A Lady Under Siege (11 page)

In the end she rigged up a sort of early warning defence system at the door. She rummaged around for a bit of rope, tied it around the door handle and then up to an unused hook some previous occupant of the house had mounted on the wall nearby. She pulled the rope as snug as she could and knotted it, and found that when she tried to open the door the rope allowed no more than a four inch gap. Of course an intruder could always cut the rope, but they wouldn’t be expecting it, and dealing with it would take time. For a second line of defence she stood a roll of paper towel on the floor next to the closed door, and set a wine glass on top. The glass would topple and shatter if anyone opened the door, at least in theory. She didn’t feel like testing it with an experiment. For the third line of defence she would sleep on the couch in the living room downstairs, with both her cordless phone and her cell phone by her pillow. Betsy would be upstairs in her bed as usual.

When she was certain Betsy had settled safely to sleep, Meghan lay down on the living room couch, checked the phones one more time, pulled her duvet to her neck, and thought, I’ve gone to a whole lot of trouble to make myself feel secure enough to fall asleep, and I’ve completely, abysmally failed. But no wonder, when there’s a hole in my door big enough for a raccoon to come through. Are there raccoons in this neighbourhood? Of course there are, they’re all over the city. One could jump in and not even knock over the wine glass.

She told herself she was being absurd, adding wild animals to her list of worries, which served to remind her of all the other worries on her list. The fridge in the kitchen grumbled and groaned like a hungry man’s stomach, and every change in tone made her eyes pop open. This is ridiculous, she thought. I will never get to sleep like this. And yet she was so tired that sleep came quickly.

16

O
n the afternoon of the second day of their journey they ascended a low, wooded ridge. At the summit the land was cleared for grazing, and afforded a view down the other side. A pleasant river snaked through neatly tended fields, and in the distance a village appeared to nestle against the walls of a stout castle much larger and more grand than the one Sylvanne had known. The men called out happily at the sight of their homes.

As they descended through the fields women and children toiling at the harvest dropped their rakes and scythes and rushed to greet them. There was much merriment, and if some embraces were overly tearful, at least they were tears of joy. Sylvanne rode aloofly among the peasants, aware of eyes upon her, but looking neither left nor right. In front of her the oaf Gwynn had lifted Mabel from the back of the cart to walk with him, and was introducing her to one and all as his betrothed. Mabel blushed like a girl paid her first compliment, and protested only mildly.

One farm wife broke from happy reunion with her husband to stare at Sylvanne unabashedly. “So this be the great Lady herself,” she proclaimed. “I can see why our Lord obsesses. Quite the fair flower, ain’t she?”

“Beauty’s not enough,” her husband added. “She’ll need to perform.”

“If she’s half as eager as I am, m’Lord will be delighted with her,” she grinned, jumping up into his arms and wrapping her legs around him with such force that he tumbled to the ground with her on top, to the laughter and teasing of the many merry onlookers.

More and more peasants and villagers joined the happy throng. They paraded into the village and crushed together in the narrow lanes leading to the castle, which soon loomed over them. Then suddenly they stopped, having reached the point where a lowered drawbridge spread across a narrow moat. Kent dismounted and took the reins of Sylvanne’s horse in his hand. He yelled for the disorderly mob to make a passage for them, and they squeezed through the crush onto the stout timbers of the bridge. Sylvanne looked over the side at the blue waters of the moat and saw half a dozen pure white swans approach, gliding closer as if to have a look at her. “Even the birds are curious, Madame,” Kent laughed. Then they passed from the sunlit bridge into the shadowed passageway of the barbican, then through it and back outside into sunlight. The castle had two walls of defences, with the space between—the bailey—occupied by stables and liveries, servants’ quarters and storage sheds. Here the cobblestoned path to the inner sanctum was lined with maids, menservants and vassals, a flood of faces all freely gawking up at the Lady upon her horse. On their master’s orders, no one spoke, and after the carnival-like chatter of the peasants outside, the sudden silence gave Sylvanne a chill.

They passed through another gate to the inner courtyard, where yet another gaggle of onlookers waited at the bottom of a long stone staircase. Their finer attire showed them to be courtiers and noblepersons, but they gaped at her just as openly as any peasant had. Kent held out a hand and helped her dismount from her horse, and when she wobbled for a moment, unsteady on legs made stiff from the long journey, a murmur of concern went up from the crowd, as if this first impression marked an inauspicious portent. A single voice called out, “Welcome, m’Lady,” but was shushed by the others. Sylvanne composed herself, and allowed Kent to lead her up the staircase. Behind her she could hear a buzzing of low voices, of whispered, pent-up remarks that exploded into chatter as she passed through the doorway and entered the castle.

The hall was murky and dim. She blinked her eyes to speed their adjustment, as Kent guided her further within. They made a left turn, then a right. Light fell upon them from a high window. They reached a dead end in the hallway, and stood before a heavy wooden door. Kent rapped upon it, and a voice bade them enter.

Kent stepped aside to allow Sylvanne to pass, then followed behind. She stepped into the room, and saw that it was dominated by a large canopy bed, its four heavy oak posts ornately carved with coiling, climbing snakes. Upon the bed, under rumpled white linen, slept a young girl, no more than twelve. Standing over her, with his back to the door, was a man. He brushed a wisp of hair from the girl’s forehead, and felt her cheek with the back of his hand.

Kent cleared his throat. “She is here, m’Lord,” he said.

Thomas of Gastoncoe turned around. “There you are,” he said. He searched Sylvanne’s eyes for a glimmer of recognition, and found nothing but seething anger there.

“Do you not know me?”

“I expect you to be Lord Thomas,” she replied.

“Yes, yes, you can guess who I am, but do you recognize me? Have you not seen me before?”

“Never,” she said coldly.

“But you have. I was at your wedding. That’s how I know you.”

“I swam in a multitude of new faces then,” Sylvanne said. “Preoccupied with my own passage from girl to wife, I remember few.”

“It was a magnificent feast, given by your husband. Nothing spared.”

Sylvanne gave him a withering look. “Indeed, it was the happiest time of my life,” she said. “And now I find each new day to be my unhappiest.”

Thomas dismissed Kent with a glance. With a bow, he left them.

“I’m sorry to hear about your husband,” Thomas told her. “A fine man, but stubborn. We passed good times together at the jousts. I was something of a mentor to him in those days, trying to curb his impetuous nature. We used to talk about going off crusading together. I was surprised when he didn’t go with his father. What was the nature of his illness?”

“You know full well,” Sylvanne spat.

“I apologize if you believe this unfortunate siege contributed in any way to his death.”

“An apology changes nothing. He’s dead, and we live.”

“Yes,” he responded. “And how is it that he died, while every other person in your retinue, everyone from maid to valet, from soldier to charwoman, survived? I know of some who clambered down over the walls and deserted you, but even of those who stayed within, how was it that he was the first and only one to die?”

Sylvanne returned his gaze defiantly. “He refused to eat while others went hungry,” she said.

“And you were not so noble? Or so impractical? You ate while he starved? If so, m’Lady, you are as much responsible for his death as I. Or did he eat somewhat? Or did he eat nearly as much as others, and only now, in death, do you seek to raise him to a false sainthood of self-denial?”

Sylvanne began to cry. She turned her back to him, hating herself for showing him this weakness. Thomas spoke with sympathy. “I don’t mean to make you suffer more for it. You’ve lost a spouse, I know what emotions that arouses, what torments bruise your heart. All I mean to suggest is that, considering that every other person placed in his circumstances survived, then some other malady must have caused his death. And I apologize if my actions in any way hastened it.”

He came to her, and placed a hand gently on her shoulder. She jumped at his touch, twisted away from it, and turned to face him, enraged, electrified.

“Don’t you dare touch me,” she growled. “Don’t you ever lay a hand on me.” She stepped back, eyes darting madly about the room. She spotted a short sword in a scabbard hanging over the back of a chair, ran to it, unsheathed it, and held it with two hands, aiming it toward him so that the tip was chest high. Thomas was alert, and wary, but not frightened, for his martial training had included techniques for fighting unarmed against a swordsman. Not that she was any swordsman—he could tell that from the awkward, insubstantial way she waved the blade at him. The fury that burned like passion in her eyes failed to translate into menace with a weapon. He smiled at her, and the hint of condescension in his eyes drove her mad. In a frenzy she charged at him, wildly slashing with the blade. He ducked nimbly behind one of the posts at the foot of the canopy bed, and when Sylvanne lunged fiercely at his head her sword came to an abrupt halt, embedded in the bedpost, perfectly bisecting one of the ornate snakes carved there. Sylvanne tugged on the hilt, struggling with all her strength to free the blade, but she couldn’t make it budge.

Thomas watched her in amusement for a moment, then stepped around the bedpost and grabbed her by her wrists. In a calm, unruffled voice he called for Kent, who entered immediately. “Help me pacify the Lady,” Thomas commanded. “I want her hands tied securely, but as comfortably as possible. And afterward free this damn blade, but carefully, without causing further damage to the poor furniture.”

In short order Sylvanne sat sullenly in a chair by the bedside, her hands roped together behind her back. In the fading afternoon light Thomas lit a candle and turned his attention again to his daughter Daphne, still asleep under white linen sheets, oblivious to the high drama that had just transpired.

“There there, my darling,” Thomas whispered to her. “Daddy’s here. I’ll keep a candle burning day and night. Promise me you’ll keep a candle burning too. We’ll keep a flame alive, won’t we?”

Daphne lay mute and still. He studied her thin, sallow face for a moment, watched the feeble rise and fall of her breast as she breathed. “She was once so full of life,” he whispered. “You should have seen her.”

Sylvanne was unmoved.

“I know I shouldn’t expect your sympathy,” he said to her. “But will you hear me out, let me explain myself?”

Sylvanne closed her eyes. “If I could close my ears against your voice the way I shut my eyes against the light, I would.”

“This is not what I envisioned at all,” he told her, his voice tinged with disappointment. “I sought you as an ally, and now you’ve made yourself a captive. I wanted, and still want, needed, and still need, your help.”

He waited for her to open her eyes, but she kept them shut. He fetched a chair and placed it beside hers, sat in it and leaned close to her face.

“I’m grateful that you cannot close your ears, for what I’m about to tell you requires they be wide open, and your heart and mind also.”

Sylvanne made no response. She continued to keep her eyes closed.

“So be it,” he said. “Listen to me carefully. Do you imagine that the future will be very much different than our present age?” He paused, then, realising it was futile to attend an answer, continued, his voice filled with an agitated enthusiasm. “Can you imagine that mankind might move forward, with fantastic inventions? Machines that can fly like giant birds, transporting people in their bellies, or astonishing glowing objects that make all of human knowledge available to anyone? Can you imagine such things might be possible?”

She opened her eyes at last and looked at him neutrally. Taking this as encouragement he spoke even more excitedly. “I don’t just imagine these things. I see them, in my dreams. Since the death of my dear wife some months ago I dream them every night without fail. But what I experience is more than a dream—I inhabit the body of a man. He’s a man of the future—a freeman, neither owned nor owing to anyone. An everyday man, not a great king, nor a renowned poet, nor respected physician, though I wish he were. There’s nothing remarkable about him at all. But every night when I lie down to dream I become entrapped in his thoughts and actions. I watch his world, this staggering complex world of the future, so much of which I can’t comprehend, through his eyes, from a place I occupy in his mind. Derek is his name. Does that name mean anything to you at all?”