“You are all so very good,” she said, hiccupping.
“You cannot eat if you are crying,” Lady Avicia said matter-of-factly, and the newly created widow meekly swallowed her tears, and a goodly portion of lamb.
After supper, Chandra fidgeted about in her bedchamber, waiting for her husband. She had finally left Lady Faye in Mary’s capable hands.
“You will wear out Mother’s new carpets,” Jerval said as he came into the room.
“Oh, good, you are here. Jerval, I must speak to you. It is very important. Now.”
“I must needs speak to you as well. I believe this is yours, Chandra.” He pulled a foot-long plaited rope of golden hair from his tunic and tossed it to her. She caught it and stared at the dusty hair.
“He was wearing it braided around his wrist—like a gallant knight with his lady’s favor.”
“It is my hair,” she said. “My hair—he was wearing it? That is ridiculous. It is no favor.”
Jerval walked slowly to her, stopping only inches away. “Listen to me. Durwald was a vicious animal. Had he escaped with you, there would have been no ransom. He would have kept you and raped you until you were dead or wounded deeply, like Lady Faye. He would have broken you, Chandra, doubt it not.”
“Just like poor Faye? Aye, you’re right. God, what you men do to women. You didn’t see all the bruises. She is only twenty-seven years old, Jerval.” She was trembling, so angry that she blurted out, “And like Mary? Mary is pregnant, raped by another one of you animals! And none of it her fault either!”
Jerval stared at her silently for a long moment. He said finally, “By the virgin, the child is Graelam de Moreton’s?”
“I didn’t mean to tell you like that. I meant to speak slowly, in a very reasoned manner. Oh, damn. There is no hope for it now. Yes, Graelam raped her, you know that. Now she is pregnant, and she doesn’t know what to do. It wasn’t her fault, but now she will be damned. Please, we must do something. I just don’t know what.”
She was over three months gone with child. He cursed softly. “I can see that you are greatly disturbed by this. So am I. Don’t worry. I will take care of the matter.”
“Just like that?” She snapped her fingers. “I know that you are very kind, that your mind works wondrously well, but what is it you will do? Come, tell me.”
But he was gone.
CHAPTER 20
Lord Hugh bellowed to the nearly eighty people in the Great Hall of Camberley, “Oldham needs a master who will not cheat its people, and who will rebuild its defenses. Sir Mark of Oldham. Ah, I like the sound of it. Come forward, Mark.”
Malton laughed at the stunned look on Mark’s face. “Go ahead,” he said, poking Mark in his ribs, “leap for joy.”
Mark just couldn’t believe it, but it was true—it really w
as true. He was now a landed knight. Lord Hugh wouldn’t lie about that. Absolute euphoria filled him.
“Will you, Sir Mark of Oldham, swear fealty to your overlord?”
A cheer went up from the men-at-arms. Mark, who didn’t think there were any words in his head that could make their way out of his mouth, did not have to answer until the noise died down. He walked slowly to Lord Hugh, who sat in his grand chair, his left hand on his boarhound’s head, Jerval standing beside him. Jerval was grinning at him from ear to ear.
Then Mark threw back his head and said, loud and strong, “I swear upon my honor and my life to be your loyal vassal, Lord Hugh.” He could have well understood if he had been appointed castellan of Oldham, but now he was the master of Oldham, and no longer a landless knight in the service of another. When Jerval asked to speak to him privately later that evening, Mark was still both bewildered and elated at his good fortune.
“I have a favor to ask of you, Mark.”
“I would hesitate to cut off my arm,” Mark said, that foolish, happy smile of his widening even more, “but anything else I will seriously consider—”
“Oldham will need a mistress, and if you have no strong objection to the lady, I would offer you Mary.”
Now this was a blow to the belly. Mark said slowly, “That makes a man serious very quickly. I suppose you have seen that I believe her comely and gentle, that I know she is honest and open, and she smiles at my jests. Perhaps I would have come to this myself, but I doubt it, being a landless knight with nothing at all to offer a wife. No, I would have had no right to ask her to wed me. But now—well, it is all different now, isn’t it?”
“Yes, things are different now. I know that her father, Sir Stephen, will provide her a sufficient dowry. As I said, Oldham will need a mistress.”
“She is a woman grown,” Mark said even more slowly now, looking past his friend’s right shoulder. Then he shrugged and smiled. “It is just that you have taken me by surprise. I had not thought of marriage. And now it is staring me in the face. Ah, Jerval, Mary is also an innocent babe.”
“Have you wondered why she accompanied Chandra to Camberley?”