Almodis (19 page)

‘Froimond had a mole or tuft of hair on his nose.’

‘Not so bad?’ I shrug at them.

‘But,’ returns Dia slowly, to increase our suspense, ‘the next child was named Horrible and he had three eyes, one on his forehead; and then there were two more sons Raymond and Theodoryk.’

‘Many ugly sons!’ I call out. ‘In spite of the deformities,’ I pick up the story, ‘the children were strong, talented and loved throughout the land. One day, Lord Raymond’s brother visited him and made Raymond very suspicious about the Saturday activities of his wife. So the next Saturday, Lord Raymond sought his wife, finding her in her bath where he spied on her through a crack in the door. He was horrified to see that she had the body and tail of a serpent from her waist down.’

They are gasping at that and Hugh falls to the floor flapping his legs together like a mermaid. When they have recovered
themselves
, I go on.

‘Lord Raymond accused Melusine of contaminating his line with her serpent nature, thus revealing that he had broken his promise to her. As a result, Melusine turned into a great serpent, circled the castle three times, wailing piteously, and then flew away. She would return at night to visit her children, then vanish. Lord Raymond was never happy again. Melusine appeared at the castle, as a dragon wailing, whenever a Count of Lusignan was about to die or a new one to be born. It was said that the noble line which originated with Melusine will reign until the end of the world. Her children will include the King of Cyprus, the King of Armenia, the King of Bohemia, the Duke of Luxembourg, and the Lord of Lusignan.’

‘Have you seen her,’ Raymond asks his eyes looking like two round pennies.

‘No, but I’ve heard her. When Melisende was born, I heard her in the moat, swimming around like a giant fish and wailing. She wails because she is exiled from her family forever by her husband’s failure to keep his promise. She mourns that she can no longer take human form and play with her children and grandchildren.’

‘Let’s see!’ shouts Hugh, and leads them in a rush out to the black waters of the moat where they try to imagine wailing and the sound of something big swimming in the water.

‘Imagine,’ says Dia, ‘you would hear the wailing getting louder and louder as she rounded the walls and then there she would be, right in front of your eyes. Her head above the water is that of the most beautiful lady but behind her you can see the thrashing of two great, green scaly tails. Tears are falling in little waves down her face and her mouth is open in a wail and the moon glints on her sharp teeth.’

The children hold their breath in horror.

‘One of her tails,’ I say, ‘flicks up in the air behind her, and her naked breast and head rear up out of the water close to Hugh’s petrified face.’

‘I’m not petrified a bit!’ he objects.

I smile and continue, ‘Her hair is long, blonde and tangled. She wears a golden crown studded with green jewels. She holds out her arm and hand to Hugh. It is a deathly pale white. It looks like the arm of a dead person.’

Raymond holds his own very pink and muddy hand and arm out for kissing to Hugh who spurns it.

‘The serpent-woman smiles at Hugh,’ I say, ‘and the smile on her small red mouth is frightening too. Hugh takes a stumbling step backwards as Melusine slithers out of the moat and on to the bank. As she touches the land she briefly shimmers into the form of a normal and very beautiful woman, but this lasts only seconds before she returns to the fearsome serpent shape again. Hugh looks into Melusine’s beautiful face and large green eyes. He feels he might drown in those eyes. He tries not to look at her monstrous tails dripping and slimy on the grass. There are worse things in the water than jelly fish, he thinks!’

‘You should have written the book, Lady Almodis,’ says Dia. ‘It seems as if you have really met this lady.’

With my husband, my former husband that is, I take Jourdain to the Priory to be entered as an oblate. Hugh reassures me that he will visit our son often. The chamberlain removes Jourdain’s child’s clothes and dresses him in a linen shirt and a novice habit so that he looks like a comically tiny adult monk. He is presented to the prior and the formula of oblation is read to us and signed by us both. The wafer and chalice of the Mass are put into Jourdain’s hands and then all are wrapped around with the altar cloth so that he and the offering might be received into the church together. The prior blesses his cowl and puts it on his head.

The boys in the oblate’s school sing in the choir but they do not keep the fasts or the night-time services of the adult monks. When he is fifteen Jourdain will decide whether to become a monk or whether to withhold his consent and re-enter the
secular
world. He seems to be taking the whole thing very cheerfully. I kiss him goodbye on his forehead. How bitter are these partings but I must not let them see me weep. I may never see him again. I try not to think of that and to hope that I will. The boys will write to me often, at least I know that Jourdain will.

Outside the priory my boys are waiting for me and I wish goodbye to my former husband.

‘I will take good care of Jourdain,’ he tells me again. ‘Good luck in Angers, boys, and write if you need anything.’ He brings his horse close to me and drops his voice, taking my hand. ‘I am glad to have seen you Almodis. I think of you every day and every night, you know.’ There is a lump in my throat and I can’t answer him for too long a time, but eventually I say, ‘I think of you often with affection also my Lord’. Dia, the boys and I turn our horses towards Roccamolten and I do not look back to where my love sits his horse and my little boy wears his cowl.

In Roccamolten my brother’s wife, Ponce, is to my liking. She manages my brother well since he is not as bright as he should be. The La Marche kin: how grand we all are these days: my brother, the Count of La Marche; I, the Countess of Toulouse; and my sister, the Countess of Carcassonne.

‘And two more sisters to wed to Occitan counts,’ says my mother, looking at my younger sisters, Lucia who is thirteen and Agnes who is twelve. Lucia has the same colouring as myself and Raingarde and some similarity of features. You can see that we are related. She is a little shorter in height, has a different mouth and her eyes are brown whilst ours are green. Lucia might make a good marriage, but Agnes is plain and very shy. She busies herself with her baby nieces and nephews and the puppies playing under the table. She seems perhaps fit for the cloister so I am surprised when my mother says, ‘Agnes has taken a foolish fancy to a
clodhopper
in Charroux.’

‘He is not a clodhopper,’ Agnes says through gritted teeth. ‘He is the son of a respectable land-holder.’ She looks at me with appeal but I cannot help her against all these, though I feel for her. Audebert will no doubt marry her to someone she does not like in a year or two.

Preparing for our homecoming feast, Guillaume and
Raymond
amuse my mother and brother, vying with each other for the hardest task. ‘I will set the fire,’ says Raymond.

‘No I will set the fire. I am the eldest and the heir.’

‘I will move the trestles then.’

Once we are all seated and eating, my mother remarks, ‘So your former husband is still unmarried.’ I do not answer. Since they are neighbours, it is not a question. ‘Odd,’ she goes on. ‘He is still a young man.’ Since this elicits no response from me she opens another topic: ‘Agnes’ daughter has wed the Emperor of Germany. Imagine how pleased she is with that! She intends to move to her daughter’s imperial court you know, now that her son is of age and she must cede the Regency of Aquitaine to him.’

‘Well it has taken him an extra few years to prise her fingers from the throne of Aquitaine,’ I say.

‘Umm,’ my mother seems distracted. ‘I was thinking of doing the same myself,’ she says looking directly at me.

‘You are thinking of moving to the Imperial German court?’ I say with mock innocence and Audebert guffaws, spitting meat onto the clean white linen. When he stops choking I turn back to my mother who is looking seriously affronted.

‘Well I’m so glad I amuse you both,’ she says, but she is
looking
at me.

I cannot have my mother at my court in Toulouse. I need to be nimble in my arrangements to cope with Pons and continue my plans. I am past a mother. I had to get past a mother when I left home a five-year old hostage, but I feel I have been unnecessarily cruel. ‘Have you considered visiting with Raingarde in
Carcassonne
?’ I ask, trying to mollify her. ‘You should see if the South suits you before making any decisions. Now that Raingarde is with child, she would be glad to have your help. You could bring Lucia and Agnes with you.’ My mother nods but is still looking at me with hostility.

‘Lucia, perhaps,’ says Ponce, ‘but I need Agnes here to help with my babies.’ ‘Yes,’ mother says, recovering her poise, ‘I will write to Raingarde and see if a visit from myself and Lucia would suit her.’

‘What do you make of this scandal of three popes, Almodis?’ asks my brother, bored now with where women will be and who will look after whose babies.

I can see that my mother is smarting at my rejection. For the next few days I am as kind as I can find the patience to be, but I
see that she will not forgive me for refusing her and I do not care to explain why.

My child is due and I am waiting here to gain one child to replace the four I am losing. The baby is late and I wander around
Roccamolten
, trying to hatch my egg, having flashes of early
childhood
memories here, running laughing through long grass higher than my head in sunshine with bees and insects humming around me.

After the birth of my new son I am maudlin.

‘Please, Almodis, speak to me!’ says my mother. ‘Nobody knows what to do with you.’

No, nobody knows. My own mother does not know for I am a stranger in the house of my family for a second time. They know nothing of me in truth. Only Raingarde is my real family. I have wept continuously for three days. I began when my mother placed my baby in my arms and I cannot stop. I am like a rusty spigot that has been turned on and cannot be turned off.

‘Now Almodis,’ says Dia, doing her best to cheer me up, ‘you’ll wash away that baby. He’ll have to learn to swim early!’

I laugh but also continue to cry. I have named him Hugh much to their consternation.

‘You know that you cannot name him Hugh, Almodis,’ says my brother. ‘He is your husband Pons’ son and Hugh is not a name in his family.’

I don’t respond and only continue to weep gently and play with my baby’s fingers.

‘Pons will take it as an affront, my dear sister,’ Audebert goes on, exasperated. ‘You know it!’ When his irritation has no effect they try other means.

‘You can’t call him Hugh, Mother,’ my eldest son tells me, touching his brother’s tiny foot, measuring its smallness with his man-boy hands. ‘We’ll have three Hughs in the family then: me, father, and my brother, all called Hugh. We’ll get confused won’t we, when you yell Hugh you rascal! Out of the door.’

I am laughing with him but I also continue to cry. I ignore their admonitions and in the night I have Dia fetch Father Jerome to give my son a benediction and name him Hugh.

‘Well,’ says Audebert, the next morning when he hears of it. ‘We will have to think of a nickname then.’

‘You could call him Hugh the Bishop,’ says Raymond, ‘since he is the third son,’ aiming to make it clear to me and his brother that he has no intention himself of going into the church.

I am losing my son, Hugh, and I lost his father, Hugh, I think in a burst of self-pity, so what does it matter if I name this baby Hugh.

‘What is a wife’s duty Mother?’ asks Lucia some days later when we are all seated in my mother’s chamber.

‘A wife’s duty is to run a household and get sons.’ My mother continues short-tempered.

‘How does a wife get sons?’ persists Lucia.

‘She lies on her back with her legs open,’ snaps my mother.

Lucia starts to cry and I look at my mother, shocked. Did she suffer as I do? I had never thought of this before since she and my father seemed happy. I soothe Lucia. ‘There now,’ I say, but I can’t lie to her and mitigate my mother’s harsh words. Instead, I say, ‘The scholar who divided humankind into three states: those who pray; those who fight; and those who work; he forgot the fourth state: those who breed.’ My mother nods at my words.

I have a letter from Jourdain at Lusignan Priory already. He
writes
that he has a great friend in one of the other boys and the masters are kind to them. His father is visiting him every Saturday to see how he does and he writes me the story of his week. His writing is full of blotches and strange spellings yet he tells me he intends to work in the scriptorium, drawing angels, flowers, and ugly demons (he adds with relish), around the letters of the manuscripts.

At noon today Geoffrey arrives, with ten of his men and is greeted warmly by Audebert and Ponce and by all of us. He has been engaged in a constant to and fro of war between Anjou, Normandy and the Capetian king for many years. He looks me over brazenly as usual, so that I am glad that I wore the finest dress and jewels that I could find. ‘Just birthed of a fifth son I
hear, Lady Almodis,’ are the first words from his mouth. ‘You look very well Countess.’ He bows low to me.

Hugh, Guillaume and Raymond troop in, wearing their best clothes, to meet their new foster father. Faced with his
forbidding
presence, they lose a little of their bounce and mischief, yet I am confident that he will be hard but kind to them. I remember his childhood kindnesses to me. There is some heart underneath his armour I believe, I hope. I introduce them and he asks them about themselves: what training they have already had, what weapons they know how to handle. Raymond trots out a long list that surprises even me. He is really too young yet, at six, to go to train, but he is precocious and eager and it is best to keep them, all three together, in Geoffrey’s household, looking out for each other.