Emma Campion - A Triple Knot (28 page)

He’d thrown away his protection, thinking he’d lost her. They’d both been betrayed by their families. “My nurse, Efa, is a gifted healer. I will send her to him tonight. Expect her.” Bella appeared at the entrance to the royal pavilion, squinting into the dark. “Go!” Joan whispered, and waited until Hugh was away before stepping out into the light from the entrance torches.

“Joan! Who was that with you?”

“Your brother, of course, wanting my help in a prank. But I’m for bed.”

Joan caught her breath as Ned’s voice rose from the royal tent, singing a round, then joined by others.

“He arrived on one end as you departed from the other,” said Bella. “Why did you lie to me? Who is he? Was it Thomas Holland?”

Joan grabbed the princess by the arm. “Do not say his name, do you hear me, or I’ll have Efa cast a spell that will see you wed to an ancient, toothless cripple!”

“You’re hurting me! I’ll say nothing, I swear. But how could you want him?
He’s
a cripple now.”

Joan squeezed hard before she let go of Bella’s arm. “It wasn’t him, anyway.”

“No? Then who?”

Joan laughed. “I would be a fool to tell you.” She kissed Bella on the cheek and stepped across the way into the Montagus’ pavilion.

The lanterns had been dimmed and all but Helena and Efa were abed. Joan drew Efa to one side, whispering to her of the encounter, what she had learned of Thomas’s wounding, including the part she believed the white hart silk had played, and asked her to go to him, help him.

“This was the silk you embroidered to hang at Woodstock, to honor your father?”

Joan nodded. “Is that important?”

“With charms, everything is. Go to sleep now, rest your
heart while I see to your beloved.” Efa stroked Joan’s forehead, kissed her cheek, and withdrew to collect her things.

“S
IR
, S
HE IS TRUE
.” H
UGH HELD THE CLOTH OUT TO
T
HOMAS. “SHE
kissed it and handed it back, saying you have every right to this, you are her husband, and she loves you still. She is sending her nurse to you, the healer Efa.”

“She saw me and she still speaks of love?” Thomas crushed the cloth in his hand, trying to constrict his surge of hope. “She’s wed to Salisbury’s heir. I dare not go near her.”

“My lord?” A woman stood in the doorway, wimpled and carrying a basket. “I am Efa. My lady sent me to you.”

Thomas motioned her to enter, offering her a camp chair. “How is my lady?”

“Incomplete without you, my lord.” She refused the chair. “Better that you sit and I look at your wound.” She was a small woman, the top of her head just barely reaching his shoulders, but her grasp was strong as she guided him into the chair.

“The best physicians in France worked on it,” he said as she untied the silk patch to expose the eye. “It is too damaged. What do you mean, ‘incomplete’?”

“Hush now.” She ran her fingers over the wound, with the back of her hand felt his forehead, bent to peer into both his eyes, whispering to herself all the while in Welsh. He felt a warmth spreading through him, though she had given him nothing to ingest, and he began to fear that she was casting a spell. “Efa, as in the first woman, Eve?” he asked.

Her laugh was light. “There are many Efas in my village in Wales. Sisters, daughters, granddaughters, nieces of Eve.” She went over to the basket she’d set down on a bench. “They were right, the eye itself is too damaged. But it is the condition of the wound that is my lady’s concern, and mine now that I see it. Half a year? The fine physicians gave him no unguents to
soothe it and keep the scar soft and supple?” She asked it of Hugh, who stood over her, closely watching what she did.

“They did, Dame Efa, but Sir Thomas is not keen to use them.”

“Ah. Mine you will. And, while we are all here, I shall work them in each morning and each evening, as my lady wishes.” She rejoined Thomas, holding a small bowl to his nose.

Thomas was surprised by the pleasant scent. “All their unguents stank.”

“So that you believe in their healing power.” She laughed softly as she spread some of the ointment along his scar.

“Joan sent you to me?”

“How else would I be here, my lord? Now hush, feel this.”

Her touch was light, yet all along the puckered skin he felt a prickly warmth and an easing, as though skin, muscle, and bone opened the fist they’d formed against pain. He gave a great sigh as he felt his entire body relax. “What spell is this?” he whispered.

“No spell, just fine medicine,” said Efa.

Before he knew it, he was lost in a dream of reunion with Joan, holding her in his arms, kissing her.… “I need to talk to my lady.”

“Not now, not yet. Earl William and Prince Edward watch her every move. What you need to do is go to Brittany as planned and capture someone who will bring a fine ransom that you can spend in Avignon.”

“Petition the pope? There is no time. By then she might have borne him an heir—”

“Do not be so certain. She is more your wife in deed than she is young Montagu’s. Countess Margaret and Earl William are uneasy in their minds about this match, whether it will be challenged, and they’ve kept them apart, though even had they not there is nothing between the two. Young Montagu’s affections lie elsewhere as well.” She sighed. “You have generous friends who love you. What you most wish for will come to pass.”

“I do not believe we can foresee the future.”

“Whether you believe is unimportant, my lord. It will be so. Now hush.”

His resistance to her words began to ease. “How am I to bear being so close and not speaking to her?”

“As you bore this wound, Sir Thomas, with courage and prayer.” She stepped back, her wide hazel eyes considering him. “Already I see a change. It was beginning to pull up your left cheek, hiding the dimple my lady loves so dearly. Might I touch the silk she spoke of?”

He handed it to her. “She said she used your charms.”

Efa handled the white hart emblem gingerly, sniffing, running her fingertips across it. “More than my charms, there is much of my lady in it, and you have strengthened it with your blood and sweat.” She handed it back. “Do not lose it again, my lord. Do not break my lady’s heart.” She gave him a little bow. “Until the morrow.”

Thomas reached for her arm. “Tell her I love her.”

The healer’s smile warmed his soul. She was on his side. “I will. May God smile on the two of you.”

When she was gone Thomas lay back on his cot, thinking to rest a moment, then join his brothers in Count William’s pavilion. But for the first time since his blinding he fell into a deep, dreamless, healing sleep, not waking until morning.

J
OAN CURLED UP TO
E
FA WHEN SHE SLIPPED INTO BED
,
AND THOUGH
she dare not speak and wake the Montagu women, she felt comforted.

In the morning, Efa took Joan aside to tell her about her meeting with Thomas, her certainty that they would complete their vows, the strength of what Joan had woven into the silk—her enduring love for her father, and his for her.

“Your Thomas is protected by your love.”

“You taught me well.”

Efa smiled. “Not me. These charms are yours.”

Joan hugged Efa tightly. “Mother was wrong to send you away.”

“She was frightened, that is all, my lady. Our priests cannot explain this power, and so they fear it and preach against it. But it is so simple.” She shrugged and pushed Joan toward Helena. “You must dress so you might watch him from the stands.”

T
HOMAS LOOKED UP AND SHE WAS THERE
,
LUMINOUS
,
A LIGHT
among the women, the light of his life. He touched his heart, she touched hers and smiled, and, just as the healer’s hands had done, Joan spread a warmth like a benediction through his being. All doubt ceased. He would win her back.

I
t was a perfect autumn day, sunlight falling through the bright, thinning canopy of beech and hazel, the air just sharp enough to make her grateful for the wool of her gown and surcoat but not so chilly that her hands were clumsy with the bow. Joan was laughingly showing Bella what was wrong with her form, bending her wrist as the princess had done, then straightening the wrist to show her how much steadier it would be. Bella whined that she hadn’t the strength.

“That is the purpose of practice, to build strength,” said Efa, nodding her approval of Joan’s correction.

Joan let go the arrow, cheering as it landed close to center. Bella sighed loudly—she was lately of the opinion that a noblewoman should not express enthusiasm. Efa was oddly quiet, and as Joan turned to her she saw the cause.

“Almost perfect, cousin!” Ned called out as he joined them, kissing her neck, then snaking his arms round to adjust her hands in a slightly different grip. “See? Even steadier.” Another kiss.

He’d made a habit of this of late, catching her by surprise and drawing her close, kissing, touching, breathing in her ear. Countess Catherine had quickly gone from being pleased with
his omnipresence, seeing Will’s delight, to shrilly criticizing Joan for encouraging the prince. She was not wrong. Ned made up for the chilliness of the Montagus. He reminded Joan that, even in the midst of so much unhappiness, she could experience magical moments. He made her laugh.

Efa disapproved.
There is a darkness in him. Keep him at arm’s length
.

Joan would remember Bruno, the ring, countless smaller incidents, and vow to heed Efa’s warning. But, the moment he was near, she found a reason to keep him there
just this time
.

“I hear your maid Mary has been sent away for being with child. Your husband’s child. Can you forgive him?” Ned meant it as a taunt, not as a question.

“I don’t want to talk about it. Go away if you’re going to be hateful.”

It was true about Mary. She’d gone to live with her parents on a farm on one of the Kent estates. Countess Catherine blamed the situation on her son’s understandable frustration in being forbidden to sleep with Joan, his wife. They were both sixteen, old enough. The wait had given Will no choice but to ease his frustration with a maidservant. Catherine had declared that, after the Christmas court, the two would commence living as husband and wife.

Will did not yearn for her; he was content with their situation as long as Ned was near. He’d taken up with Mary to quell rumors that he’d lost his heart to one of the royal grooms.

Ned grinned. “Mother has summoned Lady Lucienne back to court now that her year of mourning is finished. Did you know?” Lord Townley had succumbed to a fever the previous autumn, and Lucienne had surprised everyone at court by retiring to the country to grieve. “Thomas Holland will be happy to see her. Now that she’s a wealthy widow, he has a fortune within his grasp.”

Handing a servant her bow and quiver of arrows, Joan turned around to slap Ned, but he was already past the hedge. Sometimes she truly hated him.

“He knows you so well,” said Bella. “He knows just how to annoy you.”

I
T WAS
T
HOMAS
’
S FAVORITE
L
ONDON INN
,
NEAR THE
T
HAMES BUT
not too near, a short walk to St. Paul’s, past the elegant homes of the cloth and wine merchants. The food was good, the ale thick, and the regulars strangers to him. When he returned from months of fighting in the field, he stayed there for a week or more for quiet, peace, before facing his family. So he was irritated to find that he’d been cheated out of the extra coin he’d paid to sleep alone, albeit in a room in which he could not stand up straight for the slope of the roof above. It was already occupied.

“You must have taken a wrong turn,” he growled, turning up his lantern to see who was seated on the bed. But even before she turned he knew her by her perfume, roses and spice. How easily they came together. She gasped to see his wound, hushing him when he called himself hideous, covering his face with kisses.

Only after a long while did they talk. She wanted to hear how he’d been injured, was curious about Raoul de Brienne and his father’s household, but not too curious. And then
she
talked. She knew much of what had happened with Joan in Ghent. How? She laughed at the question, but quickly grew serious.

“You must have a care with the prince. He has asked me many questions about your rescuing Lady Joan from Albret,
about your relationship with the Van Arteveldes. He is obsessed with Joan. Protect yourself. Petition the pope.”

“I haven’t the money.”

“I do.” She leaned over him, kissing him lightly, smiling through a perfumed fall of midnight hair.

“I cannot accept—why would you do this for us?”

“Because I love you.” She smoothed back his hair, kissed the brow above his wrecked eye. “And I know she has your heart.”

“I do not deserve you, Lucienne.” He kissed her hand. “I am grateful for this, for all you have been for me. But I cannot accept your offer. I must do this on my own.”

They argued, made love again. “For the last time,” she told him. “You are no longer free.” As he led her down to the room where her servant awaited her, she repeated the warning to be careful with the prince.

Thomas looked to see if she was smiling. But no, she was serious. “He’s just a boy.”

“Do not underestimate him, Tom. Joan’s marriage to young Montagu serves him for now. Rumors are young Will prefers boys and pines for the prince. Poor Joan. But you—
you
the prince would consider a threat. Get the pope on your side as soon as you can. And Countess Margaret. I am certain she looks on her daughter’s situation with dismay and must wonder if this is God’s sign that the marriage was in error, a punishment for breaking a solemn vow.” As her servant draped a cloak around her, Lucienne said, “My offer stands.”