But I had not died. Instead I had reawakened into, as the earl had put it, a world turned upside down.
Nothing was as it should be. All was false.
So false.
In the morning, I woke with Evelyn, and demanded she help me dress. She did as I asked, as she had since last night. Everything I asked, she did without question.
Everything felt false with her, now, too.
‘I want to go to the chapel,’ I said, as soon as I was dressed.
I did not stand, for fear I would wobble alarmingly. My head swayed with lack of sleep and weakness, but more than anything I wanted, needed, to go to the chapel.
I wanted to see where the earl had interred Stephen. Maybe there I might find some truth.
‘But you are so weak,’ Evelyn said. She hesitated at the end of that sentence, as if she had wanted to add either ‘Maeb’, or ‘my lady’. But neither suited. Both of us were lost in some halfway land of indecision. ‘You cannot walk.’
Now even our friendship was blighted.
‘Then find me a strong man, if any should remain within the castle, and he can carry me there.’
Evelyn hesitated, then gave a nod and left. Within a short while she had returned with Taillebois.
I suppose she felt that a common soldier would not suffice, now.
I did not know Taillebois well, for he had come to the castle after the plague, at the earl’s request, to replace Walter Giffard, who had died in the first onslaught of the sickness. But he seemed a gentle enough man and there was no hesitation in his manner with me, as there was from Evelyn. He knew little of me, save that I was to be his lady, so I had never been to him the least of Lady Adelie’s women, now to be elevated to a pinnacle unimaginable to those about her.
‘My lady,’ he said, without any indecision in either word or manner, and swung me into his arms.
We moved toward the stairwell, Evelyn hurrying behind with a warm wrap for me.
The chapel was cold and dim. Outside was summer, all sun and blowsy warm air.
Inside the chapel I could still sense the death, if not smell its stink or forced to endure its shrieks.
Owain emerged as if he had been waiting, carrying a chair, his eyebrow raised as he asked wordlessly where I wanted it.
‘At Stephen’s grave,’ I said, and he placed it by the heartstone in the centre of the nave.
Taillebois set me into it gently, then stood back a pace, waiting to be dismissed.
I felt comfortable with him, whereas with everyone else …
‘Thank you,’ I said to Taillebois, and he inclined his head and was gone. I took the wrap from Evelyn, thanking her as well.
After a hesitation she, too, left.
‘Would you like to be left alone, Maeb?’ Owain said, and I nodded, already choking with emotion as I looked at the stone that marked Stephen’s grave.
It did look as though it had been moved recently. The earth was a little crumbly about its edges, and I fancied it had a slight incline to the north as it settled.
Settled over Stephen’s corpse.
There was now script on the stone, too, freshly chiselled. I could not read it, but I supposed that it gave Stephen’s name and some prayer for his soul.
I sat there by Stephen’s grave and wept. I wept for him and for me. I wept for everything lost, life and death both. I wish I had died with him. Mostly, I wept for Stephen.
Sobs wracked my frame, and I clutched the arms of the chair that I would not fall from its embrace. I felt the unfairness of life and of God’s will, that Stephen should have died.
What was this world without him in it? He was such a tragic loss, not merely to me, or the earl, but to the realm.
Everything was wrong with my world, nothing right. The greatest injustice was the fact that I had survived when it should have been Stephen, it should have been Stephen … people needed Stephen, not me. He’d had such a bright, golden future.
I sobbed until I had nothing left to give. I do not know how long I sat there, but I know it was a long, long time. Eventually, I leaned back in the chair, drying my tears with the back of one shaking hand, still hiccupping a little with grief.
‘Owain?’
He was by my side instantly, and I wondered if he had been hovering in the shadows all this time.
‘Drink this, Maeb.’ He held out a pewter cup.
I took it, and sniffed a little suspiciously. ‘It is but honeyed wine,’ Owain said, ‘mixed with some spices. It will warm you, and give you comfort.’
Comfort. I clung to the word as I drank the wine, soon enough handing the empty cup back to Owain.
‘My world has vanished, Owain.’
‘I know.’
‘The earl has demanded I become his wife.’
‘I have heard of that.’
‘Why, Owain? I cannot possibly understand why he would want to do this. Does he want to punish me? He knows of Stephen’s death, and those of Rosamund and John, and my part in them. He asked me to tell him of them, but he knew beforehand.’
I waited for the I know, but all I received was silence.
‘How did he know, Owain?’
‘He asked me how they died, Maeb. I told him.’
I was so angry I hit the chair with my closed fist. ‘How could you have done that! How —’
‘He needed the comfort, Maeb. He needed to know they had died well. Better than they might have done.’
‘But Stephen …’
‘Stephen was going to die anyway. It was better that he died by your hand, than the flames of the plague. The earl is angry, but not with you.’
‘I committed great sin,’ I said. ‘Not in the earl’s eyes.’
The earl would not be my judge after my death, I thought. ‘Owain, I survived. Stephen might have, too. What I did … he might have survived if I had not … if I had not …’
‘Maeb, do not torture yourself. From what I know of the plague, then yes, he likely would have died horribly if you had not acted. You did what you thought was right and what he begged of you. You were sick nigh unto death yourself. What happened, happened.’
What happened, happened. What a damning thing to say of my actions. Stephen may have survived if I had not killed him.
‘I survived!’
‘You were strong, Maeb. Please, do not resent the fact that you survived and Stephen did not. Do not bear guilt about it. He would not want it.’
I stared at him, then sighed. ‘I feel so alone, Owain. Stephen is gone. Lady Adelie. The children. My entire purpose for life has gone. But yet now the earl thinks we should wed. Owain, why should the earl wish to marry me?’
Owain smiled. ‘He needs a wife, and you are young. You will be healthy again and you are lovely of feature. If I were to be honest, then I would say that I am not at all surprised the earl wants to wed you.’
‘And yet I have no title nor rank nor alliance nor estates. The earl, as any nobleman, values these far more than a pretty face.’
Owain gave a tilt of his head, which might have meant anything.
‘Everything feels false, Owain.’
‘That feeling will pass.’
‘I cannot be a countess. I do not know how. I cannot be Lady Adelie.’
‘If the earl had wanted Lady Adelie he would have disinterred her corpse and set it in her chair at high table.’
‘Do not jest, Owain!’ For a moment I had a vision of that blackened horror seated in a chair at the high table, and it sickened me.
‘I am sorry, my lady.’
Why ‘my lady’ now when a moment ago I had been but ‘Maeb’?
‘What am I to do, Owain?’
‘Accept what lies before you. The earl means you no harm. He is an angry man, but none of that is your fault. He sees his world destroyed, and rails against the injustice. He would not suggest you stand by his side if he did not think you were worthy.’
‘How can I be worthy, Owain?’
‘You have strength and spirit. Yo
u survived what killed most others. Take what he offers, Maeb, and have the courage to see where it leads.’
I will fail, I thought. I cannot be a countess.
‘You will be a great countess,’ Owain said. ‘Stephen saw it in you. I see it in you. The earl sees it in you.’
‘Evelyn thinks the world has gone mad and I elevated beyond comprehension.’
Owain gave a soft chuckle. ‘Evelyn is a good woman, but she cannot see beyond yesterday.’
I looked at Stephen’s grave, remembering that he had said that I would survive the plague, and wed a great man, and love him dear. And so it would come to pass, although I could not imagine loving the earl dear. But remembering those words made me feel as though Stephen had blessed this marriage, and that he would have wanted me to accept it and move on with my life.
He had also said that I should confess to Owain, and do penance. If I did that, then maybe I could clear my conscience.
Stephen was dead and gone. The plague and all that had happened was in my past. I would move forward.
I sighed. ‘Will you take my confession, Owain? I cannot step into tomorrow without unburdening myself of my sins to God. Absolve me of my sins, I beg you. And then lend me your arm, for I think my legs might now, with some help, carry me back to the solar.’
‘Good,’ he said.
Chapter Five
The visit to the chapel to Stephen’s grave, and my talk with Owain, marked a turning point in my life. Before I had been a girl, uncertain, always ready to take a step backward. Now I was a woman and I would step forward into the future with some degree of acceptance, if not confidence.
Once Owain had escorted me to the solar, I instructed Evelyn to ask two of the servants to move our bed from the corner of the solar, where it had rested ever since my first arrival at Pengraic, to the chamber in the women’s dormitory that had formerly been that of the nurse and younger children. I was tired from the visit to the chapel and the painfully slow trip back to the solar, but I needed to do this. A low-ranked attending woman might cringe in a bed in the corner of the solar, a soon-to-be-countess did not.
I was also determined to regain my full strength quickly. If I was in the solar, then I would take my place by the fire, not hide away in a corner. If I needed rest, then I would retire to my chamber.
This day also marked a change in my relationship with Evelyn. We were still friends, but the balance of power had changed between us. Formerly it was Evelyn who led, now it was me, and there was distance between us, too, where once there had been none. I would shortly become countess, a rank far beyond Evelyn’s, and that difference in rank would always leave its shadow on our friendship.
This was all very ironic, considering all the advice and warnings Evelyn had once given me regarding Stephen.
But I could not dwell on that, or leave room for regrets. This was tomorrow, not yesterday.
Once our new chamber had been scrubbed out, our bed installed, and all the clothes and toys and fuss of the children tucked away in a large chest and sent down to the underground storage chambers, Evelyn and I went through the fabrics she’d had brought up from below.
They took my breath away. There were fine linens meant for chemises (and the very finest for veils), bleached so white they almost gleamed in my hands, many of them already embroidered in intricate designs using white or cream wools. There were bolts of woollen cloths, some fine weave for summer and some heavy for winter. Some of these, too, were heavily embroidered. But what truly amazed me were the silks; rare, costly bolts of fabrics which must have come from far, far away … I could almost smell the spiced air of their homelands on them. Some of the silks were vividly coloured — saffrons, vermilions, azure — others were of delicate pastels. I touched them in wonder and dared to imagine myself clothed in their glory.
As well as the bolts of textiles there were girdles, ribbons, beads, threads of every hue including heavy, gilded gold, and small delicate flowers, leaves and fruits made of wax.
‘There is so much,’ I said.
‘My lord earl had many daughters he needed dowry and marriage clothes for,’ Evelyn remarked.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘now I shall take them as my marriage clothes as it is my lord’s wish. But I cannot believe Lady Adelie did not make more use of these treasures.’
‘She was of simple taste,’ Evelyn said.
Indeed, she had been, but for a moment I wondered if Evelyn’s words contained any criticism, then I discarded the idea. There was too much else to worry about, and to do, than to dwell on what Evelyn thought.
In the end, what she thought did not matter.
I decided we needed to stitch two fine linen chemises, one good day kirtle, and one more opulent kirtle for feasts in the great hall … and betrothals. For the day kirtle I selected a light woollen scarlet fabric that we could embroider with flowered designs, and for the richer kirtle an emerald silk fabric that, together with a geometric design in the golden thread, would make a suitable kirtle for formal occasions.
Later that day, two women arrived to help with the stitching — the erstwhile wet nurse Sewenna who, together with her entire family, had survived the plague (why her family, and not that of the earl’s?), and a woman named Tilla from the village of Crickhoel below the castle.
In truth, I felt a little guilty that these women had left their families at a time when every able-bodied pair of hands was needed to help with harvest. But at the same time I refused to stand before the earl and witnesses for my betrothal in my old, worn kirtle that stank of death and disaster and subservience.
By the late afternoon the four of us had cut out the fabric for both chemises and kirtles to suit my newer, thinner frame and had begun the stitching. We worked through to evening, our work interrupted only by the occasional visit of Sewenna’s older son bringing his mother her baby to suckle and by a light supper sent to us on Taillebois’ instruction.
I rested comfortably that night, and in the morning dressed, prayed, broke my fast, then told Evelyn that I would take my stitching to the solar for the day.
When I entered the solar the earl was seated under a window with d’Avranches and a knight I did not recognise — he must have recently ridden in. The three of them were poring over large parchments; maps, I thought, by those lines I could see.
I greeted them, dipping in courtesy, and then took a chair by the fireplace — which was alight even on this summer’s day to take the chill from the large, stone-walled chamber — where the light from a second window fell over my shoulder. I had my stitching with me, but it was not for either chemise or kirtle. If I was to be betrothed shortly, then I would need a gift for my contracted husband. It was not strictly necessary, and under the circumstances, because of the recent plague disaster at the castle, its lack would surely be overlooked, but the earl had said he would settle some manors on me for my jointure and I wanted, very much, to be able to gift him something. It could be nothing of the value of manors, but it would be a gift, and its symbolic value greater, I hoped, than its fiscal value. It would enable me to hold my head high on my betrothal day.
I trusted he would like it, and not be disappointed.
The men resumed their conversation once I was settled, the recently arrived knight talking the most, and occasionally pointing to the map. I was desperately curious — what were they discussing? Army movements? Brigands? What was being planned? Snatches of conversation reached me, names of towns and manors, and at times the earl asked a sharp question of the knight, who invariably responded by pointing at the map.
I kept my eyes on my stitching, but bit by bit tilted my body toward the group of men, my curiosity insatiable.
‘Maeb.’
I looked up. The earl was gazing at me. ‘If you are so curious, then come see.’
I thought about protesting that my stitching was more important. In the event, I merely rose, laid the stitching to one side, and walked over.
‘This is Gilbert Ghent,’ the earl said,
‘recently arrived from the southeast. He is one of the senior knights of my household.’
I inclined my head and smiled at him in greeting, as he did likewise. He was a good-looking man, aristocratic, but with a face I liked and trusted immediately.
‘Sir Gilbert, does the south-east still burn? The last I heard the plague raged there with such ferocity that all life lay in its grip.’
‘My lady,’ Ghent said, and I wondered that the honorific now felt almost familiar to me, ‘the plague has loosened its grip on the south-east of England. Perhaps there is little flesh left to feed it, or mayhap, now that the summer draws on, the plague begins to lose its strength as do most plagues.’
‘We hope it will die down completely over winter,’ the earl said, ‘and give us some time to recover and plan for its probable resurgence next spring. We were discussing what parts of England still lie in the plague’s grip, and which are free.’
I leaned over d’Avranches’ shoulder, looking at the map. ‘This represents England?’ I had never seen a map before.
‘Aye,’ said d’Avranches. ‘See, here the coastline, and see here these little triangles … they represent the mountains of this realm; these wobbly lines are the rivers, and here named the towns and cities.’
‘Where are we now?’ I said. ‘Where is Pengraic Castle?’
‘Here,’ d’Avranches said, one finger stabbing down onto the map. He pointed out London, and Glowecestre, and Oxeneford, and I slowly grasped how the map depicted in representative form the whole of the realm of England.
‘It is amazing,’ I said, somewhat awed, ‘and useful.’
‘Aye,’ said the earl. ‘I shall have to keep it hid from you, Maeb, lest you use it to plot your conquest of Edmond’s realm.’
I glanced at him, worried that he was angry, but to my surprise I saw amusement in his eyes. That amusement deepened as he recognised my startlement.
‘I think my lady need only appear at Edmond’s court,’ Ghent said gallantly, ‘to conquer his realm.’
Suddenly the amusement faded from the earl’s face, replaced with a flash of irritation.