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Rising from the coffer, Linnet wiped away her tears on the heel of her hand. They were a release, nothing more. Giles was not softened by them and she would have dismissed them from her armoury long ago had she not discovered that others were less impervious to their effect.

She set her jaw and summoned Ella with a stony composure that did not falter even when the woman’s eyes flickered over the ugly, blood-filled bruise on her neck with knowing, unspoken pity.

‘You’ll be wanting warm water and a towel first,’ Ella said practically and went to fetch them.

Linnet lit a taper from the night candle and crossed the room to the small, portable screen at the end. Behind it, exhausted by the long, fraught journey, her son slept in his small truckle bed. Against the pillow, his hair stood up in waifish blond spikes. He was fine-boned and fragile, light as thistledown, and she loved him with a fierce and guilty desperation. Frail children so often died in infancy and she would find herself watching him intently, waiting for the first cough or sneeze or sign of fever to have him swaddled up and dosed with all manner of nostrums. And if he did live to adulthood, what kind of man would he make? Never such a one as his father, she vowed, although God alone knew the ways in which he would be twisted when he left the safety of her skirts for the masculine world beyond the bower.

‘Never,’ she vowed, hand cupped around the candle flame, protecting her child from the hot drip of the wax. If only it were as easy to protect him from his future.

Chapter 4

Richard de Luci, chief custodian of the realm during King Henry’s absence across the Narrow Sea, reclined in his pelt-spread chair, goblet resting comfortably on the neat curve of his belly, and regarded his guest. ‘What do you think about the latest news from Normandy?’

William de Rocher, nicknamed Ironheart, stroked his chin. In his youth his hawkish features had been striking but advancing age and the effects of a life hard-lived had imbued his visage with an unsettling cadaverous quality.

‘You mean about Queen Eleanor being caught defecting to Paris disguised as a man, to join her sons in rebellion? Nothing would surprise me about that wanton.’ He cast a dark look at his own wife. Dumpy and plain, she sat like a lump of proving dough beside de Luci’s elegant wife. At least Agnes knew her place, and if she ever approached the borderline of his tolerance, a bellow and a raised fist sent her scuttling back to her corner with downcast eyes and a trembling mouth. But some women, brought up without benefit of discipline, were wont to snarl and bite the hand that fed them. ‘I trust she’s well under lock and key now?’

‘Indeed so, but it doesn’t make the rebellion any less dangerous.’

Ironheart grunted and considered de Luci from beneath untidy silver brows. ‘I hear the Earl of Leicester has approached you for permission to cross to Normandy and offer his support to the king. Rumour has it, too, that he has amassed no small amount of treasure to fund his expedition.’

De Luci stared at him, then laughed and shook his head. ‘I swear to God, William, you know more than I do half the time!’

‘I listen at the right keyholes,’ Ironheart replied with a dour grin. ‘Besides, Leicester’s not exactly been making a secret of the fact, has he?’

‘You’ve never approved of Robert of Leicester, have you?’

The grin faded. ‘His father was as solid as granite; you could trust him with your life, but I wouldn’t trust his heir further than I could hurl a fistful of fluff. And, before you ask, I’ve no evidence to prove him unworthy. It’s a feeling inside here, a soldier’s gut.’ He struck the area between heart and belt.

‘Then it’s not jealousy because your sons spend more time in his company than they do in yours?’

Ironheart looked insulted. ‘Why should I be jealous?’ he scoffed. ‘I am their father, he is just a turd clad in cloth of gold. Let them have their flirtation. Once they’ve unwrapped Earl Robert’s bindings, they’ll back away.’

De Luci pursed his lips, not so sure. ‘I’m willing to give Leicester a chance,’ he said and, with a rueful smile, patted his own paunch. ‘A diplomat’s gut, William.’

Ironheart snorted rudely and held out his wine cup to be refilled. ‘I know which I’d rather trust.’

De Luci chose to ignore the remark and changed the direction of the conversation. ‘Did you know I’d commissioned Joscelin for the rest of the summer?’

‘No, but I thought you might, the situation being what it is.’

‘If the opportunity arises, I’d like to give him more responsibility - perhaps a seneschal’s post. He’s proven his abilities in my service time and again this last year and a half.’

William stared down at his war-scarred hands. ‘I forget how old the boy is,’ he said, ‘and how old I am growing.’ Then he gave a laugh that held more snarl than amusement. ‘He’ll make you a good seneschal if you give him the chance - one of the best.’

An atmosphere, rather than anything said, caused de Luci to glance at the women. Behind her doughy impassivity, he could tell that Agnes de Rocher was furious. Her fists were clenched and there were hectic red blotches on her throat and face. But then, he and William had been discussing Joscelin’s advancement, which was tantamount in Agnes’ presence to drawing a sword.

‘Rohese, why don’t you take Agnes above and show her those bolts of silk that arrived yesterday from Italy,’ he said to his wife, hoping to rectify the lapse of his diplomat’s gut.

‘By your leave, my lord,’ murmured Rohese de Luci, giving him a look compounded of irritation and sympathy as she signalled for the finger bowl.

De Luci returned her look with one of apologetic gratitude and knew that he would now have to purchase the bolt of peacock-coloured damask she had been angling after.

As the women curtseyed and left the hall, William’s breath eased out on a long sigh of relief. ‘When Martin enters your household next year to be a squire, I’m going to buy her a pension in a nunnery,’ he said, eyes upon his wife’s disappearing rump.

De Luci quirked an eyebrow. ‘Does Agnes know?’

‘Not yet.’ Ironheart shrugged. ‘I can’t see her objecting. We live separate lives most of the time as it is.’

De Luci said nothing, although he gave his friend a wry glance. If Agnes de Rocher was scarcely the ideal wife, William de Rocher was certainly not the perfect husband. De Luci had been a groomsman at their wedding almost thirty years ago and had watched them labour under the yoke, mismatched and tugging in opposite directions. And after Joscelin’s mother had left her mark on their lives, any chance of marital harmony had been utterly destroyed.

Ironheart took a long swallow of his wine. ‘To future freedom,’ he toasted. ‘Let’s talk of other matters.’

Ironheart’s squire handed Agnes from her litter and set her down in the courtyard at the rear of the house. William dismounted from his palfrey. The perfume of rain-wet grass and leaves drifted from the orchards beyond the stables and warred with the smell of the saturated dung and straw underfoot. At the end of the garden the Thames glinted in the last green glow of twilight. A groom and his apprentice emerged from the depths of the stables, the latter bearing a candle-lantern on a pole. By its light, William saw that the stalls were crowded with horseflesh, little of it his own.