Fires of Winter Read online

  “This is Lady Melusine’s country,” I said to the men, “and she says this place is not dangerous—”

  “No, I did not say that,” she interrupted. “I know one can pass it in daylight in safety,” she went on. “But that is all I know. I would not want any to come to harm from thinking I give more assurance than I do.”

  That made me wonder if Melusine was deliberately warning us away because this was a meeting place for the rebels. I looked at it again as we came down the hill and almost laughed aloud at my silliness. What right-minded man would come to so strange a place, even to plot mischief when he could meet his friends by his own fireside or in some wholesome wood or field with less chance of being seen. Melusine must be speaking the truth about the ring, even if she was not telling all she knew.

  As we came down, the ring was hidden by the trees that bordered the road. We passed it warily, kicking the horses into a canter, but we did not hold the pace long. Melusine, who seemed somewhat amused by our caution—the first lightening in her somber mood that day—soon called to us to turn back. She had stopped Vinaigre by the opening to a narrow track that I had thought a game trail. It led southwest into what seemed a stark wilderness. Before we had ridden half a mile, the track met and followed a small river. By then it was clear this was no game trail. Low branches had been lopped back to make a wide enough passage for pack animals and brush had been cleared, but I saw that the track had not been used often this year; there was new growth that had not been cut. Melusine saw it too, but what she thought of it I could not tell. Her face was closed—dark and sad again.

  Though narrow, the track was clear and easy to follow, and we rode along for near an hour with no surprises until on a low rise it opened out into a small meadow. My breath caught at the beauty of the scene below us. Melusine had stopped beside me, and I heard a faint sound—a sob? I put out a hand blindly to pat hers, but I could not tear my eyes from the landscape. A long lake gleaming silver under the lightly cloudy sky stretched away into the distance, bordered by steep hills that folded into each other, green with forest close at hand and shading into blue and purple in the distance. Aside from a few sheep grazing the meadow, four very small houses, and what looked like a stable and fenced yard for horses down near the water, there was no sign of man’s hand in this wilderness. To the east of the lake, however, I was not sure the mountain came directly down to the water. Though the bank rose steeply, there might be a fold of land behind that could hold an arable valley. But if the track we rode on began again to the east, behind the few dwellings, there was no sign of it.

  There was not much sign that the road continued south along the west side of the lake either, but Melusine confidently trotted Vinaigre across the north edge of the valley and then down toward the lake. I almost called out, thinking she was about to plunge into the water, when she turned right sharply and disappeared. Since there was no splash, I followed calmly enough, only to find myself perched on a trail not much wider than Barbe’s barrel and hanging over the lake. The drop was not much at this point, perhaps four or five feet, but ahead I could see a few brown and grey splotches where the track was not edged with trees and they were a hundred feet or more high.

  Fechin, seeing where my eyes were directed, uttered a snort. “We be needin’ spiders, not horses, to get up there.”

  Melusine was already well ahead, so I could only shrug and touch Barbe gently with my heels. He started willingly, by which I guessed the track must feel solid and steady to him. “Do not look down,” I called back over my shoulder. “Watch the horse ahead and the trail itself for holes or loose stones.”

  I began to follow Melusine’s rapidly disappearing back, and then had to shout to her to stop. That devil of a mare instead started a fast trot, which Melusine did not check, but I could not follow. Cormi had just called to me that Edna was in trouble. I cursed Melusine fluently as I backed Barbe a few steps to a spot wide enough to turn him. She could not get far nor elude me for long, but I was sick inside with fear that she had taken the first chance she had to escape.

  I cursed Edna too, although she, poor creature, did not deserve it. Truthfully, I had been much surprised by how cheerfully she had accepted the discomforts of the long trip, how attached she seemed to Melusine, and her stoic endurance on this ride. She had only had a few hours of practice to accustom her to being perched on a horse, and we had ridden nearly forty miles from Jernaeve to Carlisle. When she dismounted at our lodging the night before, Melusine noticed how stiff Edna was and asked me to send a man to buy a liniment to rub on her sore muscles. She was better although still uncomfortable when she came to help Melusine dress in the morning, but she made no complaint when Fechin lifted her to Merwyn’s saddle pad nor later when she was shifted to Cormi’s to rest Merwyn’s horse. I thought she might have grown faint from pain and weariness, but it was the sight of the road winding up on the cliffs that had frightened her so much she nearly fell off.

  “Let me walk,” Edna sobbed, when I asked if she could go forward after a short rest. “I will follow faithfully. I will run to keep up, but I cannot bear to sit up so high and look into nothing.”

  “My lord—” Fechin began, and then stopped suddenly, his eyes going past my shoulder.

  I turned sharply to see Melusine coming back toward us at a sharp trot, and I had to grit my teeth to keep from shouting aloud with joy. My wife—the word was sweet in my mouth, although I did not utter it—my wife had not used the length of rope I had given her to hang herself.

  Fechin shook his head and looked back at me. “Your lady makes us look fools,” he went on, “but we’uld all be easier on our feet goin’ up there.”

  Apparently Melusine had heard him, because she cried, “Oh! Do forgive me.”

  She sounded truly contrite and, oddly, somewhat embarrassed, and put out her hand to me, which I took and pressed warmly. If it had not been for the men, I would have kissed her; in fact, so great was my relief that my passion stirred, and if I could, I would have dismounted both of us and played mare and stallion without the help of Vinaigre and Barbe. Melusine must have seen that in my face—I hope no one else did—because she found a small smile for me.

  “I…my mind has been on…on other things,” she said. “I forgot your men were not accustomed to our roads. This road is perfectly safe, all sound, but the men can walk if they like. Ulle is less than three leagues and they cannot get lost.” She looked at Fechin and smiled. “You need only keep to the road that follows the lake. There are only four tracks that turn off and they go directly away from the water.”

  The men dismounted with sighs of relief, and I turned Barbe and followed Melusine. This time she did not allow Vinaigre to go faster than a walk and I was close behind. Farther on, the road curved a little inward where the land was flatter and widened so I could ride abreast.

  “You did not include me in the invitation to walk,” I remarked. “But I wish you to know, I am quaking in my stirrups and hope you will keep a sober pace.”

  Cleverly, she looked at Barbe, not at me. The horse showed no nervousness—and he was a nervous horse—so she could assume I felt none. “I did not think you would let me go alone,” she said, “and I certainly do not wish to walk all that way.”

  “Is there some reason I should not let you go alone?” I asked.

  There was a brief silence, then Melusine said softly, “I am sorry I did not come back at once when you called. I was angry when you bade me to stop until I saw that something was wrong. I thought you believed I was running away. I would not do that. I have given my word.”

  “Did it not occur to you that there might be other reasons I did not want you to go alone? You are dear to me, Melusine, and this is wild country—”

  “Not to me,” she interrupted, smiling. “There are no outlaws here”—the smile disappeared abruptly—“or were none. Perhaps good men have been driven into outlawry since I have been gone, but n
one of them would harm me.”

  “If good men have been made outlaw, I am sorry for it, and the king will be sorry also,” I told her. “That was not Stephen’s intention, and if I see the people are ill-used, I will do my best to amend it.”

  She shifted in her saddle restlessly, which surprised me. It was almost as if what I said made her uncomfortable because she did not want me to show interest in or sympathy for her people. That raised a new specter in my mind. The queen had wanted Melusine married so that no Cumbrian lord with a loyalty to David could seize her, marry her, and claim Ulle through her. Just now it had come to me that a widow would serve as well as an unmarried maid for that purpose. I suppose I was staring at her. I do not know what was in my face, but Melusine suddenly turned her head away from me, and as she did I thought I saw tears in her eyes. That only added to the puzzle, but I could think of no way to approach any solution to it, and I was thankful that the trail narrowed as we began to climb again and she pulled ahead.

  I soon began to think my doubts were foolish. There was no reason for Melusine to want another husband. Her eagerness to couple and her transports in the marriage bed were genuine, of that I was certain. If she intended to be rid of me, why should she have made our marriage complete in Jernaeve? Surely if she wished to replace me with another man, she could have refused me a little longer. And God knew this homecoming must be bitter as gall to her. There were reasons enough for tears. By the time we came to the next space open enough to ride side-by-side, I had put the doubt aside and was only troubled about how Melusine would endure actually coming into Ulle. But that, like the road, was easier than I expected—except for a few breathtaking stretches.

  The worst part of the road was the traverse of Stybarrow Crag. For over a quarter of a mile, the track hung over the water, too narrow over that whole length to turn a horse. One man could hold off a whole army—if he did not tire. On the other hand, archers, so dangerous in most wild and wooded country, would be of little use because the hill bulged out above the road and there were few places where a shot could be angled correctly. My mind was on the impossibility of bringing an army along that road, and I must have pulled back on the reins with surprise because Barbe stopped suddenly. Around a curve below the rise on which Barbe stood, where I expected to see more wilderness, there was a tame and cozy demesne farm—for dolls.

  I looked down at the tiny fields, each one not more than half or quarter of an acre—with the same surprise that Melusine expressed a day earlier on seeing the eight-ox plow working near Jernaeve. One could be fooled into thinking the fields were miles away and small with distance, except that below us, close to the edge of the lake, was a substantial, man-sized walled manor. That I recognized! Ulle!

  Now my eyes flew to Melusine, but she had not stopped as I had. I could see her head turn from side to side, sweeping the fields and then the lake. I hoped she was not suffering too much; if she had turned to me I would have comforted her as best I could, but in a way it was a relief that she did not. I did not know what to say. I did not even know whether what she saw was the same or different from when she had been mistress of Ulle. I remembered now that the ground had been covered with snow when I led Stephen’s forces into Ulle; that was why those tiny fields had not stuck in my memory.

  All I could do was increase Barbe’s pace so that I could ride beside her. Once I touched her hand, but she did not look at me and I made no further gestures. We met only one man, trudging along the track that bordered the fields with a faggot of sticks on his back. He looked up and gaped for a moment, then backed to the side of the road, staring.

  “A good day to you, Tom,” Melusine said. “I have come for a visit. I hope all has gone well with you these months I have been away.”

  “None so well,” the man replied, glancing at me before he added, “none so ill either, my lady.”

  “This is my husband, Sir Bruno of Jernaeve,” Melusine said, then nodded and rode on.

  “Good day to you,” I said, and rode on also.

  There had been first gladness and then disappointment in the man’s face after his first shock had passed. So much was easy to see, but I put that aside to think about later, my greatest concern being with Melusine as we drew nearer the manor. At least the gate was open and unguarded, which meant there had been no trouble with the local people. That was a relief, but I was surprised that Melusine’s arrival caused no more than a few curious looks. The only armed man inside the walls stared at me open-mouthed before he hailed a manservant to take our horses and said he would inform the steward that guests had arrived.

  I dismounted and hurried to lift Melusine down. Her face was a mask, but there was horror in her eyes. “Where are the old servants?” she whispered.

  “Melusine!” I exclaimed. “Those who were here when the king came were still here when he left. You know they were unharmed, even those silly old men who tried to hold us off.”

  She shook her head. “Where are they now?”

  “I do not know, my dear, but I will find out,” I said, turning to face a man who cried a hearty greeting as he came, but keeping my arm around Melusine’s waist.

  “Well come!” he exclaimed. “I am Sir Giles de Montalbe. I have not seen a new face in months. You are well come indeed in this empty end of the world.”

  “It is not an empty end of the world to us, Sir Giles,” I said. “I am Sir Bruno of Jernaeve, Knight of the Body to King Stephen, but I am on leave and my coming here has nothing to do with the king. This is Lady Melusine of Ulle, my wife, and I have brought her here because she was sick with longing for her home. I hope you do not mind.”

  “I would not mind if you were Satan, bringing Judas with you,” Sir Giles said explosively. “And if your lady wife and you would like to stay for good and can get me permission to leave, I will be overjoyed.”

  There was bitterness in his voice and disappointment and anger in his face, and Melusine drew a gasping breath and cried, “Where are the old servants?”

  “Gone,” Sir Giles replied in a snarl.

  “Dead?” I could hear the edge of hysteria in Melusine’s voice and her body stiffened.

  “How would I know?”

  The rigidity of Melusine’s body eased, and she said, “You mean they ran away?”

  “I mean that when I came here there were the hall and outbuildings of the manor, sixteen of the twenty men-at-arms with their captain that the king had left to hold the manor, and nothing else. And only twelve of the sixteen men left could bear arms. The men had been hunting to feed themselves, and in two months three were killed by falls and another five had been seriously injured, and the captain had a broken leg. The bailiff sent by the king was also dead—he drowned while fishing, and one of the men-at-arms with him.”

  Now Melusine was wholly relaxed against my arm. “This is dangerous country,” she said. “I was born here, and I have been overturned in the lake and blown off the trail near Black Crag—” She nodded northwest toward a glowering hulk of mountain that darkened the horizon. “I am sorry about the servants though. Would you like me to ask among the village people where they have gone and if they would be willing to come back?”

  “Willing?” Sir Giles almost choked on rage. “They have no right to will. They—”

  “Forgive me, Sir Giles,” Melusine interrupted. “The servants in Ulle were all free. There were no slaves or bound serfs in Ulle.” She smiled at him. “We were never rich enough to buy slaves, and they would have been useless for anything except household work or work on the demesne farm—which as you see is not large. As to trying to bind the native born into serfdom, how could we keep them if they wished to run into the hills and hide? It is more practical in Ulle to have free tenants who work willingly.”

  “Work?” Again Sir Giles’s voice rose with rage. “Who works in Ulle? They are all idlers.”

  “Let us go in, Sir Giles,” I interposed be
fore Melusine could answer. “We have been on the road since sunrise and I am sharp-set. I know we have missed dinner—”

  “Good God, forgive me,” Sir Giles exclaimed. “I have forgotten my manners and am growing as savage as the country. Do come in and I will see what there is to eat.”

  He led us in, and I made sure to enter the hall first and cross to the fire pit, leaving Melusine to hesitate at the doorway as she glanced around the room. I hoped the familiar hall would not be too much for her to bear, but I thought it less important to offer comfort than to keep her from seeing me in the doorway in armor, as she must have seen me the day Ulle was taken. But perhaps she would not have noticed me at all; she seemed far more smugly satisfied than distraught as she looked around the room, and her lips were twitching, not down but upward. I suspected it was laughter, not tears, she was trying to control.

  Melusine’s expression made me look about also. I cannot say I remembered the hall the day I burst in behind the ram. It had been dark, with all the shutters closed and barred, and my attention had been fixed on the wailing women. All I could remember was a chair of state behind Melusine. I had assumed there were other furnishings fitting for a gentleman’s hall. What I saw now would have better suited a hunting lodge where men shelter for a night or two rather than a manor where men lived—three rough benches and a stool flanking the fire pit, a trestle table of splintery planks on the dais, and that was all. I could not see behind the wall screen at the back of the dais, but I doubted that the bed in which Melusine and her brothers had been conceived still stood there.

  Had everything in Ulle been looted by Stephen’s army? Then I remembered that though there had been little of value, except furs, in any of the Cumbrian estates the king had taken—a few silver coins, some goblets and plate, and stores of food—in Ulle there had been nothing, nothing at all. Yes, that was why Stephen had left one of the minor clerks of his household to be bailiff and ferret out why Ulle was bare bones. But the bailiff had died. I glanced at Melusine, but she only looked politely bland now, as if she were entering a stranger’s hall and were determined not to notice anything out of the ordinary.