Novels 03 The Wise Woman Read online

  Alys forced herself to stand still, her hands on Catherine’s puffy hips, while Catherine’s grip tightened around her waist and her other hand stroked the top of Alys’s breasts.

  “Do you want me for desire of me, or revenge on Hugo?” Alys asked curiously.

  “Both,” Catherine said honestly. “I will humble him as he has humbled me. I lost my child but he will lose his whore. I shall steal you away from him as if you were his best possession. I shall take you like I would poach his mare. I shall make you mine and every time I lie on you I shall have all my pleasure and his as well.” She turned toward the rumpled bed, her hand insistently pulling Alys. The sheets were stained with wax and smelled sour.

  Alys froze, hiding her disgust. “Not now,” she said quickly. “Tonight, Catherine. If I can get away from Hugo I shall come to you tonight.”

  Catherine paused and beamed. “We deceive him!” she said, laughing with delight. “Just when he thinks he has beaten me to the ground and has you as his whore. We steal away together and laugh at his pride. And we will find pleasure that Hugo in his cruelty has never dreamed of.”

  “Yes,” Alys said. “I will come tonight if I can sneak away from him. And I will come to your manor as soon as you are settled.” She kept her eyes down to hide the flare of triumph. “I promise.”

  “Do you swear on Our Lady?” Catherine asked urgently.

  Alys took the oath as lightly as a butterfly sipping nectar. “I swear.”

  Catherine reached out both arms. “I agree,” she said. “I agree, Alys. Now let me hold you again.” Her grip tightened. “Let me hold you,” she said.

  Alys stood still in Catherine’s embrace for a long tedious moment; her face, hidden from Catherine, was radiant. Then she gently stepped back.

  “You should rest,” she said. “Go back to bed and eat a good dinner. I have to go and write letters for Lord Hugh. The king’s messenger came yesterday, they will need replies today.”

  Catherine reluctantly released her. “Come to me when you are free this afternoon,” she commanded. “And we will talk about the manor-house. I will tell David to fetch me the books of accounts and we can choose our home together.”

  Alys nodded. “If I can come I will,” she temporized. “You go to bed now.”

  “I love you, Alys,” Catherine said. She looked like a little girl, climbing into the high bed. “I know you don’t love me. But when you are hurt by Hugo and banished from here, I think you will turn to me. Do you think you could love me?”

  Alys shaped her lips into a smile. “I love you already,” she said. “And I look forward to the day when we are in our manor-house together.”

  Catherine held out her arms. “Hold me again,” she said.

  Alys stepped forward, put her arms around Catherine, and let the woman rest her head on Alys’s unwelcoming shoulder. Alys drew back and pulled up the covers, tucking Catherine into bed.

  “I will tell the girl to change your bedding,” Alys said.

  Catherine beamed at her. “How you care for me, Alys!” she said gratefully. “How gentle and loving we will be together when we are far from here.”

  Alys glanced out of the arrow-slits in the tower on her way to Lord Hugh’s chamber. The high hills of the moor glowed like purple mist in the bright sunshine. The air was clear and clean as it blew gently through each arrow-slit, so Alys, hastening up the spiral stairs, went from sharp moorland air to stale castle smells as the sunlight fell briefly on her face and then left her in darkness. The white road was empty of travelers. She paused and looked carefully. There was nothing stirring the dust. Nothing.

  She breathed slowly at the final window before she went in to the old lord.

  He was wearing a light summer robe and sitting in his chair before a small fire. The room was crowded. Hugo was there and as Alys opened the door he laughed at some jest and she saw his dark head thrown back and his face merry. When he saw her he gave her a swift wink and came forward to draw her into the room. As his fingertips touched hers they both felt a tingle of last night’s desire. “Give you good day, my Alys!” Hugo said warmly.

  Behind Hugo was the priest Father Stephen, still in his traveling cloak, thinner and more intense than before. David stood beside him, holding rolls of manuscript letters.

  “Ah, Alys,” Lord Hugh said genially. “Come in, come in. Here is our own good Stephen with news of his preferment. He has been made archdeacon! You must congratulate him.”

  “Indeed I do,” Alys said prettily. She put out her hand to Stephen. “I can think of no better man for the task,” she said.

  Stephen bowed slightly over her hand. His eyes flickered from her face to her belly. He had heard gossip that Alys was carrying Hugo’s child. Now he saw that it was true.

  “I have much work to do,” the old lord said. “Stephen, you will take your old rooms? And talk with me this afternoon after dinner?”

  “Certainly, my lord,” Stephen said.

  “Come riding with me now,” Hugo said. “We can take the hounds and go up over the moor, get some meat.”

  Stephen grinned. “Still hunting, Hugo?” he said. “Always some prey or another.”

  It was a private joke. Both men grinned like schoolboys. “No preaching now,” Hugo said. “Not on your first day back with us!”

  Stephen laughed and nodded. They swirled from the room in a flurry of colored capes and David went quietly after them, shutting the door.

  Alys settled herself at the table in the window, smoothed her blue gown over her knees, turned her head and smiled.

  “You’re looking very contented,” the old lord said approvingly.

  “I have been talking with Catherine,” Alys said. “I think I have done you a service which will please you.”

  He cocked an eyebrow at her and waited.

  “If you will settle a decent-sized manor farm on her, and give her a pension, then I can persuade her to let the annulment go through without protest,” Alys said calmly. “She is ready to leave at once.”

  “Christ save us!” the old lord exclaimed. He hauled himself up on his cane and walked around his chair. “Why?” he asked. “Why should she surrender Hugo after clinging to him for all these years?”

  “She feels unclean,” Alys said. “She felt the miscarriage very deeply, she has wept without ceasing until today. She feels your anger and Hugo’s. She wants to please you and she wants to get away. She knows she is barren and she will have to go.”

  The old lord nodded. “But I always thought her so lustful,” he said. “I thought we would have to lever Hugo out of her arms.”

  Alys looked down and smiled complacently. “She is a woman of unnatural desires,” Alys said simply. “She now desires me.”

  The old lord gave a crack of laughter. “God help us!” he said. “Hugo will be mortified! She’s had his cock between her legs and she prefers the peck of a hen! Wait till I tell him! He will die of shame! Catherine will let the marriage go if she can have his whore!”

  He sobered in a few minutes. “And what of you?” he asked. “Playing both sides against the middle, as usual, I suppose?”

  Alys looked up at him. “My lord?” she asked innocently.

  “What light oaths have you pledged?” the old lord demanded. “Come now, girl, I need to know the terms, all the terms that Catherine is setting.”

  “I have promised to live with her should I ever leave here,” Alys said.

  The old lord nodded. “And she was satisfied with that? Sounds very thin to me.”

  “She thinks Hugo will take another wife from far away,” Alys said. “She does not know that I carry Hugo’s child in my belly. She is a fool. Her own worries and her own fears blind her. Not even her ladies have dared to tell her that I carry Hugo’s child. She is so selfish, so drowned in her own needs, that she does not even see me. She understands nothing. She thinks I am a passing fancy, she does not see clearly enough to see me as Hugo’s lady.”

  The old lord had turned away,