Earth Song (Medieval Song 3)

He turned back to the hapless fool. “You were here, damn your ears! I want to hear what happened.”

“Oh, leave him alone,” came Philippa’s irritated voice from behind him. “The last thing I want to listen to is Crooky singing at dawn.”

Dienwald turned about and eyed her. It required all his will not to smile at her. It took him only a few moments more to tamp down on the wild relief he felt upon seeing her whole and ill-tempered. “ ‘Tis about time you deign to come to me,” he said. “You look like a snabbly hag.”

Actually, she looked tousled and soft and very, very sweet. He eased back into his chair, stretching out his legs in front of him, folding his hands over his chest. He’d fetched her another old gown worn by his first wife, this one a pale gray, frayed and baggy. It stopped a good three inches above her ankles.

“Thank you for the gown. There is no overtunic?”

“I didn’t even have the chance to see you in the other gown I gave you. This one doesn’t fit you at all, but there was nothing else. And don’t whine. Why haven’t you yet sewn yourself a new gown and overtunic?”

“I should have,” she said, wanting to kick him. He’d touched her and caressed her and kissed her, then left her to find himself another female vessel. And now he was baiting her and insulting her. But she also remembered how he’d laid his head on her stomach and told her how he’d been afraid when he’d heard what had happened. Had she dreamed that? He didn’t seem at all concerned about her this morning, just bad-tempered. She raised her chin. “I think I shall begin immediately.” She picked up a piece of bread and begin to chew it with enraging indifference.

“Tell me what happened, wench. Now.”

She chanced to look down at her wrists. They were bruised and raw but there wasn’t much pain now.

Dienwald hadn’t yet noticed her wrists; now he did, and sucked in his breath. His irritation rose to alarming heights. “I don’t believe this,” he bellowed at her. “I leave my keep, and look what happens. Have Margot wrap up your wrists.” He added several lurid curses, then sat back, closing his eyes. “Tell me what happened whilst I was gone.”

Philippa looked at him closely, decided he’d calmed himself sufficiently, and said, “Not all that much happened at the beginning. We spun nearly all the wool into cloth, and now we’ve gotten most of it dyed. The sewing has begun, just yesterday. Oh, just one small happening out of the ordinary—Gorkel had to break your steward’s neck, but Alain deserved it. I have determined that yo

u are the most pious of saints when compared to the loathsome departed Alain.”

“I see. Now, before I take you to my chamber and thrash you, you will tell me why my loathsome steward wanted you dead.”

Philippa just shrugged. She knew it infuriated him, and, unable to stop herself, she shrugged again.

He rose swiftly from his chair, walked to her and grabbed her beneath the arms, and lifted her off the bench. He held her eye-to-eye. “Tell me what happened, else you’ll be very sorry.”

“What will you do? Will you continue what you did to me in my sleep during the night?”

A spasm of some emotion Philippa couldn’t identify crossed his face; then his expression was closed again. “Give over, Philippa, give over. I am weary and wish to know what happened.”

His serious voice, empty of amusement, brought her eyes open. “I’ll tell you. Put me down.”

Dienwald very slowly lowered her to her bare feet. He walked back to his chair, pressing his hand against the small of his back. “Your weight strains even my strength,” he remarked to the black-beamed ceiling, and sat down again, waving his hand at her.

She told him of what she’d found in the steward’s chamber. “I didn’t trust him, even from that first day I was here. He hated me, and there was no reason I could see. Well, my lord, he’s been cheating you all the time he’s been here, and when he held the knife to my throat in your chamber, he admitted it and insulted you and me and said he was going to kill me.”

He made a strangled sound but said nothing. Philippa, swallowing against the remembered fear, spoke in a clipped and precise voice, emotionlessly telling him of coming to in the stables, of killing one of the men with the scythe, of running into the great hall, and of Gorkel’s killing of the steward. “Alain also sent his men out to take the other wool wagon. He had the farmers killed. It was from them that he learned that I could read and write and that I’d acted as my father’s steward.”

Dienwald said nothing for a very long time. He merely looked beyond her, over her right shoulder, she thought, as she waited tensely for him to say something, anything. To show concern perhaps for her safety, as he had in the dark of the night. To tell her of his undying gratitude. To tell her that he was glad she wasn’t hurt, to tell her he was sorry it had happened. To exclaim over the perfidy of his steward. To thank her for her diligence, her concern for him and for St. Erth. To tell . . .

He exploded into her thoughts, nearly yelling, “What in the name of St. Andrew am I to do now? I have no steward because you ensured that he’d die, curse you! Poor Gorkel had no choice but to dispatch him, and ‘tis all your fault!”

Philippa stared at him, nearly choking on the piece of buttered bread in her mouth. “He was cheating you! Didn’t you attend me? He was a filthy knave! Didn’t you hear me? Don’t you care?”

Dienwald merely shrugged, causing her to leap to her feet and throw the remaining bread at his head. He ducked, but some of the sweet butter hit his cheek in a yellow streak.

“You ungrateful fool! You—”

“Enough!” Dienwald rose from his chair, wiping the butter from his face with his hand.

“I repeat, wench, what will I do for a steward?”

She stuck out her chin, squared her shoulders, and readied herself for his insults. “I will be your steward.”

It didn’t take him long to produce the insults she expected at her announcement. “You? A female? A female who has no more sense than to spy on a man and be caught and nearly butchered for her stupidity? Ha, wench, ha!”