the saddle for such a long time that his legs at first refused to support him and the groom had to help him up from the mud as he fell .
'Lord Guyon is, er ... busy,' said de Bec to the young man as he was helped, limping, into the hall . 'Best sit down and recover yourself awhile first. We've not long ridden in ourselves.'
'He won't be too busy to hear these tidings,' Simon said, pushing his fingers through his rain-sleek hair and wiping a drip from the end of his nose. 'The King is dead, slain in the New Forest and Prince Henry's claimed the crown. I've half killed my horse getting here.'
De Bec's bushy brows shot into his silver fringe.
'God have mercy,' he said, crossing himself.
'Here, sit down by the fire. You, wench, bring food and drink for Sir Simon and tell mistress Helgund to fetch my lord and lady.'
Judith looked at her husband as the sweat dried on their bodies and their breathing slowed.
Outside the thunder rumbled and the lightning blinked against a gap in the shutters. For a time she had felt as if she was riding in the midst of the storm and she could still feel small flickers on the periphery. 'When Madoc came, he told me something else too,' she said after a moment.
'Apparently, Mabell de Serigny is with child.'
Guyon had been sleepily nuzzling her shoulder, but now he lifted his head and gazed at her with widening eyes. 'Impossible! She's ninety if she's a day, Judith!'
She laughed at the incredulity on his face. 'Not quite. She's only a few years older than Mama.
Eight and forty or some such. Oh, I know it's old to catch for a babe, but not impossible.'
'And I thought Walter de Lacey was a coward,' Guyon said facetiously, but a frown forked his brow. He wondered what would happen if the same God's grace was granted to Alicia. Even if she and his father did obtain a dispensation to marry, it would be the devil's own work to sort out the resulting blood ties.
'I suppose it is all in his favour,' Judith added, stretching sinuously, and rolled on to her stomach.
'If she carries the babe successfully then he gets an heir out of her; if she dies, then he's free to look elsewhere and because he is rich, he will be able to pick and choose. He cannot lose.'
There was a soft knock on the door and Helgund's voice came impassively from without.
'My lord, my lady, you are sought in the hall . There is important news from Winchester.'
Guyon groaned. Judith scrambled from the bed and hastily donned her bedrobe. 'Can't it wait? she snapped, feeling like a serving wench caught coupling in the straw.
'It is Simon de Vere, my lady. He says that the King is dead.'
'What?' Judith stared over her shoulder at Guyon. He swore and reached for his discarded clothes.
'Messire de Bec sent me to fetch you both, my lady. I do not know any more.'
'All right, Helgund. Thank you.'
Judith abandoned both bath and bedrobe to find her shift. 'If Rufus is dead, who is King in his place?'
'Who do you think?' Guyon snapped because it was such an obvious question. 'I'd better have one of the lads scour my hauberk because I'm going to need it.' He stood still long enough for her to smear his wound with salve, then dragged on his shirt and tunic, tugged one of her combs through his hair and strode muttering from the room. Judith glared after him, then subdued her anger. She knew he had been tired when he rode in, and wounded, and the energy expended just now between the sheets would further have drained his resources. Small wonder if his mood was sour when instead of sleep and recuperation, he received a summons of this ilk. Heaving a sigh, she called for Helgund to help her dress.
'An accident,' said Simon, whom Richard had sent from Winchester on the morning of the funeral. 'A hunting accident last Thursday evening.
Walter Tirell shot at a deer and missed and hit the King in the chest. He died instantly. Prince Henry was with the hunting party, but not near the scene of the death. He rode straight to Winchester and secured the treasury. He claims the right of being born the son of a king over his brother.' Simon knuckled his bloodshot eyes. 'He expects your feudal oath as soon as you may.'
Guyon pressed his own eyes with the heels of his hands. It was too late to set out tonight, but arrangements would have to be made for the following dawn and riders sent on ahead to organise their nightly stops. From here to London was a good six to seven days' ride; more if the weather continued dire.
'Myself and Richard must have been the last to see him alive, except for the hunting party,' Simon added into the silence, compelled to speak by renewed ripples of shock. 'I still cannot believe it.
If only he had stayed abed and not taken up de Clare's suggestion to hunt, he might yet be alive.'
'Gilbert of Tunbridge?' asked Judith.
'Yes, and his brother too. The King had been plagued by a queasy gut, the reason he didn't want to hunt in the morning, but he was fully recovered by noon. After the dinner hour, de Clare said he would not mind clearing his head by riding out to see what he could bring down and it seems to me that he was not talking of deer and that his head had never been clearer in his life.'
Simon attacked his trencher. Rufus had had his failings, but he had never found him a hard taskmaster and Richard had been moved openly to tears at the news of his untimely death.
'Are you saying he was murdered?' de Bec demanded.
'I'm not saying anything.' Simon avoided looking at his companions. 'Tirell has fled the country squawking his innocence like a dust trail. He says he was nowhere near the King, that it was not his arrow.'
'And the de Clares are his brothers-by-marriage.' Judith's voice was as colourless as her face.
'I suppose the inquest will decide the truth of the matter,' de Bec said, stretching out his legs until his heels pressed Cadi's white rump.
'What inquest?' Simon demanded sourly. 'Henry's not holding one.'
Guyon paused eating to stare at Simon, then continued to chew, but slowly, as if ruminating. 'Who else went out to hunt, Si?'
'Rannulf des Aix en Louvent, your lady's uncle William Breteuil, Gilbert de Laigle and William de Monfichet.' Simon shook his head. 'Rufus must have been mad. He might as well have ridden out with a pack of wolves. They didn't even stop to bring his body back to the lodge in decency, but rode straight for the treasury at Winchester. It was left to me and Richard to take charge of the body from the back of a charcoal burner's cart and compose it decently for the return to Winchester.
It's wrong, I ...' He swallowed convulsively and clenched his fist on the trestle. 'Anyway, Henry's claimed the crown and you'd best be quick about swearing your allegiance. He hasn't stopped since the arrow was loosed.'
Judith rose from the board, her eyes blank and, without excuse or explanation, drifted away from the men like a sleepwalker. No one took much notice. Guyon cast her a sidelong glance of surprise, but his mind was occupied with Simon's budget of news and its implications and what now had to be done. The Welsh situation was stable for the nonce and could be left to cook awhile unattended and Henry, whatever the blots on his soul, had the makings of a strong monarch.
Besides, with the private connections of bloodline, Guyon knew that providing he did nothing wildly asinine or treacherous, he was guaranteed the royal favour ... for as long as Henry remained King.
'There'll be a flaming barrel of pitch when Robert Curthose gets to hear of this,' he said and rubbed his hands slowly together, feeling the call uses on his palms where he had recently grasped sword and shield.
'And de Belleme will be delighted to light torches from it,' said de Bec.
'Oh yes. We will need to work very hard indeed to make sure Henry keeps his crown, no matter the manner of his obtaining it. Curthose has about as much control over Robert de Belleme as a wrung chicken has control of its limbs. You've seen what he's done in Normandy. God forbid he should get to wreak his worst on our lands too.'
'Want me to increase the patrol on our boundary with Thornford? It's been very quiet there of late.'
'It won't harm, but don't stretch the patrols too thinly elsewhere to compensate.' Guyon shoved his trencher aside and called for a scribe to be brought so that he could inform his vassals of the news.
Judith picked up Guyon's swordbelt and examined the strip of buckskin without really seeing its embossed golden leopards or the elaborate twists of gold wire decorating the buckle, or indeed the article itself. The sword lay sheathed on the bed. She had had one of the boys clean and oil it, for it had seen recent hard use against the Welsh. The sharpening of the two edges she left to Guyon. She could have done it herself, she was perfectly
