Heart of Ice (46 page)

     So he began again.

     ‘There was once a man called Geoffroi,’ he said softly, ‘and he went a very long way away to fight in a great battle in a foreign land. There he saved the life of a little princeling and as a reward the boy’s grandfather gave him a very precious jewel. This jewel was deep blue, like the summer sky at the end of the day, and it was set in a very old coin that was made of solid gold  . . .’

     He heard Joanna give a faint gasp from where she was sitting on the floor behind him. Smiling to himself, he proceeded to tell his daughter the old family tale that his own father used to tell him of the Eye of Jerusalem and how it came into the family. For she is my family, he thought as the tale wound to its conclusion; she is as much the grandchild of my parents as those beloved nephews and nieces in Acquin.

     Meggie had been drowsy even when she was put to bed and she was already asleep when Josse kissed her goodnight and returned to sit down beside Joanna.

     ‘I don’t think she heard the end of the story,’ he said softly. ‘Not that she’d have understood the part she did hear.’

     ‘Oh, I shouldn’t be so sure,’ Joanna replied. ‘But, with your permission, I’ll tell her the story again, many times. It is important that she knows it.’

     ‘Because the Eye is her inheritance,’ he said. ‘Aye. I had worked that out for myself.’ It was not the only thing he had worked out; between the shock of being presented with his daughter and the opportunity to talk about it, he had had time for a great deal of thinking.

     There was a pause, heavy with unspoken things.

     Then Joanna said, ‘It was Meggie who held the Eye into the water.’

     ‘I thought it might have been.’

     As if she felt the need to defend herself, Joanna hurried on, ‘They’d asked me before, Josse, and I refused. Even when they told me about the prophecy and I knew it must mean Meggie, I wouldn’t let her do it. I was afraid for her safety, with a fatal sickness affecting the Abbey and those within it. But beyond that, I was afraid of seeing you again.’

     She paused as if to allow him space to comment, but he was not ready yet. ‘Go on.’

     ‘It wasn’t that I didn’t want to see you; it was that I felt I’d managed to make my life without you and I guessed you had done the same. Seeing each other would only open old wounds.’

     ‘And has it?’

     She turned her eyes to his. Her eyes were much darker than her daughter’s – almost black in the dim light – and he felt a surge of unexpected pleasure at this confirmation that Meggie’s eyes were indeed like his father’s and not like Joanna’s. There will always be something of the d’Acquins in her, he thought, whatever her life brings to her.

     But then Joanna said very quietly, ‘Of course it has.’

     Hastening away from treacherous ground, Josse said, ‘I asked you earlier why you did not tell me that you were pregnant with her but now I think I know. Joanna, you do not want to live the life that I lead, do you? Even if I promised you all the freedom you needed, you were not born to be somebody’s wife.’

     She reached out and took his hand, pressing it to her face. ‘No, Josse. I know now what I was born for and it isn’t that. But don’t let that fact make you think I do not love you for, in my way, I certainly do. Meggie was conceived in love and now, seeing you again, I realise that love is still there.’

     Was it in him too? He watched her, head bent over his hand, and the answer soon came. ‘As is mine for you,’ he said gently. ‘What, then, are we to do?’

     She straightened up and edged closer to him and he put his arms round her. ‘I may not want to share your life as your wife,’ she said tentatively – perhaps, he thought with a wry smile, she’s just realised that I haven’t in fact asked her to marry me; not recently, anyway – ‘but that doesn’t mean I never want to see you again.’

     ‘I’m glad. I should not like to think that this was the last time.’

     ‘Apart from our feelings for each other, there’s Meggie,’ she went on. ‘She has a father as well as a mother and it is your right, if you so choose, to influence her upbringing.’

     ‘I don’t know.’ Josse frowned. ‘What am I and what have I to offer her, against the world you now occupy? You’ve just told me you’re the daughter of one of your people’s most powerful women and that your birth, and presumably Meggie’s, were foreseen because the child was somehow predicted.’

     ‘That is how I understand it, yes.’

     ‘Then, Joanna, what influence can a man like me have on such a one as she?’

     ‘Do not underrate yourself, Josse. If Meggie’s birth was foreseen, then what happened between us that led to her conception was also part of the prediction.’

     It was a shock. His mind instinctively tried to reject the thought that his role in the advent of this wonder child had been preordained. He was about to ask
why me?
but, deciding it would sound too like an invitation for her to list his virtues – and
that
would be a short list – he didn’t.

     It was all too much to take in.

     As if she realised this – which would not surprise him as she seemed to pick up virtually everything else – she said, ‘Josse, there’s no doubt that Meggie has some special touch. The Eye changed the water instantly and we all saw it. And the charged water did seem to possess a unique healing power.’

     ‘The Abbess is doing well,’ he said, aware that his thoughts had gone off at a tangent. ‘But then the water was only the second form of treatment; you had already brought her back.’

     ‘You asked me to save her life,’ Joanna said gently. ‘I could not refuse. Not only for her sake – and I know full well she is a good woman – but also for yours. Josse, you would be lost without her.’

     ‘I did nearly lose her,’ he mused. For a dangerous moment he allowed himself to imagine life without her. He’d have gone back to New Winnowlands, probably returned to Hawkenlye now and again, but with the Abbess in her grave every inch of the place would have been nothing but an agonising reminder that she was no longer there.

     The cumulative emotional shocks of the recent past seemed to gather themselves together and rush at him. He felt Joanna’s compassion wrap around him like a warm, soft blanket. It was the easiest thing in the world to drop his head into her lap and weep.

Later, lying side by side beneath the covers up on the sleeping platform, he said, ‘Joanna, this is what I suggest. I will return to my life at New Winnowlands’ – such as it is, he almost added – ‘and you, naturally, will pursue the path that has been set for you, developing your healing skills and guiding Meggie’s steps along her own destined path. I trust you to protect her and do your best for her; I do not think you would allow any harm to come to her.’

     ‘I won’t,’ Joanna said quickly.

     ‘With your permission, I will visit you here from time to time. If you are away or do not want to see me, then I’m quite sure you will find a way to ensure that I do not find you.’

     It sounded hard and she must have thought so too. ‘I would only do that if there were some pressing reason,’ she replied. ‘There are certain times of the year when we—’

     ‘Don’t tell me,’ he said swiftly. He did not think he could bear to know the details of this strange other life that Joanna lived and into which his only child had been born.

     ‘Very well.’ She hesitated. ‘It is – beneficial, Josse. The power is frightening sometimes but nobody is made to handle it before they are ready.’

     ‘A sixteen-month-old child may wield a magical healing stone, however.’

     It was unkind and he immediately regretted it. But she said evenly, ‘Meggie is a special case.’ Then, quickly: ‘But you have my word that I will never allow her to do anything that I believe to be beyond her.’

     And with that, he realised, he would have to be satisfied.

     They lay in each other’s arms. He very much wanted to make love to her – of course he did – but his child lay beside him and it did not seem right. Eventually he slept.

He left her early in the morning while Meggie was still asleep. Quickly, with no words of farewell and no turning back. He hurried through the forest, just waking to the first light of the new day, and was back at the Abbey in time for Prime.

     Then he went straight to the infirmary and took his seat on the stool by the Abbess’s bed. She was asleep but that was where he needed to be.

     When she’s better I’ll tell her, he resolved. I’ll tell her that when we were first thrown together, Joanna and I were lovers and that she conceived my child. I’ll describe Meggie to her and I’ll tell her how beautiful my daughter is. I might even tell her that it was Meggie’s strange power that made the Eye of Jerusalem work as it was intended to.

     He watched the Abbess’s sleeping face. With only the simple cap in place of her coif and veil, she looked like any other woman and it was sometimes quite difficult to recall that she was far from being that.

     Joanna.

     Helewise.

     Meggie.

     On the other hand, he thought with a grin, maybe I won’t tell her anything at all.

Postscript

Hawkenlye Abbey 27th March 1194

The King was back.

     News came quite quickly to the Abbey because Josse had been involved in the triumphal receptions prepared for Richard at Rochester and Canterbury, culminating in the state entry into London on 23rd March.

     Knowing that everyone within and on the fringes of the Hawkenlye community would be avid to know the latest news, Josse made sure to make frequent return visits to the Abbey. The King, he reported, looked fit and well; Queen Eleanor looked happy but very tired. Along every mile of the King’s progression from Sandwich, where his party had landed on 12th March, people lined the streets and cheered; it was a fine display of wholehearted welcome for a returning monarch.

     But, as Josse confided in the Abbess, now sitting up in bed and quite clearly desperate to be allowed up, the joyful celebratory mood had not in truth come about spontaneously. It had been a major part of Josse’s job – and that of his companions also summoned to assist in the arrangements for the homecoming – to whip up a bit of enthusiasm in a cynical population among whom the prevailing mood was resentment at the terrible privations forced upon them by the ransom demands.

     However, a king was a king and a magnificient, colourful spectacle had its own way of raising the spirits. Cheering was apparently even more infectious than the foreign pestilence that had so recently devastated Hawkenlye and, in the end, Josse was quite sure that King Richard must have believed his people were overjoyed to see him back and reckoned the unbelievably high price they had had to pay for him was money well spent.

On the night of 23rd March, Josse arrived at the Abbey with incredible news. The King and his mother were to embark on a round of visits to abbeys where there would be services of appreciation for Richard’s safe return and where the King would take the opportunity of thanking the religious communities that had prayed so hard for his delivery. He was to visit St Albans, Bury St Edmunds and . . . Hawkenlye.

     Josse had half-feared to deliver the announcement since he was worried by what such anxious excitement would do to the convalescent Abbess. But he had reckoned without her calm confidence; on expressing the careful sentiment that she must be sure not to overtire herself, she said, ‘Sir Josse, Hawkenlye Abbey has entertained royalty before. Queen Eleanor has been a frequent visitor and, as I am quite sure you will recall, Prince John also stayed with us not so many years ago. We shall do our best to make the King welcome and that will have to suffice.’

     Her recent close brush with death, he reflected ruefully, seemed to have increased her serenity; as the day of the visit approached, he wished he had her steely nerves.

The morning of 27th March dawned bright and dry. The Abbey looked as if every inch had been scrubbed, buffed and polished. The new building in the Vale was completed just in time; Catt had done a magnificent job. It was a long, low building, simply but stoutly made, and Catt had been meticulous in the details so that the room was well insulated and would be practical and easy to keep clean. He had finished it off with straw thatch; the roof was a joy to behold.