Epic Historial Collection (73 page)

“Is it her?” Father said.

The woman turned her head, almost as if she had heard them, and looked straight at them, and William saw again her pale, penetrating golden eyes.

“It
is
her, by God,” Mother hissed.

The woman's stare shook Father. His red face paled and his hands trembled. “Jesus Christ preserve us,” he said. “I thought she was dead.”

And William thought: Now what the devil is that all about?

 

Jack had been dreading this.

For a whole year he had known that his mother missed Tom Builder. She was less even-tempered than she used to be; she often had a dreamy, faraway look; and in the night she sometimes made the panting noises, as if she were dreaming or imagining that she was making love to Tom. Jack had known, all along, that she would come back. And now she had agreed to stay.

He hated the idea.

The two of them had always been happy together. He loved his mother and his mother loved him, and there was no one else to interfere.

Life in the forest was somewhat uninteresting, it was true. He had missed the fascination of the crowds and the cities he had seen in his brief sojourn with Tom's family. He missed Martha. Oddly enough, he had relieved the boredom of the forest by daydreaming about the girl he thought of as the Princess, although he knew her name was Aliena. And he would be interested to work with Tom, and find out how buildings were constructed. But he would no longer be free. People would tell him what to do. He would have to work whether he wanted to or not. And he would have to share his mother with the rest of the world.

As he sat on the wall near the priory gate, ruminating disconsolately, he was astonished to see the Princess.

He blinked. She was pushing her way through the crowd, heading for the gate, looking distressed. She was even more beautiful than he remembered. In those days she had had a rounded, voluptuous, girlish body dressed in costly clothes. Now she looked thinner and more like a woman than a girl. The sweat-soaked linen shift she wore clung to her body, showing her full breasts and the ribs beneath, a flat belly, narrow hips and long legs. Her face was smeared with mud and her massed curls were untidy. She was upset about something, frightened and distressed, but the emotion only made her face more radiant. Jack was captivated by the sight of her. He felt a peculiar stirring in his loins that he had never experienced before.

He followed her. There was no conscious decision. One moment he was sitting on the wall gaping at her and the next he was hurrying through the gate behind her. He caught up with her on the street outside. She had a musky scent, as though she had been working hard. He remembered that she used to smell of flowers. “Is anything wrong?” he said.

“No, nothing's wrong,” she said curtly, and she quickened her step.

Jack kept pace with her. “You don't remember me. Last time we met, you explained to me how babies were conceived.”

“Oh, shut up and go away!” she shouted.

He stopped and let her walk on. He felt disappointed. Obviously he had said the wrong thing.

She had treated him like an irritating child. He was thirteen years old, but that probably seemed like childhood to her, from the lofty height of eighteen or so years.

He saw her go up to a house, take out a key that hung from a thong around her neck, and unlock the door.

She lived right here!

That made everything different.

Suddenly the prospect of leaving the forest and living in Kingsbridge did not seem so bad. He would see the Princess every day. That would compensate for a lot.

He stayed where he was, watching the door, but she did not reemerge. It was an odd thing to do, to stand in a street in the hope of seeing someone who hardly knew him; but he did not want to move. He was seething inside with a new emotion. Nothing seemed very important anymore except the Princess. He was single-minded about her. He was enchanted. He was possessed.

He was in love.

T
HE WHORE WILLIAM PICKED
was not very pretty but she had big breasts and her mass of curly hair appealed to him. She sauntered over to him, swaying her hips, and he saw that she was a little older than he had thought, maybe twenty-five or thirty, and while her mouth smiled innocently her eyes were hard and calculating. Walter chose next. He selected a small, vulnerable-looking girl with a boyish, flat-chested figure. When William and Walter had made their selection the other four knights moved in.

William had brought them to the whorehouse because they needed some kind of release. They had not had a battle for months and they were becoming discontented and quarrelsome.

The civil war that had broken out a year ago, between King Stephen and his rival, Maud, the so-called Empress, was now in a lull. William and his men had followed Stephen all over southwest England. His strategy was energetic but erratic. He would attack one of Maud's strongholds with tremendous enthusiasm; but if he did not win an early victory, he swiftly tired of the siege, and would move on. The military leader of the rebels was not Maud herself, but her half brother Robert, earl of Gloucester; and so far Stephen had failed to force him into a confrontation. It was an indecisive war, with much movement and little actual fighting; and so the men were restless.

The whorehouse was divided by screens into small rooms, each with a straw mattress. William and his knights took their chosen women behind the screens. William's whore adjusted the screen for privacy, then pulled down the top of her shift, exposing her breasts. They were big, as William had seen, but they had the large nipples and visible veins of a woman who has suckled children, and William was a little disappointed. Nevertheless, he pulled her to him and took her breasts in his hands, squeezing them and pinching the nipples. “Gently,” she said in a tone of mild protest. She put her arms around him and pulled his hips forward, rubbing herself against him. After a few moments she pushed her hand between their bodies and felt for his groin.

He muttered a curse. His body was not responding.

“Don't worry,” she murmured. Her condescending tone angered him, but he said nothing as she disengaged herself from his embrace, knelt down, lifted the front of his tunic and went to work with her mouth.

At first the sensation pleased him, and he thought everything was going to be all right, but after the initial surge he lost interest again. He watched her face, as that sometimes inflamed him, but now he was only reminded of how unimpressive he appeared. He began to feel angry, and that made him shrivel even more.

She stopped and said: “Try to relax.” When she started again she sucked so hard that she hurt him. He pulled away, and her teeth scraped his sensitive skin, making him cry out. He struck her backhanded across the face. She gasped and fell sideways.

“Clumsy bitch,” he snarled. She lay on the mattress at his feet, looking up at him fearfully. He threw a random kick at her, more in irritation than malice. It caught her in the belly. It was harder than he had really intended, and she doubled up in pain.

He realized that his body was responding at last.

He knelt down, rolled her on to her back, and straddled her. She stared up at him with pain and fear in her eyes. He pulled up the skirt of her dress until it was around her waist. The hair between her legs was thick and curly. He liked that. He fondled himself as he looked at her body. He was not quite stiff enough. The fear was going from her eyes. It occurred to him that she could be deliberately putting him off, trying to deflate his desire so that she would not have to service him. The thought infuriated him. He made a fist and punched her face hard.

She screamed and tried to get out from under him. He rested his weight on her, pinning her down, but she continued to struggle and yell. Now he was fully erect. He tried to force her thighs apart, but she resisted him.

The screen was jerked aside and Walter came in, wearing only his boots and undershirt, with his prick sticking out in front of him like a flagpole. Two more knights came in behind him: Ugly Gervase and Hugh Axe.

“Hold her down for me, lads,” William said to them.

The three knights knelt down around the whore and held her still.

William positioned himself to enter her, then paused, enjoying the anticipation.

Walter said: “What happened, lord?”

“Changed her mind when she saw the size of it,” William said with a grin.

They all roared with laughter. William penetrated her. He liked it when there were people watching. He started to move in and out.

Walter said: “You interrupted me just as I was getting mine in.”

William could see that Walter had not yet been satisfied. “Stick it in this one's mouth,” he said. “She likes that.”

“I'll give it a try.” Walter changed his position and grabbed the woman by the hair, lifting her head. By now she was frightened enough to do anything, and she cooperated readily. Gervase and Hugh were no longer needed to hold her down, but they stayed and watched. They looked fascinated: they had probably never seen a woman done by two men at the same time. William had never seen it either. There was something curiously exciting about it. Walter seemed to feel the same, for after just a few moments he began to breathe heavily and move convulsively, and then he came. Watching him, William did the same a second or two later.

After a moment, they got to their feet. William still felt excited. “Why don't you two do her?” he said to Gervase and Hugh. He liked the idea of watching a repeat performance.

However, they were not keen. “I've got a little darling waiting,” said Hugh, and Gervase said: “Me, too.”

The whore stood up and rearranged her dress. Her face was unreadable. William said to her: “That wasn't so bad, was it?”

She stood in front of him and stared at him for a moment, then she pursed her lips and spat. He felt his face covered with a warm, sticky fluid: she had retained Walter's semen in her mouth. The stuff blurred his vision. Angry, he raised a hand to strike her, but she ducked out between the screens. Walter and the other knights burst out laughing. William did not think it was funny, but he could not chase after the girl with semen all over his face, and he realized that the only way to retain his dignity was to pretend not to care, so he laughed too.

Ugly Gervase said: “Well, lord, I hope you don't have Walter's baby, now!” and they roared. Even William thought that was funny. They all walked out of the little booth together, leaning on one another and wiping their eyes. The other girls were staring at them, looking anxious: they had heard William's whore scream and were afraid of trouble. One or two customers peeped out curiously from the other booths. Walter said: “First time I ever saw that stuff spurt out of a girl!” and they started laughing again.

One of William's squires was standing by the door, looking anxious. He was only a lad and he had probably never been inside a brothel before. He smiled nervously, not sure whether he was entitled to join in the hilarity. William said to him: “What are you doing here, you po-faced idiot?”

“There's a message come for you, lord,” the squire said.

“Well, don't waste time, tell me what it is!”

“I'm very sorry, lord,” said the boy. He looked so frightened that William thought he was going to turn around and run out of the house.

“What are you sorry for, you turd?” William roared. “Give me the message!”

“Your father's dead, lord,” the boy blurted out, and he burst into tears.

William stared, dumbstruck. Dead? he thought. Dead? “But he's in perfectly good health!” he shouted stupidly. It was true that Father was not able to fight on the battlefield anymore, but that was not surprising in a man almost fifty years old. The squire continued to cry. William recalled the way Father had looked last time he saw him: stout, red-faced, hearty and choleric, as full of life as a man could be, and that was only…He realized, with a small shock, that it was nearly a year since he had seen his father. “What happened?” he said to the squire. “What happened to him?”

“He had a seizure, lord,” the squire sobbed.

A seizure. The news began to sink in. Father was dead. That big, strong, blustering, irascible man was lying helpless and cold on a stone slab somewhere—

“I'll have to go home,” William said suddenly.

Walter said gently: “You must first ask the king to release you.”

“Yes, that's right,” William said vaguely. “I must ask permission.” His mind was in a turmoil.

“Shall I tip the brothel keeper?” said Walter.

“Yes.” William handed Walter his purse. Someone put William's cloak over his shoulders. Walter murmured something to the woman who ran the whorehouse and gave her some money. Hugh Axe opened the door for William. They all went out.

They walked through the streets of the small town in silence. William felt peculiarly detached, as if he were watching everything from above. He could not take in the fact that his father no longer existed. As they approached headquarters he tried to pull himself together.

King Stephen was holding court in the church, for there was no castle or guildhall here. It was a small, simple stone church with its inside walls painted bright red, blue and orange. A fire had been lit in the middle of the floor, and the handsome, tawny-haired king sat near it on a wooden throne, with his legs stretched out before him in his usual relaxed position. He wore soldier's clothes, high boots and a leather tunic, but he had a crown instead of a helmet. William and Walter pushed through the crowd of petitioners near the church door, nodded at the guards who were keeping the general public back, and strode into the inner circle. Stephen was talking to a newly arrived earl, but he noticed William and broke off immediately. “William, my friend. You've heard.”

William bowed. “My lord king.”

Stephen stood up. “I mourn with you,” he said. He put his arms around William and held him for a moment before releasing him.

His sympathy brought the first tears to William's eyes. “I must ask you for leave to go home,” he said.

“Granted willingly, though not gladly,” said the king. “We'll miss your strong right arm.”

“Thank you, lord.”

“I also grant you custody of the earldom of Shiring, and all the revenues from it, until the question of the succession is decided. Go home, and bury your father, and come back to us as soon as you can.”

William bowed again and withdrew. The king resumed his conversation. Courtiers gathered around William to commiserate. As he accepted their condolences, the significance of what the king had said hit him. He had given William custody of the earldom
until the question of the succession is decided
. What question? William was the only child of his father. How could there be a question? He looked at the faces around him and his eye lit upon a young priest who was one of the more knowledgeable of the king's clerics. He drew the priest to him and said quietly: “What the devil did he mean about the ‘question' of the succession, Joseph?”

“There's another claimant to the earldom,” Joseph replied.

“Another claimant?” William repeated in astonishment. He had no half brothers, illegitimate brothers, cousins…. “Who is it?”

Joseph pointed to a figure standing with his back to them. He was with the new arrivals. He was wearing the clothing of a squire.

“But he's not even a knight!” William said loudly. “My father was the earl of Shiring!”

The squire heard him, and turned around. “My father was also the earl of Shiring.”

At first William did not recognize him. He saw a handsome, broad-shouldered young man of about eighteen years, well-dressed for a squire, and carrying a fine sword. There was confidence and even arrogance in the way he stood. Most striking of all, he gazed at William with a look of such pure hatred that William shrank back.

The face was very familiar, but changed. Still William could not place it. Then his saw that there was an angry scar on the squire's right ear, where the earlobe had been cut off. In a vivid flash of memory he saw a small piece of white flesh fall onto the heaving chest of a terrified virgin, and heard a boy scream in pain. This was Richard, the son of the traitor Bartholomew, the brother of Aliena. The little boy who had been forced to watch while two men raped his sister had grown into a formidable man with the light of vengeance in his light blue eyes. William was suddenly terribly afraid.

“You remember, don't you?” Richard said, in a light drawl that did not quite mask the cold fury underneath.

William nodded. “I remember.”

“So do I, William Hamleigh,” said Richard. “So do I.”

 

William sat in the big chair at the head of the table, where his father used to sit. He had always known he would occupy this seat one day. He had imagined he would feel immensely powerful when he did so, but in reality he was a little frightened. He was afraid that people would say he was not the man his father had been, and that they would disrespect him.