Chapter 16 #2
Alone, she wandered the room, not knowing what to do.
She remembered the miller’s daughter, who counted stones.
Poor Aldreth had lost her husband to an accident.
Then a year later, her two small children had been taken by a fever.
She’d weathered the first loss, but after she’d buried her little ones she’d started to count stones. She’d never stopped.
Claire could understand now. She could see the pleasure in simply counting stones.
With a sigh she looked around the solar. It had been her parents’ room, full of happy memories. Briefly it had been a pleasure-bower. Now it was ruined by the man who had stolen her father and all joy. The man who—curse him—had woven strings into her heart so that she couldn’t quite tear free.
That sword offended her! She pulled a scarf out of one of her chests and dropped it over the black weapon.
Someone knocked on the door. Renald? No. If he came, he wouldn’t knock. She opened it to find Josce there, looking wary and curious.
“By your leave, lady, Lord Renald asks that I bring his sword to the office where he will sleep as usual.”
Claire couldn’t find words, so she simply stood back.
The squire hurried in, then stopped, looking around.
“It’s under that cloth over there.”
He gave her an odd look then uncovered the weapon. He retreated with it as if expecting some sort of attack, and she closed the door after him.
Renald’s mail still stood on its hanger, like his ghostly presence. Square, strong, cold, it was symbol of all that he was—a man who couldn’t endure to be without his weapon. A man who killed on order, and who would cheat if his master ordered it.
Why was her heart breaking over a coldhearted wolf?
She was standing staring at his loathsome armor when her mother burst in. “Claire? What foolishness have you fallen into now?”
Claire tried to find the words to tell the truth, but her courage failed. “It was just Father,” she muttered.
Her mother gathered her tight into her arms. “Oh, my poor child. You can seem so strong that I forget … Of course it is too soon, and how good of Lord Renald to respect your grief.”
Claire winced, hating her own cowardice.
“And a month is not so long,” said Lady Murielle, patting her shoulder. “It will give you time to get to know one another, which is no bad thing. And by then the wound of your father’s death will have healed.”
Claire sighed. It was no good. She could not live a lie. “He killed Father.”
“What?”
Claire moved out of her mother’s arms. “Renald de Lisle, king’s champion, killed Father in a court battle.
With that dark sword. Which was given him by the king so they could be sure of victory.
Don’t look at me like that. He admitted it all!
It wasn’t enough that he’s a decade younger and twice as strong, they made sure of things by arming him with a sword that cuts through mail like thread. ”
Lady Murielle sat down on the bed. “Lord Renald killed Clarence?”
“Yes.”
“But why?” her mother wailed.
Claire hadn’t really asked that, but the answer was obvious. “To reward another hungry follower. Bastard FitzRoger got poor Imogen and Carrisford, and now his friend has me and Summerbourne. I’m sure other men will come to untimely deaths.”
Her mother covered her mouth with a trembling hand. “No. No, it can’t be!”
“And Ulric,” said Claire, pursuing her thoughts. “He hasn’t admitted it yet, but he killed Ulric. I thought he had no motive, but he had.”
“Ulric was no threat to anyone. Claire, it’s all fancy—”
“No it isn’t! Ulric would have been there when Father died. He was bringing the full story. Renald knew that once I heard the truth I wouldn’t take the wedding vows. So he killed him.”
Her mother stared up at her, lips unsteady. “Are you sure, Claire?”
Claire flung out a hand. “Summon him. He’ll admit it.
He doesn’t seem to care. He just wanted to be sure of the wedding.
Now he has it and Summerbourne, he doesn’t …
doesn’t care.” Her brittle calm began to crack and she mirrored her mother’s gesture of horror and covered her mouth.
“Jesu. I have to break this marriage, Mother.”
Lady Murielle seemed numb with shock. “I can hardly believe …”
Claire began to pace. “He says he’ll throw us all out if I do. But I must.” She fell to her knees at her mother’s side. “You see that, don’t you? I must. I can’t lie with my father’s killer.”
Her mother reached a trembling hand to touch her cheek. “I don’t know, Claire. I don’t know. One-on-one … Oh, poor Clarence. Poor dear Clarence …”
She began to shake all over and Claire scrambled up to gather her into her arms. “Mother! Don’t—”
But Lady Murielle began to wail. Claire screamed for the maids.
Servants and friends came running, potions were sent for, and Lady Murielle was tucked, staring and trembling, into the big bed. Everyone assumed that she, too, had suddenly been overwhelmed by grief, and her mother’s occasional gabbled words didn’t reveal the truth.
The soothing draft took hold, and soon Claire’s mother lay in a peaceful stupor. Her two maidservants settled on pallets on the floor alongside Prissy and Maria. The guests drifted away and soon sounds from the hall faded. The celebration, such as it had been, was over.
Her wedding day was done.
Alone, Claire wondered what would happen if she fell apart. But it wasn’t her nature even though it might be a relief. She needed someone, though, someone to hold her. Someone to advise her.
She wrapped a cloak around herself and slipped out in search of her grandmother.
Lady Agnes had a small chamber on this floor, but as soon as Claire pushed open the door she heard a mixture of snuffles and snores.
Of course, nearly all the rooms were crammed with extra guests and they were all asleep.
Only one place beckoned. No one in this world stood ready to help her, but perhaps she could find ease from the next. She left the hall and headed for the graveyard.
Rounding the corner of the wooden church she jerked to a halt. By her father’s grave, a man stood, head bowed, hands resting on the hilt of an unsheathed sword whose point was set in the ground.
For a shocked moment she thought he was about to pierce the grave with it, to try to kill her poor father all over again. But then she recognized the traditional stance of the mourning warrior. He mourned her father?
No.
What then?
She could not say, and her mind would not try. She simply hated him the more for being where she wanted to be.
She prayed from a distance, hoping he would leave. When he didn’t—didn’t so much as move—fatigue defeated her and she trudged back wearily to the solar, tears running down her cheeks.
They were tears of grief—for her father, for her life, and for something briefly glimpsed now shattered forever. But they were also tears of fear and bitter loneliness. She’d once thought she stood exposed and lonely in a market-place, but she hadn’t known abandonment until now.
Back in the solar, in the room that still held the ghostly smells of the wedding bower, she found that some of her mother’s sleeping draft remained. She drained it, grimly anxious for oblivion. As she lay beside her mother, waiting for it to take effect, she prayed again to her father for help.
How could she break free of this marriage? How could she make the murderer pay? How could she do both and not bring further disaster on her family?
She didn’t pray for help for her other pain, however. She deserved her foolishly broken heart.