Roselynde (11 page)

"I saw that too late. I am sorry I frightened him. I had my
bellyful of the pretended stupidity of your headmen and bailiffs and I thought
your Brother Philip was giving me more of the same. And I would like to know
the reason for that pretended stupidity, too."

"For that I am somewhat ashamed, my lord," Alinor
replied. "It was in spite, because you rode out without me. I beg your
pardon. I know it was your right and duty to see the lands and question the
men, but I wished you to see how they loved me and obeyed me. I pray you, do
not punish them for my pride. But no man lied to you. That I straitly
forbade."

"No indeed. How could there be a lie when there was no
substance to lie about." Simon shook his head. "It is a nice trail of
old fish, but I am a wise dog and I do not follow false trails. Perhaps you did
not
begin
with the intent to enrage me, but you went on to that purpose.
You have not answered my question. Why?"

"You have not answered mine."

Simon stared, again wordless. No man would dare, and this frail
child— A strangled sound just outside drew his eyes from Alinor, and he
suddenly realized he had a large appreciative audience. The lesser castlefolk
melted away under his glare, but Sir Andre and Sir John felt obliged to stand
their ground. Simon passed a hand across his face. Alinor, who had had her back
to the Great Hall, swung around.

"What do you here?" she asked furiously.

Sir Andre gestured over his shoulder at the unusually industrious
servants. "They feared some harm might come to you, my lady."

"And you also felt Lady Alinor needed protection?" Simon
asked in a perfectly expressionless voice.

Sir John cleared his throat awkwardly. Sir Andre shrugged
helplessly. "My lord," he said, "we know you to be a courteous
knight, but having some years dealt with Lady Alinor— My Lord," he
continued in furious haste, "a saint could hardly help wishing to murder
her at times. I have come within inches of it myself. I thought if she went too
far, I might curb her. I am accustomed to dealing with her."

Aware of an outraged gasp from his fair tormentor, Simon smiled
grimly. "Are you?" he asked pleasantly. "Then see if you can
bring her to answer a reasonable question reasonably."

If she could have laid hands on the well-meaning dolt who had
summoned her vassals, Alinor would have scratched out his eyes. She could not
order Sir Andre and Sir John to leave. If they did, not only would Sir Simon be
justly affronted but his authority as King's warden would be brought into
question and he might feel strong measures were necessary to en- force it. If
they did not leave, Alinor's own authority would be badly damaged. Nor could
she answer for Sir Andre a question she had refused to answer for Sir Simon.
And to refuse to answer at all would make her seem a spiteful, stubborn fool.

Her grandmother had always said that pride and honor were men's
insanity, and it was neither modest nor proper for a woman to ape men's ways.
Alinor laid a hand on Simon's arm.

"I beg you not to shame me before my vassals," she
pleaded softly. "Bid them go, and I will answer whatsoever you ask."

It was a trap. Simon knew it, and yet he was as helpless to resist
her as if he had been a swaddled child. His eyes met Sir Andre's. "I
promise you," he said, "whatever the provocation, I will not murder
her. Will you trust her to me?"

Gratefully the older men retreated.

"Will you hold by your word, lady?" Simon asked as soon
as they were out of earshot. He never expected a reply.

"I wished you to be angry so that you would not think about
what I had said," Alinor replied docilely.

Simon was so surprised that he nearly lost the power of speech
again. She was faithful to her word! "Then you succeeded," he
confessed. His lips twitched. "What had you said?"

He would remember as soon as he looked at the accounts again,
Alinor knew. It was useless to lie. It would be better to make a virtue of
necessity and speak out. Besides, she had thought of a very good explanation
and wanted to use it.

"I admitted that I wrote false accounts."

Again Simon's impulse to laugh died aborning. "Why?" he
asked, horrified.

Alinor shrugged. "Because, my lord, I did not know
you
would
be named King's warden."

"What? What has that to do with your accounts?"

"My lord, what I have heard of you makes me sure you would
not rob me to fill your purse—but many men are not such as you. Thus I made it
seem that much money had been wasted on foolishness—fine clothes, spices from
the East, any matter that would be used and discarded. I swear I did naught
that would lessen the King's right. I only changed what would appear to
diminish the castle hoard. Perhaps that was not honest, but I did not expect to
be treated honestly."

Now it was Simon's turn to shrug. He could not contest what she
said. In fact, she had acted wisely if not virtuously. And, thinking back on
the figures he had been studying, Simon was convinced Alinor had spoken the
truth. His expression began to lighten. In fact, she had not lied at all. She
had— The whole thing came flooding back on him. Poor Brother Philip's confusion
and the clever little witch with her straw babies and wet nurses. Simon began
to chuckle. Alinor glanced sidelong at him; her lips curved upward tentatively.

"You are a very foolish and extravagant young woman," he
said reprovingly. "You will have to cease from eating cinnamon
cakes."

"If I promise never to eat another cinnamon cake—what is
cinnamon, my lord?—will I be forgiven?"

"Cinnamon is one of those costly spices you have been
buying," Simon said gravely. "It has a taste like—Well, since you
have promised, you need not spend any time worrying over it. You are not to buy
any more. Do you hear?"

"Yes, my lord," Alinor murmured, smiling. "I hear
and I obey. I will buy no more cinnamon."

There are guilts and guilts. There are ugly things that corrode a
man and stain his soul. Simon had seen too much of that. However, he had never
before known that there are guilts that lead to a warm intimacy called
happiness.

Obviously it was quite wrong to condone what Alinor had done. Not
that any man would lose by it or be hurt by it. Even Alinor's soul would not
suffer for the lie. She had promised to confess and do penance for that.
Merely, it was wrong in the abstract. But abstractions were cold and distant
things, and Alinor was warm and close.

The crime committed and condoned drew them together. Laughter sparkled
between them and Alinor more often spoke to "Simon" than to "my
lord." That was not to say that all was sweetness and light. Both Alinor
and Simon were too accustomed to having their own way to agree for long. They
quarreled about everything, from the best way to gut a hare—which resulted, to
the great amusement of Alinor's huntsmen, in two well-skinned and clean-gutted
hares and two exceptionally dirty and bloody gentlefolk—to the best way to cast
for surf fish—which resulted in both nearly drowning when Simon slipped and was
dragged under by his armor and Alinor, struggling to hold on to him so that the
rescuers could find him, was nearly dragged under with him.

That incident resulted in the most royal battle of all. Simon lost
all rationality in his terror over Alinor's danger and Alinor resented
furiously the notion that, because she was a woman, she should permit a friend
and companion to be swept away by the undertow.

There were only two subjects upon which they did not have high
words. When Simon stood on the great gray walls, looked out to sea, and ordered
some change in the positioning of weaponry or the manning of the guard, Alinor
nodded her head curtly in approval without even a glance at Sir Andre for
reassurance. In matters of war, she held her tongue and placed an implicit
faith in Simon's ability. And when, in the long summer evenings, Alinor sat
before her embroidery frame, which had been moved to a convenient window in the
Great Hall, Simon lounged on the nearest bench, his eyes on the exquisite work
and the flying needle that produced it.

"I cannot do that," he had said softly one time.

Alinor looked up from her work and laughed. "What?
Embroider?"

"That, too, but I meant I cannot produce beauty of any
kind."

After a moment of silence in which Alinor studied Simon's face,
she said, "That is not really true. There is a beauty in justice. Often
and often, I have heard tell, you have made fair and just what was foul and
corrupt."

Simon turned his head to look out at the long shadows cast by the
slanting, golden light of the setting sun. "Perhaps," he agreed
wearily, "but it is so mixed with blood and terror— Something lacks in me.
I cannot believe what many priests tell us, that the pain and terror of
evildoers is beautiful and a joy to God. Beauty cannot be besmirched by
fear."

A week drifted by and then another. Alinor thought no more of a
summons to Court. Simon tried not to think at all.

He did not quite succeed. When he could find no more reason to
delay, they went on progress to the properties held by castellans for Lady
Alinor. To Simon's initial surprise and delight, this changed nothing. There
was no need to threaten force to prove Alinor's authority. They were welcomed
with pleasure.

In short order, however, Simon knew why, and the knowledge made
him uncomfortable. Alinor seemed to have permitted the condition of vassal and
castellan to become confused. A vassal "owned" his land. He paid dues
to an overlord, but it was only a small portion of what the estate was worth
and when he died his children inherited the land and vassalage by right.
Castellans, on the other hand, were merely tenants. They lived in a keep and
defended it; for this service they were allowed to retain a small portion of
the rents and produce of the land, to hunt its woods and fish its streams.
However, a castellan did not "own" the property and his children had
no right to inherit it. He himself could be moved to a different keep or simply
ordered to leave at the whim of the overlord.

The situation was not something Simon could speak of while they
stayed at Iford Keep, but when they were riding from Iford to Kingsclere, he
reluctantly opened the subject. It was something he feared would really anger
Alinor—not make her fly into a half-laughing rage as most of their disputes did
but touch something deep and dangerous in her. Alinor was deeply and
passionately tied to her men and her possessions.

"The lands are well cared for, the charges promptly and
honestly paid," Simon began, administering a dollop of honey before he
proffered the bitter truth. "But, Alinor, in the name of God, this
castellan is the
grandson
of the first holder. He must think the lands
are
his."

The furious denial Simon expected did not come. "Worse than
that," she agreed wryly,
"he feels
that the lands are his. It
is a great danger. My grandfather spoke often of it to me."

Simon made an unhappy grimace. "To put out an honest holder
is a hard thing, and cruel, too, but— How did Lord Rannulf let such a thing
come to pass?"

"He did not let it come to pass. He did it apurpose. Look you
how we were welcomed. Sir Giles can greet us with open arms because he is sure
we do not come to tear away his livelihood. He has no need to dare the danger
of trying to elevate himself from castellan to vassal because his father held
after his grandfather, he held after his father, and he can expect with
confidence that his son will hold after him."

"Yes, and that is all well and good until the day that he
begins to think of how little he keeps of the value of the land and how much a
vassal keeps. The people regard him as their lord. How will you force him from
the land if he should deny you what is yours?"

Alinor shrugged. "There is your finger upon the sore spot in
all this good. And, indeed, from that spot infection may spread. My grandfather
sought to keep the plague in check by visiting often and for weeks at a time in
each of his keeps. I also have tried, but the danger is there and with each
generation it grows worse. At Kingsclere the castellan died without issue and at
Ealand there were only young children, none fit to hold for me. In these places
I have new men. But in Iford, and other places, too—Simon, to put Sir Giles
out— I could not."

"Of course you cannot punish a man for being a good servant,
you cannot just send him away. However, we could shift the castellans. Sir
Giles can go from Iford to Ealand, and that man—"

"Could we, Simon? You know we cannot shift a man after three
generations. It were better to kill him, and his son, than to break his faith
in me first and then give another keep into his hands. In his mind Sir Giles
knows I have the right to send him to hold another keep for me or even to put
him out landless if I desire, but he does not believe in his heart that this
can happen. His faith is old and built on solid ground. Shake that faith by
making him feel my power, and he will begin to seek ways to wrest that power
from me."

Simon stared at her. It was Lord Rannulf speaking through her
mouth, he knew, but Alinor was not mouthing empty words. She understood their
meaning well and clearly.