of relief and gave him a heartfelt thank you. She bit her lip. ‘When I married Giles, the bedding ceremony was as if I was being shut in a cage with a wild animal and all the guests were grinning onlookers.’

‘You have nothing to fear from me.’

‘Yes, I know.’ She crumbled a sweet honey cake set on the platter beside her trencher. ‘It is not you I fear.’

He frowned in thought for a moment, then leaned closer to speak softly.

‘Look, there’s only one more course to be served and we’ve eaten ourselves stupid anyway. Make the excuse that you’re going to check that Robert has settled down and go to our chamber. I’ll sit here and make idle conversation for a while to disarm their suspicions, then I’ll visit the latrine. By the time they realize what has happened, we’ll have the door bolted in their faces.’

She nodded with alacrity and rose to her feet as the final parade of food began arriving from the kitchens - sweet frumenties and tarts, pressed cheeses, small pasties and bowls of fresh green herbs. She was aware of the salacious glances following her, of men imagining how she would look unclothed, her hair loose. She heard the bawdy remarks shouted to Joscelin and his good-natured rejoinders. Her face flamed and her heart began to thump. Glancing over her shoulder as she reached the tower entrance, she saw that Joscelin was unconcernedly helping himself to a slice of nutmeg tart and bandying words with Conan, lulling him into a false sense of security. Gratefully, Linnet started up the concealing twist of the dimly lit stairs.

Joscelin dropped the bar across the door. ‘They might rattle at the latch,’ he said, ‘but I doubt they’ll go to the trouble of fetching an axe to see tradition upheld.’

Linnet sighed with relief. ‘I could not have endured the bedding ceremony.’

‘Once must be penance enough for anyone,’ he said wryly and sat down in the chair before the hearth. He knew what he wanted. He also knew that to take it with the directness that was now his right would be a grave mistake.

‘Was Robert asleep?’ he asked as he unwound his leg-bindings.

‘Indeed yes.’ Her face brightened. ‘Thoroughly exhausted by all the excitement. He’s head over heels in love with that pony you brought.’

‘I thought they would suit.’ Joscelin felt a glow remembering the joy in Robert’s small face when he set eyes on the little Galloway mare.

‘Do you know what he’s called her?’

Joscelin shook his head.

‘Giles once said that Leicester’s wife had the teeth and backside of a mare. Robert must have been listening. He’s named her Petronilla after the countess.’

Joscelin choked. Petronilla de Beaumont did indeed resemble a horse, although her colouring was more iron-grey than chestnut, and on balance he thought the Galloway pony the more attractive. ‘I don’t know whether the horse should be insulted, or the countess,’ he said with a grin.

‘Is it true that she girds herself like a man and rides into battle at her husband’s side?’

‘More or less. She’s with him now for certain.’ He looked at her from under his brows. ‘Not thinking of following her example, are you?’

‘Perhaps it would be easier than to sit here waiting,’ she said and looked at him as she unbound her braids.

Leaving the chair, he took her wooden comb from her coffer and sat down beside her on the bed. ‘Give me your hair,’ he coaxed. ‘You don’t want to unbar the door to summon your maid and I’ve done this many times before.’

She had tensed at his approach but now she relaxed and gave him an inquisitive smile. ‘Is that by way of reassurance or confession?’ she asked mischievously.

‘Which do you want?’ he responded in a similar tone, and taking her hair in his hands started to brush out the twists of braid. The firelight caught the ripples that the plaiting had left behind, gilding the soft honey-brown with golden-red lights. The scent of rosemary and chamomile rose from the slow movement of the comb and delicately assaulted his senses. ‘If you think I’ve led a debauched life of bedchambers and broken hearts, you are sadly mistaken.’

‘And you a tourney champion?’ Her voice was pitched low as her head yielded to the gentle passage of the comb. He watched the movement of the sinews in her slender throat, the soft hollow above her collarbone. The memory of Breaca hovered bittersweet in the shadows.

‘I do confess to plucking the occasional ripe fruit from a tree overhanging someone else’s orchard wall but, if not into my hand, it would have fallen elsewhere.’ He worked in contemplative silence for a moment. Her hair crackled and glowed with light as if it were an extension of the fire. ‘Besides,’ he added, ‘for a long time I had a woman of my own and no inclination to go filching forbidden apples. Breaca would have gelded me for certain.’

She turned her head. ‘Conan has made mention of your past,’ she said.

‘I thought he might. Probably he believed you would feel sorry for me and your heart would melt.’

‘He was watching you and Robert together. I think he spoke because he was pleased for you, and he said very little. Only that your son had died and that you and his mother had parted.’

How distant it sounded, spoken softly in this chamber resonant with his new beginning. ‘Bloody flux,’ he said. ‘He was only four years old. Breaca nearly died, too. He is buried in a churchyard on the road to Falaise and it cost all the silver I had to bribe the priest to let Juhel lie in consecrated ground - a mercenary’s unshriven bastard child.’ He gathered her hair to one side and stroked the back of her neck with gentle fingers. ‘It hit me hard. For a time I was wild, didn’t care. The summer Juhel died was my most successful ever on the tourney route. I earned back all the silver I had paid to the priest and enough to employ my own troop of men instead of traipsing in Conan’s wake.’

‘Your son’s name was Juhel.’

‘It’s Breton, the name of Breaca’s father.’ He felt her tremble beneath his touch or perhaps it was his hand that trembled with the effort of controlling all that was within him. ‘He was small like his mother but quick and bright as a pin.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s ten years ago now.’

Again she turned to look at him, her brows arching this time in startled question.

‘I was a little short of seventeen when he was born.’

‘And Breaca?’

‘She was two and thirty - old enough to have been my mother,’ he added with a hint of self-mockery.

‘Why are you telling me this?’

‘You think it would stay a secret long with Conan in the same household? He would let you have it piece by little piece and I would know from the way you looked at me which occasions he had chosen to enlighten you. Now it is told, it no longer lies between us.’

Her throat moved. Her lashes swept down, making feathery shadows on her cheekbones.

‘Or does it?’ Frowning, he tilted her chin on his fingertips.

‘No,’ she said huskily, ‘it doesn’t.’ But other things did. She was not brave enough to give him the sword of her own past to break across his knees.

He brushed his fingers lightly over her face, traced her brow, her cheekbone, her mouth. She felt his urgency and his restraint and her breathing shuddered as she too fought for control. The tentative first intimacy yielded to a more sustained assault on her senses, but refined and delicate. They drank the last of the spiced wine from earlier and shed their garments slowly, layer by layer, until they were skin to skin. Gestures became bolder, more explicit, as pleasure and tension mounted and they lay down on the bed. Perspiration dampened Linnet’s brow. She was no longer cold. The hot pressure of Joscelin’s body pinned her to the feather mattress but it was a good feeling. Against his ribs she felt the driving thud of his heart. Her palms slid upon the textures of wet skin, smooth muscle and taut tendons. She tangled her fingers in his hair and sought his mouth at the same time arching her hips and opening herself to him. She felt him push inside her - no inexpert fumbling here but the surety of experience. The sound of pleasure he made caused her to gasp and tighten her arms around him.

Someone banged on the door with what sounded like one of her best silver-gilt cups. ‘Joscelin, open up, you spoilsport!’ Conan bellowed. ‘You haven’t been properly bedded yet!’

Linnet stifled a scream and stared over Joscelin’s shoulder at the shuddering door, hoping that the bar would hold.

Joscelin muttered an oath and tensed.

‘Joscelin!’ The door quivered beneath the repeated hammering. Then there was a curse of pain. Milo de Selsey’s voice came muffled through the thick oak and Henry’s, too, trying to cajole Conan away from the barred door. ‘Not fair! ’Tsnot tradish—tradishnal!’ Conan complained.

Henry murmured enticingly that a new cask of wine was about to be broached. Footsteps staggered and scuffled. ‘That’s it, Sir Conan,’ Linnet heard Henry say. ‘It’s much better down in the hall than up here on a draughty landing.’

‘Spoilsport!’ There was a final thump on the door. Sounds retreated and the silence resumed. Joscelin sighed and pressed his head into the curve of Linnet’s throat. ‘Conan in his cups is a fiend straight out of hell,’ he muttered. ‘It’s because we’ve come out of one battle to go straight to another. Drink and women, the mercenary’s sovereign remedy.’

She heard the self-mockery in his tone and touched his sweat-damp hair. ‘Then lose yourself,’ she whispered.

He was quiet for a moment, then he lifted his head and breathed soft laughter. ‘Conan was right,’ he told her. ‘We haven’t been properly bedded - yet.’

He was still within her, although somewhat diminished. Now she felt his surge of renewed eagerness.

‘Do you think he’ll come back?’ she wrapped her legs around him.

‘I’ll kill him if he does!’

Linnet strained her ears, wondering if anyone was listening outside the door, but there was nothing, just the intimate sounds of lovemaking: the growing harshness of Joscelin’s breathing, the movement of their bodies, the rustle of the bed clothes. Her voice catching in her throat. Her loins were stretching and filling with a pleasurable tension so huge that she knew she was going to burst.

Joscelin’s lips were upon her breast, his head butting the angle of her jaw. She clenched her teeth, trying not to make a sound, but the cries came anyway. Against the curve of her breast, Joscelin groaned. His spine arched, his head came up. She closed her eyes and gripped him, absorbing his tremors through her own.

As his breathing eased, he lazily returned his attention to her breast, throat and jaw. Linnet shivered, savouring the sensations. The edge between this tender, feathery nibbling and Giles’s sated wet fondling shone as keen and narrow as the edge of a blade. One slip and she would bleed to death. She did not want the memory of other occasions to mar this one and she pressed herself against Joscelin’s body, hiding her face in his sweat-salty skin as if by doing so she could absorb even more of him into her than she had already taken.