She broke off as with a sharp slap his hand connected once again with her cheekbone. ‘I will not have her in my house,’ he said through gritted teeth.
‘May I remind you that the houses we live in are none of them yours, sir.’ She moved out of range, her back ramrod stiff. If he hit her again, she knew she would hit back. ‘This house is your brother’s. Fotheringhay is part of my dower. You married me with nothing but a wagonload of goods and four servants. The church, even the king, may give you nominal rule over me, husband, but God sees what you do. He judges!’ She put the length of the oak table between them. ‘You abuse your power over me, you squander my dower and now you dare to question my dealings with my uncle, the king. The king you hope to serve!’ She leaned forward, her fists on the table. ‘I have only to say to the king that you are unfit for royal service and he will send you to the farthest ends of his kingdom.’
Robert paled, but he managed a thin smile. ‘If he does, you will come with me, wife.’
‘Nothing would give me greater pleasure. I love the wild places, remember? The forests and the mountains are my home. The gods of those places protect me.’ To her great satisfaction, his face grew whiter still. ‘If we are tied together for eternity in hell, husband, it is I who will thrive,’ she went on relentlessly. ‘I love the fire and I love the ice! Wherever hell is it will be my home and your downfall!’
Outside the door Nesta and two serving boys stood, their ears to the thick oak panelling. Nesta held her breath, waiting for his retort. None came. Robert tried to shrug nonchalantly as he threw himself down in a carved chair.
‘I wonder if the king knows he married me to a she-devil,’ he commented at last.
‘Oh, he knows.’ Eleyne pressed her advantage home. Her hands were shaking and she kept them on the table to steady them. Her eyes were emerald green in the candlelight. ‘And he hears every time you strike me, every time you squander my inheritance, every time you abuse my servants, and he waits.’
‘He won’t dare to harm me. He needs my brother – ’
‘And he is afraid that your brother’s allegiance may go to Alexander of Scotland.’ Eleyne hid the wave of grief which threatened to make her voice waver. ‘Which it may. Do you think marrying you to me has had any effect on Roger’s allegiance either way? Give your brother more credit than that.’
‘Ssh!’ Robert looked helplessly towards the door.
‘I won’t ssh! Not now, and not when I next see the king. Not if you persist in your foul treatment.’ Eleyne left the table and walked towards him. In her scarlet gown, over which she had thrown a black mantle as a symbol of mourning for her aunt, she looked very determined and very beautiful. She stopped near him. ‘And don’t think you can stop me seeing the king. He will ask for me if I do not go to the palace.’
‘I wasn’t going to.’
‘If you want to succeed at court, husband,’ she went on without pausing, ‘you have to keep me content, or I swear I will bring you down.’
‘And if I keep you content?’ His eyes narrowed, and there was a sarcastic edge to his voice.
‘Then maybe you will find your fortune at King Henry’s court.’
XV
The body of the Queen of Scotland was taken to the abbey at Tarrant, to which she had bequeathed it in her will, and there laid to rest with great ceremony beneath a marble tomb made in haste by Master Elias of Derham at Salisbury. Two days after her death two prisoners were released for the sake of her soul, by her brother, King Henry. On 13 March sixteen silk cloths of Arras were delivered to offer with the body of the king’s beloved sister, together with silk and gold clothes worth thirty-five shillings each. Wax candles were to burn before her tomb forever. Her husband, the King of Scotland, did not come south for the funeral.
XVI
‘The king still has not given me the pardon!’ Eleyne, swathed in her sable mantle, had fought her way out of the gale and was standing in the hall of Rhonwen’s house. ‘I have asked him a dozen times, but he claims he is too grief-stricken by Joanna’s death to conduct any but the most urgent business!’ She threw down her cloak and walked over to the fire. ‘It makes me so angry. He has but to tell a clerk to write it and affix his seal. It would take him no more time than it takes to draw breath.’
Rhonwen stood near the hearth, her hands pushed into the sleeves of her mantle.
‘And you,
‘I am upset, of course I am. You know how fond I was of her…’
‘But not so fond as you are of her husband. Why deny it? Your aunt is dead. He is no longer your uncle. There are no blood ties now to make your love a sin.’
Eleyne was shocked. ‘You shouldn’t say such things. Suppose someone heard you?’
‘There is no one to hear, nothing but the wind rattling in the hangings. Your destiny lies in Scotland. Remember Einion’s words. Your future does not lie with that spoiled brat who is your husband; it lies with kings.’
Eleyne stared down at the fire. There was no denying the tight knot of excitement in her stomach. ‘If I could go to him…’
Rhonwen asked, ‘Who better to take the king’s condolences to his brother-in-law?’
‘But Robert would come with me.’
‘You would need him there,
Unbidden the image of a trailing length of green ribbon came to Eleyne’s mind, the ribbon at the bedside of the dying queen. After it flashed the image of the earth-green medicine which had stood beside John’s bed as he too died. Her eyes on Rhonwen’s, she tried to read the woman’s mind. Was she capable of such cold-blooded murder? She was deeply afraid as she stared at her nurse’s face. Rhonwen met her gaze and held it steadily. Her expression was impenetrable but there was a pitilessness there which repelled Eleyne. But it wasn’t true, Rhonwen would never do such a thing; she couldn’t. A picture of Cenydd floated into her mind; quickly, she suppressed it. That had been a terrible accident; they had struggled in the heat of the moment. It was not calculated, it could never have been calculated. Even to think it was a vicious calumny and a projection of her own secret wish for Robert’s death.
She watched as Rhonwen took the chair opposite her, arranging her skirts with meticulous care. The moment had passed.
‘I won’t be able to come with you,
XVII
It was so easy in the end. The king agreed that Eleyne should be the official carrier of his condolences; and Robert was to go with her. They set off into the teeth of a violent March gale, a party of some two dozen riders and ten sumpter horses, splashing through the mud, forcing their way against rain and sleet on the long ride north.
Alexander was in Edinburgh. He received Robert and Eleyne on a grey afternoon when snow still whipped through the air, clinging to their eyelashes and freezing their gloves to the reins of their horses. Edinburgh Castle, high on its rock, was cold and draughty, the huge blazing fire in the great hall roaring towards the darkness of the sky far above. The king, a black cloak over his embroidered tunic, rose from the table where he had been poring
