Rhys’s proffered tribute, recognized Rhys’s right to lands claimed by the Marcher Houses of Clare and Clifford, and returned to him another son long held hostage at the English court. But now that he and Ranulf were alone for the first time, their conversation’s flow began to ebb, soon slowing to a trickle.
They studied each other silently in the fire’s erratic glow, listening to the crackle of flames, the raspy sounds of Rainald’s snoring, the rhythm of rain upon the roof. Henry sipped his wine, oblivious to what he was tasting. “I grieved for you when I learned of Hywel ab Owain’s death,” he said softly. “He was a brave man, a gifted poet, and good company.”
Ranulf inclined his head. “Yes… he was.”
“I was concerned on your behalf, too, Uncle, for I very much doubted that Davydd ab Owain would let you dwell unmolested in domains now his.”
“He did not.”
Henry waited a moment and then prodded, “Well?”
“I thought it best to depart Trefriw lest I drag my uncle Rhodri down with me. My elder son joined the service of Hywel’s brother Cynan, and Rhiannon and our younger children are dwelling now at my manor in Shropshire…”
Color had crept into Ranulf’s face, spreading upward from throat to forehead, and Henry set his cup down in surprise once he noticed the older man’s discomfort. Ranulf was quiet again and Henry shifted impatiently, but this time he did not prompt, waiting for Ranulf to continue on his own.
Ranulf was still deeply flushed. “I realize you might well think that this is why I am here, Harry, to mend fences now that I’ve returned to England. But that is not so. I came not to regain royal favor-”
Henry had been staring at him incredulously and now burst out laughing. “Jesus God, Ranulf! In all my life, I’ve never known a man so uncalculating, so lacking in avarice. Did you truly think I’d doubt your motives? After you turned down an earldom?”
Ranulf joined in his laughter, somewhat sheepishly. “You will admit it was an awkward coincidence, though, that I should seek you out once I am back on English soil. I could hardly blame you for harboring some suspicions.”
“And I usually breathe in suspicions as I breathe in air,” Henry conceded. “But not with you, Uncle.” He hoped that Ranulf understood his assertion for what it was, the rarest of compliments. Death had claimed his confidants one by one-his parents, his brother Will-leaving only Rosamund and Eleanor and his sons, who were still green, untried lads. “Whether it be the doings of the Almighty or your ‘awkward coincidence, ’ Ranulf, I am not likely to question it, just to be glad of it.”
Ranulf’s smile was still the smile of his youth, curiously untouched by time. “I’m glad, too,” he said. “I’ve missed you, lad.”
Henry’s answering smile never reached his eyes. “I ought to leave well enough alone,” he said, “but I’d not mislead you by my silence. I deeply regret our falling-out over the Welsh hostages. I am sorry that there are men who dwell in darkness because of my command. But in all honesty, if I had to do it over again… most likely I would, Ranulf.”
“I know.” Ranulf had spent much of his life watching those he loved wrestle with the seductive, lethal lure of kingship. It had proved the ruination of his cousin Stephen, a good man who had not made a good king. For his sister Maude, it had been an unrequited love affair, a passion she could neither capture nor renounce. For Hywel, it had been an illusion, a golden glow ever shimmering along the horizon. He believed that his nephew had come the closest to mastery of it, but at what cost?
Henry rose and padded barefoot across the chamber to pour more wine for Ranulf, spilling only a splash into his own cup. He detoured to snatch a blanket from his bed and drape it over Rainald’s shoulders before returning to the hearth. “The drawbridge is down, the parapets unmanned. You may not get another chance to catch me with my defenses in such disarray. Are there any questions you would put to me?”
Ranulf smiled and shook his head, and Henry’s brows shot upward. “Not even about Thomas Becket?”
“No.”
Henry studied Ranulf’s face intently, and then exhaled a breath soft as a sigh, for he saw that his uncle was utterly sincere, free of all doubts or misgivings about the manner in which Becket met his death. “A pity the Pope does not share your certainty,” he said, with a flippancy that did not deceive Ranulf in the least.
“I know that the Pope has dispatched two cardinal legates to investigate the killing, and I know, too, that both men are said to be strongly predisposed in Becket’s favor,” he said and Henry grimaced his agreement.
“I think we can safely assume that there will be some finding of fault.” “Is that why you are going to Ireland, then, to delay the reckoning with the Church?”
Henry feigned indignation. “Such cynicism ill becomes you, Uncle. Would you have me sit on my hands whilst my Marcher lords carve out Irish kingdoms for themselves?”
“But Roger told me that the Earl of Pembroke hastened from Ireland to meet you at Newnham and made an abject submission to assuage your wrath,” Ranulf pointed out, and Henry shrugged.
“Yes, he came to his senses right quickly. By that time, though, I already had an army assembled. If you go to the trouble of saddling a horse, you’re going to want to ride it.”
Ranulf was amused by his nephew’s ability to avoid giving a direct answer. “If lamprey is not your favorite dish, it ought to be, for your slipperiness could put any eel to shame. I know you can give me reasons beyond counting why you must go to Ireland, beginning with that Papal Bull you were granted some years ago to bring Ireland under subjugation to Rome. Nor do I doubt that you want to teach your Marcher lords that if they try to fly too high, you’ll clip their wings. But I still say that if the Irish isle was not even more remote than Wales, you’d not be so keen to spend the winter there.”
Henry yielded, then, with a grin. “I see these past six years have not robbed you of any of your stubbornness. If you must hear me say it, so be it. The longer I can stave off the Church’s verdict, the less likely it will be an excommunication or interdict and the more likely they’ll offer terms I can live with.”
Ranulf raised his cup in a fond, sardonic salute. “Now that I think of it, there is a question I want to ask you. Rumors about the Canterbury killers have taken root in every alehouse, every marketplace, and are sprouting faster than the hardiest weeds. I’ve been told that they have gone on Crusade to make amends, that you’ve dispatched men to hunt them down without mercy, that in the months since the killing, they’ve all begun to sicken, stricken by unknown maladies that have no cure. What is the truth of it, Harry?”
“The last I heard, they had gone to ground at Hugh de Morville’s castle at Knaresborough in Yorkshire, where I daresay they are hoping to ride out the storm.”
“But you have not moved against them?”
“No,” Henry said, frowning into the depths of his wine cup. “They thought they were doing my bidding, Ranulf. Even though they wounded me almost as grievously as they did Thomas, they were arrows launched from my bow, men who were acting upon my own angry, imprudent words. I admit that I have been known to dissemble at times, for that is an essential aspect of statecraft. But I am not a hypocrite.”
“No,” Ranulf agreed, although not as wholeheartedly as Henry would have liked. It was not that Ranulf disbelieved him. But life had taught him that men learned to justify themselves almost as soon as they learned to talk, and he suspected that kings had more need than most to vindicate their acts. “What do you think will happen to them, Harry?”
Henry shrugged again. “If they are wise, they’ll confess their sins, repent, and throw themselves upon the mercy of the Church. Of course the only penalties they’d face are spiritual. The ultimate absurdity of this, Ranulf, is that their crime is one the Church would deny me the right to punish. Thomas insisted unto his final breath that only the Church could judge the offenses of men in holy orders and any crimes committed against them.”
“I do not imagine Thomas would appreciate the irony of that,” Ranulf said dryly. “From what I’ve heard, he cast off humor when he put on the sacred pallium.”
“For certes, he did when he donned that wretched hair shirt,” Henry agreed, sounding more perplexed than sarcastic. He’d been shaken by the revelation of Becket’s secret mortification, and months later, he still could not reconcile that man with the one he’d known-or thought he’d known. He waved Ranulf off when his uncle would have refilled his cup, for wine was not the key to the enigma that was Thomas Becket.
“I thought he was the hypocrite,” he admitted. “In that, I was wrong. No man would wear a filthy, lice-ridden garment next to his private parts if he did not believe utterly in the sanctity of his cause. The chafing alone must have driven him half-mad!” He smiled then, without much humor. “How could I have so misjudged him,
