Chapter Six #2
Scott nodded firmly, his expression suggesting he was as shocked as she was. “It is,” he said softly. “I swear to you, my lady, that this boy is Maximus’ son. He looks exactly like him. I believe the smithy without question.”
Jeniver’s hands moved to her head, astonished beyond measure.
But just as quickly, she thought of her friend, Courtly, and how the woman would handle the news of her husband’s bastard.
She could hardly catch her breath, knowing that Courtly’s entire world was about to be shaken to the core.
But she quickly composed herself, knowing that this was not her battle to fight.
It was not her right to feel anything other than sympathy for her friend and for Maximus, who would undoubtedly be stunned by the news.
Therefore, she took a deep breath and faced Scott.
Decisions had to be made and made quickly.
“I will take Courtly inside the keep and distract her,” she said.
“You will bring the smithy and the boy into the castle and settle them in the knights’ quarters.
Once you have settled them, you will help me explain the situation to Courtly.
But before you do anything, you must send a messenger riding as hard as he can for Gallus.
My husband must know what has happened so that he can tell Maximus.
Max will take the news better if it comes from Gallus. Is that clear?”
Scott nodded. “It is, my lady,” he said. “I agree completely.”
Jeniver nodded shortly. “Good,” she said. “Go now. Send the messenger, settle the visitors, and then come to me in the keep. We must tell Lady Courtly that her husband’s bastard son has arrived.”
She said it with some sadness and Scott could understand why.
It was a shocking and saddening situation for all involved.
As Jeniver headed back across the bailey towards Courtly, who was now sitting on the steps with Lily on her lap and the dogs milling about her, Scott headed off towards the gatehouse where the big, sickly, wheezing smithy was waiting with a very big lad who was the image of Maximus de Shera in his youth.
The entire situation was astonishing but Scott focused on what he needed to do.
With the de Shera brothers gone, this was his keep now and he was in charge.
He would make the correct and necessary decisions, with the guidance of Lady Jeniver, for all concerned.
A trusted soldier was soon racing for London bearing a shocking missive for Gallus de Shera.
*
Because it was nearing the nooning meal, Jeniver and Courtly herded the little girls into the small solar off the entry where they usually had intimate family meals as opposed to eating in the vastness of the great hall.
As Taranis and Henry milled around the table, mostly over by Violet and Lily who they knew would feed them scraps, Courtly oversaw the dishes the servants were bringing in.
Jeniver sat down and poured herself some boiled juice made from apple juice, pear juice, a tiny amount of wine, and mashed rose petals.
The little girls received the same drink and Lily tried to pick the rose petals out.
As those at the table helped themselves to drink, Courtly stood at the door of the chamber and inspected the dishes as they were brought in.
“This is the apple pie I was telling you about,” Courtly said to Jeniver as a servant set a large, baked pie onto the table.
“It is made from mashed apples, figs, raisins, honey, and a small amount of spice and saffron. Ty tried to describe this to me as a dish he favored as a child so I have tried to recreate it. I hope it turns out well.”
Jeniver smiled weakly as a servant presented her with a slab of the pie. “Anything you do turns out wonderfully,” she said, taking a big pewter spoon and scooping up a small bit. Putting it in her mouth, she chewed. “It is delicious. Ty will be thrilled.”
Courtly smiled, relieved and happy that her pie was a success. As the servants brought in bread, butter, fruit compote, and warmed-over pork and gravy from the night before, she sat down next to Jeniver and took a piece of pie for herself. Spooning a bite into her mouth, she crowed with delight.
“It is good,” she said. “I can already tell that Ty will confiscate the entire thing for himself, which means I will have to make several pies so everyone can have some. Why are men such little boys sometimes?”
Speaking of little boys…. Jeniver thought as she eyed her friend.
She took another bite of the delicious pie before using her spoon to cut up the small piece of pie on Lily’s little wooden trencher.
She then returned to her own food, accepting a piece of bread when a servant passed her a trencher filled with it.
“I spent my entire life with only my father and a few cousins and servants as company,” she said.
“Most of them were old men or young women, so I have not spent a good deal of time around men in general. I can only imagine that Lady Honey had her hands full with her sons but it seems that she ruled the nest, not the other way around.”
Courtly was almost finished with her pie.
“I am very sorry that I was not able to know the woman,” she said.
“When we first returned to Isenhall after her death, I know that Maximus was truly devastated that she had been buried shortly after her death and he had missed her funeral. For weeks, he would get up in the middle of the night and go to the family vault where he would simply sit beside her crypt for hours. Do you remember how Ty actually slept next to his mother’s crypt for the first week following her death? It was truly sad to watch.”
Jeniver remembered all of that. She had caught Gallus, several times, talking to his mother’s crypt.
Three months later, he still did it. But Jeniver knew it gave him comfort.
“What about you?” she asked Courtly. “Your father was buried in Kennington shortly after you and Max were married. Do you miss your father as your husband misses his mother?”
Courtly sighed faintly. “I do, at times,” she admitted. “But my father grew very odd towards the end. His protectiveness over me and over my sister grew to unhealthy proportions. I have not yet forgiven him for trying to kill Max on the field of battle. I am not sure if I ever will.”
Jeniver nodded. She knew of Courtly’s resentment towards her father following her marriage to Maximus.
Kellen de Lara had tried to kill Maximus under the guise of battle and might have succeeded had Bose de Moray not saved Maximus’ life by killing Kellen.
It had been a shocking and deadly turn for Kellen de Lara’s anger towards Maximus.
“Sir Bose apologized for killing your father when he came to pay his respects to Lady Honey after the battle at Warborough,” Jeniver said softly. “Did he make any mention of it again with his most recent visit?”
Courtly shook her head. “There is no need to,” she said. “I told him that there was nothing to forgive, as my father had gone mad. I thanked the man for saving Max’s life. I am indebted to de Moray, just as Max is. We owe him our happiness.”
Jeniver let the subject drop, mostly because the situation at the time of Honey and Kellen’s deaths had been turbulent, indeed. They were not particularly happy times other than Courtly and Maximus’ marriage. Jeniver finished off the last bite of her pie.
“And your sister?” she asked, changing the focus somewhat. “Will she be coming to Isenhall to stay with you? You speak of her so often I feel as if I already know her.”
Courtly smiled at the thought of her younger sister, Isadora, who had been at her family’s castle of Trelystan over the summer months, having been sent there by Kellen back in May before the chaos surrounding Courtly and Maximus’ marriage.
The younger de Lara sister had been removed from most of her father’s madness during that time, fortunately.
“I have written her three missives over the summer,” Courtly said.
“Isadora has written back to tell me that she is very happy at Trelystan because she is the Lady of the Castle now with my father and me gone. Kirk St. Héver has remained there as well to help her oversee things since my father’s death.
Technically, the castle now belongs to Maximus through his marriage to me but my husband has no desire to live there or even see it right now.
He is content to let St. Héver command the castle for now.
As for my sister, she seems happy there and Aunt Ellice has even gone to Trelystan to live with her.
Isadora is in very good hands and I am content. ”
Jeniver recalled the spinster aunt who had been so instrumental in ensuring Courtly and Maximus’ relationship.
“Aunt Ellice is quite a woman,” she said, recalling the woman’s bravery in the face of Kellen de Lara’s resistance to his daughter’s romance.
“Isadora is very lucky to have Ellice as her guardian.”
Courtly, too, was thinking on her aunt, a woman she had not particularly cared for until the incident with Maximus.
Then, Ellice had proven herself an exceptional and courageous ally.
“It is a comfort to know and understand the woman after so many years of disliking her,” she said softly, “but my father was terrible to her and she reacted in kind. Now, with my father gone, Ellice is truly one of the family and I believe she will be a good influence on Isadora. I hope they will visit Isenhall someday but, until then, I know they are happy at Trelystan.”