A Tapestry of Dreams (9 page)

She scolded the girl for wasting time, but not even the slow passage of several weeks and the news that King Stephen had come north but was staying in Durham could discourage her. Audris’s tapestry had shown the king in Jernaeve; Fritha believed, and it was Fritha who saw the royal cortege first, running to draw Audris to the window just as the lookout on the tower top called down that a large party was coming along the south side of the river.

With a quiver of mingled anxiety and excitement, Audris began to undo the entire hide that covered the window. It seemed undignified for her to peep through a corner like a maidservant, but the process was tedious. By the time she had unfastened the top, bottom, and one side and was able to swing the hide out of the way, the leading riders had reached the ford. She heard a bass roar, muted by distance, and then her uncle’s voice from the wall to the left of her tower shouting a welcome. The sounds came in the open window. Even on the third floor, the stone walls of the tower were eight feet thick, and only the sound of a battering ram or a mangonel-cast stone could penetrate them.

Audris assumed that her uncle had offered to show the party the best path through the ford, because instead of crossing, they waited on the bank. Ten men, closest to the bank, formed a divided group, two to the fore and eight unevenly spaced behind. From the depth of his voice, his size, and the huge destrier he rode, Audris was certain one of the leaders was Walter Espec. The other must be the king, but Audris did not look at him. Her eyes had been attracted to a shock of brilliant red hair on the man just behind and to the left of Espec. The distance was too great to make out his features, but at that moment Espec said something to him, and he turned his horse to ride back to the bulk of the party, which was forming a second group a short distance behind.

As the red-haired rider turned, Audris caught sight of the shield hung on his shoulder. She drew in her breath in surprise and delight, having suddenly perceived a subject that would suit the sumptuous border she had woven. For once her tapestry would be pure fantasy, incapable of any interpretation outside myth. Audris continued to look for a few moments more at the red-haired rider, who was now returning to Sir Walter, and she felt grateful to him for wearing a shield of blue with a silver unicorn, rampant. She noted how lithely his body moved to the destrier’s stride, and then admired the superb destrier. If not quite so massive an animal as Sir Walter’s, it was still remarkably strong and more beautiful, really, because more graceful. If it had a horn and were white, instead of a chestnut almost as bright as the rider’s hair, Audris thought, it would make a perfect unicorn.

Smiling at the idea, Audris realized she was cold and stepped away from the window, telling Fritha to refasten the hide. It was only after she had picked up a spindle of grass-green yarn that she remembered she had not looked at the other man, who might be the king. But that hardly seemed to matter now. She was eager to begin work on her picture of a unicorn, rearing up on the bank of a river as if to display his beauty to a maiden who watched him from the window of a tower.

Audris did not realize that she had been observed as well as observing. Although Walter Espec had mentioned the strength of Jernaeve to Stephen, the king was still startled at the sense of threat generated by the overhanging fist of stone. Stephen was a brave man; nonetheless, as they approached the ford, he felt uneasily vulnerable and found himself scanning the walls and towers. The movement in the window brought a low, startled exclamation from him and the beginning of a gesture of defense.

Bruno, just behind the king, leaned forward and said, “There is no danger, Sire, I swear. That is Demoiselle Audris’s window, and she is probably curious.”

A moment later, to vindicate Bruno’s assertion, Audris stood staring out at the men. Stephen’s raised head attracted Hugh’s attention, and he, too, glanced upward briefly before his master bade him warn the remainder of Stephen’s cortege that the ford was treacherous and they should follow the path Sir Oliver took as closely as they could. Hugh glanced up again as he returned to his position, just in time to see the small figure in the pale gown fade backward and the blank sheet of hide close the window. There was a haunting quality to that image, a fairy-tale feeling of untouchability about the girl as the blank hide replaced her.

The odd impression dissipated as Sir Oliver came around the curve of the lower wall with four men and a substantial length of sturdy rope. This was stretched across the ford as a guide, while Oliver spoke a more formal welcome than could be shouted from the wall. The words were more smoothly said than Hugh had expected from what his master had told him of Sir Oliver’s general reluctance to commit himself to any purpose other than holding Jernaeve. Bruno, too, had mentioned Sir Oliver’s indifference to political matters that did not directly affect his own, or rather his niece’s, property. The thought caused Hugh to glance again at the closed window in the tower—the girl must have been Demoiselle Audris.

But neither Walter Espec nor Bruno knew of Audris’s tapestry, and it was the weaving that provided King Stephen with the warm welcome Sir Oliver had extended. Although it made him uncomfortable, Oliver had no more doubted the validity of the picture Eadyth described than Fritha did. He had therefore been considering his response to the king’s arrival ever since Eadyth had told him what Audris’s second panel portrayed. Had he truly been surprised by Stephen’s visit, as Stephen had intended, his distaste for becoming involved in the struggle for the crown would certainly have showed—and that, Oliver had decided after considerable thought, was what the tapestry was warning against.

Oliver would have preferred greatly that Stephen leave him strictly alone; however, he recognized that none but a fool would pass Jernaeve by. It was too great a prize, a strong point blocking one of the main roads between Scotland and the wealth of England. Since Oliver believed he had already burnt his bridge to Matilda’s side by rejecting Summerville’s offer, all that was left was to make Stephen so sure of his support that he would leave him to his own devices. The decision had brought Oliver to the southeast wall to call a welcome rather than suspicious questions, and now made him seem eagerly solicitous to protect Stephen and his entourage from the dangers of the treacherous ford.

Oliver’s care resulted in so smooth a passage of the ford that his guests were hardly splashed by the low waters of the North Tyne River. Nor was the narrow pass through the west gate and the easy defense of the long, steep road up to the keep lost on the men who entered there. Eadyth was waiting to greet them at the doorway to the great hall, curtsying to the ground before the king.

“This is my wife, Eadyth,” Oliver said. “You need only tell her what you desire for your comfort, Sire, and it will be provided.”

Stephen’s acknowledgment was genial, and after he and his companions had been unarmed and attired in warm, dry garments, he returned to the hall to apologize for his unannounced arrival. “I hope it will be no great trouble to you, Lady Eadyth, to provide us with an evening meal?”

“No, my lord, it is a great pleasure and no trouble at all,” Eadyth replied calmly, for she was secure in the efficiency of her domestic management. As soon as Oliver had come down from the wall, orders had been sent to the cooks for extra dishes and whatever delicacies they could add to the evening meal, and Eadmer had tapped the tun that held the special wine. Eadyth was accustomed to exalted guests and Stephen was not the first king who had guested in Jernaeve. “We are well provided,” she explained with a smile, “for we were under siege until your coming to the north. I assure you that it is with a grateful and glad heart that I will use those provisions for an occasion so much happier and that does us such great honor.”

“My wife speaks the truth, Sire,” Oliver added as he led the way to his own chair of state.

The high-backed, elaborately carved chair had been moved to the side of the eating dais closest to the hearth, where a huge fire leapt and roared, a position affording warmth without being in the direct path of the gusts of smoke and cinders that occasionally billowed out. The fireplace was hollowed out of the thick wall of the keep that faced into the bailey, set off-center near the high end of the hall. Below the dais, to the left of Stephen’s chair, was a short bench; to the right was a smaller chair with a low back, which Oliver used when he wanted to be closer to the heat of the fire or wished to dispense with ceremony. Beyond the second chair, facing the hearth, were several benches, and two others beyond them, at right angles to the fire, faced the king’s seat.

With a lesser but still respectful curtsy, Eadyth led Sir Walter Espec to the smaller chair and gestured with a smile to the benches for the other knights. “We have not had you as a guest for years, Sir Walter,” she said. “I am very sorry about Wark, but for me the loss has been lightened by the pleasure of your company.”

Since Eadyth and Sir Walter were following close behind Oliver and the king, Stephen heard. “Ah, but there has been no loss,” he said with a pleased smile as he seated himself. “Wark has been returned to Sir Walter, and he has benefited by being rid of a treacherous castellan.”

“That is good news, my lord,” Oliver said. “We knew you had come north when Sir William de Summerville broke off his siege, and I had heard you were to meet with King David in Durham, but we had no news of the results. I am very glad indeed to hear that a man of Sir Walter’s will still be my neighbor. To speak the truth, I had no lust for a Scottish keep less than three leagues from Jernaeve. I would not have had a sheep left on the hills by the end of the year.”

Espec and the three northern gentlemen who had come with Stephen from Durham burst into laughter, but the king and the knights of his personal entourage, all from Blois, looked surprised. “The Scots,” Sir Walter boomed, “start their instruction for roasting mutton with, ‘Go out and steal a sheep,’ and those for beef or chicken with the same phrase suitably altered.”

More laughter greeted Sir Walter’s explanation, this time including hoots from Stephen’s men, but the king himself looked uneasy. Eadyth, who was behind Sir Walter’s chair, stepped closer to Stephen and, with well-trained alacrity to smooth over the slight awkwardness caused by the joke, asked, “Will you have wine, my lord?”

“Yes, that would be most welcome,” Stephen replied quickly.

Eadmer poured wine from the flagon he held into a chased silver goblet, which Eadyth presented to the king. From behind the seated knights, several squires moved to help the steward, the younger boys pouring from other flagons set ready beside cups of wood and horn, many carved beautifully. Jernaeve keep held other silver vessels and some of gold and gold-framed glass, equally precious, but Oliver had warned Eadyth not to display them. It might do the king honor, he snapped impatiently in reply to his wife’s faint protest, but it would also give Stephen the idea that Jernaeve was too rich. When the wine had been served to the knights, the squires took their own, but while the others were dispersing to where they could hear, Bruno plucked Hugh familiarly by the sleeve.

In Oxford, one of Bruno’s first duties as Stephen’s squire had been to bring Hugh his promised token—a shield, azure, painted with a rampant unicorn, argent, above which was a scroll bearing the word
incorruptus.
Hugh had been appalled, and Sir Walter had been convulsed with laughter. Bruno, who was still in the first throes of gratitude to the king, had showed that he felt indignant on his master’s behalf. His reaction had sobered Sir Walter, who hastily explained that neither he nor Hugh felt the gift to be humorous or inadequate, nor were they laughing at King Stephen.

“No.” Hugh sighed and then laughed himself. “The jest falls on me, and the king could not know that I was much tormented in my youth for being ‘pure’ like the unicorn. But that is long past. The shield is beautiful, and I will carry it gladly and proudly.”

This time it was Bruno who recognized the wealth of past misery in the lightly spoken words, and again like called to like. So when Sir Walter suggested that Hugh go back to the castle with Bruno and ask whether Stephen had time to receive his thanks, Bruno had spoken of what being taken into the king’s service meant to him. Hugh had responded eagerly, and during the following weeks, as the army moved north, the two young men had met often, spent a good part of their free time together, and became good friends.

As they talked, both Hugh and Bruno gave a small part of their attention to their lords, a habit ingrained by long experience of service. Suddenly, there was a check in the easy conversation and occasional laughter among the men surrounding the king. Hugh and Bruno were instantly alert, aware of the uneasy silence, in which the sound of the fire seemed very loud.

“But you must know, Sire, that I do not have the right to do homage for Jernaeve.” In the tense quiet, Sir Oliver’s voice was just a shade too loud. “I only rule the property in the name of my niece, Demoiselle Audris. Did not Sir Walter tell you that my brother had a child?”

“Ah, yes, I remember now,” Stephen replied, not very truthfully, for he had given considerable thought to the heiress of Jernaeve. “But it was Bruno who told me. I suppose Sir Walter did not think it needful to mention it because I have taken your… er… Bruno of Jernaeve into my service.”

“Into your service?” Sir Oliver echoed. “You are a generous man, Sire. It is not often that the bearer of bad news is so kindly rewarded.”

Stephen laughed. “Bruno was only the confirmer of the news. My unicorn—” Stephen stopped and looked around, and Hugh and Bruno came forward and bowed. “Ah, there you are. This is Hugh Licorne, Sir Walter’s man. He carried the first word of the Scots’ invasion.”

Sir Oliver glanced at Hugh and nodded. He had seen him once or twice over the years when he met Sir Walter at gatherings of the northern nobles ordered by King Henry for tax collection or some legal deliberation, but no one ever forgot Hugh’s appearance. Then he smiled at Bruno with real relief and pleasure and turned back to the king.

“I thank you, Sire, from the heart,” Oliver said to Stephen, “for you have lifted a great weight from me. Bruno is a good man, the best. You will never regret your kindness to him.”

“I am sure of it,” Stephen replied. “He has been infinitely useful already. You have some odd customs here in the north, and he saved me from giving offense where I intended none. But your niece, how is it she did not come to greet me?”