Bond of Blood (47 page)

Wine in large silver goblets, cool and sweet, did as much to calm Roger of Hereford as Radnor's explanations. Indeed, the only time he showed any interest was in Cain's comment that Maud would now try to seize Leah.

"She tried once before, thinking to wed her to a man of her own choice if I died. Now that I have escaped that trap she will try harder. She knows I love the wench," Cain said, smiling at Leah, "and Maud believes she could make me dance to her piping if she held Leah hostage. Truly, it is the only weapon good enough to use against the tale told by the prisoners you hold for me."

"Maud tried to seize Leah before the tourney?" Cain nodded and a look of enlightenment mixed strangely with both relief and apprehension came into Hereford's face. "Well, I will be strapped and tied! Listen. I received a note from Elizabeth Chester telling me not to take a lady into my house. You may suppose I did not take that kindly for—for reasons of my own, but Elizabeth must have been trying to give me warning that I should not try to protect Leah because Maud would look in my house first. Good Lord, this is horrible! When I last spoke with her, I—" He closed his eyes wearing a sick expression.

"You did not tell Elizabeth of Chester that your women were your affair and not hers—Roger, you could not have been so stupid." Radnor's voice was hushed with a combination of humor and horror.

Hereford swallowed nervously and nodded. "She will cut out my liver and eat it—heaven help me. I—I had better go at once and make my peace with her."

Radnor shuddered eloquently. "Can you? You are a braver man than I, Hereford. If I were you, I would take a trip, a long trip, even go on crusade. It might be that in ten years' time she will no longer be wishing to drink your blood. A long, dangerous voyage would be— By God's ten toes, you
are
going to take a long trip."

Leah, listening, wondered what sort of woman it was that could make two grown men turn pale. Apparently Elizabeth Chester had that power, for here were two of the finest knights in England looking at each other with despairing eyes. Lady Elizabeth, no doubt, would never be thought of as a brood mare or ordered out of her own solar. Yet Elizabeth did not seem so different from other women. She was beautiful, gay, and her tongue could be very sharp, but Leah had used sharp words once and they had cost her a beating. What defence was a tongue against a heavy hand?

Leah's nature was yielding and she had a desperate need to be loved. She did not understand the force of hatred a certain type of woman could send forth, or how that cold force could numb a man even while he struck so that the blows gave no satisfaction. Leah was afraid of pain; it was inconceivable to her that one could fight back against it physically returning blow for blow. Furthermore, although she knew that Cain was different from her father, she still did not realize that her father was in the minority among men, that most men preferred to live in peace if not in affection with their wives, and that long periods of semi-isolation in a keep with a sharp-tongued woman could finally wear down even a strong-armed man. Cain touched her with his goblet and she started, her attention returning to the men's talk.

"I am?" Hereford was replying, coldness returning to his voice. "Because you order it, Radnor? Because you wish to be rid of me? Do you think because you rule Wales you can rule me also?"

"For God's sake, Hereford, you begin to sound like Pembroke. I do not wish to be rid of you nor, in spite of what you think, have I the faintest desire to rule anything but my own lands—I have trouble enough with those. I wish you to go because it is essential to the cause we both wish well. Come, sit down again. We can make use of your trouble with the king, I hope. You, like everyone else, have heard that Henry of Anjou is expected, but you have not heard some very important matters regarding this."

"Of course I have heard. Why do you think Chester and I involved ourselves in that insane effort to dispose of Stephen? Do you think we wanted the throne for ourselves?"

"What you say shows that you do not know what I do."

"I suppose I was not secure enough to tell. You suspected that I would run to Stephen for blood money?" The bitter sarcasm, the incandescent eyes told how deep the hurt had gone.

"Roger, I am sorry, but at that time you were not safe." The earl got to his feet with an outraged gasp. "Sit down! It was your honor I feared, not any tendency to dishonor in you. Think! You were bound by oaths to Pembroke and Chester. Would it not have been your duty to tell your oathbound comrades what you heard? You would willingly do no harm, I know, but Chester is sometimes not very wise and Pembroke is a plain traitor to both sides."

Hereford took the goblet that Leah pressed into his hand and resumed his seat, his hot color returning to normal. "I cannot gainsay you. You are even kind not to say that I too am not very wise."

"You are perhaps a little hasty, but time will amend that. Nay, do not look so crestfallen. I trust you for all of that as far as any man can trust another, as you will hear if you will only listen. The most important thing you do not know is that Henry's coming, although urged by his mad mother, suits no one, not even herself. The court is in terror of whom he will bring and who will join him, but there is no support for him at all. Neither Matilda, nor Gloucester, nor Arundel will give him a man or a mil. Chester is in prison and you alone cannot withstand the might of the king. The time is not ripe. Henry must go home, and quickly, before Maud finds a way to capture him or men like Lincoln and, forgive me, your own brother Walter, use this as an excuse for more rapine, arson, and raid. One way alone we have benefited. Leah, where did Giles set those letters? Ah, thank you, my love. Here, read this."

Radnor tightened his robe, which had fallen open and made a gesture of eating to Leah, who went to give orders for a meal to be brought up. Cain closed his eyes, waiting without impatience for Hereford who read very slowly from little practice to finish perusing the rather complicated documents.

"This is something, Radnor, if it is, as you say, true that we cannot bring Stephen to battle and win."

"It is true, and you know it or you would be arguing with me. Therefore, when Henry arrives, someone must go posthaste to him, someone he will be willing to trust. Philip and I were to undertake that journey. Philip … Philip must undertake another, even longer journey all too soon, I fear." Cain swallowed hard, paused, refocused his eyes upon Hereford's face, and continued briskly. "I can go, and will if I must, but I think it more essential that I remain here to see if I can free Chester."

"You want me to ride west?"

"I do."

"But I have seen the boy only once. He will not remember me."

Cain smiled encouragingly. "He will remember your father; he will have Robert of Gloucester's word to your good faith and good will; he will have my letters supporting your embassy; and he will have these letters of Stephen's, which I will entrust to you."

"Is it not more
my
duty to see to Chester?"

"What can you do for him? Will the king or queen even receive you, much the less listen to anything you have to say about him?"

"I suppose not, but to leave …. Would it not seem as if I were running away and abandoning him?"

"What does it matter what it seems?" Radnor snapped. "You are conscious of your own honor. What does it matter what the brutes and fools think? Two other matters of importance can be seen to at the same time. The prisoners you hold for me must be conveyed to Painscastle. From Wales they may well make a lever long enough and strong enough to lift the weight of prison from Chester as well as ensure my well-doing."

"That I can see. The story would make pretty hearing at council and the queen will be most anxious to keep it from getting there. But should the men not be kept here where they can be produced at need?"

Lord Radnor shifted in his chair and gestured towards the food that had been placed before them by Leah. He was a little unsure of how to introduce his next plan to Hereford. What he was about to suggest would go greatly against that fiery young man's grain. To be truthful it went against his own, but he was more practiced in the arts of expediency. Good food and good wine were, fortunately, very calming to the hottest of tempers. Both were provided here in plenty and Radnor meant to use them. When he spoke again, his utterance was somewhat impeded by a full mouth, but his meaning was clear.

"I do not intend to bring them into council. I intend to threaten Maud with the revelation of their tale so that she will be induced to convince Stephen to release Chester. So far, it is all well, but Chester has committed treason, and after swearing to be faithful to Stephen too. Even Maud could not move her husband without some punishment for Chester and some gain for them. I am going to propose that Chester yield certain keeps in return for his freedom, and I hope that you will undertake to convince the barons who have done homage to Chester that this is necessary."

"No!"

It was a long, long argument. Candles were lighted and another meal served before Hereford had been talked around to agreement, even though he readily admitted that the particular castles Radnor wished yielded were of little or no value to Chester. Most of them were deep in areas sympathetic to Stephen and were strategically useless because they were counterbalanced by other keeps that were in the king's control. Others were only technically Chester's, being so far from his major holdings and his major interest that they virtually ruled themselves. Of these Stephen would have a choice, but it would matter little what he chose.

Neither the keeps themselves nor the additional fine that Radnor proposed to offer was what disturbed Hereford. It was the principle of submission that stuck in his craw. Again and again he returned to the notion that if Radnor could only discover where Chester was being kept, he would summon Chester's vassals and his own to free him by force.

"Roger, for the fiftieth time, I beg you to have some sense. What is the use of the vassals fighting when the leader is already taken? If too much resistance is shown, Chester might have an accident in prison—a fatal accident."

Kindling again, Hereford slammed down his wine goblet. "I say we go wrong about this. We should fight. A man has certain rights. If Stephen cannot be brought to honor these, then I say that he, not we, should die. Henry, you say, is coming. Let us drive Stephen out then and worry about freeing Chester later."

Lord Radnor was too tired now to meet heat with heat. "Who is to drive Stephen out? You alone? I have told you, again and again, that this is the wrong time for war. Even if we were ready, which we are not," he said with bitter intensity, "what profit would we have from setting a boy of fifteen on the throne?"

"I was little more when I took the lands of Hereford under my hand. Did I so ill?"

"Nay, Roger, you did well, but Hereford is not all of England with its bitter hatreds bred by so many years of war. The vassals wished to test you, perhaps, to see whether you were worthy to lead them, but in love for your father and respect for your own strong ways, they were half disposed from the beginning to accept you. You miss the very point of the argument and that is that it is not Stephen who is at fault. Largely it is those around him who do the evil and they would be no better counselors to the young Henry." Suddenly Radnor let his head drop into his hands. "Hereford, I can talk no more. I am so tired I feel faint. Go home and come back tomorrow."

He yawned and scratched his head. "I suppose the rumor that we have quarreled has been killed by your running over here every day when I was hurt, so now it is safe for you to come openly and inquire about my health." Another yawn, as though the admission that he was tired had broken the resistance he had put up so long against sleep. "Anyway, I think the worst of this hiding and whispering is over." He received Hereford's kiss with still another yawn and patted the younger man's shoulder affectionately. "It seems to me that I did not get so sleepy when I was your age."

"Nor," said Hereford, turning in the doorway with a mischievous smile, "before you had a wife. I go, I go. Do not throw that goblet, you will dent it."

The word "wife" and the suggestion in Hereford's manner recalled the events of the morning. "Leah," Radnor began when the door was dosed, holding his eyes open with an effort, "I am sorry I was so rude. This is your chamber, but the boy was so upset and there was no other place—"

"Yes, I know. Come to bed now."

"Are you angry?"

"Come to bed. This is no time to begin another discussion."

"You have not answered me."

Perhaps Elizabeth Chester could use rage as a weapon, but she could not. Leah lowered her eyes and murmured, "No, my lord, I am not angry."

Satisfied and completely unconscious that there was something beneath his wife's submission, Cain removed his robe and untied his chausses. Before he could do more, Leah took his right arm to examine the newly formed scar. His body tensed as she touched it firmly, but he did not jump as he would have if there had been a pocket of pus under the newformed tissue. Thus far Leah could not ask for better healing. She ran her hand somewhat more gently along his still discolored right side and Radnor tensed again. That was not quite as good. There was still tenderness and some swelling, but if he would take no rest, one could not expect better progress.

As if it were a matter of course, Leah now knelt to take off her husband's shoes. "That is not necessary," he said quickly.

"To me," Leah said raising her eyes to his, "it is necessary." Their glances met and fought and this time it was the man who bowed his head in submission.

"Have your will of me, then," was his resentful reply, but he did not feel truly resentful. Each time she examined him he was newly afraid, but each time the fear was less piercing and was followed by a greater sensation of relaxation.

When she was through with him, Radnor lay down and pulled the red coverlet up over him. He could hear Leah moving about softly, putting the wine and the goblets on a chest near the wall and replacing the chair Hereford had used before her embroidery frame. The sounds of movement stopped, and Cain turned on his side to watch his wife undress, his eyes almost closed.