‘How can you know – ’
‘I know, I’ve seen it happen a hundred times.’ Rhonwen bent closer. ‘You were looking at the king. Was it his future you saw?’
Eleyne watched the young king as he laughed and joked with her husband. He caught her eye and raised his goblet in a toast then turned away again, the candlelight catching the gems of the coronet he wore.
Slowly Eleyne shook her head. ‘I don’t remember, I don’t remember what I saw.’
The noise had increased. Above the shouts and laughter and roar of conversation she heard the thin music of the harp. Beef had been brought in, and venison, swimming in blood gravy, and the pages were carrying around the wine yet again. Smoke from the candles rose into the high rafters and was lost in the darkness. Beyond the king she saw Sir Alan Durward lean forward, laughing, as was his wife, the king’s half-sister, the woman Durward had once tried to have declared Alexander’s heir. If that woman should die, and the king and the king’s baby son, Anna, her daughter-in-law, could come very close to the throne. Eleyne looked at her and then at Colban, and she put her hand to her aching head. Was this then the way it would go? Was it possible that one day her son’s child would be the King of the Scots?
Rhonwen was whispering in her ear. ‘My lady, people are looking.’ She took Eleyne’s hand and chafed it. ‘You are too pale, drink some more wine.’
Malcolm had also turned, and looked at his wife sharply. His own face was ruddy from the heat and wine. His pain was better of late and he felt stronger than he had for a long time. ‘Are you unwell?’
‘Just a little overcome.’ Eleyne touched his hand with something like affection. ‘This is a great day for us, my husband.’
He grinned. ‘Indeed it is.’
A messenger arrived as the final courses of the feast were being carried in. Eleyne, tired, waved them away, watching in detached amusement as heads on the tables below the dais began one by one to fall among the debris of bread and bones, and snores began to mingle with the shouts and laughter and the music. It was then she noticed the man weaving his way between the tables. It was a long time since she had seen the Countess of Lincoln’s livery; many years since her niece had deigned to answer her desperate letters about her daughters’ welfare. No day passed without her thinking of them; no night without her remembering them in her prayers, but she had long ago given up any real hope of seeing them again.
She watched as he made his way towards her, pushing between the crowded benches. Why after all this time should Margaret of Lincoln send her a message?
When he reached the dais the young man called, ‘I seek the Lady Rhonwen.’ His eyes met Eleyne’s as though aware of her sharp pang of disappointment, then he looked away.
Rhonwen rose from her seat at the foot of the dais and touched his shoulder. Eleyne saw a letter change hands, saw the flash of a coin as Rhonwen directed the man to a place at one of the lower tables where he could eat. She saw the parchment in Rhonwen’s hand as she opened it and read. When Rhonwen looked up Eleyne’s eyes were on her face. Rhonwen made her way towards the high table.
The letter wasn’t from the Countess of Lincoln. One of her ladies, whom Rhonwen had befriended, had taken it upon herself to inform the household of Fife that Eleyne’s eldest daughter Joanna, now seventeen years old, had been married in the summer. Her husband was the recently widowed Sir Humphrey de Bohun, heir to the Earl Marshal of England; a man whose son was two years the girl’s senior.
The following day Eleyne sent Joanna a wedding gift: a silver casket and a gem-studded chaplet with a letter.
Eight weeks later the gifts were returned. Inside the casket she found her letter cut in two.
Within a year Joanna would be a widow. This time Eleyne did not write.
XVI
Eleyne had given orders that her companions be ready to leave at first light. Whatever the destiny foretold for them by Adam, Eleyne and Donald had managed to meet seldom and then only briefly: a few quiet words here, a lightly touched hand there, a glance in the great hall of the king, no more; always the shadow of Alexander was between them.
Donald was constantly in the north, administering his father’s earldom, distracted by disputes with his highland neighbours. It was increasingly difficult for him to get away, but as the stranglehold of ice, borne on the east wind, threatened to make Mar impassable he turned his horse south in obedience to her summons. Aching to be with him, Eleyne planned another meeting at Macduff ’s Castle.
Malcolm was irascible. ‘Why go? For pity’s sake, woman, it’s madness! We don’t need to check on anything in this weather, let alone that old place.’
His chest hurt, he was visibly irritated and tired. Their small grandson, normally kept out of his way by his doting nurses, was playing noisily near his feet and he’d had another quarrel with Macduff; his younger son’s quietness was now revealing itself as a stubborn arrogance.
It was a long time since Malcolm had spent so much time under the same roof as his wife, and she too had begun to irritate him. The night before he had found himself impotent again. It was her fault – she was old; unattractive. What he needed was a younger woman. And a woman who was faithful. At first he hadn’t believed the rumours, but quietly, over the months, he had watched and now he was sure. He didn’t know when the affair had started, but by God she wasn’t going to make a fool of him any more.
‘I have to go.’ She pulled on her gloves. ‘You don’t normally argue about the way I run your estates. Nor do you complain about the results. Your estates are worth nearly ?500 each year under my management!’
‘I know, I know, I just don’t want you to go now.’
‘I have to go now.’ She was hungry for Donald, a physical yearning which she could not fight.
‘I forbid it.’ Malcolm stood up and put his hand to his chest, wincing.
‘You forbid it?’ She stared at him. ‘You can’t!’
‘I can and I do, you are my wife, you will obey me.’ His colour was rising. ‘Take that brat away!’ he said to Duncan’s nurses. ‘And you, boy,’ he yelled at his younger son, ‘go and tell them to put your mother’s horses away.’
Macduff hesitated.
‘Did you hear me?’ Malcolm turned on him in a fury. ‘I have forbidden your mother to go out. And do you know why? Do you want to know the real reason why?’ He turned on her. ‘Did you think I didn’t know? Did you think I would never find out? All this care for my estates! All this meek, dutiful quartering of the lands of Fife! At every stop your lover is waiting for you with his poems and his kisses!’
He raised his hand as though to strike her, then he turned away. ‘You are a whore, madam. You’ve been a whore all your life; first with the king – while you were still married to Lord Chester, for all I know – then…’
‘Then with you,’ Eleyne’s voice cut in like a whiplash. ‘You made me a whore, Malcolm, when you married me bigamously. And if Robert hadn’t died when he did, I would have been a whore to this day, with your connivance.’ She noticed with horror that Macduff was still standing in the room, his face white with shock. Her heart turned over with guilt.
‘Go away, please. Your father and I have to talk.’
Macduff ran towards her. ‘Please, mama, the whole castle is listening!’ Already the boy was conscious of the need to keep silent before the household; the need to keep the rift between his parents hidden. He was nearly in tears. ‘Don’t quarrel!’ Behind him in the body of the hall a dozen people had paused in their tasks to listen.
‘Then the whole castle can find out the truth!’ Malcolm roared furiously. ‘Enough is enough!’ He stopped, then staggered a step backwards. A strange look of puzzlement appeared on his face.
‘Malcolm?’ Eleyne put out her hand. He had clutched at his throat. ‘Malcolm, what is it?’ He stumbled to his knees and before their appalled eyes fell to the floor and lay still.
