Arlette had prepared a farewell feast. He could see her hand at work in all the little fripperies and garnishes adorning the fare. There were a lot of small, dainty morsels and very little that could be heartily attacked. Concealing his irritation, Rolf sat down in his carved chair. His chaplain blessed the food, although Rolf doubted the ritual would make the fare any more substantial, and having muttered their 'amens' everyone began to eat.
Rolf engaged himself in conversation with Tancred, his overseer, who was to have sole charge of the herds at Brize for the next two months at least. Tancred was a cheerful, able man in early middle age. He was also one of Rolf's vassals, and had a hall and lands of his own six miles away at Fauville-sur-Risle. He had risen to his status of senior overseer by dint of hard work and a natural talent with horses, which was rewarded by a ten per cent share in the price of each horse that Rolf sold. He was a widower with a ten-year-old son whom he intended to inherit this lucrative post in the fullness of time.
'Where's young Mauger tonight?' Rolf looked around for Tancred's sturdy, blond-haired shadow. His overseer took the boy everywhere with him, showing him how things were done, teaching and explaining relentlessly.
'He's gone with one of the grooms to see the horse herd and look at the camp fires. I'm joining them later, but I knew you'd want to see me first.' Tancred smiled. 'The lad was that excited when you all arrived. It's not something he'll see twice in a lifetime.'
'No,' Rolf agreed with a slightly more rueful smile of his own, and settled down to discuss the mundane but necessary details which would ensure the smooth running of the stud during the coming months. Arlette might have preferred more delicate conversation on this last night than covering mares and selling yearlings, but Rolf was bound by the limits of diminishing time, not by his sensibilities, or more to the point, by hers.
In the private chamber above the hall, Rolf eased his sword from its scabbard and held it up to the candlelight. Fingers wrapped around the leather grip, he swung the weapon and felt the power leave his arm and enter the steel. What would it be like to strike out at an enemy in battle? To know it was kill or be killed? He had been involved in minor skirmishes when called upon by the Duke to perform his obligatory forty days of military service, but he had never gone further than perfunctory blows and vigorous spear waving. During the month at Dives-sur-Mer there had been plenty of opportunity to train and he had taken full advantage, setting out to learn as much as he could about the Danish war axes he would be facing across the narrow sea. He had even bought one from a mercenary who claimed to have killed its former owner. The curving blade, mounted upon a haft of ash wood five feet long, gleamed viciously at him from a corner of the room.
Rolf sheathed his sword, propped it against his long kite shield and hefted the axe instead. It was much heavier than the sword, far less easy to control and more tiring to wield, but once a rhythm was established, the increasing speed of the whirling axe, up and round and down, meant certain death for anyone who stood in its path. Mail was no protection. The only defence was agility and a fast spear. Spreading his legs, Rolf swung the axe and imagined himself on a battlefield.
Arlette entered the chamber and screamed. Abruptly she stifled the sound against the back of her hand, but it was too late, and their baby daughter awoke in her cradle and started to howl as if giving vent to her own battle cry.
Feeling guilty and irritated, Rolf lowered the axe, and then set it down with his other weapons.
'Can't you keep those things in the armoury?' Arlette demanded as she stooped over the cradle and lifted Gisele out.
'Everything has to be checked. I have to make sure that nothing is weak or damaged.'
Arlette sniffed. 'Let a servant do it.' She rocked the baby in her arms. 'It's all right, poupelet, Mama's here, Mama's here.'
'Would you trust a servant with my life?'
She said nothing, but he saw the pain grow in her large, grey eyes.
'I always check my weapons myself, you know that.'
'Yes, Rolf, I'm sorry. I just don't like to see them in our chamber on the eve before you go to war.'
'I've finished now anyway.' He took his winter cloak from its peg on the wall and threw it over the weaponry. He wished that she had not seen him with the axe.
'Thank you,' she said with a shaky sigh of relief.
He shrugged and came to look over her shoulder while she tucked the baby back in her cradle. The child was already Arlette's replica in both looks and mannerisms: the same martyr's grey eyes, the same silver-brown hair. Of himself he could detect nothing. The infant's eyelids drooped. 'Mama,' she said softly as her eyelids closed.
Rolf stared at his wife. She returned his bold look with a darting glance, and blushed. His scrutiny descended to the rapid rise and fall of her small breasts beneath the blue robe. He cupped one in his hand, seeking the tender peak of her nipple, and lowered his lips to the rapid pulse in her soft, white throat. His other hand caught her by the haunches and pulled her against the urgent warmth of his crotch.
Arlette gasped and pushed at him. 'Rolf, not here, Gisele might wake up again!'
'Damn Gisele!' he muttered through his teeth. Arlette went rigid in his arms. For a single moment Rolf contemplated throwing her on the floor beside the cradle and taking her whether she willed it or not. Not once in their seven-year marriage had he succeeded in winning a spontaneous response from his wife. Her mother had told her that men were beasts in their lust for copulation, and Arlette had embraced that belief so early in her life that now it was an irrevocable facet of her character. The occasions that she did respond to his lovemaking were always marked by a visit to the confessional on the following day.
The moment's threat of violence passed. Resisting the temptation to prove her beliefs right by ravishing her where she stood, he led her by the hand to their bed.
In the morning, Rolf attended mass in the village church of Brize-sur-Risle and then departed to break his fast at one of the camp fires in the fields by the river meadow.
'Do you not wish to eat in the hall?' Arlette asked, the disappointment huge in her eyes.
Rolf shook his head. 'Much as I would enjoy your company, I have too much to do in the field.' He sugared the lie with a kiss, which ended prematurely as he saw a young knight walk past, his hand on his sword hilt. 'Ho, Richard, wait a minute, I want a word about that new horse of yours!'
The touch of Rolf's lips still tingling on hers, Arlette watched her husband run to catch up with Richard FitzScrob, one of the knights helping to escort the destrier herd to St Valery. Rolf's hair shone a bright, autumn- red against the grey of the September sky. She heard him laugh and saw him slap FitzScrob's shoulder with a slender, energetic hand. His stride was long and arrogant, his blue cloak swirled, revealing a flash of yellow lining as the two men mounted up and rode away together in the direction of the river.
Ever since Duke William had fixed his mind upon taking the English crown away from Harold Godwinson, Rolf had been acting as if there was a demon in his brain. For weeks on end he had been absent, inspecting and purchasing horseflesh, making plans to transport the animals across the narrow sea, his expertise avidly sought. There was no room in his life for anything else.
Arlette was miserably aware that the more she tried to hold onto him, the further he slipped from her grasp. He said that she was his place of safe anchor, but it was difficult to watch him yearning to be gone from her harbour and to know that he might never return.
She thought of the urgency of his lovemaking last night, of the weak pleasure that had flooded her limbs as he moved within her. Sometimes, despite what the priests and her mother had taught her about such feelings being the work of the devil, her body would respond unbidden and she would have to stifle her cries against her hand, or compress her lips. Last night had been such an occasion. Even to think of it now softened her loins. Arlette tightened her jaw and quickened her pace.
As she made to enter the hall, two squires emerged bearing some items of Rolf's baggage. The second youth wore Rolf's shield on his back, slung from its long strap. In one hand he carried a spear; in the other he gripped the Danish war axe.
Brought face to face with the weapon once more, Arlette knew that it was a portent. She stared with revulsion at the gleaming, curved blade. The squire stood aside to let her pass, and as she did so, it seemed that she felt the cold touch of the axe across the back of her neck.
In the hall by the fire, Berthe, the wet nurse, was suckling Gisele. Keeping them company was Berthe's great-grandmother Ragnild. No-one knew how old Ragnild was, but by general reckoning, she had seen at least
