Chapter 18
Agnes
Agnes had woken wrong, and the day had only gotten worse. She had dressed in haste, horribly aware of what the morning was to bring. She had barely eaten, dismissing Ash’s worried looks. In the days since meeting Ash, those looks were becoming more obvious as he learned to read her better.
And now she was trapped in her chambers, standing stock-still in the new gown in the middle of the room while the dressmaker moved around her, muttering.
She shut her eyes, trying to will her soul from her body.
She was lucky, truth be told: with so little time to prepare she was having a gown from the dressmaker’s stock fitted to her, rather than having one made.
The dress would be sewn to size today and returned with the dawn, ready for the wedding that morning.
It made the whole process quicker; yet nothing could have been quick enough for her liking.
She’d been settled in herself for the past few days, and had hoped that the feeling would last beyond the fitting.
It had not. She’d let herself down.
Once, Agnes had tried to track these days – the days where it all felt worse, where she couldn’t distract her mind no matter how hard she tried.
Back then, she had thought it perhaps tied somehow to her bleeds, which always left her feeling unwell.
But it didn’t appear to be the case: some days, she woke, and her mind rebelled against her body to leave her …
Like this.
She could feel every knot and splinter in the wooden floor beneath her bare feet. Better to focus on that than the gentle fall of the dress around her knees, the way it clung to her arms, her shoulders, her chest.
‘If I could just check again here—’
The dressmaker approached, hands readied. Agnes didn’t even think: a buried, animal-like thing took over and she leapt back. She could not let her touch her. Not again. She could not.
‘I am sorry,’ she stammered, voice breaking. ‘Suddenly I feel quite unwell. I cannot … that is, if you could give me a moment?’
Her voice curled into a question, unbidden. It didn’t need to be a question: she was soon to be the lady of this house. It could be a demand. It should be a demand. But so unsure and so suddenly fragile her usual resolve was faltering, crushed under the weight of this heavier feeling.
The dressmaker only looked shocked for a moment. No doubt she was used to such outbursts from her more noble clients.
‘My lady.’ She nodded, as Agnes winced. ‘I think we have all we need anyway. I wish you well.’
‘Thank you.’
The dressmaker seemed to understand, waiting for her to pull off the dress and handing it back to be taken in before shuffling out of the room with her assistant close behind. It was only when the door shut that Agnes collapsed onto the bed.
She tugged the blanket around herself, hiding her body until she was little more than a heap of wool.
However awful she felt now, she could only imagine feeling worse were it her mother and sisters with her in that tiny room, cooing over fabrics and commenting on her form and figure and the elegance of an endless parade of dresses.
They were supposed to love her, to comfort her, but under their caring but misguided eyes she would have been—
She would have not been herself. They would never understand the horror of it, or worse: assume that the horror was for the act of marriage itself. They would see her distress and blame Ash, again.
She tugged her feet up, intending to hide beneath the blankets until necessity drove her out again, when there was a knock at her door.
‘Agnes?’ It was Ash.
She wrapped the blanket tighter. Still, it did nothing. Still she could feel herself beneath it, the odd curves of her body.
‘Agnes, are you all right?’
‘I—’ Even her voice felt wrong. She muffled her face in the blanket, willing herself to be stronger. ‘I am fine,’ she said.
There was a pause. Please go, she thought.
The door opened.
‘The dressmaker said you were unwe— Agnes?’ Beside her, the bed sagged. ‘What happened?’
‘Nothing,’ she mumbled. ‘Nothing happened. It was just … just me.’
‘Should I fetch the physician?’
‘No, no. It’s nothing like that.’
‘I could get Sara?’ He truly was desperate now.
‘No,’ she said. ‘No. But thank you.’
There was a long pause. Ash appeared to be thinking. ‘How about a jug of wine?’
To indulge in Ash’s suggestion would be a poor idea … yet still, it appealed. Better to let the fuzz of wine blur the edges of her body than struggle like this with them so solid and unpleasant.
She emerged from the blankets, feeling extremely childish for having hidden from her soon-to-be husband. She was ready for him to reprimand her when it became clear that there was nothing wrong with her – nothing physical, at least, even when the feeling was like a vice around her chest.
He didn’t. He smiled at her when she pulled the blanket away, almost shyly. As she sat up, he went to put a hand on her shoulder, then appeared to realise her state of near-undress and snatched it back.
‘When—’ His voice caught. ‘When they brought me back from France, and when I wasn’t about to die, I spent weeks hiding beneath the covers in my chambers. Months, maybe.’ He gave her another of those shy, self-effacing smiles. ‘Sometimes it is all you can do.’
Agnes sat up properly. She reached out, now, taking his hand. His fingers were cold. Her skin prickled into gooseflesh.
‘Indeed.’
‘Shall I … ?’
Agnes nodded. ‘Please.’
When Ash returned, Agnes had managed to return to some semblance of dress.
She had thrown the shift aside and pulled on instead an undershirt and hose and – after a moment’s hesitation – the cuirass as well.
She had finished tugging it tight and was slipping a thick tunic over her head when Ash walked in.
He glanced at her, but said nothing, sitting beside her and handing her a full mug of wine.
‘I … apologise,’ he said at last, looking down into his own goblet.
‘Whatever for?’
‘For all of this. I hate to think that the marriage pains you. I understand that I am not, perhaps, as good a husband as you may be able to find elsewhere. And if …’ He took a long drink.
‘If you need to call off the match, or find someone else, or leave … I will understand. I need a marriage. But I will not accept one that brings you so much pain.’
Agnes realised, slowly, what he meant. He had recognised the symptoms of panic and fear in her, knew them from his own lifetime suffering from them. But he did not know the cause. How could he? How could anyone?
It was reasonable that Ash had seen her panic and assumed it had meant she did not wish to go through with the match. That her fear was because of him.
Her stomach lurched. She wanted this. She wanted the marriage. She needed him to know that.
He wouldn’t understand. He could condemn her. But she had been trusted with the secret of the true nature of his and Oliver’s relationship, and as she had mused: perhaps such uniquenesses were not all that different.
‘It is not you.’
‘Then …’
‘It was— God take you, Ash, it was that cursed dress.’
Ash looked utterly lost. ‘You did not like it? Or the dressmaker? We could find someone else?’
‘No. It was not her, it was the feeling of it on my skin, the sensation of them looking at me, of being paraded like something …’ she took a sip ‘… like something I am not.’
‘What are you not?’ It was a cautious question.
Agnes answered the best she knew how. ‘A bride.’
Ash gave a low half-laugh. ‘Not yet, I suppose,’ he said. ‘But—’
‘You do not understand.’
‘Then help me understand, Agnes. Please.’
The cup was half-full. She saw it off.
‘Remember when I found you in the woods? And later, when we confirmed our match?’
Ash nodded. ‘I do.’
‘You did not seem concerned that I was dressed in men’s clothes.’
Ash shrugged. ‘I was not. I am not. Is that what this is? Agnes, if you wish to wear men’s clothes then I will not—’
‘It’s not that!’ It came out sharp. She immediately regretted it. ‘It is not just that. I cannot … I cannot explain it. I can barely explain it to myself.’
‘Could you try?’
Reading her expression, Ash got up from the bed and refilled their mugs, then gestured towards her with his own: go on.
‘At first it was just a game,’ she began.
‘Stealing men’s clothes and going out on the hunt.
My father knew – at first, it was because I wanted to join him without worrying about them treating me differently because I was a girl.
I dressed in boys’ clothes, pretended to be a boy, and they didn’t treat me as if I was some delicate creature who needed protecting.
And Father allowed it because he was pleased I was interested in his greatest love.
‘But then … it was after my first bleed. It had never been proper, but suddenly it was immoral. Before, my body was like … blank parchment, waiting to be filled. But the bleeds meant I was a woman. I could hunt, but only if I behaved properly. I had woken up transformed, changed from a lump of clay to a woman. Were you ever told the story of Joseph of Schonau?’
Ash frowned at the sudden shift in subject. ‘I do not recall it.’
Agnes rolled the cup in her hands.
‘You may know of him – her, I suppose – as Hildegund?’
Another blank look. Clearly Ash was not so well versed in monastic tales as she was.
‘It was a tale my nurse told me,’ Agnes began.
‘She was a nun, once, or at least spent some time with them. She was …’ she sniffed ‘… a very pious woman. But she brought with her stories from the convent. Joseph was a saint … miracles, visions, speaking to angels … but the true miracle was his death. He predicted upon which day he would die, which as far as miracles goes was good enough, but after he died it was said he transformed into a woman.’
‘What?’