The Hunter’s Tale (23 page)

Master Selenger went very still and in the blue gathering dusk Frevisse could see his eyes searching for some clue in Lady Anneys’ faceless stillness to her seriousness in that.

She answered his unasked question, “I’m not.”

Master Selenger went on looking at her with a worry Frevisse could not quite read. Then he reached a hand toward Lady Anneys’ lying quietly together in her lap; but her shoulder nearest him jerked forward, warning him away, and he took his hand back and after a moment tried, even more gently than he had been speaking, “Lady Anneys—”

Her own voice suddenly crisp, she interrupted him. “I’ll tell you this much.” She raised her head and finally looked at him; Frevisse wished she could see her face. “Lady Elyn came to me with a woman’s worry. I advised her just as my mother advised me before ever I married—that a wife’s duty is to submit and accept. So I advised her and so I hope she will do. Will that satisfy Sir William?”

Uncertainly Master Selenger said, “It should.”

Lady Anneys nodded once and looked away again, letting him see she was waiting for him to leave; but he went on sitting there, still looking at her and silent as she was. In the quiet, small birds were twittering and settling for the night among the vine leaves over the arbor and from somewhere, faintly carried on the small wind, came distant laughter. From the village, Frevisse supposed; she did not think she had heard anyone here at the hall laugh since she had come, save maybe Miles, and darkness ran under his laughter.

But then darkness seemed to run under and behind everything and everyone here.

And from more than Tom Woderove’s death.

Why that thought should come to her so clearly here in the garden’s quiet, Frevisse did not know, nor did she fully understand what it meant, but she followed it, to find where it would go. Sir Ralph was the core of it, she thought. Assuredly he seemed to have created darkness enough in his life that it still lay over everyone here. Tom Woderove’s death had only added to it. But there was some shadow more than that. Something sharper, newer. There was… fear?

Frevisse moved carefully around the edge of that thought, looking more closely at it. Lady Anneys was afraid, surely, and admitted as much. She was afraid of Master Selenger because of the trouble he could bring on her; and of Sir William because if she was right about him, he was the cause of that trouble; and for her children—afraid not only of losing more of them but of how amiss their lives might go. But those were fears every parent had, and her worry over Sir William and Master Selenger was reasonable, too; but both those fears had shape and boundaries. It was her fear beyond that that Frevisse did not understand. There was a ceaseless wariness in Lady Anneys, a ceaseless waiting for something
more
to happen, as if some other, deeper, secret fear were feeding her more open, reasonable ones.

And though to say Hugh or Miles or Ursula were afraid might be to say too much, still, there was something… There was a wariness in them, too. The sense of a guard being kept. Against what?

Master Selenger stirred and said slowly, as if he regretted the need, “There’s something else, my lady.”

For the first time Lady Anneys let impatience into her voice. “What?”

Both looking and sounding on the edge of apology, Master Selenger said, “Sir William asked me to speak to you about Hugh’s marriage to Philippa.”

Lady Anneys lifted her head and faced him again, said nothing, then said, with each word carefully separated from the others, “Hugh’s marriage to Philippa?”

‘My lady—“ Master Selenger began.

Lady Anneys interrupted him with cold anger. “You can tell Sir William that he’ll be told when anyone here is ready to discuss marriage and that until then I do not want to hear about it from him or anyone else.”

‘You can tell him, too,“ Hugh said over the rear gate, ”that when and if the time comes to talk marriage, I will be the one to talk to.“ He shoved open the gate and came in with Miles behind him. ”Not my mother. She has grief and troubles enough without having to deal about that or with Sir William. Especially now.“

Master Selenger stood up. “Hugh. Miles. Lady Anneys and I were—”

‘We heard,“ Hugh said. The arbor and the evening’s shadows had hidden his and Miles’ coming along the cart-track until they were at the gate. There was no knowing how much they had heard, but like his mother, Hugh was angry. Unlike her, he was not cold and sounded ready to include Master Selenger in his anger.

Lady Anneys stood up, too, saying quickly, “Master Selenger was only asking because Sir William told him to.‘

‘Then Master Selenger can take our message back to him that no one here is ready to talk marriage yet,“ Hugh answered, his look fixed on Master Selenger.

Master Selenger accepted that with a small bow and started, “Sir William only thought that—”

‘Sir William can keep his thoughts to himself,“ Hugh said tersely.

‘—that the marriage would reassure everyone that there’s peace between the families.“

‘They can be reassured by the fact that we’re not openly fighting.“

“Is
there peace?” Master Selenger persisted.

‘Yes. There’s peace,“ Hugh snapped.

‘Simply not ease,“ Miles put in quietly. ”Ease will take longer than peace.“

‘Tell Sir William we need time,“ Lady Anneys said. ”That’s all. He’s simply too soon with it.“

Frevisse saw Master Selenger’s swift look from her face to Hugh’s and Miles’ before he bowed to her and said, “I’ll tell him so, my lady. He’ll understand.”

He held out his hand for hers. It was a reasonable courtesy but unreasonable here and now since she had so lately refused it. But after only the barest pause and probably for the sake of keeping up a seeming of courtesy in front of Hugh and Miles, she gave her hand to him in return. He bowed over it, did not make so bold as to kiss it but, when he straightened, held it a moment overlong, taking the chance to gaze into her eyes. Only the instant before she would have snatched her hand away did he let her go, smoothly turning to bow to Frevisse and bend his head to Hugh and then to Miles, who said, “I’ll keep you company to the yard,” in a way that warned he would see him out of the yard and well away, too.

While they left, silence except for the settling rustle of the birds in the arbor vine filled in the garden. Not until they were gone did Hugh ask, “Is that all he came for? To talk about Philippa’s marriage?”

Again Lady Anneys paused, barely, before answering, He asked first why Elyn came here today.“

Hugh frowned, puzzled. “Why shouldn’t Elyn come here?”

‘She was upset about something. Sir William was worried for her because she wouldn’t say why. I told Master Selenger that we talked and that I reassured her.“

‘Is she with child?“

‘No. It was a woman trouble.“

That put Hugh off that track as thoroughly as it had Master Selenger, but he went to, “What about this marriage business?”

‘Nothing beyond the ordinary. Philippa’s marriage to Tom had been purposed for years. You know that and why.“

‘Because adding Sir William’s manor to ours is sensible. But not as sensible as it was before Father married Elyn to Sir William.“

‘Sir William was thinking to marry again. Sir Ralph offered Elyn to him as a way to double-guard our interest. Nor was Elyn unwilling.“

‘Of course Elyn wasn’t unwilling,“ Hugh said, sounding impatient at being told what he knew too well. ”And even if Elyn does bear a child or children, Philippa has enough inheritance from her mother that her marriage to Tom would still have been a profitable thing. I know all that. I suppose what Sir William wants is assurance I’ll marry her in Tom’s place. The trouble with that is—“

Either catching his impatience or else giving way to the anger she had not dared show Master Selenger, Lady Anneys said sharply, “The trouble is that no one ever seems to wonder what Philippa might feel or want in the way of marriage. That’s the trouble and the pity. You’ve never thought about what she might want in the matter, have you?
Of
course you haven’t. No man ever does. All that’s ever asked of women is to submit and accept. That’s what I told Elyn today. Submit and accept. Just like every woman has to do.

Frevisse had not found, over the years, that simple submission and plain acceptance were all that common among women, whether maidens, wives, widows, or nuns. For some women, yes, for some women, no, with most women living somewhere between, sometimes yes and very often no. Just as most men lived in between what was expected from them in their lives and what they truly wanted. Most men but not men like Sir Ralph—and Frevisse had known women like him, too—who demanded and forced and took what they wanted and left the pain and scars of it on others. The way the pain and scars were left on Lady Anneys, who said now with deep-scored bitterness, “That’s how I survived your father. By submitting and accepting, accepting and submitting.” She spat the words. “And wished him dead so many times, so badly wanted him dead…”

Frevisse was unable to see her face, but Hugh’s was raw with pain. He tried to speak but Lady Anneys cut him off again with, “Do you know how I stopped him from hitting me? You never saw him hit me, did you? You know how I did that? I was six months married when I found I was with child. With Tom.” Her voice threatened to break on his name but she pulled back into her anger and went on, “I was so afraid Sir Ralph would do something to me and I’d lose my baby that I told him I’d see to it I’d never bear him any child at all if he ever,
ever
laid hand, fist, or whip on me again.”

‘Again?“ Hugh said hoarsely. ”He’d already hit you?“

“Already? Better to ask how often. I spent that first half-year of my marriage being hit whenever he felt like it. After all, I wasn’t one of his hounds, to be gently handled and cherished. I was his brood mare, to give him sons to replace Miles’ father, his disappointing firstborn. So I told him that if he ever struck me again, there’d be no sons at all, only a long, barren marriage. I made him believe there’d be no children if he ever hit me. Later, when we’d had children enough, he’d ceased noting me enough for me to be worth hitting. But the threat to never bear him children at all was how I won free of him.”

‘Could you have done it?“ Hugh asked, sounding half-frightened of the answer.

‘Yes.“ Her voice was flat with certainty but bitterly weary as she went on, ”Only I never found a way, after you all were born, to save any of you from him. I could only save myself.“ She sank down on the bench beside Frevisse, all the anger and strength gone suddenly out of her. ”And now I’m worn out. Childbirths and all those years of never showing weakness to Sir Ralph—of never showing
anything
to Sir Ralph—have left nothing of me except tiredness.“

She made to stand up but might have failed if Frevisse had not hurriedly stood up, too, to help her. Hugh, too, took her by one arm and helped to steady her when she was on her feet; but it was on Frevisse she leaned and to Frevisse she said, hardly above a whisper and on the edge of tears, “I want to go inside now. I want to go to bed and never get up again. Please.”

Chapter 14

Hugh let his mother and Dame Frevisse leave him standing there beside the bench in the gathering darkness. He was not needed by them nor did he know where to go or what to do, and when they were gone, he sat down on the bench again, leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands, and waited to feel something else besides sick with the weariness of worry. Too many things were too wrong in too many ways, with no way he saw to make anything better.

When Degory had said Master Selenger was here again, he had been angry—and been angrier when he saw how badly troubled by him Lady Anneys was. Did she guess the same thing Miles guessed about Selenger’s attention to her?

Or should she be warned? He didn’t know. There were so many things he didn’t know—didn’t know what to think, didn’t know what to do, was beginning not to know even what to feel.

And now there was what his mother had just said.

That she could have kept him, Tom, the girls from ever being at all.

He had never even thought much about being or not being until lately, and that was strange, because death was such a close part of life. There were always, in the usual way of things, the deaths of manor folk or neighbors and every autumn the slaughter of whatever cattle and pigs could not be kept through the winter and sometimes the need to put down hounds that were too hurt or sick to live, let be that he had hunted enough animals to the death for sport and food.

But Sir Ralph’s death…

That had been different.

… his head all splintered bone and blood and gray brain matter…

And then Tom’s death.

Tom lying there so… empty.

Gone past ever having back.

And now their mother said she could have made it so they never were at all…

Hugh gripped his head more tightly, wishing he could stop his thoughts. Any and all of his thoughts. Everything was become so tangled out of sense and shape, the whole world unraveling around him, with nothing left to his life but rough, torn, unmendable edges…

‘Hugh?“ Ursula asked softly.

He lifted his head. He had not realized it was grown so late; she was only a shadow-shape among the other garden shadows, and he said, “Come looking for me? I’m sorry, and made to rise.