Slowly, I lowered myself on to the ground beside her. Our eyes met and held. I sensed her reaching out to me. I said, ‘Zarina, won’t you confide in me?’ Realizing that, bearing in mind the dreadful accusations I had just thrown at her, I was probably the last person on earth she would trust, I gave her hand a squeeze. ‘Whatever you’ve done, I’m quite sure you had your reasons,’ I said softly.
After what seemed a very long time, she removed her hand from mine and started to speak.
‘I related to you how I had to flee from Haglar,’ she began.
‘The man your father was trying to make you marry,’ I replied. ‘Yes. I remember.’
‘I told you, too, how he sent a man after me and Derman killed him?’
‘Yes.’
She nodded. ‘Good. Then you will understand, perhaps, if I explain how I never felt safe, even with the troupe of entertainers. We travelled all over, this country, that city, and always the fear lurked that, having sent one man who managed to track me down, Haglar would do so again and this time I would not be so fortunate as to have Derman on hand to conveniently remove him.’ She paused, her eyes full of the memory of that constant dread. ‘In the end I confided in one of the older women in the troupe,’ she went on. ‘Knowing what Derman was like, you will, I am sure, understand that it was not much comfort to talk to him. He would kill for me — he had killed for me — but his comprehension was severely limited. As long as he was well fed, warm, and the sun shone, he was happy. Until he met Ida,’ she added under her breath.
‘So,’ she continued after a moment, ‘I opened my heart to Mathilde. She listened in silence, although I could sense she understood and sympathized. When I had finished, she said that she, too, had been threatened with a marriage she did not want, and her way of avoiding had been simple: she had married someone else.’
As the surprise faded, I saw the sense of it. Haglar might still succeed in tracking Zarina, and he would no doubt try to have her abducted, but even if he did, she would be able to hurl in his face the fact of her being legally married to someone else and, unless or until he could contrive to have that marriage annulled, he would be powerless.
‘I was desperate,’ she went on. She was looking at me, her face flushed with embarrassment. ‘I was young, I was out of my mind with worry, I was alone — ’ you had your brother, I wanted to say, but then, remembering what sort of man he had been, I realized she was right — ‘and I did what I did with barely a thought. Before I knew it, I was married and — ’ her blush deepened, turning her cheeks to scarlet — ‘and because I was well aware that an unconsummated marriage can be dissolved, I did my utmost to make that marriage one of the flesh.’ She dropped her head. ‘I failed,’ she whispered.
I wondered what he had been like, this man from the troupe who had agreed to marry the young Zarina so as to keep her out of another man’s clutches. Why had he not succeeded in making love to her? Had he been very old, perhaps? I found it hard to imagine any other reason for a man not to leap at the invitation into Zarina’s bed. Or — I recalled something Edild had told me — perhaps this husband had been one of those men who are aroused only by their own sex, as the rumours said our reeve, Bermund, was.
Could I ask her? I waited, not speaking, and after a while she raised her head again and looked at me. To my surprise, she was smiling.
‘You do not know, do you?’
‘How could I?’ I flashed back. ‘I only saw your troupe on one occasion. How do you expect me to guess which man was your husband?’
Your husband.
The words sank in at last, and I understood. I stared at her, horrified. ‘You’re married!’ I whispered. ‘That’s why you can’t marry Haward!’ I saw my dear brother’s face, imagined him having to say goodbye to his hopes of happiness, and something in me broke. ‘You’re married,’ I repeated numbly. ‘Your reluctance had nothing to do with Derman.’
She reached out and took my hand again, holding it so tightly that I could feel the cracked, rough skin of hers. I felt a wave of emotion coming off her — a wave of love? — and I did not know what to do. I saw again the fall of my runes, that time I had tried to read the future for this extraordinary woman and my beloved brother. I remembered what I had seen. A very small, very faint hope began to shine.
Zarina put her face close to mine and whispered, ‘It has everything to do with Derman. Lassair, dear Lassair, he was already with the troupe when I ran away and joined them. He wasn’t my brother, he was my husband.’
I believe I knew it a blink of an eye before she told me. Nevertheless, her words still rocked me to my core. It all fell into place: You know nothing about me, she had cried. How right she was.
‘I regretted it almost straight away,’ she was saying softly. ‘My terrible attempt to make him consummate the marriage is something for which I can never forgive myself. He didn’t understand, you see, yet somehow I fear I planted in him the seed that would lead to his infatuation with Ida.’ She paused. ‘He was not formed as most adult men are formed,’ she said delicately.
‘I know,’ I said dully. ‘I helped my aunt lay him out, and I saw his body.’
‘Of course you did,’ she breathed. I sensed she was relieved. ‘Well, then.’
I could think of nothing to say. After a moment Zarina spoke again. ‘Life was not so bad,’ she said. ‘I loved the travelling, and I enjoyed my work as a performer. I learned to tolerate Derman and forgive him his shortcomings, which, indeed, were no fault of his. I knew that I could trust him, for he had already proved that he would do almost anything for me. In a way, I grew fond of him.’ She hesitated. ‘Then one Lammas time we came to a small settlement in the fen country and I fell in love with your brother.’ She glanced at me.
‘I didn’t kill Derman,’ she said after a while. ‘It would have been like killing a child. I swear to you, Lassair, on all I hold dear. I wanted him gone — of course I did — but I took no step such as you suggest to rid myself of him. He saved my life,’ she reminded me. ‘What vengeance would I have brought down on to myself, had I murdered my saviour?’
Slowly, I nodded. I understood. Some things in this world are simply unforgivable, and the retribution would have been terrible.
She was still holding my hand, and now I placed my other hand over hers. ‘I am sorry I accused you,’ I said humbly. ‘I know I was wrong.’
My head was down, and she bent so she could look into my face. ‘Do you?’ She spoke with sudden fervour.
‘Yes.’ I smiled. ‘Really, yes.’
Her tense expression relaxed. She smiled. ‘I’m very, very glad to hear it.’
‘Why?’ I was smiling too.
‘Because I’ve just told your brother I’m going to marry him.’
The runes had been right. My heart began to sing.
TWENTY
Edild looked up with her finger to her lips when I went in. ‘He’s sleeping,’ she whispered, indicating Sir Alain. Quietly, she got up and crossed the small room to the door, leading the way outside. Pulling the door almost closed behind her, she said, ‘Lord Gilbert has heard that Sir Alain was attacked. He sent a messenger to ask after our patient’s state of health — no doubt Lady Claude is very anxious — and I told the man to say that he lives and I expect him to recover.’ She bit her lip, looking back towards the room she had just left. ‘I ought, I suppose, to report in person,’ she added slowly, ‘although in truth I do not want to leave him.’
‘I’ll go,’ I offered. Just then I was so happy that the last thing I wanted was to sit perfectly still in Edild’s small room, not even allowed to talk.
She looked at me, apparently only then really seeing me. ‘What are you so cheerful about?’ she demanded. She, too, was smiling. She’s like that, Edild; she seems to catch other people’s moods, which is fine if they’re good moods, but not so great when they’re bad.