The children had gone to bed, Rhys and Jasper had retired to their rooms over the apothecary, Kate was tidying the kitchen. Owen and Lucie relaxed on the long window seat looking out into the garden, enjoying the evening air chilled by rain and smelling of turned earth and the smoke of cooking fires. Owen stroked Lucie’s hair as she leaned back against him. She held up the parchment to catch the light from a lamp behind them so they might reread Alice Perrers’s letter.
‘I admire the care with which Dame Alice writes,’ said Lucie, ‘though I understand it is not meant to impress but rather protect her children and herself, ever aware that she is watched. Judged. How can people believe that she chose such a life, mistress of the king, their children illegitimate, her position precarious at best?’
‘Those who see only the pearls, the gowns, the properties. Until one has been amongst the royal family and their court, the life seems one of immense pleasure. They have no sense of the shifting sands. At any moment it all might be snatched away.’
She folded the letter and set it aside. ‘Heavy thoughts on a sweet evening.’
‘And to no purpose,’ said Owen. ‘Until I meet with Wykeham I cannot guess the purpose of her closing words.’ He inhaled deeply. ‘What is it about an evening rain that feels so comforting?’
‘The day’s tasks are finished,’ said Lucie. ‘And if there is nothing clamoring for your attention, such as a querulous child, you need do nothing but enjoy the coolness.’
‘And allow it to settle you toward sleep.’
For a while, they sat listening to the rain on the leaves.
‘Gwen will miss Rhys,’ said Lucie, breaking the silence.
Owen thought of the young man. ‘Did you know he meant to leave so soon?’
‘What is there to keep him?’
‘We had talked about my finding him other work.’
‘That was kind. Perhaps he thought you too busy?’
‘And I am, now. You must be right. He admired the stone carving tools. The way he touched them, the reverence – I felt he had seen them before. But he denied it.’
‘Something he dreamed of for himself?’
‘Jasper says his brother David is a gifted stone carver. Maybe they reminded him of his brother’s tools.’
‘A strange thing to be in that cart. When did the cart appear at Toft Green?’
Owen kissed the top of her head. ‘Not yesterday evening, but it was there by early morning according to those Stephen questioned.’
‘So where was it for several days?’ Lucie wondered aloud.
‘That is why I have Alfred and Stephen searching.’ He told her of Alfred’s pride in the mayor’s newfound respect for him.
‘I am happy for them. Winifrith says the children already adore him, and he’s kind to her father.’ She sighed and stretched.
It was not her first such sigh. ‘What troubles you?’
‘Giving advice about the heart is impossible.’
‘Alisoun? I saw you two in the garden.’
‘I could provide little comfort for what ails her. I almost wish it were as easy for Jasper and Alisoun to know they want to be together as it was for us.’
‘Easy? I remember a long while of you keeping me at arm’s length. Until that night …’
‘You cannot know how hard I struggled against my feelings for you! It took immense effort to resist them. But that night, finding you out in the garden stripped to the waist, sweat casting a sheen on the muscles of your back and chest …’ There was a smile in her voice.
‘And you coming out in only your shift, your hair tumbling around your shoulders.’ He groaned into her hair as he moved a hand down her shoulder to her breast. ‘Jasper and Alisoun are resisting each other?’
‘Mmm. She is resisting.’
‘Wise. They are not yet betrothed.’
‘No. But they are old enough to be.’ She turned to look up at him. ‘Shall we go up to bed?’
Laughing, he let her lead him up the steps.
‘What bliss is this?’ he whispered after the lovemaking. ‘No interrupting knocks on the door, calls from the nursery …’
Lucie gave a wicked laugh from deep in her throat as she slipped a leg over him. And so they began again.
Later, the covers thrown back, they shared a cup of wine and continued the interrupted conversation.
‘They did not lie together the night she stayed with him?’ he asked.
‘No. God forgive me, but a part of me was disappointed to hear it. I had hoped–’
‘That passion would end Jasper’s thoughts of entering the monastery?’
‘What mother so yearns for her son to sin?’
‘To be happy.’ Owen kissed her forehead. ‘We both want that.’
‘And if taking religious vows was his path to happiness?’ she asked.
‘Then so be it. Jasper has his own mind.’
‘Keenly proved of late.’
‘Painfully,’ Owen said. ‘But you say it is Alisoun who resists?’
‘She is just as conflicted,’ said Lucie. ‘Which has me doubting they will ever be together. She believes his frustration caused Jasper’s uncommon anger.’
Owen considered the possibility. Even if Jasper were meant for the Church, he was a young man with a healthy appetite – he had often witnessed how eagerly his son rushed to assist young women in the shop. ‘I can see how that might be true. You don’t think he hopes to force her to a decision?’ He held up a hand as Lucie began to protest. ‘No, I know, that’s not our son. But to express his frustrated desire by making his sister so unhappy. I cannot ignore that. God’s blood, being a father can be a torment.’
Lucie gave a soft laugh, handing him the cup.
He drank, thinking of the prickly Alisoun. He often wondered if she was right for Jasper. But he did seem to love her. ‘She hesitates because of her work with Magda?’
‘That is much of it. But there is more. She began to say something about disappointing Jasper. When I told her that whatever it was, he should hear it from her first, before you and I knew of it, she grew quiet.’
‘Little frightens her. But there was the time Sir John Holland tried to seduce her,’ said Owen. ‘Or perhaps she fears what I feared – that you would find me lacking.’
Again the naughty laugh. ‘Surely you did not fear that.’
‘I did.’
‘Difficult to believe, my love.’ Her laughter turned to sighing. ‘I pray that whatever it is, telling him does not make him even more disagreeable. Poor Gwen.’ She leaned her head on his shoulder. ‘I wish I could think of something to cheer her. But I fear it may not be in our power to soothe her. I think only Jasper can undo this.’
‘I agree. Shall I fetch some wine?’
‘No. I think I can sleep now.’
Moments after Owen had shuttered the lantern kept by the door, he thought he heard voices down below. Stepping out onto the landing, he pricked his ears. Not in the house, out in the garden. Male and female.
‘What is it?’ Lucie whispered, joining him.
‘Alisoun and Jasper. In the garden.’
Lucie crept down a few steps, paused, listening, and climbed back. ‘Tomorrow may be difficult. Let us get some sleep if we can.’
In the night, Alisoun had told the guard at Bootham Bar that she could not sleep for worry about Anna Thornton, who was about to give birth. It was true she was concerned for Anna, and she would go to her in a little while, but she was not the cause of Alisoun’s sleeplessness. Lucie Wilton’s advice haunted her. For more than a year she had rushed past the shadow of an event that would almost certainly change Jasper’s idea of her, each moment of delay in telling him about it making it more unlikely that he would take it well.
She had not even confided in her teacher, for she had known what Magda would say – tell him. What madness had kept her silent? In the beginning, she had been confused about how she felt and feared that to speak of it in such state might make it worse. Yet she saw in that argument the very reason for telling him. He deserved to know, deserved a chance to express his feelings, and together they might have … might have what? There. That was the fear. They might have decided to end their courtship.
Magda had heard her cry out in the night from suffocating dreams, and doubtless guessed that Alisoun agonized over a painful secret. But it was not her way to force a confidence. At any other time Alisoun would have described the dreams, eager for her teacher’s insight. But she could not. And Magda had behaved as if nothing were between them, which was maddening at times. And instructive. Her problem was entirely of her own making.
After parting with Lucie in the garden that morning, she had gone about her duties with only half her attention, pondering how she might best approach Jasper. At the end of the day she’d fled home to confide in Magda at last and seek her advice. They had walked along the river into the forest of Galtres, her teacher listening, asking questions, helping her pour out her tangled thoughts. The experience was far harder than she had anticipated. By the time she had talked herself hoarse, Magda had brought them to a rest beneath a willow and settled on a fallen log.
She took Alisoun’s hand in hers, looking into her eyes. ‘So long thou hast held close this secret.’
‘Too long.’
‘Thy delay will make it all the more painful for Jasper. That thou didst not trust him to understand.’
‘I know.’
‘Magda has many questions. But this is for thee to resolve.’
‘A test?’
Her teacher’s smile was tinged with sadness. ‘Speak from thine heart to Jasper. It is for him to receive it however he may. Thou canst no more control his heart than thou canst thine own.’
‘And then?’
‘Though it may be painful, accepting whatever comes is the path to the fastest healing. For both.’
‘You know he won’t forgive me.’
‘Magda knows nothing of the future. But she has witnessed many wounded hearts.’
‘Can I forgive myself?’
‘Every act has consequences. Dost thou regret what thou didst, or how long it has taken thee to tell him?’
The strength in her teacher’s firm, warm grasp encouraged her to consider the question with care. She did not like the answer. ‘I regret how long it took me to speak of it. To you and to Jasper.’
‘And now thou must face the consequences. Thou wilt survive the ordeal.’
‘I will be whole.’
Magda looked deep into Alisoun’s eyes and pressed her hands. ‘Thou art whole. There is no question of that.’
Returning in a companionable silence, a soft rain spurring them to a faster pace, Alisoun had felt lighter, freer, and crawled beneath her bedclothes eager for the oblivion of sleep. But the specter of telling all to Jasper arose to torment her, shredding her short-lived peace. She’d fetched a sleep potion, but feeling Magda’s eyes on her she set it aside. Time and again her teacher warned against escaping the inevitable. Each missed opportunity worsened the pain, and delayed healing, sometimes irrevocably. She had already delayed too long. The time to tell Jasper about her days with another up on the moors had been at Martinmas the past year, on her return. That chance was lost. She would wait no longer.
Reaching the apothecary, she woke Jasper by tossing pebbles against the shutters of his bedchamber on the first floor. In a moment he had come below to open the shop door, a finger to his lips, and led her through the building and out into the garden.
‘Why not upstairs?’ she asked, uneasy about their voices carrying into his parents’ house from the garden. And though the rain had stopped, it was chilly now, all the surfaces damp.
‘Have you forgotten what happened the last time?’
‘Of course.’ She was so caught up in her own worries she had not thought of that.
He took her hands. ‘What brings you out so late? Were you with Dame Anna?’
‘I will go to her in a little while. I need to tell you about last autumn, up on the moors.’ She took a deep breath, looped her arm through his, and led him in a slow walk along the garden path away from the house. ‘Magda’s great-grandson was up there.’
‘Einar?’
‘No one in Asa’s village knew he was there. When I turned home, I happened upon him sitting by a beck. He had just come up onto the moors from York and was gathering his strength, praying for guidance about which way to go.’ Magda had sent him away to be alone, find his calling, after working among the folk during an outbreak of pestilence in the previous summer. ‘We spoke of Magda, the mystery surrounding her. I learned how she came to the settlement where she met his great-grandfather. A strange tale.’
‘You come in the middle of the night to tell me about something that happened a year ago?’ Jasper stopped and turned to face her. ‘You did not mention seeing Einar when you returned.’
‘No. I should have.’ She reached for his hands. ‘But I was confused. How could I tell you when I didn’t understand?’
‘There is more to this than Einar telling you an odd story about Magda Digby.’
The tightness in his voice almost made her stop. She forced herself to continue.
‘Yes. And if you care for me as you say you do, you will allow me the courtesy of hearing my story.’
He withdrew his hands and took a step back. ‘You lay with him, didn’t you?’
Was she that obvious? ‘Yes. But that is only part of my tale.’
‘How could you?’ he hissed.
‘I am not excusing myself. At the time I felt so close to him, we have a deep connection through Magda …’ She heard how foolish she sounded. Because she was not speaking from her heart as Magda had advised. But how could she tell Jasper that Einar’s nearness had made her heart race, that his touch had sent waves of heat through her unlike anything she had ever experienced? ‘In the moment I thought it was love. But later it felt more like an enchantment.’
‘You would not lie with me, but you did with him.’ Jasper’s voice was sharp with hurt.
She could not blame him. ‘It is why I hesitated that night. I wanted you to know this first. I should have told you a year ago. I’m sorry I didn’t. I don’t love him, Jasper. Not as I love you.’
‘Am I to thank you for telling me that you gave yourself to him even though you don’t love him? And then waited so long to tell me? Let me keep dreaming of being with you for another year when all along … I can’t, Alisoun.’
She caught his arm as he turned from her. ‘Many a time you have told me of the debate you have with yourself, whether you are called to be an apothecary and husband, or if God calls you instead to take monastic vows. I have listened with all patience, trying never to let you see my pain because I know you would never be happy were you to force yourself to turn away from a true calling. But it tore at my heart. Were you to choose the Church you would cut me off from you for good. What happened with Einar is not like that.’
‘Of course it is.’
‘No. I am telling you it means nothing about what is between us. I don’t love him. I love you.’
‘Yet it took you a year to tell me you had slept with him.’ He moved an arm’s length from her, bowing his head.
She let go his arm and waited.
‘You choose me now,’ he said after a long pause. ‘But if his search brings him back to Magda, how do you know you’ll not regret your decision?’
‘What if you choose me, we wed, I am with child, and you decide you made the wrong decision, that God is calling you to the abbey?’
‘You think I would abandon you and our child?’
‘You seem to think I would.’
‘It’s not the same.’ His tone was angry, pushing her away.
‘No? Why? Because you would claim a higher calling? A holier path?’
‘You would disdain such a choice?’
‘How can you ask that when I have waited patiently for you to choose between me or the Church? In all this time I have not pushed, I have not taunted or tried to tempt you away. If you left me – I’ve thought about this so often, the pain, the loneliness, knowing you would not be there, I would not see you …’ Her voice broke and she stopped to breathe. ‘But I would pray to find forgiveness in my heart,’ she whispered.
‘Forgiveness?’ His voice dripped with disdain. ‘What would there be to forgive? I would be answering God’s call.’
‘Are you so hard-hearted? You wouldn’t care how I felt?’
‘If God calls me–’
‘But you must know how hard that would be for me. And even so I would pray to understand. Will you not do the same?’
A sharp snort. ‘You are nobler of heart than I am. Is that what you want me to say? Was it noble to lie to me for a year?’
‘I wasn’t–’ She stopped. Calmed herself. ‘I ask only that you listen, and that we move forward with no secrets between us.’
‘I have listened. Now I need to sleep.’ He retreated so suddenly it took her a moment to move herself to follow, and by the time she reached the door to the workshop he had shut it.
Slumping down to the ground, she pressed her hands to her mouth to muffle the scream of frustration.
Bess Merchet woke to a voice somewhere in the bedchambers. Earlier she had heard voices in Lucie’s garden, stepped close to check that there was no trouble. Alisoun and Jasper, their voices tense. As long as they were not intruders, she had no cause to bother. But now the voice was near at hand, male, sounding frightened. And was there another? A low murmur? Were they up above? She stepped out of her chamber, listening. Silence now but for a snore below. Perhaps it had been in the yard. Crossing to the window she opened the shutter and looked out, but the moon did not light the shadows. In case they were there she shooed them off as she would stray cats. When she stepped back to close the shutters a cloaked figure slipped from Lucie Wilton’s garden and out toward St Helen’s cemetery. Female, she thought. Alisoun. Perhaps she had been confused.