Lady of the English (17 page)

Geoffrey contained his instinct to kick the filthy creature off his horse and have him clapped in fetters for his insolence.

It was in his own interests to keep his subjects sweet and see justice done. He knew his father-in-law had put a stop to such abuses among the officials of his own court, and that he had received praise from the people because of it. Over and above that, Henry had taken control of the situation and stopped men from lining their own pockets At the expense of himself and his subjects. This charcoal burner might be crude and soot-smirched, but he spoke a refreshing truth.

“What else do they say?” he asked.

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people, and it was mostly uncomplimentary. He had been given much food for thought. He had also been highly entertained by his guide, whose name was Thomas Charbonnier. The charcoal burner’s expression when he finally realised he had been riding pillion behind the Count of Anjou himself was priceless and Geoffrey was deeply amused to witness the shock from both peasant and castle attendants alike; the latter horrified that their lord had been sharing his horse with a man of such dubious credentials. Charcoal burners were always viewed with suspicion. Living their itinerant lives in the forest, they were only one step away from being poachers, and outlaws. Charbonnier knelt, with bowed head, but Geoffrey raised him to his feet and, laughing, ordered the servants to give the man food and drink and a horse to carry him home.

“A donkey would be better, sire,” Charbonnier said. “A horse would take too much caring for and cost too much to feed. Men would envy me. If it did not die, it would be stolen.

But a donkey will bear a burden of charcoal and be coveted by few.”

“So all you desire is a donkey?”

“Yes, sire.”

Geoffrey chuckled. “Therein lies wisdom,” he said. “Perhaps I should make you my fool.”

Charbonnier gave him a shrewd blue look. “I am no man’s fool, sire.”

“Indeed not. But would you not like to give up the life of a charcoal burner for one at court? Wear fine clothes and sleep on a feather mattress and know that your wife and children were well fed? That to me seems the deed of a wise man.”

Charbonnier puckered his face in thought. “Indeed, I would enjoy such things,” he acknowledged, “but I would be changed. I would be more than a simple charcoal burner and that would not be so wise, sire.”

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In the end Geoffrey sent him on his way with the requested donkey laden with provisions and a promise to buy whatever charcoal he produced. Watching the peasant go on his way, happy with his donkey and his lot, Geoffrey felt a momentary pang that was almost envy.

“Sire,” said his chamberlain, bowing. “Your lady wife arrived while you were gone. She is settling in the wall chamber of the west tower.”

Geoffrey’s heart sank. He’d known her return was imminent; it was part of the reason he had gone hunting, because he had felt it was his last opportunity to taste true freedom. He dismissed the man with a curt wave and, pinching his upper lip, turned to look down the road that the charcoal burner had taken with his new donkey. Losing his way today might have been a portent, and his conversation with the forest dweller as they journeyed to Loches had made him very thoughtful indeed.

ttt

Matilda paced the chambers she had been allotted by Geoffrey’s tense attendants. Preparations had been made to receive her, but the fine details of laying a fire and providing warm washing water and refreshments had led to a last-minute flurry. Now everyone had gone, apart from the members of her own household. Geoffrey was out hunting, for which she was glad because it gave her time to assemble her defences. She still did not know what she was doing here. Although safeguards had been put around her by letter and strict agreement, she was uneasy. In her absence, her rivals in England could work upon the matter of the succession to their own advantage, and although she had an increased household, she was still isolated.

Drogo had not returned with her, but had taken the cowl and become a monk at the abbey of Prémontré. Others had replaced him, but they were her father’s men, not knights of her choosing.

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At least there had been neither sign of Aelis nor evidence of her occupation here, although Matilda had not asked about her.

Geoffrey’s servants had shown her to her quarters, seen to her hospitality, but otherwise kept their distance. She felt as if she were standing inside a gilded cage, but was unsure whether it offered her protection from what was to come, or was a place to imprison her until the time came for her to be disposed of.

Her chamber door suddenly flung open, making her start, and Geoffrey strode in, vibrant as a young lion. His red-gold hair was a mass of wind-ruffled curls and his eyes were as vivid as clear green-blue glass. He had grown and broadened during the time they had been apart; the soft angles of adolescence had hardened into the chiselled bones of young manhood. He was breathtaking. And she hated him and she feared him.

“Lady wife, welcome home.” He flourished a mocking bow.

She felt a horrible mingling of arousal and trepidation.

Already she was preparing to fight him to the death. If he beat her again, one of them would die.

“I trust your chamber is to your liking.” He looked round, hands on his hips.

“Thank you, my lord, it is—or it will be when my people have finished making it so.” Her attendants had knelt as Geoffrey entered the room. She gestured them to stand and continue with their tasks.

His jaw tightened, but there was bleak amusement in his eyes. “Strange to say, but I have missed your presence,” he said.

“The challenge and the icy looks have been wanting. No one else can send such a chill down my spine with a single glance.”

She eyed him with contempt. “I would have had an annulment were it possible.”

“My sweet wife, I considered giving you one.” He glanced at the servants again. “But since it is not to be and we must both bear our crosses as best we may, shall we discuss matters?”

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“Now?” She fought her fear.

“Why not? Better sooner than later.” He raised his hand, then paused in mid-gesture and turned his palm over towards her. “Will you dismiss your people?” There was an edge to his voice, but obviously he was abiding by the letter of their reunion, if not the spirit.

She wondered what he would do if she refused him “Leave us,” she commanded with a brusque gesture, “but do not go far. I will call if I have need.” She ignored her husband’s snort of amused contempt.

As the servants filed out, she and Geoffrey locked stares like two opponents circling behind their shields. The latch fell and there was silence apart from the snapping of the logs in the hearth as the fire licked over the seasoned bark. Then Geoffrey crossed the space between them and slipped his arm around her waist and drew her against him. “I meant it when I said I had missed you. I also meant it when I said I considered an annulment. Why should I keep a wife who fills my cup with vinegar?”

“Because there are compensations?” she mocked. “Because it raises your rank to be married to a dowager empress and future queen? It gives you power and standing you would not otherwise have. Because you want Normandy and you will never get it without me…”

Geoffrey’s grip tightened. They were both breathing hard with lust and anger. Her loins were moist with need. It had been so long, and however much she disliked, perhaps even hated him, however little she would ever forgive him for what he had done to her, the physical attraction between them was still a powerful drug.

“Oh, I admit it, wife,” he said. “I would not have thought to say so, but I do, and whether you like or not, you feel the same way.” He pushed himself against her and made very 131

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sure she could feel how aroused he was. Between kisses, he drew her to the freshly made bed and there took her with leisurely thoroughness, drawing off her garters, kissing her legs all the way up from instep to inner thigh, trailing his hand over her pubic mound until she moaned. He covered her with his body and entered her, fitting his hipbones inside hers, thrusting slowly, thrusting harder, taking his time until she was thrashing with need. And then he forced her over the edge and watched her shudder in climax before he surrendered to his own.

Matilda closed her eyes as the flickers of pleasure died to twinges. She ought to have felt deliciously relaxed but she was on edge. She had not had time to insert the moss, but it was near the time of her flux and he probably would not get her with child. Pushing out from beneath him, she left the bed and began to dress.

Geoffrey watched her with heavy eyes. He had dined but he was unsatisfied because she still eluded him. He studied her body as she sat down on a stool to tidy and rebraid her hair.

“Do you have anything else to ‘discuss’ before I summon the servants back in?” she asked.

He sat up, his gaze sharpening. “No, because your father made all very clear in his letter, as I did in mine to him. As you can see, I have complied.”

Matilda vigorously wove her hair under and over. “So far yes, but the rest remains to be seen.”

“On both sides, wife,” he said. “I will have obedience from you.”

“What of Aelis? What have you done with her?” she demanded.

There was silence from the bed. Matilda looked round and caught a look of pain on Geoffrey’s face. Then it was gone as he schooled his expression to neutrality and began fastening his 132

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braies to his hose. “You need not trouble yourself about Aelis,”

he said curtly. “She is dead.”

Matilda’s stomach jolted. She wanted to say she was glad, but it was not the emotion that flowed through her. What arrived beyond the initial spark of shock, was alarm. She wondered just what this husband of hers was capable of. “How?” She made an effort to keep her voice level.

“Of the milk fever a week after giving birth to my son. She at least had an easy womb to fill. I have a daughter of her too and both shall be reared in this household. As I recall your father said nothing on that score, and the matter is not open to negotiation.”

Matilda crossed herself. “God rest her soul,” she muttered, thinking that Geoffrey had killed her indirectly after all.

He stood up. “I think it fair to say I have learned from my mistakes, but have you learned from yours, wife? Will you show me respect in public?”

“As you do so to me—and as you have promised to my father.”

“So be it, and may our marriage be blessed and fruitful,” he said grimly and left the room.

Matilda shuddered and breathed a deep sigh of relief as he closed the door. After a moment, she went to her devotional and, prostrating herself, prayed for the strength to endure and the grace to accept her lot, and, at least in public, play the role that was her duty.

When she had finished praying, she composed herself before summoning her servants back into the room, to finish their tasks. In silence the maids changed the sheet and remade the rumpled bed. Matilda took her cloak, beckoned to Uli, and climbed to the battlements to look out over the town and the wooded countryside. In the distance she could see people on the road, including a peasant leading a laden donkey. The last 133

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time she had stood on a wall walk had been at Northampton with Brian FitzCount. She felt a welling of sadness for what might have been if the road had been different, but immediately shook herself. What was the point in thinking upon roads not taken and pathways that had never existed in the first place?

She had to concentrate on the one she was travelling now.

The sky was darkening towards dusk and small drops of rain spattered her face as an isolated shower blustered in from the west. She left the battlements but by a different door that led her along a corridor and past a small chamber set into the thickness of the wall. Two women sat within. One was suckling an infant, her ample white breast poking through a slit in her gown. The other knelt beside a tiny little girl who was made in Geoffrey’s image, with his coppery curls and the same stubborn chin. She was stacking wooden bowls one inside the other and chattering away to herself.

On seeing Matilda, both women hastened to rise and curtsey, the wet nurse clutching the baby awkwardly to her bosom.

“These are the count’s children?” Matilda asked as a formality.

“Yes, madam.” The wet nurse lowered her gaze to the suckling baby.

“What are their names?”

“The babe is Hamelin, madam, and this is Emma, his sister.”

The woman’s voice was tinged with anxiety.

“Have no fear,” Matilda said. “I do not persecute innocents.”

She left the chamber deep in thought. With these children Geoffrey had proven that he could beget bastards with ease.

They would serve his bloodline as they grew up in the same way that her father’s numerous illegitimate offspring served him. Had she not been taking precautions, and given different circumstances, they could have been hers. She had almost died birthing her stillborn son in Germany and the pain and grief of that time would scar her for the rest of her life, as would the 134

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fear that she might die in the bloody struggle to deliver a child.

For Heinrich, she would have laid down her life in the effort to provide him with an heir. She had no such loyalty to Geoffrey, but the sight of the babies had filled her with a bittersweet pang of longing.