Novels 03 The Wise Woman Read online

  “Pull it down at the front,” he ordered. “And pull the sleeves down.”

  Alys pulled the stomacher down at her waist. It was too long for her as well, stopping at the swell of her hips and with the sharply pointed V at the front extending too low. It held her stiffly so that her breasts were flattened into one smooth line from the rich swirl of the skirt to the square neck of the gown which showed at the top of the stomacher. She tugged the oversleeves on both sides. They were long and sweeping, folded back to show the undersleeves like rich slashed pouches beneath him. David nodded.

  “And the girdle goes loosely over the top,” he said. Alys fastened the silver girdle and straightened it so the long end fell down in front, enhancing the narrowness of her waist and the pointed line of the bodice, subtly suggesting the desirable triangle at the top of her thighs. She ran her hand over her cropped head where her growing hair was golden and stubbly.

  David nodded. “A sweeter honey even than Meg,” he said to himself. “Who will stick his tongue in this pot?”

  Alys ignored him. “Is there nothing to hide my head?”

  The dwarf rummaged in the chest for a few moments. “Nothing you could wear without hair to pin it on,” he said. “You’d best go bareheaded.”

  Alys grimaced. “I suppose no one will look at me,” she said.

  “They’ll look at nothing else!” he said with malicious satisfaction. “Half of them think you’re a holy healer, and the other half think you’re his whore. And the young lord…” his voice trailed off.

  “What?” asked Alys. “What of the young lord?”

  “He’s got a keen eye for a pretty wench,” the dwarf said simply. “And besides, he’s got a score to settle with you. If the old lord had died he could have taken himself to the king’s court, put aside that shrew he wed, and made his way in the great world. He’ll not thank you for that.”

  “The shrew? His wife?” Alys asked.

  The dwarf motioned her to follow him through the door and then led her down the twisting stone staircase. As she passed an arrow-slit window Alys breathed in the cold wind which blew from the wintry moorland to the west of them, over the River Tees. It smelled of her home, of her childhood. For a moment she even longed for the little hovel by the river with the moor quiet all around it.

  The dwarf grinned. “She complains of him to the old lord,” he said. “I’ve been there, I’ve heard her. Lord Hugo won’t come to her bed, or he won’t use her kindly. One time she angered him so that he beat her favorite waiting-woman before her. Too proud to touch his lady, but a temper on him that would scare the devil! The old lord used to keep Hugo on a short leash but after nine years they’re both weary of the shrew. He used to watch that the young lord didn’t abuse her over-much, and kept her supplied with trinkets and perfumes, little sweeteners for her vinegar. But she has called down a storm on them both too often, they both long to be rid of her.”

  “They can’t do that, can they?” Alys asked, frowning.

  David shrugged. “Who knows what can be done now?” he asked. “The Church is ruled by the king now, not the vicar of Rome. The king does as he pleases with his women. Why not the young lord? The rightful wife stays barren, but if they dismiss her they lose her entailed lands and her dowry. And in all of Hugo’s roistering he’s never got a wench with child. So the shrew stays here until they can think of a way to be rid of her and yet keep her wealth.”

  “How?” Alys asked.

  “If she were taken in adultery,” David said in a whisper. “Or died.”

  There was a cold silence around them as they went through the empty guardroom, and down the flight of steps to the entrance of the great hall.

  “And she?” Alys asked.

  David hawked and spat disdainfully. “She’d do anything to take the young lord’s fancy,” he said. “She’d do anything to creep into his bed. She’s a passionate woman gone sour, a lustful woman on short commons. There’s nothing she would not do for the young lord. I’ve heard her women talk.

  “She’s praying every day for an heir to make her place secure. She prays every day for the young lord to turn to her and give her a son. She prays every day for the old lord to cleave to her cause, not to take up the new ways of setting aside wives as lightly as changing hunters. And she’s hot for Hugo.” He paused. “All the women are,” he said.

  “And he,” Alys began. “Does he…”

  “Sshh,” the dwarf said abruptly. He glanced over his shoulder to see that Alys was ready and at her nod he pushed open one of the thick wooden doors at the side of the great hall.

  Chapter

  4

  The great hall was a high arched chamber, dark with only arrow-slit windows high up in the thick stone walls. A massive fire was burning against the east wall, great trunks of trees flung pell-mell and blazing, the smoke filling the room, smuts and light white ash dancing in the air. Beside Alys, to her left on a raised dais, was a long table with three empty high-backed carved chairs behind it, facing the room. Down the length of the room ran four long tables and benches, soldiers and guards seated in the best places at the dais end of the hall; the servants, scullions, and women struggled for places nearest the south door.

  The place was in uproar: three or four dogs were fighting by the east wall, the soldiers were hammering on the table and yelling for bread and ale, the servants were shouting to be heard above the noise. In the brackets on the walls there were burning torches, and as Alys watched a well-dressed young man stepped up to the lord’s table and lowered a fine candelabra from a candle-beam and lit sconces of pale golden wax candles.

  David the dwarf nudged Alys in the ribs. “You will sit in the body of the hall,” he said. “Come on, I’ll find you a place.” He led the way, with his rolling, half-lame stride, between the tables. But before he could seat Alys at an empty place there was a ripple of excitement in the hall. David turned around and tapped Alys’s arm, directing her attention to the high table. “Now you watch!” he said triumphantly. “You see the welcome he gets, my Lord Hugh! You see!”

  The tapestry behind the table on the dais was drawn back, the little arched door opened, and Lord Hugh stepped through and took his place in the great carved chair at the plumb center of the table. There was a moment’s surprised silence and then suddenly there was a great roar of delight as the soldiers and servants cheered and hammered the table with their knives and drummed their boots against the benches.

  Alys smiled at the welcome, and saw how the old lord nodded his bony head in one direction and then in another. He looks well, she thought. After nearly a week of seeing him as an invalid, in the cramped room of the tower, she was surprised to see him now as the lord at his own table. He had flushed a little, with the heat and with pleasure at his howling, yelling welcome. I cured him! Alys thought, with sudden, surprised pleasure. I cured him! They left him for dead but I cured him. Hidden by her drooping sleeves she stretched out her hands, feeling her power flow through her, down to her fingertips.

  Alys had cured people before, vagrants and sick paupers in the infirmary, farmers in their heavy beds, peasants on pallets. But the old lord was the first man she had made well and seen rise up and take his power, great power. And I did that! Alys said to herself. I had the skill to cure him. I made him well.

  She looked at him, smiling at the thought, and then the curtain behind him moved again and the young Lord Hugo came into the hall.

  He was as tall as his father, with his father’s sharp bony face. He had his father’s black piercing eyes too, and his beaky nose. There were deep lines either side of his mouth, and two lines at the roots of his eyebrows like a permanent scowl. But then someone shouted, “Holloa! Hugo!” from the benches and his face suddenly lit up as if someone had put a brand to a haystack, in the merriest, most joyful smile. Alys said, “Mother of God!”

  “What is it?” David said, shooting a look at her. “Have you the Sight? Have you seen something?”

  “No,” Alys said