Chapter 10 You
You
Sparring set aflame what was smouldering before; absence fans the fire.
Part of you is sure that if you could only act – if you could take Bisclavret by the hand and lead him aside and forget your place and his – it would fade into nothingness, a simple infatuation, and you would be free of it.
But left alone, the wanting grows and consumes, until you fear it will burn its way out of your flesh and leave a brand for all to see.
He is gone, in any case. A fortnight without him; a fortnight to have the arrangements made. A fortnight for the bruises he left on you to fade, and your raging blood to still to coolness.
You had no choice but to surrender the fight and give him the victory: he would always have won, and to prolong it would have shamed you.
Your body aches still with the memory of blows, and when you undress to bathe the next day, your hip is purpled with bruising and your skin burns for his touch.
In the polished bronze mirror, you see the mess he has made of your ribs and arms.
You would have let him do worse, but for your men watching.
The bath eases the aching and tames a little of the heat inside you, but it does not soothe your hunger or make rational your mind.
Your disordered thoughts spiral into chaos, interrupted by the memory of him – of his smile, of his sword-work, of the body beneath his clothes, of the way it felt to be the sole object of his attention.
It’s for the best that he’s gone; you can imagine the trouble you might have made for yourself, otherwise, trying to keep a fair distance.
When you are dressed, you proceed to the chapel to make arrangements. The chaplain there is almost as newly raised to his post as you are: he’s a young man, younger than the dour bishop who taught you your letters and Latin as a youth, and far milder in temper.
He is not surprised to hear of Bisclavret’s knighting, which means word has already spread through the castle. ‘A man cannot be knighted until his soul has been made ready for it,’ he informs you. ‘When he returns, I will need to take his Confession. He will profess his faith and keep his vigil.’
‘You think his soul unready?’ you say, with a glimmer of mischief, squashing your disappointment that the ceremony must be delayed another day beyond Bisclavret’s return. ‘Why, he is a good Christian man.’
He could be none of those things and you wouldn’t care. You suspect the chaplain knows this, though he has been your confessor only since your return from exile, and spared the bulk of your sins and indiscretions.
‘It is as much a part of the ceremony as the oath,’ he says. ‘You know this, my lord. You kept your own vigil.’
You did. It was a lonely night spent making yourself right with God and your own heart before taking up the sword.
You wonder, still, whether God really minds.
If He notices at all. In your father’s day, there were no such vigils; were his knights less holy for it?
None of them rode out to answer the call of popes and kings; they had enough to worry about at home without concerning themselves with holy war.
But the spectre of it fell heavily over your childhood nonetheless.
‘Very well,’ you say, at last, though you wonder how Bisclavret will cope with a night under the chaplain’s watchful gaze, if he cannot even bring himself to sleep in the hall.
‘Though the man is practically a hermit. He must have done many years’ vigil under the stars before now, and made enough peace within himself for a lifetime. Certainly enough for a knighthood.’
The chaplain’s eyes narrow. ‘Anyone would think you were treating this lightly, sire.’
He has you there. ‘I wouldn’t dream of it.’
‘Mockery is unbecoming of a king.’ Is that disapproval from this mild-mannered chaplain of yours?
That’s new. You have never crossed him before, happy to let him minister as he sees fit.
‘Even the purest heart must be made ready for service, and I know nothing of this man. When he returns, send him to me, and I will prepare him.’
‘So be it,’ you say, and cross yourself in half-sincere deference. The chaplain raises an eyebrow at that, but he lets you leave without imposing penance for your impertinence. That is a relief: you have much else to organise, and no wish to aggravate him.
You have other duties, too, a fact your seneschal is keen to draw to your attention.
The role of a new king, it seems, is to give gold and clasp hands; to receive fealty and hear petitions; to visit those tenants who might benefit from alms after summer storms left their farms battered and fatigued.
You must be seen, so that all might learn to love you.
They don’t know you, but nor did they know your father as anything more than a distant figurehead, so that matters little.
They would kiss the palm of any man in a crown who paused long enough to hear their troubles.
You meet a newborn child. They say they’ll name him after you, but you tell them to give him a brighter name, a younger one – one with less to weigh it down.
Their uncertain smiles suggest they can’t tell if you’re joking, and you wish you knew, too, how much of that was jest. But you hope nonetheless that they don’t name the child for you.
All you did was touch his brow and laugh when he clasped tiny hands around your finger; there must be fathers, uncles, grandfathers whose names are a better fit.
You meet older children, too. A small boy tells you he wants to be a knight, and you encourage him with tales of great deeds and chivalry.
A girl tells you the same, and when you glance over at her mother you see the woman’s concern, though you can’t be sure if she’s afraid you’ll punish the girl for her dreams or merely trample them.
You do neither, and tell her the story of a damsel rescuing a captured knight to repay him for his favour, because it is the best story you can offer her.
Two brothers, at odds with each other, bring a petition to you concerning their inheritance.
Two sisters, penniless, beg a dowry from the castle’s coffers, for they’ll make no marriage without one.
A poacher hunting in your father’s forests – your forests – is brought before you in chains, to be made an example of, and you regard him for a long moment.
‘Were you hungry,’ you ask him, ‘or merely sporting?’
‘My lord,’ begins your seneschal, but you hold up a hand to silence him.
‘I would have his answer.’ You turn back to the man. ‘You did not hunt a doe or hart. You trapped hares. That to me speaks more of hunger than of greed, but I would know your defence.’
The man is trembling, but he manages to meet your eyes.
‘I had three sons and lost two to the sea, sire,’ he says, ‘initially as fishermen until they were drowned last winter. Now my third son and I try to keep body and soul together on land scarce large enough to keep goats and the last of those fell sick with a fever. We’ve no coin to buy more and no crop large enough to live on. ’
Perhaps it is a lie. A figment, a story, designed to evoke pity.
Your father would have thought so. He’d have fined the man if he were in a good mood and had his hand in a foul one, if he let him free at all, though all outcomes would have required him to concern himself with matters of justice and not merely the pursuit of his pleasure.
No doubt your seneschal expects a firm hand and a similar violence from you, to prove to your people that you are no soft-hearted boy to be trifled with.
But a king can do worse than to be known for his kindness. ‘Give this man a goat,’ you tell your steward. ‘No – two goats. And coin enough to feed them for the winter.’
‘Sire,’ the seneschal protests, with real dismay in his voice. ‘If you allow poachers to evade punishment, you—’
‘Will gain a reputation for mercy? What a tragedy. Perhaps if I ensure my subjects do not starve, there will be no call for poaching. Who’s next?’
More of the same, it seems: more tests of what flavour of justice you might mete out, more signs that your father’s interest in his land and people had waned before his death.
It was not the weeks of waiting for your return and coronation that left lands mismanaged and tenants starving, but the years that went before them.
You will have your hands full for some time restoring your kingdom to prosperity, and that’s assuming no greater trouble – no raiders from the sea, no invasion from the east.
When the day is over and you are finally freed from duty and the weight of your crown, you find that there is somebody else who wants your attention: your ward, sitting beside you as you eat.
It is strange to think of her as such, when she is almost your own age and no niece or daughter.
Perhaps a sister, in another life, if your father had not sent you away and you had had the chance to know her better.
Perhaps a wife, if you did not know already that you will marry for political ends if you must marry at all.
Still, she is under your protection, and you have been neglecting her these last days, your mind full of other things.
‘I hear you are winning the hearts of poachers and petty thieves,’ she says, with a touch of laughter in her voice.
She is dressed almost as finely as you, in her silk bliaut with its embroidered hem and full, draping sleeves, her hair in long braids wrapped with ribbon.
A narrow circlet keeps her silk veil over her hair.
‘Better to win the hearts of thieves than the hearts of nobody,’ you answer her, affecting the same lightness of tone. ‘Am I inciting such rumour already, or do you take a particular interest in petitioners?’
‘A little of both,’ she says. ‘One never knows whether the next man to stand before you in the hall will be there to ask for my hand.’