‘Suppose he marries Yolande Herevi?’
‘He won’t. I’ve told you before, even that man wouldn’t stoop to marry his concubine. Don’t thrust a stick in a wasps’ nest.’
François rubbed his red cheeks and looked dubious. ‘I’d be happier if the nest was completely burned out.’
Marie grew pale. ‘No, François.’ It was not easy for her to plead, but she reached a hand towards her son. ‘Enough is enough. Please.’
François held his mother’s gaze for a heartbeat or two. ‘If it pleases you, Maman,’ he answered off-handedly, ‘I’ll play it your way, unless circumstances should change.’
Marie’s hand fell. ‘My thanks, François, I knew you’d see reason.’
Part Two
Champions and Heroes
O God, the sea is so wide and my boat so smalclass="underline"
Be good to me.
Prayer of a Breton fisherman.
Chapter Eleven
Kermaria, two years later. Spring 1185.
Jean St Clair and his family gathered for supper in the hall, together with the men-at-arms, serving women and other members of the household. The whiff of mildew and decay had long been banished, and the scents of lavender and beeswax mingled in the air. The rushes were changed regularly; the whitewash was renewed annually. A large wall-hanging brightened the gloomy north wall. As last year’s harvest had been good, Jean had money in his coffers – terracotta tiles had been carted in from Vannes, and the hearth and fire-surround had been relaid in bold chevrons of terracotta and gold.
‘The duck smells good,’ Raymond said, hooking a stool from under the trestle with his boot. Raymond’s thick brown hair fell in tousled waves. He was unusually handsome, for not only had he inherited his mother’s fine emerald eyes, but he also had her beautiful bone structure. His muscles had filled out, and he had the ungovernable appetite of any active young man. Without waiting for his parents to choose their birds, Raymond took his knife from his belt, wiped it perfunctorily on his breeches, and speared himself a fowl. It thudded on his trencher, and an onion rolled across the table leaving a glistening trail like that of a snail.
‘Raymond, your manners!’ Yolande chastised him, smiling.
Her son flashed her an incorrigible grin and flung himself on his stool. His charm he had from his father. ‘Apologies, Mama, but I’m famished! Where’s Gwenn?’ Gwenn was his dinner partner, and she was supposed to share the food on his trencher, after the fashion of nobles in larger households. Raymond never understood why they had to affect these ridiculous manners, but to save family argument he was prepared to pay lip-service to the odd caprice of his mother’s.
‘Here I am.’ At fifteen, Gwenn remained petite and darkly pretty.
‘Hurry up, sister. Or there’ll be none left.’
There was plenty, but Gwenn took her place at her brother’s side while Raymond lunged at the sauce jug.
‘This bird suit you, Gwenn?’
‘Aye.’
‘And wine sauce?’
Already he was drowning the bird, and a dark pool of sauce seeped out under the edges of their trencher. ‘It would be too bad if it didn’t,’ Gwenn observed wryly.
Raymond stared at the jug as though it were bewitched and had leapt into his hand on its own. ‘Sorry.’
‘That’s alright. I like the sauce.’ Gwenn noticed that Ned Fletcher was watching her from the other trestle. Goaded by some inner demon, she lowered her head and peeped experimentally at him. Recently, she had discovered that Ned Fletcher went bright pink when she did that. A tide of crimson swept up the Englishman’s neck and surged into his cheeks, and he swiftly transferred his attention to a flagon of wine. Gwenn smiled.
Yolande’s clear brow – she had marked this exchange – clouded.
Everyone, with the exception of Raymond, who was already carving his bird, was looking to the master of the house for the signal to begin. The door opened, and Denis the Red, so called because of his fiery crest of hair, tramped in. One of Ned’s peers, Denis had been posted at the bridge on the avenue. A travel-stained stranger dogged his heels. Someone groaned. This would mean a delay in eating.
‘Aye? What is it, man?’ Jean asked irritably, for he was as eager for his meat as were the rest of them.
The stranger, a courier, stepped forwards and proffered a scroll. ‘I’ve a despatch for you, sir.’ He lowered his voice. ‘It’s from your brother, Sir Waldin.’
Jean raised startled brows. The St Clair brothers wrote only rarely to each other, and the last time Jean had heard from Waldin had been two years earlier, after Jean requested Waldin’s support. Waldin’s reply had been curt and to the point. Waldin had sent his regrets, but it was not quite convenient for him to comply with his brother’s wishes. Waldin had promised that he would join his brother later. Jean had not taken Waldin’s promise seriously.
While his household waited, knives suspended over trenchers, the knight broke the seal on the parchment and ran his eyes slowly over the script. He was a novice where reading was concerned, but this hand was bold and clear, and easy on the eye. Waldin must have done well in the last tournament to be able to afford so neat a scribe. ‘Waldin is coming home,’ he announced with a smile. He turned to the messenger. ‘Is my brother in good health?’
The man started. He had been staring at the heaped trenchers; he had not eaten in hours and the smell of braised fowl was making him giddy. ‘Aye, sir.’ Swallowing down a mouthful of saliva, he mustered a smile. ‘He’s been Champion of Champions this past two years.’
‘Has he, by God? So that’s why he wouldn’t come when I beckoned. I thought you were going to tell me he’d been injured, and was coming home to lick his wounds.’
The rush-strewn floor was shifting under the courier’s feet. ‘No, sir. Sir Waldin is as sound of wind and limb as he has ever been.’
‘Thank the Lord.’ Jean grubbed in his pouch for a coin, and tossed it at the messenger. ‘Sit you down, man. On my soul, you look half famished. Eat,’ he said, addressing his household as well as the messenger.
‘My thanks, sir.’ The envoy stumbled to the soldiers’ board and fell upon the food.
Denis the Red watched in envy. His stomach growled. Tonight, Denis would have to be content with cold fare by the bridge. He stumped sullenly for the door and wondered what they’d be getting tomorrow. He wouldn’t be on look-out at supper-time tomorrow.
‘So we’re to meet the great tourney champion at last,’ Raymond said.
‘Yes, if he doesn’t change his mind.’ Waldin was notoriously unreliable, and tourneys were his life.
Gwenn saw that Ned Fletcher’s gaze was once more trained on the top table and she tried another smile. This one failed to bring the slightest flush the young trooper’s cheeks, and Gwenn thought she knew why. Ned knew all about Sir Waldin, and he had his ears stretched to catch every last word about the champion knight-at-arms. She herself had met her father’s younger brother when she was only seven, and she longed to see him again.
Waldin St Clair was, in his way, a rebel. He had refused the expected career in the Church and had gone off to make his fortune at the tournaments. Gwenn’s memory of him personally was hazy. All she could remember was that he had appeared out of nowhere, but she had vivid recollections of the tournament that he had taken her to with Raymond on the outskirts of Vannes. Of course, Gwenn was older and wiser now, and she realised that, for Waldin, that small local tournament must have been an insignificant affair, but it had given her a taste of the excitement they offered. She had seen the silken pennons flying, and the gaily caparisoned horses. She had heard the thundering of great hoofs and the squealing of the horses. She had smelt the excitement.