The Wise Woman Read online

  Hugo reached out his hand and touched the base of her neck. Her pulse beat steadily, unhurried by any alarm, under his finger.

  'You are not carrying my child,' he said, showing his disappointment. Alys smiled at him. 'I was not carrying him when I first said,' she said. Her blue eyes twinkled. 'But I am a liar no more! I am with child now, as I foretold. I missed my term this month and soon I shall be as fat as you could desire.' Hugo's face warmed, the deep frown lifted. 'Our son will be born in April,' Alys said with unshaken confidence. 'I am glad it is this way, Hugo. The first time we were lovers it was not good. You had lain with Catherine and you went back to her bed. Our son could only be conceived when you lay with me heart and soul. And I only want a son conceived in my passion.'

  Hugo drew her to him. 'And you think it is a son?' he asked.

  Alys nodded. 'I know it is a son,' she said. 'He will be born when the strongest Iambs are born, when the weather is good. He will be born in your grand new house if you make haste and build me a beautiful chamber with wood panelling and big bright windows. Build me a room which overlooks the river where I can have sunshine all day, and I will give you a son that will be the best of both of us. Your courage and my skills. Think of a lord who could play with magic, Hugo! He could rise and rise until he was the greatest lord in all the land.'

  He tightened his grip on her. 'What a boy he would be!' he said.

  Alys smiled up at him. 'How high he could go!' she said. 'And the daughter who will come next – think who her husband could be, Hugo! How high our family could rise with our noble, magical children!'

  They were silent for a moment. Alys could see the ambition in Hugo's face. He and his father had craved sons, but this reign had taught men the value of pretty women as pawns in the power game.

  Hugo checked himself and returned to the present. 'Never lie to me again,' he said. 'I shall feel a fool telling my father and everyone around the castle will know. I don't like to be teased by you, Alys. Don't lie to me again.'

  Alys chuckled idly. 'I promise,' she said easily. 'I needed to lie then, but I will never need to lie again. I am safe now. I am safe enough in your love, am I not? There is nothing I could do to lose your love, is that not so, Hugo?'

  He closed his arms around her and buried his face in her hair. 'That is so,' he said. 'There is nothing you could do which would lose my love.'

  'And I am your father's best companion and most trusted friend,' Alys said contentedly. 'And now I am carrying his grandson. There is nothing which can threaten me now.'

  Hugo rocked her gently, feeling her lightness, his tenderness and desire rising again.

  'Nothing can threaten you,' he said gently. 'I am here.'

  Alys put her arms around him and held him close. The breeze through the window smelled of hay and meadow flowers. She closed her eyes and smiled. 'I am safe now,' she said.

  'But don't lie to me,' Hugo said with residual resentment. 'I hate women who lie.'

  Next day was the last day of haymaking and Alys and Hugo rode out to watch them making hay in the high meadows between the moorland and the river. Half of the castle went with them, the cooks and serving-maids and lads, the soldiers, their women, the young pages and girls who worked at sewing or baking or brewing or spinning. Even the old lord came out for the day, riding a stocky old war-horse, with David, very smart in a dark velvet suit, riding beside him. A hundred people took a holiday from the castle, walking in a laughing, singing crowd across the stone bridge at the foot of the castle to the fields on the far side, and before them all rode Hugo and Alys on her new roan pony, wearing her new green gown.

  She wore her hair brushed loose, tumbling over her shoulders and down her back, trimmed with ribbons of green and gilt, in defiance of the fashion of the new modest Queen. The silver gilt glinted like real silver in the sunlight and the green ribbons flickered around her head. She wore light leather gloves for riding trimmed with green ribbons, and new tan leather boots. The roan mare which Hugo had bought cheap at the Appleby sales was quiet and Alys rode confidently, with her head up, smiling around her as if she owned the fertile fields and the singing people. When Hugo leaned over and spoke softly to her she laughed aloud as if to tell everyone that the young lord shared his secrets with her alone.

  Catherine had stayed behind with Ruth and Margery, a handful of servants, a couple of cooks and the soldiers on guard. 'She doesn't want to come,' Alys had told Hugo. 'She is too tired she says, she is always too tired for anything. It will be better without her.'

  Hugo did not hide his concern. 'She has three months before the child is born,' he said. 'If she takes to her bed now, what will she be like by October?'

  Alys had giggled. 'She will be a haystack,' she said unkindly. 'Have done, Hugo! She is tired, she wants to rest; you cannot force her to come. Sit with her in the evening when we come home and tell her all about it. It is no kindness to her to drag her out of her chamber and into the hot sunshine when she is so gross and weary.'

  It was the last hayfield to be cut of the demesne and Hugo was to cut the last swathe. They had left a narrow strip of pale green grass standing, ready for Hugo to come and scythe it down. The party from the castle scattered around the edges of the field, the serving-girls and lads started spreading cloths and unpacking big jugs of ale and unwrapping loaves of bread and meat. Half a dozen musicians stood in one corner of the field, tuning their instruments for the dance, making a clamour like howling cats. The labouring men and their women had been waiting in the hot sunshine since before noon. They had cut down branches and bent them into an arbour and placed a seat inside for the old lord. He was helped down from his horse and went to sit in the shade while David scuttled around the field, missing nothing, ordering everything for the feast.

  They had a scythe ready sharpened for Hugo, and the bailiff who had ordered and overseen the haymaking was * dressed in his best, his wife beside him, ready to hand the scythe to the young lord. Hugo jumped down from the saddle and threw his reins to a page-boy. Then he turned and helped Alys down. Hand in hand they went towards the farmer and his wife; Alys kicked at the long piles of cut grass, sniffing at the sweet, heady smell of the meadow flowers and the new-mown hay. Her new green gown rustled pleasantly over the stubble. Alys raised her head to the sunshine and strode out as if she owned the field.

  'Samuel Norton!' Hugo said pleasantly as they drew close. The bailiff pulled off his hat and bowed low. His wife dropped down in a weighty curtsey. When she came up her face was white, she did not look at Alys.

  'A good crop of hay!' Hugo said pleasantly. 'A grand hay crop this year. You will keep my horses in good heart for many winter nights, Norton!'

  The man mumbled something. Alys stepped forward to hear what he was saying. As she did so the woman flinched backwards in an involuntary, unstoppable movement.

  Alys checked herself. 'What's the matter?' she asked the woman directly.

  The farmer flushed and blustered. 'My wife's not well,' he said. 'She would insist on coming. She wanted to see you, my lord, and the Lady Cath…' he broke off. 'She's not well,' he said feebly.

  The woman curtsied again and started to step backwards, her Sunday-best gown brushing the cut hay, picking up seed heads.

  'What's this?' Hugo asked carelessly. 'You ill, Good-wife Norton?'

  The woman was white-faced, she opened her mouth to reply but she could not speak. She looked from her husband to Hugo. She never once glanced at Alys.

  'Forgive her,' Farmer Norton said hurriedly. 'She's ill you know, women's time, women's fancies. All madness in the blood. You know how women are, my lord. And she wanted to see the Lady Catherine. We did not expect…'

  Hugo's bright cheerfulness was dimming rapidly. 'Did not expect what?' he demanded ominously.

  'Nothing, nothing, my lord,' Farmer Norton said anxiously. 'We mean no offence. My wife has a present for the Lady Catherine – some lucky charm or women's nonsense. She hoped to see her, to give it to her. Nothing more.' ‘I will g