Thomas glanced up through the increasing mist as the clouds that now effaced the sky began to envelop the earth. Dull the story was not, but he had no wish to recount his days in prison to this or to any man. Nor did he want to discuss the price he had paid for an act of sodomy, an act and a love he could never regret.
Robert tugged at the sleeve of his new friend’s habit as the monk remained silent, his eyes turned to the heavens. “Have you left this world, Thomas, or have you just had a vision?”
“Neither. I was just thinking that we might be in for quite the storm. Those clouds will surely bring more snow. But let me return to my question. Am I right that the woman with the Lady Juliana is Sir Geoffrey’s wife?”
The lady in question was now walking toward the main hall. His lusty jesting aside, Thomas did wonder why a happily wedded wife would look around with such suggestive boldness and walk with hips swinging so that men of any station could watch, then imagine how wildly those hips might shake the winnowing basket in the marital bed. In contrast, Robert’s soon-to-be-betrothed followed with great modesty, head bowed, some steps behind the wife.
“You assume correctly. That is the Lady Isabelle, Sir Geoffrey’s much younger second wife. As you would surely conclude from seeing the Lady Juliana and the Lord Henry, all his children are from his prior marriage.”
“Not long wed, I would guess.”
“More than a year.”
“Then I am surprised the new mare has not yet bred.”
“Aye, she has, but it came long before term. Or so she said.”
Thomas raised an eyebrow. “I hear the hint of a tale there.”
Robert’s face flushed. “My father has always said I was too plainspoken.”
“And I might say your speech is frank, as suits an honest man.” Thomas smiled. “Tell me the story. I would know more of this family, for what you’ve told already is a sad but most compelling tale.”
Robert shrugged. “I’ll not pretend I believe all is thriving in this second marriage. You see, Sir Geoffrey’s first wife was a woman well known for her sweet nature and godly heart. I remember her from the days when the lady and her family visited us, and the memory is a fond one.” Robert’s eyes glazed with sadness. “My own mother was still alive then and was good friends with the lady. Alas, Sir Geoffrey’s wife sickened with a festering of the womb. I heard tell that he took a vow of chastity during her illness, hoping that God would restore his dear wife to health and his bed. God did not keep His part of the bargain, it seems, for the illness grew worse until she died in great pain. In quick succession after her death, Sir Geoffrey lost his hand, his brother died, and he returned to take over the estates.” The wistful look disappeared from Robert’s eyes, a brittle disdain replacing it. “Waiting for him was his young ward, the Lady Isabelle. In the time it took her to lean back and lift her robes so he could mount, she had bred a child. Out of honor, and some have said love, he married her. Then she lost the babe. She has not quickened since, and, as I have heard told, she no longer cares for his left-handed caresses. Perhaps they were sweet only before the vows and the dower she gained thereby.”
“She was a landless ward?”
“Nay, she had lands enough to tempt a husband, but there is no denying she gained far more than she was able to give from this marriage. Still, it angers me that she drew the good Sir Geoffrey into her bed with false eagerness, only to turn her back on him after the vows. A London whore would have been more honest about what she’d give for the price of her favors.”
Thomas saw the animosity flash in his friend’s eyes and decided it would be wise to shift the subject. “Methinks you will be happy with the lord’s daughter, however. She bears herself in a more seemly manner than her stepmother. Perhaps she takes after the mother who bore her?”
The anger in Robert’s eyes faded, but in the murky light of the coming storm, Thomas could not identify the new emotion that took residence there. “The Lady Juliana was a gay child, as I recall. Even Henry laughed on occasion at her precocious wit and playful spirit. That aside, George has told me she has grown cheerless since her mother’s death and her father’s all too hasty marriage. He fears that the wedded state is one she no longer desires.”
“Surely you will change her mind about the joys of marriage, Robert, if any man can.”
As Thomas turned to clout his new friend on the shoulder with encouraging affection, the expression on the man’s face stayed his hand. Robert’s glance was shifting back and forth between the two women as they walked across the open ward toward the dining hall. His gaze had turned melancholy, causing Thomas to wonder if Robert’s unhappiness was caused by Lady Juliana’s sorrow or by some other reason altogether.
Suddenly, an angry voice called out, shattering Thomas’ reflection, and he looked up to see Henry striding after his stepmother and sister.
Sir Geoffrey once again called to his son to stop, but the young man only quickened his step.
A cold shudder of premonition passed through Thomas’ body. Had Henry not heard his father’s command?
Reaching the two women, Henry grabbed Lady Isabelle by the arm, then glanced over his shoulder with a wild look of defiance at his father.
Sir Geoffrey called out again, this time ordering his son to leave the women be.
Henry did not release his stepmother. Instead, he pulled her to him in an awkward embrace. As he continued to stare at his father, a glow of triumph reddened his fair-skinned face even more than the biting wind had done. Then he quickly bent his head toward the struggling woman. She turned her face away from him.
Frozen in horror, Thomas wondered if he was trying to kiss or bite her.
Robert started forward.
Lady Juliana reached out, grabbing at her brother’s robe.
Sir Geoffrey roared in outrage. With greater speed than Thomas would have credited a man with so much gray in his beard, the father leapt toward his son like a predator after prey. In an instant, he was at his son’s side. Seizing him by the shoulder with his left hand, Sir Geoffrey spun his son around, then backhanded him across the face.
The Lady Isabelle, flung free by the violent assault, tumbled back into Juliana’s arms.
Henry fell into the snow, blood from his nose running in a rivulet down to his chin and dripping into the urine-streaked slush.
Picking his heir up by the cloak with one hand, Sir Geoffrey spat in his face and tossed him back into the muck. Then, with a quick jab of his foot to Henry’s groin, he turned and left his son writhing on the foul and freezing earth.
Thomas winced, then stepped toward the squirming figure on the ground. Henry may have richly deserved some punishment for his crass behavior, but Sir Geoffrey’s assault was brutal. Suddenly Thomas felt a hand on his sleeve, gently but firmly pulling him back.
“Let him be,” Robert said, his tone mocking and his gaze hard as iron. “He got no more than he deserved.”
Chapter Six
Thomas hastened down the stone walkway toward Richard’s chambers, shivering as he went. Even inside the walls, warmth was a relative thing. A bitter wind invaded the castle corridors through wood-shuttered windows and arrow-loops with far greater success than any human enemy ever could, and neither the spiced wine he had just drunk nor his thick woolen robe were of significant help in banishing the chill. When he had left the open ward, his feet had been numb from the ice-cold slush. Now, as feeling returned, they burned. He grumbled to himself, hugging his body with his arms and shaking uncontrollably. Without a doubt, Thomas felt utterly wretched.
However desolate Tyndal and East Anglia might be, its people surly with the damp and morose from the heavy gray clouds that weighed down a man’s soul, there was nothing quite like this bone-snapping cold for misery. Sister Anne had warned him about it just before their journey here. If a man weren’t careful, she had said, it could turn his flesh as black as charcoal and he would rot to death of it. Thomas shook his head as he stumbled with the pain in his burning feet. He did not want to see what color they might have turned.