What Bianca said to Hella when she dragged her outside that morning in Montreux is still unknown to him. She has resolutely refused to answer his questions. From watching her rule over the Jackdaw tavern on Bankside, he suspects it will have been blood-curdling. He admires that resolve in her – her determination to protect those she loves. He thinks that to be on the receiving end of it would be terrifying.
The last exchange between them on the matter occurred during a rest halt earlier in the day. While strange, matted beasts with curving horns watched them with disinterest from the crags, and Hella was picking mountain flowers some way off, Nicholas had said, out of the blue, ‘That morning – when I was abed – I’m sure she meant nothing improper. It was sisterly, that’s all. I think, underneath, she is frightened. She has no one else to turn to but us.’
Bianca had refused to meet his eye. Instead she had replied tautly, ‘Why is it men can be so blind, even when the sun shines brightly?’ Then she had turned away from him, to tell him she had no need of any answer he might think of making.
The chill between Bianca and Hella is now mirrored by the cold air of the mountains. For weeks they have been travelling under a hot sun, always grateful for a summer shower to wash the dust from their faces and refresh their parched throats. Now they could be back on Bankside in the chill of a late-autumn day. Nicholas is thankful that he took advice and purchased cloaks of coarsely woven kersey before leaving Montreux.
For Bianca, the low moaning of the wind is a permanent accompaniment to a voice she seems unable to banish from her head for longer than an hour or so. I understand why you’re distraught, Mistress. But I am the last person you should blame… now that you are with child.
How can the maid possibly know? Is it another of the tricks she plays – nothing but a wild guess aimed at unsettling the mind? Bianca does not feel as though she is pregnant. She has been called upon enough times – to mix the distillations, syrups and tinctures that ease the travails that come with pregnancy – to know the signs. And even if Hella is correct, her longing for a child with Nicholas has somehow suddenly faltered. What manner of creature would it be, if it has been conjured by someone else’s will, someone with a longing for death and judgement? The idea that Hella can influence her body fills Bianca with dread. She reminds herself that the maid is a fraud. She cannot allow herself to think otherwise. But when she glances at Hella driving herself ever onwards, the mountain chill is not the only thing that threatens to freeze her blood.
Bianca Merton is not alone in trying to read another’s face at this moment. Because her Ned was born with a face to put the fear of God into his enemies – Rose sometimes likes to imagine that he popped out of the womb complete with his scowling, fiery complexion and bushy auburn beard – it has taken her a while to learn how to read its more complex emotions. But she is adept at it now, and she knows Ned is keeping something from her. Witness the way he changes the subject about what occurred between him and Sir Fulke Vaesy, when he went across the river without telling her and procured the treasured letter exonerating Master Nicholas.
Where, she wonders, is the joy in him now? Why isn’t he dancing a happy measure at the prospect of Master Nicholas’s and Mistress Bianca’s return? Why did he sound so low-key when she finally prised out of him the few details he seemed prepared to vouchsafe to her? Yes, Vaesy had written the letter voluntarily. No, Ned hadn’t forced the quill into his trembling hand after beating him half-senseless. The letter is obtained. It is what they needed. It has been passed to Lord Lumley for presentation to the Privy Council, and if they won’t act upon it, then to the queen herself. There’s little more to be said.
So why does he lie so still when he rolls over in their bed at night? Why does he wake in the small hours and pace their chamber like a caged bear when he thinks she’s still asleep?
Where the track levels a little, close to a tumbling stream that fills a black rockpool, Nicholas calls a halt. While Bianca wraps her cloak about her for warmth and seeks a little slumber on a bed of moss, Nicholas leads the mules to drink. He waits while they take their fill, staring tiredly into the mirror of the pool.
‘Why are you letting her lead you somewhere you don’t want to go?’ Hella Maas’s reflection says.
Torn from his musings, he turns to her. ‘When have I said I did not wish to go to Padua?’
‘You haven’t. But I have sensed for some time that you are not sure in your heart it is truly what you want.’
‘It is not my home; that, I confess. And Bianca fled it several years past. But I have always thought the day might come when she would wish to return. And why should I not follow her? She is my wife and, for the present, Padua is as safe for us as anywhere.’
‘My sister Hannie thought Breda was safe. But I knew differently. I was warned. I should have spoken louder.’
‘Are you trying to warn me that Padua is unsafe?’
‘Nowhere is safe, Nicholas; Breda, Padua, this very spot…’
He gives a sad, compassionate shake of his head. ‘You couldn’t have known what was to happen in Breda, Hella. You are not to blame for what the Spanish did there, any more than these mountains are.’
In the mirror-glass of the pool, her face contorts into ugliness. ‘But I am. I knew.’
‘How?’
‘Because I can read the signs. Remember, I was born when a new, bright star blazed in the night sky and men of learning scratched their heads in wonder at it. Many said it was a portent. And ever since I can remember, I have known when bad things were about to happen. I could see it in the fall of the numbers when my father played cards with my mother; in the harvests that failed; in the villages that emptied when the wool trade with England fell off; when the great winds came, when the rivers flooded, when the stars with long tails appeared in the sky. All these things are God’s warnings to us. Why will some people not see what is so clearly visible?’
‘If Padua is unsafe, Hella, then so is Rome. So is anywhere you choose to go. In which case, why did you come with us? Why not stay in Brabant?’
‘You know why – because eventually they would have burned me as a sorceress. And because I wanted to be with you, Nicholas.’
He glances to where Bianca is sleeping on the moss, then back to Hella. A stab of alarm courses through him. ‘Me? Why me?’
‘Because we are the two poles of the same star. We have been in company a long time now, and I have heard you say how you mistrust the knowledge of medicine that you learned from ancient books and old professors – how it may harm as well as cure. I know you blame it for the death of your first wife and her child.’
Nicholas has to stop himself from shouting, lest he wakes Bianca. ‘You’re wrong! I seek better knowledge – knowledge that can be trusted to save lives. You believe only that it will end them. I am not the other pole on this meridian of death you have set around yourself, Hella. I want no part of it. Unlike you, I have no idea what the future will hold. I don’t much care – just as long as it has Bianca in it.’
Hella’s face is as cold as the mountains now, twisted half in fear, half in unbearable sorrow. ‘But you saw what was coming, in the painting of the Day of Judgement. How can you deny it?’
‘It was one man’s imagination! It was nothing but a nightmare retold in paint and pigment.’