So Great A Love (8 page)

She could not stop thinking about Arden. More
than a dozen years in the past, when Arden was a handsome young
squire and Margaret a maiden fostered at the same castle of
Cliffmore, she had developed a secret fondness for him. It was a
weakness she never dared confess to anyone, not even to Catherine,
and she always took great care that Arden himself should not guess
at it.

From confidences whispered when she and
Catherine were alone Margaret had known all about Catherine's
girlhood tenderness for Tristan, the son of the baron of Cliffmore.
Yet never was Margaret able to speak, even in a whisper to the
friend of her heart, about her own feelings for Catherine's
brother.

Perhaps her interest in him had developed
because Arden was so different from her. The young Arden was always
laughing, frequently impetuous, and boldly willing to accept any
consequences of his impetuousness without shame or fear. But that
was all on the surface of his character and Margaret sensed there
were secret depths to Arden, waters so deep and dark she was almost
afraid to speak to him, lest she be pulled into an undertow too
swift and dangerous for her to survive it. For that reason she took
care never to touch him, though she had often been close enough to
do so, and she had longed to feel beneath her fingertips the hard,
youthful muscles and the warmth of his tall, broad-shouldered body.
Drawn to him while at the same time frightened of the longings he
stirred in her, she had been struck dumb whenever he was near.

She was five years younger than Arden and so
she held no feminine interest for him. Toward Margaret, Arden was
scrupulously polite. She envied the warm, protective affection
between Catherine and Arden for, on the rare occasions when she saw
Eustace, Margaret received no hint of love from her own
brother.

When Arden left England to travel to the Holy
Land to join the neverending war against the infidel forces,
Margaret put her tender thoughts of him firmly out of her mind
while, at the same time, consoling Catherine as best she could for
her brother's absence. A few months later, Margaret was called upon
to comfort Catherine again, when she was distraught over Tristan's
departure on the same great adventure. A short while after
Tristan's going, Catherine returned home to Wortham Castle when her
mother died, and Margaret's heart ached for the dear friend who had
suffered three great losses in so short a time.

Finally, Margaret left Cliffmore Castle to
return to Sutton, there to quarrel with her father and brother
about the arrangements they had made for her future and, having
lost the quarrel, to wed Lord Pendance. Once she was ensconced in
Pendance Castle in distant Cornwall, her girlhood seemed far away
and, except for the once or twice a year when she exchanged letters
with Catherine, she refused to think of more carefree days, or of
Arden, whom she was certain she would never see again.

But now she was staying in the manor
belonging to Arden, and it seemed to her that he was everywhere.
She could not get him out of her mind. Her sense of his presence
was so unnerving that she began to wonder if Arden was dead and if
his spirit had returned to say a last farewell to his home. She
told herself the notion was a trick of her own unruly and disturbed
thoughts. Arden had stayed away from Bowen for more than a decade,
a fact which suggested his spirit would not yearn to visit
there.

As she worked with Catherine, directing the
servants and cleaning and polishing, Margaret discovered she liked
Bowen Manor very much. It contained little in the way of luxury,
yet everything about the house and its surroundings was sturdy and
well planned. Bowen was not large, but it was built on a compact
scale that Margaret found far more pleasing than the huge, drafty
spaces of either Sutton or Pendance Castles.

Bowen had a well-proportioned great hall that
boasted a large fireplace in the center of one long wall. Several
windows on the opposite wall were glazed with pale yellow,
diamond-shaped panes that let in a warm, southern light. Thanks in
large part to this soft light, the hall was so pleasant a place to
be that the men-at-arms gathered there for every meal, with Sir
Wace at the head table. Groups of men were often to be found in the
hall between meals, polishing their armor or leather harness,
playing at dice or board games, or simply sprawling before the
fireplace to talk, all activities that might in another manor have
been carried out in the barracks. At Bowen, the chosen spot was the
great hall.

A short staircase led up from the entrance
end of the hall to the solar. The lord's chamber opened directly
off the solar on one side and, on the other side, a corridor gave
access to four small guest rooms. It was in two of these rooms that
Catherine and Aldis had taken up residence with every sign of
perfect contentment.

There was a chapel that opened off the entry
hall below, though it was bare and unused, since few priests ever
came to Bowen, except when Royce brought one with him from Wortham
Castle on the visits he made twice a year.

Bowen Manor was snug against the worst
weather and for the most part it was self-sufficient, thanks to
basement storerooms filled with preserved food; and, apparently, it
went unnoticed by the world outside the dense forest. For all of
these reasons, Margaret was delighted with it.

Their housecleaning chores completed in late
afternoon, the three young women took advantage of Bowen's small
bathhouse, which was located just outside the kitchen door, between
kitchen and laundry. There they washed away the dust of travel and
of housework, and shampooed their hair. Margaret added to her
toilette a large splash of her own perfume. Aldis had packed the
tightly stoppered vial among the few belongings of Margaret's that
she had gathered to remove from Sutton, and Margaret was glad to
have the fragrance at hand, for it was a special concoction of her
own making.

After they were clean they hastened,
laughing, through the falling snow to the kitchen and along the
passage into the great hall, where a fire burned and the tables
were being laid for the evening meal. Then on to the solar they
hurried, where they sat before their own, private fireplace and all
three combed their hair until it was dry and shining.

“What a terrible snowstorm,” exclaimed Sir
Wace, stamping snow and ice off his boots as he came through the
front entrance and into the great hall below. His voice carried up
the steps to the solar as he addressed the men-at-arms. “It's the
worst I’ve ever seen. No man nor beast will venture out tonight.
Not even the wild Welsh tribesmen would care to cross the border
and cause trouble in this weather. I dare say it's safe to reduce
the number of sentries on duty. There's no point in subjecting more
men than necessary to such cold and the chance of frostbite. But
the rest of you, seek your beds early, for there will be mounds of
snow for you to shovel tomorrow.”

Up in the solar, Margaret and Catherine
looked at each other and smiled.

“What a nice man Sir Wace is,” Margaret said.
She leaned forward on her stool, turning her head so the heat of
the fire would finish drying her hair as she continued to comb it.
“And what a lovely place Bowen is. It feels the way I have always
imagined a real home ought to feel, a safe shelter, with friendly
people in it. Cat, thank you for bringing me here.”

“I have never before been here in winter,”
Catherine said. “My father and I come each spring and fall and I
love it in both of those seasons. There’s an apple orchard outside
the western wall of the palisade, and in spring the fragrance from
the apple blossoms is wonderful. You would like it at that time of
year, on a sunny day, with the trees all in bloom and the bees
going about their work. And then, in the autumn, the apples are
ripe, and the grain in the fields near the river is golden when
it's ready for harvest. And we always go into the woods gathering
nuts to store for the winter.”

“That's my favorite season at Bowen,” Aldis
said in a dreamy voice. “Golden, russet autumn is so beautiful
here.”

“I would love to see Bowen then,” Margaret
responded, adding with a wistful sigh, “I could be content to live
here for the rest of my life, far from ambitious nobles and
demanding men.”

She fell silent, looking around the solar,
with its freshly scrubbed wooden floor and four narrow windows
topped by rounded arches in the Norman style. The thick glass in
the windows was as clear as the glassblower's art could make it,
with only slight ripples. The glass was specially chosen to let in
as much daylight as possible, for the solar was traditionally the
room where the women gathered to work at spinning or weaving or
embroidery. The windows were fitted with shutters that could be
closed to keep out the cold. At the moment they stood open to admit
the last of the fading afternoon light.

The solar had enough space for a loom to be
set up with the light coming in over the weaver's shoulder, but
there was no loom, nor even a small embroidery frame. With no lady
of the manor to ply her needle or her shuttle, the windows served
only to provide a view of dancing snowflakes and of the drifts
piling up high against the inner side of the palisade. Still,
seldom-used and bare as it was, the solar offered a feminine
sanctuary that Margaret appreciated.

Like the men-at-arms, the women also went to
bed early and Margaret lay snug for a second night in the lord's
chamber, curled up beneath a thick quilt, with a charcoal brazier
to warm the room. She smiled into the dark when the wind rattled
the window shutters. In the morning she would locate ink and
parchment and write her note to Lord Royce. Meanwhile, there was
nothing she could do about her secret information.

“No man nor beast will venture out tonight,”
she murmured. “Sir Wace has said so, and I trust Sir Wace.” Secure
in the knowledge that neither her father nor Lord Adhemar could
reach her in such weather and pleasantly tired after the vigorous
exertions of the day, Margaret sank into the deepest, most profound
rest she had known in more than a month.

* * * * *

The snow was falling so heavily that Arden
missed the turning onto the track that led to Bowen. Only when he
was several yards beyond the giant boulder that marked the track
did its snow-covered shape register in his weary mind.

“We must go back,” he said to Michael and
Guy. “Turn your horses. The path we want is behind us.”

“Are you sure?” asked Guy. “It's growing
dark, and if we lose our way, we'll die out here.”

“And no one will find us until spring,”
Michael added. “When I was in the Holy Land, I longed for English
weather. Now I'd give all I own for a few moments of blistering
sunshine.”

“I said, turn back!” Arden shouted. “No
matter how long it takes, we will reach Bowen before we stop.” He
usually allowed the men attending him great freedom to speak their
minds, but not tonight. He yearned for warmth and shelter from the
unrelenting storm no less than his companions. The difference
between him and them was that Arden knew that, for him, there was
no safe or comfortable place to stop, not even when they reached
Bowen Manor. For him, there might very well never be a place where
he would find peace.

Arden guessed it was near midnight when they
finally came to the palisade that surrounded the manor house and
the outbuildings at Bowen. Knowing there must be a sentry on duty,
he called out, identifying himself. After a moment he received an
answer. It took another few minutes for the wide gate to swing open
enough to allow Arden and his men to enter.

“My lord,” said the sentry, “we didn't expect
you, and Sir Wace decided we'd need only one man to guard the gate
on a night like this.”

“Don't disturb Sir Wace,” Arden said. “I
remember where the stable is. We can see to our own horses. We
aren't hungry; we brought food with us, but we are tired. All we
want for now is a place to sleep. I can show my men to the hall and
I'll speak with Sir Wace in the morning.” He nudged his weary horse
and it began to move away from the gate. Guy and Michael followed
him.

“My lord,” the sentry called after him, “I
think you should know – your sister, my lord – and her
friends—”

Arden paid no attention to the indistinct
words. He was almost at the stable door and the sentry's voice was
muted by snow and the wind.

A short time later, with the horses fed and
watered and only one stableboy awakened in the process, Arden and
his fellow travelers entered the great hall of the manor. They
found it pleasantly warm, heated by the fireplace in which banked
embers still glowed.

“'Tis clean and well-kept,” said Guy, looking
around with appreciation for what he saw. “You have a good staff,
my lord. They haven't shirked their duties in your absence.”

“I must remember to congratulate Sir Wace
when I see him tomorrow,” Arden responded dryly. As he spoke he
unclasped and swung off his wet cloak, then bent his head and
lifted his arms so Michael could remove his chainmail hauberk. His
next words were muffled by the mail. “There are rooms above stairs
that you are welcome to use if you like. I can rouse the servants.
They'll be sleeping in the kitchen, near the fire there.”

“Unused rooms will be cold,” said Guy.
“There's no need to waken anyone. Like the servants, I would rather
be warm by a fire.” From the saddlebag he carried slung over his
arm, Guy pulled a thick blanket. This he spread on the floor near
the fireplace. He then arranged his saddlebag as a pillow.

“Leave space for me,” Michael said to Guy. He
finished divesting Arden of his sword and belt, his armor and his
boots, then laid everything in a neat pile on the floor. “This is
the best kind of campaign, when we have a roof over our heads at
night, a steady fire to warm us, and the sure knowledge that we
won't be ambushed while we sleep.”