Chapter 16 #4
Thibaut growled something and left the room. His black dog got up and followed him.
Hugh’s head peeked inside. “Do you need me, sir?” he asked.
“No, Hugh,” Jean said, convivial. “Take a little diluted wine and a few pastries and return to the door.” The youth thanked Jean, took some pastries, and went back out.
Finally, just the two of us remained. Earlier, when I was changing my clothes in the bedroom, I imagined Jean and I making love on the beautiful bed. Now, I felt that that was not appropriate and, more to the point, dangerous.
“Perhaps we should return to our spring?” I suggested after a short silence.
“It seems that would be the correct thing to do, my lady,” Jean said, sighing again. “Somehow, it always feels that the time with you is too short,” he added with a hint of melancholy.
“I don’t have to go straight home,” I said. “We could sit there a little.”
Jean smiled broadly and was suddenly full of energy. “Come,” he said. “This time, we shall gallop.”
By the time we got back to the bustling courtyard, I was completely revived and even a little tipsy—in a very pleasant way—from the wine and pastries I had devoured.
The clothes from my time were bundled in a big cloth sack (Jean struggled for a few moments with my sneakers, which stuck out of it).
I was already completely in the character of Lady édith from Cilicia, and I just hoped we wouldn’t be intercepted by an Armenian priest who might try to speak to me in his mother tongue.
We turned toward the gate, and Jean instructed Hugh to bring éclair.
“Are you certain you do not wish for me to join, sir?” asked Hugh. “Two are better than one.”
“Depends on the goal,” said Jean jokingly but grew serious when he saw Hugh’s frown.
“I do not require your service just now,” he said without expression.
“Yes, sir,” said Hugh and turned toward the barn with an expression of insult.
Jean clicked and muttered, “What a burden,” his gaze following the boy as he walked away.
I looked all around the yard. I wanted to walk around, to peek into the church, to see the main hall, to pass by the bakery.
But Jean was in a hurry to get out of there, and I knew I did not have much time with him.
On our way, we passed an elegantly dressed man, and he stopped before Jean with a look of condescension.
“Young Ibelin,” he said and looked at me, licking his lips.
He looked about Jean’s age, but he was dressed richly in silk and velvet lined with fur, an elaborate hunting cap with a feather on his head, and his mustache and beard looked oiled.
A yellow lion was embroidered on the front of his blue velvet tunic.
“De Brienne,” said Jean, his jaw tightening.
“This must be the intriguing cousin of yours,” said the oily one. Okay, my story really was spreading fast.
“Yes,” said Jean, making the gesture of someone intending to continue on his way.
“Strange rumors were spread about her in the castle, Arsur. It is not appropriate to bring her to a holy place like this.” He said this in a tone, as if Jean were in on the joke.
“Watch your tongue,” said Jean.
“The sergeants are chattering about some ‘Lady of the Spring’ who materialized at Le Destroit in front of one of the guards,” the man chuckled.
His breath had the sour smell of baby spit-up.
“Thibaut of Navarre is singing of a fairy you met, and the servants are spreading rumors about a shadowy witch who you dragged here earlier. Have you no shame?”
Jean blinked at him once, slowly, as if utterly exhausted, then said, in a formal and customary tone, as if he had already introduced me a thousand times, “De Brienne, this is my cousin, the Lady édith, daughter of the family Baberon of Cilicia. She is in the midst of a pilgrimage and on her way to visit my sister at a convent near Jerusalem.” The oily one bowed his head with respect, his feather almost tickling my nose.
“Cousin,” Jean went on, “May I introduce you to Count of Jaffa and Ashkelon, Gautier de Brienne, nephew to King Jean of Brienne, may his soul rest in peace, and an important force in our holy army.” These were the words that he said, but by the tone in which he said them, it sounded like “Meet the cockiest son of a bitch I know.”
I bowed, holding the edge of my dress.
“The pleasure is mine,” mumbled the Count of Jaffa and Ashkelon while gripping my hand with his clammy one, kissing it in an almost slimy way—I had to muster my strength not to wipe off his saliva on my skirts.
“Sir,” I half-sneezed.
He nodded with a grin to Jean, still limply holding my hand in his damp one. I took my hand back with an additional, sloppy bow.
“Has your uninhibited cousin taken you to the church of the Pilgrim Castle to pray before Saint Euphemia?” the count asked and licked his lips again. I turned my head to Jean, like an obedient cousin.
Jean looked at him in silence and then noticed Hugh standing by the gate with éclair.
“Another time,” he said curtly, taking my arm in his and pulling me after him.